Atlas of Heaven and Man.

Chapter 753 Counter-Invasion
Chen Chuan walked into the tent and handed the lost object to Xu Chan when he came out.

"Old Xu, when I'm not around, you will still be in charge of keeping this lost item. If you encounter any unexpected situation, you will decide what to do. Don't worry about me."

Xu Chan took it and said solemnly, "Boss, I understand."

After Chen Chuan gave the instructions, he went back to make some preparations. After all, he didn't know what the situation was in the camp over there. The Skinner had said before that an unknown ceremony was being prepared in the camp, so he had to be prepared at all costs.

He packed up some weapons and items, put them in a bag, and then picked it up. In his other hand, he held the Xuejun Knife and walked to the edge of the earthworms. He called out to Chaoming, and after it flapped its wings and flew into the air, he jumped down from above several times, and then ran quickly among the insect tide.

On the surface, the swarm of insects now seemed to have become much sparser, but they were still covering the ground. The insects were of different sizes, some were as tiny as rice grains, and some were as big as water tanks. As soon as he stepped into them, they began to gather towards him as if something had been touched, and flapped their short wings, trying to jump and pounce on him.

The most terrifying thing about these insects is their number. Once they wrap around a person, they will continue to swarm in until they swallow him up.

After he stood on the ground, there was a sudden bang, and a torrent that broke through the air wall immediately knocked away all the surrounding insects, then rushed out at a speed that was difficult to see with the naked eye, and plowed a path in the insect swarm that was not closed for a long time.

Relying on this explosive high speed, Chen Chuan rushed all the way to the camp location indicated by the skinner.

The location he gave was actually only a rough range, because this person was originally moving with a large group and did not have the ability to distinguish directions in the intersection area. He only knew the general surface features.

But this did not pose a problem for him. He just needed to know that the camp was facing the wide and long side of the rock. Even if he could not find it immediately, it would not take much time to walk around it.

But fortunately, it didn't have to be so troublesome, because he soon found some traces of campfires that had not been completely burned out in front of him. Although a large number of insects were crowded around, they deliberately avoided that place, which pointed him in the direction.

In less than two minutes, he arrived outside the camp and stopped near the campfire in front. Then a rumbling sound came from behind him, and all the insects nearby were blown away by the explosive airflow.

He looked inside a few times. Although the bugs were on the periphery and did not go in, this did not give him any sense of security. Instead, it aroused his vigilance.

This is a place that even insects are unwilling to enter. It is obvious that there is something inside.

After taking a few glances, he stepped into the swarm of insects before they surrounded him again. Chao Ming followed him from behind and hovered in the air to scout the surrounding situation for him.

After walking about ten steps inside, he found that the entire camp was quiet and empty, as if the camp had been abandoned long ago. The surroundings were exceptionally quiet, and at this moment, a sense of danger arose in his heart again.

He stopped, thought for a moment, and then focused on the spiritual mark in his hand. It seemed that Xue Shou walked past him inadvertently, stepped forward half a body, looked around the camp, and said, "Well, this situation..." He looked in one direction, "Let's go over there and take a look first."

Having said that, he went ahead.

Chen Chuan followed his footsteps in that direction. After passing a group of scattered and empty tents, he saw an area surrounded by barbed wire. The ground inside was full of wooden stakes, which were inserted there in a certain pattern. In the middle was a slightly raised flat ground covered with something with cloth, but the things inside seemed to have been damaged.

Chen Chuan took a few glances and immediately made a judgment: "This is a secret religious ritual."

Xue Shou said, "I remember you are familiar with the esoteric rituals. You are right, but this is not the way we used to do things in the old days." He walked over to the cover and said, "Uncover it and take a look."

Chen Chuan walked forward and used the Xuejun Knife to pry open the cloth. He saw a wooden statue inside that had been scratched and crumpled, but his original appearance could still be vaguely discerned.

Xue Shou squatted down and took a few glances, then said, "Well, this is the style of the Chuzhimin, for sure. Judging from the layout here and the statue, this is some kind of ritual of the Chuzhimin.

The First People have a large number of rituals for communicating, sacrificing and exchanging sacrifices with the other side. After the Linax Federation occupied Yinglu, it obtained a lot of ancient texts from the First People. Apart from the secrets of fighting, the most were esoteric rituals.

You know, they suffered a lot in the secret rituals of the First People, so they used them all later."

Chen Chuanshuo said: "If you look at it this way, the original people were not weak. How did they fall to this point?"

