The Lost Tomb : Ten Years Later

Chapter 24: Rock

Grandpa, Chen Wen-Jin, and all the others must have met something that changed their bodies.

There were many possibilities, for example, did they eat something? They had been searching for the ancient method of immortality in the tombs, because it was rumored that the alchemists kept the method of immortality in their own tombs. Of course, Black Glasses and I both said the same thing: If they could live forever, why did they have tombs?

That was why people in ancient times went looking for the Mountain of Immortals. They wanted to shed their earthly skin and become immortal by cultivating. Of course, shedding their earthly skin referred to the corpses the immortals left behind in ancient times, which were often very old but didn't rot for a long time. The thing in front of me seemed to be an immortal who shed his earthly skin, but no one told me that it would basically be the same as a zombie. Whatever happened to them so long ago must have affected their bodies, which was why my grandfather thought his body would change after he died.

Chen Pi Ah Si lived to the point where his life and death were unknown, but the condition of his body after death was really strange. Chen Wen-Jin was even more serious. Based on my investigation, she thought she would become a monster in a very short period of time. Whatever happened to Grandpa and the others must have happened in the ancient tomb, and may have come about because of a mechanism or accident.

But what happened to Chen Wen-Jin must have occurred in the nursing home in Golmud, and may have even been man-made.

Grandpa Chen's corpse leaned toward me little by little, and I shook my meteor hammer. As long as I was a little farther away, I couldn't see its state clearly. It was too dark, but it didn't seem to be relying on its eyes to know that I was here.

"Excuse me." I saw an opportunity and threw the meteor hammer out for the first time and then ran. I was hoping that I could wrap the meteor hammer around Grandpa Chen's corpse, catch the other end, and then tie it to a stone.

But the meteor hammer wasn't as useful as I thought. It couldn't reach that far, so after I threw it at Grandpa Chen, it hit him hard and then fell.

I pulled it back, ready to throw it out again, but the oxygen tank's warning light went out at this time. My surroundings immediately plunged into absolute darkness.

I threw the meteor hammer at random and hit a rock, causing sparks to appear. As I drew it back, my heart began to beat wildly and my mind went blank. Absolute darkness meant that the eyes couldn't give the brain any information to process.

I swung the meteor hammer like a helicopter blade, making sure nothing was near me. It only turned twice before it suddenly hit something and fell to the ground. I pulled it up and retreated in the opposite direction while spinning it again.

All that was needed was a nebula chain [1].

I threw it again and hit a rock in front of me, causing sparks to fly everywhere. Yes, a rock! I fumbled over, touched the rock that was as tall as a person, and began to climb up. The sharp rock immediately cut the soles of my feet, but I resisted the severe pain and climbed to the top, breaking off several fingernails in the process.

I felt a little more secure now.

I went to pull the meteor hammer back to my side, but after tugging twice, it suddenly tightened. It looked like the hammerhead had been caught by something. When I pulled, the strength on the other end was very overwhelming and wouldn't yield.

I didn't dare pull anymore, but I suddenly had a plan. I tied one end of the meteor hammer in my hand to the sleeve of the diving suit, then took off the diving suit and wrapped it around the rock.

Because the rock had edges and corners that would snag clothes, the diving suit stayed snug against it under the tension. I didn't think this immortal would know that he was in a tug-of-war with a rock right now. I carefully jumped off the rock and shook the oxygen warning light. This thing was connected to the barometer, and it was reasonable to use lithium batteries so the power wouldn't go out as quickly.

I suddenly realized that with the oxygen tank gone, there was something wrong with the barometer. I shook it a few times and the red light finally came back on. I had two goals:

1. Immediately look at what was written on the stone.

2. Find a second light source immediately, because this one wouldn't last long.

I saw the figure pulling the meteor hammer in the dim light, leaned to the other side to avoid it, and went over to the stone where it had been facing just now. I held the red light against the rock, and could almost make out what the text was saying by looking at each individual character.

The first word was: if.

I narrowed my eyes and finished reading the five lines of text. "If future generations come here and find my body, take half of my nasal bone. Heaven and earth are within it, so you may be able to obtain karma."

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Note:

[1] It's a weapon the protagonist Andromeda Shun from the "Saint Seiya" manga uses. The chain is legendary for its durability and defensive nature. It can extend enough to reach light years away, penetrating the very fabric of space. When there's s a threat, the chain can give out warning signs and become charged with enough electricity to release shocks of at least 10,000 volts.