Chapter 687
Chapter 687
Whoooosh.
A cool wind blew through the place. Shen Lang had expected the cave to be completely sealed and reek, but that wasn't the case. Instead, a strange fragrance filled the air, and it was so dark he couldn't see his own hand in front of his face. When Shen Lang lit a torch, another chill ran down his spine. The ground beneath his feet was covered with countless skeletons, most of them not white, but black. Who knew how many people had been thrown into this Cave of Ten Thousand Snakes over the long years for the skeletons to be piled up like mountains.
But something was strange. Tossing people into the Cave of Ten Thousand Snakes was merely a punishment; it wasn't as if they were feeding the venomous snakes. So how did tens of thousands of vipers survive without food? Shen Lang saw only human bones, not the bones of any small animals. This meant the Shaman Tribe did not deliberately feed the snakes, which implied that these vipers hunted for food elsewhere to reproduce, and this place was simply their den. As he widened his view, Shen Lang quickly looked away.
‘That nearly scared me to death.’
It was his fear of dense clusters. He and Li Qianqiu were surrounded by countless venomous snakes, a dense, writhing mass of black shapes gathered around them. Moreover, every snake, big or small, was half-reared up, its head raised and body coiled like a spring, ready to strike at any moment.
‘Master Wu Daozi, you’re a lifesaver. Thank goodness you gave me this bonsai pot, otherwise, I would have been a dead man today.’
Shen Lang then tried to get his bearings and search for the possible entrance to the ancient ruins. But just then, the countless venomous snakes receded like a wave.
‘What does this mean? Are they running away?’
Shen Lang soon realized how naive he was. The snakes were preparing to welcome their king. All the vipers prostrated themselves on the ground, and soon, Shen Lang saw the Snake King.
‘That’s the Snake King? What kind of snake is that? It’s not a cobra, nor a python. It’s a snake of moderate size, about eight meters long, slithering slowly, yet its presence is surprisingly noble.’
How did Shen Lang know it was the Snake King? It had a crest-like growth on its head, which made it look particularly majestic and easy to identify. A Cockscomb Snake? It didn't seem so. This snake was much more handsome than a Cockscomb Snake. Shen Lang couldn't find any data on this snake in his mind’s database.
Seeing the Snake King slither toward Shen Lang, Sword King Li Qianqiu gripped the hilt of his sword, ready to kill it. The Snake King’s gaze immediately shifted to Li Qianqiu. Truly formidable. It could sense killing intent instantly. The vivid butterflies gifted by Wu Daozi enveloped Shen Lang and Li Qianqiu, forcing the countless snakes to retreat. At that moment, the Snake King suddenly opened its mouth and spat something out. Sword King Li Qianqiu immediately held his breath and sealed every pore on his body, as even skin could absorb the toxin. It seemed the Snake King was about to release its venom.
As expected, a white, mist-like breath shot out like an arrow, and the countless butterflies protecting Shen Lang and Li Qianqiu instantly fell to the ground, dead. It was like watching leaves fall in autumn. Shen Lang's heart ached. Each of these vivid butterflies was as precious as a treasure, a natural enemy to venomous snakes. Yet they couldn't withstand the Snake King's breath. The remaining butterflies all flew back into the box, disguising themselves as leaves and petals on the bonsai.
‘Damn it, even the butterflies are scared? So the butterflies from Mount Fudao are useless against this thing.’
The Snake King then slithered toward Shen Lang and Li Qianqiu. Tens of thousands of vipers slithered forward in unison, and Shen Lang truly felt like he was about to piss his pants. Li Qianqiu once again reached for his sword.
“Senior Sword King, don't move.”
No matter how high Li Qianqiu's martial arts were, he couldn't possibly kill tens of thousands of vipers. Even ten grandmasters would not leave this cave alive.
But when the Snake King reached Shen Lang, it unexpectedly licked him with its tongue.
‘Hey! Do you think you're Bai Suzhen?’
The next moment, the Snake King slithered onto Shen Lang's body and coiled around him once. It seemed to be smelling him. Shen Lang still didn't move a muscle.
‘This does not feel good at all.’
But Shen Lang was confident he wouldn't be bitten to death by the venomous snake. After all, even the ancient insects of Mount Fudao couldn't withstand his blood and all died. The Snake King wrapped around Shen Lang's arm, lifted his hand, and even spread it open. Then, it bared its sharp fangs and swiftly slit Shen Lang's palm. The movement was incredibly fast; as soon as it scraped his palm with its fangs, it recoiled like lightning. After a long moment, a single drop of blood welled up on Shen Lang's palm. The Snake King cautiously lowered its head and smelled the blood. And then...
Swish!
The Snake King slithered off Shen Lang's body and left immediately, disappearing without a trace in an instant.
‘Damn it. What does that mean?’
After the Snake King left, the tens of thousands of vipers left with it. They didn't flee as if running for their lives, but rather departed as if they had decided to ignore Shen Lang, casually wandering away. In the blink of an eye, all the snakes had vanished completely, leaving only countless skeletons in the cave. Shen Lang and Li Qianqiu looked at each other.
‘What in the world just happened? What exactly did Prince Gong experience back then?’
Shen Lang clearly felt that the Snake King felt neither intimacy nor hostility toward him, but an intention to keep a respectful distance.
