A powerful beam swept through the passageway of the tomb. A man holding a high-powered flashlight shone it in every direction, searching the stone walls and arched ceiling of the passage, as well as the pitch-black space ahead.
When the powerful beam shone at close range onto the stone wall, the man's figure was reflected in the darkness.
He was a lean, middle-aged man with neatly slicked-back hair, a fair, clean-cut face, abundant vitality, bright eyes, and a calm, composed bearing.
His entire appearance was spotlessly neat, and his clothes were equally orderly. He wore a black traditional Chinese tunic suit and held a straight, polished cane.
Such immaculate grooming in a tomb environment would seem unusual to strangers, but those who knew him would find it perfectly normal. He was an "underground archaeologist." In his younger days, the jianghu had called him Grandpa Dao. Later, as his seniority and status in the jianghu grew, people respectfully addressed him as Daoist Master.
Under normal circumstances, Daoist Master now secluded himself for quiet cultivation, living much like a Daoist priest. He rarely went out personally unless he encountered a particularly interesting place. The tomb before him, for instance, had an extremely rare design.
The cane tapped the ground with hollow thuds as he walked. When the ground suddenly gave a metallic clang, Daoist Master stopped. Rather than immediately looking down, he swept his gaze around the area ahead with the flashlight beam. A vast, pitch-black underground space appeared before him. Under the beam, he could vaguely make out that he had reached the tomb's underground palace. Such a huge underground palace was extraordinarily rare.
After roughly observing his surroundings, he finally lowered the flashlight beam to his feet. He struck the ground several more times with his cane, then scraped twice with the tip of his shoe, brushing away a layer of dust and revealing a metal floor with a faint ancient-bronze sheen.
Daoist Master lifted his cane and tucked it beneath the arm holding the flashlight, freeing one hand to hang naturally at his side. He slowly raised his palm, and a tiny vortex formed in the dust on the ground. Suddenly, he turned his palm and thrust it forward. Internal Energy burst forth, and a gust of palm wind roared out, sweeping away the dust covering the ground ahead. He struck out several palms in succession, sending dust billowing through the air.
He took hold of his cane again and planted it beside him as he waited. The swirling dust could not come near him. He shone the powerful flashlight over the ground where the palm wind had cleared the dust and determined that the floor within a radius of more than ten meters ahead was all paved with metal, not merely the small patch beneath his feet. The metal floor seemed to bear carved patterns, but without clearing away all the dust, its complete appearance could not be seen.
Once the dust settled, Daoist Master continued forward with his cane. From time to time, he shone the flashlight at the domed ceiling. Several other pitch-black entrances surrounded the underground palace, resembling the passage he had entered through. He simply did not know where they led or what secrets their ends concealed.
"I've really never seen a design like this before. Interesting..." Daoist Master muttered with a smile. But then his foot gave a crack, as though part of the floor had caved in beneath it. Immediately afterward, a buzzing sound seemed to rise from underground, accompanied by the clatter of some mechanism.
Boom! A thunderous crash came from the direction of the passage he had entered through, as though a heavy object had fallen to the ground.
Daoist Master's expression changed slightly. With his experience, he knew at once that some falling object had blocked the passage he had entered through.
Then, from several other pitch-black openings, came dull creaking sounds, as though heavy doors were opening.
Daoist Master withdrew his foot and backed away several steps, rapidly sweeping the flashlight around him. He knew he had triggered a mechanism, though he did not know what arrangement in the tomb chamber he had set off. If it could cut off the passages in and out, then the mechanism clearly meant no good.
He kept a heightened watch on his surroundings. Yet after waiting for a while, everything remained deathly silent, and he heard no movement at all.
Instead, an explosive clang suddenly rang out from the direction of the entrance, shaking the ground beneath them. The buzzing reverberated throughout the underground palace.
Soon, he noticed something different amid the echoing buzz. The flashlight swiftly turned toward a pitch-black opening. It seemed something was running inside. Under the beam, a pair of oily green eyes appeared deep within the entrance. Then the figure's outline emerged completely—a raggedly dressed person appeared.
It did not look much like a person. It was corpse-dry, covered in white hair, with sharp fangs and savage teeth. Green light gleamed from its eyes under the flashlight, while the tips of its ten fingers were blue-black, sharp claws. It charged wildly out of the opening, roaring as it lunged straight at him. Figures were appearing from all the surrounding openings as well.
Zombies! The thought flashed through Daoist Master's mind. His hands did not stop moving. He twisted the handle of his cane, and a streak of cold light slid from within as a sword left its sheath. He dodged sideways and swiftly retreated a step, avoiding the zombie's fierce pounce. His sword flashed, and in an instant it tore through the zombie's neck, spraying a fountain of green blood.
The zombie's head flew off, severed from its body. Its corpse crashed to the ground with a clang and spasmed there, trying several times to rise but failing.
Daoist Master's movements did not stop. Sword light flashed repeatedly in his hand, and one lunging figure after another was cut down. Only the flashlight beam, swinging wildly before him, could be seen.
There was more than one zombie. Zombies kept charging from the surrounding openings, roaring at him. More and more came.
Caught off guard by the encirclement, he could no longer fend them off with his sword alone. He used both hands and feet. In his haste, he stabbed one zombie through the heart, only to discover that piercing its heart was useless—the zombie still swiped at him with one claw. Daoist Master drove one foot forward, its force mighty and surging, kicking the zombie flying backward into several others behind it. Before his foot even landed, he sprang into the air, twisted, and delivered a backward kick, sending another zombie flying. He twisted his waist in midair and lashed out with a flurry of kicks, rapidly sending several more away, while the cold light in his hand chopped off several heads.
