"So what are you going to do now? Just wait here for Li Xian to come out?"
Ling Zhou's lazy voice rang out, dispelling some of Shen Qing's uneasiness.
In this unfamiliar place at the bottom of the sea, Shen Qing still hoped that someone could stay by her side. Even if she couldn't see Ling Zhou, it was good to hear her talk.
Shen Qing lowered her head and thought for a while. There was a forbidden formation outside the Merman Palace, so there was no need to worry about the invasion of sea beasts. If she didn't go to the ninth floor, it would be safe to stay below the eighth floor.
After making up her mind, she said to Ling Zhou, "I only took a brief look at those floors just now. Since I'm free now, I might as well take a stroll on each floor."
Ling Zhou also agreed with Shen Qing's idea and said excitedly, "Thanks to my little disciple. Otherwise, I wouldn't have been able to reach this legendary Merman Palace. I thought mermaids didn't exist, but I didn't expect there to be descendants in the world."
"But I have to say, although the mermaids sealed on the ninth floor have mutated, their fish tails are really beautiful, shining with colorful lights. No wonder there was a rumor before that if one could make a celestial skirt with the scales of mermaid tails, it would surely outshine everyone."
"By the way, by the way, aren't you curious about Li Xian's mermaid form? I'm really looking forward to it. I want to see it."
In just a few steps, Ling Zhou had already murmured a lot in Shen Qing's mind.
Now Shen Qing didn't find Ling Zhou annoying. Instead, she found this kind of voice extremely reassuring.
The eighth floor seemed to be a place for cultivating spiritual plants. Apart from a room filled with all kinds of bottles and jars and a table made of unknown stones, the entire eighth floor was planted with corals and other sea plants.
But these plants hadn't been taken care of for a long time. Except for some with strong vitality that were growing wantonly, most of the others had withered.
There was no gravity on the eighth floor, so Shen Qing could only swim around above these spiritual plants.
"Strange. Master, have you noticed that these spiritual plants seem to be growing out of thin air on the coral floor? There's no soil. How did they grow?"
Ling Zhou stopped murmuring and seemed to be thinking. By the time Shen Qing thought Ling Zhou had been silent for too long.
"Master, what's wrong? Why aren't you talking?"
"Little disciple..." Ling Zhou's voice trembled slightly. "You're right. There's indeed something wrong with the Merman Palace, but it's not just the ninth floor..."
Shen Qing twitched the corner of her mouth. A chill spread up her spine. "Master, what are you talking about? Don't scare me..."
Shen Qing stopped swimming and floated in the air. When she heard Ling Zhou say something was wrong, she tried to swim upstream as much as possible, getting closer to the night pearls on the ceiling.
Ling Zhou spoke again. Shen Qing could sense that he was trying his best to calm the fear in his tone. "Listen to me. Don't be afraid. Come on. Swim slowly straight down."
Shen Qing hesitated for a moment. She was very resistant in her heart but couldn't hold back her curiosity.
After struggling for a while, Shen Qing swam straight down with a pale face.
"Okay, okay. Stop here. Don't move!"
Seeing that Shen Qing could reach out and touch the withered spiritual plants, Ling Zhou quickly shouted to stop. "Have you noticed what shape this patch of withered spiritual plants looks like?"
Shen Qing lowered her head and observed carefully. This place originally seemed to be planted with plants like sea anemones, but they had dried up and turned into brown things.
But except for this patch where it could be seen that something had been planted, the surrounding was a smooth coral floor.
Shen Qing looked from left to right. It was like a circular shape, and there was a thing in the middle connecting a large area of withered sea anemones. Then, near the circle, there were two things growing...
Shen Qing swam straight up to the ceiling. In panic, she opened her mouth, and the sea water rushed into her throat one after another. Besides feeling nauseous, she also felt extremely disgusted.
"That's... the shape of a mermaid. Master, do you mean that these things didn't appear here out of thin air but were planted using mermaids as nutrients?!"
Shen Qing covered her chest and looked around in shock. She found that every place where spiritual plants had grown was in the shape of a mermaid.
It turned out that not only the ninth floor but also the eighth floor was so terrifying.
"Why..."
Shen Qing swam close to the ceiling and observed the entire eighth floor.
She couldn't help but imagine in her mind that back then, a group of mermaids were somehow fainted or died and then placed here. Then, their bodies were planted with spiritual plants, and the spiritual plants absorbed their nutrients...
This made Shen Qing think of the flowerbed she had taken care of for Lin Yibai before she awakened. Underneath it were the dry bones drained by Ji Zhongming.
"Maybe after the divine punishment came that year, not only the newly - born mermaid babies mutated, but also the other clan members were affected."
"Do you mean that these mermaids were all affected by the divine punishment, and their bodies changed, growing these plants?!"
This is even scarier! Watching one's own body turn into plants bit by bit but being helpless. How desperate that must be!
"Little disciple, there are problems on the eighth and ninth floors. Do you think there are also problems on the lower seven floors..."
Ling Zhou's reminder made Shen Qing's scalp tingle instantly. Just now, she and Li Xian had passed by in a hurry and hadn't carefully checked if there was anything wrong with each floor.
They had only scattered their spiritual senses to check if there were any living things nearby, but they hadn't expected that the strangeness had never been about the presence or absence of living things.
"Let's go and take a look!" Shen Qing clenched her fists and said firmly.
Ling Zhou was surprised. "Little disciple, aren't you afraid? After all this, you still dare to go. Why not wait for Li Xian to come out..."
"No! This Merman Palace is full of strangeness everywhere. If we wait for Li Xian to come out and then go to check, it will take a long time. Since there are no living things, there should be no danger. I'll go and check by myself."
Without waiting for Ling Zhou to continue speaking, Shen Qing swam towards the stairs leading to the seventh floor.
Now it was Ling Zhou's turn to feel his scalp tingle. Although he was also a cultivator, he hadn't encountered such strange things in his lifetime.
He hadn't even seen many ghosts. The scariest things he had seen the most were those ferocious demonic beasts that bared their teeth and pounced on him.
But intangible things were much scarier than tangible ones. He would rather there be mermaids attacking everywhere here than see these strange things!
Before long, Shen Qing passed through the stairs and reached the seventh floor. The seventh floor was a huge warehouse. Li Xian had just used a mermaid secret technique to open the door of the seventh - floor warehouse. Inside were piled up the treasures collected by the mermaid clan.
Valuable gold and pearls were casually piled up in the corner, forming small mountains.
Gems and unknown crystals were piled up on one side and casually hung on the huge red corals.
When passing by, Shen Qing and Li Xian had just taken a simple look and then left, but the door just wouldn't close. Now it saved Shen Qing some trouble.
Shen Qing took a deep breath at the door and swam in as if taking a desperate gamble.