Ancient tomb excavation traces

These past few days I've been extremely sensitive. Although Ge San was just staring at me with his eyes open, his gaze was incredibly rigid and chilling. After calming myself down, I tentatively called out, "Brother Ge?"

However, all I received in response was deathly silence.

I glanced at Bao Cai, steadied myself, grabbed my bicycle light, and cautiously walked to Ge San's side. At that moment, my nerves were taut with fear.

Bao Cai, standing beside me, slowly leaned closer and whispered, "What's going on? Is this guy sleeping with his eyes open?"

I replied, "Who knew, as soon as I turned over, he just sat there staring at me without moving!"

Bao Cai shuddered and said, "To be stared at like this in the middle of the night is really fucking creepy!"

The most agonizing part is always before the answer is revealed... In the pitch black all around, I shone my bicycle light on Ge San. He didn't flinch, but his face looked deathly pale in the light.

I found it strange, but tried calling him a few more times, yet there was still no response. A chill ran down my spine, and I stiffly extended my index finger to check his breathing. This caused me to stagger back a step, looking at Bao Cai with utter terror. Bao Cai quickly asked, "What's wrong, buddy...?"

I said blankly, "She's not breathing..."

"What?" Bao Cai looked surprised and asked, "Am I mistaken?"

After I confirmed it, he mustered his courage, walked over to Ge San, and peered at his nose. His expression changed instantly; he looked at me in astonishment and said, "He's really dead..."

The earth was dark, the forest vast, and we were as small as ants; everything was unfamiliar. Bao Cai and I stood on a suspension bridge that was about to collapse. There was no way forward, and no way back. A deep despair surged into our hearts like a giant wave in this unbearable night.

Ge San's death came too suddenly, too inexplicably. In the silence of fear, all the surrounding shadows seemed to be grinning maliciously, ready to attack when we least expected it. And we were trapped in this encirclement, at the mercy of terror.

To find out what happened, Bao Cai was tasked with investigating Ge San's cause of death. Although he was terrified, he had no choice, because if Ge San had been bitten by poisonous insects, then we had to leave this place immediately. I held up my bicycle light for him to illuminate the way, while Bao Cai, worried about direct contact with the corpse, used my Mongolian knife to cut a piece of cloth from his shirt as a precaution.

In the light from the bicycle headlights, I saw something on the old tree move extremely slowly. It was long, but it didn't look like a snake. Sensing something was wrong, I immediately patted Bao Cai on the shoulder and said in a low voice, "Let's go!"

Bao Cai was examining Ge San's neck at the moment. When I called him, he turned his head, looked at me with a puzzled expression, and asked, "What's wrong?"

I cautiously drew my Mongolian knife, my throat tightening with tension; only by holding a weapon could I find a sliver of security.

Just then, I heard an extremely faint friction sound. This sound became more and more frequent, in the area covered with fallen leaves, in the surrounding trees, and even on Ge San's body, which lay dead on its side.

My scalp tingled, and I took a step back. Bao Cai then realized the seriousness of the situation. I told him to lean against me in case something suddenly appeared in the darkness. Bao Cai swallowed hard, his whole body stiff with fear.

At this moment, what was even more perplexing was that Ge San's corpse was suddenly pulled by something, as if a mad dog was using its mouth to pull at a giant chunk of flesh held in a person's hand. During the tug, the corpse suddenly tumbled off the hammock, and I caught sight of several wire-like things, crimson in color, like octopus tentacles, rapidly retreating into the darkness.

The stench of blood filled the air. I saw several bloody holes on Ge San's back. These holes should have been small, but because of the pulling of those things, the wounds on his back that were not easily noticed were violently torn open, and now blood was gushing out.

Having tasted the blood, the rustling sounds in the woods grew louder and louder. I zoomed in with my bicycle headlight, and what was not far from us was revealed—vines! They hung densely on the branches of the giant tree, like disgusting worms crawling on an old face, with a touch of the bizarre and eerie.

On the treetops, they were intertwined, and within them, half a face could be vaguely seen, a face that looked like it had been spat out of the giant python's mouth, covered in a lot of slimy fluid. Its torso was completely rotten, revealing the gleaming, slimy white bones.

"They...they...are eating!" Bao Cai's voice seemed to be squeezed out of his throat as he looked at everything in disbelief. "We...we didn't even notice these things when we were resting here!"

I thought to myself: it's not that we didn't notice, it's just that it was already getting dark when we approached this area, we didn't have any particularly good lighting tools, and we wouldn't have imagined that such anti-plant creatures existed. Looking at that scene, a wave of nausea washed over me, and fear washed over me, penetrating to my very bones. It felt like I was locked in a claustrophobic place, and just when you thought you were all alone, a spotlight suddenly came on, shining on the wall and showing you countless worms, and corpses all around you.

I dared not make any rash moves, nor dared to breathe loudly, because the air was filled with tension and a sense of impending doom.

Bao Cai was trembling all over. He said to me in an extremely faint voice, "Young Master...we're going to die. This thing kills without a trace. It looks like a monk who doesn't eat meat, but it's actually a lecherous monk!"

When I heard him say that, I thought to myself, "Truly a treasure! Even at this point, he can still come up with such a metaphor." But then again, these things look like plants, but they actually crave meat.

However, the atmosphere did not lighten as a result, because those things slowly raised their foremost branches, as if confronting us.

