C351 – At the End of the Hole
Posted on April 15, 2019 by AzureOrchid92
Shao Xuan gritted his teeth to endure the feeling of dizziness caused by a lack of oxygen, as well as the pain of his bones cleaving. He could only grit his teeth to bear the pain as he tightly clung to the uneven stone surface. He knew that if he let go, he would be dragged out by the force, along with the sea, to be part of the whirlpool. In which case, he would really be dead.
Surrounded by a formation like an invisible huge net, all the creatures that touched the net would be netted in. Under the powerful tearing force around, Shao Xuan simply had no time to deal with his cracked wounds and could only mobilize his totem power to concentrate around the wound, trying to close it to reduce the blood flow.
If he didn’t have a high-level totem warrior’s physical strength, if there was not enough strength to replenish what he used, if he only have little strength to hold onto the stone, he would not be able to bear it for long.
Finally, when Shao Xuan was about to lose consciousness, everything subsided again.
Shao Xuan only felt his body turn light, then the pressure from the sea disappeared. The power tearing around also disappeared, as if it never appeared at all, so suddenly, it was gone.
His still shaking bones slowly subsided. His muscles that had been pulled taut loosened. It was not that Shao Xuan let his guard down, but that he had no more extra strength, and that he was now at his limit.
Suddenly, the changing ended and it seemed to be safe for a while, which made Shao Xuan sigh in relief.
He could exhale?
He tried to breath.
Then, breathe again.
It’s smooth!
There’s air!
Shao Xuan opened his eyes and looked around.
At this moment, Shao Xuan mistakenly thought that he had come to another world, a world without seawater.
However, after carefully distinguishing his surroundings, Shao Xuan found that he still held onto the same stone. Not far behind was still the cliffs by the sea floor. The only difference was that this place that was the sea was almost emptied. However, his clothes, the hair on his head, the little seaweed attached to the stone on the ground, were like water was sucked out of them and were now dry.
On the stone floor, the dried seaweed, which was attached to the stone floor, cracked and broke into debris as soon as it was touched.
Shao Xuan felt like he was also lacking water, hence he drank the rest of the water in his kettle. This still could not supplement his body of its missing moisture, but he just took it in a rush.
There was huge hollow that was formed around him Outside the hollow, the sea was still flowing vertically, but it no longer affected this stone land.
The surrounding was very dark. It was some distance from the sea, so they was very little light cast around. Fortunately, Shao Xuan had his other sight’s ability.
Shao Xuan sat on the stone floor, thinking about what to do next.
The feeling of lacking of oxygen was waning. Though the oxygen content here was low, Shao Xuan could withstand it, as it was still better than choking due to lack of air.
After calming down, his physical strength also gradually recovered as his mind slowly cleared.
He wanted to set out, but he didn’t know when such a change would end. Should he stay here and wait, or walk down this long hollow?
Should he do a rope divination?
But there’s no rope on his body, so should he rip a part of his clothes?
However, this time, Shao Xuan did not intend to rely on the divination since he did not know whether it would succeed. He decided to follow the words of the Shaman: when the choice is difficult, seek answers from the totem flame, when in the dark, the fire will light up the road ahead. As it was when he was trapped in the stone worm cave.
Closing his eyes, he felt the totem flame in his mind and carefully observed the movement of the flames.
At this moment, his will almost blended in with the fire.
The flames beat, drifting towards one side, once, two times…
It was no accident that when he determined the movement of the flame, Shao Xuan opened his eyes and looked ahead.
In front was the direction the flame was fluttering. Even though its end was unknown, he could never even guess his road in the future.
Looking at the swirling flow of seawater around, Shao Xuan breathed a sigh of relief and finally lifted his feet forward.
Hesitating would only be a waste of time. Now that there was a decision, he naturally has to take the time to act.
Shao Xuan didn’t know how long the hollow would last, whether it will disappear halfway through. But, since the fire has so chosen, he would give it a try. In fact, without using the tribal fire, he also has a kind of intuition to go forward.
Admittedly, it should be safest to stay here and wait for the change to disappear and for the sea to return. But Shao Xuan still intended to follow his intuition and the fire’s choice. Even if this was a dead end road, he would continue.
The surrounding was very quiet, like all the voices of the outside world was closed out. Only the sound of Shao Xuan walking was heard.
When he was hungry, Shao Xuan scraped those drained of water seaweed from the stone to eat. This seaweed was very rare that it could still tighten itself on the stone after such a large suction earlier. It didn’t taste good, but it didn’t take much for it to replenish his strength and it kept Shao Xuan from starving to death.
Shao Xuan also found that these seaweed, even if drained of water, were still well, rooted deep into the stone. If everything returned to its original scenery, the sea would cover it again, so they might continue to grow normally.
The farther forward he went, the darker the hole became. The dim light that came through from above could be seen at first, but after walking for long, there was only darkness left.
Shao Xuan did not know how long he had to walk in this dark hole, how long he had to eat those dry seaweed. Every day, in addition to resting and eating, his time was spent on running forward, afraid of the next moment the hole will return to normal and he will be buried in the sea. This ongoing pressure has been urging Shao Xuan to run, and run quickly.
Fortunately, he also had a water resource which was the rain stone given by Yang Sui. It could condense water here as this hole was only without water because of the formation of the hollow. After the change, the water could still be formed normally. Even though he knew this was not at the bottom of the sea, perhaps because it had been surrounded by water, this stone could condense water much faster than in the desert.
Shao Xuan was incredibly lucky to be carrying this stone with him, or he would die of thirst.
As Shao Xuan continued to eat the seaweed without really tasting it, he noticed that there seemed to be some dim light around.
Shao Xuan didn’t know if this was only for a short time, or he was close to the end. When he saw a mountain wall, he knew that he had reached the end.
The hole ends here and the wall was attached to the mountain.
It was just that the surroundings still looked the same.
As a last resort, Shao Xuan continued to wait again, waiting for the sea to return to its original appearance. He kept to his every day routine of eating, drinking and running, to keep his physical strength and form at its best in order to face the powerful whirlpool that might happen next.
After a while, the movement of the sea started to change.
The air was sucked away in a blink, the water vapor around him thickened and the powerful tearing force came at last.
Holding his breath, Shao Xuan had been prepared as he clung to the stone on the ground calmly.
When it was all over, Shao Xuan swam above.
Splash!
A head emerged from the surface of the sea, breathing the air together with the smell of the sea. Because he had been using his special vision in the sea most of the time, after the change, it did not take long for him to adapt to the bright world.
As he opened his eyes, the glare of the sun made Shao Xuan have a moment of deep thought. He even has a kind of feeling of not knowing what year it was.
Ahead was not a high cliff, but a piece of land.
There were high columnar cacti on the land. Some animals, similar to camels, were standing upright and biting the flowers from the columnar cactus.
A camel chewing a cactus flower, looked towards the sea, and saw the person in the water. It shook its two long ears.