Sarawa was reluctant to give up and tried to shake the door, but it was still in vain.
What was truly terrifying was that they couldn't sense any energy from the door.
It meant that the entity that had confined them here was more powerful than any of them present.
They couldn't even detect it, let alone open the door.
They watched as the area of withered roses in the corner gradually expanded.
All they could do was pray that Ning Yitao and the others would quickly finish dealing with the matter below.
********
The water below was unexpectedly deep, seemingly bottomless!
Ning Yitao felt that she had been walking down for a long time when she noticed a faint veil on the water surface in the depths.
She approached it and tentatively reached out her hand. She could pass through it. Turning to Ji Wangqiu, she said, "This is a bipolar formation. There's a high chance we won't be able to come back. Are you sure you want to follow me through?"
"Of course. I'll go wherever you go," Ji Wangqiu replied matter - of - factly, staring straight at Ning Yitao.
Ning Yitao got the answer. It seemed she had heard this answer many times many years ago. Now, thinking about it, she only found it laughable.
She averted her gaze. Some emotions churned in her eyes and then disappeared.
The two stepped through the veil.
Ji Wangqiu tried to hold Ning Yitao's hand, but she dodged.
Zhaocai immediately laughed mockingly, "Stop daydreaming. It's impossible. It was impossible before, and it's even more impossible now."
Ji Wangqiu shot it a cold look. "Shut up. I don't want to deal with you now."
Zhaocai smacked its lips and said smugly, "Don't be so childish. Taotao will definitely help me. Do you dare to challenge Taotao one - on - one?"
This made Ji Wangqiu so angry that he was about to grab Zhaocai on the spot.
"Watch where you're going. If you keep arguing, I'll leave you all behind," Ning Yitao said as she steadied Ji Wangqiu, who had stumbled because he wasn't looking.
After crossing the veil, it was pitch - black. They groped their way forward slowly.
Suddenly, Ning Yitao felt something in her hand. After feeling it carefully, she realized it was a petal. She had just opened her mouth to say, "Not good."
Immediately afterwards, the two were flipped over by a force and fell to the ground.
When the lights came on, they were actually back in the hall where they had first entered.
The two spaces were actually connected. A deluge of rose petals rushed towards them. Yes, the word was "rushed".
Mountains of roses filled the house, threatening to suffocate them. Ji Wangqiu rolled over to protect Ning Yitao, preventing the flowers from hitting her directly.
Ji Wangqiu recited a spell, and the petals that had been falling steadily returned to the ceiling.
Only then did Ning Yitao react. So this was the purpose of the flowers in the garden.
Ning Yitao's eyes were sharp. She saw a figure shuttling through the flower bushes. She reached into the pile of petals, her fingers forming claws, and grabbed the thing.
Taking a closer look, it was a little girl with a pale - gray face. This was exactly what she looked like before she died.
Her death wasn't particularly gruesome. It was obvious that she had died of suffocation.
Ning Yitao grabbed the trembling little girl and asked, "Why did you harm people?"
Instead of answering her, the little girl let out a shrill scream.
"Not good. She's calling for help," Ji Wangqiu said as he immediately covered her mouth.
But it was too late. The next second, yin energy emerged from all directions.
Ning Yitao shifted her body slightly and licked her lips. "Since you're all here, show yourselves. Don't be cowards."
The yin energy gathered into human forms. Four ghosts stood in front of Ning Yitao. They seemed to be a family, and they all had the same cause of death.
The men were wearing silk robes, and the women were wearing mink shawls. They were obviously from the century before last.
Ji Wangqiu immediately said, "Why are you all so silly? Why did the whole family choose to die together? Look at this little girl. She has no manners at all. She calls her parents whenever she can. Really."
Ning Yitao watched as the already pale - faced family turned even greener with anger.
Ji Wangqiu added, "It was this little girl who called you out. It has nothing to do with us."
Ning Yitao tugged at Ji Wangqiu, signaling him not to make a fool of himself.
The middle - aged man in the lead was obviously angry. He roared, "Let my daughter go."
Ning Yitao sneered. "If I let your daughter go, what about the person you killed?"
She deliberately lifted the girl in mid - air and waved her, threatening, "What if I beat this little girl until her soul is scattered?"
The man was enraged. He raised his hands and tried to control the petals to fall.
Ji Wangqiu stood out with his hands on his hips. "Don't bother. As long as I'm here, I won't let these petals fall. I have this much ability."
"Alright, tell your story. After that, we'll send you to reincarnation," Zhaocai said slowly as it lay on Ning Yitao's shoulder.
"? Reincarnation?? Can you send all of us to reincarnation?" the man suddenly asked eagerly.
"Of course. As long as we find the thing that's trapping you and destroy it, you can naturally go to reincarnation," Zhaocai explained while secretly whispering to Ning Yitao in her mind, "Do you think how much merit power we can earn by sending these people away?"
"You'll definitely get your share. Don't worry."
Ji Wangqiu joined the conversation, "What are you guys talking about?"
— The other two ended the conversation tacitly.
"I hope you're not lying to me. Our family doesn't want to be trapped in this daily despair anymore."
The man in front of them fell into memories and began to tell his story.
Their family had once been Roman nobles, living in luxury and without a care in the world.
They should have lived a happy life, but everything changed at that banquet.
The young Roman emperor was corrupt and incompetent. He only did things according to his own mood, regardless of the consequences.
There was also a beautiful female singer who was very popular with the emperor at that time. In order to make the beauty smile, the emperor built a magnificent palace for her, ignoring the starving common people.
The singer wanted the honest minister to dance for her. The emperor immediately ordered the minister to perform a striptease in public. If he didn't, his whole family would be killed. The minister danced with tears in his eyes and felt extremely ashamed.
There were many such absurd things.
But he never thought that one day, such a thing would happen to his own family.
At a dinner party, the singer said she wanted to watch someone dance in a sea of rose petals.
The young Roman emperor, wearing a golden silk robe and a crown, hugged the docile singer and watched this grand event on the platform behind the sea of flowers with other guests wearing flower wreaths.
The man's family was invited to the banquet but paid with their lives and became an episode of the banquet for others to watch.
The emperor even hired someone to design a reversible ceiling.
There were countless needles hidden in the thick petals, which pierced them, forcing them to dance to avoid the needles.
As soon as the man's family stepped into the banquet, they were submerged by the rose petals falling from the ceiling above, and the needles pierced deeply into their skin.
The emperor used these petals to suffocate the unsuspecting guests.
The man's family struggled desperately in the sea of flowers to climb onto the platform and tried to cry for help.
But as soon as they opened their mouths, large handfuls of roses rushed into their airways, and the needles mixed in them made them spit out mouthfuls of blood.
The last thing the man saw before he died was the emperor and the guests using his family's lives for their own amusement.
Hate, endless hate. The wrongly - killed family wanted to fight back.
But they were sealed by the exorcist invited by the emperor, using the petals stained with their family's blood as a medium.
Since then, they had been trapped in this place, experiencing the pain of suffocation every day.
The gorgeous roses had turned into a nightmare.
For some reason, the man's expression changed. As if he had thought of something, he suddenly said, "You must never provoke the person upstairs."