Zhang Yuanqing looked around in panic. He was suddenly brought into an unfamiliar environment. Anyone would be at a loss.
"Tunnel? This is the She Ling Tunnel in the ghost story?"
As a native of Songhai City, he certainly knew the Sheling Tunnel among the top ten strange stories. When he was naughty and didn't sleep at night when he was a child, his grandmother would scare him with strange stories.
However, leaving aside the fact that ghost stories are just mythical stories, take the Sheling Tunnel as an example. Zhang Yuanqing returned to his hometown to pay homage to his father a few days ago and even passed by the Sheling Tunnel.
Where is the real Sheling Tunnel like this and so old?
"By the way, this is a spiritual realm, not the real She Ling Tunnel."
The cramped environment was unsettling, so Zhang Yuanqing walked forward cautiously, with only the sound of his lonely footsteps in his ears.
As he walked, he thought about his situation and the information given by the voice in his head.
There is no doubt that he encountered supernatural phenomena, was taken into strange stories, and will complete the mission issued by the mysterious power.
"The voice gave me two tasks, namely to survive for three hours and to explore the spiritual realm. The difficulty level is S, and the single-player death type... This death type makes me panic."
Surviving for three hours means there will be great danger.
Exploring the spiritual realm...should be exploring this tunnel. In other words, is the tunnel very dangerous?
He quietly tensed up his nerves, and at the same time, a question flashed through his mind: What rewards will he get for completing the task?
Since it is a task, there must be a reward.
"Well, according to the attribute panel just now, my profession is Night God, but level 0 instead of 1. Becoming a Night God should be one of the rewards, right? What is a Night God?"
"Brother Bing is right. This black card will indeed change your life, but I ignored the second half of his words. This thing is difficult to control. Do you mean the degree of danger?"
Zhang Yuanqing combined the known information and silently analyzed it.
At this moment, the old-fashioned xenon lamp beside him seemed to have an unstable circuit and flickered a few times. Between the light and darkness, Zhang Yuanqing vaguely saw a figure wearing a miner's hat standing under the lamp.
Fuck... He jumped up in fright, the train of thought in his mind was instantly interrupted, and he ran forward for a distance like a frightened deer.
Looking back, the xenon lamp continued to light up and stopped flickering.
The dark figure wearing a miner's hat just now seemed to be his imagination.
With this fright, Zhang Yuanqing did not dare to stay in this ghost place and quickly headed towards the tunnel.
Click, click, click... The footsteps echoed in the quiet tunnel. Zhang Yuanqing didn't dare to stop. He walked like this for five or six minutes. The old-fashioned xenon lamp on the curved dome flashed again, but this time, he was not wearing a miner's hat. The figure appears.
"Didn't follow?"
He felt slightly relaxed and did not dare to stop. He walked quickly with his head lowered. Suddenly, staring at the ground, he caught a detail that made his heart stop.
The orange xenon lamp stretched his shadow very long, and there were more than a dozen shadows following his shadow.
They've been following me?!
The coldness spread from his feet to his head, causing goosebumps all over his body. Zhang Yuanqing's face turned pale with fright, and he started running wildly.
Finally, the tunnel entrance appeared in front, and outside the tunnel was the cold and frosty moonlight.
Zhang Yuanqing rushed out of the tunnel in one breath, holding his knees and bending over to catch his breath.
After taking a breath, he looked around the surroundings. The full moon was like a disk, hanging lonely in the night sky. Under its light, the stars were eclipsed.
The lush forest was bathed in the moonlight, casting large tracts of rich shadows.
He was in a deserted mountain.
The xenon lamps in the tunnel flashed a few times and then went out. The entrance to the tunnel was dark and quiet, like the mouth of an animal that chooses people to eat.
"Leave quickly..."
Zhang Yuanqing's scalp went numb and he climbed the mountain along the rugged mountain road.
