Translator: AnubisTL
Chen Jiang glanced with a peculiar expression at the plump, wriggling fish Scar Dog was cradling, then at the jade-like pearl in his hand.
Without further hesitation, he opened the item's description panel:
[Item Name: Ten Thousand Races Arena Energy Pearl]
[Item Star: None]
[Item Effect: When transforming a world into the Ten Thousand Races Arena, this pearl provides the energy to activate events, global announcements, and other automated operations.]
[Item Details: Sustaining a Ten Thousand Races Arena from start to finish requires 1,048,576 Ten Thousand Races Arena Energy Pearls.]
[Item Description: This pearl is exceptionally durable and difficult to shatter. However, if it breaks, the extremely compressed energy within will instantly explode with the force equivalent to 0.56 tons of TNT detonating simultaneously.]
Chen Jiang's jaw slowly dropped as he stared in shock at the seemingly ordinary little pearl.
What had he just seen?
This pearl was the energy source driving the entire Ten Thousand Races Arena?
In other words, this pearl represented the arena's fundamental logic?
Scar Dog and the others had just seen the item description for the pearl.
"Holy shit," Scar Dog muttered, a flicker of lingering fear in his eyes. "If this thing exploded, it would be equivalent to detonating 0.56 tons of TNT simultaneously?"
"This little thing is practically a small-yield nuclear bomb!"
It was hard to imagine they had been casually tossing this thing around, weighing it in their hands.
If it had detonated just then!
Scar Dog would have been a dead dog for sure.
Without a racial innate ability, he would have had no chance of surviving such a blast.
Although the item description claimed the pearl was "extremely durable," that term was too vague. Who knew where the threshold for "extremely durable" actually lay?
"Where did you get this thing?" Chen Jiang asked, his voice grave as he carefully placed the pearl in his palm and looked intently at Scar Dog.
"The fish spat it out," Scar Dog replied instinctively, still shaken.
"And the fish?"
"We caught it in the underground river."
"Take me to where you caught it."
"Yes, sir."
Soon, as an energy block shattered in Scar Dog's hand, a phantom gate formed from swirling white mist slowly materialized beside them.
Without hesitation, Chen Jiang and the others strode through the phantom gate.
In the blink of an eye, they found themselves in an underground river, hundreds of meters beneath the surface.
The pitch-black cavern was illuminated only by a few high-intensity flashlights carelessly discarded nearby.
The cavern was eerily silent, save for the constant rush of flowing water.
The air was damp and humid, making prolonged habitation here a surefire way to develop rheumatism.
The space felt cramped, barely two meters high, with jagged rock formations jutting down from the ceiling.
"Right here!" Scar Dog stood by the underground river, pointing at the ceaselessly flowing water. "This is where we caught that fish."
"Uh..." He suddenly paused, tilting his head with a strange expression. "This scene... it feels like we're bringing a criminal suspect back to the crime scene for identification."
"This is the place?" Chen Jiang frowned slightly, strode to the riverbank, crouched down, and gazed intently at the rushing water, observing it closely.
To be honest, there was nothing particularly remarkable about it.
The water was crystal clear and fresh.
When he reached out to touch it, he felt a bone-chilling cold.
"How did you suddenly decide to come here to catch fish?" Chen Jiang asked, sensing something suspicious about the situation.
A normal person, without any brain disorders, wouldn't idly think about catching fish in the basement of the Ten Thousand Races Arena, would they?
"It's like this," Scar Dog said, his expression serious. "Although there's an underground river down here, only this section has a relatively tall cavern where a person can stand. The rest of the river's terrain is too narrow."
"The water practically fills the entire cavern. There's no room for even a dog to stand, let alone a person."
"Then, as usual, after dawn, I came down here to set up a few hundred energy blocks and activate the phantom gate to power my Perpetual Motion Series Water-Cooled Air Conditioner."
"Just then, we noticed how crystal-clear the underground river was—almost no aquatic plants, plankton, or anything like that."
"I instinctively remarked, 'The ancients were right: clear water really has no fish.'"
"Li Hao countered, 'Clear water has no fish because it's too clean. There's nothing for fish to eat, so they can't survive.'"
"Naturally, I argued back."
"I said, 'Clear water has no fish because the water's so clear, any fish would be spotted instantly and caught upstream long ago.'"
"We couldn't reach a consensus, so we decided to put our theories to the test. We stretched a fishing net across the middle of the underground river."
"After waiting about two hours, this big fish swam right into our trap."
"That's how it happened."
"..."
Chen Jiang remained expressionless for a moment before turning to Li Hao. "Manifest a map of this area and check for any anomalies."
"If there are no anomalies, just identify any caves along the upper reaches of the underground river large enough to accommodate people."
"Let's head upstream and investigate."
"Understood."
The group knew what the discovery of this Ten Thousand Races Arena Energy Pearl meant: the arena had been deliberately placed here.
And the pearl had drifted downstream.
This meant that if they followed the river upstream, they might even find the arena's central control room and uncover its true secrets.
Perhaps even... the secrets of the universe.
"Um..."
Zhao Ritian, standing nearby, suddenly hesitated, as if struck by a thought. "Since this Ten Thousand Races Arena Energy Pearl provides energy to the arena, wouldn't removing it cause some kind of malfunction?"
"Like, could the Ten Thousand Races Arena suddenly collapse?"
"Or could some bugs appear?"
"That shouldn't happen, right?"
Scar Dog rested his chin on his hand, pondering. "After all, losing one pearl out of a million doesn't sound like a big deal. But these pearls are supposed to be incredibly valuable. How could one have been leaked so easily?"
