Translator: Nyoi-Bo Studio Editor: Nyoi-Bo Studio
There’s a chance that its corrupting agent isn’t something that can usually be found in this world. Maybe it’s something that the Cataclysm brought into existence, thought Gao Peng.
He put away his laboratory equipment and said to Stripey, “Stripey, I’ll leave you here with the statue. Go play with it if you’re feeling bored.”
Stripey nodded and watched as Gao Peng left the stone cottage.
Poke, poke.
When Gao Peng was finally gone, Stripey began playfully prodding at the statue.
This new toy that Gao Peng had given it was quite sturdy. No matter how much Stripey played with it, it still remained intact.
As tolerant as the Guan Gong statue seemed, it wouldn’t let just anyone or anything touch it like that.
The bronze statue glared at Stripey as it silently judged its own size against the mountain-sized spider.
Don’t test me, spider!
Still having too much fun with its new toy, Stripey poked it gently with one of its massive legs and sent it tumbling to the ground.
“Hey, have you ever heard of me?” asked Stripey happily.
Monsters of the same species were usually capable of communicating with one another.
Even though Stripey was a spider, it was able to communicate with other rock-type monsters, an ability it had obtained after absorbing the Mountain Spirit King’s essence.
The Guan Gong statue simply didn’t want to engage with the spider.
“I think you have heard of me. I’ve been getting a lot of praise from the humans outside recently. They’ve been talking about how I’m the greatest familiar in the world. Can’t blame them; it’s the truth!” Stripey was overjoyed to have finally found someone to talk to. It crawled to the Guan Gong statue’s side and began talking excitedly to it.
However, the conversation was mostly one-sided, as the bronze statue didn’t say a word to it.
“Metal man, did you know? That was probably one of my coolest moments ever,” Stripey gushed enthusiastically while tapping on the Guan Gong statue’s head with its leg.
The Guan Gong statue remained mute.
“Hey, did you know? I think that the mealworms that Gao Peng bought for me in Chang’an City were the tastiest things I’ve ever tasted. I haven’t had anything tastier since,” continued Stripey, sounding somewhat disappointed.
“Have you eaten mealworms? Oh, I completely forgot that you’re a metal man. You probably don’t need to eat, do you? It’s a shame. You probably don’t even know what it’s like to taste.”
The Guan Gong statue continued to say nothing.
“Have you ever been to Chang’an City? You’ve probably never been there. It’s almost as big as Yuzhou City,” Stripey went on.
Finally, the Guan Gong statue blurted out, “Could you please stop talking?”
Stripey looked at the bronze statue in surprise. “You can talk?”
…
That night, Gao Peng was searching for information on recently discovered monsters from other regions when suddenly, he heard Spidey’s voice in his head. “Gao Peng, I finally cracked the statue.”
“How did you do it?” Gao Peng was taken aback. It had only taken Stripey a day to accomplish what he had been trying to do for a week.
“Nothing, we just chatted for a bit,” said Stripey happily. “It probably just wanted to be my friend.”
“All right. Did you ask it why it killed someone that day?”
“It said that it saw a couple of hooligans causing trouble in the neighborhood that night, so it decided to step in.”
Gao Peng nodded to himself. “So why didn’t it flee from Yuzhou City immediately after killing them? Why did it hide in a porcelain shop instead?”
Stripey fell silent for a moment, then it said, “The statue said that it wanted to leave Yuzhou City by following the western side of the city, but it got lost, so it decided to rest in the store during the day and resume its journey at night.”
At first, Gao Peng had assumed that the statue was searching for an elemental artifact or some sacrificial offering in the city to help it evolve.
Hearing that it had only gotten lost and stopped at the porcelain store to rest somewhat diminished the mystery around the statue.
However, despite its cold, impassive exterior, the bronze statue was still a monster.
…
Every news outlet in the Huaxia region was abuzz about the Yungang Grottoes.
Although the Huaxia Government issued quick responses to silence the matter, news about the grottoes still managed to leak, making everyone antsy.
Every news channel had captured footage of the grottoes from various angles.
In them, one could see that the grottoes’ walls, which had once been a dull gray, were now awash with a golden light. Small stone statues were caught peeking out from their shrines and staring curiously at the reporters. Some of them were a bit shy and timidly hid from the cameras.
They appeared to be a new species of monsters that had evolved from stone statues. The short Buddha statues seemed like children, filled with curiosity and wonder about the world around them. On the other hand, the adult-sized statues appeared more mature and dignified.
Some of the Buddha statues sat cross-legged in the grottoes and generally ignored the reporters as they chanted their Buddhist verses.
It was as if a whole new world had popped up out of nowhere.
“These Buddha statues are actually alive. That’s just incredible. I remember visiting the Yungang Grottoes once. Back then, they were all just inanimate mounds of stone.”
“Really gets you thinking. Will we become extinct one day?”
“Man, this world really has it out for us humans…”
Everyone began expressing their wonder and fears about this after watching the news.
Some even began discussing the possibility of taming these statues to become their familiars.
“In accordance to the agreement made between the Allied Government and the Buddha Statues of the Yungang Grottoes, the Allied Government has agreed to delineate the 20-mile area around the Yungang Grottoes as the statues’ critical habitat and has forbidden anyone or any organization from entering the place to capture these creatures for their own means. In exchange, the Buddha statues of the Yungang Grottoes will be providing their assistance to the base city of Bingzhou in their efforts to curb the monster invasion that has troubled the city for weeks…”
Gao Peng turned off the television.
He had seen the monsters’ stats in the news.
[Monster Name]: Yungang Buddha Statue
[Monster Level]: Level 6-40
[Monster Grade]: Normal, Excellent, Perfect
[Monster Attribute]: Earth, Rock
The news footages had captured mostly Normal-tier to Commander-tier Buddha statues. The highest monster grade among them was Perfect. Gao Peng hadn’t seen any Epic-level monsters, but then again, the reporters hadn’t ventured that far into the grottoes.
Even though Gao Peng hadn’t seen any Lord-tier Buddha statues on the news, he had a feeling that they did exist in the caves. Otherwise, the Huaxia government wouldn’t have been so secretive about the whole affair.
