The Lost Tomb : Sea Of Sands

Chapter 31: Surprise Attack

Wu Xie was referring to the contradiction that all the bodies they found were under the truck, indicating that they had been in the sand before their death. Wasn't that rather unwise if all the sand here was dangerous?

Wu Xie said: "Let's analyze it. All the people here were lying on the sand, which shows that even if there was something under the sand, it shouldn't be anything particularly terrible. But just in case, we'll stay in the truck tonight and not worry too much about it."

"Maybe when they were trapped, that thing under the sand didn't exist and only came later. Let's be careful." Li Cu suggested.

Wang Meng said, "It's expected for us to be cautious, but it's sad if you're thinking like that."

As soon as he finished speaking, all three saw something moving in the sand valley where the dead were buried. Wu Xie was stunned and said to them, "Go and look."

When Wang Meng asked him why, Wu Xie said, "It's better to take the initiative. Let's go and have a look."

The three men rushed down the sand dune, and Wu Xie picked up an iron bar and thrust it into the place where the sand was moving. He found nothing even after stirring it a few times, so he continued to stab it into the surrounding sand. That thing had been moving in the sand just now, so it must be living a creature. Moreover, sand was different from water, so that thing shouldn't be able to move that fast. It was probably still nearby, or deep in the sand. With that train of thought, he dug harder at the sand, but still found nothing despite digging for a while. He repeatedly thrust the bar into the sand in order to try to scare the thing out.

Wu Xie did this for half a cigarette's time before both he and Li Cu found that something was wrong. Wu Xie asked, "We didn't bury the bodies that deep, right?"

"What do you mean?"

"I've been poking around for while, but haven't hit anything. Where are the bodies?" Wu Xie asked. "Help me dig up the sand and see if the corpses we buried earlier are still there." They all bent down and began to dig in the sand, but after digging six or seven small pits, they found that all of the bodies were gone.

Wu Xie wiped his cold sweat and said, "I changed my mind. We can't stay here."

"Why?"

"We can't understand anything in this place; it's like a ghost's domain. If we stay here, we'll definitely have an accident. Although I'm curious about what will happen if we continue to stay here, there's no need to take this risk since we have to leave anyway. Go, go and fill all the containers you can with water. Bring everything you can and we'll leave before dark."

The words were just spoken when Wang Meng suddenly let out a yell and his whole body was dragged into the sand by something. Li Cu thought he had stepped in one of the sand pits and got stuck, but just as he went to pull him out, he heard Wang Meng continue yelling. Then, Wang Men's whole body disappeared into the sand as if he had been sucked in by something. Li Cu froze and started randomly digging in the sand but found nothing. Looking back, he found that Wu Xie had already run far away and was shouting as he ran, "Run for your life!"

"Fuck you!" Li Cu still hadn't reacted until now, but just as he turned around, the whole pile of sand in front of him surged up. Something in the sand seemed to move a few inches in his direction so he immediately started running in Wu Xie's direction.

Since Wu Xie couldn't run fast on the sand dune, the two men were no more than ten meters apart even with his head start. The both of them fell to the ground, and Wu Xie wanted to get up and keep running immediately, but the slope was too steep. He couldn't climb up even after several attempts, but actually slid down instead.

Li Cu was worse off than him. He hadn't even reached the base of the sand dune before he immediately slid back into the pit. Almost at that same moment, he heard a loud rumbling sound coming from below, and then the whole pile of sand started squirming, and Li Cu saw something quickly bearing down on Wu Xie.

He watched as Wu Xie climbed to the top of the sand dune and was preparing to roll down the other side to escape, when the thing at the foot of the sand pile instantly grabbed Wu Xie's feet, and half of his body was suddenly pulled into the sand.

Li Cu was completely frightened by the sight and reflexively stood up and ran in the other direction. He ran a few more steps before he looked back and found that Wu Xie had completely disappeared. The whole desert was quiet as if nothing had happened.

"Oh shit!" Li Cu cursed, not daring to move. He didn't know what would happen next, so he stood completely frozen, only allowing himself to look around. All he saw was endless sand and the haizi beside it. He closed his eyes and felt that his ending wouldn't be much different from that of Wu Xie and Wang Meng. It was only a matter of time.

He waited with his eyes closed for a long time, but there weren't any changes. He opened them again and found that the surroundings were the same as before. Nothing attacked him, and nothing had changed around him.

Li Cu frowned and took a while to realize that it seemed that the thing attacking Wu Xie and Wang Meng wasn't interested in him, or didn't find him. What was the reason? Was it because of sound? He thought it over, remembering many European and American horror movies about monsters in sand dunes. He guessed that if this monster didn't rely on smell, then maybe it relied on hearing since sound transmissions through the sand in the desert were so good.

If I don't move, maybe that thing won't find me. Li Cu thought to himself. But the sun is shining now, so I'll be completely dried out if I don't move for a period of time. What should I do?

Li Cu slowly calmed down. All the various hardships he had suffered as a child gave him a strong backbone here, and he decided to do an experiment. He slowly untied his belt and threw it at the sand dune not far in front of him. The belt fell onto the dune and slipped rapidly, causing a small landslide.

He held his breath and looked in that direction to see if there was anything crawling towards that place.