When he mentioned the strange and unfathomable maze, Battle God Lei Zongchao's facial muscles twitched again.
For an instant, he felt that his vitality magnetic field had become incredibly unstable. His body also became blurry, as if he was about to split into all sorts of different possibilities.
Fortunately, he sucked in a deep breath and stabilized himself.
"The process of exploring the ancient ruins is similar to diving deep into the sea. The deeper you go, the greater the pressure you have to endure."
Lei Zongchao calmed himself down and continued. "At the bottom of the sea, the pressure is equivalent to tens of thousands of elephants standing on the tip of a needle. It can completely flatten a main battle tank, and motorized armor that can withstand a frontal attack from a rocket launcher is as fragile as a can.
"There's also mental pressure similar to water pressure in the depths of the ancient ruins. The deeper you go, the greater the mental pressure you face. Your mental strength index will plummet at any moment, and your mind will break.
"Five hundred to one thousand meters underground is the limit of what humans can explore with their current technology and cultivation base.
"The explorers who move around in this area are the same as the divers who move around in the deep sea. They're known as the Deep Divers.
"The Deep Divers are the most dangerous occupation in Dragon City. They're one hundred times more dangerous than the hunters who face Apocalyptic Beasts head-on. At any moment, they might run into mysteries that they can't name and can't fight against.
"What's even more terrifying is that once they reach the maximum depth, the Deep Divers will often hear mysterious voices and fragmented images in their minds. They're like the bewitching songs of a banshee, and they'll attract them to head deeper into the ancient ruins.
"One thousand five hundred meters, two thousand meters, three thousand meters …
"If the Deep Divers have a slim chance of survival when they move five hundred to one thousand meters underground, they'll definitely die.
"But if they dive deeper, they'll definitely die.
"I once teamed up with a Deep One to explore 800 metres below the surface of the ancient ruin. In the end, this teammate heard a mysterious summoning. He stumbled and stumbled his way down a slit that led downwards. He managed to descend for more than 1000 metres.
"At that time, all the Deep Divers had soft but sturdy safety ropes that were made of crystal powder and monster bone powder. When we noticed that my teammate had disappeared into the depths of the crack, we pulled him back regardless of the cost. We would rather be covered in wounds while we were dragging him back, but we still wanted to save his life.
"However, it was still too late.
"When we used five minutes to pull our teammate out from the gap, he had already turned into a rock."
"What?"
Meng Chao could not believe it. "A … stone?"
"To be more exact, he is a stone statue that is vivid and lifelike. His facial expression, body details, and even the wrinkles on his clothes are exactly the same as himself. Even the safety rope is tied to his body in perfect condition.
The corners of Lei Zongchao's eyes were twitching, and his voice was cold. "His facial expression, on the other hand, was forever frozen in the most appalled moment. I've never seen anybody who could display 'fear' so vividly in my entire life. I can't even imagine what he saw during the few minutes he was lost in the crevice.
Meng Chao felt a sharp pain in his head.
Countless bizarre light and shadow fragments appeared in front of him.
They were all terrifying projections of otherworld Godfiends.
He had to admit that compared to the extraordinary beings of the Other World, the monsters were really pretty and harmless.
Would the existences in the depths of the primordial ruin be more terrifying than the Fiendgods of this world?
Or rather, what was the relationship between the primordial ruin and the extraordinary beings of the Other World?
"This Deep Diver is considered lucky. At the very least, he was instantly turned into a stone statue. Aside from a moment of fear, he shouldn't have suffered any more torture or pain. But the other Deep Divers might not be so lucky," Lei Zongchao continued.
"Some of the Deep Divers were bewitched by the summoning in their minds and crawled into the depths of the crack. They never came back, and no one knows whether they crawled straight into hell.
"Some of the Deep Divers struggled to escape, but their minds were broken. They danced around crazily and chanted in a language no one could understand.
"There are also some Deep Divers who look healthy and sound on the surface. They can pass the mental strength test. Their mental strength index is between 80 and 120, and they can return to normal human society.
"But no one knows that they have already turned into ticking time bombs. Once they explode, they will turn into the most terrifying lost people. They will go through spirit energy deviation, lose their humanity, and commit horrifying murders.
"After countless tragedies, we watched countless outstanding youths with great futures run into accidents while exploring the primordial ruin. We had to tearfully control them and even destroy them. Then, the scientists and powerful people in Dragon City came to a unanimous conclusion. The ancient ruins one thousand meters underground is not something that can be explored and analyzed with the current technology on Earth. We should seal it and leave it for our wiser and stronger descendants.
