"Senior Sister, I'm scared."
"Don't be, I'm up here."
Zhang Ze held the light up to illuminate below for Qiao Lezhi.
Senior Sister Qiao was holding a smaller door panel, digging out rocks and soil upwards.
With the cultivation of the Golden Core Realm, she swung quickly, making clean and smooth work of the theft hole.
"I say, Senior Sister, do you really remember nothing?"
"It's not that I don't remember, I just never attended those early classes."
Alas.
Zhang Ze sighed, squatting down to massage his temples.
"Raise the light higher, can't see anything."
"Okay."
"By the way, Senior Sister, do we really not need me to call someone to get us out?"
"No calling anyone.
"Too embarrassing."
"Junior Brother, you have to trust my ability, I'm not bragging, at the same level, I'm unbeatable.
"With persistence, we can definitely dig our way out," Qiao Lezhi said confidently.
"Oh."
Zhang Ze felt like he had been regretting lately, regretting trusting others too much.
Especially when it came to trusting Senior Sister Qiao, Zhang Ze made two mistakes in a row.
Just now, he shouldn't have let Qiao Lezhi continue talking.
He should have acted like a domineering CEO, immediately pulling out the Jade Pendant, contacting the sect, and calling thirty flying ships to rescue them.
Zhang Ze genuinely didn't expect that Qiao Lezhi, a dignified Golden Core Stage Sword Sect cultivator, hadn't even learned the basic escape technique of the Sword Sect.
He thought the Pavilion Master's evaluation was an exaggeration, but turned out Senior Sister Qiao really knew nothing.
Normally, cultivators in the Golden Core Realm are vaguely seeing the threshold of the Dao.
Learning escape techniques like Shifting Form and Shadow is as simple as breathing.
Not useful in combat, but definitely handy for traveling.
For example, being trapped underground without any other restriction, one escape technique can get you out.
But Qiao Lezhi doesn't know, not even one.
The genius body cultivator Senior Sister Qiao, with her understanding of cultivation as unique as her breathing and drinking water, part of her body refining.
If she can't learn a Taoist technique, it means that technique has no use.
Therefore, attending class isn't as good as sleeping.
Sleeping is cultivation.
Senior Sister Qiao's wise and magnificent brain forms a perfect closed loop.
And this closed loop allows Qiao Lezhi to awaken with confidence and a sunny smile.
So when Senior Sister Qiao patted her chest in front of Zhang Ze, promising to get him out.
Zhang Ze chose to believe one more time.
In the end, mistaken again.
Zhang Ze pulled out the Jade Pendant, planning to sneakily call for help.
Senior Sister Qiao's voice came from afar above.
"It's connected!"
Zhang Ze heard and put away the Jade Pendant.
After a while, Senior Sister Qiao's voice came again.
"But I haven't dug us out, I don't know where this is!"
Enough, enough.
"Hey, Mei'Er, is it?"
"Can you contact my master?"
"Uh-huh, ask him to come rescue me, please."
"Not very urgent, no danger here, just lost."
"Uh-huh, okay, goodbye Mei'Er."
Putting down the Jade Pendant, Zhang Ze waited on the spot for Senior Sister Qiao to come down, and for his master to come get him.
However, it seemed Qiao Lezhi found something interesting.
"Junior Brother, come quickly, there's something fun."
"You attended more classes than me, help take a look."
"Oh, coming."
Zhang Ze got up, climbed up through the theft hole Qiao Lezhi dug.
When Zhang Ze climbed out of the theft hole like Hu Bayi, he paused.
It was the very hall that once housed the Spiritual Snake statue.
The ground was covered in spirit stone dust and fragments of the statue.
Miraculously, the hall hadn't collapsed, its supporting structure still intact.
Qiao Lezhi squatted in the center of the hall, intensely observing something.
A hint popped up before Zhang Ze's eyes.
[Thousand Mechanism City side quest triggered]
[Hidden task, Dream Awakening Rebirth, completion rate 0]
"Huh, didn't the related side quests completely vanish?"
"What vanished?", Qiao Lezhi asked.
