Tomb Raiding: My Family's Last Clan Chief is Little Brother

Chapter 295 Mirror Conspiracy
Because there were many people around, Uncle Wu didn't say much. He only instructed Erjing to send someone to take Wu Xiaoxie and the others down the mountain so that the accompanying doctor could examine them.

Uncle Wu Er made a big splash this time, booking out all the stilted wooden houses near A Gui's house. He brought over a hundred assistants with him, and even several of his cousins ​​who followed Uncle Wu Er came, and none of them looked too happy.

This display of force startled Wu Xiaoxie so much that he didn't dare to ask any more questions. After exchanging a few pleasantries, they stayed by the lake with their second uncle for the time being.

Yun Cai was worried about Fatty and the others, so she went back to Banna with A Gui. Fatty was so excited to see Yun Cai that if it weren't for the crowd, he probably would have rushed up to hold Yun Cai's hand.

Although they weren't seriously injured, they didn't look too well. After all, they had been trapped underground for over ten days without seeing the sun and didn't have the energy to care about anything else.

After resting at A-Gui's house for two days, Uncle Wu and his group returned. Seeing Wu Xiaoxie's strange expression, Wu Xiaoxie felt uneasy.

Second Uncle cleared everyone out, leaving only himself in the room to talk to Wu Xiaoxie about something.

Zhang Wuxun and the other two stayed in the outer courtyard, helping Yun Cai prepare vegetables.

The fat man happily squeezed next to the cloud, boasting about his many adventures and experiences along the way. Seeing the cloud's adoring gaze, he immediately became completely carried away.

Zhang Wuxun and the young man sat to the side, listening with smiles, without trying to save face for him.

Around lunchtime, Uncle Wu and Wu Xiaoxie came downstairs. After they talked for a while, Wu Xiaoxie's expression turned sour.

After the meal, Uncle Wu left with his men in a hurry.

Wu Xiaoxie quickly called Zhang Wuxun and the others back into the house and took out a photo. It showed Chen Wenjin and a tall, thin man. Only the man's back could be seen, but it was clear that Chen Wenjin looked at him with great respect.

"Who is this guy?" The fat man hadn't realized the seriousness of the situation. "Was he one of the archaeological team members?"

Wu Xiaoxie shook his head. "He was the organizer of that expedition team back then."

The fat man hummed in response, "Hmm?" "Who is it?"

Wu Xiaoxie shook his head again, "I don't know, but he was a big shot back then. My second uncle told me not to investigate these things anymore, but he didn't stop us from continuing to look into Xiao Ge's past."

Zhang Wuxun frowned. "Did your second uncle say where he got this photo?"

Wu Xiaoxie glanced at Xiao Ge and whispered, "Second Uncle said he knew about Banna many years ago. This photo is of great importance, so he sent someone to retrieve it from Xiao Ge's stilt house in advance."

The fat man curled his lip, "Just a back view, how could anyone recognize you?"

Zhang Wuxun lowered his voice and said, "I think there must have been traces of 'it' behind Chen Wenjin's expedition team back then, and the people in the photos may also have some connection with 'it'."

“So we still need to be careful. ‘It’ hasn’t disappeared. Even after all these years, ‘it’s’ energy is still something to be wary of,” Zhang Wuxun said. “The places those people went to were extremely dangerous. Banna was their first stop, but we still don’t know what their purpose was back then.”

Wu Xiaoxie gave a wry smile. "My second uncle and third uncle are different. If he says something can't be done, then it absolutely can't be done."

"So, you're going to back out?" The fat man scratched his head.

Wu Xiaoxie shook his head, "Of course not. Our purpose in coming to Banna is to find out Xiao Ge's past. This does not conflict with my second uncle's, and my second uncle even gave me this."

As Wu Xiaoxie spoke, he took out a hand-drawn map and another old map from his pocket, spread them out on the table, pointed to several key places on them, and said, "Look, this is a map of the ancient village at the bottom of the lake that I got from my second uncle, as well as a floor plan of the entire Banna Yao Village. Muyu and Xiaoge went down to the bottom of the lake before and saw that ancient Yao Village. At that time, you only said it looked very similar, but look at these two maps, the layout is exactly the same, there is almost no difference."

Uncle Wu and his group came prepared this time, carrying a lot of high-tech equipment. They directly surveyed the layout of the Yao village at the bottom of the lake and drew it down.

Zhang Wuxun and his team carefully compared the two pictures and found that the buildings, paths, and fences were exactly the same as those in the village.

