Ying Chen's eyebrows shot up as he read this.
Then, he eagerly flipped open the records of the peculiar incident.
The case occurred in the vast desert of the Northwest.
It was an uninhabited wasteland, with only Gobi and sand as far as the eye could see. Most importantly, the desert spanned thousands of miles, and even with a guide, the chance of getting lost was extremely high.
For instance, a renowned biologist once organized an expedition team to conduct research there.
They ultimately got lost in the endless sand dunes and disappeared.
Although the authorities declared him dead, legends about him spread like wildfire among the populace, becoming more and more widespread.
This even gave rise to bizarre tales like the Twin Fish Jade Pendant.
The protagonist of the case, Xiao Chu, was inspired by the story of the Twin Fish Jade Pendant to embark on an adventure.
However, Xiao Chu was somewhat sensible and knew that venturing into the Northwest desert without preparation was a one-way trip.
Therefore, he spent a year undergoing survival training.
After a year, he packed his bags and officially set off.
Initially, things went smoothly. Even when he encountered some unexpected problems, he overcame them with his survival knowledge.
But on the tenth day, he suddenly found that his compass was malfunctioning!
His satellite phone inexplicably went dead.
Even his mechanical watch stopped working!
The situation suddenly became bizarre, filling Xiao Chu with a sense of panic and helplessness.
Driven by this feeling, Xiao Chu decided to let go of all pretense and walked aimlessly in one direction.
He believed that as long as he walked far enough, he would definitely be able to escape the desert.
But he never imagined that three days later, all his food and water were depleted, and he still hadn't seen the edge of the desert!
Xiao Chu completely broke down.
He lay on the desert floor like a dried corpse, his cracked lips bleeding, his hollow eyes staring blankly at the scorching sun in the sky, his dehydrated body gradually curling up like a withered branch.
Xiao Chu had a premonition: he was going to die!
But just then, Xiao Chu suddenly noticed something strange happening in the depths of the desert!
In the dry and scorching desert, a mist inexplicably appeared!
Most importantly, this mist was sea blue!
It seemed to originate not from the desert, but from the sea!
The blue mist slowly spread towards Xiao Chu, inching closer.
Xiao Chu understood that he should avoid this strange-looking mist as much as possible.
But he was already dehydrated and weak, how could he possibly escape?
He could only watch as the blue mist enveloped him.
Upon entering the mist, Xiao Chu was stunned to discover.
These mists were not real mist, but were released by desert flowers that shimmered with a sapphire glow!
These desert flowers seemed to be buried deep beneath the sand, their roots invisible. Only large patches of vines were visible, spreading rapidly across the desert surface.
Each flower was about the size of a bowl, with crystal-clear petals, upon which hung droplets like dew.
Parched and thirsty Xiao Chu, seeing the dew, could no longer control himself.
Even though he knew it was dangerous, even though it was likely poison, he didn't care!
He would rather die of poison than thirst!
So he struggled to lift his head, bit down on a flower, and began to suck the dew from it.
One drop, two drops...
Xiao Chu didn't know how many drops he had sucked.
He only stopped when he felt his body no longer dehydrated.
Afterward, Xiao Chu lay on the ground with a contented expression, quietly waiting to die.
But what he didn't expect was that he lay there for a full seven or eight hours!
He had actually fallen asleep!
When he woke up, he found that the blue flowers had long since vanished, and the blue mist was nowhere to be seen.
It was as if they had never appeared.
Only a bright moon hung high in the night sky, heralding the arrival of night.
Xiao Chu couldn't believe it. He thought he was doomed, but he was perfectly fine!
What he found most unbelievable was that he had slept for seven or eight hours in the scorching sun, lying in the open desert, and hadn't been baked into a mummy!
It was truly inconceivable!
Furthermore, Xiao Chu felt an inexhaustible supply of energy within him, a stark contrast to his previous listless state!
Despite his inability to comprehend it, Xiao Chu got up and continued walking in his previous direction.
This time, it seemed fate finally favored him.
Halfway through, he encountered a local.
The local was greatly surprised to see Xiao Chu.
Because the direction Xiao Chu had come from was known as the Valley of Death!
For thousands of years, no local dared to enter that area!
It was said to be the entrance to hell, and anyone who entered it would never come out alive!
The local, feeling shocked, offered Xiao Chu food and water and led him out of the desert.
The matter would have ended there if Xiao Chu hadn't spoken about it.
But in the second year after Xiao Chu returned to civilization, he was in a car accident. The doctors had already declared him dead, and his body had been sent to the morgue.
However, on the same night, Xiao Chu walked out of the morgue!
This terrified the morgue attendants and the doctors.
It wasn't until the Fengdun Bureau arrived to take over the case that things were calmed down.
The Fengdun Bureau initially suspected Xiao Chu was a zombie, but after examination, they found him to be a perfectly healthy living person!
The Fengdun Bureau was greatly intrigued and began to unravel this mysterious past.
After hearing Xiao Chu's account, the Fengdun Bureau immediately realized that Xiao Chu's resurrection must have been due to drinking the dew from those blue flowers!
Without hesitation, the Fengdun Bureau went to the location Xiao Chu described to investigate.
However, after more than half a month of investigation, they found no blue flowers or blue mist.
But their efforts were not entirely in vain. The investigators discovered that the local sand and gravel were distinctly different from those elsewhere.
The local sand and gravel seemed to possess some kind of activity!
Unfortunately, this activity was extremely weak, and it completely disappeared before it could be transported from the desert to the Fengdun Bureau's laboratory.
The Fengdun Bureau, filled with regret, had to temporarily suspend the investigation.
The investigating personnel wrote the following sentence in their report:
"All things carry the negative and embrace the positive; where there is decay, there is rebirth; where there is desolation, there is awakening. Everything seems to be developing in the direction predicted by that expert: when things reach their worst, they will take a turn for the better."
For the first time, from an official standpoint, they affirmed the opinion of the second expert!
"Northwest Desert," Ying Chen silently noted the location.
Although Ying Chen knew that such blue flowers were rare and could not be found by simply waiting.
He still decided to find an opportunity to go and see.
This was because it was highly possible that behind those blue flowers lay a mysterious hidden realm!
Otherwise, such a cluster of flowers, especially flowers with regenerative abilities, would not have appeared out of nowhere!
"If spiritual energy truly shows signs of resurgence, then such phenomena will not be isolated incidents."
Ying Chen muttered to himself as he flipped through the files in his hand.
As expected, the subsequent pages were almost entirely filled with records of similar phenomena!
One case after another, dozens of pages!
There were hunters in deep mountains who discovered that the mountains seemed to be rising;
Places that rarely received rain for millennia suddenly began to rain continuously, turning deserts into swamps;
There were even reports of strange atmospheric fissures, as if the entire world had been split open by a sword and then imperfectly reassembled;
Even more astonishingly, during excavation work, a snake as thick as a water bucket and tens of meters long was unearthed. The snake actually spoke human words, issuing a solemn warning to the workers present!