Just then—
Li Hao suddenly spoke up. "Brother Jiang has been located. There's a rocky cave about 700 meters northeast. The upstream of this underground river flows through that cave, which is about ten meters higher than our current position."
"Let's move."
"Understood."
With the activation of the phantom gate, the group vanished from their location.
Consuming over a dozen energy blocks, Chen Jiang's team ascended closer to the surface.
The underground river ahead had dwindled to little more than a stream, no thicker than a human forearm. It was clearly too narrow to accommodate the five-kilogram fish.
Chen Jiang's brow furrowed as he realized he had fallen into a logical fallacy. He turned to Scar Dog. "Did that fish come downstream or swim upstream?"
"Huh?"
Scar Dog paused, lowering his head in thought for a long moment before shaking his head. "I honestly didn't notice. I was chatting with Li Hao when I suddenly felt the net move, and I dove into the water."
"I pulled the net and the fish ashore together."
"I really didn't pay attention to whether it came from upstream or swam up from downstream."
"..."
Chen Jiang pondered briefly before shaking his head. "Let's go. We're heading the wrong way. The fish probably swam up from downstream. We need to head downstream."
"Understood."
A flash of white light, and Chen Jiang and his team vanished from their location once more.
Only Chen Jiang and his team could explore the underground river with such ease.
For anyone else, this underground river would be akin to a death trap.
Without light, they would have to swim through the underground river, but not every stretch offered places to surface for air. It was common to swim for several minutes underwater without reaching a spot to breathe.
Moreover, in the darkness, they would have no way of knowing what sharp rocks or jagged protrusions might tear through their bodies.
The initial sting of such injuries would be masked by the icy river water, with the pain only surfacing as a faint warmth spreading from the wounds later.
For those with claustrophobia, exploring the underground river would be an experience akin to torture.
Soon, Chen Jiang and his team were back at the starting point. Without lingering, they continued teleporting downstream through the river channel, targeting cave after cave.
Before long, they had consumed over a dozen energy blocks and found themselves huddled in a cave roughly 1.5 meters high. Their lower bodies were completely submerged in the underground river, with only their shoulders and heads above water.
The only light came from a few high-intensity flashlights, casting a confined glow in the cramped space, making the team feel somewhat claustrophobic.
"Brother Jiang!" Li Hao, his body shivering from the icy water, wiped the droplets from his face and spoke, "About 600 meters downstream, there's a 1.2-meter-high cave."
"But between here and that cave, there's a nearly two-meter-high cliff with a steep waterfall."
"This means if that fish swam upstream, it would have had to fight against the current and then swim up the cascading water of a nearly two-meter-high waterfall."
"This..."
Though Li Hao hadn't finished speaking, everyone clearly understood his implication.
The current here was already incredibly strong.
It was a massive fish. Surviving such a powerful current and swimming upstream was already remarkable, but attempting to scale a cliff as steep as a waterfall seemed nearly impossible.
"Well... I've seen videos on Blue Star of fish swimming upstream and leaping over waterfalls," Scar Dog said hesitantly. "But a fish this size... I'm not sure."
"When I caught it, some of its scales were missing. Could it have scraped them off while trying to swim up that waterfall?"
Chen Jiang gazed at the pitch-black cave entrance, now flooded by the underground river, and pondered for a moment. "Let's keep going. Scar Dog, you brought enough energy blocks, right?"
"A full bracelet's worth."
"Good. Let's move on."
"Yes, sir."
If they ran out of energy blocks, they would likely be trapped here to die.
Without any diving equipment, escaping this place alive by sheer physical effort would be nearly impossible.
No, to be precise, even with full diving gear, escape would still be almost impossible.
They had been using map manifestation to locate coordinates where the underground river surfaced.
However, they weren't always so lucky. There were times when they couldn't find any such points on the map.
On one occasion, they had no choice but to open the phantom gate directly into the river. Emerging from the gate felt like being thrown into a witch's amniotic fluid—the icy water instantly enveloped them, making it impossible to breathe.
Without pausing, they immediately began carving the next teleportation glyph.
Yet that time, they couldn't find any surfacing points.
After three consecutive attempts, they finally discovered the small rocky cave where they had just surfaced.
In other words, if they had failed to find a surfacing point after seven or eight attempts, they would have been trapped in a desperate situation.
Advancing meant facing unknown dangers ahead, while retreating was impossible due to their dwindling oxygen supply.
Therefore, they had set a strict limit: if five consecutive attempts to find a surfacing point failed, they would immediately turn back and abandon the exploration.
Fortunately, they only needed three attempts to find the small rocky cave.
Even with the phantom gate, they were struggling. Someone without that ability, even a world-class diver, would likely be trapped here forever.
Time seemed to stretch endlessly.
Just as Chen Jiang and the others were on the verge of exhaustion, a flicker of excitement lit up Li Hao's eyes. "Brother Jiang," he suddenly announced, "a square room has appeared on the map."
"It's about eight hundred meters ahead."
"The room shows no players or light sources. It looks completely empty."
"There really is a room?"
Chen Jiang fell into a complex silence, his expression unreadable. Ever since he'd seen the pearl, he'd suspected the existence of a central control room, but he hadn't been certain.
Now, a square room had abruptly materialized not far ahead, deep beneath the earth. This confirmed many of his suspicions.
"Scar Dog."
"Yes, sir."
Scar Dog nodded solemnly, took a deep breath, crushed an energy block in his hand, and pulled a shotgun from his chest rig.
In the next instant—
A phantom gate opened, and the group vanished from their location.
(End of the Chapter)
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