Chapter 65: Inner Cavity, Ghost Coffin, Maze Tomb Ghost Face
The Nether Hall was empty, which left Hu Ba Yi, Da Jin Ya, and Wang Pang Zi both surprised and puzzled.
Since ancient times, the Nether Hall has been the place to house the deceased’s coffin, but the Nether Hall before them had neither burial items nor coffin, only a few unfinished murals, clearly a half-finished product, and this scene left Hu Ba Yi equally baffled.
The four then walked forward, only to see that the entire front hall of the Nether Hall was built like a palace, but many important areas were incomplete, some places still had scaffolding from construction, yet the stone door of the underground palace was sealed shut, with even the stone slab gaps welded dead with molten iron.
On the ground of the underground palace’s front hall, there was unexpectedly a very small fountain, and the spring eye was still bubbling water outward.
“Master…”
Hu Ba Yi couldn’t help but look confused, feeling that this ancient tomb completely exceeded his understanding.
From the layout of the underground palace, it was clearly a grand tomb of imperial nobility level, at least a prince’s large tomb, yet it was fundamentally a half-finished product!
“This is clearly an inner cavity, commonly known as coffin surge, extremely suitable for burying a woman, but why is it empty here?”
Hearing Hu Ba Yi’s question, Su Mo just smiled faintly:
“Simple, because this tomb is fundamentally a half-finished product, and a problem arose during construction, so they directly chose to abandon it!”
Da Jin Ya said:
“That’s not right, Master Su!”
“If it was abandoned due to war during construction, that might be possible, but from the situation in the front hall, the entire construction stopped very calmly and unhurriedly, not only sealing the underground palace with molten iron and stone slabs, but also seeming to have no intention of continuing afterward—what’s the reason for that?”
Su Mo of course knew that it was because this Tang Tomb encountered a Zhou Tomb during construction, thus forming two tombs in one grave.
Two tombs in one grave is a great taboo in ancient burials, so the Tang people directly chose to stop construction upon discovering the Zhou Tomb below, sealing the underground palace with stone slabs and molten iron, and abandoning this tomb.
But at this moment, Su Mo didn’t want to tell Hu Ba Yi and the others too much, not only because it was hard to explain many things, but also because Su Mo actually felt that the entire tomb was shrouded in many mysteries.
There were many ancient Feng Shui arts grandmasters, and just in the Tang Dynasty there was Grandmaster Li Chunfeng and others; it would be too far-fetched to say they couldn’t see that a Zhou Tomb was buried here first.
But since the Feng Shui master had already seen that there was a large tomb here, why still place the Tang Tomb here? There must be some unspeakable secret!
As Su Mo was thinking, he suddenly heard Fatty let out a startled cry:
“Holy shit… there’s a ghost!”
Su Mo and Hu Ba Yi looked ahead following Fatty’s gaze, only to see at the southeast corner of the Nether Hall, right where Hu Ba Yi had just placed the candle, what seemed to be a person standing there.
The candle’s light was very dim in the Nether Hall, the corner flickering in and out of the candlelight, and Fatty’s flashlight couldn’t reach that position at all, plus the four were far away, so that human shadow looked blurry and indistinct.
Hu Ba Yi’s heart skipped a beat, immediately thinking it might be some fellow tomb raider who had also entered via the tomb raiding hole, so he loudly shouted the code phrase:
“Black bend probes dragon lifting treasure canopy, Mountain Mover opens hill with wondrous cave, stars suddenly part, Big Dipper gathers southern light!”
These words meant that everyone was a fellow tomb raider, there is first-come first-served, we are the latecomers, we dare not snatch food from the tiger’s mouth, and will leave soon!
But after Hu Ba Yi finished several code phrases, the other party showed no reaction at all.
Su Mo sneered:
“Scaring yourselves, where’s the ghost!”
He dashed over in one arrow step, but before he got close, that candle suddenly went out, and then that eerie human shadow suddenly vanished.
Da Jin Ya was so scared he plopped down on the ground:
“Human lights candle, ghost blows lamp…”
He had been scared by Hu Ba Yi and Wang Pang Zi’s usual bragging, only hearing of human lights candle ghost blows lamp, rooster crows lamp out no tomb raiding, so seeing the candle extinguish, he thought the other was some evil ghost blowing it out with ghostly breath, and was so terrified his legs went soft on the spot.
“Blow a damn feather!”
Seeing Da Jin Ya like this, Hu Ba Yi couldn’t help but angrily curse:
“The candle was so short, it’s normal for it to go out, don’t scare yourselves!”
While the two were talking, Su Mo had already reached the southeast corner of the Nether Hall, only to see no ghostly shadow there at all, but indeed there was a stone relief human face carved on a huge stone sarcophagus.
This stone sarcophagus was enormous, over ten feet long and seven feet wide, entirely made of large stones, with huge human faces in relief on the sides and lid, their features distinctly outlined, looking unspeakably bizarre and eerie!
“Damn it, what the hell, this Nether Hall was clearly empty just now!”
Hu Ba Yi, Wang Pang Zi, and the others came over and saw this stone sarcophagus, but couldn’t help being very puzzled.
When they entered this Nether Hall earlier, it was empty without a single thing, how did a stone sarcophagus suddenly appear here in the blink of an eye?
What the hell was that?
After being scolded by Hu Ba Yi, Da Jin Ya mustered his courage and walked over, carefully looked at the stone sarcophagus, and said:
“Not right, the decorative patterns on this stone sarcophagus look like Western Zhou things, not something that should be in a Tang Tomb at all!”
Hu Ba Yi also found it strange:
“Exactly, how could there be a Western Zhou stone sarcophagus in this Tang Tomb? And we clearly saw nothing here earlier, how did it suddenly appear here!”
Su Mo was also puzzled in his heart.
This ancient tomb in Dragon Ridge had Tang Tomb and Zhou Tomb overlapping, like a labyrinth, with chaotic magnetic field and energy in the tomb, so even using the Great Yin Meditation Technique, he couldn’t discern the truth.
Fatty couldn’t help cursing:
“This stone sarcophagus looks so simple, definitely no good stuff, why don’t we leave here first!”
Hu Ba Yi nodded in agreement:
“Master, why don’t we go back the way we came!”
Su Mo just nodded without speaking.
He knew there was definitely more strangeness in this tomb than this, but for now, they could only jump out of this Nether Hall first.
The four then jumped down along the tomb raiding hole in the middle of the Nether Hall, but after jumping down, they realized something was wrong—the original tomb raiding hole was at a forty-five-degree angle, but after jumping down, the bottom had become flat ground.
Hu Ba Yi shone his flashlight around, only to find all around were very strange and peculiar human face murals, not the previous tomb raiding hole at all!
These human faces were large and small, their faces looking extremely eerie, twisted strange faces, each showing a different expression.
Joy, sorrow, grief, anger, surprise, fear, sadness…
All sorts of different expressions, all sorts of strange faces, like a group of evil ghosts in hell, staring at the four from the tomb walls!
