Liu Dashao cursed under his breath. “This bag is damn sturdy, even a dagger can’t cut it. These tomb raiders must be something else!”

Seeing that he couldn't open the bag after a long time, he finally drew his Celestial Master Sword and lightly drew it across the material. With a sharp shhhk, a long tear appeared on the bag.

Liu Dashao pulled the edges of the tear as wide as he could, revealing another bag inside. This one, however, was just an ordinary sack. This made Liu Dashao slightly underestimate them again. He fumbled around for a moment and found the zipper, pulling it open with a soft zip.

Liu Dashao cautiously opened the sack, afraid of finding something horrifying inside. Only after carefully examining it and confirming there was no immediate danger did he muster the courage to reach in and grab its contents.

He wouldn't have known if he hadn't reached in—it was a shocking discovery! The bag was filled with explosives, along with two portable flamethrowers. Liu Dashao thought to himself, having these two items together was a recipe for disaster; one careless move and he’d be sharing mahjong tiles with the Jade Emperor.

Big Cricket asked, “Brother, what peculiar gadgets are in that bag?”

Liu Dashao replied with resignation, “Nothing good, just a few packs of explosives and two portable flamethrowers. Looks like they kept all their essential gear on their persons.”

Upon hearing Liu Dashao, Big Cricket immediately jumped onto the boat, grabbing the sack with one hand while frantically rummaging inside with the other. After a moment, he stopped. “These tomb raiders are truly cunning; they carry all their necessities with them.”

Liu Dashao picked up the entrenching shovel lying beside the bag and examined it. “It seems the only useful thing here, for this environment, is this shovel. At least we can use it as an oar for now.” Saying this, Liu Dashao pushed the shovel into the water and made a couple of strokes, finding it surprisingly manageable.

Fan Debiao, hearing the exchange between Liu Dashao and Big Cricket, vigorously pulled the bandage tighter while wrapping the wound for Green Caterpillar. Green Caterpillar was gritting his teeth, brow furrowed in terrible pain. Fan Debiao glanced at him, muttered an apology, then turned to the others. “This is bad. Now we don’t even know what kind of firepower they have. What if they’re carrying a few rifles, or maybe submachine guns, or heavy machine guns? With our collection of beat-up pistols, we might get riddled with bullets before we even see what they look like when we run into them.”

With that, Fan Debiao quickly snatched Green Caterpillar’s Thompson submachine gun and held it close, declaring that since Green Caterpillar was gravely injured, he would keep the weapon safe to better protect him.

Liu Dashao scoffed at Fan Debiao. “Rifles and submachine guns—you might as well say they have rocket launchers!”

Fan Debiao ignored Liu Dashao and focused on examining the gun. He pulled the charging handle a couple of times, then cursed, “Damn it, no ammunition.”

Big Cricket interjected, “Alright, alright. Get on the boat, all of you. Never mind what planes or artillery they might have. If we wait any longer, the feast will be cold.”

Big Cricket spoke and was the first to leap onto the boat, standing beside Liu Dashao. Fan Debiao helped Green Caterpillar up and guided him toward the boat, muttering, “Kid, you’re tough. If we were in a brawl, you could definitely take on five guys by yourself.”

After getting Green Caterpillar settled, Fan Debiao launched himself aboard. With Fan Debiao’s considerable weight landing on the vessel, the entire boat lurched violently. If Big Cricket and Green Caterpillar hadn't grabbed hold quickly, the boat might have capsized immediately.

Liu Dashao was annoyed. “Fan Debiao, tread lighter! If this boat flips, you’ll be hearing from me!”

Fan Debiao waved a hand helplessly and laughed. “My apologies, an accident. Purely accidental.” He shifted his weight, causing the boat to rock again.

Liu Dashao seized Fan Debiao’s arm. “Fine, fine… Fatty, can you move toward the center of the boat?”

Hearing this, Fan Debiao slowly and cautiously began to shuffle toward the hull. It took considerable effort for him to reach the middle.

Seeing that the boat had stabilized, Big Cricket let go of his grip and said, “Good. Everyone, let’s head inside.”