"Nothing."
Zhang Ze wandered to Senior Sister's side, discovered Qiao Lezhi was looking at half of a snakehead statue.
Judging by its form and the distribution of surrounding fragments.
It should be the Unawakened Spiritual Snake that Zhang Ze shattered.
A small coffin was embedded in the snake's brain position.
"I say, Senior Sister, maybe let's really not do immortal cultivation anymore, let's go tomb raiding."
"Not going, too tiring."
The small coffin's material was unknown, the part exposed was entirely pitch black, with spiral designs on the surface.
Zhang Ze felt the spiral increasingly familiar, seemed like he'd seen it somewhere.
Until even Qiao Lezhi got a bit impatient, he finally remembered where the pattern came from.
Rebar.
Zhang Ze pulled out rebar from his waist, compared the pattern with the coffin, found they were of the same material, just overly decayed.
Not sure if it was a coincidence or something predetermined.
"Should we dig this thing out to take a look?"
Qiao Lezhi had an active personality, hearing the clever junior brother suggest so, naturally acted upon it.
In no time, the small coffin was pried away by Qiao Lezhi.
The small coffin was crafted entirely from Dragon Wood.
The base of the coffin seemed engraved with a few small characters.
Zhang Ze and Qiao Lezhi's faces nearly touched as they squinted to read what's written.
"Don't..."
"Open?"
"What are you looking at?" Li's voice suddenly rang behind Zhang Ze.
Zhang Ze's soul was half scared away.
Qiao Lezhi was also startled, gripped the Dragon Wood small coffin, crushed it into pieces.
Even the smallest coffin is still a coffin, any room with a coffin is a burial chamber.
Zhang Ze thought places like these were like jokes.
Over two people in a burial chamber is bound to cause trouble, when opening a coffin, someone will certainly interfere.
The zombie inside the coffin surely installed a camera in the burial chamber, bound to seize the moment and start trickery.
Once the small coffin shattered, a flash of white light blinded Zhang Ze, a ball of blue smoke escaped from the coffin.
But as soon as it escaped Qiao Lezhi's hand, Elder Li smacked it into the ground.
Zhang Ze illuminated the spot.
Found the thing appeared to be a ball.
Seemed like Elder Li even knocked it unconscious.
After scooping the ball with rebar, Zhang Ze grabbed it, found it soft and elastic.
"Fish ball?"
He tossed the small pearl on the ground, sure enough, it bounced back to Zhang Ze's hand.
Even bouncier than Master Ye's Peeing Beef Balls, also not dangerous.
After tossing it twice more, the small ball suddenly flared twice.
A system prompt sprang up before Zhang Ze.
[Hidden task Dream Awakening Rebirth, completion rate 100%, follow-up tasks await exploration to trigger]
Huh?
This task appeared mysteriously, also left without any sign, Zhang Ze couldn't make heads or tails of it.
Qiao Lezhi leaned over.
"Junior Brother, you're smart, what is this thing?"
Zhang Ze turned.
"Master, you're smart, what is this thing?"
Elder Li stroked his beard, pondering.
"Don't know, but what do you think else might be placed inside a coffin?"
Zhang Ze ceased pinching the small ball.
He recalled the Phoenix Gall from Ghost Blows Out the Light.
Remembered Grandpa Wang's tall tales, those ancient monsters that persisted for centuries awaiting rebirth.
Recalled the eerie spirit stone statue once unearthed by Spiritual Snake Taoist.
Remembered the two small characters carved on the Dragon Wood coffin's base.
"Don't Open"
Zhang Ze politely tossed the small ball to Elder Li.
"Whatever it is, could you kindly seal it for me?"
"Preferably suppress it for forty-nine days."
As Elder Li grasped the small ball intending to seal it with the Sword Sect Secret Technique.
He suddenly sensed a tremendous force emit from the small ball.
The small ball slipped from his hand, bounced twice on the ground, sprang back into Zhang Ze's hand.
Zhang Ze felt a bit chilly.
"Senior Sister, care to light a candle at the southeast corner of the burial chamber?"
"See if the flame turns green."