Chapter 146: Exploring the Cave and Meeting the Netherworld River Again (1)
Translator: Henyee Translations Editor: Henyee Translations
Lin Yan took out the silk map and carefully compared it to the surrounding environment.
The lower left section of the map clearly matched the valley in front of him. The red dot marked on it was on the upper right of the map. There was also a curve that was probably a river, which reached that red dot.
“Therefore, let’s find the river in the valley first and follow the river to reach the red dot.”
Lin Yan’s physique had greatly improved, and his hearing was extremely strong. Soon, he found a stream in the forested valley.
The stream was at most an arm wide and actually had an orange-red color. It emitted a pungent sulfur smell and meandered deeper into the valley.
Lin Yan followed the stream forward and gradually descended the hill into the deeper parts of the valley. The plants along the way became darker and greener, and there were many plants that looked like banana trees. The air became damper and damper, and water could come out with a touch.
Soon, they arrived at the bottom of the valley, at a narrow cave entrance that was three people tall and one person wide.
The stream flowed quickly into the cave, making a faint sound of water flowing. It entered a gloomy darkness, as if it was swallowed by a cracked mouth.
“I didn’t expect it to be a cave. This is the place marked by the red dot. The stream keeps flowing in, but it doesn’t fill the cave. There must be another world inside.”
The entrance of the cave was a golden rock entrance. The rock wall inside was smooth and damp, with some greenish-gray moss growing. Further in, it was pitch-black and nothing could be seen.
Lin Yan searched left and right. The surrounding trees were all damp. Helpless, he could only climb up the valley slope again and find a thick dead tree. He made a torch and came to the cave again.
In the cave, a thin and hazy white fog seeped out. Below was a stream, and the left and right walls were polished smooth by the water.
Lin Yan didn’t want to step into the water, so he formed a claw with one hand and grabbed the rock wall before entering horizontally.
The sunlight landed behind him, and the environment immediately changed. Lin Yan raised the torch in front of him. The tunnel in front of him was extremely deep and winding. The dim firelight couldn’t illuminate it completely.
He climbed up the rock wall quickly. As he went deeper, the darkness became thicker. However, the rock walls on the left and right opened up, widening the space inside.
“There are some traces of excavation here. It looks like an abandoned mine.”
There should be some minerals nearby, especially the smell of sulfur.
The sound of a waterfall crashing into the rock wall could be heard. Lin Yan quickly arrived in front of a large crack in the ground.
Here, the stream formed a waterfall that flowed down.
It did not go straight down. Instead, it went down one to two feet, accumulating a muddy and yellow pool. Then, it continued to move down from the edge, winding all the way to the depths of the ground.
“The surface of the nearby rocks is as smooth as the rock wall just now. This means that this crack has existed for a long time and not because of the recent earthquake.”
The waterfall was curved. Lin Yan’s fire illuminated it and he jumped over dozens of feet of darkness to the rock wall opposite the pool below. He stabbed his hand into the rock wall and hung himself firmly.
Below him was a bottomless abyss. Damp water droplets gathered in his hand along the rock wall, and there was only a small patch of fire.
At this moment, Lin Yan looked to the left of the rock wall and saw a thick and long iron nail in the rock wall.
“There’s not much rust. This was nailed on recently.”
He naturally did not need nails as a ladder. He directly did as he had done and jumped down again to the rock wall opposite the pool below.
Just like that, he jumped down the rock wall.
Along the way, the waterfalls converged into streams again. There were even some areas where jagged cobblestones were exposed. He stepped on the ground and walked.
He did not know how deep he went down like this. He only felt that his surroundings were abnormally stuffy and hot. Then, he heard the rumbling sound of water.
“There’s a big pool below!”
Lin Yan walked forward and saw another underground rift valley in front of him. It was actually an underground cliff!
The water flowed down the cliff and fell into the darkness, making a rumbling sound.
“Aren’t these the stalactites? This is already deeper than the underground black market in Ding’an City!”
Lin Yan found the smooth rock wall beside the waterfall and bit the torch in his mouth. He used his hands and feet to climb down the smooth rock wall.
The rock wall was a half-penetrating white jade color. It should be some special mineral. It was polished extremely smooth under the water flow. It could simply reflect a person’s image.
At intervals, iron nails were also pushed into it.
The weak flames flipped up and down. Lin Yan had been moving, but he still had the illusion that he was stagnant. It was as if he was moving along a mirror whose bottom he couldn’t reach in endless darkness.
Fortunately, the rock wall had a bottom. After climbing for a long time, Lin Yan clearly felt the water vapor below increase greatly.
He took off the torch and shone it on it. His eyes narrowed slightly. “What a huge pool!”
Under the rock wall, there was actually a pool of water that was more than a hundred feet wide. It was dark green like amber, and there seemed to be a vortex in it.
There was also a huge black rock standing in the middle of the pool.
Amidst the rumbling water, Lin Yan swept his torch across. The underground space was surprisingly huge. Beside the pool was a rugged stone ground covered in cobblestones.
He flipped his body and stepped on the rock wall. He suddenly exerted strength under his feet and ejected himself like a slingshot, landing on the empty space beside the pool..