‘That's fine by me.’
Shen Lang then began to search for the path. The interior of this cave was vast, open on all sides like a labyrinth; anyone who entered would surely get lost. Shen Lang scanned the area with his X-ray vision but found no clues. He also felt a breeze in the cave. Just like before, he could feel a wind, and not a small one, flowing through all the caves.
‘How strange. We're hundreds of meters underground. Where is this wind coming from?’
“We must search this cave!”
Shen Lang and Li Qianqiu then entered the cave and began their search for the ancient ruins. The first cave was a dead end. The second cave was the same. The third, the fourth, the fifth... After a full ten hours, Shen Lang and Li Qianqiu had found nothing. There was no shadow of any ancient ruins in these interconnected underground caves. When Shen Lang found a small, sparkling, translucent cave among them, he thought he might find the ruins he was looking for inside. But upon entering, he found two snakes coiled together, engaged in a very important act. It was a dead end, with nothing inside.
Snakes are most ferocious when engaged in such acts, so as soon as Shen Lang entered the cave, the two snakes instantly went berserk, but they too soon fled. They didn't attack him, still maintaining an attitude of respectful distance. Shen Lang was highly suspicious. Did ordinary snakes also have the intelligence to fear him? Just then, Sword King Li Qianqiu told him that the Snake King had left some kind of mark on his body, causing all the snakes to flee upon smelling the Snake King's aura.
***
After twenty hours, Shen Lang, having once again toiled in vain, returned to the center of the cave.
‘What is going on? Was my guess wrong? Are there no ancient ruins here at all? Could Prince Gong have encountered some other fortunate opportunity after surviving the Cave of Ten Thousand Snakes? That can't be... If there are ancient ruins within the Shaman Tribe's territory, this is the most likely place. Otherwise, why would countless vipers make their nest here? Besides, the entrance to ancient ruins usually has distinct features. For example, if the undersea earthquake hadn't happened last year, the entrance to the ancient ruins on Black Rock Island would never have appeared.’
The giant stone statue holding a planet, with various maps on it, was a clear sign of ancient ruins. So, what was the most special place in this cave labyrinth? It was the sparkling, translucent cave where the two snakes had been engaged in their important act. Shen Lang went back into that small cave and meticulously studied every nook and cranny, but still found nothing. He had already searched it more than ten times. Even scanning it with his X-ray vision revealed nothing. The reason it was sparkling and translucent wasn't because the cave was made of jade; many other types of stone could have this characteristic. But among all the caves, this small one was the most unique.
Li Qianqiu said to him.
“Perhaps we need to wait. Young Master Shen, what you lack most is patience.”
Shen Lang was taken aback and nodded. He then sat down and waited, and waited. He didn't know how much time had passed. Suddenly, a beam of light shone in. It looked like moonlight. How truly strange. This was an underground cave, so how could moonlight possibly enter? Shen Lang soon figured it out. The stone walls of this cave were as smooth as mirrors, allowing light to reflect and enter. After multiple reflections, the light was able to illuminate the inside of this small cave.
“There are words on here!”
Just as Li Qianqiu said, words appeared on the smooth stone wall of the cave. They looked like fluorescent writing, arranged like a table. The first line had the number 2. The second line had the number 7. The third line had the number 227. The fourth line was blank, and the fifth line had a question mark. It was very clearly another arithmetic problem. So it was ancient ruins after all. To open the entrance to these ancient ruins, one had to write the answer on the fifth line.
“Senior Sword King, can you solve this?”
“I can't make heads or tails of it.”
In fact, most people in this world would not be able to understand this problem. Moreover, the numbers written on the wall were an early form of Arabic numerals. On Earth, they were likely invented by ancient Indians several centuries BCE. The moment Shen Lang saw it, he couldn't believe his eyes.
‘Prince Gong solved a problem this difficult all those years ago? This is a conundrum for the ages.’
Why couldn't Shen Lang believe that Prince Gong was such a genius? Because most people in this world wouldn't even understand what the problem was asking. But Shen Lang recognized it at a glance. The entrance to the ancient ruins on Black Rock Island required the use of the four-color theorem. This problem in the Cave of Ten Thousand Snakes required the use of the most fascinating word in the world of mathematics: 'prime'.
A prime number is a positive integer greater than 1 that has no positive divisors other than 1 and itself. On the cave wall, the 2 on the first line is the first prime number. The 7 on the second line is also a prime number, the fourth prime number, to be exact. The 227 on the third line is the 49th prime number. The rule was very clear: the number on the next line was the prime number whose position was the square of the position of the prime on the line above. This meant that the number to be written on the fourth line was the 2,401st prime number (the square of 49), which would require a very difficult calculation. The answer was probably 21,467.
But this was not the answer the ancient ruins required. It asked for the answer to the fifth line. This meant the fifth line was the prime number at the 460,832,089th position (the square of 21,467). Don't these numbers alone make your head spin? That's right. He had to write down a prime number that was somewhere after the 460 millionth position. This was a devilish problem, a problem that could drive a person mad. If one had to calculate it by human power alone, it would take a very, very long time. Using the most foolish method, a conservative estimate would be several decades, and one would use millions of sheets of paper just for the calculations.