The Lost Tomb : Sea Of Sands

Chapter 135: Stone Box

Li Cu didn't speak. The middle-aged man was very skilled in giving the lecture, and hooked him right in. He wouldn't feel comfortable until the man kept talking. But when the man suddenly stopped lecturing, it was like watching an American drama that had been cut off in the middle, making Li Cu feel as if his internal organs would burst from the suspense.

He knew that this kind of explanation also required the one being lectured to enter the state, so he concentrated his energy and expressed his interest in the course.

"But don't think that this was a huge, overwhelming plot. It was just a desperate plot. One might even say it was pitiful." The middle-aged man continued, "I think if King Mu had any other way, he wouldn't do such a thing. But reality forced him to. He was undoubtedly a genius, but even a genius can't describe the ingenuity of his plot, and the extreme wisdom of humans.

"When King Mu implemented his plan, he had already lived for quite a long time. Even if he was only a hundred and five-year-old man, he had been a crown prince who later became the king of Zhou. During his reign, he had accomplished countless feats— including wars, long voyages, and traveling in all directions— and left behind mythical historical records. It was enough to show that he clearly wasn't mediocre.

"In addition, he had seen the changes the world had undergone in a hundred years, so his views on life, humans, and the evolution of interests and commerce would be more thorough than most.

"When he was faced with the problem at that time, he could use these past experiences to develop his plan.

"The problem he encountered at that time couldn't be solved, meaning he either faced death again, or faced a more terrible change than death. But King Mu didn't yield to fate, and began looking for something called 'jade burial armor'.

"Jade burial armor was also a specialty of the ancient country of the Queen of the West. King Mu knew—we don't know if the Queen of the West told him, or he found it himself according to historical records—that such jade burial armor existed among the famous mountains in China, because he wasn't the first Han Chinese to go west to her country. Otherwise, there wouldn't be any legends on the Queen of the West.

"King Mu used his relationship with King Shang to find the jade burial armor, and complete a series of things.

"The jade burial armor could stabilize the side effects of immortality, but there was one problem—the process took a long time.

"This time was measured in terms of centuries, but it wasn't like a novel, where he would have a vampire entourage to protect him forever. During this period of time, earth-shaking changes would take place in human society, and the intensity of these changes was beyond anything people from that era could imagine.

"Once this process started, he would face many problems. First, he would lose anything and everything, including the wisdom he had gained over time. Second, how would he wake up? How would he ensure his own safety for such a long time?

"It wasn't like one's purpose for living forever was to be a ten-thousand-year-old loser.

"King Mu solved this problem by thinking of all the experiences he had gone through in searching for the Queen of the West. He first had to turn his whole plot into a transmittable message. Moreover, he had to use a method to make the information work for thousands of years."

Grave robbing, Li Cu said in his heart.

He guessed right, and the middle-aged man said, "King Mu chose grave robbers to help him complete his plan.

"This is a key point. Many people don't understand that grave robbing is only a minor crime in the criminal system. Grave robbers are the kind of thieves that have nothing to do with politics, and can't even compare to the harm done by large-scale economic crimes. Their crimes are mainly concentrated on the destruction of human civilization and cultural heritage, so they're honestly just committing a kind of humanistic crime. The ruling class generally doesn't care about this kind of behavior as long as it doesn't shake their ruling foundation. In many cases, those in the ruling class are actually the biggest grave robbers.

"Why is it that such an unimportant class of people became so important in Chinese history that most of the core families entered the political arena and even controlled the lifeblood of society?

"This is the reason. After King Mu, a large number of feudal emperors committed grave robberies. From Xiang Yu, to King Liu Qu of Guangchuan, to Cao Cao's Mojin Xiaowei [1], and even to Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty, there are too many to count.

"This act of burying a large amount of wealth in one's own grave after death meant that grave robbers would never disappear throughout China's history.

"In Chinese history, the custom of 'generous burial' came from the 'rites and music are in ruins' [2] phase during the Spring and Autumn Period. This change happened during the time that King Mu was most active, and I wonder if he was involved somehow.

"What we can verify through textual research is that robbing tombs was the most important thing for King Mu at that time, but his main purpose wasn't the property. Instead, a large number of clues were distributed among these ancient tombs.

"A large number of silk books were scattered throughout these ancient tombs, and contained a lot of information. Just like slow-release capsules, they were slowly distributed to grave robbers of all ages through grave robbing activities."

"Is that feasible?" Li Cu asked, "It all depends on luck. If there was any mistake, then it would've been game over for His Majesty King Mu. If all the silk had rotted away, or if the ancient tombs had been destroyed throughout history, or if the information in the silk hadn't been taken seriously, then it might have prevented it from spreading."

"This is only part of it. But the success rate of this part was actually very high, because even ancient books such as the Book of Changes have been passed down to later generations through tombs. At that time, there weren't many scholar-officials, so there weren't very many burial books. Even so, they could be unearthed and passed down to later generations. This shows that it was quite easy to preserve some information through tombs, as long as you know how to rob tombs. In other words, the tombs selected by King Mu weren't ones that ordinary thieves could enter. These tombs needed to be excavated by large forces, or by people who gained permission from the authorities. The device he designed for preserving the silk was very clever. He used an exquisite box that was very strong, but couldn't be opened directly. This meant that the first thing the grave robbers got was a valuable box. They would naturally determine that the contents must be very precious, and the method to opening the box must be with one of those scholar-officials who were familiar with this bit of knowledge. Therefore, as long as grave robbers got the box, it would circulate in the black market, and the people who finally got it and opened it would certainly be able to read the silk and understand its meaning." The middle-aged man continued: "But this wasn't King Mu's trump card."

He pressed the switch, the slide moved on again, and a stone box with a dragon pattern appeared on it.

"At that time, King Mu carved a stone box like this. It's this box that has gradually turned China's grave robbers into a huge, organized, and terrifying social controller."

****************************************

Notes:

[1] Name for tomb robbers in ancient China who were trained down through the generations in uncovering tombs, navigating crypts, avoiding traps, etc.

[2] Figuratively means that society was in total disarray.