I deeply felt that I misjudged people, mistaking Chen Qinghan for a gentleman, but it turns out he likes to be ruthless!
After Miss Scream fainted, she was carried by Wen Jing like a sack. She was quite beautiful, but unfortunately encountered two tourists who ignored the warning signs and stepped on the flower beds.
Outside the exit was a huge space, clearly a naturally formed underground cavern, with no traces of artificial chiseling, except for the exit of the maze-like tomb path which was carved into a doorway.
In this vast cavern, countless phosphorescent lights were floating, commonly known as ghost fires.
There was once a tomb robber who wrote a 'book' on scientific tomb raiding. He knew it couldn't be published, so he printed it himself and carried copies for his partners.
Later, he and his team perished in this tomb, making me the only reader of this book.
The book recorded numerous supernatural phenomena, analyzed and understood through scientific theory.
Ghost fire was one of them, but in the massive space before us, the number of ghost fires was countless, beyond what thousands could describe.
I don't remember so many tomb robbers dying in this tomb. If these ghost fires didn't come from the tomb robbers' bodies, then who did they come from?
"Oh dear! Is this a million-person pit? So many ghost fires?" Wen Jing exclaimed. Although he was highly nearsighted, ghost fires had no features and could be easily recognized.
No wonder Miss Scream screamed; there must be an astounding number of bones here. For outsiders unaccustomed to dealing with corpses, it must be eerie and terrifying, making their hair stand on end.
Dead people aren't scary; what's deadly are either the traps designed by the living or the living companions.
"Could it be that Miss Cheng was just guided by the ghost fire's light... uh~ so terrifying~" The young man rubbed his arms.
"You call yourself a Moving Taoist, and you're afraid of the dead?" Wen Jing asked, puzzled by his fearful expression.
"Hiss! What's moving? I'm a Mountain Mover Taoist, and from now on, call me Qingfeng."
"Didn't you say your dad was in the demolition office and had connections with Mountain Mover Taoists, so calling you Moving Taoist isn't wrong either? Also, you said Shunfeng was the name your master gave you, and if your master knew you changed it at will—"
"Bro, stop it, don't mention my kind master while we're underground. What if he comes looking for me? Spit, spit, spit, no offense, master, don't be mad, I was just joking. My Taoist name is Shunfeng, Shunfeng!"
I read a line in a novel that said tomb raiders shouldn't fear ghosts; if they fear ghosts, they shouldn't raid tombs. The people before me violated all taboos.
"There's absolutely no ghosts in this world, if there are, they're in the people's hearts," Chen Qinghan suddenly said.
I agreed with him, so I gave him a thumbs-up as praise.
"Exactly, learn from Little Fu; she's always around bones, and look how calm she is," Wen Jing praised me.
"Tch, being with demons and monsters for too long, of course she wouldn't be afraid," Shunfeng said, unconvinced.
What he said didn't sit well with me. How could demons and monsters assimilate me? It's always me assimilating them!
"Shunfeng!" Chen Qinghan's tone was clearly scolding, and Shunfeng immediately shut up.
Chen Qinghan may not be a professional tomb robber, but he certainly is an authoritative team leader.
"Hey? Hey hey?" Wen Jing suddenly exclaimed, "Look, are the ghost fires flying?"
With his reminder, we redirected our gaze to the massive cavern and indeed saw the ghost fires descending from above.
This was also recorded in the tomb robber's book. The phosphorescent lights are very light and move with the air currents.
When people walk, they cause air currents to flow, so the ghost fires follow them.
But none of us moved, could it be their voices attracting them?
"Oh my! Look, who's that?" Wen Jing, despite his large size, always liked to scare others. He suddenly pointed to a place not far from us.
The ground of the massive cavern was full of rubble, thankfully not sharp. In the pile of stones Wen Jing pointed out, there was a person.
Or rather, a corpse. Wen Jing was about to check, but Chen Qinghan stopped him.
"Don't go over, it's toxic."
"Toxic? Where's the poison from?"
"These phosphorescent lights are highly toxic."
"That seems like Daxiang." Shunfeng took out a monocular from somewhere and observed the corpse.
"Daxiang? Wasn't he Boss Lu's bodyguard?" Wen Jing was quite surprised.
"Step back, this place is a gas chamber." Chen Qinghan urged us back to the tomb path entrance.
If he hadn't mentioned it, I would have forgotten. Phosphorescent light, also known as phosphine, is a colorless, flammable, highly toxic gas.
Phosphorus decomposed from dead bones becomes phosphine. Inhaling a large amount of it can be fatal.
The phosphorescent lights in the huge cavern were enough to kill an army that entered, let alone just a few of them.
Chen Qinghan's backpack didn't have any gas masks; I had checked earlier. So attempting to cross this cavern was nearly impossible for them.
"If Daxiang died in there, does that mean Boss Lu and his people went in?" Shunfeng asked after peering outside at the corpse again.
"I think... there's no need for us to go in. It's fine if Boss Lu ditched us. She forced us to come in the first place. Now that the tomb is explored, we don't have any use, getting close might mean being killed." Wen Jing said.
"The traps in this tomb are unlike any other. If we don't stick together, it's likely none of us will get out," Chen Qinghan said.
I wanted to speak up, to tell them that fighting solo and in a group wouldn't make much difference. But if I spoke up, I might discourage them from moving forward, which would be a problem for me.
"Little Fu, do you have any good ideas?" Wen Jing directed the problem at me.
I squatted down and wrote on the ground with small stones: I can go in.
"Aren't you afraid of the poison?" Shunfeng immediately questioned.
I shook my head. Nothing in this tomb could poison me. Previously, some harmful tomb robbers threw collected toxins into my coffin, wanting to see if they could kill me, but nothing happened to me.
But throwing garbage onto my bed is a behavior I cannot tolerate, so I returned the toxins to them. In the end, I concluded that life is really fragile.
"Then trouble you to scout ahead. If there's no other exit, we won't need to go forward," Wen Jing said with a smiling face.
"Don't push yourself," Chen Qinghan said, not entirely reassured.
I gave an OK gesture before stepping out of the tomb path and into the massive cavern.
Exploring in my own tomb, this was a first. Maybe my life as a zombie was going to change trajectory.