“Aiyo, it would really cost someone’s life if one doesn’t know science!” On the way back to their campsite, Zhao Yu turned on the other electric baton, but the electric baton had lost its function too. “Can’t water conduct electricity? I thought I could use the electric baton to shock the water and the two persons! Now, great, not only did it not work, the electric batons are spoilt too! Public tools, I will need to pay for it! I signed the paper!”
Miao Ying took a glance at Zhao Yu and asked a different question, “That’s not right, Zhao Yu. How do you know that there were people in the bushes trying to outflank us? The direction and distance, how could you predict them so accurately?”
“I… I am on your side!” Zhao Yu quickly explained, “Of course I can see!”
“Yours are pulse electric batons,” although Professor Tian Dongmin was walking with difficulty, he couldn’t help but explain the theory to Zhao Yu. “High voltage low current. After it comes in contact with water, the current would disperse, so it can’t shock anyone! If you want to shock someone with a puddle, not only do you have to use alternating current, you also have to increase…”
Then, the old expert said a bunch of physic terms.
“Oh….” Zhao Yu could barely understand, but he still nodded, “Luckily we had plan B. Team Leader Miao knew how to climb the tree. Hehe… Otherwise, it would be troublesome!”
“Hey, don’t redirect the topic,” Miao Ying rolled her eyes at Zhao Yu. “The two of us were standing in parallel positions. You might be able to see the person behind the tree behind my back, but I couldn’t even see those among the bushes, so how could you see them?”
“If people crawl among the bushes, the grass would move, right?” Zhao Yu explained.
“But, how about distance? How could you gauge distance…” Miao Ying wouldn’t let him off so easily.
“That’s not right,” Zhao Yu quickly used his killer tactic and redirected the topic: “Captain Miao, are we overlooking a minor issue for a major one? We finally found the old folks, so let’s hurry up and ask what is going on exactly.”
Listening to Zhao Yu’s reminder, Miao Ying then remembered about the business. She quickly turned around and looked at the two old experts.
“Sigh!” Receiving the glare from Miao Ying, the professor named Wang Taiming sighed and said, “It’s a…. Long story!”
“Fooey!” Zhao Yu spatted, “You have to tell us, even if it’s long. Pick the important parts. Who are those fools? And, what was going on with the explosion earlier? Who was killed in the explosion? Are they really policemen? And… How about Dong Peizhuo? What’s up with him?”
“Sigh!”
Listening to what he asked, the two old experts’ faces grew awkward, as though they were primary school students that had made a mistake. They constantly shook their heads.
“Like I said, hurry up!” Zhao Yu pulled Tian Dongmin to walk forward, while he shouted, “Let me tell you, that bunch of people might catch up to us anytime. You’d better tell us quickly, or you might lose the chance! Hurry up, stop the suspense already!”
“Zhao Yu! How could you talk like that?” Miao Ying scolded him. “They are already at such a difficult state, so stop urging them, okay?”
“It’s… It’s our fault!” Tian Dongmin said, shivering. “We… Are Guilty! If back then, we were to announce it to the public, maybe… We wouldn’t be at such situation! We… We are such a disgrace to the nation!”
“Oh… If so, you really did join the grave robbers in their evil doings?” Zhao Yu teased.
The two old men heard this and were shocked.
“Huh?! You… Who are you? How would you know that those people are grave robbers?!” Wang asked in terror.
“We are, of course, policemen!” Miao Ying answered, “Whether you are guilty or not, you have to tell us the truth, stop hiding!”
“You guys are really policemen?” Wang was in doubt, “The policemen were killed by the Taoist priest in that explosion! If there were so many policemen, why not just arrest them all?”
“It was really Fu Jiangxing!” Zhao Yu felt that it was such a pity. He would have never guess that Fu Jianxing, who was such a smart man leading so many police detectives, would be killed by the enemy in an explosion!
“We are from a different branch. We already understand that your disappearance and the gang of grave robbers are related to the Golden Buddha statues!” Miao Ying said in a hurry. “Quick, tell me, the Taoist priest that you are talking about, who is he?”
“Yeah, that short one with a braid. That guy is brutal!” Zhao Yu asked, “Is he the leader of the grave robbers?”
“Yes, Old Dong was killed by him!” Tian Dongmin said grievously, “We… Sigh! We committed a sin and couldn’t live! We… We made a big mistake!”
Then, the two old experts dared not hide anymore. They finally told them the ins and outs of the incident, describing the entire story. After the story, Zhao Yu and Miao Ying sighed with emotion. Although they made some lucky guesses, the complexity of the entire incident was out of their expectation…
…
Twenty years ago, in the hinterland of the mountain area in Qinshan.
The section chief of the Cultural Relics Bureau, Fan Peng, brought a team for inspection. They went there to look for ancient remains. According to the mountain village, there was a cave in the mountain area housing many historical remains that were left behind by the ancient people!
Back then, besides Fan Peng, the rest of the team members were Dong Peizhuo, Tian Dongmin, and Wang Taiming.
Coincidentally, after they entered the mountain, they caught up to the rainy season in the forest. It had been raining for the past few days, which inconvenienced their inspection work. But, according to the clues provided by the villagers, they finally found the hidden cave in the General Ridge, and discovered many historical remains of the ancient people.
The cave was a little bizarre. Although the entrance was very small, the space within it was huge. The width and the height inside the cave was about ten meters. Plus, the cave was extremely deep and it even connected to the underground river.
As the location of the cave was comparably higher, and was covered by the bushes and trees, hardly anyone came across it. In the cave, they found some broken pottery, ironware, and some ancient war weapons. Through careful inspections of the experts, they found that the historical remains in the cave were mainly from the Ming Dynasty centuries back. As there were traces of life and fire, their initial judgement was that there were some people that once lived in the cave, at least for a few years.
Fan Peng made an inference that the reason why these people stayed far away from human inhabitants, living in the depths of the forest, was most likely to seek asylum. Judging it based on time, they thought that it would most likely be the chaos period in the end of the Ming Dynasty.
Back then, the peasants revolted, as an army and the troop led by Zhang Xianzhong seized control of Luya, where they started a war in the city. These people most likely were from that time, and ran to the woods to hide.
But the environment was harsh and unsuitable for humans to stay for long. In the end, it’s uncertain if these people passed away due to plague, or were forced to leave. They were nowhere to be found.
Regardless, these historical remains had a high archeological value. The four of them from the inspection team stayed back to collect samples and carry out more detailed archaeology work. During that time, they even went deep into the cave and found an underground pool! Right on the last day of searching in the cave, an accidental discovery changed their fate entirely!
According to Professor Tian Dongmin, they were tired from working and were lying down on a slabstone to take a break. In the end, section chief Fan Peng suddenly saw that there was something weird looking on a higher place in the cave. When they took a closer look, they realised that the thing looked like a corpse!
As it turned out, the connecting point of the top and the wall of the cave had a natural indentation that looked like man-made corridor. The corpse was located right at the dent. The top of the cave was ten meters high, and the wall was almost perpendicular with the top. Plus, it was very slippery. They wondered how the corpse got up there and why it would appear at such a place.
With doubts, Section Chief Fan Peng used their professional hiking equipment and finally got to the top of the cave to the corpse. Then, Tian Dongmin and Wang Taiming couldn’t help but sigh a breath of relief. They said that every story had its starting point, and that theirs was the mysterious corpse!!!