Chapter 109: This Time It’s A Real Colleague!
Time passed in silence among the few of them. Ever since Wu Xie told Lin Yan to be careful of that middle-aged man, he had been constantly watching the man’s movement, but the man didn’t do anything else besides staring blankly and smoking.
The car drove for another hour or so and finally arrived at the foot of Mount Tai Bai. As soon as they got off, the man came over again to chat: “Little kid, you guys came here for tourism by yourselves? How come you didn’t get a tour group to follow? This mountain is full of twists and turns, easy to get lost. How about you hire me as a tour guide? I’m a local, pretty familiar with the paths here, can go anywhere!”
Wu Xie shook his head repeatedly: “No need, uncle, we have a tour guide, all arranged, waiting for us up ahead. No need to trouble you!”
The middle-aged man wanted to persuade them more, but seeing their firm attitude, he gave up, though he still followed them to the town entrance before parting.
He left, and the three of them all breathed a sigh of relief. In this desolate mountain wilderness, a stranger was scarier than no one, because you didn’t know if the other party wanted to double-cross. They stumbled around and found a guesthouse to stay in—mainly Lao Yang, he hadn’t ridden in a car for years, the highway was okay before, but this mountain road, even with motion sickness medicine, didn’t work, he threw up all over as soon as he got off, and now he was still a bit exhausted.
The conditions of the guesthouse in this county town were worlds apart from those in Xi’an city. The one they stayed in was a bit like a youth hostel, one room just for the three of them, a bunk room. Lin Yan sat on the bunk, looking at the bedsheet with some yellow stains, completely dumbfounded: “Isn’t it, they should at least do the most basic hygiene, right? This is too uncomfortable?”
Wu Xie gave a bitter smile: “It’s just a small county town, this condition is already pretty good, at least not sleeping on the street, right? Alright, wash up and rest, let’s take a nap to recharge, then head into the mountain tomorrow.”
They still had the mood to sort things and wash up, but Lao Yang went straight to bed and fell asleep as soon as he entered the room.
By the time Wu Xie and Lin Yan woke up again, they had missed dinner the first day and breakfast the next, a fragrance of food woke their stomachs.
Lin Yan opened his eyes and saw the room’s only table covered with food, Lao Yang grinning at them: “Awake? You—you guys sure can sleep! It’s—it’s already no—noon!”
Wu Xie glanced at the sunlight outside, got up and forced himself to wake up: “What time is it? Lao Yang, you went out? What’s the situation in the town?”
Lao Yang rolled his eyes at him: “Wha—what situation, making it sound like—like an underground contact. I—I already asked around, here tomb raiders often come, the town is—is—used to it! Might—might run into colleagues this time!”
Lin Yan looked at the food on the table, rolled over and got up, threw on some clothes haphazardly, brushed his teeth, and sat down to eat: “Lao Yang, you went out, did you see where the convenience store or supermarket is? I need to buy some stuff later, or it won’t be good if they close.”
Lao Yang looked surprised, he had bought all their equipment, how couldn’t he remember missing anything: “You, you still need to buy—buy what? Did I—I miss some—something?”
Lin Yan saw him stuttering uncomfortably, almost dragging his speech: “No, nothing, I just want to buy some more dry rations!”
Lao Yang had watched him eat along the way, nodded upon hearing this, suddenly realizing: “This, this adding—you, indeed not—not enough food!” Lin Yan rolled his eyes at him, he wasn’t a big eater, just got hungry easily! Rice warrior, rice soul, rice eaters are the elite!
By the time they finally packed up and went out, they were full and satisfied, full of energy. Only then did Lao Yang notice Wu Xie’s backpack was half as flat as Lin Yan’s, couldn’t help but find it strange. He had personally bought the equipment, logically they should all be about the same for the three of them?
Only after Lin Yan came back from the convenience store did he understand why. He watched wide-eyed as Lin Yan skillfully stuffed most of that big bag of snacks and dry rations into it! He incredulously leaned over to look in Wu Xie’s bag, besides the medical kit and a small Luoyang shovel, everything else was stuff Lin Yan bought!
This was just outrageous! Were they here for tomb raiding or tourism? Lao Yang, who hadn’t experienced Lu King’s Palace and the underwater tomb, didn’t know that after experiences where they planned for just one day down but it dragged to two or three, now the most important things besides water were dry rations. After all, dying from a mechanism wasn’t too unjust, but starving to death below because they brought too little food—that would be too frustrating!
Just as they were about to head back to the guesthouse for a bit more rest, Wu Xie passed a corner and dragged Lao Yang and Lin Yan one in each hand inside, startling both of them: “What? The entrance is right ahead, why drag us over?”
Lao Yang reacted, poked his head out from beside him to peer inside the door: “These—these people look—so familiar?”
Wu Xie nodded: “Yeah, we saw them at the Xi’an night market, didn’t expect to see them here again!”
Lin Yan knew Wu Xie wouldn’t guard strangers without reason, so he carefully looked inside. Inside the door was an old man leading a few young people, the old man squatting holding a branch drawing something on the ground, the young people listening and nodding repeatedly. Lin Yan couldn’t make out exactly what he was drawing, but could guess from Wu Xie’s actions: “What, colleagues?”
He turned to ask Lao Yang: “They aren’t after that tomb of yours too, right? Weren’t all your batch caught?”
Lao Yang racked his brains and shook his head: “I—I don’t know, I should—should have gotten the light—lightest sentence, the—others either life or—executed.”
Seeing Lao Yang like this, Wu Xie and Lin Yan knew they couldn’t ask anything more, just watched that group inside the door from afar, planning to check if they left any clues after they left. Suddenly, one of the young people glanced their way, froze, pointed at them and said something to the old man, then everyone looked over.
As soon as that young person looked over, Wu Xie knew something was wrong, he quickly thought of ways to break the situation. You know, tomb robber meeting tomb robber was always life or death, that old man didn’t look like a pushover, plus they outnumbered them, hard confrontation wasn’t best, even if Lin Yan was strong.
“Holy shit!” He suddenly heard Lin Yan whisper in shock, no time to say more, seeing everyone inside the door look over, he simply led the way towards them, trying hard to keep his expression natural while mouthing instructions: “Don’t talk much, act like we just got back!”
Hearing Wu Xie, Lao Yang and Lin Yan tried to relax their expressions, following him casually into the door.
The old man saw them approach, stood up and tossed the branch, rubbed out what he had just drawn with his foot. The ground figure was scratched out with the branch, the surface soil not very packed, with a couple rubs it really almost destroyed the map.
Unfortunately, Wu Xie had glanced at it ahead while approaching, getting the shape mostly.
The old man didn’t speak, one young person got eager to move as they approached but was held back by him. Wu Xie gave him a slightly stiff smile as he passed, he froze, hand twitched, seemed to subconsciously want a cigarette, but none in his pocket. As they were almost past, they heard an old hoarse voice ask them in heavily accented Mandarin:
“You folks, wanna go do some tomb robber business?”
What the hell? Speak human? Not understanding a single word is a bit outrageous too, right?