With that, Big Cricket pulled several sections of steel piping from his backpack, connected them, and plunged them into the water to turn the boat around. These pipes were originally meant to be used with the Luoyang shovel, but now they proved quite useful for poling the boat.

Since they had the mine lamp, the flashlight was now redundant. Liu Dashao tossed it aside casually and opened his backpack to check for any remaining rations.

He was speechless when he opened it: the compressed biscuits had turned into a sludge from the water damage. Liu Dashao sighed, set the backpack aside, and quietly resigned himself to hunger.

After the boat traveled for a while, the winding river channel began to straighten out, and the width narrowed to only about two meters. The surrounding stone walls appeared to have been artificially carved, and some engravings adorned them. Due to prolonged exposure to the water, the walls were thoroughly coated in moss, obscuring whatever images were etched there.

The boat navigated the narrow channel for a short distance, passed through a cavern, and then the river ahead opened up again. The stone walls here looked more natural this time.

Suddenly, Fan Debiao pointed ahead with his finger. “Look, there’s something up front!”

At Fan Debiao’s exclamation, Liu Dashao quickly looked in the direction he pointed. Because the range of the mine lamp was limited, he could only make out a dark silhouette ahead, discernible only in its general form. Only as the boat slowly approached did they clearly see that the dark shape was a bronze statue.

The bronze figure was a little over a meter tall, standing in a niche about two meters high and half a meter wide carved into the stone wall. Its eyes were closed; its right hand held a sword, while its left hand pointed the sword forward. Despite having been near water for over two thousand years, the bronze statue was still remarkably well-preserved.

Fan Debiao remarked, “Why the hell is this weird thing planted here? It looks awfully creepy!”

Liu Dashao also found it strange. He shone his flashlight around other areas to see if anything else was present. The light revealed a very narrow tributary river channel, barely over a meter wide, with numerous bronze statues lining the stone walls on both sides. Each statue was in a different posture, but they shared one characteristic: all the bronze figures had their eyes closed.

Seeing this, Liu Dashao urgently called Big Cricket over to examine the scene. Big Cricket peered inside, frowned, and couldn't offer any immediate explanation, only remarking on the material and craftsmanship of the bronze figures.

As Big Cricket was lecturing Liu Dashao on the history of bronze, Fan Debiao exclaimed in surprise, “There are two dead bodies here!”

Hearing this, Liu Dashao and Big Cricket immediately turned toward Fan Debiao. Illuminated by the flashlight, they saw two gruesome skeletons lying near the boat. It appeared something had completely stripped the flesh from their bones. They must have been the tomb raiders who entered here, meeting a terrible fate.

Fan Debiao rejoiced, “Heh heh. That’s great. With these two dead here, it saves us a lot of trouble.”

“Not just two,” Big Cricket corrected, pulling three backpacks up from beside the bodies. “There should be three. Two are dead, so one must still be alive. But how did these two end up like this?”

Fan Debiao said, “Let’s not worry about that now. Let’s see what good stuff is in their packs.”

Saying this, he snatched up one of the bags and started turning it over. After a long search, his face fell. “These tomb raiders were too boring! Their gear is worse than ours—just a few packs of biscuits and some worn-out rope.”

Fan Debiao tossed that backpack aside and picked up another, searching it with a look of disappointment.

Liu Dashao took the backpack from Fan Debiao’s hand, looked at it closely, and confirmed there were only a few packs of compressed biscuits turned to paste. Liu Dashao rummaged through the inner pocket and found a photograph. The picture showed three foreigners posing together by a river. These must have been the people traveling in this boat.

A new question arose in Liu Dashao’s mind: “Why are these foreigners over in our China doing tomb raiding? If the government found out, they’d definitely be arrested and shot.”

Liu Dashao handed the photo to Big Cricket. “Big Cricket, why are these foreigners running around raiding tombs in our China?”

Big Cricket took the photo and studied it carefully. “They aren't tomb raiding. They are archaeologists from the French TOUR Expedition team.”

Liu Dashao asked, somewhat bewildered, “What do you mean by that?”

Big Cricket shone the flashlight on the photo. “Look at their clothing.”

Liu Dashao focused his gaze and finally noticed the three English letters, “TOUR,” stitched on the left breast pocket of their shirts.