72: The Boundaries of Taboo

Hope is like a glimmer of light suddenly appearing in the abyss of eternal night, enough to ignite all the will to survive in a living being.

That greyish-black angular shape was the light!

"Over there!"

Lin Feng roared, his voice already hoarse beyond recognition, yet it carried a hint of desperate madness.

He saw the ruins, like a drowning prisoner seeing the only rock he could climb onto. He had no idea what kind of hellish place it was, but every cell in his body was screaming—there, it was their only way out!

"Go!"

He supported Wang Dalong, who was almost turning into a pile of limp mud, tightly pinning his heavy arm onto his own shoulder. Using his last ounce of strength, he almost dragged and pulled him in a desperate charge toward that greyish-black silhouette.

"Hang in there! Dalong! We're almost there!" Lin Feng roared into his ear, both to encourage him and to command himself not to fall.

Wang Dalong's consciousness was already blurred; aside from the wheezing sound like a broken bellows, he could no longer make any sounds. He could only rely on the force of being dragged to mechanically move those legs that no longer felt like his own.

The loud noise behind them grew closer and more violent!

"Boom—Rumble!"

The Emperor Crocodile seemed to have discovered their intentions, and its patience for playing with its prey vanished instantly. It was no longer strolling leisurely but suddenly accelerated, its four thick, short legs digging frantically, its massive body turning into an out-of-control heavy tank, crashing through the jungle!

"Boom! Boom! Boom!"

The frequency of the ground's tremors suddenly quickened like dense drumbeats, each strike hammering at the hearts of Lin Feng and Wang Daya. The "crack" of trees as thick as bowls being snapped and the "thud" of boulders being crushed blended together, composing a symphony of death.

Lin Feng could even clearly feel a hot wind mixed with blood, stench, and violent aura, whipping against the back of his neck like a lash!

He instinctively glanced back.

That single glance almost froze the blood in his veins!

That prehistoric behemoth was less than twenty meters away from them!

Its bloody maw was slightly open, and between its sharp, snow-white teeth hung half of Juan's blood-stained, tattered clothes and blurred flesh!

Those cold vertical pupils were locked onto them, filled with nothing but pure, predatory killing intent!

"Ah—Ahhh!"

Wang Dalong also caught a glimpse of that hellish scene, and his dilated pupils suddenly shrank to the size of pinheads. A scream filled with extreme terror, sounding entirely inhuman, exploded from deep within his throat!

In the final moment, the instinct for survival squeezed out the last bit of potential in his body.

He actually broke free from Lin Feng's support and, as if injected with adrenaline, stumbled forward on his own, his speed even faster than before!

Was this the so-called final glow before death?

The silhouette of the ruins rapidly enlarged in their field of vision.

It was a complex of buildings constructed from exaggeratedly large, unpolished black rocks. The walls were towering, with a rugged and primitive style, as if they were building blocks casually stacked by ancient giants. The walls were covered with thick vines and dense moss, emitting a desolate aura of ancient times forgotten by time.

The entrance was a massive arched stone gate over ten meters high.

Behind the gate was a bottomless darkness, like the throat of a man-eating beast opened wide, leading to some unknown world.

Ten meters!

Five meters!

Closer! Even closer!

Lin Feng and Wang Dalong almost used both hands and feet, rolling and crawling as they lunged toward the stone gate.

At that very moment, behind them, the Emperor Crocodile let out a roar that shook the mountains and forests! It raised its hill-like massive head, and its enormous shadow instantly enveloped the two of them completely.

The shadow of death was so real!

It opened its maw, large enough to swallow a car, preparing to finish off these two bugs that had been bouncing around in front of it for so long in one bite!

A moment of life and death!

"Thud!"

Wang Dalong was the first to lunge into the stone gate, his body slamming heavily onto the ground.

Immediately after, Lin Feng also leapt inside.

After rushing in, they didn't dare stop, staggering forward another dozen meters by their final momentum before both collapsed completely on the ground from exhaustion, like two dead fish out of water.

The expected excruciating pain and the sensation of being crushed did not come.

