The cave was vast, so wide that even shouting produced an echo. After circling it once, they estimated the depth to be about twenty meters, making the space roughly the size of a basketball court. Stranger still, the ground beneath their feet was paved with flagstones, each one about four square meters, intricately carved with strange, ancient patterns.

Young Master Liu suddenly clapped his hands. "Excellent! We can get out from here!"

The others looked at him, puzzled. "What? Did you find the way out?"

Young Master Liu pointed to the flagstones underfoot. "Look at these stones. They were clearly laid by human hands, meaning people used to frequent this place. If someone could get here, there must be a passage connecting to the outside!"

Hearing this, the others seemed to wake from a daze, their excitement mounting.

Zhang Enpu pondered for a moment, then cautioned, "We don't know what the ancients used this place for, so everyone be careful!"

Young Master Liu asked Zhang Enpu, "Master, can you tell what era these flagstones are from?"

Zhang Enpu squatted down, touching the stone. "The patterns on these flagstones are a bit peculiar; I can't pinpoint the exact time, but judging by the texture, they seem to be from around the Ming Dynasty."

As they were speaking, they heard Bai Er Laizi cry out in terror, "Oh my heavens, come look at this!"

A chill ran through the group, and they hurried toward the sound of Bai Er Laizi’s voice. There, a half-burnt candle lay on the ground, still flickering. The candlelight illuminated Bai Er Laizi’s face, pale and completely drained of color; his gaunt features resembled those of a corpse. He was slumped on the ground, his trembling finger pointing ahead, babbling, "A ghost! A ghost!"

Seeing his state made everyone’s heart skip a beat. What on earth could have frightened Bai Er Laizi into such a condition?

Tian Guoqiang picked up the half-burnt candle. "Damn it, stop trying to scare us! We are fine young men living under the great spring breeze of socialism; we don't believe in ghosts and spirits!" With that, he stepped forward and raised the candle to illuminate the area ahead.

"Ah?!" Tian Guoqiang’s arm froze mid-air. He stammered, "Th-this... this is too terrifying..."

The candle’s halo reflected on a stone wall a short distance away. The group peered into the dim light and were instantly struck dumb with fear. About three meters from them, hanging on the stone wall, was a gigantic scroll, nearly five meters long and two meters wide. The imagery on the scroll was bloody and bizarre, its colors so vivid they were dizzying. The scene depicted a man kneeling, his hands bound. His mouth was wide open. Beside him sat a brazier, and a fiendish little demon held a white-hot iron tong, gripping the man's tongue tightly. The tongue was stretched taut, and as thick smoke billowed, blood continuously oozed from the corner of the man’s mouth.

A faint, almost imperceptible smell of blood mixed with decay emanated from the scroll, making them nauseous.

Young Master Liu shook his throbbing head and stepped back. "What the hell kind of thing is this painted? How can it be so frightening?"

Tian Guoqiang suddenly remarked, "Doesn't this painting look a little strange to you?"

The way Tian Guoqiang spoke was eerie, raising goosebumps all over their skin.

When the others asked what was strange, Tian Guoqiang said, his voice trembling, "I feel like the person in the painting isn't painted at all—he looks real!"

What?! Everyone stared at the gruesome depiction, and the more they looked, the more they felt Tian Guoqiang was right. The entire painting possessed an intense three-dimensionality, as if the figure might crawl out of the frame at any moment.

"Give me the candle!" Zhang Enpu took the candle from Tian Guoqiang, walked to the stone wall, covered his nose with a handkerchief, and quietly began examining the painting.

Zhang Enpu looked very closely. He pulled out a tissue, holding it in his hand, and touched the scroll through the paper, his expression growing distinctly strange.

After a long pause, Zhang Enpu turned back, his face grave. "Do you know what this painting is made of?"

Young Master Liu casually replied, "A painting is made with pigment on a brush, of course!"

Zhang Enpu shook his head. "No! This painting is embroidered with strands of hair!"

Hair strands?! The others stared at Zhang Enpu in disbelief. A painting embroidered with hair—such a bizarre scroll existed in the world? Young Master Liu, full of questions, approached the scroll. Zhang Enpu warned him, "Don't touch it with your hands!"

Young Master Liu nodded and leaned in for a closer look. Indeed, the gruesome scene on the scroll was painstakingly sewn with fine strands of hair. By some unknown method, the strands were fused so tightly together that there were no gaps between them. Strictly speaking, it was an astonishingly ingenious work.

But who could have embroidered this picture, and why choose such a bloody and bizarre subject?

At this moment, the group was riddled with unanswered questions.

Tian Guoqiang clicked his tongue. "How many people’s hair must have been used to embroider this scroll?"

For some reason, the thought of the painting being made of hair made Young Master Liu profoundly uneasy. His scalp felt tingly and itchy, as if his own hair were being pulled out strand by strand.

