Volume 3 Chapter 19: The Story of the Bones
Before he finished speaking, I don’t know who kicked me, right in the face, almost knocking me out. Immediately, I heard a series of cracking sounds as the bones broke, and I didn’t know what was going on. In a panic I hurriedly lit the torch and looked closely. I saw that Lao Yang was struggling with something and had rolled into the pile of corpses.
I hurried to help, but I found that I couldn’t help at all. The thing was not very big, but it was very strong. Lao Yan’s weight of more than 100 pounds couldn’t hold it down. The two bodies rolled together, crashing around, and I couldn’t get close at all. Moreover, if I wasn’t careful, I would be kicked inexplicably. I tried several times but couldn’t get into the battle. I could only stand outside and watch helplessly.
After a while It didn’t take long before Lao Yi couldn’t hold on any longer. The thing almost managed to escape several times. I couldn’t stand it any longer and had to call in the cold master. The two of us jumped on Lao Yi from above and below, pressing Lao Yi and the thing under our bodies. Lao Yi didn’t expect me to do this, and was pressed hard enough to yell, “You fucking take it easy! My backbone is about to break.”
I pressed down on Lao Yang, and the three of us weighed down on the thing below. I asked him, “What’s the matter? Is the thing dead?”
Lao Yang squeezed out a few words between his teeth: “I don’t know! But if you don’t let go, I’ll die!”
I saw His face was turning red, so I quickly withdrew my strength. Lao Yang rolled over and let out a sigh, and said to me, “You—you’re too ruthless. Don’t think that when I was a kid, I could stack seven or eight people without any problems. Fortunately, my backbone is strong, otherwise I would have been paralyzed!”
I said, “What are you talking about? If you couldn’t handle that thing, would I have to stack people at this age? Your back is broken, and it’s not easy for me either.
Lao Yang After hearing this, he rubbed his waist while cursing me for being heartless. I ignored him and turned to the cold-blooded counselor and said, “Come to think of it, what exactly is that thing? It’s amazing how it has such strength for such a small body. We need to take a closer look.”
After I said this, the three of us came to our senses. We leaned over and saw a gray, furry mass in the pile of bones. It was probably as big as a lynx, flattened by our weight, and still trembling.
Lao Yang I picked up a human femur and turned the thing over. I looked at it and said, “Fuck! After all this time, it turned out to be a big rat. I looked at Lao Yang and Liang Shiyi, and they looked at me. The three of us laughed. No wonder we couldn’t find the attacker just now. It turned out to be this. This rat After attacking us, the rat must have simply burrowed into the eye sockets of any skeletons it found, and then disappeared without a trace. We idiots thought we had encountered a ghost, just like a hen calling herself a mother—scaring itself (with fear).
However I thought about it and felt that it was not appropriate. This rat is too big, I don’t know what kind of breed it is, maybe it grew up eating corpses, I don’t know how many more rats like this are in this hole, if we run into a group, we’ll be in trouble.
Lao Yi He shared my thoughts, smiled, and then his face changed. He said, “No good, the emperor mouse has been crushed to death by us. I wonder if his descendants will come looking for trouble. I think we should leave quickly and not stay at the scene of the crime.”
I nodded in agreement. Lao Yang turned his head and just walked a few steps, then suddenly said, “Oh, no! Which way should we go?”
I looked up I looked up and saw that we had been in a big fight and had been tossed back and forth. It was the same again, and now I couldn’t tell which way we had come and which way we were going.
Although I had a vague feeling that I could tell which way was right, it was too faint, and I was almost not sure if what I thought was right.
Lao Yang I looked back and forth more than ten times, but I couldn’t see a way out. I said to myself, “Forget it, let’s just charge forward.”
I looked around and still felt a little uneasy, so I wanted to ask Master Liang for his opinion. I turned around and saw that he wasn’t listening to us at all, but was instead intently picking up the bones on the ground.
I felt strange, so I grabbed Lao Yao and the two of us leaned over to see what he was doing.
This This battle between man and rat involved more than ten corpses, which had long since decayed into sand and soil. So once they collided, they were completely destroyed, most of them broken into small pieces of bone, and the ground was in a mess. For some reason, the old master picked up the remaining bones that had not been broken and put them aside.
Most of these Most of the bones were also incomplete, probably used by the rats as a tool for grinding their teeth. They were pitted and some could no longer be identified as parts of the human body.