After walking for more than ten steps, he looked back again and saw a row of figures standing at the entrance of the tunnel wearing miner's hats and shabby clothes, with their heads lowered.
They stood in the shadow where the moonlight could not reach, saying nothing, as if they were seeing him off.
Zhang Yuanqing took a few steps back in shock, twisted around and ran up the mountain.
The branches and leaves on both sides of the mountain road are lush, and the thin moonlight casts down, enough for Zhang Yuanqing to see the road clearly.
It's just that the silence in the mountains is eerie, with no insects or birds chirping in the forest, which makes Zhang Yuanqing's footsteps sound extra loud.
"It's too quiet. There's no way there aren't even insects chirping in the mountains this season."
He looked around, the full moon was like a disk, the shadows of the trees were dancing, and he always felt that something was watching him in the darkness.
After walking for an unknown amount of time, until a thin layer of sweat broke out on his body, Zhang Yuanqing finally walked out of the dense forest, and his field of vision suddenly broadened.
The moonlight was like water, the surroundings were dead silent, and at the end of the rugged mountain road was an abandoned ancient temple.
Standing quietly in the darkness.
This ancient temple has been abandoned for who knows how many years. The paint on the gate in front of the temple is mottled, blackened and full of holes. The lanterns at the corners of the temple have fallen to the ground, leaving only the bamboo strips skeleton.
The plaque is still there, covered with cobwebs and hanging diagonally under the eaves, but the light is too dark to see clearly what is written on the plaque.
The steps in front of the temple gate are cracked and weeds are overgrown in the cracks.
How could there be a temple here in the barren mountains and ridges, with no villages in front and no shops behind?
Wait...Temple?!
Zhang Yuanqing reacted suddenly, and the voice from the spiritual realm information introduction seemed to ring in his ears:
"Don't enter the temple, don't enter the temple..."
"According to the instructions of that weird voice, I shouldn't be able to enter the temple. No, I've already come out of the tunnel, which means that what I really want to explore is this dilapidated ancient temple."
After hesitating at the entrance of the temple for a long time, Zhang Yuanqing cautiously walked towards the ancient temple standing in the darkness and stepped across the shabby threshold.
What came into view was a vast front yard with waist-high weeds growing in it. A rotten incense burner half as tall as a man was dumped in the grass. It had been exposed to wind and rain for many years.
Underfoot is a road paved with bluestone slabs, with clumps of wild grass growing between the gaps between the slabs.
My eyes followed the undulating decaying grass to the end of the bluestone road. There was a dilapidated main hall with a very high foundation and six steps. There was a dim light shining through the lattice door of the main hall.
"Is there a light?"
The surroundings were silent, desolate and dilapidated, and the bright moonlight shone down. In such an environment, the halo did not bring any warmth to Zhang Yuanqing.
It even felt more terrifying.
rustle.......
Stepping on clumps of withered and yellow weeds, he kept alert and walked towards the main hall. In the open environment, the sound of footsteps was particularly clear.
Rustling, rustling... Suddenly, Zhang Yuanqing's ears moved slightly, and he heard the sound of footsteps behind him, and something was following him.
Huo Ran turned his head.
The night is like water, the grass is lush, and there is nothing behind you.
"Have you heard hallucinations?"
Zhang Yuanqing paused for a moment in fear, then moved his legs forward again.
"Swiss, swiss, swish..."
The footsteps came again, and this time he heard clearly that something was really following behind him.
..... It can't be so evil, right? He encountered dirty things as soon as he entered the temple? He didn't dare to look back and quickened his pace.
The footsteps behind him also accelerated.
Zhang Yuanqing could no longer hold back, and with goosebumps rising on his skin, he ran wildly towards the main hall.
The footsteps behind him were like a shadow, chasing after him.
During the chase, Zhang Yuanqing quickly rushed out of the grass, approached the main hall, jumped up the six steps in two steps, and finally, with a loud "clang", broke open the two lattice doors of the main hall.
