The chance, a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, vanished in an instant. After a brief hesitation, Young Master Liu hoisted Zhang Enpu onto his shoulder and scrambled out of the outer tomb chamber, half-rolling, half-crawling.

The group bolted forward a considerable distance as if driven mad, only stopping to gasp for breath once they were certain the desiccated corpses were no longer pursuing them.

Once the immediate danger had passed, the thoughts they had consciously suppressed or ignored moments before began flooding their minds in a relentless torrent.

Young Master Liu didn't switch on his flashlight, standing in the oppressive darkness to control the surge of emotion within him, feigning calm as he spoke, "Master, just now you..." He nervously rubbed his lips together, finding himself unable to finish the sentence.

"We cannot go back," Zhang Enpu said quietly from the darkness not far from me, his voice thin like the sound of wind passing through reeds.

... Right... We really cannot go back... For the sake of the village, for the hundreds upon hundreds of innocent people, we absolutely cannot turn back...

Young Master Liu managed a wry smile. No matter what, they had to neutralize this impending disaster... even if it meant... sacrificing their own lives... wasn't that it?

"Let's go, find the main culprit," Young Master Liu composed himself, flicked on his flashlight, and took the lead.

Zhang Enpu wordlessly pulled Young Master Liu back: "You walk behind."

Young Master Liu shrugged, offering no protest, and stuck out his tongue at Tian Guoqiang beside him.

They walked on in silence for a not-so-long stretch before Zhang Enpu, ahead of them, abruptly stopped.

"What is it?" Young Master Liu asked, baffled, hurrying to his side.

The path ahead was no longer a long tunnel, but a vast chamber, easily more than double or triple the size of the previous side chambers.

In the absolute center of the room rested a slightly translucent, blood-red stone platform. The platform was utterly bare. There was no coffin as expected, no burial artifacts; the entire chamber held nothing but this stone dais.

"This..." Young Master Liu frowned hesitantly. "This should be made of Blood Jade, right? But this looks... so much like an altar? Where is the coffin?"

Not only that, the ground before them was riddled with bullet holes and fresh bloodstains, as if a fierce battle had recently taken place here.

Zhang Enpu remained silent, clearly lost in thought.

Young Master Liu and the others were consumed by worry, feeling restless yet utterly helpless.

Suddenly, Zhang Enpu lifted his foot and walked toward the stone platform. I quickly followed.

Young Master Liu reached out to touch the platform, trying to discern what it was truly made of.

The stone surface was coated in mottled reddish-brown dry powder, which immediately stuck to his hand when he brushed it.

Young Master Liu rubbed it between his fingers; the powder clung stubbornly. After rubbing for a long time, he managed to dislodge only a small amount of the loosely adhered dust.

"That is Dragon's Blood Resin," Zhang Enpu stated, seeing Young Master Liu's bewildered expression and offering a reminder.

"What is Dragon's Blood Resin?" Young Master Liu felt intensely curious about this name he had never heard before.

Zhang Enpu explained, "Dragon's Blood Resin is a medicinal material formed from the dried, congealed blood of the deceased. It has miraculous efficacy in staunching bleeding, resolving stagnation, and promoting tissue regeneration."

Young Master Liu nodded repeatedly, furiously rubbing his fingers together, trying desperately to wipe off the resin.

A medicinal material, he thought, but the clotted blood of dead people—it was bound to feel repulsive, no matter how potent it was, even if it could bring someone back from the dead...

Yes! A flash of brilliant insight struck him. A medicine for stopping bleeding and moving stagnation!

"Master, hurry and take off your clothes," Young Master Liu urged, disregarding the nausea. He slammed both palms onto the stone platform, smearing them thoroughly with the reddish-brown resin before lifting his hands.

Seeing Zhang Enpu hadn't moved, Young Master Liu's tone turned forceful: "Your choice: I help you, or you lie down and rub it on yourself."

