Brian Cooper finally made up his mind that day, but the last sliver of hope he had been waiting for in his heart—the reinforcements from the Holy City—ultimately never arrived.

After a long time, Brian Cooper finally lit the torch once more. The firelight illuminated the darkness of the refuge again, but what appeared before his eyes was not a pleasant scene.

Brian Cooper forced himself to suppress the urge to vomit, found the weapon he needed, and took some fresh water and dry rations from the storeroom, packing them on his person... Once everything was ready, he walked to the great jade door.

The mechanism for the stone door was behind the wall. As Brian Cooper reached out to open it, he suddenly paused, then threw the torch to the ground and stomped it out. Taking a deep breath, gritting his teeth, he forcefully pulled the lever.

"Boom..."

After so long, the rumbling sound echoed once more in the darkness.

A heavy sound came from underground as the thick stone door began to move slowly. When a gap opened between the door and the wall, a breeze blew in from outside, and a beam of light shone through.

Brian Cooper stood in the darkness, gazing at that beam of light.

It was sunlight.

It seemed to be daytime outside, and the weather looked pretty good.

Blue sky and white clouds, the forest lush and green, a gentle breeze rustling the leaves and branches, making a soft, subtle sound—not noisy, but instead adding a touch of tranquility to the place.

It looked like it should be afternoon, a time that ought to be a peaceful midday, but all Brian Cooper saw before him was a scene of brutal bloodshed. There was no tranquility here, only death. This was not a paradise, but a hell.

Corpses lay piled upon the ground, many of them mangled and incomplete. After so many days, the blood had dried and turned black, and many of the bodies had begun to rot and stink.

Brian Cooper took his first step outside, and immediately saw his former friend.

The captain was already dead.

His once tall, burly, and strong body was now just a corpse, sprawled on the ground, eyes still wide open, face twisted in a grimace of fear and despair. His mouth was open too, as if he had been shouting and screaming even in his final moments.

There was a huge round wound in his back, piercing through his entire body and ultimately claiming his life.

Brian Cooper looked at him in silence, the corner of his eye twitching. After a moment, he quietly walked around his friend's corpse and moved forward.

Ahead lay even more gruesome and terrifying remains.

All sorts of strange and rare flies and maggots appeared on this nightmare-like ground. As Brian Cooper slowly walked out of the jade chamber, his steps landed on soil blackened by soaked blood. Everything he saw before him—even though he was no stranger to life and death, and his will had been tempered to be exceptionally tough—still made him feel a stifling discomfort, a faint urge to vomit.

Fortunately, he did not lose his composure. Gritting his teeth, he forced down his discomfort, gripped his weapon tightly, and moved forward slowly and cautiously.

There was no path before his eyes or beneath his feet. Perhaps there once had been, but now it was buried under the omnipresent, terrifying corpses. Most of the time, he had nowhere to step, and had to jump, climb over, or even step on some of the bodies to move forward.

It was a painful and torturous process. The dead, with their twisted, demonic faces, though stiff and dried, still looked as if they might leap up at any moment, turning into vengeful spirits to drag the living down to hell with them.

Brian Cooper's palms were slightly sweaty.

But, thankfully, that terrifying scene did not occur.

The dead were just dead; they would not rise again.

Brian Cooper kept moving forward, carefully watching his step, while also scanning the distance around him, because what he feared most now was that the terrifying and mysterious monster might still be lurking nearby.

However, it seemed his luck was good. After walking two or three zhang away from the jade chamber, there was still no movement nearby. It looked like the ferocious monster had already left.

This allowed Brian Cooper to breathe a sigh of relief, and his steps grew lighter. But just then, as he happened to step over a nearby corpse—because three or four bodies were piled up there, leaving him nowhere to land—he had no choice but to leap over them. In the process, he bumped into one of the corpses, which rolled half a turn on the ground, changing from a facedown position to lying on its back.

Brian Cooper was about to keep moving forward, but suddenly froze, stopping in his tracks.

He turned to look back, his expression grim, even a bit ashen.

In the afternoon sunlight, the corpse's face was twisted into an indescribably horrifying shape, but Brian Cooper did not look at its face. His gaze was fixed intently on the dead man's chest and abdomen.