Ancient tomb excavation traces

(A note to thank "Bai Qingzhu" for the 588 reward over two days, and "Damon一Ken" for the 588 reward. The programmer will continue to work hard. Thank you for your support, fellow readers.)

Seeing the red lines poised to burst forth, I shouted urgently, "Old man, watch out behind you!"

Although Chen Yi wasn't as agile as Chu Ba, he was still someone who had been through the ups and downs of life. When he heard me call out, he immediately turned around, pointing the torch at the red threads, making them crackle and pop.

The tip of the red thread touched the fire, curled up, and stuck together, instantly emitting a strange, burnt smell. At the same time, the main body of the red thread, the "Mountain Demon" we called it, stopped acting and let out a frenzied hiss, clearly full of rage. Inside the pit, its body writhed continuously, like a surging venomous snake, which was extremely terrifying. With each movement, the overwhelming stench made me dizzy and I couldn't help but stumble.

I gagged a few times. I still had the insect-repelling herbs Ge San had given me on me, so I immediately covered my nose with them. But before I could catch my breath, a large, red mass of flesh suddenly surged out of the coffin-shaped pit below. To my surprise, from within that mass of flesh emerged faces with mouths shaped like the letter "O." These faces were still inside the flesh of the "Mountain Tai Sui," so I could only see a crimson outline, but these indistinct outlines were even more grotesque than the corpses that had just emerged directly from the ground.

I thought to myself: Damn, this thing's flesh is really elastic. It's stretched to this point and it hasn't been burst yet.

Just as I was thinking, suddenly a face pushed forward through the red, gelatinous flesh. The face was embedded in the flesh, with deep-set eyes, like a skull tightly wrapped in a piece of red, elastic fabric. For a moment, I gasped in fright, and it struggled to reach me, just a body length away.

The dead man was screaming through the flesh, his resentment chilling me to the bone, making my heart skip a beat. Before I could react, Chen Yi rushed over with a shout, pressed down on the evil head inside the flesh with one hand, and then chopped it off with a knife.

In an instant, cold blood splattered all over my face, and I shuddered. However, we were only focused on the severed head and didn't notice the hand reaching out from the flesh. After a large gash was cut open between the mountain spirit's flesh and the dead man's head, the dead man's hand suddenly reached out from the gash, hugged Chen Tan and me, and tightly gripped our arms.

With this grip, Chen Yi's knife fell to the ground. Now, no matter how much we struggled, we couldn't break free. On the contrary, the more we struggled, the tighter the grip became.

"What... what a greedy monster, it wants to swallow two more!" Chen Yi and I were huddled together, barely able to breathe: "If I were to die, I would definitely crawl into the belly of this 'Mountain Tai Sui' and let it... let it stir things up, let it... suffer, suffer unbearable pain."

"At a time like this, you still have the mood... the mood to be sarcastic..." I said through gritted teeth. To be honest, if the mountain spirit's hand had only grabbed one of us, it probably would have dragged us down very quickly. But the fact that both of them were there undoubtedly slowed down the speed at which we were dragged down. We were lucky; it gave Chen Yi and me a chance to catch our breath and prevented us from going to see the King of Hell right away.

I wanted to call for help, but seeing that the young Taoist priest and the others were busy dealing with the remaining red threads, and Chu Ba was also preoccupied with his own problems, I didn't want to cause them any trouble at this time. So I could only sadly say to Chen Tiao, "Old Tiao, this is really something. We can't be born on the same day, month, and year, but we can die on the same day, month, and year..."

"Go to hell... I... I haven't even won over your pretty girl yet, how... how can I be swallowed by something like this..." Chen Yu struggled, baring his teeth. As he spoke, he tried to reach for the Mongolian knife at my waist. But the "Mountain Demon" was alert, constantly retracting as Chen Yu's hand approached me.

Chen Yi was in so much pain that he had to abandon his plan to pull out the knife, so I leaned back like in a tug-of-war to buy him some time.

I did as instructed, but the flesh tightened more and more, causing my arms and ribs to ache terribly, as if they were about to burst. At that moment, the most painful sensation was my heart, which was also being squeezed... I was having difficulty breathing, and an inexplicable heat was rising within me.

The mountain spirit is still imprisoned. If its true form were to emerge, the entire space would likely be crushed, leaving only devastation. And if Chen Yi and I are to be taken into the lower level, this coffin-shaped pit would truly become our burial ground.

I struggled in agony, my blood rushing to my head. Just as I felt myself returning to normal, I caught a glimpse of a gleaming silver dagger flashing towards me and Chen Yu out of the corner of my eye. My vision was blurred by the scalpel, and my eyes rolled back involuntarily, preventing me from seeing clearly. I could only hear the person shouting for us to hold on. Then, my nearly crippled arms suddenly loosened, and I collapsed to the ground, trembling uncontrollably. I could only lie on the ground like a worm, panting heavily.

