Chapter One Hundred and Three: Secret Passage

The fierce sun blazed down on the few of them, and their hurried figures looked somewhat flustered.

Nearly half an hour passed, yet they still found nothing. They were drenched in sweat, and even their clothes had begun to cling to their skin and wounds.

“Have you found anything over there?”

Jun Yeli could not help calling out loudly to the two men approaching him.

At this, the pair exchanged a look and, in unison, shook their heads.

Exhausted to the bone, they all made do by sitting on a huge rock and took a little water and dried rations to recover their strength.

Seeing that Jun Yeli was still studying the map, one of them could not hold back and said, “Your Majesty, perhaps the Hall of No Shadows is deceiving us. We clearly already reached the marked endpoint, and it just feels like we’ve been swindled...”

The other nodded as well, tapping the water flask against his knee and panting softly. “Exactly. Even if they truly lacked the ability to find the location of the Ghost Realm Forest, they should have at least forged something convincing. One place is ringed by mountains, the other is dense jungle—how could those possibly be the same place?”

Surely they could not expect the mountains to suddenly turn into a forest and let them walk in.

“Enough. The two of you, stop talking!” Jun Yeli was already seething, and these two only shattered his last shred of hope with every word they said.

Still, after so long they had indeed found no new clue. After folding up the map, Jun Yeli slowly closed his eyes, and in his mind that graceful figure kept rising again and again.

“Concubine Rong, where exactly are you? Could it be that you are thinking of me as well?”

With these thoughts swirling in his heart, he sat there for two full hours. Gradually, night fell, and after setting up camp, the group decided to make do for the night.

But deep in the night, a faint rustling suddenly came from outside.

“Something seems to be moving!”

One of the guards was the first to grow alert. He straightened at once and hurried outside in alarm, scanning the darkness, yet could see nothing around him at all.

“Bring me a torch. I clearly heard movement just now. I’m afraid someone has been following us in secret!”

As royals, they were coveted wherever they went, let alone by the people in the imperial court. Even if word said they were traveling incognito, those people would likely stop at nothing to eliminate future trouble.

Better to be safe than sorry. At those words, one of them hurriedly reached for a torch, only to see a black shape in the distance suddenly shooting toward them like a sharp arrow.

Before anyone could even react, the next instant a piercing scream tore through the sky.

“What is happening outside?”

Jun Yeli had initially not intended to go out to investigate, but hearing the cry, he also sensed that something was wrong.

While asking, he quickly rose and rushed out, only to see that two men had already begun fighting with a huge bird.

“So many eagles, Your Majesty, go quickly! This place is far too dangerous!”

One man gripped his sword sheath in both hands and held his ground against the eagle before him. His face was twisted with strain, and he was clearly struggling to keep up.

Jun Yeli’s brows knit tightly. Seeing the many scratches on the two men’s bodies from the eagle’s talons, he had a sudden idea. He turned toward the nearby campfire, lit a torch, and thrust it straight at the eagle’s wing.

The smell of burning flesh rushed at them. The eagle let out a miserable shriek, and faced with the raging flames, even it showed a trace of fear.

“They’re afraid of fire! Hold up the torches quickly, and they won’t dare attack!”

At his command, the two men did not dare delay. The three of them huddled together with their torches in hand. Although the eagles were numerous, they no longer dared to act rashly, lest they accidentally turn themselves into roast birds.

Only after half an hour had passed and the eagles could no longer hold out did they slowly retreat.

The three of them let out a breath of relief, though remembering how close they had just come to becoming prey for the eagles still left them shaken.

One of them gasped for air and could not help but lament, “Damn it, how did so many eagles appear all of a sudden...”

Jun Yeli held the torch and looked at the feathers fallen on the ground. He picked one up and examined it carefully, falling into a brief задумчивость.

“Yes. How could so many eagles suddenly emerge from this mountain cliff...”

Then a thought flashed through Jun Yeli’s mind, and he hurriedly asked, “Did you two see clearly just now? From which direction were those eagles coming?”

Hearing this, the two men thought for a moment before one of them suddenly remembered. “Right, it seemed they were flying over from the gorge!”

The two of them pointed casually, and what they indicated was not the towering cliff that rose into the clouds?

The cliff was hard to make out clearly in the dead of night.

Jun Yeli looked around, and relying on his memory from the daytime, he felt that something was off. “That cliff is far too barren. It does not look like a place where birds and beasts would dwell. I fear there is more to this. Let us search again!”

Without waiting for the two of them to react, Jun Yeli took the torch himself and headed straight toward the direction they had pointed out. Looking closely, he actually discovered a gap between two sheer cliffs.

With a leap, he landed before that opening. Seeing only a pitch-black void within, he cautiously picked up a large stone and threw it down.

The stone tumbled and bounced for a long while before finally producing a dull thud.

At that, Jun Yeli’s heart lifted, and he could not help saying with a smile, “This seems to be a cave. It might well be the entrance to the Ghost Realm Forest. There is no time to lose—come up here at once!”

The two men flinched and dared not delay in the slightest. They immediately used their lightness skill to leap up as well. The three of them, torches in hand, carefully felt their way forward.

As time slowly passed, the narrow cave suddenly opened up into a wide expanse.

Under the pale moonlight, the entire forest faintly emerged before their eyes.

“Th-this... could this really be the legendary Ghost Realm Forest?”

One need not have eaten pork to have seen a pig run.

“Not yet certain. Let’s walk farther in and see.”

The rest they had planned for was now forgotten by Jun Yeli. The three of them stayed close together and wandered into the jungle.

At that moment, the quiet moonlight fell silently upon Hua Rong.

The woman had her eyes gently closed, lying quietly beside a tree trunk. She was so exhausted she had nearly lost all her strength, yet she still murmured, “What kind of damned place is this? Fine, if I can’t get out, so be it—but now I can’t even find my way back...”

The trees in here seemed almost alive. Her feet were worn to the point of near collapse, yet she still had not found the exit she wanted. All she could do was describe her situation with one word: hopeless.

Just as despair took hold, she suddenly heard a light, airy voice above her.

“I told you long ago that you would never get out. Why would you refuse to listen?”

Who was speaking?