Volume 9 Chapter 9 The end of the mark

I quickly pulled the fat man back and turned to look at Wen Jin. She was busy with a colleague unpacking the equipment that had been sent down the rope ladder and didn’t notice the fat man’s actions.

I asked the worker, “What are you doing down here? Aren’t you supposed to be taking care of my uncle?”

He smiled and said, “Third Master is being taken care of, I came down to see if there is anything I can help with.”

I looked at his expression and felt something was wrong. I thought to myself, “This is bad. These sons of bitches are a bunch of riffraff. The best thing riffraff can do is scatter like birds and beasts when in danger, and turn on each other when there’s something to gain. This guy’s expression seems to suggest he’s up to something.

Soon, three more people climbed down and looked at the huge circular tomb chamber. Their eyes were filled with fire. Before leaving, Uncle San had lied to them, saying that the place was so rich in treasures that they would be scared to death on the way here, but as soon as they saw the tomb chamber, they forgot everything. Although they were all novice tomb robbers, tomb robbers are tomb robbers, and their greed for ancient tombs is even greater than ours. Wen Jin climbed down the rope ladder and saw this situation. He looked displeased and whispered to me, “Let them go. These people are desperate. They are only polite to ‘your uncle’ on the surface. They are only after the property. They all have weapons. It would be very bad for us if we fell out with them. Anyway, if they find anything, just give it to them. We can’t stop them now.”

I thought about it and realized that even if my uncle could stop them, he was now unable to move around, and even if he could, he would not be able to stop them. I, a third-generation descendant, was called a little third uncle by these people, and there was no sense of respect. They were completely teasing, and they couldn’t do anything about them. Thinking about the way they used to be in Changsha, they were indeed all because of my uncle.

I felt a little depressed. Instead, we were being controlled by others. I had a feeling that these people might ruin our big plans.

The fat man was very sensitive to this and had already become nervous. He clutched his shotgun tightly, gave us a look, and told us to walk faster and get away from them.

After all the dangers we had encountered, I found that the biggest threat came from our own people. It was a great irony. And if these people were greedy, they might even kill us. For them, they had never been rich in their lives, and morality and virtue were nonsense. This was a huge worry.

Muyoubing also brought his equipment and descended the rope ladder. We no longer paid attention to those people and began to grope our way forward. The “non-” shaped tunnel quickly came to an end, and a cave appeared in front of us. There were stairs at the end of the tunnel, which wound down along the walls of the cave.

The mine lamp was not enough here. Uncle San and the others had a lot of spare equipment, and Fatso immediately fired a flare.

Uncle San had several types of flares, and Fatso used a low-altitude flare, which was designed for use in caves. It didn’t have a long range, and the fireball burst open soon after it flew into the darkness, illuminating the cave brightly. Fatso fired two more rounds, illuminating the dead corners around us. This was a bit extravagant, but we had never been so well-equipped before, and we were at the end of the line anyway, so we might as well use it.

Fatty threw away the shell and wanted to reload and fire another shot. Wenjin held him down: “No matter how rich you are, you can’t use it like this. Besides, it’s already bright enough. If it gets any brighter, we won’t be able to see anything. Be careful, you’ll burn our eyes out.”

The fat man gave up, and we waited for the brightest stage to pass, and the light to shrink, and the situation around us to become clear.

This is indeed the deepest part of the bottom of the city of Tamudu. The cave was not naturally formed, but excavated by people. The top of the cave was too high to see clearly, but the sides of the cave were like stadium seats, built in steps. Each step was covered with black statues of bloated shapes, densely packed, in circles and circles, with no empty space.

Because these statues are black, it is still difficult to see the details. I feel that I have never seen them before. Could they be secret statues, or totems unique to the royal family that outsiders cannot see or possess?

I thought of the Tibetan corpse chamber in the Genting Palace, which was also in this style. I felt that these statues might not be made of stone, but of specially treated corpses. This might be the royal family’s burial cave, where the lower-ranking royal family members were buried to dry naturally.

The flares were falling lower and lower, and there were traces of human activity at the bottom. I saw a stone disc placed at the bottom, surrounded by dozens of bronze vessels of strange shapes and sizes. Everything was very simple. Looking at the walls of the mountain, there was no obvious place to continue forward. Indeed, we had reached the end of the road. All the mysteries should be solved in this place.

The fat man was amazed. It was hard to say how deep it was. The Queen Mother’s clan should be called the Mole Clan. They really like digging holes. They dug such a deep place under the imperial city. What was the purpose?

Wen Jin said, “This place may be the holy land of the Queen Mother’s country, a place where the royal family of the Queen Mother conducts secret activities. They may hold some extremely confidential rituals here, or practice some kind of religion.”

The fat man said, “Fuck, this holy place is so shabby, it’s really disappointing. These Wangmu people are also short-sighted. What are these bronze vessels and these stone carvings? They are… my god! Little Wu, what are these stone carvings?

The fat man was startled, and I was startled by him. At this time, the flare landed on the ground and was still burning, but the lighting range had been greatly reduced. I lifted the miner’s lamp to shine it, and when I looked closely, I almost screamed out. It turned out that these “stone carvings” surrounding the cave walls were not stone carvings at all, but rows of jade figurines!

I kept gasping for breath, and memories of the Seven Star Lu Palace came flooding back. At the same time, the Mufeng bottle let out a groan, apparently greatly stimulated, and its brows were locked together.

Sure enough, these points are all connected. How could there be so many jade figurines here? Could there be a living corpse inside each one?

The fat guy was brave and immediately climbed up a flight of stairs. I was afraid he would get into trouble, so I grabbed him and told him that he didn’t need to make an effort to go down to the bottom.

We gathered our thoughts and quickly descended the stone steps. At the last step, the fat man jumped up and came to a jade figurine. He shone his miner’s lamp on it and saw the corpse inside. It was a completely dried-up mummy. Because the gaps were too small to see the details clearly, he shone the light on one after another, and there was one in each jade figurine.

“It seems that the eldest sister was right. This place may really be where they practiced.” The fat man said, ”Damn, are these dry things the immortals under the Queen Mother of the West in Chinese mythology? This is too far off.”

“But these jade figurines are a bit different from those in the Lu Palace,” I said. ”The jade figurines in the Lu Palace had living bodies inside, but these seem to have become mummies.”

“That’s because of the time. This cave was probably excavated when the Xiwangmu Kingdom was at its peak, which would have been 5,000 years ago. After such a long period of time, anything that still had moisture would have been dried out by the wind.”

The fat guy touched the black jade shell with his hand. The stuffy oil bottle grabbed his hand and told him to be careful. I said, “It’s best not to touch this stuff. Didn’t the little brother say that if the time was not right, the jade figurines would be very dangerous after they shed their shells?”

The fat man said in a depressed tone, “I just want to touch it, can I keep some memories?”

I said, “Don’t forget your pain as soon as you get better. I said it was useless to say it, so I ignored him. Wenjin, who was on the side, had already been attracted by other things and walked towards the place full of bronze vessels.

I followed him and was surprised to find that these bronze vessels were huge. Standing below them, I could see that they were taller than me, and they had strange shapes. I couldn’t even name one of them. However, it was clear that each bronze vessel had its own function. I saw the astonishing decay on them, and the signs of use were obvious. It was clear that this was not a place for display. If this cave was used by the Xiwangmu clan for cultivation or religious rituals, then these things should also be related to cultivation and religious rituals.

At this time, Wen Jin muttered, “Oh my god, this is the alchemy room of the Queen Mother of the West. It really exists.”