Chapter 264: Stealing a Bull to Sacrifice to Heaven, the Ancient People
A few hours later, in the desert hundreds of kilometers south of Bai Ze's nest.
Chen Jue and Yun Xiaomei were sitting on Bai Ze's back, heading deep into the desert, and the little parrot was flying with them in the air.
"The temperature here is getting higher and higher!" Chen Jue glanced at the temperature data displayed on his wrist. It had reached 73℃, which was more than 20℃ higher than the edge of the desert.
Everywhere you look, you see wavy and distorted scenes, which are caused by the refraction of light due to the expansion of the air due to heat.
In addition, the gravel under Bai Ze's feet gradually turned from the normal yellow to black, and the particle size of the gravel also became black, gradually replacing the fine yellow sand with coarser black gravel.
"Roar!" Bai Ze let out a low roar. His feet stepped on the hot gravel, making him feel a little uncomfortable.
According to the information Yun Xiaomei translated from her communication with it, Bai Ze was able to use the five-colored rainbow light to achieve low-altitude flight before.
However, Bai Ze's horns were cut off by Chen Jue, which was equivalent to the damage of his extraordinary organs. He temporarily lost the ability to release his spiritual energy. Not only could he not communicate directly with Chen Jue and the others like the phoenix, he could not even realize the ability to fly in the air. He could only temporarily rely on walking.
However, Bai Ze is huge in size, and each step he takes can cover a distance of dozens of meters. When he runs wildly, he is as fast as lightning, and his speed is no less than that of a parrot flying in the sky.
After walking for several hours, Bai Ze finally stopped beside a yellowish-brown hill covered by sand in the desert.
Looking at the rolling hills in front of him, Chen Jue felt as if he had seen an ancient rock castle weathered in the desert.
Although these rock castles are full of potholes and signs of weathering, a closer look will reveal that their appearance bears very obvious signs of artificial carving.
The collapsed huge stone pillars, the broken and completely shapeless rock sculptures, and the block-shaped ruins all indicate that there was once a civilization created by intelligent creatures here.
"Brother Chen Jue, this place makes people feel uncomfortable!"
"It's like... a completely dead world..." Yun Xiaomei was also looking at the rock castle that stretched for who knows how many kilometers. She had a little sweat on her forehead and the extremely high temperature around her was accelerating her physical exhaustion.
"Something is indeed wrong!" After seeing products of civilization such as the Bai Ze Tu and the bronze mask, Chen Jue was no longer as surprised as before when facing the buildings left behind by the suspected alien intelligent life forms.
On the contrary, he was using his celestial senses to detect the negative radiation energy around him that was similar to space radiation.
Although this negative radiation energy is already very weak, compared to the comfortable Qi environment in other places, the area near the rock castle seems to have been bombed by some thermonuclear weapon, leaving behind a lot of nuclear pollutants.
Even the monitoring device on the wrist lit up a red alarm, indicating that the radiation dose in the air had reached 100 millisieverts.
You should know that the radiation that ordinary people can be exposed to in the natural environment is about 1 to 2 millisieverts per year. Even for people engaged in radioactive work, the upper limit of radiation they are exposed to is only 50 millisieverts per year.
However, as soon as Chen Jue and Yun Xiaomei approached the rock castle, they were exposed to such an extremely high dose of radiation, which was enough to show the special nature of the environment here.
If an ordinary person came to this place, his skin would probably turn black and his whole body would become red and swollen immediately.
Because large doses of radiation can directly penetrate the human body, reach the chromosome level, and cause damage to DNA.
Although the aerospace combat uniforms worn by Chen Jue and Yun Xiaomei have a certain effect in weakening radiation, in such a special environment, they can only rely entirely on their bodies to withstand it.
"Roar!" At this time Bai Ze made a sound, and leaped onto the top of the rock fortress. Then he put Chen Jue and the other man at the entrance of the fortress that had been dug by sharp claws.
"Brother Chen Jue, Bai Ze said that it's too big to get in, so we have to go in and find it ourselves."
"Before, it relied on spiritual energy to penetrate in and fish things out." Yun Xiaomei translated.
Upon hearing this, Chen Jue first observed the scratches at the entrance, then glanced at the long and narrow staircase. He broke off a piece of weathered rock at the entrance and squeezed it. He found that the rock here was very hard, only slightly worse than the special alloy produced at the base. He nodded in understanding and said, "In addition to violent demolition and direct digging, we can only rely on spiritual energy to take shortcuts."
