The half-fossilized "Huo's Immortal Worm" finally emptied its stomach. After a few mournful shrieks, its raised head slammed back down; its strength completely spent, it curled up motionless.

Fatty, who had just been drenched head-to-toe in the stomach acid from the female corpses and the giant insect, and had nearly been crushed by the large chest, was still shaken but immediately forgot about plundering treasure. He walked closer, wiping the foul-smelling yellow slime from his face, muttering to himself, "*** Nearly squashed Fatty into a meat patty... A narrow escape must mean good fortune follows. But what was this big box used for? How did that giant bug swallow it whole?"

I was also perplexed. In all my experiences, this was the most bizarre. Following Fatty, I watched the box that had resided in the worm's belly for thousands of years, countless questions swirling in my mind. Perhaps this box was just as Inley Yang suggested, like the "Pandora's Box" of Western legend—a box hidden inside a fire dragon, containing a monumental secret and countless demons and monsters.

Fatty was already impatient. He used his ice axe to drag several female corpses piled near the box aside, clearing a space around it, ready to pry it open and see if there was any valuable merchandise inside.

I noticed that the female corpses snagged by Fatty’s ice axe were all jet-black and rotting, vastly different from the "Dead Floaters" we had seen bobbing in the water. My curiosity piqued. I pulled on gloves and hauled one of the female corpses out of the pile; it felt incredibly heavy in my hands. Though the saying goes that corpses are 'dead heavy,' these bodies had been submerged for perhaps over two thousand years; how could they still weigh so much? Such weight should have made it difficult for them to float in water.

The female corpse was naked; even if it had clothing, it was likely dissolved by the water. The face was perfectly preserved, yet horribly ugly and grotesque, as if the expression was frozen at the moment of death. The skin was almost completely altered, so black it looked less like an East Asian person and more like an African; there was no resemblance to the beautiful, nude corpses we had imagined. This corpse only evoked thoughts of death's ugliness and cruelty.

Noticing the unusual surface of the female corpse, I touched it through my glove. It felt very hard and smooth. I couldn't tell what transformation had occurred to make it this way, allowing it to remain submerged in the cold water for approximately two millennia without decaying.

Inley Yang asked from the side, "The female corpse’s body is strange. What did you find?"

I shook my head: "I can't make sense of it. The outer layer of skin and flesh has become incredibly hard, somewhat like amber. Perhaps it has been fossilized. It’s hard to determine right now how this hard casing formed."

Inley Yang remarked, "While the general features and contours of the female corpse are still visible, the surface seems encased in a layer of black, semi-transparent substance, making details unclear. However, based on the external features, they vary in height, build, and size. They are all young women. First, we can confirm this is not a stone figurine." She put on rubber gloves as she said this, fearing poison on the bodies, and began examining the fine details.

Fatty saw us examining the corpses dragged out by the giant insect instead of helping him open the strange bronze chest, and complained loudly. He accused me of lacking strategic vision, arguing that the corpses weren't worth much and that opening the chest was the real priority.

I told Fatty, "What's the rush? You eat rice one bite at a time, and fight battles one by one. We haven't even entered the Tomb of the Xian King yet and we've run into so many strange things. We must investigate each one thoroughly to truly know ourselves and the enemy, so we don't lose our lives down here in the Insect Valley. That big bronze chest is the oddest thing. Will opening it bring fortune or disaster? It's impossible to predict. It's not too late to open it after we figure out what these female corpses are. Are you afraid the box will sprout legs and run away?"

Seeing no one would help him, and finding the square bronze chest tightly sealed and impossible for him to open alone, Fatty grumbled and went to the edge of the underground water. He found a spot clear of "Dead Floaters" and washed off the stinking giant insect fluid covering him.

I ignored Fatty then and busied myself investigating the pile of female corpses that had accumulated into a small mountain. Inley Yang and I grew increasingly astonished and alarmed the more we looked. The way these women died, and the state they were in post-mortem, was terrifying.

The female corpses' arms and legs were curled sharply beneath them, the joints completely broken. Their limbs held an olive-shaped, semi-transparent object against their backs at an impossible angle. This object resembled a giant insect cocoon, appearing to have several layers externally: an outer layer of transparent silk threads, and beneath that, a hard shell—both very thin and transparent, yet extremely tough.

The entire body of the female corpse, including the limbs and the cocoon-like object held to the back, was encased in a layer of brownish-black semi-transparent material, much like a gigantic piece of amber.

The surface of this semi-transparent black hard membrane was covered entirely with layers of secret curses, identical to the symbols found on the "Dragon Scale Demon Armor" and the surface of the water tank at the stone tablet shop. These were the ancient incantations used in Chong Shu to seal the vengeful spirits of the dead and transform them into potent toxins through other channels. As we observed closely, countless tiny holes—impossible to count—pocked the bottom of the "cocoon." These honeycomb-like circular pores likely led deep into the cocoon structure, perhaps for the insect to lay eggs. However, the surface of these nest-like pores exerted a strong suction. Inley Yang touched it and immediately felt a suction force like a suction cup, causing her to snatch her hand back quickly.

Inley Yang turned on her "Wolf Eye" flashlight and shone the beam onto the cocoon-like object. Immediately, a dark shadow appeared inside. Judging by the shape, it resembled an unborn fetus, and it was trembling slightly.

Fatty, having cleaned himself up, came over and saw it, exclaiming in surprise to Inley Yang, "Hey... what's that big shrimp tail in there?"

