Chapter 118: Untitled

Amid the bloodcurdling laughter of the child-torturer, Chen Cao felt a sharp, rigid object pierce through the right side of his neck. A wave of numbness and soreness followed, his throat tasted bitter, and the figure before him—still resembling a primitive ape—began to blur.

He tried to struggle, but his entire body felt limp and powerless.

“Rest well, prepare to welcome the springtime of your life... hahaha!” To Chen Cao’s ears, the tormentor’s figure grew increasingly indistinct, and the laughter seemed to drift away into the distance.

When Chen Cao opened his eyes, darkness still enveloped him.

“Where... am I?” Chen Cao sat up abruptly, his whole body trembling. He checked himself—his torso was intact, neither more nor less—and breathed a sigh of relief. It wasn’t too bad, after all.

“Hey, boss, looks like you’re awake! I knew you were the best!” A voice full of surprise and hope came from the darkness. It was Stanley, clearly relieved to see him alive.

“I didn’t expect this guy to come back alive!” Lu Tianming’s voice carried astonishment. He hadn’t imagined anyone could survive the arena, let alone return unscathed. Even when he feigned death back then, he ended up with three broken ribs. If his body hadn’t been strong, he would have perished in this very cave.

“It seems like nothing serious happened to you,” Chen Cao said.

At this, Lu Tianming sighed deeply. “I don’t think it’s nothing serious. You’re going to be selected for the arena again, over and over, until you’re either killed or crippled. Then they’ll throw you into this pit to slowly die.”

Stanley interjected, “Hey, boss, don’t listen to him! Didn’t I come back from the arena just fine?”

Chen Cao didn’t respond to Stanley directly but pondered for a moment. “I have a question—Stanley, were you unconscious when you came here?” Now was not the time for trivial talk; escaping was paramount.

There was a sudden thud as Stanley sat down in the dark, his voice tinged with embarrassment. “Well, I should have been awake, but I pretended to be unconscious when they brought me here. To be precise, I only saw the ground.”

Chen Cao felt a cold sweat bead on his forehead. He knew he wouldn’t get much more information from Stanley. Today had been a near-death experience; he had no desire to be sent back to the arena, forced to endure the drugs that drained his strength. The sensation of having his life controlled by others was unbearable.

Moreover, that bristly-haired fiend seemed bent on killing him. This creature had clearly been involved in the abuse of Meimei. The thought of that fiend’s cruel smile and what he had done to Meimei made Chen Cao’s hair stand on end with rage and disgust. This monster appeared to be here to seize some treasure, but Chen Cao wondered if the two other men who had severely wounded him had also been brought here. If so, he would find a way to eliminate all these scoundrels.

His fists clenched tightly at the thought.

To break the silence in the darkness, Lu Tianming muttered to himself, “I wonder how my wife is... sniff... she must have been sent to the breeding grounds, just as Uki said. My God, I will never see her again!”

“Uki!” Chen Cao’s eyes lit up. “You said Uki? How could he get in here in a place like this?”

Lu Tianming thought for a moment, then lightly patted his thigh in the dark. “It’s simple. That little guy is very curious and eager to learn about the outside world. Uki and I met a few years ago when they were dumping corpses here. He was startled at first! I had already been locked up for over a year then. I tried to escape, but you know what? In this darkness, there’s no other living creature but me. Do you understand the feeling of such loneliness? When I realized that escaping was just a pipe dream...”

Lu Tianming continued while Chen Cao listened quietly, knowing that Lu Tianming tended to be long-winded.

“Later, I met Uki. Although I don’t know what he looks like, I know he must be a pure-hearted little boy, full of curiosity about the world outside. I really like him. He often sneaks down to chat with me and bring me bits of meat to supplement my nutrition. Without him, you’d be looking at a skeleton right now.”

“What do you talk about when you chat with Uki?” Chen Cao asked.

A crisp crunching sound echoed, and Chen Cao realized Lu Tianming was eating those disgusting beetles again.

Lu Tianming chuckled. “You want to know how to get out, huh? I’d advise you to stop dreaming. You know, Uki told me this place is essentially a corpse pit—a nutrient pool to feed the Jungle God. While chatting, he mentioned an ancient tree here, thousands of years old. He doesn’t know exactly how big it is, but half the trees in the tribe’s forest grow from the roots of that ancient tree. That’s why they call it the Mosu Tribe. The chieftains and shamans say it’s a sacred tree, the tribe’s root, tied to their lifeblood. So they must protect and nurture it carefully. Hence, the corpse pit was built beside the tree, dozens of meters deep, used to stack the bodies of tribe members who erred and invading outsiders. It serves both as a deterrent and as nourishment for the ancient tree.”

Chen Cao said, “Because Uki longs for the outside world, you taught him the Dachen language and Mainz language, and showed him how to deceive people.”

In the blackness against the cave wall, Lu Tianming sat upright, his voice rising. “Mr. Chen, you need to take back some of those words. I admit I taught him language, but I firmly deny the rest. I swear by the heavens, I only taught the boy language and about the outside world’s wonders. Nothing else.”

Chen Cao thought for a moment. “So Uki tricked me. We should thank him for that.”