Only then did I see clearly that their tips were bare, covered with countless tiny holes, while the other part, hidden in the darkness, vaguely revealed sparse leaves. Most of these leaves were a ghastly green, but a few were crimson. If I wasn't mistaken, those crimson leaves were the murderers who killed Ge San. They had turned red because they were thirsty for blood.

I thought to myself, "These ancient plants are really something else!" But before I could think any further, the thing started descending from the hanging branches. I knew I was in trouble, and controlling my tone, I yelled to Bao Cai, "Run! Run as fast as you can!"

Upon hearing this, Bao Cai stiffly shifted his feet, and with that movement, the vines to his right flank darted towards us like snakes. I cursed, "Damn it!" and immediately grabbed the bewildered Bao Cai and ran.

I don't know how fast I ran, but I felt many tiny insects hitting my face in the light, and the branches of the trees tore my clothes and cut my skin.

I could no longer feel the pain, because imagining them catching up with me, piercing my body, and feasting on my flesh and blood through those dense little holes, gave me an extremely intense chill.

I'm glad I ran with Wei Zi at night and in the morning for a while, so I developed some explosive power and endurance. But the forest path was full of obstacles, and it was really not easy for me wearing these ancient shoes.

Just then, Bao Cai, who was breathing heavily behind me, suddenly screamed. I turned around and saw that the long, thin vines had spread out like a giant net, and one of the vines had pierced Bao Cai's buttocks. He fell to the ground, wincing in pain.

I cursed under my breath. Seeing the vines about to drag him backward, I immediately drew my Mongolian knife and lunged forward, severing the vines from his buttocks. The thing let out a sharp hiss and then quickly retracted. Bao Cai painfully pulled the broken branch from his left buttock, clutching his wound. I saw the vine netting swirling maniacally above us and immediately tried to help Bao Cai up, but it was too late. The thing swooped down towards our heads, emitting a cold, almost human-like laugh. I thought to myself: We're doomed, we're going to die in the late Eastern Han Dynasty!

Just as we were about to die, a ball of fire approached us from the darkness, and then a figure suddenly darted out of the darkness. Upon closer inspection, it turned out to be the young Taoist priest we had seen during the day.

He waved a torch above our heads, and the vines, as if afraid of the fire, froze in mid-air. Taking advantage of this, he urged us, "Get up! Let's go!"

Suddenly, my savior appeared. I was so stunned that I froze on the spot until I saw a vine slithering towards my face. I was terrified and got up, stumbling and dodging it.

Just when he thought he could finally breathe a sigh of relief, Bao Cai ran into trouble again. He screamed in terror, sat down on the ground, supported himself with one hand, and brandished his Mongolian knife in front of his eyes with all his might.

Seeing that things were going badly, I shouted and swung my tennis racket, cutting down the two deadly vines. But because I used too much force, I lost my balance and was then entangled by the flying vines, being dragged violently towards the place where the vines were gathered.

I slid rapidly across the ground, and just as my body lost its grip, someone suddenly grabbed my left hand and shouted, "Young master, we've got you!"

Now that I was outside the protection zone of the little Taoist's flames, many things in the darkness rushed towards me with jubilation. Bao Cai tried to pull me away little by little, but the strength of the vines was extraordinary. In an instant, I was like the rope in a tug-of-war, being pulled painfully.

Bao Cai noticed my discomfort and gasped, "I'll loosen my grip... Get up... and chop that guy down right now!"

I answered with difficulty, and then Bao Cai seized the opportunity to let go. In order not to let him down, I endured the pain in my back and quickly leaned back to cut the vines binding my feet.

At that moment, a thrill of escaping death filled my heart, and all my fear transformed into burning passion. I had never felt anything like it before, a sense of freedom surging from my heart.

"Heh..." At this moment, a laugh came from behind me. It was Bao Cai. He breathed a sigh of relief when he saw that I was free. However, because he had gripped me tightly just now, a lot of blood had seeped out of the small hole in his buttocks. Now he was lying on the ground groaning.

I retreated behind the young Taoist priest and helped the half-dead Bao Cai to his feet. The young priest cautiously observed the movement of the countless vines in front of him, then slowly backed away until he was beside us, saying, "Come with me!"

At that moment, I couldn't care less about anything else. I helped Bao Cai up and followed the young Taoist priest to a flat area in the woods. I was extremely grateful to him, because without him, Bao Cai and I would have been riddled with bullets, our blood drained by those tiny holes, leaving only skin and bones!

Sitting on a boulder now, I sighed deeply. The thrilling and tumultuous night had made my aches and pains even more pronounced. It was a pity that Ge San was dead; his body remained there, and I couldn't take him back to the village ahead.

After calming down a bit, I asked the young Taoist priest, "Do you know what that thing is?" I thought to myself that as long as he didn't say what kind of monster it was, I could accept it.

The young Taoist priest said, "That thing is called a man-eating vine. It likes to hunt at night and is extremely bloodthirsty. If it targets you, you have almost no chance of survival."

I thought to myself: There is indeed no hope. Ge San died silently right next to me. If I were in his position today, I would be the one who dies.

Thinking of this, my heart sank heavily. Reflecting on the time I spent with this guy, though he was taciturn, he at least gave us food when we were hungry. Now he's dead, and we're strangers in this world. What are we going to do? The map is on him; going back to find it is impossible. How are we going to get to the ancient tomb? And even if we get there, how will we cope? I sighed deeply, and then it occurred to me: why would the little Taoist priest have come to this remote mountain forest at this time?