After blocking the mine, Xu Xin didn't dare to stay on the edge of the hill any longer. He immediately turned over and rode on the Silver King, commanding it to rush into the resource area surrounded by hills and began to plunder blue-level resources as quickly as possible.
Basically the same as the resource area over at the tree house.
There are not many fruit-bearing trees or shrubs here. The only blue-level resources are a few poplar trees and a rosewood tree. However, he did find a blue-level medicinal herb, which is of no use to him, but can be used to make blue-level pills for Qi Xuefei.
As for food, there was only an ordinary green-level apricot tree and a small patch of green-level mushrooms. Adhering to the principle of not wasting, Xu Xin collected all of them and put them into his backpack.
After exploring the entire resource area, Xu Xin rode the Silver King to the altar of the beast statue.
Last time, the Silver King was very afraid of this altar and even trembled when he stepped into it. But this time, he didn't feel afraid at all and stepped into the beast altar easily.
Perhaps it was because after it became a mutated beast, it was no longer one of the sacrifices on the altar.
“Click.”
The moment the Silver King stepped into the altar, the strange voice sounded again from under the altar. Then Mimi also stepped into the altar, but did not make any sound.
Xu Xin had anticipated this and was not frightened. He looked at the four stone pillars on the four corners of the altar.
"Is that really the case?" he thought.
Two of the original four stone pillars had already been destroyed by Xu Xin through sacrifice, and they should have been empty, but now, new statues have appeared on the stone pillars.
Originally, there was a statue of a mouse in the place where the rabbit statue was.
Compared to its body which is smaller than other statues, its front teeth are very scary, like two sharp guillotines, as if it can chop off the heads of other creatures with one bite.
The wild cat statue is replaced by a fox statue.
The size of the statue is similar to that of a wild cat, but the proportions of its tail are very exaggerated. The fluffy tail is raised high, twice as long as the body, and much larger than the entire body. However, Xu Xin could not tell at a glance what powerful abilities this tail has.
However, the wild boar and wolf statues did not change, not even the blood-red patterns on them changed.
When I left last time, the pattern on the wild boar statue pillar had basically spread to the statue, and now the pattern is still at that position. It seems that as long as I sacrifice four or five more fangs, I should be able to summon the intermediate mutant wild boar with terrifying fangs in the statue.
Unfortunately, all the beasts in the jungle have now disappeared. If one wants to offer sacrifices to the altar, they can only wait until the beasts return.
Xu Xin suddenly thought of something.
The last time the ground of this altar was scratched by the blood-marked rabbit's ears, the two scratches were quickly repaired and the ground recovered automatically, which was very similar to the situation in the salt mine cave just now!
… Shit, this altar can’t be a living thing!
He felt a chill at the thought that he might be standing on top of a big guy.
No, no, no, it shouldn’t be.
Every time you step onto this altar, a "click" sound is heard from beneath the ground. This sound obviously sounds like some mechanical mechanism, not like a sound made by a living thing.
I just don’t know what kind of mechanism he triggers every time he steps onto this altar.
"嘤!" Coco had been looking around on Xu Xin's shoulder. Suddenly, she saw something and cried out. She pointed her little paws at the altar in the center of the altar, indicating that there was something over there at Xu Xin's side.
Xu Xin looked over there, and sure enough, there was a very small object on the altar.
"That is..."
Riding the Silver King forward, Xu Xin saw the small objects placed on the altar clearly, and his expression changed immediately.
“… Why is this thing here?!”
Xu Xin looked at the ring on the altar with a look of surprise.
He was very familiar with this ring, after all, he had worn it for a while.
Isn't this the ring he gave back to Chang Yin? The ring Chang Yin made for Xue Lan himself!
Why is this ring here
Changyin family... have been here
Xu Xin looked at the ring. The original ring was a blue-level material that emitted blue light. However, the ring on the altar had turned into an ordinary ring. Under Xu Xin's identification ability, the ring emitted white light.
The blue level ring has become white level
Xu Xin picked up the ring from the altar.
Damaged Mutated Beast Ring (White): A ring that once had remarkable abilities, but after being sacrificed it has been completely damaged and has become a very ordinary ring.
This ring was offered to the altar.
Chang Yin said that the ring contained materials from high-level mutated beasts, and perhaps that was why it could be sacrificed on the altar.
But why did Changyin's family come here to offer sacrifice
Could it be…
Xu Xin suddenly realized what would happen here after offering sacrifices to the altar.
Isn’t it just about turning the beast statue into a real beast!
Could it be that Changyin and his family want to turn back into humans by offering sacrifices here
Very likely. Very likely.
They said that they would do something big on the ground, which was what the mysterious voice had promised. They also said that they would give him an unexpected surprise when they met next time.
Moreover, Xue Lan was so impatient to leave that he didn't even want to sit in his tree house.
Now it seems that they probably just want to get to this altar quickly, offer sacrifices to the altar, and then turn back into humans.
