If she could fully explore the mission, her evaluation grade would also improve.
Nan Yue's hesitation lasted only a fleeting moment; to an outside observer, it seemed as if she hadn't hesitated at all as she lowered her head and crawled into the hole that would trigger claustrophobia in anyone.
The air quality inside the hole was much worse than in the passage, so Nan Yue held her breath slightly, trying to minimize her breathing.
The thing that had been clinging to her back earlier had already climbed down and was now crawling behind her; Nan Yue could hear the rustling sound it made as it moved.
There was truly no turning back now.
The flashlight on Nan Yue's head illuminated the tunnel, and she could see some black-shelled insects burrowing through the soil.
Nan Yue's movements paused for a nearly imperceptible second; Antswamp Village had left her with some psychological trauma, and even now, seeing insects gave her the urge to crush them all.
She forced herself to think about other things to avoid looking at the insects churning in the dirt, disturbed by the light and her presence.
There were insects in this tunnel, which meant the ecological environment here was healthier than the passage outside.
That wasn't quite right; the fact that there was nothing in the passage outside seemed to be the result of something beyond science rather than being normal.
However, the thing behind her had led her to crawl into this tunnel, so logically it should be the same as the outside; why were there insects here?
Thinking of this, Nan Yue looked closely at the revolting insects and realized they seemed to be carrion-eaters.
There were corpses here.
Just as this thought crossed Nan Yue's mind, a blue-purple face suddenly appeared before her eyes.
The face was extremely close to Nan Yue, barely half a palm's distance away.
Nan Yue instinctively held her breath, her entire body tensing up as a faint black mist appeared in front of and behind her; the moment the thing moved, she would launch an attack.
But the face in front of her remained motionless.
It appeared to be a corpse.
Nan Yue observed carefully; the face belonged to a very young girl, likely only fifteen or sixteen years old, but her eyes were filled with terror and despair.
When Nan Yue swept her headlamp around, she realized the tunnel had reached its end, opening into what looked like a bottomless pit.
She avoided the corpse in front of her and leaned over the edge of the pit to look down.
Below was a massive circular pit, packed densely with corpses.
However, these corpses didn't seem to have been dead for long; they hadn't even begun to rot, and no heavy stench of decay reached her.
It would be difficult to climb back up once she went down, so the corpse that had been so close just now must have used the last of its strength to crawl up before dying.
Nan Yue examined her; she was wearing a pink opera gown, with a scenery of a bright, harmonious spring embroidered in gold and silver threads.
Was this person the female ghost who had climbed onto her back and guided her to find this mass grave?
Judging by the craftsmanship of the clothes alone, this wasn't something an ordinary opera performer could afford; only a wealthy family could sustain such an investment.
The Zhou family.
The image of the Zhou family in its prime appeared in Nan Yue's mind.
Why would they take in Liping Garden and provide the opera performer with gold, silver, and fine clothes?
Because they liked listening to opera?
That was one explanation, but Nan Yue knew a bit about the history of mission worlds from the olden times, and Wen Xiang Yuan had shared some knowledge as well.
In ancient times, wealthy gentry did not treat opera performers or servants as human beings.
They might like them, but they were merely toys.
While absurd things like buying an entire opera troupe for a favorite performer did happen, if the young master of the Zhou family really had the courage to defy the opinions of others for love, he wouldn't have needed to dig a secret passage to meet his lover in secret.
Even if Old Master Zhou didn't allow it, building Liping Garden right inside the Zhou family residence and then trying to restrict his son seemed contradictory.
Moreover, there wasn't just one person in this pit.
At a glance, there were likely hundreds.
Could an opera troupe have that many people?
There was still enough oxygen in the pit for now, so Nan Yue didn't delay any further; she crawled over the pink-clad corpse and slid down into the pit.
There seemed to be far more corpses in the hole than Nan Yue had imagined; she moved two or three bodies aside, only to find the space beneath them still packed tight with more remains.
Digging further down, she found semi-decayed bodies, and below those were white bones.
These corpses had been frozen in a specific moment within the illusion, which was why there was no smell.
Nan Yue stood in the pile of corpses, covered in dust and grime, her shock turning into numbness.
There were far more than just a hundred bodies here; what on earth was going on?
Why did the Zhou family have so many dead people in their secret passage?
Why would they build their house over this mass grave?
As Nan Yue examined the bodies, she noticed that only the top layer was dressed as opera performers; the rest appeared to be daughters of poor families or maidservants based on their clothing.
Judging by their skeletal structures, they were all female, and none of them were very old.
What was the Zhou family doing?
There was nothing else in the pit, so Nan Yue tested the soil; it was somewhat soft but firm enough for her to climb out.
She dug her hands into the earth and kicked off the wall, easily flipping herself back up to the edge.
The pink-clad corpse was still there; her neck was covered in scratch marks, and fresh blood was seeping out.
This manner of death was suffocation.
The female ghost behind her had vanished, and Nan Yue intended to leave this place.
But suddenly, the gruesome female corpse beside her moved.
Almost instantly, a strand of black mist surged out from Nan Yue, about to entwine the female corpse, but she forced it to stop.
Nan Yue realized the state of the corpse was changing; it was slowly turning back into a living person.
The blue-purple face turned pale, and a flush appeared on her cheeks from the effort of crawling up the pit.
Her face was full of panic, and she didn't see Nan Yue standing beside her; she only stared at the entrance Nan Yue had come through.
"Please, don't leave me behind!"
Nan Yue turned to look; a man's face had appeared at the opening.
His features were thin and his expression cold.
"You've enjoyed the life of a young lady for a few years; it's time to pay it back. Otherwise, did you think the Zhou family was running a charity? People from your opera troupe weren't just picked for no reason."
"Please, I don't want to die."
The woman tried to say more, but the man outside vanished, and the opening was sealed by a massive stone; judging by the sound, it had been pushed into place by several people.
This girl could never have pushed that stone open; she was already exhausted just from crawling up here.
The last bit of hope in the girl's eyes turned into despair as the stone blocked the entrance.
Before long, the oxygen in the hole was rapidly consumed; the girl began to claw frantically at her own throat and the dirt on the ground until she finally stopped moving.
The corpse returned to the state Nan Yue had first seen.
Nan Yue looked at the girl's body in silence; her life had just begun to bloom, and now it had ended here.
She offered a silent prayer for a moment and then crawled back out the way she had come.
By the time Nan Yue reached the end, there was no stone, only a faintly shimmering hole, and she could hear Zhu Xi Ning's voice coming from a distance.
Rate on N.U.
