Ancient tomb excavation traces

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Reaching the edge of the cliff required courage to go down. Bao Cai was afraid of heights, so he peeked down at the scene below, then shrank back in panic. While he was hesitating, the strange man on the suspension bridge shot an arrow straight at us with a "whoosh." Judging from his menacing appearance, he was clearly intent on killing us.

The arrow was aimed at Bao Cai's temple. If it went in, it would pierce his forehead and injure me. The situation was critical. I kicked Bao Cai hard and dodged to the side. Bao Cai didn't react in time and swayed on the edge of the rock, looking like he was about to die. Seeing this, I went up and kicked him again. He screamed and fell straight down. I could still vaguely hear him cursing me.

As the strange man pulled out his second crossbow bolt, the priestess and I exchanged a glance and descended hand in hand. Just then, the arrow flew towards us. I instinctively dodged, but I heard the sound of flesh being pierced beside me. The priestess had been struck in the chest by an arrow. The arrow came with ferocious force and was knocked away mid-air.

I thought the sound of us falling into the water would be very loud, and that the force of the water would cause internal injuries. But to my surprise, after we fell into the stagnant water, it only made a muffled sound. When I was in the water, I found that it had a strange, slippery feel, and swimming in it felt more like someone was pulling on my arms and legs.

Bao Cai and I emerged from the strange water at the same time. As soon as we looked up, we saw a strange man on the suspension bridge staring at us with a sinister expression. What was most ferocious was that another crossbow bolt of his had pierced the head of the King of Gu Insects. We stared at each other for a while, and then he turned and disappeared on the suspension bridge.

Watching him leave, I was filled with doubt and asked myself, "Strange, he clearly still had crossbow bolts in his hand, enough to kill us without any problem, so why didn't he do that and instead left?"

Bao Cai didn't understand what I meant and said with a disdainful look, "Young master, you artists are so pretentious. I practically begged and pleaded to get this weirdo away, and you still want him to stay? What kind of masochistic mentality is that..."

I slapped him on the forehead and said, "Go to hell, that's not what I meant."

Bao Cai rubbed his head and cursed, "Damn it, what does that mean? Why can't you talk properly? You just want to hit me."

I couldn't be bothered with his nonsense and said seriously, "Imagine a monster guarding a tomb that has claws capable of attacking and killing people, yet it gave up. Why?"

Bao Cai casually remarked, "He just had a sudden burst of kindness..."

I shook my head and said, "He knew we were doomed..."

Upon hearing this, Bao Cai's expression changed drastically, and he suddenly realized something. He exclaimed in horror, "Damn, you mean there's something even more dangerous in this water?"

I nodded, but right now only he and I were out of the good stuff, so we changed the subject and anxiously started looking for the Miao girl who had been shot with an arrow.

We called out, our voices echoing in the empty cave. Worry pounded in my heart; if she didn't respond, something might have happened.

I anxiously looked at the two walls of the water's edge and discovered that the jagged stone walls were full of mummified corpses. The corpses were very similar to the surface of the cave, looking extremely hard. Each person's face was distorted beyond recognition. They looked as if they had been drained of their blood and squeezed together to form a weathered wall of mummified corpses, which resembled fossils.

Seeing all this, I was horrified. Bao Cai swam over from the other side and said there was no sign of the witch at all. This reminded me of my premonition; all the illusions were slowly coming true... This ominous feeling filled me with panic.

However, there was no time to think about these things. After the oil and liquid entered our noses, both Bao Cai and I had difficulty breathing. It wasn't until we could breathe properly that we realized the smell of the Netherworld Dead Water was very strange.

Bao Cai was a person with a spirit of inquiry. He stretched out his hand and carefully observed the stagnant water. Then he brought it close to his nose and smelled it, saying, "This smell seems familiar..." As he spoke, he looked at the corpses around him that had turned into compressed mummies. In an instant, he seemed to realize something, and his face showed a look of horror. He stammered, "Damn, I... I know... This... This is..." Before he could finish speaking, he suddenly started to gag, but because he hadn't eaten anything, what he vomited was just acidic water.

I asked him what was wrong, and he lowered his head and waved his hand at me, looking extremely pained. His appearance made me realize that the water was not just a simple problem, so after he finished vomiting, I asked him again.

He calmed himself down and said seriously, "Young master, we...we need to get ashore quickly. This water is damn oil, and who knows what else has mixed in with it, turning it into such a big ditch."

After Bao Cai finished speaking, a sour feeling welled up in my mouth. What he meant was that we were now in a dead river made of human oil, and it was old oil that had been there for years.

I once found a book in my grandfather's attic called "Ancient Evil Records." It was an old book from the Qing Dynasty, filled with strange and unusual stories, one of which was about refining corpse oil. It stated: "The sorcerer uses corpses for refining, forging raw oil, combining the essence of the human body, controlling the power of yin thoughts, and creating the master of all spirits."

The process of refining corpse oil is extremely complex and not something an ordinary person can do. It is a crystallized human substance used by the highest shaman. Once made, it can be used to cast a mysterious and evil spell according to her will. It is said that once this evil spell is activated, it can bring victory to one's country without a fight, which is similar to the idea of ​​borrowing ghost soldiers. This may also be the reason why the shamans of Chu have such a high status.