Lao Yi saw that the old man was already deep in thought and was curious, so he asked him, “Master, what are you doing here?”
The old man Master Liang paused for a moment, turned his head and said to me, “Amazing! The rat messed up the bones, but it was a stroke of luck that I discovered a big secret.”
I saw his eyes shining with excitement, and I was even more curious. What secret could these bones hold?
Master Liang told us to squat down, picked up a bone and asked, “Can you see anything?”
I and I looked at Lao Yang and didn’t know what he was up to. Lao Yang gave a strange smile and said, “Aren’t you embarrassing us? We’re dealing with dead people’s stuff, not dead people. Just tell us what you know and let’s get going.”
The cool master smiled sheepishly and said, “I’m so excited, I can’t even speak. Don’t mind me. Let me think about what to say. Uh—look at this bone. Take a closer look.”
I took I took the bone and looked at it myself. I saw that the place he was pointing at had a very smooth gap. The cut was the same color as the bone, and it should be quite old. But I couldn’t figure out what the old master was trying to show me.
The old master looked at me with a puzzled expression and said, “It’s okay if you can’t see it. Let me tell you. This bone is a human clavicle. This is the position.” He pointed pointed to his own neck and continued, “This notch is called an old bone injury, which was caused before death. You can see that the incision is sharp and there is no sign of bone healing, which means that the time of this wound is very close to the time of death.”
Old Itch heard this and thought it was something. He was very impatient and said, “What kind of secret is this? It’s really sad that the bone is injured, but let’s hurry up and go. The torches are almost gone.”
Liang Shiyu hurriedly waved his hand and said, “Give me three more minutes, I’ll be done soon!”
I saw He was very excited and would not stop until he had made himself clear. Lao Yang was talking too much and was wasting time. I quickly gave him a look to tell him to stop talking and then turned to Lao Yang and said, “Don’t mind him, just tell me.”
He swallowed He swallowed and said, “Where were we? Oh, the time of the wound is very close to the time of death. I can roughly determine that this wound should be the cause of death. The reason it is in this position is probably because someone cut the carotid artery above the collarbone with a knife. The knife was too fast, so it scratched the bone.”
I was puzzled and asked, “According to what you said, the owner of this bone was killed by someone cutting his throat!”
Liang Shi Master Liang smiled strangely and shook his head: “Not just this one. All the bodies here died in this way. Look, there are seven clavicles here, all with these cuts. In general, ancient sacrificial human sacrifices were sacrificed by kneeling in front of the sacrifice, and then the priest cut the throat behind him. But here, people were killed in front of them. So, I think that most of these people were not sacrificed alive, but died in battle.”
Master Liang After saying this, he looked at me with piercing eyes. I was so scared that I thought to myself, “What’s wrong with this guy? If they died in battle, why get so excited?” I asked him hurriedly, “Master Liang, is the big secret you’re talking about this?”
Master Liang pretended to be mysterious and said, “No, no, this is just the prologue to the big secret. What I’m going to say next is the main topic.”
He said pulled out another object from the corpse’s remains and said to me, “The big secret is hidden in this object.”
I took it and looked at it. It was indescribable. It seemed to be a hat, or part of a helmet, but since it wasn’t bone, it must be a Mingqi. I picked it up and looked at it carefully in the light of the torch. I was surprised and said, “Is it a bronze armor piece?”
Master Liang nodded and said, “Yes.”
At this time I don’t know if it was because I was infected by the nervous counselor or my own intuition, but I vaguely felt that what the counselor said might really have some shocking elements in it, and I was suddenly covered in cold sweat.
The counselor continued, “This is the style of armor that only appeared after the Han Dynasty. Look at this piece, it has no lining, it’s summer armor. This person died in the summer, and the strangest thing is this thing.” He carefully peeled off a piece of the armor carefully peeled out a piece of something from the fragments of the armor. “You see, this piece of something is inconspicuous, but it is the key. Little Wu Ge, you are a wise man, and you can tell what this is at a glance.”
I was already cold all over, and when I looked at it along with his meaning, I immediately understood. That piece of something was nothing else but a small piece of silk, probably stuck to the armor piece by the corpse fluid when the corpse was decaying.
These are all Han things. How could they appear in the burial pit of the She people, who died thousands of years ago?
Liang Shiyi looked around and said, “If I am not mistaken, this is not a burial pit, but a battlefield. There are two groups of bodies here: one is the guardians of this ancient tomb, and the other is a Han army.”