"Now, the ruins research center's main area of exploration and research is five hundred meters underground.
"Even the ancient technology hidden in the shallow underground is not something we can completely digest and absorb within a short period of time. Many of the so-called 'black technology' is still a black box. We can use and copy it, but we can't analyze the principles behind it. The difference in basic science might take us three to five hundred years.
Time, an astronomical amount of money, and countless smart people will be needed to make up for it and catch up to it.
"It's a pity that time, funds, and smart brains are all things that we lack very much.
"Right now, Dragon City is still surrounded by powerful enemies, and we are in a precarious situation of survival. What we need are practical weapons and cultivation methods that we can use the moment we get them, not vague ancient secrets," Meng Chao said.
Meng Chao nodded.
He could understand this very well.
Even if they expanded their sphere of influence to the entire Monster Mountain Range, Dragon City's civilization still lacked resources. The cake was only so big. If they ate more, they would have less.
If they invested more money into the development of super armored airships, they would have to invest less into controllable transmigration.
At the very least, the development of super armored airships was clear and controllable. As long as they invested a lot of money, they would definitely be able to achieve results.
As long as they were equipped with a large number of super armored airships, they could rush out of Monster Mountain Range and get one hundred times the resources for Dragon City. The return on their profits was really high.
Hence, the nine great mega corporations were willing to invest in the super armored airship project.
But controllable transmigration was too uncertain, and they used up a lot of resources too.
Even though being able to freely move between Earth and the Other World sounded good, no one knew when their dream, which they had been boasting about to the heavens, would come true.
If the development failed, the astronomical amount of money and resources would go down the drain.
This was not just a problem of the investors losing money.
In fact, it would cause the Survival Committee's finances to collapse and delay Dragon City's colonization of the outside world. They would miss a rare strategic opportunity!
Hence, the nine great mega corporations and the Survival Committee had always been lukewarm toward the controllable transmigration project. Most of the funds had to be gathered by the project team itself.
Among all the ancient technologies, controllable transmigration technology was the one that humans could understand relatively well. It was also one of the more practical technologies.
Two birds in the bush were worth a bird in the hand.
Since the current ancient technology was enough for Earthlings to research for a while, and the cost and risk of continuing exploration was so high that they could not bear it, temporarily sealing it up seemed to be the most logical choice.
"If you want to enter the ancient ruins to look around and train, I can be your guarantor. I'll get you a pass that allows you to move freely within a shallow depth of five hundred meters. After decades of exploration, our safety in this depth is rather guaranteed," Lei Zongchao said.
"But let me say this first. The danger of entering the ancient ruins is incredibly high. Every time you go deeper, you must go through the relevant tests and training. Even so, we can't guarantee 100% safety.
"If strange voices and pictures really appear in your head and attract you to continue diving deeper, then in the end, you will be entangled by a mysterious power and turn into a monster that is neither human nor ghost, then even if you have countless achievements and are the youngest blood medal bearer in Dragon City, we will not hesitate to kill you. I will even personally attack and give you a quick death.
"Now that you understand this, do you still want to enter the ancient ruins?"
Meng Chao thought about it for a while.
I thought to myself that there were already countless strange sounds and images appearing in the depths of my brain.
The trip to the Primordial Ruins was a must.
It was not that he was greedy and wanted to instantly understand all the secrets of the ancient civilization.
However, there were two things he had to understand.
The first was the mystery of his return to the past.
Soul Breaking Saber Luo Wu's son, Luo Hai, had once told him that on the day before his national college examination and the day he returned from the apocalypse, a huge explosion had happened in the ruins research center under the Supernatural Tower.
It was as if a lab and all the project team members inside had been blown to smithereens.
Meng Chao did not believe in coincidences.
He believed that as long as he could rebuild the lab, he would be able to solve the mystery of his return to the past.
The second was the "Primordial Curse", also known as the X-shaped eye tattoo.
He wanted to know just what the curse was.
After the X-shaped eye was implanted in his body, aside from awakening to his bloodline, were there any other side effects?
Did the implanted X-shaped eye have to kill each other until the last person was the last one to break the curse?
This was related to his younger sister's safety and happiness.
No matter how dangerous it was, he had to understand it!
With this thought in mind, Meng Chao nodded.
"Master Lei, thank you for your reminder, but I still want to enter the ancient ruins and see the power that completely changed the face of human civilization," Meng Chao said seriously.
"I will be responsible for my actions, and I won't cause trouble for anyone."
"I believe that, Meng Chao."
Lei Zongchao smiled faintly and extended a finger. "Then, let's make a deal."
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