Chapter 1113: Chapter 1113: Snake Heads

“Two passages?” From the look on his face, Adrian seemed to be quite surprised.

Curling his lips, Lincoln said, “If you decide to take the passage on the left, you won't ever be able to step foot into the Dark Underground Palace until the end of time!”

Originally, when he agreed to Adrian's request, it had been solely because he helped him to gain his freedom. Back then, he wasn't really expecting that Adrian would be insisting on taking the seven Spirit Supreme Realm warriors along with them.

To be capable of cultivating to such a level, it should go without saying that none of them were fools. Lincoln might have been so relaxed all the time, but he was also quite a brave and cautious man. The seven brothers, on the other hand, were by no means good people. There was a good chance that they'd opt to take all of the treasures the moment he opened the entrance to the underground palace.

Be that as it might, Lincoln had faith in his own abilities. And on top of that, he was even more confident in Zen's capabilities.

If they could behave well in the process, things would be good, but were they to do something that troubled him or Zen, they would just be shooting themselves in the foot.

The moment the hidden passage was opened, a dark and numbing aura blew out from deep within. It felt as though a countless number of ghosts had been rushing toward them, with each and every single one of them baring their fangs and swinging their claws, raring to tear everyone to shreds.

“Such a dense amount of dark energy!” Ab exclaimed in awe.

“It's a good thing that I brought this with me.”

Adrian, who had been standing on the side, brought out several pale yellow branches. These branches were from the Sun Flame Tree. It was a type of tree with fire attribute, which was rather hard to come by. It only grew at the top of a number of volcanoes. In the event that a volcano would erupt and the tree would get covered by layers of lava, the Sun Flame Tree would not burn, and instead, it would actually even draw in the heat from the lava itself.

Making use of the branches from the Sun Flame Tree to withstand the dark energy was a great plan. It was something that Lincoln had asked them to prepare beforehand.

As if Freya was carrying out a feat of magic, two branches of the Sun Flame Tree suddenly manifested in her hands. After handing one over to Zen, she kept one for herself. Then, with just a wave of Zen's hand, two balls of fire appeared and ignited the tips of the branches they were holding.

Despite the fact that the branches of the Sun Flame Tree were completely dry, the speed at which they had been burned wasn't that fast. In actuality, they simply let out a bit of smoke as dark red light was emitted from the burning area.

When the branches were lit up, the dark energy suddenly met its archenemy. It was just like ice and snow coming into contact with a big fire as it rapidly melted away.

“Well, then. Let's go in,” Lincoln said, as he held onto a branch of the Sun Flame Tree, showing them the way into the hidden passage.

The lips of the seven brothers moved slightly, making it seem as though they were communicating through the use of life vitality. Even though Zen was unable to hear anything, he could tell from just a single glance that they were probably up to no good.

He and Freya then stepped into the depths of the passage as well, each of them having a branch of Sun Flame Tree in their hands.

Zen's lips moved just the slightest bit, and he whispered to Lincoln in secret, “Those guys seem to be plotting something.”

“Are you going to turn tail?” Letting out a soft chuckle, Lincoln couldn't help but poke fun at him.

“Are you kidding me?” Zen replied flatly. “I just wanted you to know.”

“There's no need for you to get anxious. It's gonna be just fine if these guys don't do anything, and I'll keep my promise and give them their shares. And even if they do, then they'll just be digging their own graves,” Lincoln replied, sounding so sure of himself. Right after saying that, he asked Zen, “Isn't that right, Zen?”

From this, it was easy to understand that he intended for Zen to be on his side.

“Of course.” There was a deadpan look on Zen's face. Truth be told, he couldn't really care less about the agreement made between Lincoln and those warriors. That being said, if those people acted recklessly, he wouldn't really have any qualms about getting rid of them whatsoever.

Right now, it wasn't just the people from the Magnolia Sacred Place who had their eyes on them.

In the Purple Bamboo Sacred Place of the Demon Night, there were also some warriors who had been keeping a watchful eye on them.

“They have already located the second passage. It looks like they came prepared, or at least, they didn't come barging in.” The Saint Lord of the sacred place stood atop the highest leaf. Despite the leaf being just about the size of a palm, it was still able to hold the weight of a warrior.

