Whoosh! Whoosh! Whoosh!
Countless arrows instantly shot out from all directions, directly turning the scarecrow into a hedgehog.
Right away, the scarecrow started cursing Ethan angrily in his head, ["Didn't you say there was absolutely no problem? What the hell is going on here… ah!"]
Who knows where it came from, but a huge boulder dropped straight down from above and smashed the scarecrow's head flat.
Luckily, the scarecrow didn't have any brains, otherwise, even its brains would have been splattered out by now.
["I XX your OO, didn't you say nothing would happen! Does this look like nothing happened… ow!"]
Before the scarecrow could finish talking, it let out another miserable scream.
Because the spiked iron ball that represented the sun pressed down and snapped the stick that made up the scarecrow's lower body as well.
"Uh…"
Ethan looked at the miserable sight of the scarecrow in front of him and dryly laughed twice, "Uh! Hehe, that was just a misstep!"
"Don't worry, don't worry. You won't die anyway, just treat it as some kind of training."
"I promise I'll help you fix it once we're back, okay."
After that, he dragged the scarecrow that had been smashed into pieces back.
Then he squeezed its head back into shape, trying to make it as round as possible, even though it looked very square now.
Since the scarecrow's head was made of straw, it was still usable.
It was just, Ethan picked up the wooden stick on the scarecrow's body.
It had been completely snapped. Even the Sunflower Manual probably wouldn't have been cut this thoroughly.
No saving it.
["Is it really impossible to save it?"], the scarecrow said, its expression changing drastically, ["This is my only leg! If even this is gone, what am I supposed to do? Wuwuwu…"]
"It's fine. I'll just change one for you right now."
As Ethan spoke, he had already taken out a wooden stick from his backpack and jabbed it straight up into the scarecrow from below.
(:3」∠❀)_☜ poke
["Oh oh… oh oh oh…"]
The scarecrow let out a strangely refreshing sound.
Ethan, however, slapped its flat head and said, "What are you yelling for! Can you even feel it? Since the prosthetic is installed, hurry up and get up, keep testing!"
["Test again? I'm almost completely wrecked and you still want me to go. Are you even human?"]
"No. Now hurry up!"
Ethan admitted it without hesitation.
Then he patted the scarecrow's butt, "Alright, alright! When we get back, I promise I'll have logistics fix you up, okay."
["You said logistics! You're not allowed to lie to me!"]
The scarecrow hopped over to the stone man's feet, crying as it went.
Taking advantage of this time, Ethan went back to studying the map. He quickly discovered that the cloud-covered pattern had a rule to it: first the sun, then the moon, and finally the stars.
'Could it be that the buttons has to be pressed in order?'
"Brother Scarecrow, quickly press the sun symbol, then the moon, and finally the star."
Ethan instructed the scarecrow.
The scarecrow trembled as it followed Ethan's instructions and pressed down on the sun's fingernail, ["This time there really won't be a problem, right? You promise. Don't let it happen again!"]
"It should… probably… be fine… right?"
After N failures, Ethan really wasn't that confident anymore.
But as the scarecrow quickly pressed the sun, then pressed the moon symbol, and the trap still didn't activate, Ethan's eyes lit up, "I told you there wouldn't be a problem! See, there's no problem at all!"
"Heh! Heh! Heh!"
(๑‾᷅^‾᷅๑)
The scarecrow coldly laughed and pressed the final star symbol.
The result…
Rumble! Rumble!
That huge stone man actually moved, then raised its arm and stretched lazily.
But the moment the giant stone man stretched, it accidentally slapped the scarecrow standing by its feet away with one swing.
["Ahhhhh!"]
The scarecrow was sent flying straight out.
Ethan shaded his eyes with his hand, watching the scarecrow fly farther and farther away, and silently mourned for it for three seconds.
He finally understood, this guy was just insanely unlucky.
Everything before this had absolutely nothing to do with his decisions. It was purely because the scarecrow's luck was just that bad.
"Haah!"
After stretching, the giant stone man finally spoke, "Who is it that woke me up?"
"It was me," Ethan raised his hand from afar, "I want to enter the Land of Treasure. Could you please let me pass, big brother Stone Man?"
"Kid, you're pretty lucky. You actually calculated the password correctly and passed the trial."
The stone man moved its toes, sweeping away a patch of sand and dirt in front of it, revealing an extremely complex formula carved into the ground below.
When Ethan saw the formula engraved on the ground, his mouth dropped open in shock.
(๑ʘ̅ д ʘ̅๑)!
'So there was a calculation problem after all.'
And he had passed the test purely by blind guessing and random button mashing.
"No wonder the scarecrow was so unlucky, hahaha!"
Ethan scratched his head and laughed awkwardly, "Big brother Stone Man, since I've already passed the test, does that mean I can go in now?"
"Of course," the stone man said gently, "But before you go in, you must first answer me one question."
"What question?"
"Do you think I look like a human?"
The stone man suddenly asked a strange question.
Ethan was just about to answer when he remembered the legendary story of the Yellow Weasel Immortal. It was said that once a weasel finished cultivating, it would come down the mountain and stop passersby to ask them a question.
That question was exactly the same as the stone man's.
If you answered "yes," then you were giving it half of your lifespan, helping it become human.
And if you answered "no", that meant the weasel's cultivation wasn't complete yet. Your words would directly damage its cultivation, and the weasel would naturally cause you trouble, even haunting you for the rest of your life and making you unlucky forever.
The stone man's question was extremely suspicious.
And just as Ethan started to feel suspicious—
[Do not answer the Stone Guard's question! This is a trap!]
[If you answer that it "looks like a human," then it will replace you and become human, while you will take its place guarding the entrance to the Land of Treasure until the next substitute appears.]
[If you answer that it "doesn't look like a human," it will fly into a rage, because you've taken away its chance to leave this place. So it will use every means possible to kill you.]
[PS: Do not try to provoke the Stone Guard. It has stood here for nearly a hundred years absorbing enough natural elements. Its full-power attack is comparable to that of a Grand Archmage. So… absolutely, absolutely do not provoke it.]
"..."
Ethan was speechless at this tip.
'You talked for so long and didn't say a single useful thing. How the hell am I supposed to solve this? At least tell me that!'
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