"Little sister, do you want the little parrot to take you to the sky to avoid radiation?"
"The radiation dose here is a bit high. I'm afraid it will have an impact on your body." Chen Jue asked with concern, and then glanced at the little parrot that was reluctant to land. It was obvious that it also felt the abnormality in this area.
Animals are inherently much more sensitive than humans, let alone exotic animals like parrots.
"Brother Chen Jue, you are not afraid, so I am fine too!" Yun Xiaomei shook her head, looking like she was determined to fight him to the end.
Seeing this, Chen Jue felt warm in his heart. He reached out and tapped gently on Yun Xiaomei's helmet, then led her into the long and narrow staircase.
…
Walking from the staircase into the rock fortress is a slanted downward journey. Although the steps under your feet are covered with thick black gravel, it feels like stepping on hard stone slabs.
Curiously, he leaned over and brushed away a piece of dust on the step, revealing a smooth step slab underneath. Chen Jue reached out and knocked on it and found that it was neither gold nor stone, and he didn't know what material it was made of.
"It is indeed a product left over from an alien civilization... Is it the ancient human in mythology? Just like the 'human' that the phoenix bird mentioned..." Chen Jue thought to himself.
Continuing to walk downwards, fine carvings of patterns began to appear on the walls on both sides of the passage. The techniques and craftsmanship of these carvings were very similar to those of the bronze mask.
It's just that its area is larger and its purpose is unknown. There are also ancient square-shaped hieroglyphs on it, whose meaning is also unknown.
After passing through a nearly one-kilometer-long winding passage and arriving at the interior of the rock fortress, what came into view was a devastated interior scene.
This stone chamber covers an area of about four to five hundred square meters. In the middle is a bronze object that resembles a giant tree, separating the ceiling of the stone chamber from the ground support.
The walls of the stone chamber are covered with murals constructed with bronze patterns and large blocks of text, which seem to be telling of the former glory of this place.
"Brother Chen Jue, it's so dark!"
"I can't see anything..." Yun Xiaomei was hugging Chen Jue's arm tightly at this moment. She had never practiced martial arts like "Night Walking Skills" which specifically trains night vision ability. She was inevitably a little nervous in this dark stone chamber.
"I forgot about this!" Chen Jue slapped his head, secretly cursing himself for not knowing how to take care of others. He quickly stretched out a finger, urging the internal energy in his body, and red-gold flames emerged from his fingertips.
The dazzling light was like a lamp suddenly lit in the dark night, allowing Yun Xiaomei to see the surrounding scenery clearly at once.
"What a practical function! Brother Chen Jue, you don't have to light candles anymore." Seeing that Chen Jue's fingertips were emitting a light similar to lighting, Yun Xiaomei narrowed her eyes and giggled.
After taking a look around, Yun Xiaomei suddenly exclaimed, walked to a tall mural, pointed at it and said, "Brother Chen Jue! Come and see! The scene in this painting seems to be some kind of ceremony!"
"ceremony?"
Chen Jue moved his mind and moved closer, but before he had time to take a closer look at the mural, the energy emerging from his fingertips seemed to be attracted by something.
He couldn't help but float towards the bronze mural in front of him. Just like the bronze mask was activated by the soul crystal before, the mural with bronze patterns in front of him was also activated by the aura emanating from Chen Jue!
"Buzz buzz" a soft hum of bronze echoed in the stone chamber, and the dust stuck to the murals was suddenly shaken off.
The tall mural in front of him seemed to be electrified, and soon red-gold energy spread along the bronze lines, lighting up one after another.
Chen Jue felt that the flow of the internal Qi in his body was accelerating abnormally, just like a high-pressure water pump, continuously flowing out from his fingertips onto the mural.
When the entire stone chamber was thoroughly lit up and the surrounding environment presented a strange sense of splendor, Chen Jue could then clearly see the meaning of the mural in front of him.
In the picture, there is a group of human-like intelligent creatures surrounding a one-legged Kuiniu, skinning it and hanging it up high, as if they are making something, or performing some kind of ceremony to worship the sky.
In addition, these humanoid intelligent creatures are covered in extremely obvious colorful light, and the scene is just like the colorful striped clothing worn by the Dulong people.
When Yun Xiaomei saw the mural, she was shocked as if she had been electrocuted. She stroked the mural with her hand and murmured, "Nuwadelumu! This is our Dulong ethnic group's ritual of slaughtering cattle to offer sacrifice to the heavens!"
