Daomu Biji

I can't bear to repeat the ensuing process. All I know was that the blood from Granny Huo's wound was black. We got several backpacks and packed all the things we should take into one of them. In Little Brother's backpack, we found two strange rings, and knew at a glance that they were the originators of the two imprints we had seen in the coffin from the previous floor. These things must've been very important if they were in Little Brother's backpack, so we stuffed them all into the bag.

Poker-Face still didn't wake up. I pulled him onto my back and tied him to my body, finding that his weight was actually moderate. His body muscle content was especially large, so although his body looked thin and symmetrical, his actual weight was much heavier than the last time I helped him.

Fatty was carrying everything else, as well as Granny Huo's head. Our plan was to retrace our steps but before we left, we put all those who still had breath back into the secret room. Although we knew that they definitely couldn't wait until the next time we came in, we still left some food and water. If they could survive like Ghost, then we had left a ray of hope.

To be honest, it was very difficult to make such a choice, and I felt very uncomfortable. But I told myself—I'm just an ordinary person, I can only do so much.

Nevertheless, we went down the burned out hole in the floor and came to the previous level we had walked around before.

I asked Fatty if he wanted to continue going up but he said, "d.a.m.n it, our aim was to come in and save Little Brother. Now that he's been saved, why don't we run away? Even if there are countless Russian girls pole dancing, I definitely won't go up there!"

There were still many layers above Zhang Jialou, and there should be various strange situations on each layer. But at this time, I also had a rare fear that suppressed all my curiosity.

We walked back carefully the entire way, and soon we reached the ground floor.

I was already sweating and my feet were shaking unconsciously. This kind of rough work was usually done by Fatty and now I felt like I was going to die suddenly. I didn't expect to be so tired after carrying a person on my back.

Fatty was too tired to carry anything else and stopped to light a cigarette, saying, "Wait a minute. We can't go back the same way. That thing must be waiting for us there. Even if it's not, the quicksand was too f.u.c.king difficult to walk through. With so many strange insects, we'll certainly be unlucky if we go down. We have to find the route where Little Brother came in!"

The copper door was closed before so Little Brother and the others must not have come in that way.

How to find it? Ah, too bad this guy was now in a deep coma!

Fatty suddenly said, "Look at the ground!"

I looked down and found it

I did as he said and realized what he meant. The door we came in only had two clear footprints. I could tell at a glance that they belonged to the two of us.

"It seems that Little Brother and the others didn't come in through the door." Fatty said, "Look, the footprints here are very messy. Now we can find out where they came from according to the patterns on the soles of his shoes."

I looked down at the countless footprints at our feet and knew Fatty's method was feasible.

Using this method, we retraced his steps all the way to the middle of several pillars and found that Poker-Face's footprints actually came from one of them.

"Could it be the pillar man came out of the pillar?" I touched my chin to express my doubts. Fatty stuck his nose up and looked at the details of the pillar carefully.

It was full of carved patterns of pixius (TN note: mythical animal that brings luck and wards off evil, having head of a dragon and lion's body, often with hoofs, wings and tail), which was really quite rare in ancient tombs. But I discovered that these pixius' bodies had Qilin scales. I thought it may be a new kind of mixed mythical beast, or the Yangs.h.i.+ Lei was mistaken, but the carving was so serious that it's unlikely to be wrong.

Fatty touched the a.s.s of one of the pixius, suddenly let go, and turned to another post to touch. After touching dozens of times back and forth, he said to me, "The temperature's different! The two pillars are made of different materials. This pillar seems to be wrapped in some metal, but it's been specially painted exactly like the other."

"So, there's a mechanism here?" I said.

"Needless to say, Little Brother's footprints came out from here so there must be a mechanism. This place may be the official secret pa.s.sage into and out of the ancient building." Fatty said, "Help me press some as well. One of them must be the key." Fatty was about to take off his coat and do some research.

I hastened to stop him: "As long as the dust here is stained with sweat, you'll feel itchy all over your body and the taste is worse than death. As soon as you scratch it, a piece of skin will follow, and if you touch the a.s.s of these pixiu, we aren't sure what trap will be triggered." When Fatty heard me say this, he could only wrap his clothes tighter around his body. But he didn't care about the trap and crept up, saying: "There weren't any particularly deadly traps along the way so I don't think there's any need to worry about this. Just be careful. This Fat Master is very experienced."

Fatty studied the details one by one. He was so thorough that it was a little creepy, but no matter how he studied, these pixiu were dead and couldn't be pressed.

Just when we were wondering what to do, Poker-Face on my back suddenly moved and I saw his hand sticking out.

I looked back at him. He was extremely weak, with his eyes still closed, and I didn't know if he was fully awake.

Fatty also looked back at him and asked softly, "Brother, what do you need?"

"I'll do it." Poker-Face whispered from my back.

As soon as I understood what he meant, I took a few steps forward. His long fingers were attached to the cold pillars, and then he used his fingers to slide gently across all the patterns.

Carrying him on my back, I walked quietly round and round the post, not daring to make any noise. When we went round to the 20th lap, I heard Poker-Face say, "Thirteenth in the first row, sixth in the second row, and seventh in the third row. Give each one a gentle tap. Remember the order."

Then his hand dropped down immediately.

Fatty hurriedly complied. After finis.h.i.+ng, I suddenly saw the pillars begin to rotate slowly and after turning around, there was a gap in the middle pillar that only one person could pa.s.s through sideways. Inside the gap was a pa.s.sage leading all the way down to the ground.

There were climbing pins on the inner wall of this pillar.

"Ah, our family's brother is such a treasure!" Fatty exclaimed.

The two of us put down our equipment and I pa.s.sed Little Brother over to Fatty first, and carefully went down sideways before catching him. Down at the bottom, we used a lighter to look around and were surprised at what we saw—it was a room made of stone, and should be an underground palace.

"Is this also part of the Zhang family's ancient building?" Fatty asked. I nodded—according to previous practice, this underground palace of the ancient building should be the tomb of the Zhang family's old ancestors. I'm afraid the people buried here were all very old predecessors.

"What should we do?"

"Little Brother came out from here so obviously the entrance and exit is here! Brother, you're actually a good man in the end, do your GPS again." Fatty told Poker-Face.

Poker-Face had no reaction on my back and it seemed that he had pa.s.sed out again. Fatty looked at him and could only shake his head. He said to me, "No power."

"Let's go, we'll be careful. Since the way out is here, we can always find it." I said. "Whether we meet mountains and open roads, or meet water and build bridges, we take one step at a time. I'll put Little Brother down and we'll look around first."

There wasn't any dust here so we could have a good rest. I thought Fatty was also gasping for breath, so I told him to put everything down first.

I had never been so tired. When Little Brother was taken from my shoulder, I felt dizzy immediately. I rubbed my shoulders and followed Fatty around.

After looking, we found that the only way out ahead was a stone door. It was tightly closed, but there were traces underneath showing that it had been opened recently.