Zhang Chen carried the leftover chicken from last night and walked to the beehive. He saw swarms of large wasps flying out, crawling all over Zhang Chen’s body, hair, and head, showing affection.
Seeing this, Zhang Chen smiled, casually placed the meat on the grass leaves, letting the wasps feed, then brushed off the wasps from his body and headed towards the deep mountain forests. He hadn’t used the Beast Taming skill today and was planning to use the mountain bees to gather honey.
"It’s a pity I haven’t discovered a beehive. If I could find a beehive, I wouldn’t lack honey to eat." Zhang Chen looked at the mountain scenery and couldn’t help but sigh softly.
In these deep mountain forests, beehives are well hidden and not easy to find. Moreover, Zhang Chen is not the kind of person who doesn’t work for what he gets. The bees work hard to collect honey, and if he took all of it, the bees would probably starve. It would be better to use the Beast Taming Technique to drive the bees to serve him for an hour, gradually accumulating honey over time.
The Beast Taming Technique was activated, and countless bees shuttled through the forest, laboriously collecting honey for Zhang Chen. An hour later, Zhang Chen looked at the jar with seven or eight ’caps’ of honey added, finally satisfied, he packed the honey into his basket and turned to walk towards the tomb.
Regarding the stone tablet in the tomb, he always felt uneasy. After all, it was something strange, and who knew what methods it might have. It was better to eliminate it as soon as possible.
He was somewhat worried: what if the strange entities in the world are truly immortal and undying, or what if he couldn’t destroy the stone tablet and it managed to escape?
If the stone tablet escaped, Zhang Chen feared he would never sleep peacefully again.
Zhang Chen headed to the tomb. At this moment, the flames inside the tomb had not yet extinguished, with waves of heat continuously surging out of the cave. Zhang Chen stood quietly at the entrance, waiting patiently. He had no other plans for the day, so waiting to see the changes of the stone tablet in the mountains put his mind at ease.
Zhang Chen started his climb at six in the morning, and eight hours later, the flames extinguished. It was around two-thirty in the afternoon, leaving an hour before Zhang Chen usually returned home.
Zhang Chen would typically climb out of the tomb around four in the afternoon, pack his things and head back, to avoid encountering any terrifying anomalies in the tomb.
When the flames in the tomb extinguished and the heat vanished, Zhang Chen crouched to enter the tomb. But once he entered, he couldn’t help but be stunned, staring at the stone tablet before him with shock on his face: "What is that?"
His eyes fell upon the stone tablet, which remained a stone tablet, but its color had changed. The stone skin color it had before had transformed into a jade-like hue after the fiery burning, resembling mutton fat jade—clean, smooth, and lustrous.
Inside the stone tablet, there was a faint red light circulating, countless threads weaving back and forth, appearing and disappearing from sight.
"Has it mutated?" Zhang Chen stood five steps away, scrutinizing the stone tablet. He looked at it intently for a long time and, seeing nothing unusual, carefully approached the cave and circled the stone tablet, but found no experience points or skill values falling from it.
"Interesting! Such a large piece of mutton fat jade, if I could carry it out and sell it, I might make a fortune, surely fetching a good price." Zhang Chen stood in front of the stone tablet, his eyes gleaming with golden light, scrutinizing the stone tablet from top to bottom, but seeing no anomalies. The blood-red writing on it had lost its luster, transforming into a golden-yellow color, with a hint of the divine.
In the palm of Zhang Chen’s hand, golden light burst forth, and he slapped the stone tablet. No, it should now be called the Jade Stele.
Golden light burst from Zhang Chen’s palm, directly penetrating into the stone tablet. This time, the penetration was deeper and further. As the red threads encountered the golden light, they evaporated completely. The strands of the jade stele were rendered void.
Zhang Chen adjusted his breathing, channeling his Light of the True God, continuously using it to invade the red threads within the stone tablet.
After an hour, Zhang Chen stopped his actions, eyes fixed on the stone tablet in front of him, his brow furrowed: "No change? Could it be that the strange entities of Heaven and Earth are truly immortal and undying? If so, that would be a problem."
A sense of urgency suddenly arose in Zhang Chen’s heart. Now the jade stele was moving every day, attempting to escape. He had to render it void before it managed to escape.
Seeing the cold air within the cave rise once more, Zhang Chen had no choice but to prepare to retreat.
Before leaving, Zhang Chen cast an uneasy glance at the stone tablet and headed back with a heavy heart.
Life suddenly seemed to have calmed down. If not for the pressure of paying rent, everything seemed peaceable. As usual, he checked the traps in the mountains and caught two wild chickens. Binding them, he cut some grass, and leisurely made his way home.
Upon reaching his doorstep, suddenly, golden light erupted from Zhang Chen’s eyes, and he saw a phantom-like young girl carrying a large bag of pork belly with a bowl of coarse rice, merrily walking over from the village.
"Damn it... no wonder the Fox Spirit isn’t causing me trouble anymore; it seems she’s tired of eating meat, and now she’s targeting the villagers instead." Seeing the approaching Fox Spirit from afar, Zhang Chen dared not look any longer and quickly headed to his courtyard.
He tossed the grass to two baby deer, entered the house, fed coarse rice to the wild chickens, then took out yesterday’s roast meat to make pan-fried pork belly, eating to his heart’s content before washing up and going to sleep.
The night passed without incident. Next door, the person and the Fox Spirit quieted down, and the blood-red book page hadn’t erupted with any anomalies in the past few days.
The next morning, Zhang Chen, with worries on his mind, awoke early and picked up a piece of steamed jerky, heading straight to the mountains.
He inspected traps, fed the Hunting Falcon, and hurried to the tomb, crawling into the cave, eyes locked on the luminescent jade-like stone tablet.
The stone tablet showed no experience points or skill values, but it had left a long trail on the ground, a deep imprint etched into the floor.
"Roughly a step’s distance. It means that in less than half a month, the jade stele will ’walk out’ of the tomb’s path and appear in the outside world. Once it reaches the outside, if it absorbs the Sun and Moon Essence or draws blood from external creatures, things will become even more unpredictable." Zhang Chen stood before the stone tablet, his eyes showing a hint of seriousness.
He no longer cared about gaining experience points or upgrading skills; he only wanted to destroy the stone tablet as quickly as possible.