# 1136
Chapter 1136: His Appearance
Lin Qiye had eaten the Heavenly Peaches and undergone the baptism of faith. Not to mention a few small tears in his flesh, even if he were stabbed through the heart with a blade, as long as his vitals weren't damaged, he wouldn't be in any life-threatening danger.
Lin Qiye's gaze swept across the entire dead-silent valley, and finally landed on the direction of the abyss's depths.
The future An Qingyu's aerial grasp before her departure had directly annihilated all life contaminated by Cthulhu power near the valley, and Lin Qiye's spiritual perception had also returned along with it.
He scanned the surroundings, confirmed there were no other resentful souls or Seraph corpses, and immediately set out with An Qingyu toward the abyss's depths.
Standing on the mountaintop and looking into the distance, Lin Qiye could see blood-colored light blooming between the mountains in the nearby sky. Countless demons flapping black wings were circling in the air around that crimson glow.
If Lin Qiye guessed correctly, that was the deepest part of the abyss.
Lin Qiye turned his head, about to say something to An Qingyu beside him, but saw that the latter was staring blankly at the rushing earth below while hurrying forward, as if in a daze.
At the sight of her expression, Lin Qiye's heart trembled.
This kind of expression, Lin Qiye was all too familiar with. When he was on the Pamir Plateau before, his expression was exactly like An Qingyu's now...
Anxiety, confusion, self-doubt.
If he hadn't experienced the Monument Guarding Battle, he would probably still be trapped in these negative emotions.
Lin Qiye recalled the conversation with An Qingyu just now, and his gaze grew complicated.
It seemed that although An Qingyu claimed she wasn't interested in the future, deep down, she was still constantly questioning herself, worrying about her future direction.
"Qiyè." Just then, An Qingyu snapped back to reality and turned to look at Lin Qiye. "Just now, did you see what the future me looked like?"
Lin Qiye was stunned.
"My head was pressed down by some mysterious force, so I couldn't see above myself at all. I could only catch a glimpse of it... From your angle, you should be able to see the full picture, right?"
It seemed that An Qingyu, like himself, could only see the future appearance of the other person due to the angle issue, and couldn't clearly see the future above her own head.
"Yeah." Lin Qiye nodded.
"What did it look like?"
Lin Qiye's mind once again conjured up that figure wrapped in a black robe, wearing a hood, standing in the center of rolling mist. Whether looking at himself or at An Qingyu herself, its gaze carried no emotion whatsoever, cold and indifferent.
Lin Qiye looked at the confused eyes of An Qingyu, hesitated for a moment, and smiled softly:
"You stood in the mist wearing a deep crimson cloak, the edges of the cloak were a bit ragged, as if you'd just been through a battle. You weren't wearing glasses. Besides your temperament being a bit deeper than now, there didn't seem to be any changes."
Lin Qiye lied.
If he let An Qingyu know the truth now, her confusion and self-questioning would only become more severe, just like his past self, getting stuck in a dead end.
He portrayed the future An Qingyu as roughly the same as the present one, just to reduce her questioning of her future self's path and stabilize her state of mind.
"No changes?"
Hearing these words, the confusion in An Qingyu's eyes clearly faded somewhat. She nodded thoughtfully. "That's good then..."
"What about me?" Lin Qiye followed up on the topic. "From your perspective, what does the future me look like?"
As for what kind of person he would become in the future, Lin Qiye couldn't help but feel a bit curious too.
An Qingyu opened her mouth and paused for a moment before saying:
"You're in a yard. The yard has flowers, trees, a pond. You stand under a maple tree, also wearing a deep crimson cloak, looking very spirited. Your strength is also much stronger than now."
Lin Qiye briefly visualized the image of his future self and nodded slightly.
It seemed his future self was doing quite well?
With the spiritual perception of the 【Mortal Divine Realm】, the two of them avoiding the demons in the sky while advancing wasn't difficult at all. As time passed, that glaring crimson glow drew closer and closer to the two.
"We've already approached the deep abyss." Lin Qiye said solemnly. "Any further, and the distribution of demons will be too dense. It'll be hard for us to bypass."
"If the exploration ship entered the abyss through a breach, then the location where it sank shouldn't be far from the breach. Zuo Ge was ambushed on the ship and escaped. In a place with demons this densely packed, he wouldn't forcibly push through to leave. Instead, he'd choose a relatively safe visual blind spot to hide... perhaps a deep crevice, or a cave, a mountain stream, places like that."
An Qingyu pushed up her glasses and analyzed calmly. "Also, in Jiang Er's last communication, she mentioned lava flowing through the water, so there must be a fractured mountain with lava nearby."
"...I understand."
Lin Qiye stuck his head out from behind a massive rock on one of the mountain peaks, his gaze scanning the surroundings, and quickly锁定了一不远处一片连绵的矮小山脉。
Among several of those mountains, scarlet lava constantly flowed from the mountain passes, streaming down the broken mountain body into the water at the foot of the mountain, producing wisps of white mist.
"It should be there."
Lin Qiye and An Qingyu moved quickly, heading toward the direction of that mountain range. Whenever a demon flew overhead, they dove into the void. Soon, they arrived at the surroundings of the mountain range.
Lin Qiye closed his eyes and carefully sensed for a moment.
"Found it!"
He opened his eyes, his dual pupils gleaming with sharp light as he looked toward the mid-slope of one of the mountains. "It's Zuo Ge! He's hiding in a cave!"
...
In the dead-silent cave, a void rift opened out of thin air, and two figures cloaked in crimson raced out.
"Zuo Ge!"
Lin Qiye saw Shen Qingzhu leaning against the wall, motionless, and his pupils constricted sharply.
Shen Qingzhu had his eyes tightly closed, his face deathly pale. A vast pool of blood spread beneath him, staining more than half of the cave floor.
Lin Qiye rushed forward and tested Shen Qingzhu's breathing. His expression immediately turned grim.
He stood there in a daze, staring at this cold corpse, completely frozen in place.
An Qingyu gazed at Shen Qingzhu sitting slumped against the ground. A hint of gray flickered in her eyes as she confirmed there was not the slightest trace of vitality left in his body. Her two fists couldn't help but clench tightly.
"How is it..."
Lin Qiye turned his head僵硬ly, a flicker of hope flashing in his eyes as he looked at An Qingyu. He hoped he had misperceived. He hoped An Qingyu could give him a different answer.
The苦涩 appeared in An Qingyu's eyes. She shook her head gently:
"We were too late..."
The entire cave fell into dead silence. In the dense scent of blood, only the cold wind outside the cave whistled mournfully.