Chapter 5.5 Underground Lake (Extra)

Many years ago, Lei Benchang met a grave robber here, who told him that there was an ancient tomb in the pine forest at the back of the mountain. The dragon coffin fungus in the tomb had already started growing, so he could take it any time in the next three years. He was getting older and older, and he didn’t want to use this kind of method, but this might be his only chance to catch the fish alive.

I felt like I already knew what was going on after listening to him, including what he did and didn’t want to say. Before, he said that he had worked as a “lantern lighter” for more than fifty years, so he knew what business Poker-Face was in as soon as he saw him.

“Lantern lighter” was one of the codes used in the Central Plains, which referred to the person in charge of distributing the spoils after a tomb had been robbed. A few decades ago, there were a lot of things in ancient tombs, so each participant would take their distribution of the spoils depending on the risks and their experience and duties. This proportion had to be agreed upon before the operation took place.

Grave robbers usually had a low level of education, so they used code words like “plum blossom”, “cutlassfish”, or “leather train” to divide the goods into classes.

Many people would renege on the agreement once the good items were taken out, so the need for a lantern lighter arose. In fact, once the grave robbers had reached an agreement, they would tell the lantern lighters their codes such as “plum blossom”, “cutlassfish”, “leather train”, or “big old K”. In this way, if someone wanted to renege on the agreement, they would need to find the lantern lighter to inspect and verify the goods. The lantern lighter couldn’t actually do anything about it, but they would know who had broken the agreement. Whenever someone went to hire these experts in the future, they would often ask for the lantern lighter’s opinion.

In fact, it was a personal credit scoring system.

After more than fifty years, this lantern lighter had seen many grave robbers, so he could practically identify them with a glance. Fatty told me that it was like a brothel owner spotting a beautiful prostitute in the crowd. It only took one look. Those in the underworld definitely gave off a different aura compared to ordinary people.

I stared at the old man a little ruefully. Whenever I saw such an old-timer in the early years, my legs would tremble and I would feel that the old expert’s gestures were oppressive. Now, seeing that the old man in this village was actually an old grave robber—whose mannerisms and conversation while drinking tea weren’t that bad—I only felt an unknown pity in my heart.

You’ve gone further than them, so you don’t need to be afraid at all. I said to myself.

“Can you believe this ancient book?” I flipped through the copied fish records. “You don’t know where it is on the back mountain, but say it’s not too far from here. Why don’t you go pick it up yourself? If the tomb’s already been robbed, it shouldn’t be dangerous.”

Lei Benchang sighed, shook his head, and said, “Although I know a lot of grave robbers, I can’t do it myself. In fact, I’ve begged many people in recent years, but they were unwilling to help me. These kinds of people won’t help unless they get something out of it.”

It was obvious the ancient tomb had already been robbed. If it were me, I wouldn’t want to go the extra mile just to help him dig up a coffin fungus, either. But he had just said that there was a good thing for us, so I asked him what it was.

The old man suddenly looked at the door, got up, and closed it. He then went to the back room, closed that door, and then told us to help him move all the fishing rods on one of the walls. We were surprised to see that the wall was covered in many lines.

The old man’s handwriting was actually very good. The lines were annotated, and some of them could easily be understood at a glance. Some hills had been drawn with distance markers written in the old man’s handwriting on the sides. A lot of rivers had been drawn under those mountains, but I looked at them and knew that most of them weren’t actually rivers aboveground. Most of the black lines had been blackened into many strange patterns, marking the underground rivers.

“I fish in the underground river here. In order to find out what direction it flows in, I tag the fish and throw them back. For more than ten years, the fish I’ve thrown back in this pool have been caught in other pools. The farthest distance is more than thirty kilometers. I’ve marked all the logical relationships among them. They’re here, which is where most of the underground rivers lead to.” The old man was very excited, just like a kid showing off the porn DVD he had hidden.

The three of us got up and stood in a row in front of the wall. We copied Poker-face and put both hand in our pockets as we looked at everything. The black lines were like blackened veins, and there were more than a dozen rows of numbers written on them.

“What’s this?”

“This is the time.” The old man said. “The fish released in this pool would pass through the underground river and reach the next pool. I was determining how many twists and turns the underground river has. It’s very strange. Some pools are only one or two kilometers away, but it takes several months for the fish to get there. Other pools are more than thirty kilometers apart, but the fish would appear in them overnight.”

“Is it the current?” I asked.

“I thought the same thing at first, but it wasn’t right. After I released some of them in a deep pool thirty kilometers away, I could still catch them in another pool further upstream after only day. If it was because of the current, it should be one-way instead of two-ways. Later, I discovered that there might be another explanation. Was it possible that all the deep pools weren’t connected by underground rivers, but by something else?”

He pointed to the center of the wall. There was a big circle, which had been completely painted black. Almost all the underground rivers were connected to this black circle.

“What is this thing?” Fatty asked.

“This is an underground lake.” The old man continued. “But this isn’t a natural underground lake, it’s artificial.”

<Extra 5.4> <Table of Contents><Extra 5.6>

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Whether you’re in the US or not, Happy Thanksgiving darlings!!!! Only 1 chapter tonight, I need to go digest my food baby and fall into a post-turkey coma lol.