Inley Yang replied to Fatty, "Are you hungry for shrimp? I think this looks more like a parasite inside an egg. She used her Paratrooper Knife to slash at the outer shell of the female corpse and the cocoon, trying to pierce it and see what was inside. But the black semi-transparent outer membrane was so tough that even the sharp blade of the Paratrooper Knife only left faint scratches; it couldn't cut through it at all."

Fatty declared, "Watch me. When it comes to brute strength, only the mighty Li Yuanba from the Sui and Tang dynasties had arms like mine! I mean it!" He swung his entrenching tool and brought it down with force. His blow was indeed substantial, and he managed to slice a large gash in the semi-transparent hard membrane.

The wriggling object inside was revealed through the opening. I moved in to assist, intending for the two of us to work together to pull the crack in the black hard membrane wider and extract whatever was inside. But the moment my hand touched the cocoon-like object, flipping the female corpse so it faced downwards, the corpse suddenly lunged forward, like a fish just pulled onto the shore that wasn't quite dead yet. Its strength was astonishing; it shot forward over half a meter in a single thrust.

It was less than a centimeter from the bottomless underground water in the "Gourd Cave." Fatty and I yelled simultaneously, "Where are you running!" We thrust our two "ice axes" forward and hooked onto the female corpse firmly. The body was extremely heavy, and it took considerable effort to haul it back.

Fatty cursed, "It's the dead little ghost inside causing trouble! Watch how Fatty deals with him!" With that, he went to work. He inserted the entrenching tool into the gap in the hard membrane and smashed the fetal-shaped object inside into a pulp. A stream of inky-green, foul-smelling liquid flowed out of the rupture, ten times more nauseating than the giant insect's stomach acid. I have never smelled anything worse in my life; the stench forced the three of us to quickly put our gas masks back on.

Looking at the black mass smashed into a paste by Fatty's shovel, it was certainly dead. The parts chopped by the blade were plump and white, with pinkish blood streaks. What was this thing? Although it resembled an unborn fetus, it lacked the contours of a human body; even an ordinary pregnant woman couldn't carry such a massive fetus.

Seeing this, I suddenly recalled an ancient punishment from the Warring States period called "Fu Zhui" (), specifically used for pregnant female criminals. In those feudal times, there was certainly no modern concept of humanitarian treatment for prisoners. The execution would only take place when the pregnant woman was exactly eight months along. Her clothes would be removed, her four limbs shackled to a frame, her entire body smeared with salt paste, and then she would be dragged to the middle of a busy market square to be crushed by a stone roller. The blood and the fetus would flow out until the bleeding stopped. The populace called it "Jiao Yu" (). Those whose bellies ruptured severely () would draw huge crowds, all turning pale afterward, sighing at the severity of the law.

This meant that a pregnant female convict would be held until she was exactly eight months pregnant before execution (). During the execution, she would be stripped naked, tied to a wooden frame, and placed in the middle of a crossroads. Two water buffaloes would be brought, pulling a modest-sized stone roller. The roller couldn't be too large or heavy, lest it crush her prematurely; the key was not to break the bones. Before the process began, the criminal’s body would be smeared with "salt paste" and "Ma Nian" ()—pain-relieving drugs, dosed just enough to ensure the criminal wouldn't die from the agony alone.

Once prepared, the two water buffaloes would drag the specially made, narrow roller back and forth over the criminal's body. Intestines, stomach, heart, lungs, and the fetus inside would be squeezed out from the sides. Naturally, once the heart pulse was crushed, the criminal would be finished. However, the law required the rolling to continue until no blood flowed from either side. Spectators watching until the end, seeing the woman slowly crushed into a human skin, would be unable to bear it, sighing at the strictness of the law and warning themselves to abide by the statutes from then on.

Of course, crimes like infidelity or murdering one's husband, while serious under the strict moral codes of ancient times that highly valued chastity, were not severe enough to warrant this level of treatment. Only female convicts who committed earth-shattering offenses while pregnant might receive this fate. Historical records show that very few people suffered this torture; it was one of many cruelties in Chinese history. "Fu Zhui" was gradually abolished by the Tang Dynasty, surviving only in name, and was never used on convicts again.

After thinking for a long time, I told Inley Yang and Fatty, "It seems this thing isn't a big shrimp, nor is it a fetus. It looks more like the Zhi Feng () we saw earlier on the living figurines—it’s a giant wasp pupa."

Fatty shook his head, unconvinced: "How could a Zhi Feng pupa be this big? And this thing has considerable strength, fastened tightly to the female corpse’s back. I’m not exaggerating; I think this is clearly a monstrous birth."

Inley Yang carefully used the Paratrooper Knife to scrape away the pulped white flesh bit by bit. At the tip of the fat, white meat-pupa, it was actually connected to the female corpse's lower body, and there was a fossilized placenta (). Furthermore, an umbilical cord was attached.

Not only was there an umbilical cord and placenta, but the white, puppet-like body was curled into an arc, with a large head and thin feet, its end plunged directly into the female corpse's nether regions, possibly reaching all the way into the uterus. The situation was now overwhelmingly clear.

Fatty and I held the flashlight to illuminate the scene. Seeing this, our hearts pounded, and we gasped in unison, "It really is a freak!"

Even Inley Yang, despite her vast knowledge, couldn't help but feel nauseous from the sight of the contrasting red and white monstrosity. She rushed to the water's edge, removed her gas mask, dry-heaved a couple of times, and then told Fatty and me, "This is definitely not a human fetus. It's a Tuan Luan ()."