There was actually no need for Ye Fan to explain anything to him.
The soil they had deliberately spread thinly and dumped over the fields outside made it clear that large-scale earthworks were underway in the Vegetable Greenhouse.
In the eyes of a professional like Li Zhi, those people's supposedly flawless methods were riddled with loopholes.
Moreover, judging from the soil they had dug up, they still had not reached the Main Tomb Chamber.
When it came to dealing with tomb-raiding groups of this caliber, Li Zhi had far more experience than Ye Fan.
Then Li Zhi said, "Let's go. We'll head to the neighboring county to buy some things."
Two hours later, the trunk was packed with medical protective suits, work gloves, hammers, low-light flashlights, thin steel cables, shovels, pickaxes, and other tools. There were even several generations of vegetable seeds and mushroom seeds.
Ye Fan stared blankly at Li Zhi.
"Are you wondering why I bought all this?" Li Zhi asked with a smile.
Ye Fan nodded. "I can understand buying protective suits, work gloves, shovels, and flashlights. But why buy thin steel cables and hammers, not to mention vegetable seeds and the rest?"
"To deal with trouble, of course," Li Zhi said.
Li Zhi sounded perfectly relaxed, but Ye Fan heard boundless killing intent in his words.
Seeing the complicated look in Ye Fan's eyes, Li Zhi suddenly turned serious. "Ye Fan, remember this. When dealing with lawless people, don't expect to do honest business with them. Not getting robbed by them is already a blessing. Sometimes, when special circumstances arise, we have no choice but to leave certain potential dangers underground forever."
The hammers and thin steel cables were naturally meant for killing people and silencing witnesses.
Knives had never been efficient killing weapons, whether long or short.
Hammers were different. No matter who it was, taking a heavy blow from one would instantly cost them their ability to fight.
"Beat you to death with a hammer" wasn't a joke.
It was genuinely a method that could settle everything with a single blow.
Thin steel cables, meanwhile, were the best weapons for suffocating someone in a cramped space.
After hearing Li Zhi's explanation, Ye Fan still asked, somewhat unable to bear it, "Do we really have to kill people?"
Li Zhi suddenly laughed. "If they don't want to kill us, then we don't need to kill them. After all, killing people is troublesome."
Ye Fan was still too young at this point. A trace of the kindness of a university student still remained in his heart.
He was not yet the ruthless and decisive Ye Hei of the future.
Perhaps after experiencing this incident, the ruthless and decisive Ye Fan of the future would emerge.
Of course, Li Zhi had no idea whether the kindness in his heart would be worn away.
Thanks to reader Kuku Pao Huicheng for the reward. Here's a four-thousand-word chapter.
At the same time that Li Zhi and Ye Fan were purchasing supplies,
the group of tomb raiders was also making their final push.
After three years of archaeological-style excavation, they had already investigated that great tomb thoroughly.
Only the Main Outer Coffin Chamber, enclosed by Huangchang Ticou, remained unopened.
The various treasures in the Outer Coffin Storage Room had long since been completely looted.
If they continued excavating in the same archaeological manner as before, they would be unable to open the Main Outer Coffin Chamber.
That was because the enormous, heavy cypress logs could only be moved with large mechanical equipment.
Thus, after clearing the surrounding area, they planned to use a chainsaw to cut a passage directly through the cypress-log wall of the Huangchang Ticou and into the Main Outer Coffin Chamber.
To protect the treasures inside the Main Outer Coffin Chamber as much as possible, they had made the most meticulous preparations.
When Ye Fan and Li Zhi returned from the county after buying their supplies, they suddenly discovered that the small road leading to the Vegetable Greenhouse was blocked by a large truck parked across it.
The vehicle could not pass at all.
One of the truck's front wheels had already been removed.
It seemed to have stopped because of a flat tire. They also saw no sign of the owner at the scene, as if he had taken the tire away for repairs.
Seeing this, Li Zhi said to Ye Fan, "Looks like we won't be able to go today."
Ye Fan was clever and immediately connected the dots. "They probably put this truck here specifically to block the road. Could they be planning something big today?"
Li Zhi nodded. "Judging from the situation, they're probably making a major move."
Ye Fan asked, "Then are we still going?"
