Stealing Heavenly Secrets

Then he ran out of the greenhouse and called softly to Jia Xiaowu, "Brother Wu, something's going on down there."

Jia Xiaowu immediately jumped down from the earthen wall, slung the imitation Type 56 Semi-Automatic Rifle over his back, and charged into Greenhouse No. 4 with Zhang Changgui.

At the same time, two kilometers away, Li Zhi, lounging under a dirt cliff, caught sight of Jia Xiaowu leaping off the greenhouse's earthen wall.

Li Zhi patted Ye Fan on the arm and said, "Little Leaf, let's go. Time for us to move."

Having trained in breathing techniques, Li Zhi had sharp ears, keen eyes, and extraordinary vision.

Even in the dead of night, with only faint moonlight, he could clearly make out movement two kilometers away.

Such terrifying eyesight was practically on par with an 8x Scope.

Ye Fan, who had been lying on the ground staring up at the Big Dipper in the night sky, instantly sat up, raring to go. "Brother Li, are they starting to haul out the artifacts?"

Li Zhi shook his head. "Not yet. But those two lookouts went back inside, so their digging for today is probably done."

Ye Fan asked, "So when we go over, are we robbing the robbers, or forcing a sale?"

When it came to this kind of thing, Ye Fan's experience was still limited. He wasn't yet the future Ye Hei, bold enough to traffic in the disciples of the Big Dipper's major holy lands.

Nor was he the Ye Fan who, at Ascension Cliff on Ziwei Ancient Star, would snatch food from the mouths of the Ancient Longevity Temple and the Human Monarch Hall, successfully blackmailing Yin Tiande, the number one Heavenly Pride of Ziwei Ancient Star, and seizing the Divine Scripture.

For this kind of reconnaissance mission, his stomach for it wasn't quite there yet.

Li Zhi gave Ye Fan a meaningful look at that, thinking to himself, So this is where your style of doing things was forged—back on Earth.

"We're upstanding citizens—how could we do anything illegal or against the rules? We just happened to pick up some discarded stuff while out for a stroll. As for why that stuff is so valuable, how would us ordinary folks know? We're not professional archaeologists."

Li Zhi started spouting nonsense with a straight face, painting his actions in such a righteous light that Ye Fan was left blinking in confusion.

He almost forgot the "archaeology world" cases of robbing the robbers that Li Zhi had told him about earlier when they were chatting under the dirt cliff.

Seeing the meaningful look in Ye Fan's eyes, Li Zhi quickly said, "Alright, I've said too much today. You can chew on it later."

The more time Ye Fan spent with Li Zhi, the more he felt that Li Zhi, with his ever-lazy expression, was unfathomable.

The two of them, bags on their backs, sprinted toward the vegetable greenhouses.

Two kilometers—for an average person running over open ground—would take about ten minutes.

But Ye Fan and Li Zhi, even with their bags, covered the whole distance in just six minutes, and after arriving, they weren't even out of breath.

At the fence surrounding the vegetable base, the two, calm and composed, took a short running start and vaulted straight over the nearly three-meter-tall iron railing.

Then, like cats, they moved silently through the greenhouse base, their footsteps barely a whisper.

Soon, they reached the earthen wall behind Greenhouse No. 4.

They nodded to each other, then used the wall for leverage to climb up.

Once on top, they crouched behind a rolled-up straw mat and listened closely to the sounds inside.

After more than ten minutes, an excited exchange suddenly erupted from within the greenhouse.

"Brother Wu, we're gonna be rich this time." The voice was muffled, as if speaking through a thick mask.

"Changgui, hurry it up. The air down there might be toxic. Our Gas Masks won't last long." Another muffled voice reached Ye Fan and Li Zhi's ears.

"Brother Wu, there's a lot of stuff. Throw me two more bags." Zhang Changgui, wearing a Gas Mask, seemed to be down in the shaft.

"Changgui, don't bother bagging the broken pieces. Just grab the intact ones." Jia Xiaowu, holding the rope outside the shaft, called down.

"Don't worry, Brother Wu. There's hardly anything broken this time." Zhang Changgui's voice came from the bottom of the shaft.

Li Zhi and Ye Fan, lying on the wall, dared not make a sound after hearing the conversation inside.

Another half hour passed, and suddenly several gunshots rang out from within.

Ye Fan was startled, but Li Zhi shook his head at him, signaling him to stay calm.

Then they heard Jia Xiaowu groaning—he seemed to have been shot.

Zhang Changgui's voice had vanished completely.

At that point, Li Zhi pulled two hammers from his bag, handed one to Ye Fan, and gestured for him to hold nothing back.