Bai Er Laizi finally managed to climb up from the floor, dusting off his trousers with a foolish grin. "So it was just a painting. I thought it was a ghost!"

"Hey, look! There's another one here!" Tian Guoqiang called out from the side.

The group looked closely and saw another scroll, just as large, hanging about five or six meters away from the first. Because their attention had been fixed on the initial painting, they hadn't noticed another one nearby.

They moved to the second scroll. Its subject was equally grotesque and bloody: a little demon wielding a pair of large shears shaped like an alligator's jaw, snipping off a person’s ten fingers. Blood sprayed violently from the severed digits, a shocking sight.

Tian Guoqiang exclaimed, "What kind of torture is this? How can it be so cruel?"

"Damn, you guys come look, there's something even crueler here!" Young Master Liu shrieked.

About five or six meters from this second scroll, a third one appeared, its imagery even more horrific. In the center of the third painting was an iron tree, but instead of branches, its trunk sprouted countless sharp blades. A naked person was impaled upon this iron tree, riddled with holes from the blades, with blood and shredded flesh dripping steadily downward.

Young Master Liu fought back the urge to vomit and retreated far away.

Zhang Enpu suddenly urged, "Quick, keep moving along the wall! There must be more scrolls here!"

Zhang Enpu was right. When they moved another five or six meters to the side, a fourth scroll materialized on the stone wall. This one depicted a bronze mirror. A person was kneeling before it, and the golden light emanating from the mirror revealed a monstrous apparition where the person’s reflection should have been.

They continued moving along the wall, discovering new scrolls one after another.

The fifth scroll showed a massive steamer basket suspended over roaring flames. A person, bound hand and foot, was placed inside like a suckling pig, apparently destined to be steamed into a human-head bun.

The sixth scroll depicted a thick bronze pillar burning with intense fire inside, glowing red-hot. Several small demons fanned the flames, while a naked person, bound to the pillar, was roasted until his flesh was charred black, emitting wisps of green smoke.

They went from one scroll to the next, unthinkingly circling the entire cave wall. Counting them, there were a total of eighteen such scrolls. Each painting depicted a different scene, yet every single one illustrated rare and seldom-seen tortures of the mortal world, leaving Young Master Liu terrified and his limbs cold.

After viewing the eighteenth scroll, Zhang Enpu said to Young Master Liu, "I wasn't wrong. The content of these scrolls depicts the Eighteen Levels of Hell!"

The Eighteen Levels of Hell?! Young Master Liu gasped. The legend of the Eighteen Levels of Hell was ancient, and he was familiar with it, but no one knew exactly which eighteen tortures constituted them.

Zhang Enpu explained, "Each of these scrolls represents the torture of one level of Hell. Starting with the first one we saw, the eighteen levels are: The Hell of Tongue Extraction, The Hell of Shears, The Hell of the Iron Tree, The Hell of the Sin-Mirror, The Hell of the Steamer, The Hell of the Bronze Pillar, The Hell of the Mountain of Knives, The Hell of the Mountain of Ice, The Hell of the Boiling Oil Pot, The Hell of the Cow Pit, The Hell of Crushing Stone, The Hell of the Mortar and Pestle, The Hell of the Blood Pool, The Hell of Wrongful Death, The Hell of Lingering Death, The Hell of the Volcano, The Hell of the Stone Grinding Mill, and The Hell of the Saw."

Young Master Liu stuck out his tongue. "Heavens above, these Eighteen Levels of Hell are terrifying! It seems we really shouldn't do bad things in life, or what agony it must be to be cast into these eighteen levels after death!"

Zhang Enpu clarified, "Actually, the difference between these eighteen hells is not spatial ascent or descent, but time and the method of punishment. Those who committed evil in life are sent to the corresponding hell after death. For instance, those who enjoyed sowing discord and spreading rumors in life will descend to the first level, the Hell of Tongue Extraction. In terms of time, one year in the first level equals three thousand seven hundred and fifty years in the human world. The beings there must endure ten thousand years, unable to die even a day sooner. That ten thousand years equates to one hundred and thirty-five billion years in the living world. Since the duration of time and lifespan in Hell increases exponentially with each level, by the eighteenth level, the unit of time is measured in trillions of trillions of years. Such prolonged suffering is truly eternal damnation—the pain and cruelty are beyond the comprehension of mortals."

Hearing Zhang Enpu's explanation, Young Master Liu sucked in a sharp breath. If the eighteen levels of Hell truly existed, enduring them would be an unbearable fate.

"Alright, alright, let's stop studying the Eighteen Levels of Hell," Tian Guoqiang interjected. "Let's focus on finding a way out of here first!"

Yes, why were they researching the hells? If they didn't leave soon, the oppressive darkness would suffocate them to death.

They only had two flashlights. Young Master Liu distributed the remaining candles from his bag, and the group split up to search for an exit.

Suddenly, Tian Guoqiang screamed, "Snake... snake..." Then the flashlight beam flickered wildly before falling onto the ground.