[Molten Realm]
Chen Zijin's arrival seemed to bring a faint reversal to the situation that had been locked in stalemate for a whole ten days.
Because of her reminder, Zhang Yue realized that perhaps the method of cracking this domain was not as simple as finding the flame beads, opening the flame gate, and jumping to the high ground to look for the exit.
Because according to Chen Zijin's description of the ultimate boss of the Hell Arena, the Hell Demon Golia, Zhang Yue came to understand: Golia had the same characteristic as this Molten Realm, lava.
"On Golia's body flows molten lava, somewhat similar to the lava down there," Chen Zijin leaned on the edge of the high ground, gazing into the depths of the scalding magma, and said.
Zhang Yue realized, "So, this place is connected with the ultimate boss of the Hell Arena, which means this is a hidden domain belonging to the King-level secret realm Hell Arena, not a hidden map of the World 32."
That being the case, it could explain why this map was so difficult to crack.
Zhang Yue had thought before, if this place was merely a hidden map of the World 32, with his ability he could crack it in at most a day or two.
But now, Zhang Yue had already been trapped here for more than ten days.
If this place was defined as an inner hidden domain of the Hell Arena, then it made sense.
After all, the Hell Arena itself was already a King-level secret realm.
Usually, even if an ordinary secret realm had a hidden domain, it was already rare.
Not to mention, a hidden domain inside a King-level secret realm.
Therefore, this domain could no longer be looked at with ordinary eyes.
At this time, Chen Zijin said thoughtfully, "Before the Hell Demon Golia appeared, everyone had guessed whether there might be a hidden domain inside the Hell Arena. Who would have thought, there really is such a place."
Zhang Yue then asked, "You said my line of thinking was wrong. Then according to your line of thinking, how would you crack this situation?"
Chen Zijin stood up, picked up a flame bead that had fallen on the ground, studied it carefully, and muttered, "Have you noticed that on every flame bead, there are different imprints engraved?"
Zhang Yue also picked up a flame bead.
The flame bead's exterior was wrapped in a layer of warm flame.
Blocked by this layer of flame, the structure of its surface could not be seen.
Zhang Yue imitated Chen Zijin's method, tightly wrapping the flame bead in both hands.
When he opened his hands again, sure enough, the flame covering the bead vanished, leaving only a translucent red bead.
And on this bead, there was clearly engraved the imprint of a dragon.
This sight made Zhang Yue's heart suddenly jolt.
Because, trapped here ten days, during those ten days Zhang Yue had been searching through countless flame beads every day, yet he had never discovered that flame beads actually contained such a hidden detail.
This breakthrough discovery from Chen Zijin made Zhang Yue start to rely a bit on her, "So, what do you think this imprint represents?"
Chen Zijin held the flame bead in her hands, walked a circle around the edge of the high ground beneath their feet.
At last, she stopped at a certain spot, squatted down, and placed the flame bead into a round groove on the ground that was not easy to notice unless one looked closely.
The size of the flame bead matched the size of the groove perfectly, fitting just right.
And as soon as the flame bead was placed into the groove, a flame instantly released.
That flame floated into the sky, transformed into the image of a chicken, and then disappeared.
At this time, Chen Zijin looked up at Zhang Yue and asked, "The flame bead in your hand, what's the image on it?"
"Dragon," Zhang Yue said.
So, Chen Zijin, recalling the circle she had just made around the high ground, counted forward four steps, pointed at a spot, and said to Zhang Yue, "Go take a look there."
Half doubtful, Zhang Yue went to the spot Chen Zijin pointed at.
Squatting down, sure enough, he saw a round groove.
And inside the groove, the image of a dragon was engraved.
Zhang Yue placed the dragon-marked flame bead into the groove.
The next moment, the flame bead released a flame, which transformed in the air into the image of a dragon, and then disappeared.
Chen Zijin stood up, smiled, and said, "Solved!"
"This high ground has twelve grooves, corresponding to the twelve zodiac signs. And the flame beads dropped from killing the Scarlet Flame Dragon also have the twelve zodiac signs. As long as you put the flame bead into the matching groove, they will fuse."
"Let's try filling all twelve zodiac signs on this high ground."
Zhang Yue opened his backpack, took out the large number of flame beads he had collected, and by cutting off air supply to extinguish the flames, exposed the images inside.
Zhang Yue discovered: only a small number of flame beads had images. Most of them had none.
He picked out the ones with images, and according to their engravings, placed them into the matching grooves.
Soon, eleven grooves were filled, leaving only the pig's groove still empty.
But the remaining flame beads on Zhang Yue either had no images, or had the wrong ones.
The next line of thought and goal became immediately clear.
Zhang Yue summoned his pet team, ordering them to continue hunting the Scarlet Flame Dragon.
Cherry brought the flame beads obtained from killing the dragons back to Zhang Yue.
Soon, the final flame bead with the pig image appeared.
Immediately, Zhang Yue placed it into the last pig groove.
As soon as all twelve grooves were filled, suddenly, from the twelve groove positions, beams of light shot up at the same time, flying into the sky, then falling into the center of the high ground.
Next, above the high ground, a white radiance floated out.
The two of them walked up before the white light.
They stretched out their hands to touch it, but directly passed through it, unable to grasp the white light.
Just as Zhang Yue was at a loss, Chen Zijin opened her storage space, and took out a silver-white token.
The next instant, a miracle happened.
That white light was actually absorbed into the token.
Faced with this scene, not to mention Zhang Yue, even Chen Zijin herself was surprised.
"So it really is like this! No wonder I felt this thing resonating!"
Zhang Yue looked at the token in Chen Zijin's hand and asked, "What is this?"
"Gladiator Token, a white item obtained from the Ultimate Arena."
Chen Zijin said, "The Ultimate Arena is an item battle. It seems everyone had one of these Gladiator Tokens, but since nobody knew what it was for, they were basically left in the corner gathering dust."
"Who would've thought, it actually had this purpose…"
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