"These two mines were not dug at the same time." Yan, who had always been silent, spoke at this time.
After hearing his words, everyone couldn't help but stop arguing about which mine to go to, and turned to look at him.
"Look, the one on the left was obviously excavated manually, and the chisel marks on it are very obvious." Yan said, pointing to the stone wall of the mine on the left.
Everyone came forward after hearing the words.
Sure enough, the mine on the left was dug out with a chisel.
"What age are we in now? We still use manual labor to dig, aren't we afraid of dying from exhaustion?" said the mountain ghost.
"No, this was not dug in modern times. Look, the area around these chisels is not much different from the stone wall outside. This mine may have existed for more than a dozen years!" Uncle Long touched the stone wall and said,
"Let's go, look over there."
Uncle Long took the first step towards the entrance of the mine on the right. The walls of this mine were very rough, with large chunks of rocks broken into pieces. In some places, there were gravel piled in the corners of the ground.
"This was dug by a machine, probably by the later group of people, and the railroad tracks also lead to this mine tunnel. It seems we don't have to worry about which one to take anymore," said Uncle Wang.
"But, obviously they already have one, why do they want to make another one? Is it too much money to burn?" Boss Zhang said with squinted eyes.
"Yes, what Boss Zhang said this time is reasonable." Uncle Long nodded.
"What do you mean, Mr. Long, do you mean that everything I said before was all nonsense?" Boss Zhang glared.
"Hey, hey, that's not what I meant, that's not what I meant." Uncle Long hurriedly said, "If it were you, under what circumstances would you give up a ready-made passage and then go to the trouble of digging one out?"
"Well, this..."
After listening to Uncle Long's words, several people fell into thinking.
"Are there several possibilities?" Uncle Long looked at the crowd and asked; "The first possibility is that they discovered this existing mine tunnel when they dug here. Maybe it is not a mine tunnel at all. When they went in to investigate, they found that the road didn't lead to where they wanted to go, so they dug a new one."
"The second possibility is that they came here just to find this ancient mine tunnel, but for some reason, there may have been a collapse or something else in this mine tunnel, which made them unable to get through here, so they had to dig next to it. A new passage was built to connect with the existing ancient mine tunnel, bypassing the impassable part."
"If that's the case, the purpose of that group of people coming here is not just mining. If they had known that there was such an ancient road down here, then the so-called mining was just a cover, and their true identity and purpose were. ..." Uncle Wang glanced at the crowd and said.
"I think this place shouldn't be like this before. The group of people who came later destroyed the entire original underground structure. This ancient mine cannot appear here for no reason. The part before the entrance should be It overlaps with the one when we came in. And the space here is so big, it was only dug out later. If they were really looking for the ancient mine tunnel, why would they dig such a big hole here." Yang Lixuan said.
"So what do you mean?" Yan asked.
"The later group of people may have really just been mining, but accidentally discovered such a mine tunnel. In order to save manpower, they dug along the mine tunnel. After digging halfway, which is where we are, What they wanted appeared in the rock formations, which is why there is so much space here."
"Well, you have the same idea as me. This ancient mine has existed for a long time. Those people must have explored it after they came in. Even if there is anything, it has been taken away by them long ago." Yan said.
"The locals said that the accident happened because they dug underneath the Man-Eating Valley, and our destination is also there. Therefore, walking along the railway track is the right direction." Yang Lixuan said.
"Yeah." Everyone nodded in agreement. Boss Zhang wanted to say something more, but seeing that Yan agreed, he said nothing. After determining the direction, the group of people set off again. As they were leaving, Chen Tao looked at the ancient mine tunnel in a daze. For some reason, the mine gave him an inexplicable sense of familiarity, as if he had been here before. of.
"Taozi, what are you thinking about? Let's go!" Haozi shouted at Chen Tao. Chen Tao then recovered, shook his head, and followed the others into the cave.
After a few steps along the mine tunnel on the right, Chen Tao suddenly remembered something and asked, "Hey, do you still remember that Old Man Li Guangsheng and Old Man Liu seemed to have mentioned the same thing?"
"What's the matter?" Uncle Long asked.
"Corpse!" Chen Tao said, "Li Guangsheng said that there are many corpses and bones in the big pit of the Cannibal Valley. Let's talk about the Cannibal Valley separately. But didn't Old Man Liu say that he touched the ribs on the corpse in the mine tunnel? Really? But along the way, let alone the corpse, we didn’t even see a hair on it!”
