I am the Clone of a Death Row Inmate-Chapter 53: Digging a Hole

Ye Muni could only watch as Feng Bqing took Su Ze and burrowed into the ground. He had no way to pursue them. His specialty was fire; he couldn’t very well burn down the entire mountain.

He turned to Amida and demanded, "Mr. Amida, why didn’t you do anything?"

But Amida’s expression was grave as he shook his head. "I did act. It was just... useless!"

"Useless?" Ye Muni didn’t quite understand what he meant.

"I only specialize in mental attacks. Just now, I launched my strongest mental assault on Feng Bqing, but he had no reaction whatsoever."

"That’s impossible!" Ye Muni couldn’t believe it, but he also knew Amida wouldn’t lie to him about something like this.

Amida pondered for a moment before saying, "Feng Bqing is incredibly powerful. As evolvers of the same level, my mental attack was never going to be a fatal threat to him. At most, it would have affected his mind, but he’s already in a state of mental damage."

"What use is a mental attack against a mental patient?"

"Well..." Ye Muni had no answer for that.

Seeing Su Ze get away, Liou Wenxin and Mrs. Yun both breathed a sigh of relief. However, they remained worried for him, wondering what fate awaited him after being abducted by a lunatic.

...

At that moment, Su Ze was on a fantastical journey.

Green light of evolution emanated from Feng Bqing, illuminating the darkness of the underground.

Su Ze felt as if his body had merged with the soil, constantly sinking downward. From the perspective of a passerby, he witnessed a completely different sight within the mountain.

He saw a Burrowing Mouse skilled at digging, the nests of cave ants, a hibernating Red-Scaled Serpent, and... a maggot!

A gigantic maggot shuttled nimbly through the earth, a true eye-opener for Su Ze.

’Could this be the legendary "extract blind box"—the Dung Eater?’

Su Ze had heard of this miraculous mutated beast, but this was the first time he had seen one with his own eyes.

It was said that the Dung Eater’s body structure was exceedingly strange. It fed on the feces of various mutated beasts, and while digesting, it had a certain chance of copying gene fragments from the original owner of the feces.

These gene fragments often corresponded to a certain skill. The Dung Eater couldn’t use these skills; they were simply sealed within its body to be used as a reference for its next evolution.

However, when a human evolver absorbed a Dung Eater’s extract, they had a chance to obtain these skills.

A single vial of wild Dung Eater extract could contain dozens or even hundreds of skills, ranging from those of E-rank mutated beasts to the top-tier skills of S-rank beasts. Which skill one absorbed was purely a matter of luck.

That’s why Dung Eater extract had earned the nickname "extract blind box."

Su Ze merely found it novel. He himself had no interest in opening skill blind boxes. ’I’m rich, so there’s no need!’

Within this mountain was a completely different world, a whole other vista.

There were caves everywhere, mutated beasts everywhere, and roots.

The roots of the Spirit Root Tree!

If the entire mountain were a person, then the roots of the Spirit Root Tree were like blood vessels, spread throughout its entire body.

Su Ze couldn’t imagine what a commotion such a behemoth would cause if it started to fight.

The brief clash between the Spirit Root Tree and Feng Bqing had already caused the mountain to crack and sent tremors like an earthquake through the surrounding Mengka City and Heiyan City.

’As expected of a Spiritual Plant on the verge of evolving to the fifth rank...’ Su Ze guessed that the four Saint-level experts from the two nations were hesitant to act because they were wary of the Spirit Root Tree’s power. They knew killing it would be no easy task, and they feared that the Filth Earth Organization and Feng Bqing would cause trouble at a critical moment.

That was why they wanted to eliminate the members of the Filth Earth Organization before making a move.

But that was easier said than done. It was too difficult to achieve. They had no way to specifically target someone like Feng Bqing, who possessed such powerful survival skills.

Feng Bqing carried Su Ze as he burrowed straight down, not stopping even when he reached the base of the mountain. He continued deeper beneath the surface, finally coming to a stop in a spacious underground cavern.

Su Ze felt his body once again undergo a strange transformation, returning from a state of shadow to his original body of flesh and blood.

This underground cavern had likely been dug out by some mutated beast, but it was now abandoned. Inside, there was nothing but a few animal skeletons.

"BLEGH..."

The moment he arrived, Su Ze started to dry heave. It wasn’t because of any strange smell in the cavern, but because the stench coming from Feng Bqing was too foul.

He hadn’t been able to smell it while in his shadow state, but now that he was right next to Feng Bqing, the nauseating odor drilled straight into his nostrils.

"Qiangzi, what’s wrong?" Feng Bqing asked with concern.

But immediately after, he clutched his head with both hands and began to wail on the ground.

Su Ze was stunned. He didn’t know that Feng Bqing had been hit by Amida’s mental attack; he thought Feng Bqing was just switching to a new script.

Su Ze quickly backed away. He didn’t mind Feng Bqing changing scripts, but he was afraid the man would suddenly go berserk and attack him. The gruesome sight of Zhang Fantie’s death was still fresh in his mind.

Feng Bqing rolled on the ground, clutching his head and repeatedly pleading, "Stop chanting, Master, stop chanting! I’ll never do it again!"

Su Ze had intended to go over and help him up, maybe even ask him to escort him to Dongli to retrieve the scriptures. But then he feared Feng Bqing might suddenly pull out a staff and beat him with it. After a moment’s thought, he decided to just let him perform his one-man show alone.

’It’s not that I haven’t thought about escaping while I have the chance,’ Su Ze thought, ’but the cavern exit is sealed. If I try to dig my way out, it’ll take until who knows when.’ He only wished he had learned the Burrowing Mouse’s burrowing skill.

After an unknown amount of time, Feng Bqing’s head seemed to stop hurting. He was no longer wailing, but he didn’t get up either. He just lay there on the ground, sniffed the air, and, as if he’d caught a scent, started digging at a patch of dirt.

His hands moved with incredible speed, like two iron shovels, and in the blink of an eye, he had dug a large pit.

’Turns out the Burrowing Mouse’s burrowing skill is pretty damn useless,’ Su Ze mused. ’A Saint-level expert can dig just as fast without any skills.’

Before long, Feng Bqing had dug a half-meter-deep hole in the earth. At that point, he stopped.

Su Ze crept a little closer to look. Inside the hole, a finger-thick root had been unearthed. It was a root from the Spirit Root Tree.

Feng Bqing put his nose close to the root and sniffed it, then immediately continued digging in the direction it extended from.

The hole grew deeper and deeper, turning into a tunnel, and the length of the root exposed to the air grew longer and longer.

Su Ze maintained a certain distance, following behind Feng Bqing. The tunnel Feng Bqing dug was so low that Su Ze could only follow by hunching over.

In just a few minutes, a hundred-meter-long tunnel lay before Su Ze.

’Looks like he’s following the clue to its source. Is he planning to follow this root all the way to the Spirit Root Tree’s main trunk?’

’Then again, doesn’t he have that skill to turn into a shadow and pass right through? Why bother digging a tunnel?’

’Skill cooldown?’

’Ah, who knows what a madman is thinking.’

Su Ze just felt that the man was courting death.

’No, Feng Bqing might not necessarily die from acting so recklessly, but if I dare to follow him, I’ll definitely die a quick death.’

The moment the Spirit Root Tree reacted and counterattacked Feng Bqing, even the slightest aftershock from a clash between Saint-level beings would be enough to send Su Ze to meet the God of Evolution.

’Speaking of which, why hasn’t the Spirit Root Tree reacted at all yet?’