Chapter 274: Bluewave city 6.

"Yes."

"How far down?"

"About two hundred zhang."

"There should be water."

"There is."

Mo Yuxin stopped.

The passage opened into a huge underground chamber.

And an entire street had been built beneath the city.

Wooden houses stood in rows.

Old shop signs hung from cracked beams.

A stone road ran through the middle.

There were wells.

Bridges.

Shrines.

Even a small square with a dry fountain.

It was an underground town.

Su Yubing stared.

"Bluewave City was built over another city."

Mo Yuxin nodded.

"Or around it."

They walked farther.

The buildings were empty.

No bodies.

No skeletons.

No signs of violence.

Only abandonment.

Mo Yuxin touched the wall of a house.

A faint spiritual imprint remained.

Families had lived here.

Children.

Shopkeepers.

Cultivators.

Fishermen.

Normal people.

Then, one day, they had left.

Or disappeared.

The underground street was silent enough that their footsteps sounded loud.

Su Yubing reached for Mo Yuxin’s hand again.

She did not look afraid, but Mo Yuxin knew her well enough to recognize the slight tension in her fingers.

"Do you feel it?" Su Yubing asked.

"Yes."

Something was observing them.

Not from ahead.

Not from behind.

From everywhere.

The entire underground city felt like one enormous living thing that had opened an eye.

They continued.

At the end of the road stood a stone temple.

Its doors were open.

Inside was a statue of a woman holding a bell.

The statue had no face.

Mo Yuxin stepped closer.

The bronze token reappeared in front of them.

Not the broken pieces.

The whole token.

It floated in the air.

Su Yubing frowned.

"It rebuilt itself."

Mo Yuxin nodded.

The token moved toward the statue.

Then it stopped.

A crack appeared across the stone floor.

The entire temple shook.

A voice echoed through the chamber.

"Who brought the Key of Tides here?"

Neither woman answered.

The voice came again.

"Who brought the Key of Tides here?"

Mo Yuxin looked at the token.

"That is not its original name."

Su Yubing nodded.

"No. Someone renamed it."

The voice became colder.

"Return the key."

Mo Yuxin crossed her arms.

"No."

Silence.

Su Yubing looked at her.

"You did not even ask what it does."

"It is demanding something. That is enough reason to refuse."

Su Yubing smiled.

"Very reasonable."

The floor opened.

A column of seawater shot upward.

It rose several dozen zhang before collapsing around them.

But not a single drop touched Mo Yuxin or Su Yubing.

An invisible barrier separated them from the water.

The water stopped in the air.

A massive shadow formed inside it.

A woman’s face appeared.

Her eyes were closed.

Her hair floated as if underwater.

She looked ancient.

Not old in the mortal sense, but ancient in the way some mountains felt ancient.

"The seal is failing," the woman said.

Mo Yuxin’s expression changed slightly.

"What seal?"

"The sea beneath the city."

Su Yubing frowned.

"What is sealed beneath it?"

The woman did not answer.

Instead she looked at Mo Yuxin.

Then at Su Yubing.

For some reason, her expression became strangely complicated.

"You should not be here."

Mo Yuxin asked, "Why?"

"Because you are not who you appear to be."

Su Yubing’s eyes narrowed.

"Neither are you."

The woman’s face disappeared.

The seawater collapsed.

A shockwave swept through the temple.

This time Mo Yuxin deliberately released a tiny amount of power.

The shockwave disappeared before it touched them.

She looked at Su Yubing.

"That was not a normal city formation."

"No."

"It is ancient."

"Very."

"And it recognized us."

Su Yubing was quiet.

Then she said, "Maybe it recognized me."

Mo Yuxin immediately turned to her.

"What do you mean?"

Su Yubing frowned.

"I do not know. But when that woman looked at me, I felt something familiar."

Mo Yuxin stepped closer.

"What kind of familiar?"

"Like hearing a song I knew before I was born."

Mo Yuxin did not like the sound of that.

She took Su Yubing’s hand and squeezed it.

"We leave."

Su Yubing nodded.

They turned around.

The path behind them was gone.

The underground street no longer existed.

Instead, there was only water.

An endless black ocean stretched from one side of the chamber to the other.

Mo Yuxin narrowed her eyes.

"Illusion."

"Probably."

"Do you want to break it?"

Su Yubing looked at the water.

"Not yet."

Mo Yuxin glanced at her.

"Why?"

"Because something is coming."

A ship emerged from the darkness.

The same black ship they had seen outside.

It sailed through the chamber as though the entire underground space had become an ocean.

The deck was empty.

At least, it looked empty.

Then a figure appeared at the bow.

A man dressed in blue robes.

His face was pale.

His eyes were empty.

Su Yubing whispered, "The missing merchant captain."

Mo Yuxin recognized him from a notice posted at the harbor.

Captain Lu Wei.

He looked at them.

His lips moved.

"Do not let them ring the seventh bell."

The ship passed through them.

The figure disappeared.

Mo Yuxin’s eyes remained fixed on the place where it vanished.

"Seven bells."

Su Yubing nodded.

"We have heard three."

A bell rang.

Dong.

Four.

Another.

Dong.

Five.

Then nothing.

They waited.

No sixth bell.

The silence became heavier.

Mo Yuxin looked toward the ceiling.

"Someone is stopping the formation."

"Or delaying it."

A soft noise came from the darkness behind the statue.

A human footstep.

Then another.

Someone was walking toward them.

Su Yubing moved closer to Mo Yuxin.

Mo Yuxin’s expression was calm, but her spiritual energy was already circulating beneath the surface.

A woman stepped out of the darkness.

She was dressed in the uniform of the Bluewave Merchant Alliance.

She was young, perhaps thirty years old.

Her hair was tied neatly.

She carried a sword.

And there was a small wound across her cheek.

"Do not attack," she said.

Mo Yuxin did not move.

"Who are you?"

"Han Qing."

Su Yubing’s eyes narrowed.

The woman they had seen in the city earlier.

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TO BE CONTINUED.