The Lost Tomb : Sea Of Sands

Chapter 27: Truth Behind the Mass Death

Li Cu approached the truck and saw all the bodies curled up beneath it, completely buried in the sand. He looked at the tent cloth hanging around the truck's frame and said: "They seem to have formed an angle with this truck and this boundary marker, and then covered it with the tent to make a camp."

"They had tents, but they didn't put them up. It looks like the absence of wind here is an illusion, and the boundary marker and truck were needed as a barrier to make a shelter, indicating that there may have been a big storm here."

"Then how did they die?" Li Cu was a little confused.

Wu Xie speculated: "They must have been trapped. Almost all of the bodies are under the truck and are in the same position, indicating that they were killed almost at the same time. It looks like the crisis they encountered was so sudden that they didn't even have time to use the tents for protection."

"Does that mean anything?"

"It means we have to quickly find the route and method to leave here, otherwise, we'll end up like them if the same danger occurs."

Li Cu looked back, saw Wang Meng still basking in the sun by the haizi, and wondered whether he should switch with him. After all, staying at the water's edge would be more reassuring and comfortable than dragging a mummified corpse. But after taking another look, he found that the raft seemed to be particularly heavy, and neither Wang Meng nor the haizi appeared to move. He also felt that Wu Xie had another purpose in making such an arrangement, so he had to go up and help him.

The two were busy for a long time and finally managed to drag all the bodies out from under the truck and put them in a place to be slowly examined later. Then, Wu Xie wanted to search the cab of the truck.

The truck's glass was intact, so when Wu Xie pulled the door handle, he said in a surprised voice: "It's locked. What a good habit."

"Knock on the window and say the traffic police need to check their license." Li Cu smiled.

"You don't understand. People don't usually lock their vehicles in the desert. Most lock them when they're inside. Did someone lock the door from the inside?" Wu Xie jumped onto the truck's step bar.

"Maybe the driver has OCD?"

"I'm not in the mood to joke." Wu Xie swept away the sand and white alkali dust from the window and looked in. He then jumped down, stepped back, and cursed, "It's really fucking bad."

"What's the matter?"

"The driver died inside, holding a strange thing in his hand." Wu Xie said, "It scared me."

"Is this dead man very special? Aren't you pretty familiar with corpses? Why are you afraid of this?"

"He's not scary, but what's in his hand is scary." Wu Xie pointed to the dangerous containers in the truck bed. "The driver's holding that thing in his hand and it's been opened. If what you said is true, then this container holds very dangerous things, and he may have died because the contents leaked out. He may have locked the door from the inside before he died because he was afraid that others might open the door by mistake."

"You mean he committed suicide?"

Wu Xie was undecided: "Maybe. If the container was filled with biochemical hazardous substances, and he locked the door and committed suicide like this, the others wouldn't be able to save him. The door is sealed to a certain degree, so it wouldn't affect others."

Wu Xie looked at the locked door and the truck again: "But after all these years, the rubber seal has aged and isn't effective anymore. We've been standing by the truck door for so long but are still alive, so it seems like the contents of this container have lost their lethality. Go find a crowbar and I'll pry the door open."

"No, get out of the way." Li Cu said. "I have a way. This kind of lock can't stop me."

"What are you planning on doing?"

"I can unlock it. If we need a sealed space, but the door's broken and won't close, then we'll be screwed. It's better to keep the door intact."

"The lock is completely rotted. How do you expect to open it?"

"Mechanical locks don't rot."

Li Cu was deliberately trying to show off. His father had worked as a transport driver in the factory since he was young, and knew a lot about this "great liberation" lock. He learned the small skill of opening car locks from his father, but the technology was very simple, so it didn't mean that any lock could be opened. Generally, the low-end mechanical locks on cars were no problem, but the advanced ones were too hard.

He jumped onto the truck's step bar, looked into the window, and saw the body inside. But the view through the glass was very fuzzy and he couldn't see anything specific. He sighed, suddenly seeing a corpse should make me afraid, but after seeing so many, I got used to it. He touched the lock, broke the handle, and asked Wu Xie if he had any thin wires. Wu Xie took off his key chain and straightened the key ring for him. Li Cu poked it into the lock and suddenly found that something was wrong: "This door is unlocked."

"Why can't we open it if it's unlocked?"

"The lock was broken, and it was broken from outside. The man inside was locked in the car."