58: Chapter 58 Flesh and Blood as a Pen: The Last Line of Defense for Memory

Old Ghost led everyone deep into the valley to find the stone door.

Taking advantage of everyone's busyness, Lin Sa quietly walked to Wu Lie's side.

“Hey, Old Shotgun.” Lin Sa's voice was a bit raspy.

Wu Lie turned around and looked at Lin Sa: “What is it? Want to learn a few tricks?”

“Give me two Proximity Explosives and a Bear Trap.” Lin Sa got straight to the point, her tone leaving no room for doubt.

“What do you want these for?” Wu Lie frowned, instinctively protecting his backpack.

wkan.com, take your pick.

A flicker of imperceptible anxiety flashed in Lin Sa's eyes: “I lost my life-saving items just now. In this godforsaken place, I don't feel at ease without some heavy hardware in my hands.”

Wu Lie hesitated for a moment but eventually pulled the items out while grumbling: “Use them sparingly; this is my personal stock!”

Lin Sa took the explosives and quickly stuffed them into her tactical backpack.

The two continued deeper, and Xu Mo stopped by a broken Altar at the deepest part of the valley.

There lay a dried-up corpse wearing a WWII-era expedition suit, long since weathered. But in the corpse's hand, it tightly gripped a notebook that had already carbonized.

Xu Mo crouched down and carefully peeled back the last page.

There was only a single line of blackened words on it:

“Here, death is not the end... forgetting is.”

Boom—!

It felt as if something had suddenly exploded deep within his brain, the buzzing sound lingering for a long time.

Xu Mo froze on the spot, his gaze locked onto the empty space before him; that inexplicable sense of horror almost felt like it was going to rip the top of his skull off.

He forced himself to stay calm, his gaze scanning the crowd one by one.

“The head count matches; no one is missing from my memory.”

But then, why were his hands shaking?

His brain's instinct was frantically warning his logic—his memory had been tampered with!

A look of resolve flashed in Xu Mo's eyes as he walked to Lin Sa's side.

“Lin Sa, lend me your dagger.” Xu Mo's voice was incredibly raspy, as if it had been rubbed against sandpaper.

“What's wrong with you?” Lin Sa's brow furrowed; she keenly sensed that Xu Mo's state was not quite right.

“Trust me, lend it to me!” Xu Mo looked up, his bloodshot eyes staring fixedly at her.

Lin Sa was jolted by that look, and she ultimately let go.

Taking the “blood kiss,” Xu Mo didn't hesitate for a second and abruptly rolled up his left sleeve.

The moment the cold blade touched his skin, he didn't even flinch.

Slash—!

Flesh was sliced open, and bright red blood instantly splattered, the warm liquid dripping down his forearm.

On the muscle tissue where his sense of pain was most acute, he deeply carved a twisted, hideous, deep-to-the-bone number—“7.”

“Hiss—” Lin Sa sucked in a breath of cold air and was about to step forward to stop him, but she was pinned in place by Xu Mo's cold gaze.

Xu Mo expressionlessly lowered his sleeve, letting the blood spread and become sticky against the fabric.

He put back on that mask of calmness that was almost callous and stood back in the center of the Altar.

Eyes can lie, and the brain can be rebooted, but the pain carved into the marrow of the bone will never tell a lie.

By this time, Old Ghost had already reached the secret door behind the mountain wall, and that Camera, radiating an evil aura, emerged from the Altar once more.

Old Ghost had already found the stone door hidden behind the mountain wall, and that familiar Camera embedded in the Altar appeared once again.

“Quick! Everyone come and stand still! The beast swarm might be coming back; we'll be safe once the door opens!” Old Ghost's voice was urgent.

He had been constantly paying attention to Xu Mo; this clever person seemed to have discovered his secret just now.

“Old Ghost! Why are you standing so far away? We haven't even entered the viewfinder yet!” Xu Mo suddenly roared.

“There's no time! Listen to that noise, the monsters have entered the valley!” The honesty on Old Ghost's face vanished completely, replaced by a hysterical ferocity, his finger already tightly gripping the shutter release cable.

“Lin Sa! Stop him!”

Xu Mo's command was as fast as lightning.

Lin Sa's killing instinct erupted completely; the Soul-Hooking Chain shot out from her sleeve like a black dragon, instantly entangling Old Ghost's ankle and jerking him backward!

“Ah!”

Old Ghost let out a miserable scream and was pulled down, falling flat on his face.

The moment Old Ghost hit the ground, with a madness that screamed “if I can't have it, I'll destroy it,” he slammed down the shutter button.

Xu Mo took advantage of this moment to grab Lin Sa's arm, and the two of them rushed into the Camera's field of view.

Click—!!

Blinding white light exploded instantly; at that moment, it felt as if even the soul was forcibly frozen in place.

The white light faded, and the world fell into a deathly silence.

Xu Mo felt like his brain had undergone a reboot, and the sense of void made him nearly retch.

Lin Sa stood dazed, still tightly clutching the Soul-Hooking Chain, but her eyes were extremely vacant.

She looked at Old Ghost, who had just scrambled up from the ground, and tilted her head in confusion: “Strange... why did I just pull this old man?”

The team members behind them also began to criticize them one after another.

“Are you two crazy? Attacking our only living map at a critical moment, do you have a death wish?”

“Exactly, without Old Ghost leading the way, we would have died in that pile of skeletons long ago!”

Xu Mo didn't respond, his face as pale as paper.

He was trying hard to search through his memory fragments.

Why did he move against Old Ghost?

His mind was a complete blank, like a painting that had been forcibly wiped away.

“Alright, the door is open, let's go quickly.” Old Ghost brushed the dust off himself and turned around.

In that instant, his cloudy old eyes had become venomous and cold.

Everyone hurriedly packed their supplies and stepped through the stone door.

Lin Sa carried her backpack, walking at the very back.

While organizing her backpack, her eyelid twitched. There were two explosives and a Bear Trap in her bag.

“These things... whose are they?” Lin Sa picked up the explosives and held them up in front of everyone.

“Not mine, my bag is packed full.”

“Not mine either, who would dare to carry these things around? You'd blow yourself up.”

The team members shook their heads one after another, looking at Lin Sa as if she were an idiot.

Old Ghost walked over and gave them an indifferent glance: “Maybe you picked them up at some point and forgot. Lin Sa, don't be so paranoid, let's go!”

Xu Mo didn't say anything, falling to the very back of the group.

It wasn't until the entire team stepped into that shadow that swallowed everything that he quietly stopped.

He took a deep breath and slowly, tremblingly rolled up his left sleeve.

On his arm, that fresh wound was still constantly seeping blood.

A strikingly red, even somewhat twisted number—7.

Counting himself, this team... now only has 6 people.

Xu Mo stared intently at Old Ghost's back as he talked and laughed with the team members; the dread in his heart transformed into an ultimate killing intent!