Chapter 68.1

Editor: Kat

Proofreader: Junyans

“AH——!!”

IV-1’s eyes turned scarlet. The extreme pain and panic made him scream, and a great sense of deadly crisis encapsulated him. IV-1 was in a hurry to retreat, but he was not reconciled to not getting the remains of the Xiangxiong King. By sensing around, he used his hands to send flying claws at the fish, but he was not accurate in his aim. With a slamming sound, the claws hooked the eye sockets of the black stone skull inlaid with jade. The impact knocked the “jade” loose, but failed to completely remove it from the giant fish’s mouth.

IV-1 retracted his claws. Only the “jade” and the black stone around the “eye socket” had been hooked by his claws. However, IV-1 didn’t dare to use his hands to hold the items. He hurriedly stored them in a sealed pure gold box——this had originally been prepared for the tame head behind him. With this simple action, the nails on his fingers fell off like scraps of paper, and the skin on his fingers cracked. Now, it appeared like flesh sores had covered his skin and were oozing scarlet pus.

IV-1 felt that he couldn’t waste any more time. The sense of crisis he had felt extinguished the greediness in his heart. IV-1 immediately retreated from the lake water. Currently, he was in a horrible situation. It was obvious that his legs were on land, but he felt like he was stepping on mud and his body was wobbly. His head felt heavy, yet his legs felt light, and he felt an intense, unbearable, and intertwining sensation of pain and tingling. It was as if his whole body was boiling. His body was obviously hot, but he only felt cold and kept shivering.

He had no time to feel distressed about using so many points, and hurriedly bought a bottle of all-purpose healing medicine from the Travel Services. After drinking half of the bottle, he installed the nozzle and sprayed the medication all over his body. It cost 5,000 points for a bottle of the expensive medicinal liquid, and he sprayed two bottles in a row. Finally, the itchiness that could cause one to go insane subsided a little.

“Motherfucker,” IV-1 cursed in rage.

He resentfully remembered that the Dragon God was the source of 400 kinds of diseases in the world. If the Dragon God was angry, he would sow the seeds of plague on the world. IV-1 hadn’t taken this sentence to heart before. After all, this was a Difficult-level tour without supernatural elements. The more than 400 diseases mentioned by the descendant of the eagle flutist might have just meant that the dragon fish carried some kind of virus or bacteria.

Moreover, what this descendant of the eagle flutist said was bullshit! He clearly said that if IV-1 gave the Dragon God enough sacrifices, he could get the remains of the Xiangxiong King. But he saw that after the dragon fish ate the sacrifices and vomited, it didn’t spit out anything. Was the descendant of the eagle flutist trying to fool him!

If it weren’t for the strong flashlight, he wouldn’t even have been able to see the black stone skull. Therefore, wouldn’t all the effort he had put in be wasted?! Thinking of this, IV-1 felt unreconciled again. In any case, he was now injured. If he had been more ruthless back then and taken the entire skull out, it would have been better than only getting a few pieces of the stone inlaid in the skull.

But when he looked at Tangra Yumco again, IV-1 found that the aquatic reptile had disappeared in the depths of the lake. There was only a dirty bloodstain around the lake, and the surroundings were in a mess. IV-1 staggered and was about to go back but once he took a step backwards, he stopped. His face changed constantly, then he turned around in a rage and reluctantly returned to the shore.

“Who knows if IV-1 has enough points to deal with this mess.”

Mao Xiaole was drinking iced Coke and staring at IV-1’s bloody face as he ate food. He ate a few chicken legs and said, “At the very least, he has to use another bottle of sterilizing antiviral cleaning agents, and a bottle of anti-radiation medicine. He just used two bottles of panacea, right? It might have used up all his points.”

“You don’t have to worry about him exploiting Three Waters. Gosh, how could Three Waters be the one to be exploited by him?”

