329 Code Words

Outside the Iron City.

Under the moonlight, Lin Ran looked at the patterns on the fabric. Although his eyesight was not bad, the imprint was too rough. He had to focus with all his might to barely distinguish what it was.

It was not until his eyes were sore and his head was dizzy that Lin Ran finally saw something.

Among the complicated patterns, he could vaguely see some lines that looked like strokes. However, he was already dizzy and was not sure if he was hallucinating.

“Is there… a word inside?”

Lin Ran looked at the fabric and asked, “I think I saw some brush strokes, but I can’t recognize them at all.”

“It seems that you still have some comprehension!”

Ye Jin chuckled and stood up. She patted Lin Ran’s shoulder like a little adult. “Don’t be discouraged. It’s normal that you can’t recognize it because it’s not ordinary words, but code words.”

“Code words?”

Lin Ran frowned in confusion. He had some knowledge of deciphering code words, but the patterns on the fabric were unfathomable to him.

Seeing that Lin Ran was confused, Ye Jin didn’t explain directly. Instead, she took the piece of fabric and cut off the pattern of each metal rod with a small knife.

After completing it, Ye Jin picked up one of them and pointed at a two-layer vortex pattern on it with the tip of her knife. “This is the serial number. The number of circles represents the number—”

Then, Ye Jin moved the tip of the knife and pointed at a symbol with a sharp tip. “This is the direction of the patterns. The sharp ends of all the patterns have to go up. And this…”

“Wait a minute!”

Lin Ran raised his hand to interrupt Ye Jin and said helplessly, “I don’t have much time now. Can you just tell me what it means and teach me later?”

Hearing this, Ye Jin looked troubled. “But I don’t know what this means…”

“You don’t know?”

Lin Ran held his breath to suppress his anger. “Then why did you tell me you know a huge secret? Are you lying to me?”

“I’m not lying to you! This is really a huge secret!”

Ye Jin hurriedly defended herself. Thinking of how Lin Ran had said that he would send her away if he found out that she was lying, she became nervous.

However, the more nervous she was, the more she did not know what to say. After opening her mouth a few times, she could not make a sound. In the end, she simply spread all the pieces of fabric on the ground and began to arrange them in a specific way.

There were not many pieces of fabric. Ye Jin quickly finished arranging them. Then, as she looked at the patterns on the fabric, she began to use the knife as a pen to write on the sand.

“Cloud Breaking Slash?”

Seeing the first three words written by Ye Jin, Lin Ran’s expression immediately changed.

Previously, when he was in the forest, the system notified him that it was a [Special Place], so Lin Ran used Tu Baichuan’s heavy sword to sign in. The reward he obtained from the system was also called Cloud Breaking Slash.

However, for some reason, although Lin Ran had obtained Cloud Breaking Slash, the scroll in his mind was blank.

After that, Lin Ran guessed that it was because the weapon was not the right kind, so he started to search for a saber. After entering the Iron City and obtaining the Black Shadow Saber, he hadn’t had the chance to check the scroll in his mind.

Now that he saw Ye Jin analyze the words “Cloud Breaking Slash” from the patterns, Lin Ran couldn’t help but wonder if the “Cloud Breaking Slash” recorded on the necklace was the same thing he had obtained from the system.

Thinking of this, Lin Ran was also interested in the content hidden in the patterns. He took a deep breath and suppressed his excitement. He squatted beside Ye Jin and watched.

At the same time, Ye Jin had already analyzed dozens of words from the patterns, but she only used four or five pieces of fabric. From this, it could be seen how complicated the information hidden in the patterns was.

After a long wait, Ye Jin finally shook her sore wrist and stood up. “Done!”

Lin Ran, who was about to fall asleep, perked up when he heard this. He quickly went closer to take a look. There were hundreds of words written densely on the sand.

Apart from “Cloud Breaking Slash”, the rest of the words seemed to be independent. He could recognize every word, but he didn’t know what they meant when put together. The only thing he could understand were the last eight words: Learn it and you can kill the dragon.

However, even after figuring this out, Lin Ran still had no clue.

“Are you sure it’s in the right order?”

Lin Ran pursed his lips and asked suspiciously. It was not that he didn’t believe Ye Jin, but these few hundred words were not related to each other at all. Apart from the “Cloud Breaking Slash” and the last eight words, the rest of the words seemed to be in disorder.

“It must be the right order.”

Ye Jin nodded heavily and said firmly, “When I was young, my mother often played this kind of guessing game with me. I remember it very clearly. I’m not wrong.”

After confirming that Ye Jin was not wrong, Lin Ran could only conclude that this was a “Heavenly Book”.

However, Lin Ran didn’t give up completely. After all, he still had a chapter on Cloud Breaking Slash in his mind. Although he didn’t know what it was, since it was called Cloud Breaking Slash, there must be some connection.

Thinking of this, Lin Ran silently committed these words to memory. After instructing Ye Jin to wait for a moment, he plunged into his consciousness.

In the boundless void, an ancient scroll flickering with golden light slowly appeared in front of Lin Ran.

The scroll slowly opened, and lines of words appeared on it.

Seeing this, Lin Ran was overjoyed. After quickly looking around, a meaningful smile gradually appeared on his face. “I see…”