They slit the plastic sheeting with a knife, grabbed the rope, and swung down into the greenhouse.

Once on the ground, Li Zhi moved like lightning, like a tiger pouncing on its prey, swinging his hammer as he charged at Jia Xiaowu, who was binding a wound on his left arm.

Jia Xiaowu, back to Li Zhi, seemed to sense the danger and bent down to grab the Type 56 Semi-Automatic Rifle propped against the shaft.

But Li Zhi had already hurled his hammer.

"Thud!"

Like a watermelon bursting, Jia Xiaowu's head split open.

Ye Fan, stunned, glanced at the hammer in his own hand.

Li Zhi turned and shouted to him, "Alright, Little Leaf, time for us to move. Put on the protective suits."

Ye Fan followed suit and donned a medical protective suit.

Both of them put on Gas Masks.

Then Ye Fan followed Li Zhi down into the shaft.

They first saw Zhang Changgui at the bottom of the vertical shaft, his head blown open by a bullet.

Then, in the sloping tunnel, they spotted two bodies dragged to the side.

At the entrance to the main outer coffin chamber, they found Xu the Scholar, his skull pierced through by Sword Qi.

Entering the coffin chamber, they saw Brother Qiang's severed head and the tomb raider whose heart had been stabbed from behind with a chisel.

Li Zhi explained in detail to Ye Fan how each of those people had died.

Taking in the scene, Ye Fan sighed, "Truly, men die for wealth, birds die for food."

Yet there was little fear or panic in his voice, and his body felt no nausea or discomfort.

Li Zhi said, "Now you know why tomb raiders are mostly father-son teams."

Ye Fan nodded. "These people really have no humanity."

Li Zhi glanced at the Horseshoe Gold and bronze vessels on the ground, then suddenly asked, "Faced with so many treasures, don't you have any other thoughts?"

Ye Fan replied, "Brother Li, you're teasing me again. I may be poor, but I've got enough sense to see that these people died because they touched something they shouldn't have. It wasn't purely for wealth."

Sure enough, Ye Fan had some understanding of the taboos underground.

Li Zhi nodded. "You observed closely. That man who died with a sharp blade through his head—the wound on his skull wasn't made by any normal weapon. The Master of this great tomb is no ordinary figure."

Ye Fan said excitedly, "Could this be a great tomb left by ancient Cultivators?"

Li Zhi pondered for a moment before saying, "I need to study it to be sure."

In truth, he had already noticed something unusual about this coffin chamber.

Under normal circumstances, it couldn't have been preserved so perfectly; it must have been shielded by a formation for a long time.

Ye Fan hadn't yet come into contact with the cultivation world.

Though Li Zhi hadn't either, he knew that Cultivators existed in the world.

When considering problems, he naturally factored in their methods.

Thirty meters underground, in the Main Outer Coffin Chamber of the Huangchang Ticou.

After a thorough search by Li Zhi and Ye Fan, they only found some strange powder beside the corpse of Xu the Scholar.

After that, they saw no other traces of supernatural power.

The bronze ritual vessels bore Inscriptions, but only a few names—nothing of practical use to them.

There were quite a few bamboo slips, their content carved in clerical script and easy to read. They mainly recounted the general's life, with almost no connection to cultivation. After a cursory glance, the two left them untouched.

Archaeologists might find those slips interesting, but Li Zhi and Ye Fan had little interest.

Then, on Li Zhi's suggestion, the two dragged all the corpses into the coffin chamber.

After that, they carried the bronze vessels and Horseshoe Gold that Jia Xiaowu and Zhang Changgui had moved back outside, returning them to the Main Outer Coffin Chamber.

Ye Fan was curious but didn't ask why while they were moving things.

Only after they had brought everything back into the Tomb Chamber did Ye Fan speak up. "Brother Li, you don't want these things?"

Li Zhi shook his head. "Dead men's wealth isn't so easy to take. If your fate isn't strong enough, you'll meet disaster. And even if your fate is strong, if your blood relatives' fates aren't, disaster will still come."

Seeing Li Zhi so calm, Ye Fan instantly realized that Li Zhi was only saying dead men's wealth was hard to take—not that it couldn't be taken at all.

There was definitely knowledge here that couldn't be found in books.

Sure enough, Li Zhi continued, "To take dead men's wealth, you first need a sacrifice. Second, you must gain the Master's consent to ensure no lingering trouble."

Ye Fan seemed to understand, pointing at the corpses. "Is that why we moved all seven bodies into the tomb chamber?"

Li Zhi nodded. "Correct. It may seem cruel, but in truth, using human lives to sacrifice to the dead is a very effective method of offering."