Wang Pengpai was hugging an entire family bucket of fried chicken. Compared to Mao Xiaole, his tastes were considered to be ordinary. After seeing that IV-1’s body was festering and oozing pus, and that he looked like a human skin skeleton, his appetite had been greatly reduced. Wang Pengpai ate fries and muttered, “What a shameful trash. Why didn’t he remember to use his cloak to cover himself.”

All the tours organized by the Travel Services occured in reality. Because most of them were exploring restricted areas, they would encounter many obstacles, and these obstacles might alter the local natural environment. In this respect, the supernatural tours weren’t that bad. If a ghost king was killed, it would not damage the ecological environment, but for tours without supernatural factors like Northern Tibet, the black stone jade skull in the belly of the aquatic reptile would definitely be an object with high radiation. It might also be a huge ticking bomb that carried many terrifying virus strains.

Wenbunan Village rested on the shore of Tangra Yumco. If it was not handled properly, it was likely that the skull would bring about a cruel plague. And tourists and tour guides couldn’t be completely depended on to wipe the plague out, given how “conscientious” they were. Fortunately, the Travel Services had unspoken rules, which could prevent IV-1 from being noticed by the residents of Wenbunan Village and the local government when he engaged in killing sacrifices by the lake, and they could also force him to clean up his mess before he left.

Even if IV-1 was so distressed that he was bleeding inwardly because of the huge amount of points he would have to spend, he had to complete the clean up. If his points were not enough, then he could take out a loan from the Travel Services.

Anyway, this wasn’t the concern of the audience watching the livestream outside of the tour. Now, the situation was extremely chaotic in IV-1’s livestream room. Apart from people scolding IV-1 as a noob, a dog, or an ugly piece of shit, more of them were arguing.

Why did IV-1 honestly conduct the sacrificial ceremony? And why did the aquatic reptile directly spit out the black stone jade skull when IV-1 shone the strong flashlight on it? Last night, Wei Xun had obviously dealt more damage than that. He had snatched a sacrifice from the mouth of the aquatic reptile, shone a strong beam of light on it, and even joined the snow leopard to leave countless scars on the aquatic reptile. So why hadn’t the dragon fish punished him?

It seemed that IV-1 was indeed a bit aggrieved.

[Would this fish have the same attitude when dealing with a beautiful and an ugly person? Even if the aquatic reptile is an animal, he knows that Wei Xun is good-looking.]

[Maybe this is a difference in talent. IV-1 is a toad that wants to eat swan meat, and it’s very pleasing to see this idiot meet with such an end]

Back at Mao Xiaole’s place, Mao Xiaole took his mobile phone and opened the Thrilling Tour app. After hiding his identity, he began to boast about Three Waters irrationally, feeling extremely happy. Many people were led astray by him, but there were also some rational people in their midst.

[I think there are a few reasons why this happened]

[First, Wei Xun acted prior to IV-1. Judging from the remains of the bone piles in South Village, it is possible that some people have been secretly offering sacrifices to the aquatic reptile during this period, and the aquatic reptile is used to being fed by humans and does not have its guard up against humans. Hence, when Wei Xun did all that, it was equivalent to the fish receiving a slap from Wei Xun. It was stunned, because the fish had still been naively waiting for Wei Xun to feed it.]

[Second, Wei Xun’s title of A Wild Beast’s Psyche may have made the aquatic reptile more tolerant towards him. Even if the aquatic reptile had once been kept in captivity before the Kingdom of Xiangxiong had been destroyed, it has definitely been a wild animal in this lake for a long time. It can still be regarded as a wild animal]

[Third, it was because Wei Xun had the snow leopard. The snow leopard has always been a snow elf in the Tibetan area, a sacred beast of the snow mountain, and a mount during the battle of the sacred mountain. Both are species in Tibetan myths and legends, and there may be a relationship between snow leopards and the aquatic reptile.]

