The Lost Tomb : Sea Of Sands

Chapter 97: Discovery

Yang Hao and Liang Wan each chose a different direction to go in at the T-junction, so after weighing their options, the three decided to go after Liang Wan. After all, girls in this sort of environment had a lower chance of survival and needed more help.

The passage was a curved top structure, and all the cement walls were covered in black asphalt. But since the walls weren't flat, the traces painted on looked very similar to some kind of skin disease.

The asphalt was of a very high purity, so the surface was still glossy.

"It's not as good as ancient man-made ones." Su Wan said, "There's no beauty at all."

"It's good enough to be able to construct such a complex building in the desert." Black Glasses said.

"Acting like you understand again, aren't you illiterate?"

Black Glasses smiled and seemed very happy to hear this sentence. He thought for a moment and said, "I also heard it through the grapevine."

After walking more than ten meters into the passage, there was no longer any sand on the ground, and it became very clean. Even after walking several hundred meters, there was no fork in the road, and the passage didn't turn or fluctuate. The only thing they saw was that every thirty meters, the wall would have "Second North District, Sixth Passage" painted on in white characters.

After seeing it a few times, Li Cu began to recall some things: "Ah, we need those drawings Liang Wan has."

"What's the matter?"

"Do you still remember the first mummy that was sent to your house? It was found in the third passage of the Sixth North District, and the date said 1984." Li Cu replied. "This is the Second District, and also part of the North District, which means this place is bigger than you would think. And it's complicated, so we have a higher chance of getting lost."

Su Wan frowned. "Found in 1984? That's not right."

"What do you mean?"

Su Wan didn't immediately answer and thought for a moment: "The mummy died before 1984, but wasn't this project said to have been built in the 1980s? Even if construction started in the '80s, it would take about two years if we assume they had a large engineering team. It was still a very new building at that time, so why was more than one corpse found in this building?"

"What do you mean?" Li Cu asked. "Speak clearly."

Su Wan said: "Huo Zhongshu was a mummified corpse, but maybe he wasn't mummified when the body was found? We thought these mummies were the result of relic exploration, but we were wrong. They were fresh corpses that had been processed, and had actually been found in these tunnels not long after the building's construction was completed. Do you remember Huo Zhongshu's nametag? He was 487 and the person who found him was 037. What's this mean? They belonged to the same organization. In other words, these people were the staff here, and one day after the building was complete, many of them died in different parts of the tunnel. What caused these people to die?"

Li Cu pursed his lips: "Didn't you say at that time that 487 represented more than four hundred bodies? So I basically rented a warehouse for nothing."

Su Wan shrugged: "Now it just proves that we didn't analyze it all that well. Let's start with why these people died. Slaughtered? In-fighting?"

"The nametag said 'Found', which means these bodies were found during the search." Li Cu said: "That is to say, we have to look at what stage they disappeared."

"Don't make wild speculations. Focus." Black Glasses said to the two of them, and then stopped. The first fork had appeared in front of them.

At the entrance to the fork was written "Third District, First Passage", and if they continued on, it would become "Fourth District, First Passage". The depths of the two tunnels were dark and felt as if they led to a different world.

"Which path did Sister take?" Su Wan muttered to himself.

"Do you have a compass?" Li Cu asked. Su Wan pulled one off his backpack strap and gave it to him. Li Cu looked at it and said, "Well, let's try to figure out why Liang Wan and Yang Hao parted ways. In a place like this, there can't be more than two trains of thought: one is to go in and the other is to go out. So was Sister Liang going in or going out? The third district is towards the central area, and the fourth district is the outer area."

"With Sister Liang's exploration wisdom, when she came to this fork in the road, she probably couldn't even tell right from left, and wouldn't consider it so carefully."

"This way." Black Glasses pointed to District Four: "The footprints when they separated were far apart. They didn't stop when they came ashore, and the two of them ran and separated. It's not hard to guess. There was a time lag when they landed, so something was chasing them. One landed first and chose one side; the other landed later and chose the other side. The girl's physical strength is very weak, so she must have been behind the young man in the water, and was the one being chased. After she ran into the tunnel, she ran all the way here. At most, she had a flashlight. When she ran through the tunnel, she wouldn't have time to see the fork in the road and must have gone straight through."

Li Cu and Su Wan were stunned and remained silent for a long time before Li Cu said, "Are you a famous detective from Japan?" [1]

Black Glasses hooked the two men's shoulders, touched their hair, and said helplessly: "I really shouldn't have agreed to this job. You aren't as fun as Boss Wu used to be." With that, he pushed their heads and shoved them towards the District Four passage. At this moment, however, he suddenly felt like something was off and glanced at the District Three entrance.

He took off his sunglasses and immediately realized what he had seen. He suddenly turned around and pressed himself against the wall.

Li Cu and Su Wan saw this and immediately copied him. Black Glasses broke the glow stick in his hand, grabbed the two men, and put the chemical substance in their palms. Then he dropped it on the ground, stomped on it, and said to the both of them: "Follow my footsteps, and you won't bump into anything. Trust me and follow me as fast as you can." With that said, he turned to District Four's dark passage and began to run.

Su Wan and Li Cu shared a glance, then immediately ran to catch up.

In the first few steps, there was a fluorescent substance stuck to the ground, and then two rays of light could be seen in front of them, running away at an unimaginable speed.

Li Cu and Su Wan both played soccer and wouldn't show any signs of weakness, so they gritted their teeth and stared at the light as they followed.

Black Glasses' speed was getting faster and faster, and Li Cu and Su Wan were also gradually reaching a critical speed. It really appeared as if they blindly trusted him, because they couldn't see anything at all, and could be killed if there was any kind of obstacle.

But they didn't really trust Black Glasses.

They heard a strange noise from behind that was similar to the sound of walking clogs, but the frequency was so slow that it sounded almost every two or three seconds. But every time it rang out, it sounded a lot closer to them, and after a few more times, it was almost right behind them.

Li Cu didn't know what it was, but if something wearing clogs was chasing them, then it must be taking ten meters strides.

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Note:

[1] Pretty sure he means Detective Conan, which is a super popular Japanese detective manga/anime series.