The ancient return was exposed by his sister's live stream.

Shouts came from the tunnel entrance, and everyone turned in that direction at the same time. They were covered in dirt, their eyes were bloodshot, and they didn't jump out as nimbly as usual. Their movements were stiff, as if they had just come out of an ice cellar.

Qin Zheng strode over and asked how things were going down there.

The agent stood there, his eyes slightly red, still reeling from what he had just witnessed. "There's no danger down there."

His voice was hoarse. "But there are skeletons. Human skeletons. Lots of them."

Qin Zheng's heart, which had been hanging in suspense, was instantly relieved. As long as there were no casualties, everything would be fine. He patted Qin Zheng on the shoulder.

He then turned and waved his hand, saying in a deep voice, "Everyone, take precautions. Professors, stay in the middle of the group. We're going down! Make sure you thoroughly understand the entire underground space, protect the professors, and do not touch any items without authorization!"

"yes!"

The team members immediately split into two groups, holding their guns and turning on their powerful flashlights, and tightly protected the professors in the middle. Qin Zheng walked at the front, with Wu Qingya following closely behind.

Ying Wenjie, Qin Xiaoyu, Ye Chendong, and Wu Tian followed at the back of the group, slowly walking down the steep stone steps into the dark tunnel.

The stone steps were slippery and covered in moss. The further down you went, the colder and more gloomy the air became, and the stronger the smell of decay grew.

Extending downwards, the tunnel widened as you walked, and after about fifteen minutes, it transformed into a vast underground space.

The space was unbelievably large, several times larger than the ruins plaza above. The dome was so high that the lights couldn't reach the top, and a dark red light shone from the depths of the space, illuminating the stone walls like the afterglow of the setting sun.

"This way." Wu Qingya walked in front, holding up his tactical flashlight. The beam swept across the darkness—a white ocean appeared ahead, a vast expanse of white covering the entire ground.

He walked closer and stopped, finally able to see the white blurry things clearly.

Skeletons. Thousands upon thousands of skeletons. Densely packed, covering the entire underground space, piled up in countless layers... layer upon layer, covering the entire ground, forming a boundless sea of ​​skeletons!

Some have been reduced to dust, while others still retain their original postures—some kneeling on the ground with their hands clasped together, others lying face up with their mouths open.

Everyone was stunned, standing still, no one daring to take a step forward. The scene before them froze everyone in place, their minds blank, and they even forgot to breathe.

They originally thought that the underground was just an ordinary tomb, an empty cave, and a few skeletons.

Ying Wenjie's stomach churned, he turned around, squatted down, and vomited. The faces of the younger team members behind him were also pale, and Qin Xiaoyu covered her mouth as well.

Everyone was trembling with fear, their bodies stiff, their eyes filled with extreme shock and terror, and they didn't even dare to breathe.

"These...these are all...human skeletons?" Professor Chen Jingshan's voice trembled, his legs went weak, and he almost collapsed to the ground. His teammates quickly supported him.

Professor Li's hands trembled. "This...this is the truth behind the disappearance of the ancient Lao people?"

His voice was hoarse as he took a difficult step forward, squatted down, and gently brushed away a layer of loose soil to reveal a section of grayish-white radius bone, without a single scar.

The professors began their work: examining, photographing, and collecting samples. One expert said, "These skeletons date back approximately 500 years, and there are no obvious signs of external injury. Judging from the posture of the bones, they did not struggle before death."

"All the skeletons showed no signs of external injury, knife wounds, or poisoning. The bones were intact, and there were no signs of struggle or fighting. It was as if... in an instant, they had all lost their vital signs." Ying Wenjie felt a chill run down his spine when he heard this.

In the very center of the sea of ​​bones, there is a clean and tidy blue stone passage without a single skeleton.

The passage is about five meters wide, extending from the entrance of the tunnel to the deepest part of the underground plaza. The skeletons on both sides are neatly arranged, as if they are worshipping the existence at the end of the passage, forming a solemn yet eerie pilgrimage route.

"The skeletons are laid out on both sides, and the passage is clean and empty, which means that when they died, they were still in the worship posture of ancestor worship, and until the last moment of their lives, they were kneeling and worshipping in the direction of the end of the passage." Professor Li Songlin recovered his senses, held up a flashlight and shone it on the passage, and analyzed in a solemn voice.

Qin Zheng nodded and said in a deep voice, "Follow the passage and see at the end!"

The group carefully walked along the bluestone path. Skeletons lay silently on the ground on both sides, their empty eye sockets seemingly staring at them. The flashlight beam swept across them, creating an indescribable eeriness.

The path paved with bones came to an end, where a huge altar appeared. The altar was not tall, only about one meter high, but it was very large, with a diameter of over fifty meters.

Its color wasn't bluish-gray, but rather a bluish-green, covered with a layer of bronze rust that gleamed faintly in the dark red light. The entire altar was cast in bronze.

Professor Chen Jingshan squatted down and tapped the edge of the altar with his finger, producing a dull sound. It was solid, not hollow.

He raised his head, his voice trembling: "The entire altar is made of bronze." How did the ancients thousands of years ago cast such a bronze altar, which was tens of meters wide? How much bronze did they use? How much manpower and resources did they need?

It's important to understand that even with modern smelting technology, casting such a massive, one-piece bronze artifact would require countless manpower and resources, let alone the ancient Lao people from hundreds or even thousands of years ago.

This is completely beyond the limits of ancient smelting technology!

"What secrets does the ancient Lao tribe hold? How could they possibly forge something like this?" Wu Qingya frowned, staring at the bronze altar, his eyes full of doubt.

The crowd walked up to the altar. The surface of the altar was smooth and flat, and in the center was a densely packed inscription in ancient Lao script.

Professor Li was already there studying it; his glasses were practically pressed against the bronze surface. Several other professors were also there, some taking photos, some copying notes, and some having a heated discussion.

Before long, Professor Li was pulled away by several colleagues to look at the sacrificial text on the front of the altar. They called him several times before he finally ran over from the side of the altar. He knelt on the ground and read it word by word.

"In the thirty-first year of the Jiajing reign... in the year of Bingwu... the ancient Lao tribe received a message from their ancestor Jiulong... and gathered here... by divine mandate..."

He paused here, raised his head, and stared straight ahead. "During the Jiajing era of the Ming Dynasty. The ancient Lao people continued to hold ancestral rites here until the Ming Dynasty. They were probably all buried here on that very day."

Wu Tian walked over from the side, heard this, and spat out: "Pah, what kind of bullshit immortals are you?"

Professor Li didn't reply. He stood up and walked to the center of the altar, looking around. The altar was too large; standing on it, he couldn't see the edges. The more he looked, the more something seemed off—the direction of the patterns seemed to be forming some kind of design.