"Huh? It's true, Mr. Long, you didn't see any corpses along the way?" Mountain Ghost also asked curiously.
"Oh, Old Man Liu, this old bastard, is lying to us! I'm going to give him a hard time!" Boss Zhang scolded from the side.
"And didn't he say that his sheep died here, and there were no sheep corpses or bones?" Haozi was also a little angry and said through gritted teeth.
Listening to everyone's words, Uncle Long's heart skipped a beat. He clenched his fists tightly and then relaxed them. An imperceptible look flashed in his eyes, and he thought to himself: "Could it be that they are up to something again? Is that old man Liu really one of theirs? Then that proprietress of the canteen, that crazy kid, and that Li Guangsheng... What if? That would be troublesome!"
It was dark all around, and no one noticed the change in Uncle Long's expression. Uncle Long glanced around with the corner of his eye, and saw that there was nothing unusual about the people in the mine tunnel, and nothing could be seen in the darkness, so he couldn't help but be cautious. He said in his heart: "If all this is really like that, this trip will be very lively!"
"It's not necessarily that they are lying." Yang Lixuan said: "Under normal circumstances, it takes 7-10 years for a corpse to go from flesh to bones and then to complete decomposition. It takes 7-10 years for an adult, 4-5 years for a pediatric corpse, and 4-5 years for a toddler's corpse. 2---3 years, and a newborn corpse is about 1 year. This place is so humid and connected to the outside all year round, it is almost a natural breeding ground for microorganisms and bacteria. The corpse will decompose faster here than outside."
"Besides, there is no guarantee that animals such as wild cats and dogs will crawl in in search of food. In a place like this, the chance of a corpse being preserved is very small." After a pause, Yang Lixuan continued:
"Many years have passed since the things they mentioned. Even if the body cannot be found, it is not surprising. Forget about Li Guangsheng and the group of people who started mining in the mountains, it is unlikely that things that happened decades ago can be left behind. It's possible. As for the old man Liu, he was scared to death. I doubted whether anything he touched was a corpse. The ground here was full of rotten sleepers and rails. His sheep shovel might have been stuck by these things. .”
"Well, what he said makes sense. We didn't have any interaction with that old man Liu before. He only served us as a guide for a day. He gave us all the money he deserved. There is no grudge between the two. He There is no reason to lie to us!" Chen Tao also echoed.
"Oh, little boss of the Chen family, you are still too young. As the saying goes, people's hearts are separated from each other! I see that old street thief with a sly look on his face. He is very smart. Who knows what he is thinking! "Boss Zhang shook his two big hands and was very angry.
"I think what Sticky Yang said makes some sense. Maybe we think too much." Uncle Wang said.
"I hope so." Listening to everyone's analysis, Uncle Long frowned and said: "Let's go, we have already come down anyway. The soldiers will come to cover up the water and earth. Let's continue."
Everyone stopped worrying about this matter and continued down the railway track. Along the way, they passed several gentle upward slopes. Chen Tao noticed that as he went deeper, the color of the surrounding rock walls gradually turned black. When the flashlight shines on it, although most of them are black rocks, there are many tiny crystal stones in some places. The light of the wolf-eye flashlight is crystal clear, with little black fluorescence like gelatin.
"Damn it, this thing can't be jade, can it?" Chen Tao was surprised and said to himself, "Is it possible that those people were digging jade here back then? There is actually a raw jade mine under the Man-eating Valley? "
Hearing Chen Tao's voice, others also noticed the changes in the surrounding stone walls, and took flashlights to shine on the black crystals embedded in the stone walls.
"Oh, my lungs are dripping. This is not just jade, this is black jade. Oh, it's going to be developed now! It's developed!" Boss Zhang greedily touched a small hole as big as a fingernail on the stone wall. A piece of spar, with a big grin almost reaching the base of his ears. He picked up the folding shovel and pried it against the stone wall, trying to pull out the small piece of black crystal.
Boss Zhang spent a long time, but the crystal stones on the stone wall did not move at all, with only a few tiny cracks showing. Ah Cheng on the side said: "Boss Zhang, let me do it."
I saw him take the folding shovel from Boss Zhang's hand and shovel it hard against the stone wall. The blade of the shovel was directly inserted into the tiny crack that Boss Zhang took a long time to dig out. Then he pressed his shoulders against the stone wall with both arms. As soon as he exerted force, he heard a snapping sound, and a black crystal as big as the belly of his finger was pulled off by him.
Boss Zhang stepped forward and picked it up, then picked up the flashlight and shined it carefully.