To form a river of this size, it would have required the killing of tens of thousands. Bao Cai and I speculated that some of the oil here must have been animal fat, a fact confirmed by the mummified corpses scattered along the riverbank. There, we saw many horned animals; Bao Cai said most were cattle and sheep. Considering the high-ranking status of the Chu tomb's owner as a sorceress, they must have been used for sacrifices.

Thinking about it, neither Bao Cai nor I wanted to stay here any longer. We searched for the witch while also looking for a safe place to settle down, but neither approach yielded the results we hoped for. Every visible bank of the river of corpse oil was littered with weathered corpses. Bao Cai was terrified; he was the kind of person who was particularly superstitious, and in such a place filled with such deep yin energy, he naturally felt a chill. I was similar; I had a feeling that something below might suddenly grab our feet.

At this moment, he said in bewilderment, "Young master, this trip was truly a disaster. I didn't get any treasures, and I almost got myself killed." Just as he was complaining, the green light on the corpse oil suddenly began to gather. Bao Cai looked on in horror, then realized something, and said with a bitter expression, "Damn it, I finally know why this place is called the Netherworld Dead Water. There really is a Netherworld here!"

His words sent chills down my spine. In an instant, I understood what he meant. According to what he said before, corpse oil is a crystallization of the dead. It undoubtedly condenses the resentment of many people. This resentment lingers and floats on the surface, seemingly a layer of poisonous gas, but in reality, it is deadly yin energy.

Bao Cai and I had never seen anything like this before, and we were at a loss for what to do. We just watched as the green light floated in the air, like eerie will-o'-the-wisps, flitting around us. I covered my ears, and all I could hear was a whooshing sound, like the wind rushing through a corridor. This sound contained some sinister, sharp laughter, which made us feel uneasy and confused.

Upon seeing this, Bao Cai said with a sob in his voice, "Heroes and sisters, your deaths have nothing to do with me, Liu Bao Cai! If you want to find someone, find the one who killed you, not me!"

However, Bao Cai's desperate pleas could not change our fate. I grabbed him to dodge an attack and said urgently, "Stop begging! These people can't understand our Mandarin!"

As soon as I finished speaking, the pale green ghost suddenly swooped down. I could even see its features clearly in the light. It was a person without a scalp. Its face was shaped like a dead person's bones, but it still had eyeballs. Those eyeballs had an extremely fierce look, which was very terrifying.

These things seemed to be venting their resentment that had been dormant for a hundred years. They rushed towards us with their mouths open. I pressed Bao Cai's head down and shouted, "Hold your breath!" Then I plunged into the corpse oil.

I'm pretty good at holding my breath, but Bao Cai is far inferior. As he struggled to peek out, the thing suddenly bit him. He was in excruciating pain and cried out, "Young Master, save me! Save me!"

At this point, we had no usable magical artifacts on us. The only thing that could ward off evil was the Mongolian knife. Thinking this, I pulled out Bao Cai's Mongolian knife and swung it wildly. Just then, the entire stagnant water began to surge, and countless ghostly spirits screamed in unison, creating quite a commotion. My hair stood on end. It wasn't good to stick my head out, but it wouldn't be easy to stay in the corpse oil either. Weighing the pros and cons, the only option for now was to ignore those terrifying dried corpses. With this thought, I returned the Mongolian knife to Bao Cai, had him lean against me, and swung it with all my might, while I dragged him through the corpse oil toward the pile of dried corpses in the cave.

Just as we were about to reach the shore, Bao Cai suddenly cried out, "Young Master, something terrible has happened! Lots of corpses are surging out of the water!"

Upon hearing this, I turned around and saw that they were all dead bodies, and they all looked fresh. They were rolled up by layers of corpse oil, creating a wave of corpses as tall as a person. The corpses in the wave of corpses swayed with the oil, looking as grotesque as could be.

An idea immediately flashed through my mind. I asked Bao Cai to check if there were any corpses of Chen Yu and the witch. He said, "I can't bear to look at all these piles of dead bodies, and there are so many of them!"

Indeed, those things were incredibly disgusting; no one could bear to look at them. I could only grit my teeth and continue to pull him closer to the pile of dried corpses. Just then, I suddenly felt a huge suction force on my legs, and my body sank. The force pulled me down, and I looked back in confusion. It was a rapidly swirling vortex that suddenly appeared between me and Bao Cai, and it was getting bigger and bigger. Bao Cai and I were separated. He screamed and swallowed a lot of oil.

Seeing him being pulled into the center of the vortex, I ignored the disgusting corpse oil and plunged in. I swam with all my might to the outer edge of the vortex, but just as I was about to get close to Bao Cai, the corpses got caught in the vortex and Dead Hand slapped me several times. In an instant, a sweet and pungent taste filled my mouth.

I cried out in despair. At that time, I didn't think about why a whirlpool would be formed in the calm, stagnant water. But as the deafening roar of the whirlpool rang out, my body was swallowed up by it.