Behind them, the deafening roar and the earth-shaking pursuit also came to an abrupt halt.

The whole world was deathly silent.

Lin Feng lay on the cold, hard stone slabs, his chest heaving violently as he gasped for air, his lungs burning. The immense sense of collapse after surviving a disaster left him without even the strength to move a pinky finger.

After a full half-minute, he used all his strength to slowly raise his head and cautiously look back.

Not far away, Wang Dalong made the same movement.

The scene before them was something they would never forget for the rest of their lives, even more shocking than being hunted just moments ago.

They saw that cruel and violent prehistoric Emperor Crocodile standing stiffly outside the stone gate.

Its hideous, massive head was less than a meter away from the threshold of the stone gate! But it just stopped, not advancing another inch, as if there were an invisible wall of air in front of it.

That threshold, built from the most ordinary stones, now seemed like an invisible chasm, an impassable forbidden boundary drawn by a god!

The Emperor Crocodile appeared exceptionally anxious and angry.

It paced back and forth outside the gate, each step making the ground tremble slightly. Its massive tail, comparable to a battering ram, occasionally lashed out irritably at the nearby stone walls, making dull "Bang! Bang!" sounds as crushed stones flew everywhere.

It stared fixedly at Lin Feng and Wang Dalong inside the gate, low, unwilling growls emitting from its throat.

In those cold vertical pupils, besides rage, there was actually a hint of... fear?

Yes, fear!

Lin Feng saw it clearly; it was a fear originating from biological instinct toward a higher existence!

This prehistoric behemoth, standing at the top of the food chain in this valley, was afraid!

It was afraid of these ruins!

"Why... why... isn't it coming in?" Wang Dalong sat paralyzed on the ground, his voice shaking like a sieve, his teeth chattering.

"I don't know." Lin Feng shook his head, his brain equally blank and buzzing.

What kind of place was this?

Why could it make a prehistoric Emperor Crocodile, comparable to a dinosaur, stop in its tracks?

Was it some kind of scent it hated? Or some kind of ultrasonic wave it couldn't bear?

Or... some kind of supernatural power that couldn't be explained by science?

Lin Feng suddenly remembered the giant serpent guarding the river, the strange tribe calling themselves "Guardians," and now this Emperor Crocodile that dared not cross the line.

In this damn valley, everywhere was filled with a bone-chilling weirdness!

El Dorado... could it be that this place is the true entrance to "El Dorado"?

The Emperor Crocodile paced outside the gate for a full ten minutes, seemingly finally confirming that it could not enter no matter what. It raised its head with extreme reluctance, let out one last world-shaking roar, and then slowly turned around, its massive body dragging a long indentation as it unwillingly disappeared into the deep jungle.

Only when that suffocating, terrifying pressure completely vanished did Lin Feng and Wang Dalong go limp and truly breathe a sigh of relief.

They survived.

They had actually survived.

But immediately after, a new despair welled up in their hearts.

They were trapped here.

Ahead was the bottomless, danger-ridden unknown ruins; behind was the death jungle occupied by the terrifying behemoth.

"Feng... Brother Feng..." Wang Dalong's voice carried a sob, having completely broken down, "What... what do we do now?"

Lin Feng did not answer.

He struggled to climb up from the cold stone slabs, walked step by step to the edge of the stone gate, reached out his hand, and cautiously touched the rough rocks on the doorframe.

The rocks were bone-chillingly cold, carved with some extremely blurred symbols that had long been weathered by time.

His fingertips brushed over those ancient symbols.

The moment his fingertip touched one of the most complex symbols—

Buzz!

A strange numbness, as if struck by a high-voltage current, surged through his fingertip, into his arm, and straight to the top of his head!

At the same time, the Rune his fingertip touched suddenly lit up with a faint golden light!

In the next second, a series of cold, emotionless mechanical voices boomed in his mind!

[Main Quest: Search for the Lost El Dorado (Progress 20%)]

[Reached key area: Sun God Temple]

[Please investigate carefully to find the path to El Dorado]