"Huh? What is this? Why haven't I seen this kind of black jade before?"
On the other side, Ah Cheng took several more pills. Sure enough, a strong man is different. Such great strength is not something ordinary people can possess. The title of Mercenary Titan is not for nothing.
Everyone picked one up, held it in front of their eyes and looked at it carefully with flashlights.
"These seem to be just ordinary black crystal stones. If you take them back and make them into handicrafts, you can still sell them for a few bucks." Uncle Long said.
"I was shocked. I thought it was black jade, but it turned out to be just some junk!" Seeing that it was just an ordinary crystal, Boss Zhang curled his lips and threw it aside.
"Hey, although this thing is not very valuable now, it was very rare in the past! That group of people probably came to dig it because they discovered that there was a black crystal mine here. Look at this, the black crystal stone in this section of the road It's almost dug out." Yan looked at the black crystal stone in his hand and threw it aside with a look of disdain.
"I think it looks pretty good. It would be nice to make a ring, necklace or something to set on it. Put some of this on a wooden box, maybe it will sell well." Haozi squeezed the small piece of crystal in his hand, and smoothly Just put it in my pocket. Tomb keepers are not like tomb robbers, they all have serious business interests. Mr. Li has his own carpentry shop. Haozi saw that this black spar had good texture and gloss, so he planned to go back and study it to see if it could be used in the decoration of wood.
"Cut..." Seeing Haozi loading up the black crystal, Yan cut it with disdain. There was not much space in the mine tunnel, so everyone heard it. Haozi immediately became angry and cursed:
"Why do you wear red hair? Do you have any objections?"
"How dare you! You are all big shots, and I am a nobody and don't know much about things." Yan said calmly.
Listening to his lazy and disdainful tone, Haozi wanted to pluck out all the red hair on his head. Just as he was about to have an attack, Uncle Long coughed and said, "Haozi."
Seeing Uncle Long speak, Haozi had no choice but to endure the anger in his heart, gave Yan a hard look and said, "Wait for me!" After saying that, he followed Uncle Long and walked forward.
Yan curled his lips, smiled carelessly, put his hands in his pockets and wrote boldly, with an expression on his face that he had the ability to hit me.
Seeing Haozi being offended, Chen Tao couldn't help but feel angry. This Yan was silent before, and I thought he was similar to Yang Lixuan, maybe a powerful person with some abilities, but he turned out to be such an arrogant person. It’s not that this person doesn’t like to talk, maybe he feels too good about himself!
Judging from his age, he is not much different from himself and Haozi, and may even be younger than himself. The slap he used to knock out the son of the proprietor of the canteen was obviously something he had practiced before. Chen Tao knew in his heart that if it were him, he would never be able to do it as neatly as Yan.
"Hmph, I hope you have the capital to be arrogant!" Chen Tao glanced at him and followed Haozi to find Uncle Long.
Wang Shushangui didn't say anything. After all, they were all people who had been here before. This kind of thing was not surprising. Compared with them, Chen Tao and Hao Zi were still younger after all.
Boss Zhang came over from behind and patted Yan on the shoulder, making a thumbs up gesture with his hand. The two looked at each other and smiled. Boss Zhang raised his chin and signaled Yan to continue moving forward.
"Damn, this red-haired guy is so arrogant!" Haozi said in a deep voice through gritted teeth.
"Now is not the time to break up with them, don't be impulsive." Uncle Long shook his head and said, "Let's go, there is still a long road ahead."
“These old stubborn people from the Chen family of the Spirit Alliance have become whores and have to build archways. Every time there is something good in the pot, they don’t take it and don’t let others touch it. They only pick some shabby trinkets. Even if they take it, they won't take action. Many priceless treasures have been hidden by them. I really don't know what they think. If there is something good this time, if they dare to stop us..." Yan raised his hand and said He made a gesture of wiping his neck.
Ah Cheng shook his head and said, "As mentioned above, we were just asked to keep an eye on them. That guy named Chen Tao, I don't know what he is capable of, but he even lured him here."
Yan squinted his eyes and looked at the back of one of the people in front of him, licked his lips and said, "What do they want to do?"
"Di Yilong, this old fox, is really smart. I didn't expect to find them as helpers! This guy is so desperate that he really underestimated him." Boss Zhang said with squinted eyes.
"Hmph, it's interesting. Let's go. The fun is yet to come." Yan Xiexie smiled and said
"Huh, Chen Tao, right? I want to see what surprises you can bring us, but don't let me down..."