[Looking at the battle yesterday, we can see clearly that Wei Xun only used the flashlight to shine a light on the aquatic reptile and the fish opened its mouth——and the mouth of the aquatic reptile had been stuck together by some kind of glue-like substance. When it swallowed the sacrifice, it finally opened its mouth. From this aspect, Wei Xun can’t be considered to have caused too much harm to the aquatic reptile, and most of the wounds on its body were left by the snow leopard]

[As for IV-1, it was really just bad luck. The aquatic reptile had just been harmed and now hated humans, and it was on guard against any assault. IV-1 sent poisonous snakes and the tame head to bite the dragon fish. This attack was more harmful when compared to Wei Xun, who had tried to “pry” open the dragon fish’s mouth. Of course, the most important thing is that the aquatic reptile had already spit out the wet corpse and skull to Wei Xun. Now that the enraged aquatic reptile had vomited everything valuable out, of course whatever it vomited out for IV-1 would be nothing good.]

[P.S. This is the analysis of Bai Xiaosheng, and I am just a hard-working message porter]

“Tsk, Bai Xiaosheng is secretly goofing off again. He didn’t obediently monitor the situation at Andean Civilization’s Gate of the Sun.”

Mao Xiaole pouted as he watched the commentary barrage compliment Bai Xiaosheng, saying things like, “As expected of Big Boss Bai Xiaosheng,” “Big Boss, I got it,” “What the boss said makes sense!” He put down his phone in a hurry.

Wang Pengpai said cheerfully, “Isn’t the captain also inside the tour? Brother Bai has a cold face and a warm heart. He must be worried about the captain’s situation.”

“What’s the situation? Captain is having a good time with my Teacher Wei.”

Mao Xiaole was a little jealous and said, “The two of them who possess [A Wild Beast’s Psyche] are now sticking together. I think Teacher Wei wants to bring the snow leopard home to raise it.”

“Indeed, you’re right. Two people with [A Wild Beast’s Psyche] sticking together is really miraculous.”

Wang Pengpai rubbed his chin, and felt it was strange. “I think the captain’s condition is now getting better, what do you think? If that’s the case, everyone doesn’t have to work hard to drill into a 30th Parallel North tour. We can take our time doing that.”

“It’s hard to say. Didn’t even Astrologer say before that the captain’s strange illness can only be relieved by finding enough Maria Butterfly fragments?”

Mao Xiaole was skeptical. “Didn’t you see that the captain had been completely unable to sleep before entering the Northern Tibet tour. Even when he murdered someone, he couldn’t feel relief. We only own 1/5 of the Maria Butterfly fragments. That’s completely insufficient. It would be better if we had more of them.”

“Right.”

Wang Pengpai sighed and said, “If it weren’t for the fact that Northern Tibet was just a Difficult-level tour and not a Extremely Dangerous-level one, just looking at Wei Xun’s actions, I would guess that he would open up a 30th Parallel North tour.”

“Regardless of the modern subdivisions of the various regions in Tibet, if we just talk about the past Xiangxiong Dynasty, the entire Xiangxiong Kingdom seemed to be able to form a tour that is of a higher level than a 30th Parallel North tour. In other words, it can also be said that the Xiangxiong Dynasty stands a level higher than 30th Parallel North tours.”

When Mao Xiaole spoke about how Three Waters might stir up a huge storm, his sleepiness was wiped away. He replied excitedly, “Maybe it’s really possible?”

Although it was impossible for this Northern Tibet tour to directly open up a new tour of the 30th Parallel North, it was very possible that one could find important clues in it! In order to discover more 30th Parallel North tours, they, the Homeward tour party, entered Tibet at least six or seven times a year. Each member of the tour party could be said to be very familiar regarding the various historical facts and legends of Tibet.

Most of the historical materials in Tibet were from the seventh century AD because in the seventh century, Songtsen Gampo had sent 16 smart youths to Tianzhu to study Sanskrit. In the end, 15 people died in a foreign country, and only one person had successfully returned to the Tibetan Empire. Later, this person incorporated Sanskrit with the local language of that time to create the Tibetan language.

