Chapter 28 Two-Faced Ancients

TN Note: I made a boo boo last chapter. Ba Ye is still chillin at the top of the tower at the start of this chapter.

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Qi Tiezui looked at the valley in the distance. After examining the rolling land, he found that the valley had very good feng shui. There was a stream at the bottom of the valley, terraced fields on the mountains near the Dong village, and virgin forests far off in the distance.

To his surprise, there were irregular dirt mounds every ten miles in the flat parts of the valley. Although they weren’t very high, it looked very unnatural. People familiar with this kind of thing would immediately know that these mounds were used to cover up graves.

And if there really was an ancient tomb under these protruding mounds, then that meant there had to be a cluster of graves here.

There had been a lot of ethnic minority kingdoms here in Xiangxi in the past, and it had been said that the ancient kingdom of Yelang in the Han Dynasty was also nearby. The funeral habits of these minorities weren’t like the Hans in the Central Plains. In fact, it was illogical to have such a large-scale dense entombment.

If it really was a tomb, then who was buried under it? Most large-scale joint burials were usually found in the tombs of Han kings, or the family tombs of important imperial officials. Here, all the previous dynasties were led by a chief who ruled over the Western Yi lands. No matter how good the feng shui was, no one should have dared set up a graveyard here.

There was only one possibility—this cluster of earth mounds was a group of empty graves meant to hide a really big tomb.

It was no wonder the Huo family held onto this territory with an iron fist. They had been operating here for a long time, and may have discovered these empty graves early on. They had probably been looking for the real location of the big tomb that these fake mounds were protecting.

He climbed back down the tower and talked it over with Zhang Qishan, who nodded and said: “Leaving aside this matter for the time being, what’s going on with this ‘major event that’s not good’? Don’t mince your words, fortune teller. I’ll really use my family’s methods to get it out of you.”

Qi Tiezui grimly replied: “It’s not bad, it’s just that this major event isn’t good.” With that said, he picked up a small stone from the ground and started drawing the shape of the whole valley, along with the location of each dirt mound. He usually had an average memory, but when it came to feng shui, his memory was excellent. As a result, he was able to make an accurate depiction of the whole valley, and Zhang Qishan could already figure out what it was when he was only halfway through. This whole valley was shaped like a person.

“You see, Fo Ye? Every dirt mound in this human-shaped valley is very consistent with the positioning of the coffin nails on the expert’s body that we saw during the autopsy.”

As Zhang Qishan carefully recalled the details, he felt his heart move. Sure enough, this cautious and cunning Qi Tiezui was famous for a reason. It only took him a glance to figure out the connection between these things. He was truly a talented person.

Qi Tiezui continued, “My family’s expert made all the preparations before leaving, but unfortunately, I can’t remember the lines in front of the coffin nails. Those are probably the secret passages connecting these empty graves.” He looked down at his feet. “We have one right below us, too.”

When he finished speaking, all the pieces finally connected together. There were a lot of mechanisms in the empty graves. For some reason, the locals might have been excavating the empty grave beneath their feet and touched the mechanism that was inside it. They thought there was something evil there, which was why the Taoist temple was built on top of it.

After living here for a long time, the Taoist priests probably encountered the mechanisms under the temple and died violent deaths, which was how the strange corpse jars and talismans under the everlasting tower came about.

Did the Japanese hide the train by using these huge tunnels between the empty graves?

It was possible.

Zhang Qishan realized that Qi Tiezui was thinking the exact same thing as him, so he patted him on the shoulder and said: “If there are empty graves, then it must be—”

“A big tomb in the mountains. The empty graves are mostly set on the periphery of the big tomb, so the location is hard to determine. But it’s definitely hundreds of feet deeper than the empty graves.” As Qi Tiezui spoke, he looked at the vast mountains around them. “Fo Ye, whether it’s three hundred years in the past or future, do you really think you can find this hidden dragon cave? Did you go into the mountains alone before to check? Did you see any obvious feng shui indicators?”

Zhang Qishan was silent. He had gone into the mountains alone to verify something that was related to his own origins.

There were many things that would happen only when he was alone, but he had gone all that way for nothing.

That didn’t prove anything, though. Maybe it just wasn’t time for them to show up yet.

The group was full of doubts as they descended into the underground tomb at the bottom of the everlasting tower. This time, everyone took a torch to illuminate the whole tomb and Lieutenant commanded his men to hang lanterns everywhere.

It was only at this time that they finally got to see the whole underground tomb. There was more than one red thread leading down various grave robbers’ tunnels and into the lower level where they couldn’t see before.

Lieutenant went down and ordered everyone to pull out their pistols.

Zhang Qishan waved his hand, and a group of people put on gloves and carefully sorted out a path around the corpse jars. He went up to one of the grave robbers’ tunnels and removed the corpse jar, revealing a straight tunnel. It had been drilled into the stone floor and messily chiseled away with a hammer.

“Doesn’t look like it was done by someone experienced.” Zhang Qishan stuck the torch down. “And it was dug from below.”

Lieutenant touched the hammer marks with his hand. Sure enough, the person who dug this hole had come up from below.

On the other side, Qi Tiezui went over to the place where he had trampled the corpse jar before and found that the jar was really broken. But the debris had completely dried, making it obvious that it had been trampled a long time ago. The filthy black sludge in the jar had also dried up.

The one who stepped on it wasn’t him, but someone a long time ago. He looked above his head. Could it be that what he saw and felt was the expert’s memory from that time? Was the expert the one who trampled this jar?

He looked around. There was nothing in the underground tomb, so the weasel spirit must have left.

Lieutenant took the lead and went down into the tunnel below, receiving the torches one by one. It was only at this point that they realized they were standing in a huge tomb passage. The tomb’s bricks were covered in mottled and moldy murals that were full of all kinds of ancient portraits. But the strange thing was, these ancient figures all had two faces.

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