System: Infinite Evolution into Qilin Bloodline

Chapter 180

Not all areas of the museum are open.

After entering the museum, the middle-aged man walked towards the less crowded areas, as if he were very familiar with the place.

He walked ahead at a leisurely pace, seemingly waiting for Zhang Hao to catch up.

Zhang Hao followed him through an alley, where a sign on the door at the end read "No entry for non-staff members".

The middle-aged man ignored the sign and pushed the door open to enter.

Zhang Hao hesitated for a moment, but finally followed.

Behind the gate was a courtyard, scattered with many terracotta figurines, just like those in the museum, except that none of them were intact; they were all broken into pieces.

The middle-aged man's figure had disappeared.

Zhang Hao emitted a sound wave, and when the sound returned to his ears, the situation within a radius of several hundred meters appeared in his mind.

The middle-aged man entered the room, took a crossbow, and was now hiding in the shadows, aiming at Zhang Hao.

"call out!"

At that moment, an arrow flew swiftly toward Zhang Hao.

He raised his hand and blocked the arrow that was shot at him.

"boom!"

The arrow struck his arm with a metallic clang before falling to the ground.

"Whoosh, whoosh, whoosh..."

When the first shot failed, crossbow bolts were fired one after another.

Zhang Hao easily deflected all the arrows, but the middle-aged man continued to fire his crossbow.

"Hmph, hmph..."

Suddenly, Zhang Hao smelled a faint fragrance in the air, mixed with a familiar stench of corpses.

He instantly realized that the man had never intended to harm him with the crossbow bolts; he had simply used the arrows to deliver the sleeping potion.

He was unaware that Zhang Hao possessed a third-tier Qilin bloodline, rendering ordinary medicine ineffective.

However, in order to find out more about the other party, Zhang Hao chose to play along.

He pretended to be taking Chinese medicine, swayed a few times, and then collapsed to the ground.

The man in the middle behind the door saw Zhang Hao fall to the ground and then stepped out from the shadows.

He walked up to Zhang Hao, kicked him twice, and when Zhang Hao didn't react, he grabbed one of Zhang Hao's arms and put it on his shoulder, then helped Zhang Hao into a room.

Although Zhang Hao's eyes were not closed, his senses were very sharp.

Everything that happened was fully known.

The middle-aged man took out a pair of handcuffs and cuffed Zhang Hao's hands and feet. Then he triggered a mechanism on the left wall, leading Zhang Hao into a secret room.

"I never expected to run into a descendant of the Zhang family again. But compared to their ancestors, the Zhang family is too stupid, letting me succeed so easily."

Hearing the middle-aged man talking to himself, Zhang Hao knew that it was almost time.

He suddenly opened his eyes and saw that the walls of the secret room were covered with countless bottles and jars, and in the middle was a large stone coffin that could easily accommodate two or three people.

"Who are you, and why have you arrested me?"

The middle-aged man woke up as soon as he saw Zhang Hao, a hint of surprise flashing in his eyes.

"You woke up just minutes after being drugged by my drug. You are truly worthy of the Zhang family; your bodies are the perfect vessels."

The middle-aged man evaded the question, refusing to answer Zhang Hao's question at all.

Perhaps in his eyes, Zhang Hao was just a lamb to the slaughter, not worth wasting words on.

He busied himself with his work, taking down a dozen or so bottles and jars of varying sizes from the wall and pouring their contents into the stone coffin.

After doing all that, he brought over a pottery jar that was half a person's height, filled with a scarlet liquid.

The middle-aged man poured all the liquid from the earthenware jar into the stone coffin, mixing it with what he had poured in earlier.

As he approached the stone coffin, Zhang Hao noticed that the man had a museum work badge on him.

The name on it is Zhao Gao.

Zhang Hao was startled when he saw the name.

Is this just a coincidence, or is the Zhao Gao in front of us the same Zhao Gao from more than two thousand years ago?

The familiar stench of death emanating from Zhao Gao, along with everything he did and said, made Zhang Hao even more convinced that he was the Zhao Gao from over two thousand years ago.

Perhaps he lived for far more than two thousand years.

According to Uncle Wu, the Wu and Zhang families had long ago used special methods to prevent the gods from finding them.

In other words, the Wu and Zhang families disappeared from history thousands of years ago, and apart from their own family members, no one else should know their identities.

Zhao Gao, however, recognized Zhang Hao's identity as a member of the Zhang family at a glance, and thus led him here.

In other words, he is very likely an ancient monster who has lived for an unknown amount of time.

His method of achieving immortality is to allow his consciousness to continuously occupy new bodies, and this has continued to this day.

He discovered Zhang Hao's identity and knew that Zhang Hao's body was an excellent vessel, so he lured him here and then drugged him, all for the sake of Zhang Hao's body.

“I, Zhao Gao, have always been a man of great fortune. The Zhang family, who disappeared thousands of years ago, have actually appeared right under my nose. This is a chance for eternal life bestowed upon me by Heaven.”

Only the bodies of your Zhang family members can grant me true immortality.

"I won't have to keep searching for new bodies to occupy anymore."

Zhao Gao completely disregarded Zhang Hao, and busied himself preparing a crimson liquid with a strong, foul odor inside the stone coffin.

After doing all this, he came to Zhang Hao's side, picked him up, and was about to throw him into the stone coffin.

He didn't know what was in the coffin, and although it certainly wouldn't harm him, being enveloped in that foul-smelling liquid was disgusting enough.

Zhang Hao didn't want to get his hands dirty with that foul-smelling liquid.

With a thought, he activated his self-defense capabilities.

This is an ability gained after fusing with the Nine Deaths Terrifying Armor. It allows you to activate or deactivate your self-defense capabilities at will.

I haven't tried out what this ability is like since I got it.

Now that he had the chance, Zhang Hao activated his self-defense ability to test what it was all about.

The moment his self-defense ability was activated, more than a dozen barbed, metallic vines grew from various parts of his body.

They grow extremely fast, reaching a length of over ten meters in the blink of an eye.

These vines seemed to be alive; they attacked everything that appeared around Zhang Hao.

A vine coiled around the handcuffs and began to tighten.

The sound of metal scraping against metal rang in Zhang Hao's ears, followed by a loud "bang" as the vines snapped the steel handcuffs in two.

Vines even slithered up to Zhang Hao's feet and broke the handcuffs on his feet.

The remaining vines swam forward to attack Zhao Gao.

Zhang Hao was startled and broke out in a cold sweat when he saw the vines that suddenly grew on his body.

"What kind of monster are you?! What are you?!"

Seeing the vines swimming towards him, he took off running and rushed to the side to grab a sword from the wall.

He kept waving his sword to block the approaching vines.

The moment the sword made contact with the vine, a metallic clang rang out.

Zhao Gao noticed that every time his sword, which could cut through iron like mud, came into contact with the vines, a new nick would appear on it.

He was even more shocked.

He couldn't understand how such vines, harder than steel, could grow on a person's body.

Moreover, these vines seem to be alive, actively attacking.

"boom!"

The sword in Zhao Gao's hand broke into several pieces after only a few seconds.

He stared at the approaching vines and instantly fell into despair.