Since then, Tibetans had their own writing language and history could be recorded. However, history only recorded the victors. In fact, as early as the seventh century AD, there had been a vast and extremely powerful dynasty on the Tibetan plateau, the Xiangxiong Dynasty. The Bon teachings became the teachings the state advocated for. And this spread across the places which were under ancient Xiangxiong Kingdom rule, which spans from western Tibet to northern India, and even to Pakistan.

However, in the eighth century AD, the Tibetan Empire had destroyed the Xiangxiong Dynasty. It was recorded in Dunhuang manuscripts that Songtsen Gampo’s younger sister Sad-ma-kar had married the last generation of Xiangxiong kings, Li Mixiu, and become his imperial concubine. Later, she had cooperated with Songtsen Gampo, and the king had been assassinated while offering sacrifices to the lake. The Tibetan Empire conquered Xiangxiong, Tibetan Buddhism also replaced the Yungdrung Bon religion and the history of Xiangxiong Dynasty was also wiped out under the rolling wheels of history.

According to historical records, when the ancient Xiangxiong Dynasty had been at its peak, it had been divided into upper, middle, and lower districts. Each district had 10,000 households and a total population of one million people. The upper districts were located in areas like the Kailash Range, while the western regions consisted of Iran, Ladakh, and Baladi. The imperial capital was the Silver Palace of Garuda Valley. The middle district was the area east of the Kailash Range, including the eastern regions of the present-day Ngari and the western regions of Nagqu, with Tangra Xiangxiong as the capital.*

And the ruins of the Xiangxiong Kingdom were what Wei Xun and the others would be exploring in their tour.

However, a huge group of tombs had been discovered at the ruins on the other side of the Silver Palace of Garuda Valley. More than 1,800 tombs constituted a tomb group of more than 100,000 square meters. Numerous pottery, stone, iron, and bone tools had been unearthed, and there was even one bronze double-sided statue. However, at the Xiangxiong site on Qianzong Mountain, only dilapidated watchtowers and city walls with earth and stone structures had been found.

Those underground passageways and the imperial capital were both eroded due to the corrosion of time, and no glimpse of the grandeur of the old days was present there.

Generally speaking, ordinary people couldn’t excavate the remains of ruins, likely due to supernatural forces. These areas were the focus of the tour groups and tour guides.

However, most of the high-risk tours in Tibet were concentrated on Mount Kailash and Mount Everest. Tours related to northern Tibet were rare, and most of them were below Dangerous-level. Because the Tibetan area was vast, the scenic spots were distributed far away, and since there were many snow-capped mountains and lakes, most of them were “exploratory” tours. Tourists would spend most of their time in a vehicle, and the dangerous aspects consisted of the harsh environment of the plateau and wild animals.

Most exploratory type tours could only be regarded as Difficult-level tours. For example, this tour to Northern Tibet, which specifically involved the Ruins of Xiangxiong Kingdom and Xiaolin Temple, was actually very rare. It was IV-1’s luck that he was able to lead this tour. It seemed that his luck was similar to that of III-9, who had been allowed to lead an Intoxicating Xiangxi tour. It was no wonder why many tour guide alliances had tried to recruit him.

The tourists in large tour parties couldn’t enter lower-level tours unless they used special means. For example, unless the entire tour party acted together, everyone in the Homeward tour party would only be able to enter the special tour at the year-end celebration. The special tour would probably be one of the very few Extremely Dangerous-level tours, or a tour of the 30th Parallel North.

Therefore, most of the large tour parties divided themselves to act separately so that they could embark on most of the Extremely Dangerous-level tours.

T/N: Backlogged chapter (1/2) – next backlogged chapter will be published on weds.

*The asterisk was added because the author has listed some reference materials in the author’s notes they referred to when writing the chapter. (See c68.3 when it’s posted).