This was probably the promise that the mysterious voice gave them, promising that they would be turned back into humans once again after they returned to the ground.
But... did they succeed
Xu Xin looked around the altar. Apart from this ring, there was nothing else related to Chang Yin Xuelan's family.
He thought of the process by which the beast statue was transformed into a beast.
Blood-red patterns crawled all over the body, and then the statue cracked, a red light became brighter, and finally the statue shattered. A mid-level mutated blood-marked beast emerged from the broken stone statue, as if it had shed a layer of stone skin.
If this is also the process of Changyin's family becoming human...
Xu Xin took a deep breath.
The first step in transforming a statue into a living being is to cover the entire statue with blood-red patterns.
If this is true, they may have become mutated humans, just like the first survivors in the dungeon who grew blood-marked hair all over their bodies and became mutated monsters.
Of course, this is just Xu Xin's guess, but this guess is not impossible, and it is even quite likely.
"Is this really going to happen..." Xu Xin was now very worried about the Changyin family. This family was his life-and-death friendship. He helped them get to the surface, and similarly, without the help of this family, he was afraid that he would not be able to return to the surface.
He really didn't want anything to happen to the Changyin family. Not only did they have the ability to make contracts that he didn't have, they were also partners he recognized in his heart.
While worried, he thought of what the maid had said to Xue Lan.
"Ma'am, there's no need to rush about that matter. It's useless to go now. We can wait until dark before setting off."
This is what she said when she persuaded Xue Lan to visit Xu Xin's tree house.
It's useless to go there during the day, it's only useful at night.
… Could it be that the altar at night is different from the altar during the day
Thinking about it carefully, he had indeed never seen the altar at night. The latest was only evening, and there was still sunset glow in the sky. It was still some time before dark. He didn't want to be outside before dark, so he hurried back to the tree house.
"... Come and have a look tonight." Xu Xin planned to come here fully armed tonight to have a look.
If Changyin's family really had any trouble, he could do his part to help.
Xu Xin checked the altar knife in the altar again and unexpectedly found that the altar knife was no longer in the altar. The small stone drawer was now empty.
"…was it taken away by Chang Yin and his men?" Xu Xin muttered to himself, "Could it be that they are still operating in this resource area?"
Last time, Xu Xin took the altar knife back to the tree house, which led to the appearance of the blood-marked troll. Since nothing happened around now, does it mean that the person holding the altar knife is not far away
But Xu Xin had just explored almost every place around him and didn't find anything else moving.
There were no red dots on the map. Of course, the Changyin family, like Coco and the giant crocodile, did not display their targets on the map. He had confirmed this after coming out of the dungeon.
No, there is one place that has not been checked.
The lakes and lake bottoms in this resource area.
"Come on, Silver King, Mimi, let's go to the lake and take a look." Xu Xin jumped onto the wolf, and Silver King immediately ran away.
When they arrived at the lake, the lake was in a completely different condition from the last time Xu Xin came.
Last time, there were many wild animals drinking water by the lake, and there were some red dots in the shallow water area of the lake, which were crocodiles. But now, both by the lake and in the lake, it was very calm, and there were no red dots on the map.
Xu Xin could vaguely see a few fish swimming in the lake. They should be the only remaining fish in the lake.
Xu Xin touched Coco's little head, which was lying on the back of Silver King's neck, and said, "You guys wait on the shore, I'll go down and take a look."
“Bing!” “Ouch!”
He is currently wearing a purple-grade anaconda scale armor set, which allows him to move freely underwater. Although he has not yet consumed the blue-grade fish bladder that he just obtained to enhance his ability to resist water pressure, a short dive will not be a problem.
He didn't intend to consume all the blue-level resources here. His dining table, stove, and grill could maximize the effects of the resources. It would be a waste to eat them here.
The lake here shouldn't be that deep, right? Let's go down and take a look first.
Xu Xin didn't eat any aquatic plants either. He took a deep breath and jumped into the water.
He opened his eyes in the water and could see the entire scene in the lake.
It was a very ordinary lake. Its depth gradually increased from the lakeside to the center. It was only about six or seven meters deep in the center. Compared with the lake next to the tree house, this place was much more normal.
He wandered around under the water and found that there were no resources in the lake.
Um
Before he swam to the center of the lake, Xu Xin found several footprints on the mud at the bottom of the lake.
There were three adult footprints and one child's footprint. The footprints were very heavy and sank deep into the soil.
These are the footprints of Changyin’s family!
They walked underwater!
Xu Xin swam upstream quickly, ate the water plants, dived again, and swam in the direction of the footprints.
The footprints were not heading straight in one direction, but were winding around at the bottom of the lake, as if they were looking for something.
Finally, the footprints of several people stopped near the center of the lake.
In front of the footprints, there was a deep hole as big as a well. Looking inside, it was pitch black and there was no bottom to be seen.
Coming again
Did they jump
… Is this going back underground?!