Li Zhi thought for a moment before saying resolutely, "We're going, of course. And we can't let them get there first. In ancient tombs, the things most useful to us aren't the buried gold and silver treasures, but the bamboo slips and silk cloth that rot easily. The moment they're exposed to air, they'll weather away."
Ye Fan nodded as well. He had been thinking the same thing.
Then he asked, "How do we get there?"
Li Zhi smiled faintly. "We'll ride bicycles."
They definitely couldn't walk. Walking there would make their purpose too obvious and could easily alert the enemy.
Li Zhi and Ye Fan then drove to a nearby town.
At a shop that sold children's bicycles, they bought two off-road bicycles.
After that, Li Zhi and Ye Fan each slung a backpack over their shoulders and rode their bicycles there again, looking as if they were going on an outing.
Meanwhile, inside Greenhouse No. 4 at the Vegetable Greenhouse base, six men wearing protective suits and gas masks were carrying equipment into the underground passage.
There were electric drills, chainsaws, spades, chisels, ropes, winches, and all sorts of other tools for digging tunnels.
The entrance to the underground passage was a vertical shaft one meter in diameter.
From the outside, it looked no different from an ordinary well.
Going down more than ten meters from the opening led to the bottom of the shaft, where there was also a layer of standing water more than two feet thick.
From the outside, it appeared to be an ordinary shallow well.
However, one meter above the water at the bottom of the well, scaffolding had been erected.
On the wall of the shaft beside the scaffolding was a horizontal sloping tunnel one meter wide and two meters high.
The downward-sloping tunnel had also been reinforced with timber, and the workmanship was highly professional.
The reinforcement method was almost identical to that used in the underground shafts of small coal mines.
Inside the sloping tunnel, there was even a ventilation duct one hundred millimeters in diameter, constantly sending fresh air inside.
If Li Zhi saw the Robber's Tunnel they had dug, he would surely cry out in surprise. This wasn't a Robber's Tunnel at all—it was clearly a professional mine tunnel.
There had to be someone from a coal-mining background among the tomb raiders.
Since all of them were wearing gas masks, it was impossible to see what they looked like.
"Everyone, move faster. Let's open the Main Outer Coffin Chamber tonight and avoid complications later. Once we finish this job, we can retire."
"Brother Qiang, stop urging us. We're even more anxious than you are. After three years of hard work, we're finally going to see the face of this great tomb's owner."
"Scholar, once the Main Outer Coffin Chamber is opened, you'll still be in charge of overseeing the excavation."
"Don't worry, Brother Qiang. This great tomb has been preserved extremely well, and no water has entered the Tomb Chamber. There shouldn't be any silt inside the Main Outer Coffin Chamber. The good stuff will definitely be laid out in box after box. As long as we're careful, we can move all of it out."
"You graduated at the top of your class from the archaeology department. We'll listen to you," Brother Qiang said.
There was actually a professional among this group participating in the tomb robbery.
This was information Ye Fan had failed to discover earlier.
"Scholar, I heard that the princes and nobles of the Han dynasty liked to store Horseshoe Gold in their tombs. Does this great tomb contain any?"
"It should. But there won't be much. After all, the owner of this great tomb wasn't an Emperor, only a general," Scholar replied.
Then he added, "Once we open the Main Outer Coffin Chamber, no one touches anything at first. You can carry things out only after I finish taking photographs."
"Don't worry, Scholar. We'll leave the bamboo slips and jade tablets for you. Anything with writing on it will remain untouched until you give permission," Brother Qiang said.
From their conversation, it was not difficult to tell
that Scholar and Brother Qiang were not from the same group. They seemed more like partners.
The tools were soon all carried down.
Then Brother Qiang began assigning everyone their tasks.
The sloping tunnel led directly to a depth of thirty meters underground.
Around the sloping tunnel were numerous abandoned passageways, probably left behind when they had excavated the burial pits earlier.
The sloping tunnel turned twice underground before finally stopping in front of a wall built from stacked timber.
It was the cypress-log wall that made up the Huangchang Ticou.
After drilling core samples, they had already determined that the cypress-log wall was two meters thick.
The excavation began immediately.
They used a method in which the machines never stopped even when the workers rested, digging continuously without pause.
Two hours later, they had cut a hole in the cypress-log wall that was 1.8 meters high, 1.7 meters deep, and 1.2 meters wide.
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