The sound of footsteps behind him suddenly disappeared.
"Whoosh, whoosh..."
Panting heavily, he finally dared to look back. The moonlight was shining like water on the courtyard, the grass, and the stone road. It was so quiet that it was scary, but there was nothing.
"Fortunately we didn't come after you."
After Zhang Yuanqing took a breath, he gently closed the door of the main hall, as if he had blocked the fear out.
Then, he glanced at the scene in the main hall. On the high stone base, there was enshrined an empress wearing a fur cloak and gorgeous clothes. She had a round face, slender eyebrows and an air of charity.
The empress was holding a whisk in one hand and making a grasping gesture with the other hand. It seemed to be holding something, but at the moment it was empty.
On the left and right are a boy holding a sword and a maid holding a book.
In front of the pedestal is a dusty tribute table. On the table is a candlestick, a candle twenty centimeters long and as thick as a baby's forearm, burning quietly.
The candlelight dispelled the darkness and seemed to dispel the fear in Zhang Yuanqing's heart. He felt that his mood was much more stable.
On the wall on the left, two faded and cracked wooden boards are hung, covered with italic characters.
Zhang Yuanqing strolled to the wall and stared at it by the candlelight at dusk. The style of these regular scripts was classical Chinese.
His Chinese proficiency is pretty good, and he has a clear understanding of his environment through half-guessing and half-seeing.
This mountain is called Sandao Mountain, and the mountain god worshiped in the temple is called Sandao Mountain Empress.
This Mountain Goddess was a person from Songfu in the early Ming Dynasty. She practiced in Sandao Mountain in Songfu. She was proficient in the method of talismans and alchemy. She could pray for rain to drive away ghosts and bless a place with good weather, so she was regarded as a god by the people.
After she became an immortal, the local government built this temple in Sandao Mountain and named it "Sandao Mountain Empress Temple". The descendants of the Empress' mantle would manage the incense and serve as temple blessings.
"The temple in the early Ming Dynasty must be five or six hundred years old." Zhang Yuanqing muttered.
At this time, he couldn't help but glance at the bottom of the tribute table, and his heart suddenly shuddered.
A dark figure lay in the shadow under the table.
I was too panicked just now, and the candlelight was dim, so I didn't notice it immediately.
Zhang Yuanqing bravely approached and took a closer look. It turned out to be a corpse with only a skeleton left.
Zhang Yuanqing breathed a sigh of relief despite being frightened. Compared to this weird mountain temple, the corpses were actually less terrifying.
Taking a few steps closer, with the faint candlelight, he could clearly see the clothes on the skeleton, a dusty labor protection uniform.
Worker?
"Is this the construction team from back then? So I really entered the world of ghost stories."
As soon as Zhang Yuanqing made his guess, he thought of a more alarming possibility. Maybe the construction team back then, like me, stumbled into this place by mistake.
Hence the urban legend.
If it is the former, this so-called spiritual realm is a scene based on ghost stories.
And if it is the latter, it means that the ancient temple has always existed, and the construction team is a victim just like him at this moment.
According to the historical background of Shanshen Temple, Zhang Yuanqing prefers the latter.
"An entire construction team died in the temple, and only one person survived. People will really die here... Now that I have entered this temple, I will face unknown dangers at any time...
"
Hiss~ He took a deep breath, tensed up again, and looked around subconsciously.
Then, he suddenly realized a detail that was horrifying to contemplate.
This ancient temple dates from the Ming Dynasty and has a long history. How could the candles still be burning? Who is replacing the candles in the main hall?
The more he thought about it, the more horrified he felt. Even the kind-faced sculpture seemed to have a strange and sinister look in the candlelight.
Although the three clay sculptures are covered with dust, they are lifelike and every detail is carved lifelike, especially the eyes.
They stood on the pedestal, staring down at Zhang Yuanqing under the candlelight at dusk.
