"Let’s keep heading up for now. It’s too dangerous down here."

Bai Zhou and Li Luo clearly didn’t understand the connection between Martin and the robed figures’ ritual either.

They checked their robes and slowly started upward.

"If anyone asks us something and we can’t answer, we attack immediately," Bai Zhou instructed.

Li Luo nodded.

The language barrier with the robed figures was indeed a major problem.

The upward tunnels grew steeper. However, man-made, zigzagging wooden staircases had been installed in them, with woven vines securing the stairs in the cracks of the rock.

They looked extremely primitive and crude.

"Did the people from the monitoring station make these?" Li Luo asked curiously.

Bai Zhou stepped forward to observe them. After a moment, he shook his head and replied, "No, this craftsmanship is too primitive. It was probably made by those twisted people. They’re obsessed with this kind of retro creation."

Seeing Li Luo’s somewhat confused expression, Bai Zhou continued to explain.

"See those guys carrying torches? They clearly have lighting equipment, yet they prefer to light torches. It’s like they have a clear aversion to all forms of technology."

Bai Zhou then pointed to a metal elevator in the distance, which was covered in all sorts of plants from disuse.

"They could have taken the elevator straight to the top, but instead, they built a wooden staircase and let the original elevator fall into ruin."

Mo Ling flew up toward the elevator and discovered it connected all the way to a much higher cavern. Riding it would have saved a lot of time, but it now seemed completely inoperable. It was impossible to know if it even had power.

Li Luo thought for a moment before asking Bai Zhou, "Did they forget how to use this equipment? Did those organ modifications alter their brains?"

Bai Zhou considered it, then shook his head again. "It’s an aversion. They still know how to use it. They once used the monitoring station’s cameras to look for me, but I happened to discover them. They never used them again after that."

’How strange.’

’They know how to use technology but refuse to? Is this related to how they’ve forgotten normal written language?’ Mo Ling’s doubts deepened.

Following the wooden stairs upward led to a platform. From there, a crudely made suspension bridge connected to a distant point. After repeating this process several times, they finally reached the highest part of the cavern.

The elevator doors stood there, plain as day.

Bai Zhou and Li Luo looked at each other and spread their hands, showing that they were just as baffled.

On the highest platform, a wide cavern extended inward.

Bai Zhou glanced at the map and said to Li Luo, "There’s a jungle ahead. It might be dangerous, so be on your guard."

Sure enough, just as they entered the cavern, the ceiling rapidly soared upward, revealing a vast space before them.

This place seemed to be near the edge of the Black Tower. One side had many openings connecting to the outside, allowing bright sunlight to stream in.

Water dripped constantly from the ceiling, likely moisture from other parts of the Black Tower that had gathered here.

The sunlight and water made the vegetation in this area incredibly lush and diverse. Some small, well-fed animals scampered about in the jungle.

What was astonishing was that all the plants here grew crookedly. Some had even collapsed, stretching desperately toward the sunlight.

This made all the vegetation in the jungle look extremely strange. It was also very low to the ground, and a single glance revealed that everything grew at a similar angle.

Calling it a jungle felt wrong; it was more like a forest blown over by a hurricane.

Soon, Mo Ling understood what Bai Zhou had meant by "dangerous."

The crooked plants grew so densely there was nowhere to step. A type of lizard-like animal scurried back and forth in the gaps, swarming over to attack at the slightest sign of movement.

Despite their small size, they charged in a fearless swarm.

"They’re venomous. Finish them off quickly, and don’t get bitten."

Bai Zhou warned, then summoned watery tentacles and began attacking the swarming lizards.

Mo Ling also quickly activated his teleportation, pulling trees and lizards together into the Block, carving out square-shaped gaps in the surrounding Crooked Jungle.

The swarm of lizards was quickly eliminated. Bai Zhou looked at the smooth-cut edges all around them and remarked to Li Luo, "Your relic is really something."

Looking at the gaps he had created, Mo Ling suddenly had an idea.

He aimed in a straight line ahead of him and began to teleport.

As the obstructing plants vanished piece by piece, a straight path instantly extended before them.

The brown earth was exposed, as if a dirt road had been laid out.

A jarring gap suddenly appeared in the otherwise uniform Crooked Jungle.

The move left Bai Zhou stunned.

"It’s best not to use relics recklessly. The Old Fishman in my tribe often warns me about that."

Despite his admonishment, he stepped onto the path Mo Ling had cleared.

Before long, more of the lizards appeared, but they seemed afraid to enter the area devoid of vegetation, shrinking back from the path Mo Ling had cleared.

Mo Ling was about to continue clearing the way when he saw Bai Zhou crouch down and make a "stop" gesture.

’Trouble?’

Mo Ling couldn’t see what was far ahead. He could only descend quickly and hide the Block among the trees.

Inside his helmet, Bai Zhou’s eyes slowly widened, as if he had seen something utterly shocking.

He asked in disbelief, "Is that... a village?"

Li Luo, beside him, stared for a long time before slowly nodding, also seeming to find the sight unbelievable.

’What are they seeing?’ Mo Ling wondered, his curiosity piqued. Their reactions were just too dramatic.

Fortunately, they didn’t watch for long before Bai Zhou directed them to keep moving forward.

After adjusting their robes, they began leaping from trunk to trunk, arriving at the front of the village.

Mo Ling followed cautiously behind, and the village slowly came into his view.

The moment he saw the village, Mo Ling’s thoughts came to a halt.

Because the buildings in the village were just too bizarre.

It was a clearing in the jungle, likely man-made, covering a large area with a dense cluster of buildings.

The buildings were all made of wood, probably using trees felled during the clearing, so the color of the lumber was very similar.

The strangest part was that, like the trees in the jungle outside, the houses were also crooked, and it seemed they were intentionally built that way.

If a normal house is a rectangle, these houses, seen from the front, looked like parallelograms.

Not only that, but they slanted in the opposite direction of the surrounding plants, leaning away from the sunlight.

The houses and the surrounding plants were like two waves moving in opposite directions, each leaning away from the other.

"Could anyone live in these?" 𝚏𝗿𝗲𝐞𝚠𝕖𝐛𝗻𝗼𝐯𝕖𝚕.𝚌𝗼𝗺

Mo Ling finally understood why Bai Zhou and Li Luo had looked so exaggeratedly shocked earlier.