Zhang Enpu hesitated for a moment, then removed his outer layers, revealing his wounds. Young Master Liu gestured for him to unwrap the bandages, then pressed his hands firmly onto Zhang Enpu's injuries, muttering all the while, "You've hit the jackpot this time. Look, such fine medicine, and it's free and unlimited use. Honestly, look at you—ouch, this wound is tearing open again. Don't you feel any pain? Fine, I admit, if it were me, I certainly wouldn't let the wound split again; that would hurt dozens of times more than the initial injury..."

After finally managing to coat all of Zhang Enpu's wounds with a layer of Dragon's Blood Resin, Young Master Liu had practically rubbed the entire platform clean.

Young Master Liu rewrapped the bandages around Zhang Enpu, offering a consolation: "It's a bit dirty, but better than nothing."

Zhang Enpu silently pulled his clothes back on.

Young Master Liu moved to the upper left corner of the stone platform.

While rubbing the platform earlier, he had felt a large, peculiar protrusion in that exact spot.

The edges of the platform were carved with auspicious cloud patterns, but the surface itself bore only a single, massive carving of a carp. That protrusion was the carp's eye.

It was called a carp, but it didn't quite look like one.

The fish was hideous, its eyes bulging menacingly. Its scales were somewhat damaged, and the entire body looked as if it had been ripped apart and crudely pieced back together, with several distinct fissures running right through it.

These cracks were almost certainly not intentional by the sculptor; he had never heard of any artist deliberately rendering a motif so damaged. Based on his years of antique experience, no dynasty was this avant-garde.

But why were these fissures present?

Curiously, Young Master Liu traced the lines of the fish, and when his hand reached the eye, he instinctively pressed it down!

With a crisp snap, the stone platform separating the two of them cracked open down the middle. It didn't slide away on mechanisms but split cleanly, as if someone had struck it with a hammer from underneath.

When everything settled, a hole the size of a cartwheel was revealed in the platform.

Young Master Liu stared at the opening in shock.

"Don't move," Zhang Enpu said, frowning deeply as he peered into the dark aperture.

After a long moment, Zhang Enpu looked up at Young Master Liu. "It's a pit of the dead down there."

A pit of the dead? Why would there be a mass grave beneath the altar stone?

Young Master Liu leaned over curiously to look inside the hole.

"Ah!" Young Master Liu cried out. "Aren't these the things that were skinned in the terracotta figurine pit?"

The desiccated corpses, still savagely tearing at their companions, stopped their frenzy when they heard his shout. They slowly raised their heads, fixing their blood-red eyes on Young Master Liu with venomous resentment, their mouths still smeared with a mixture of flesh remnants and saliva.

They were as repulsive as ever... Young Master Liu grimaced, fighting back the urge to vomit.

Yet, their appearance seemed different from before.

Their flesh-ball bodies were swelling and convulsing with a massive, rhythmic expansion and contraction, accompanied by a slow seepage of blood from the folds of their skin.

"Master... Master..." Young Master Liu stammered nervously. "Are they... are they about to self-detonate?"

Zhang Enpu stated calmly, "They are likely about to give birth."

"Give... give birth..." Young Master Liu’s eyes widened in horror as he stared at the living corpses. "Give birth to what?"

Zhang Enpu faintly shook his head, offering no further explanation.

So, what were they supposed to do now? Watch how dried corpses propagate their young? A live masterclass on midwifery? Damn it, if it failed to deliver, would he have to climb down and assist?

Young Master Liu quickly scurried to Zhang Enpu's side. "Before those unknown little monsters are born, let's get out of here. Who knows what dangerous things they might bring forth. Besides, I really can't stomach watching a woman in labor."

"Go!" Zhang Enpu glanced warily around, stood up, and motioned for everyone to explore deeper.

The others rose. Tian Guoqiang took the lead with his double-barreled shotgun, Bai Er Laizi brought up the rear, and Young Master Liu and Zhang Enpu walked in the middle, using their flashlights to illuminate both the front and the back.

The path ahead gradually leveled out, and slabs of cut stone began to appear on the floor.

"Looks like we're nearing the bottom. Be cautious," Zhang Enpu reminded them.