“They've just arrived at the second passage. That doesn't really count for anything, given the fact that they still have seven passages ahead of them. What's more, with regards to this matter of the Dark and Light Nine-turn Passage, it wasn't much of a secret anyway. One could easily ask around in the Dark World and learn about it. The only thing we have to do is wait and see whether they really have a way to open the underground palace or not,” stated another Demon Night woman, with a smile creeping onto her face. 𝙧ä₦Ổ𝐛ƐŜ

If one intended to get to the Dark Underground Palace, there was no other choice but to go through the Dark and Light Nine-turn Passage, and all of those nine turns had to be chosen correctly. If they so much as made a mistake along the way, then entering the underground palace would be out of the question, and one could only aimlessly go through the endless maze of passages.

The level of difficulty of making it through the Dark and Light Nine-turn Passage might not appear to be too high at first glance. One would have to accurately choose between two different passages nine times. If one were to pin their hope solely on luck, the probability of getting through and choosing all the correct passages was only one in 1, 028.

In any case, it wasn't really that big of a secret in the Dark World whether one should take the light or the dark passage. One could find that out without difficulty by simply asking around in this supreme world.

However, at this moment, the three great races were all hoping that Lincoln's group had not learned of this secret from asking around in the Dark World, but from other supreme worlds. Only then would they be able to have hopes of opening the underground palace.

The things that the Supreme Lord from remote ages had left behind were exceedingly tempting to any tenth-grade sacred place. For that reason, it shouldn't come as a surprise that everyone, be it ogres or Demon Night members, would have their attentions completely focused on every single person who had stepped foot into the place.

After a couple of hours of walking along the dimly-lit passage, Lincoln suddenly stopped once again. Then, he proceeded to open up a light passage that didn't seem to contain any dark energy.

What they had to do next was travel back and forth between two entirely distinct passages with Lincoln leading the way.

Going through each passage would take a couple of hours. Upon making their way through the sixth and seventh passages, they opted to take some time to rest before going on their way.

Finally, after two days and two nights of seemingly endless walking, they were now done pacing through this inconceivably long passage.

Turning his head around to gaze upon the passage which they had just walked through, Coy blurted out, with fear apparently still remaining in his heart, “Just how long is this passage? We should probably be a long way away from Auspice City by this time, right?”

“It's not that far away,” answered Adrian, who had been staying on the tail end of the group, pointing with his finger. “It is indeed true that every single one of these passages is of quite a considerable length, but all of these passages had been designed in a way that we have only been walking in two big circles around Auspice City. At this point, we should have already made our way back to the bottom part of the city.”

“Are we actually right below Auspice City?” Finn Hou cried out, seemingly so dumbfounded.

Nodding his head, Lincoln answered apathetically, “What Adrian said is correct. We are currently at the bottom of Auspice City. All of you, follow me!”

After telling them that, Lincoln led the way and was the first to exit the passage. Hearing his words, the group immediately followed him.

The moment they got out of the passage, the area surrounding them turned bright in an instant. And right in front of everyone was a colossal statue of a Nine-head Snake that was about the size of a mountain.

“Five heads of the Nine-head Snake have already been cut off!” exclaimed Freya all of a sudden, who was standing behind Zen, with her eyes wide open.

There were a total of nine massive snake heads protruding on top of the huge statue. Every single one of them had their fangs exposed, giving them the appearance like they could swallow the warriors at any second. Apart from that, the statue had quite a lifelike appearance. However, five out of the nine snake heads were severed just around the neck area, leaving behind only four snake heads still intact.

Lincoln sized up the snake heads before he flew up and headed straight toward the seventh head of the Nine-head Snake statue.

“The seventh head of the snake statue? Is that how he's going to open the seventh passage? Ha-ha, it seems like we're gonna need to get our disciples ready to go on an exploration of the underground palace. If the underground palace really were to get opened, it's going to take a lot of effort to fight for it and take everything inside!” Meanwhile, in the Dark Asura Sacred Place of the Dark World, a mountain-like ogre warrior had his gaze fixated on the scene that was happening in front of him and let out a blaring laugh, appearing as though he had great confidence in Lincoln's following actions.

There was a total of nine ways to open the underground palace created by the Supreme Lord from remote ages, and those nine ways had been carefully passed down from generation to generation in great secrecy. None of the methods which could be used to open the underground palace were alike, so it was almost impossible to work those things out. And above all else, the Supreme Lord had placed quite a troublesome enchanted barrier inside the underground palace for undisclosed reasons.

For a Soul Sea Realm or Spirit Supreme Realm warrior, this enchanted barrier could be considered as an overwhelming experience. Be that as it might, to a lot of world lords and Supreme Lords, it wasn't really something particularly worth mentioning.

The main problem was that as long as the enchanted barrier received any sort of damage, everything in the underground palace would be destroyed instantly. For that very reason, not a single mighty warrior could force their way in.