In only a short while, more than twenty immensely strong and vicious zombies had fallen around him. Yet despite their encirclement, not one had managed to injure him. His hands and feet could not stop moving, either. An ordinary person would have long since been beaten into keeping their distance, but these zombies feared neither death nor pain. Their attacks were fierce, and they were ferocious and difficult to deal with.
"Rat-a-tat-tat..." Rapid gunfire suddenly erupted from the entrance. A short, slight man held the weapon, its muzzle spitting flames as bullets screamed toward the zombies pouncing on Daoist Master and came to his rescue.
After firing a burst, the short man realized that bullets striking the zombies had little effect. Instead, they drew some of the zombies toward him. He clearly had some experience dealing with these things as well. He quickly adjusted his aim, shooting at the zombies' heads and knee joints.
The charging zombies either had their ability to run destroyed and fell forward, crawling toward them, or were shot in the head, their brains exploding as they collapsed.
Beneath the muzzle's spitting flames, the short man's cold, expressionless face was illuminated. He remained exceptionally calm and composed.
Seeing the zombies charge fearlessly, he advanced instead of retreating and met them head-on. With rapid, practiced movements, he swiftly changed magazines, pulled the bolt, and sent the gunfire ringing out again after only a brief pause. As he moved forward at an unhurried pace, he shifted the weapon to one hand and drew the pistol at his waist with the other. He wiped the pistol against his belt, chambering a round with a click. Without even looking, he casually aimed at the head of a zombie that had had its knee shattered and was crawling toward him, firing twice—bang, bang—and blowing its head apart.
At times, he swung the pistol backward and fired several shots behind him, blasting apart the heads of zombies pouncing from the rear.
He changed magazines between the rifle and pistol with one hand as naturally as breathing. His handling of firearms was extraordinarily practiced. The zombies could not even get close before they fell one after another.
Just as Daoist Master dodged and sliced off the head of the last zombie before him, the short man's gun also fired twice, rat-a-tat, knocking down the final zombie that lunged at them. Daoist Master hooked his cane's shaft up with the tip of his foot. It spun through the air and fell back down. With a casual motion, he sheathed the sword, transforming it back into a cane, which he planted on the ground again. His movements were clean and decisive. He raised a hand and smoothed down his disheveled slicked-back hair.
A strange, foul stench of blood permeated the underground palace.
The short man walked a circle around Daoist Master. Whenever he encountered a zombie that had been cut in half but was not yet dead, or one whose legs had been severed but was still thrashing forward, the barrel of his rifle flashed as it pointed at its head and fired twice, rat-a-tat, blowing its head apart. At other times, he raised his pistol and fired twice, bang, bang.
Once all the zombies in the underground palace had fallen silent, the short man warily watched his surroundings. He swiftly changed magazines, slipped the pistol back into his waistband, and slung the rifle over his shoulder. Then he pulled a tube from his back and tore it open. With a hiss, an illuminating flare burst to life. He casually tossed it away, then threw several more around the underground palace. Under the flares, the general outline of the palace emerged: a domed, circular ceiling and a floor littered with zombie corpses.
The short man walked over to the man straightening his clothes and said indifferently, "Daoist Master, the people who followed us from outside have all been dealt with. The brothers are guarding the entrance, and we've blasted open the rockfall blocking it. We can withdraw at any time."
Daoist Master grunted. He shone his flashlight over the zombie corpses on the floor, inspecting them. He also used his cane to prod and turn one over for a look.
The short man glanced at the corpses around them and made a rough estimate. There were at least a hundred of them. Somewhat puzzled, he asked, "Where did so many zombies come from?"
"Who knows? In the past, even when I encountered them on a job, there were only one or two strays. So many of them really are... This place is interesting. It wasn't a wasted trip!" Daoist Master chuckled. His powerful flashlight swept across the surroundings again before settling on a nearly ten-meter-tall seated statue of Guanyin, who was seated cross-legged against the wall with a compassionate, merciful expression.
The entire underground palace was empty apart from that one conspicuous statue of Guanyin. It was impossible not to notice her.
The flashlight beam fixed on the statue's neck, revealing a pendant hanging there. The entire statue of Guanyin had been carved from a single piece of stone, while the pendant had clearly been added afterward. For now, it seemed to be the only movable object in the entire underground palace, whose structure otherwise appeared to be completely integrated.
Daoist Master cautiously walked over. Having already suffered one setback, he knew that this tomb was unusual and strange. He struck the ground with his cane all the way there, like a blind man feeling out the road. In reality, he was listening to the echoes from the floor to see whether anything was abnormal, guarding against triggering another mechanism.
Upon reaching the base of the Guanyin statue, he raised his head and studied it. He struck the statue again with his cane and listened to the sound. After inhaling deeply, he suddenly gathered his strength and lightly leaped upward, landing on the statue's leg. With another light spring, he quickly climbed onto the statue's shoulder. Crouching there, he pulled at the chain around Guanyin's neck and examined it. It was a metal chain. He tugged the pendant up, blew away the dust, and inspected it under the flashlight. To his surprise, it was a palm-sized ancient Bronze Mirror.
He had never seen a style like this before. Unlike the chain, which was badly rusted, the Bronze Mirror possessed an antique luster and did not bear a single spot of rust.
This was no place to study it slowly. Daoist Master tried to remove the Bronze Mirror and take it with him, only to discover that the chain holding it was integrated with the statue. Seeing that the chain was already nearly rusted through, he estimated that it could not be very sturdy. He set down what he was holding, seized the chain, exhaled, and exerted his strength. With a snap, he tore the chain apart—only to discover that a golden thread had been pulled from inside it, as though he had tugged something within the statue's neck.
P.S. New book uploaded. Please collect it, vote for it, send it warmth and care. Bowing in thanks!