Chapter 2695: The Man-Eating Wall
Soon, shadows appeared in the corridor. A faint patch of light swept past the door, then swept across Xu Huo's face. Realizing it was the reflection of water, he abruptly jerked Qi Cong backward while simultaneously slamming the door shut!
The moment he moved, Yan Jiayu beside him used her body to brace against the door. However, neither she nor Xu Huo could successfully close it. A flood-like torrent surged out of thin air, rushing from the corridor straight into the room. Not only did it completely blast the door open, but it also swept the three of them into the waves, hurtling them toward the balcony!
At that moment, what lay beyond the balcony was no longer the soft castle lawn, but a bottomless black abyss!
It was unclear what kind of things lurked in that black abyss, but they absolutely could not fall in!
Bracing against the immense suction force, it was difficult to open the Spiritual Gate. Even if a passage were opened, it might be damaged midway. Xu Huo was pulled by a Materialized Object, managing to grab the balcony railing and not fall completely out. Below him hung Yan Jiayu, and below Yan Jiayu hung Qi Cong. Under the pull of the suction, the two kept sliding downward.
"Climb up!" Xu Huo sent several Materialized Objects to attach to the two of them, helping them resist the suction.
A thick smell of blood wafted from Yan Jiayu again. After a moment, she regained some strength, reached down to pull Qi Cong up, and let him straddle her back. Then, grabbing Xu Huo's leg, she climbed upward. Once at the balcony edge, she first pushed Qi Cong inside, while keeping a firm grip on Xu Huo's arm to prevent him from losing strength.
With the two no longer hanging on him, Xu Huo also successfully returned to the balcony.
"What the hell was that place..." Qi Cong looked out at the balcony, still shaken. But now the black abyss outside had vanished, reverting to the previous lawn ground.
The three then looked back into the room.
The moment Xu Huo had hung onto the balcony, he had used Materialized Objects to close the door. The massive flood had only lasted an instant. After washing the furniture, it had also brought in a fish.
That's right, a fish.
A fish as translucent as glass, shimmering with a faint, iridescent light.
It swam through the air, but a clump of water clung to its body. The sound they had heard earlier was the fish flicking its tail in that water.
It showed no interest in Xu Huo and the others, simply swimming around the room. After a while, it swam to the door, seemingly wanting to get out.
"It's pretty smart, not heading for the balcony," Qi Cong remarked.
It wanted to leave, and Xu Huo's group also needed to leave. None of them could take the balcony.
After a brief silence, Xu Huo returned to the door and opened it for the fish.
Just a tiny crack, and the fish eagerly squeezed out, leisurely swimming along the corridor.
A living item. But not every living item possessed the intelligence of the Painting Woman or Mr. Dong. In most cases, they simply acted according to the traits they were born with. They had brains, but not many.
"No brains means not much emotion, and no emotion means no likes or dislikes," Yan Jiayu mused. "What if we follow it?"
The three carefully exited the room and silently trailed behind the swimming fish.
This fish seemed to be looking for an open door. It approached every room along the corridor to peer inside.
Seeing this, the three simultaneously had the same idea.
So, just as they were about to reach the next room, Xu Huo used a Materialized Object to open the door for it.
Sure enough, the moment the door cracked open, the fish spewed out a massive wave, instantly filling the entire room. The room door must have had some item on it, but it was washed away the moment the water touched it.
The flood didn't last long. The crawling puppet that had been washed away got stuck on the balcony for two seconds before regrouping. It began crawling at high speed, indiscriminately attacking anything that moved. First, it climbed the wall and pounced on the fish, knocking it out of its water clump. Without the water, the fish fell to the ground and turned into a decorative ornament. Then, the puppet burst out of the room, scurrying frantically along the opposite corridor wall, charging straight at Xu Huo and the others!
The puppet's hands, feet, and abdomen were all covered in spinning gear-like blades. Judging by its momentum, even brushing against it would result in serious injury, let alone being grabbed by the head.
Yan Jiayu immediately twisted two crowbars together, extending the attack range, and then aimed a solid blow at the crawling puppet.
The crawling puppet flew backward with a clattering sound. Its shattered head fell off, but that didn't affect its mobility. Even without a head, it maintained its aggressive attack power. After being severed twice by Xu Huo, it stubbornly discarded parts of its body and kept moving.
Xu Huo frowned. When it charged at him head-on again, his Materialized Objects transformed into thousands of slender tangent lines, slicing it into finger-sized pieces!
Only then did the crawling puppet finally stop moving.
The three had no time to marvel at the Box Carrier's craftsmanship, because the stilt-walker was approaching again.
After wandering through so many places, they had neither found an exit nor encountered the Painting Woman or Da Mao. They hadn't even run into Zhu Bu, Dai He, or the others. They couldn't tell if they were in different spaces or if they had already...
Xu Huo suddenly stopped in his tracks, turning his head to look at the wall on the right!
The Box Carrier's castle was extremely luxurious. The walls were covered in what looked like paper, but was actually a thin layer of beaten metal, engraved with intricate patterns. However, they weren't just patterns. Upon closer inspection, one could see tiny humanoid figures—or rather, not real humanoids, but metal shards shaped like humanoids—clinging to each other in various poses.
They were lifeless. But just now, he had distinctly felt a gaze coming from inside the wall.
"What's wrong?" Yan Jiayu stopped and asked.
"There's something in the wall. Be careful," Xu Huo said.
They themselves didn't dare touch the walls recklessly. Now that they sensed something unusual, it was only to be expected.
To be safe, Xu Huo activated several defensive devices simultaneously.
But just as they were dodging the stilt-walker and heading upstairs, a hand suddenly shot out from the wall at the stairwell landing, grabbing at Yan Jiayu!
Yan Jiayu's first reaction was to sidestep and smash the large backpack on her back into that arm. She had considerable strength, and the arm was bent backward on the spot. But that was all. Its force didn't diminish; it grabbed the backpack and pulled it back into the wall.
In the tug-of-war, Xu Huo's group was at a disadvantage. They could only watch helplessly as the wall swallowed the backpack.
Yan Jiayu, who only managed to snatch back two crowbars, stared at the vanished backpack. She weighed the crowbars in her hands, then drove them fiercely into the wall... and then, the two crowbars were also swallowed by the wall.
"It can eat anything?" Yan Jiayu asked Xu Huo for a string of firecrackers, lit it, and fed it into the wall.
The wall swallowed things quickly, but the firecrackers were long, giving them some time to burn. So, with only a small tail left outside, the firecrackers exploded.
It was unclear what was happening inside the wall, but the firecrackers only detonated the remaining exposed section. The rest was still swallowed, leaving only a bit of black ash at the explosion site.
"Where did he get all these bizarre items?" Yan Jiayu said enviously. "I want some too."