Even the small paths near A-Gui's house, which were almost completely covered by grass, were shown on the map at the bottom of the lake.

The more you compare from one end of the village to the other, the more alarming it becomes; it's as if it were copied and pasted.

Zhang Wuxun said softly, "In other words, the Yao village was built like this by humans, intentionally."

"But what is the purpose of doing this?" Wu Xiaoxie still couldn't figure it out. Villages are different from cities. City construction can be planned, but villages are too unpredictable.

If someone suddenly decides to build a side path outside their yard, it's completely uncontrollable. You can't control everyone's thoughts; that would be too terrible.

The fat man hit the nail on the head: "So, the Yao village we see now that can be inhabited is probably fake. The real Yao village was submerged underwater long ago, but in order to cover their tracks and prevent outsiders from discovering that the village has disappeared, they cleared out a piece of land on the ground and built a new Yao village."

This is a mirror conspiracy. Just like the expedition team that Pan Ma killed, the old expedition team is wiped out and replaced by a new team of unknown origin without anyone noticing. This is the mirror.

The conspiracy behind this grand scheme may be extremely bloody; to conceal the truth, the entire village would inevitably be slaughtered.

The murderers likely disguised themselves as villagers and moved into the fake village to carry out their plan. This conspiracy must have happened a long time ago, and the truth of that year is now impossible to verify due to the passage of time.

So what secret is it that requires such great effort to hide?

The fat man suddenly thought of something, "Could it be related to the jade vein mine we saw after being swept up by the siphon tide? Those people dug up a group of monsters while mining, so they hid the village and the mine underwater together."

Zhang Wuxun shook his head, stepped forward, grabbed the map of the ancient village at the bottom of the lake, lifted it up and adjusted its orientation, pointing it at the sunlight streaming in from the window, "Look, what does this image look like?"

Upon seeing this, Wu Xiaoxie and Fatty immediately exclaimed in shock, "Holy crap!"

"Damn it!" The fat man pointed at Zhang Wuxun in disbelief. "Isn't that the Qilin tattoo you and Little Brother have?"

Wu Xiaoxie was also surprised. "What's going on? Could it be that the ancient Yao village that disappeared back then is related to Xiao Ge's family?" Xiao Ge's eyes were also clearly surprised as he glanced at Zhang Wuxun.

Zhang Wuxun said helplessly, "We may not be able to escape this situation. What Uncle Wu is looking for now may very well coincide with our ultimate goal."

The fat man looked on with great interest and urged the young man to take off his clothes. "Hurry up, let's compare them quickly. I'm finding this to be getting more and more interesting."

"The tattoo only shows up when the body is hot, Fatty, go get a hot towel from my sister-in-law," Zhang Wuxun teased.

"What sister-in-law?" The fat man was stunned for a moment, then he chuckled and said with great interest, "You're quite the smooth talker. As long as Sister Yun Cai agrees to let me know, once we've finished dealing with things here, I'll take her back to the capital and bring my father-in-law along too."

Wu Xiaoxie gave him a push in annoyance, "Alright, alright, stop daydreaming and go get the towel."

The fat man returned quickly, carrying a basin of hot water with two towels soaking in it. He scooped the towels out with his fingers and urged the young man to take off his clothes, his expression as excited as a Japanese officer seeing a pretty girl.

Wu Xiaoxie, holding another towel, also looked eager to try.

The young man pursed his lips helplessly, "I'll do it myself."

Zhang Wuxun walked to the window and lowered the wooden window. There were still Uncle Wu's men guarding near Agui's house, and they couldn't be allowed to see.

The young man placed a hot towel on his left chest and slowly wiped it. The towel was soaked in boiling water and was still a bit hot, causing his fair skin to turn slightly red.

Soon, the bluish-black tattoo slowly appeared on his chest.

The fat guy watched with envy and muttered, "That's a great trick. Why didn't I know this when I was cheating before?"

Zhang Wuxun, holding a pen and paper, waited for the tattoo to fully appear before tracing it down and comparing it. Hearing this, he couldn't help but laugh. "Can you bear the pain of getting it tattooed? This is the juice of a special thorny plant, prepared using a secret method, and then it's injected one needle at a time. No anesthesia can be used when it's being injected. It's more than ten times more painful than getting a tiger or lion tattoo on someone else."

The fat man retorted, "How do you know it won't work if you haven't even tried? I heard from Uncle Gui that when the boys here reach adulthood, they get a tattoo on their bodies to represent the girl they love most, signifying that they will never be separated from her in this life. Once Yun Cai agrees to my request, I'll go find the craftsman in the village and get a little cloud tattooed on my body to express my determination to love Yun Cai."