Xue Shu said: "Because the people of Chu were not united, they were divided into dozens or hundreds of states and thousands of tribes, and they had been killing each other for thousands of years. When the immigrants from the Western Continent arrived, some of them took the initiative to help kill their compatriots. Well, in their eyes, they were not like that, but enemies of generations. Rather than saying that they died at the hands of the Linax Federation, it would be better to say that they died at the combined efforts of their own people and foreign enemies."

He commented: "In this world, any country of any size is difficult to be attacked from the outside. Only when there are problems within itself will it be exploited or even defeated.

Well, I have strayed off topic. Let’s take a look at this first…” He glanced outside a few more times and said, “This ceremony should be a ceremony of entrustment and transfer. The people of the Linax Federation seem to have some ideas. They hope to obtain the power of entrustment from a certain existence.

It was roughly based on the original ceremony arrangement, with some changes. They used metal sheets and iron wires instead of corn leaves and varro tree branches. If suitable ritual items cannot be found, there is actually no problem using this, and it can also ensure the progress of the ceremony.

But the ceremony itself is a process of reaffirming the original contract, because the other party will find ways to deduct the power you want to obtain, so they cannot cheat no matter what, which requires the integrity of the ceremony and the restoration of details to ensure.

Sufficient and tedious preparation is the prerequisite for the execution of the contract. If it is not sufficient, not only will it fail to be completed, but it will also leave loopholes for the other party to exploit. You must know that each of those ritual clauses is summarized with countless lives and flesh and blood, and none of them is redundant.

In the current situation, it is obvious that the ceremony was carried out very hastily, probably because of the threat of the worm quicksand, so they had to do so. However, this will bring more problems. I don’t know if the person in charge of the ceremony is unaware, or doesn’t care, or has other plans. ”

Chen Chuan felt that he was very knowledgeable and said, "I didn't expect that Teacher Xue knew so much about esoteric rituals."

"How should I put it..." Xue Shu smiled, "My ancestors once served as high-level officials in the old state religion, and my family has researched this area. Although I am not a good person and have taken a different path, I still understand a little bit because of what I have seen and heard."

Chen Chuan nodded, looked around, and said, "Teacher Xue just said that this ritual is to communicate with the other side and transfer power?"

Teacher Xue looked at the claw marks on the broken statue on the ground and said, "The ritual itself should not have been successful. And judging from this situation, something else came along with the loopholes in the ritual."

As he was speaking, there was a slight fluctuation on Teacher Xue's figure, and at the same time, his second self also showed a sign of blurring.

When Chen Chuan looked up, he suddenly discovered that the scene around him had changed. He was no longer standing in the camp, but in a wilderness.

There was a huge cowhide tent in front of them, which was very typical of the primitive people. Not far away was a burning bonfire. From inside the tent, a strange sound was coming at this moment. It was like the sound of tearing flesh and gnawing bones quickly.

Right at the door of the tent, there was a small pile of half-eaten bones, all of which appeared to be human bones, mixed with torn clothes, twisted and smashed implants and guns.

Chen Chuan turned a step at this time so that he could see the situation inside the tent better, but this step seemed to alarm the things inside, and the sound inside suddenly stopped.

After a while, the tent was lifted up, and a two-meter-tall woman with eye shadow walked out.

She had two ponytails, skinny limbs, sharp nails on her ten fingers, and her exposed limbs were covered with blue-black scales. Some kind of covering bone had grown on her face, and there were many holes on her body that seemed to have been forcibly squeezed and torn.

Chen Chuan's eyes narrowed slightly, because he saw a faint light overflowing from the wounds. This was the power of spiritual perception, and he could feel that this power was not used to repair the wounds, but because the spiritual power was too abundant and overflowed to various parts of the body, causing the body to be unable to bear it.

When the woman looked at him, there was an almost crazy and greedy look in her eyes, as if she regarded him as some kind of food. But she seemed to be afraid of something, and did not rush up for a moment. Instead, she bent down, stretched out one hand, and picked up a long and thick stick from the ground.

After taking a few glances, Teacher Xue said, "There are signs of high-level spiritual power infused into her body. Some of this power is used to transform her body, otherwise she would not be able to withstand the accumulation of this power. However, there is no more. The existence behind her is obviously very stingy with her. It only maintains her existence and does not want to give her too much, but..."

He reminded Chen Chuan, "Even so, the power she possesses now has already surpassed the limits of a fighter in the usual sense. You have to be careful."

……

……

(End of this chapter)