The Gentleman at the End-Chapter 663 - 661 Solemn Treasure Appearance

[Ten minutes ago]

William and Catherine passed through the cave entrance and stepped into the mysterious cave that sealed the Main Divine Statue,

and instantly felt completely isolated from the outside world,

a feeling of unease, strangeness, and gloom wafted from deep within the cave. They could even faintly hear laughter, singing, and crying, very soft but undeniably real.

The cave had been artificially repaired, with both the floor and walls leveled.

Strangely, despite the cave entrance and the surrounding forest being covered with yellow talismans, there were none inside the cave to suppress evil spirits, nor were there any hemp ropes.

Additionally, the cave passage was not straight but had a slight downward slope, and due to its proximity to the sea, there was severe water infiltration, with humidity levels exceeding 100%.

After standing for only a moment, their clothes were completely soaked,

and they even felt that the water droplets clinging to their skin would continuously seep in. Even William’s physical resistance felt weakened, and any moisture that penetrated the body produced a slight sensation of ’weakness’ that accumulated over time.

Because of this,

investigators who came to the village never truly ventured deep into this bizarre cave,

or perhaps they were aware of the existence of the Buddha Mother of Flower Sea Village and knew that such deities were not to be offended lightly. Their investigations were limited to the ’stability of the village.’

As long as they could ascertain that there were no apparent tourist deaths, they would report back, and Flower Sea Village would be opened again.

William sat down cross-legged after walking a distance, concentrating on the abyss within his abdomen. With each rotation of the abyss, streams of water flowed out from its edge.

He also felt relieved, as if a weight had been lifted from inside his body.

Catherine had it even easier. Her octopus legs were exposed and attached to her thighs; if any moisture invaded her body, the octopus legs would expel it immediately.

It looked as if water was flowing as she walked.

"Indeed, it’s interesting. I can feel there’s something big in here! Not just these villagers, even the city’s investigators are wary and won’t come near easily.

William, speed up your water expulsion a bit, I can hardly wait!"

With Catherine urging him on, they soon encountered the first fork in the cave passage, with three different paths to choose from.

But at the junction stood a person, or rather, a corpse.

Its eyes had been replaced with flowers, and it held a bizarre smile, raising its hand to point down the right-hand passage as if directing ’guests.’

"Catherine, is this the direction?"

"Yes, that’s right. The direction the dead man is pointing is correct. The residual sensation of the Divine Statues in my body is also pointing this way. It seems they’re quite eager to meet us."

"Be careful."

William took the lead, stepping into the right passage first to make sure it was safe before letting Catherine follow.

They hadn’t gone far when suddenly they felt a chill from behind, and they both turned around simultaneously.

To their surprise, the ’flower person’ standing at the junction had changed its posture,

no longer pointing the way but now gesturing with its hands,

and its mouth, which should have been stiff, was still writhing, as if saying ’welcome.’

The next second, its mouth opened wide, and the flowers stuffed inside burst out frantically.

This eerie phenomenon made Catherine uncomfortable. She took a step to close the distance between her and William, wrapping her octopus tentacles more tightly around his arm.

William was about to tease Catherine about her fear with a few choice words, but in the end, he said nothing, simply maintaining their current state.

They soon came to another junction,

which made William feel as if this so-called cave was more like a man-made underground maze, deliberately trapping the Buddha Mother deep inside.

Similarly, there was another flower person standing at this junction, but this one did not raise a hand to point the way.

As they approached to investigate,

whoosh! The flower person suddenly turned its head and pressed its blooming face against Catherine’s ear, speaking through the growing and rubbing flowers.

"The left~ side~"

Startled by this sudden jump-scare, Catherine almost screamed, and her octopus leg, attached to her thigh, tensed completely.

"Catherine, are you okay?"

"*cough cough* What’s not to be okay about? These things are no threat."

"What I mean is, can you still tolerate this level of fear? Catherine, your ’Fear’ isn’t of this type, is it?"