"Tsk tsk tsk." Zhang Wuxun's teeth ached from listening. "This is really too much dog food."

Wu Xiaoxie also laughed and said, "Then we're all considered Yun Cai's family. We'll keep an eye on you. If Yun Cai can't handle you, we'll have Brother Muyu make you kneel on a washboard."

The fat man yelled, "Damn it, you guys are so unfair! Sister Yun Cai loves me so much, she can't bear to part with me. You can only be envious and jealous, humph."

While the group was chatting, the hot towel brought out all the tattoos on the guy's body.

Zhang Wuxun directly stuck thin paper on the guy's body and used a marker to trace over all the tattoos.

“Look at the location of the ancient building.” The fat man pointed to the path above. “If Yao Village and Ancient Village are the same, then the location of the ancient building at the bottom of the lake is exactly the location of the stilted wooden building where Xiao Ge used to live, and the one attached to Xiao Ge is exactly the eye of the Qilin.”

Wu Xiaoxie compared the other places in detail and said in surprise, "It seems we can be sure of one thing: Brother Xiao, or rather Brother Xiao's family, must have a connection with this Yao village."

Suddenly, the fat man remembered something, pointed at Zhang Wuxun, and said, "Muyu, aren't you also from Brother Xiao's family? How come I've never heard the elders mention you?"

Zhang Wuxun sighed, "Our overseas branch has always been detached from the family and has not had frequent contact with the main family. Back then, when the main family was suddenly attacked, the overseas Zhang family lost all contact with the main family."

“We younger generation have never been to the old site of our family. The elders are very secretive about what happened in our family. No one dares to mention it. I don’t know much either. I only know that there should be something of the Zhang family hidden in the mountains of Banna. It is very likely that it is the thing that your second uncle is looking for.” Facing Wu Xiaoxie and the other person, Zhang Wuxun could only mention a little bit in a vague way.

Wu Xiaoxie looked utterly hopeless. "That's terrible. If my second uncle finds out, he'll definitely skin me alive."

The fat man nudged him with his elbow and whispered, "Just don't let your second uncle know. Your second uncle and his gang have more people and more resources, so they'll definitely find more information than we do. When the time comes, you can sneak in while serving tea or water and steal the information. Strike first. You're his own nephew, he can't possibly lay a hand on you."

Wu Xiaoxie was speechless. "Fatty, what kind of terrible idea did you come up with? You have no idea how terrible my second uncle is. He said he would break your legs, but he won't sew your mouth shut. He means what he says. So what if I'm his nephew? The punishment might be doubled because I ignored his words."

The fat man rubbed his arms and said sympathetically, "You're really pitiful."

“If you dare to go against my second uncle, you’ll suffer even more.” Wu Xiaoxie gave him a deadpan look, then turned to Zhang Wuxun and Xiao Ge and said, “We can’t go head-to-head with my second uncle; we need to think of a safer way.”

There was silence in the room.

The fat man yawned and comforted everyone, saying, "Why are you all looking so gloomy? At least we're seeing some progress on this matter, so there's no need to rush. Anyway, the village can't just suddenly disappear again. We definitely have to stay here and conduct a thorough investigation."

"In addition, we need to inquire about the surrounding villages, and we also need to take a look around the lake. There might be some clues in the ancient building. We will have to stay here for quite some time."

Zhang Wu thought for a moment and said, "So you're planning to let Yun Cai and the others stay in Banna indefinitely? We didn't die this time, and Ta Jianban must know that Yun Cai betrayed him. That guy is elusive, and you can't be with Yun Cai 24/7. I'm afraid Ta Jianban will make a move against Yun Cai, and it will be impossible to guard against him."

The fat man immediately frowned. "With so many people guarding this place, that guy shouldn't be that bold, right?"

Wu Xiaoxie also said, "I think it's better to settle Yun Cai out. We didn't see Pan Ma when we returned to Banna last time. His son even led people up the mountain to look for him, but there was no news. I guess the old man is probably in grave danger."

The fat man thought about it more and more and felt that it was very likely. Pan Ma was so skilled and experienced as a hunter, and he had fallen for it. Wouldn't Yun Cai, who was powerless, be in even more danger?

He dared not gamble with Yun Cai's life.

He immediately said anxiously, "Then I'll quickly send Yun Cai and Uncle A Gui out so they can stay with her sister."

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(End of this chapter)