Before I could even come to my senses, I felt someone struggling to pull me back. I tried several times to open my eyes, and finally I could see clearly that the person pulling me was Bao Cai, and the one who rescued us from the mountain spirit's soft flesh was Chu Ba.

"Hey, Xiao Liuzi, are you alright?" Chu Ba asked us worriedly.

I nodded weakly, saying that if I hadn't been so lucky, that thing would have taken my last breath. Chen Yi wasn't in much better shape; his back wound was bleeding even more, but he was full of resentment, cursing and swearing, determined to fight that mountain spirit to the death.

Bao Cai mocked him, "Fat old man, can you shut up for a minute? Your physique is indeed..." Bao Cai gestured slightly, as if to say "you know what I mean," and continued, "But in 'Grandpa Tai Sui's' place, your build is nothing compared to his. Eighth Master and I barely managed to drag you two over, and if you want to go, you'll have to be dragged down to get a treat..."

"Pah, you wicked monkey, always spouting such nasty things! Go back and find your Grandpa Sun, and ask him to lend you some guts so you can escape that monkey path sooner and make something of yourself!" With that, Chen Yi turned around, quickly dodging the gushing, red flesh pit, picked up the torch he had just dropped, and dragged the giant axe from the stone terracotta warrior along with him. Then he ran back quickly and handed the torch to me.

I asked him what he was going to do. He said, "I'm going to destroy this mountain spirit's nest and let it experience what it feels like to be burned by my wrath!"

After saying that, he grabbed Bao Cai and made him go collect the tomb guardian beasts. Bao Cai refused no matter what, and Chen Cai said, "We're only one step away from the main coffin chamber, and we haven't gotten anything yet. If you don't work hard now, your children will go hungry in the future. How many generations do you want to be poor? Or do you want to leave some inheritance for your descendants?"

Chen Yi's words had an immediate effect; Bao Cai jumped up as if he'd been injected with adrenaline. In an instant, I understood what he was going to do: he wanted to burn the "Mountain Tai Sui" (a mythical creature believed to bring bad luck) with a lacquered wooden tomb guardian beast. For Chen Yi to burn his beloved funerary object meant he was truly determined.

We divided the tasks among ourselves. Chu Ba and the young Taoist priest, being more agile, provided cover for us. Meanwhile, Lan Quexi and I focused on collecting the scattered tomb guardian beasts.

After gathering them, we placed the strange-faced little beasts in front of Chen Tiao. Chen Tiao had a fondness for these things, so he hesitated for a moment before raising the axe. But for the sake of his life, he finally bit his lip and chopped them open one by one.

It took quite a while to start the fire, but it finally worked. Watching the flames leap and dance on the demon-suppressing beasts, I thought to myself: Fire is truly a wonderful thing...

I don't know if it was because I'd encountered too many strange things, or what, but as the bodies of the tomb guardian beasts began to burn, I seemed to hear their agonizing screams, as if they were unwilling to disappear. Old Tiao asked me to help kick the tomb guardian beasts into the pit, and I nodded. Chu Ba and the little Taoist priest also came over to help at this time.

One by one, the burning tomb guardian beasts fell into the interlayer, while the mountain spirits, engulfed in flames, roared and thrashed about wildly. I leaned against the wall, listening to its mournful cries, and felt a pang of pity…

Old Chai said, "You rascal, what's there to be soft-hearted about! A cunning creature is a cunning creature, ruthless and vicious. If it doesn't die, we die. Don't forget, those who were stuffed into its belly, they were all sucked blood and swallowed alive, how horribly did they die?"

Hearing Chen Yi's words, I nodded. Unlike the children in the urn passage who were murdered and turned into venomous ghosts, these spirits were inherently pure and kind. The mountain spirits, however, were ruthless, capable of bewitching souls. Moreover, the number of wronged spirits in its mouth was unimaginable; my overflowing sympathy was indeed somewhat superfluous…

As the smoke and vibrations grew stronger, we realized that we couldn't stay here any longer. We had thought that since the mountain spirit's head appeared behind the hidden door, there must be a direct path to the main coffin chamber below. However, the current situation did not allow us to go down, and I really didn't want to go through that resentful, narrow passage.

Just as everyone was getting anxious, they suddenly heard a "click-clack" sound, and the bronze hidden door on the east side actually rose up.

Chen Yi exclaimed in surprise, "Holy crap, is this the pattern of opening a portal after defeating a monster?"

We stared blankly, and strangely enough, behind the door I saw a man dressed in armor and wearing a bronze mask. He stood majestically, stepping on another part of the "Mountain God's" body, and behind him was a crossbow.