Shunzi and Panzi were left speechless, muttering to themselves, “What the hell is going on? Did we take a wrong turn?”
“Not at all!” Both I and the Fatty had some experience and immediately understood what was happening: “The tomb passage has shifted. When we were inside the burial chamber, the old passage moved to another location, and a new passage has appeared here.”
“Can it really be done?” Panzi’s mouth fell open in disbelief.
“It can!” The Fatty and I nodded vigorously. In our minds, we thought, this was just the tip of the iceberg. Given the design of the tomb by Wang Canghai, it was no surprise that strange things were happening.
I felt a bit scared but also somewhat reassured because the change in the tomb passage suddenly made me understand why Shunzi’s father and several other corpses had been trapped and died in the gold. If one didn’t understand Wang Canghai’s schemes, the bizarre changes in the tomb’s chambers and passages could easily drive a person insane. We had nearly lost our sanity in the underwater tomb, but once we grasped the principle behind the sudden changes in the passage, it didn’t seem so terrifying anymore.
With the change in the passage, the crossroads we had come from no longer existed, making it impossible to return. Although we didn’t know what lay at the end of this new passage, if we stayed here without leaving, our fate would inevitably be the same as those corpses.
At that moment, I thought that at worst, the end of the passage would lead to nothing—a dead end. That wouldn’t be such a big deal; the corpses were likely trapped here for the same reason. Without explosives, the path we had come from suddenly disappearing would naturally leave one at a loss, leading to that expression of despair.
Looking back, I realized I was still too young. The deep despair etched on the faces of the corpses indicated that what they encountered was far more unimaginable than I had thought, and my thinking at the time was far too simplistic.
I shared my thoughts with the others and explained the principle behind the passage’s changes to Panzi and Shunzi. They finally came to their senses, showing expressions that suggested it wasn’t such a big deal. However, Panzi thought a bit further ahead and said, “If that’s the case, theoretically, the structure of this underground palace could be infinitely complex. Wouldn’t we end up like being trapped in a Rubik’s Cube, unable to find our way out?”
I reassured him, “That shouldn’t be the case. To be honest, Wang Canghai’s tricks are just psychological pressure on grave robbers. If he really wanted to trap people to death, it wouldn’t be easy. I suspect many people ultimately died from mental breakdowns due to the torment.”
In any case, we had to explore this newly appeared passage and think of a way out. If we couldn’t find a way out, as the Fatty suggested, we could first determine a direction and then blast our way out step by step. Now that we had explosives, we felt much more confident.
With that, I took the lead and stepped into the passage, with the Fatty and the others following closely behind. Suddenly, I felt something was off. The murals around us were too chilling; with so many large shadows, it felt as if the surroundings were filled with such things, making one extremely uncomfortable. I suddenly thought: Could it be that the end of this secret passage contained such a thing? If its shadow fell on the wall, we would surely fail to notice it.

However, since I had already walked in, it would be too embarrassing to turn back. I had no choice but to brace myself and walk at the front, trying not to think about these things. Soon, the tomb entrance behind us was no longer visible, and we had arrived at a place that seemed to lead nowhere.

As we walked, Panzi asked Shunzi about his father and the expedition team. Shunzi told him a bit, and Panzi said to us, “Just now, on our way here, all the sealing stones were blasted open using directional explosives, which is the latest technology. This indicates that they didn’t come in the same way we did. It seems there must be more than one way out of here.”

I replied, “Definitely. Look how fast A-Ning and the others are moving. The fact that they can reach the treasure room before us by taking the same route shows that we were lacking in information.”

But I couldn’t help but wonder where A-Ning and the others had gone. They should have also reached the treasure room we just saw. Did they encounter the moving tomb passage as well? Was their tomb passage the same as ours? Moreover, what about Third Uncle? Was he in the same situation?

I felt uncertain. We had entered the underground palace according to Third Uncle’s secret signals, but he hadn’t given us any follow-up signals. It seemed that after entering the underground palace, he might also be at a loss.

As we talked and walked, after about twenty minutes, the beam of the flashlight ahead reflected back, indicating that we had reached the end of the tomb passage. We couldn’t help but feel tense and immediately quieted down, slowing our pace and moving forward little by little. Soon, we saw a jade door at the end of the tomb passage.

When the jade door first appeared, I was taken aback because it looked exactly like the one we had just seen. Then I thought that most doors in ancient tombs were crafted by the same artisan, so it made sense they would be similar. The stone material of the door was still of good quality, and there was a hole at the bottom, also blasted open.

It seemed that someone had been here before, which was good. No matter who it was, it was a good thing for us, as it at least proved that there were no traps or pitfalls.

We once again streamed in, and since there wasn’t much cold smoke left, this time Panzi didn’t bother to light any cold smoke but instead lit a few fire sticks. As we looked around, we were taken aback.

Behind the tomb door was a room identical to the treasure room we had just seen. The room was piled high with gold and silver treasures, forming small mountains, and there were four massive pillars in the corners of the room, almost identical in layout.

I thought to myself that there must be more than one such room in this underground palace. Just how much treasure was piled up here? No wonder the Eastern Xia Dynasty, despite being so weak, could still construct such a magnificent tomb and underground palace. They must have hoarded so many treasures. It seems that hoarding wealth is a habit of ruling powers; Genghis Khan’s spirit treasures are buried beneath the Mongolian grasslands, and it is said that Hitler’s Nazi gold is buried in Tibet. The Jin Dynasty’s treasures of the Yelü brothers are right here.

While I was lost in these thoughts, suddenly, Panzi shouted my name loudly, startling me.

I thought something had happened and turned to look at him. He had his mouth wide open, standing on a mountain of gold, trying to speak but unable to get a word out as he was out of breath. I hurried over to see, and I was also taken aback. Among the treasures here, there were several bodies curled up.

I asked curiously, “Shunzi, how many fathers do you have… oh no, how many people are in your father’s group?” Before I could finish my question, I suddenly noticed a chilling phenomenon. Next to the pile of corpses, there was a neatly arranged collection of gold items. When I shone my flashlight on it, I realized it was exactly the same set of items we had just organized in another treasure room, in the same order and category.

The胖子 could no longer contain himself and lit a cold firework, which illuminated the entire tomb chamber. As we descended, we took a closer look, and these items were clearly the same ones we had just taken out.

The胖子 exclaimed in shock, “What’s going on? Is someone imitating our actions…?”

I furrowed my brows, stood up, and took a look around. A sense of familiarity washed over me, and I said dumbfounded, “No… we’ve come back to where we started! This is the place we left from!”