Still wary from the previous incident, Young Master Liu had been watching his feet. Zhang Enpu's comment prompted him to look up and survey their surroundings.

It was a remarkably wide passage.

How to describe it? It was about as wide as some of the larger hutongs in Beijing, and the ceiling arched high above their heads.

This was Young Master Liu's first time descending into a tomb. He had no idea what other tombs were like, but he was already feeling a sense of awe.

The tomb walls were constructed from large, fitted bluestone blocks, with only a hairline seam visible between them. These stones were heavily painted with vibrant murals depicting what appeared to be the tomb owner's life before death.

The first scene showed a magnificent, golden hall. Kneeling in the center was a figure smaller than the person standing before him, who was placing a ceremonial crown upon the smaller figure's head. Many kneeling ministers filled the hall, yet the small figure's mouth curved into a clear sneer.

The second scene depicted the study. The same small figure was still kneeling, presenting a box upwards to the Emperor.

Subsequent panels illustrated the construction process of the Emperor's mausoleum. Young Master Liu scanned them quickly, confirming that the small figure was Emperor Chongzhen, the younger brother of Emperor Xizong, and the tall figure must be Emperor Xizong, Zhu Youxiao, himself.

The later panels showed Zhu Youxiao dying of illness, being transported a thousand li for burial, and Zhu Youjian ascending the throne.

Young Master Liu studied the images one by one, his brow furrowing deeper.

By the time he reached the final panel, the surprise he had been suppressing finally erupted.

The last painting was rendered entirely in a red pigment, striking him profoundly the moment he saw it.

In the scene, Zhu Youxiao sat once again upon the throne, clutching a long sword.

Young Master Liu couldn't tell if it was psychological or the painter's sheer skill, but he could see the triumph and cruelty glinting in Zhu Youxiao's eyes and the slight upward curve of his lips—everything was rendered with unnerving clarity, down to the finest detail.

He closed his eyes, unable to look at the blood-red mural any longer.

"Hmm?" Zhang Enpu suddenly spoke up. "Wait a moment."

"What is it?" Young Master Liu opened his eyes and asked.

Zhang Enpu walked over to the final mural and touched it. "There's a trick to these murals too. It seems to be double-layered."

Zhang Enpu used his fingernail to gently scratch at the red paint.

Beneath the scratched area, there was something black.

Zhang Enpu continued to clear away the mural steadily, without emotion.

Young Master Liu watched in astonishment as the painting was peeled back piece by piece, revealing the nascent form of a new mural underneath.

A black background stood in stark contrast to the painting that had covered it.

A mountain of corpses; compared to this, the previous mass grave was insignificant.

Upon this mountain of the dead, Zhu Youxiao stood triumphantly, looking down condescendingly at the countless bodies, one foot planted firmly on a corpse, holding a long sword in his right hand!

Just as everyone was focused intently on this painting, the Zhu Youxiao depicted suddenly lifted his head, his gaze locking onto them with murderous intent. His eyes had turned an almost dripping, blood-red hue.

Young Master Liu sucked in a cold breath and involuntarily stepped back two paces.

It wasn't just him; everyone, including Zhang Enpu, was stunned by this development.

"Don't be afraid. This is merely a technique used by ancient painters," Zhang Enpu said after a long pause, regaining his composure. He walked back to the group and spoke calmly. "This isn't double-layered; it's triple-layered. The first layer is what we saw—Emperor Xizong and Chongzhen. The second is Xizong standing atop the corpse mountain. The third is this one. However, the second layer was made with a special pigment that gradually evaporates when exposed to air, creating the illusion that the figures in the painting are moving."

He had heard of these kinetic paintings before. Even now, certain charlatans posed as fortune-tellers and used such pictures to swindle money. But what had just happened was so unexpected that it had startled him.

Who would have thought a mere wall mural in a tomb could conceal so many intricate layers?

"What was the painter trying to express?" Young Master Liu asked. "Surely it wasn't just to scare away tomb robbers?"