"Of course not, I specialize in Nightmare Phobia, not this weird stuff... It’s just that I’ve been walking in this threshold space for too long and feel a bit spiritually uncomfortable, that’s all."

"It might also be because you’ve absorbed the copied Divine Statue, Catherine. The deeper we go, the more we are affected by an invisible influence."

As he spoke, William quickly grabbed Catherine’s palm, intending to alleviate her spiritual discomfort with this simplest and most direct form of contact.

Catherine instinctively tried to pull away, but William’s grip was tight,

and after failing to break free once, she went with it naturally, fɾēewebnσveℓ.com

In fact, holding hands turned out to be quite effective. The shift in attention made Catherine much calmer, and to relieve the awkwardness, she even began to strike up a conversation.

"This mode of fear is indeed not bad. Once back at the Circus, I might be able to borrow and learn from it to enhance the effect of fear."

"Hmm."

Following that, at every fork in the road, they would receive hints from the blooming faces; after passing seven forks, the passage in front of them started to accumulate a significant amount of seawater,

and the sounds of weeping, singing, and laughter grew clearer.

"From the moment we entered the cave, the passage has consistently sloped downwards. Our current position should be below sea level, and Flower Sea Village might even be connected to what’s below.

It’s very likely that the Main Divine Statue is at the end of this passage."

"William, let’s hurry up~ Let me see what the ’God’ related to this world and its oceans looks like, and how it compares to me."

Along the way, William also learned to evacuate seawater from his abdomen without needing to sit in meditation.

When the two of them, wading through knee-deep seawater, emerged from the passage, it suddenly opened up.

Deep in the cave, there lay a hidden heaven, utterly different from what William had imagined,

an Underground Temple appeared before them,

supported by four columns covered in blossoms,

with the floor beneath a half-meter-high layer of sea water, upon which floated a hundred or so meditation cushions, invisibly maintaining equal distances from each other.

Atop these cushions knelt the drowned worshippers, with blooming eyes, who even in death presented a devout posture.

And their orientation pointed precisely to where the Main Divine Statue stood.

In front of them floated an incense burner on the water’s surface, with several sticks of tribute incense burning,

and behind, towering over thirty meters tall, was the Main Divine Statue—’Flower Sea Buddha Mother’

The Buddha Mother’s bloated and soggy corpulent body sat atop a lotus, with layers of flab piled high, as if filled with grease. Yet, the surface of her skin was extremely wrinkled, either from recent malnourishment or having been soaked in the sea for too long.

The Buddha Mother’s hand gestures resembled those of the Divine Statues in the villagers’ homes,

her left hand forming a Lotus Seal,

while her right hand lifted a White Jade Bottle. However, that jade bottle’s interior was embedded with Blood and Flesh, also covered with circular teeth arrangements, much like a special living Magic Artifact.

Looking even higher,

one would officially see the Buddha Mother’s indescribably detailed "Head", the source of the previously heard sounds.

The replicated Divine Statues in the residents’ homes simply carved dense flowers onto the Buddha Mother’s face to represent her visage.

But in this Underground Temple, the real Divine Statue’s face was indeed covered in flowers, each corresponding to a corpse.

Or rather,

the Buddha Mother’s face was densely riddled with ’holes’, each sized just enough to ’vertically’ fit a person, a corpse, or perhaps describe it most aptly with the term ’sacrifice’.

A person’s body would be fully stuffed inside, leaving only the head outside.

As time passed, the heads exposed on the Buddha Mother’s face would bloom entirely, jointly presenting an image of such dignified ’blooming faces’.

When the face’s flowers withered, it meant the sacrifice had been completely drained dry, and those kneeling corpses on the cushions became replacements.

If it had been earlier,

when Flower Sea Village functioned normally as a tourist attraction,

this Underground Temple would have been bustling and filled with incense smoke at all times. Every cushion would have someone kneeling on it, and in the sea, there would float a multitude of ’queueing participants’.

They all ’couldn’t wait’ to be embedded into the Buddha Mother’s face.

Catherine too was stunned by such a scene—how were they to absorb such a gigantic Divine Statue?

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