Chapter 136- Underground Part 2

As the light from the observer illuminated the area, Adori and Xin could witness the various unique shaped rocks that were made of different materials. Some of them had a rectangular shape, some of them had cubical, some of them had cone while some of them were just a randomly odd shape.

Unlike the barren and dull desert on the surface, the minerals and rocks had many colors, from the dark ones like black, brown, and purple to the bright ones like green, teal, red, and orange.

"Princess Adori, it's already midnight so it's better for us to get going." Liu Guanyi said to warn the team.

"Indeed, you are right, let's go." Adori said as she ordered the group to continue their exploration.

They began to move and explore the tunnel with the observers from Xin and Theo lighting it up. Liu Guanyi was in the frontmost acting as the vanguard with Theo right behind him while Adori was in the middle and Xin was in the rear.

They walked as they scoured the pitch-black tunnel carefully. Although they walked slowly, the sound of their footsteps still echoed in the quiet and silent space.

Realizing this, Adori told them to use their shinsu control to muffle their footsteps before they would attract any creatures that lurked nearby. Even though the Shinheuh were weak compared to them, they didn't know how many creatures were exactly there.

Considering the space and size of a single tunnel alone, it was safe to say that there were probably tens of thousands of Shinheuh or hundreds of thousands, or maybe even millions of them living and hiding in the vast and deep underground network of tunnels.

Fighting in this area was not advisable unless it was necessary since it could easily attract many other creatures that would take advantage of their fight and killing them would simply attract even more of them toward them.

Even if they didn't make any noises in their fight, many Shinheuh could still smell the blood or feel the vibration on the ground so it didn't matter. However, the worst scenario was if they managed to attract a large number of Shinheuh. If that happened, they would have to intimidate them or run away if that wasn't possible.

Not only because that fighting them would just attract more of them to swarm them, but fighting hard in the underground could cause the underground to collapse and that would be very bad since they were around hundred of meters below the surface, and they had to go lower to find the death worms.

Just as expected, the tunnel sloped downward deeper to the underground and they had just to follow the path. After walking for a while, they hadn't seen any creature at all even though they had passed many small branching tunnels unlike what they had expected.

Thinking about it, Liu Guanyi considered that maybe the Shinheuh had reached some mutual agreement to prevent causing chaos and destroy the tunnel so they avoided each other? Or maybe they didn't live here since many Shinheuh passed this tunnel to go to the surface?

"These tunnels are just the passageway that small creatures use in the inner parts of the underground. Since we are looking for the death worms, we don't need to bother to check them." Explained Theo as they nodded and went along with the scout.

When they reached the end of the tunnel, there was an extreme downward curve that was different from the previous small tunnels they had passed before.

"This is the tunnel that will lead us deeper underground." Theo said after he touched and felt the surface of the hole.

"From here on, we will meet many Shinheuh. However, most of them wouldn't attack us as long as we keep our distance and if we don't show any weakness for them to take advantage of so we don't need to antagonize them needlessly and focus more on the exploration." Theo explained, confirming some of Liu Guanyi's guess.

They quickly went into the tunnel without hesitation, going deeper into the underground network. Calmly looking around the place, although it was still big, it was smaller than the previous tunnel. As they walked, they could hear a crunching sound on one of the big rocks around.

Checking the source of the noise, they saw a massive beetle-like bug with black hard carapace hovering around a block of rich rock mineral before it landed on it and used its jaw bit the rock then crunched the mineral.

"That's Black Steel Rock Crunching Beetle, a beetle that eats hard rocks rich of minerals. Because of their diet, their body is extremely hard. Also, to eat the hard rocks, their jaw is particularly strong, making them a powerful entity in the food chains of the underground. However, their nature is peaceful so unless provoked or threatened, they wouldn't do anything to us."

They moved on and saw many more creatures like Mold Eating Fireflies, fireflies that molds on the walls and ceiling of the tunnel that glowed in green color when they were lit up with light since their body deposited the remnants of the molds that hey had eaten for a long time, Rock Worms, worms that burrowed under the rocks that also ate minerals, though their bodies were small, only around ten centimeters long, and many others.

However, they all had a smiliar trait, they were peaceful and not carnivorous as they were busy with their own businesses. This trait was probably the reason why they could live together in harmony.

Even when they approached them to observe these unique Shinheuh, they didn't become antsy and become aggressive, something that was rarely found in wild creatures.

It seemed that unless they touched them or disrupt their activities, these Shinheuh wouldn't even bother to take a look of their presence.

"These creatures are incredible, aren't they? It's very hard to find wild animals that are as peaceful as they are even in the tower. However, in this desert, these are common and easily found." The scout said with a hint of pride.

"Indeed, though it's not that amazing since they are not carnivourous." Replied Liu Guanyi as he observed the mineral-eating creatures.

Theo had a slight smile and said. "Then, let's go to the deeper level. There, we will meet many carnivorous Shinheuh, though I hope that we won't meet a lot of them."