Fire Hell wasn't devoid of plants, but the vegetation here had long since mutated into peculiar forms to adapt to the extreme heat. Most plants here were as hard as metal, their colors a deep green verging on black, with sparse, broad leaves and well-developed root systems.
But the plants before them were low shrubs with lush, thriving foliage radiating a vibrant green, looking like the delicate, moisture-loving plants found only in warm, wet river towns.
Li Nian also poked her head out of the cabin.
"Whoa, this place is practically a paradise on earth! I bet if we go in there, we'll find some good stuff!"
Sanyang drove the escort cart closer, and the moment they crossed a certain distance from the Taoist Temple, it felt like they passed through an invisible barrier!
A wave of true, incomparable coolness washed over them.
"This place... is truly mysterious. I've been escorting carts for years, yet I've never heard of such a spot."
Yue Zhenqiao couldn't help murmuring.
Chen Yuanye shook his head. "This place isn't on the main road to begin with, so almost no one passes by here. Besides, in earlier years, there were confusing mazes and trapping formations here... they only failed a few years ago."
"If my family hadn't told me about it, I wouldn't know such a good place existed either."
The group dismounted from the escort cart and slowly approached the Taoist Temple.
The green stone slabs in front of the temple were spotless, with only the occasional fallen branch lying on them, producing a faint rustling sound when stepped on.
Lin Yu looked up and saw that the temple's walls showed almost no signs of age. Only moss covered the base, with a few collapsed gaps indicating the place had been abandoned. The plaque above the door was so worn that its characters were barely legible, allowing only a vague reading of "Lay Practitioner's Cultivation Retreat," but the prefix before "Lay Practitioner" was completely indistinguishable.
Although Chen Yuanye had been here before, Lin Yu couldn't help but remain cautious.
Just as Lin Yu was carefully observing, he saw Li Nian approaching with Little Fire Dragon and the other players.
"What's up?"
Lin Yu looked at Li Nian and asked.
Li Nian lowered her voice. "He says this is the exact place where they first entered the dungeon!"
Lin Yu raised an eyebrow in surprise.
"That can't be right. Wasn't the Taoist Temple outside Twin Saw Mountain? That's how the map shows it too!"
Li Nian stepped aside, and Little Fire Dragon spoke firmly. "But the Taoist Temple we entered at the start was identical to this one... Either the temple moved, or there are two completely identical temples."
"Of course, since we got lost in between, there's also a chance we made an error... but like you said... the map also shows it that way!"
Hearing Little Fire Dragon's words, Lin Yu frowned slightly.
"Let's take another look at the map."
He unfolded the map again and studied it. According to the damaged map, the Taoist Temple's marked location should indeed be some distance outside Twin Saw Mountain.
But where they were now wasn't marked on the map at all.
Lin Yu let out a breath.
"How strange... According to Chen Yuanye, this temple has been here for quite some time—but you all saw another identical temple half a day's journey away."
"There's definitely something suspicious about this!"
Deadshot, who had come closer, also spoke up and offered his opinion.
"So, are we still going in?"
Flying Knife asked cautiously.
"Of course we have to go in. This strangeness has already set its sights on us. If we don't actively deal with it, are we just going to hope it lets us leave for Willow Town?" Lin Yu said calmly. "I'm not in the habit of leaving an unknown enemy at my back."
"Since those three say they've seen this temple before, we have to go in and check it out... See if the layout inside is the same."
With that, Lin Yu pushed open the creaking wooden door and stepped inside.
After all... his psychic perception hadn't sensed anything wrong.
Inside the temple's courtyard, weeds had grown wild, full of life. White flowers even sprouted from the soil in the cracks of the green stone slabs.
The tiles on the main hall's roof were chipped and incomplete, allowing sunlight—much gentler than outside—to stream through the gaps, casting mottled patterns of light and shadow on the ground.
In front of the hall, an incense burner lay toppled, ash scattered everywhere. The only thing still standing inside the hall was a broken deity statue, but it was covered—just like the beams, tiles, and walls—in thick layers of old cobwebs.
Chen Yuanye and the escort guards walked inside, resting and catching their breath in the temple with its normal climate.
Though the crisis wasn't over yet, this comfortable temperature was indeed perfect for a short break.
Lin Yu turned to Deadshot, Little Fire Dragon, and Squirtle.
"Well? Is it the same as the place you saw?"
Deadshot nodded. "Yes... the layout is basically identical."
"If you go to the back courtyard now, you'll find a dry skeleton wearing a tattered Daoist robe."
As he spoke, Lin Yu nodded and immediately passed through the back door of the main hall, arriving at the temple's rear courtyard.
And just as Deadshot had said, a withered skeleton sat in the courtyard.
Other than that, there was nothing particularly unusual about the back courtyard.
Lin Yu retreated back and fell into thought.
"Hmm... truly strange. For it to be this identical, it can't be two separate temples. It has to be the same one."
"So the question is... how did it teleport a hundred li within a few hours?"
Lin Yu didn't dwell on how the temple managed this. After all, in the Prison Mountain Realm, it wasn't impossible for some Fangshi to use sorcery or mystical arts to move a building a certain distance.
Besides, this building itself had numerous formations; it might even be able to move on its own—after all, its aesthetic seemed like it had been arbitrarily plopped down here.
So the key issue wasn't how it happened, but why it happened.
Lin Yu carefully pondered this newly emerging strangeness.
Since entering the Prison Mountain Realm, there had been far too many inexplicable oddities...
This made Lin Yu recall Senior's intel—according to that information, the Prison Mountain Realm was mostly filled with 【Competition】 and 【Slaughter】 dungeons, so it shouldn't require too much scheming.
After all, although the demons here were cunning and treacherous, their methods were definitely inferior to those on Misty Islands or in Night Valley.
Thinking this, Lin Yu looked back at the map he had taken from Little Fire Dragon.
"Speaking of which... Senior Brother Chen, that demon you were ordered to hunt back then—was it this one?"
Lin Yu pointed at the marker on the map and asked.
Chen Yuanye casually replied, "The demon I was sent to purge was rumored to be a blood-drinking bat demon. Your map here... huh?"
Chen Yuanye was somewhat surprised. "Using a skull to mark a demon? That's an old method the Daoist sect stopped using long ago. But my master taught me—one skull means Six-String, and two means Twelve-String. Because this classification was too rough, later on the Daoist sect, the Fangshi, and us martial artists all unified it and called it 'String.'"
"But what are these three skulls supposed to mean? Was it drawn wrong?"
