Book 3: Chapter 43: Living Inanimate Object

Book 3: Chapter 43: Living Inanimate Object

I didnt understand what Fatty meant, so he continued explaining, "Look at the simple strokes of this pattern. The underground palace has eyes. In fact, it has a lot of eyes." He pointed his flashlight at the pattern, and when I looked carefully, I saw that it was true. There were so many eyes painted on the lotus-shaped underground palace that it almost looked like some kind of creature.

When I saw that ceramic figurine before, I was surprised that an inanimate object could move like that. But now, seeing how this underground palace was painted, it almost seemed like it was a living thing, too.

"Have you ever encountered a situation where common sense dictates that something is an inanimate object, but it doesnt actually seem to be inanimate?" Fatty asked me. "In ancient times, there were many legends where objects had been imbued with some kind of feng shui qi and turned into spirits, right?"

I touched my chin, "Is the underground palace a spirit?"

If thats the case, then why the hell can the underground palace turn into a spirit?If I fill in all of these holes and restore the underground palace, will this spirit appear in my tent when Im dreaming and say, "After a hundred years of cultivating, Im finally fated to meet you. I have come to repay the favor."

In the past, people usually met spirits like snail girls(1), but the spirit I ended up meeting turned out to be an underground palace. And compared to the size of the underground palace, I was the "snail" in this scenario. I couldnt even ask a Taoist priest to reveal her original form because the Taoist priest and I would both be crushed to death.

"Why are you smirking?" Fatty thought I was acting strange because I was amused all by myself. "You can even smile like a fool thinking about the idea of an underground palace turning into a spirit. As expected of an architect, what you find sexy differs from us mortals."

I quickly apologized and began thinking about the problem seriously.

An inanimate object seemed to be alive.

I soon realized that I had actually heard of something like this before. And not only had I heard of it, but it was also quite important.

"Scorpion tomb."

When Poker-Face was released into the wild as a child, he went into a tomb that resembled a scorpion. A man named Ma Pingchuan uncovered and tried to excavate the tomb sometime later, but it wasnt found in the end. All that remained was a two-foot-long iron scorpion.

The tomb ate the coffins of the nearby tombs and then suddenly disappeared. Although it was only a legend, it sounded like a living creature.

So, the two of us had nothing to do. I listened to Xiao Hua's broadcast again on the satellite phone, but there werent any changes. In fact, the hidden anxiety in my heart had reached a critical level. Although I hadnt said anything along the way, I knew in my heart that it had taken us too long to get here because we had encountered too many obstacles. Now I could only pray that Black Glasses and Xiao Hua were still acting normally.

Fatty and I didn't dare leave either since crevice exploration was more dangerous than cave diving. I asked him to keep watch while I went to the pool outside to clean myself up.

The water was so cold that I was shivering as I hurriedly washed up, but at this time, I suddenly looked up and saw Ping Lian appear above me at the mouth of the hole.

His jaw was still hanging down, which looked very painful, but he seemed to be all right. He rushed at me and shook his jaw, almost like he was asking me for help.

His eyes were normal, and when I looked at his belly, I found that there was nothing there. I petted him and said to myself, youre lucky. I took a sip of water, grabbed his jaw, and fiercely sprayed the water on his face. As soon as he shrank back, I pressed his jaw back in place.

He shook fiercely and whimpered a few times, but when he found that he was healed, he immediately ran away and began drinking some water.

I sat by the water's edge and pointed my flashlight at him, catching a glimpse of his reflection in the water. Since it was facing me, I could see in the ripples that what was actually reflected back was a human face. It wasnt drinking the water at all and was just looking at me coldly.

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TN Notes:

(1) Theres a legend about a snail girl here. In China today, people used the words snail girl for people who take care of cooking and other household chores.

(2) Legendary Indian Buddhist mystic who introduced Tantric Buddhism to Tibet and who is credited with establishing the first Buddhist monastery there. Info here and pic here.

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Looks like the "Heavenly Palace" drama is gonna drop soon (about time). Considering I saw Xiuxiu and Xiao Hua on the character list, it's probably going to wildly diverge from the books like all the others the author had a hand in *sigh* but hey, at least we get the same Fatty from Season 2 (my personal fave). New novel chapters are published on