Hearing this, Yue Qingshan rarely interjected: "If it is really like what you said, then the history of the ancient Shanshan Kingdom would be so exciting. I have one more thing to ask you. If even Steinhein's professional team cannot find the ancient Shanshan Kingdom, Shanwang City, can we, the idiots, really find the right place? Don’t return without success.”
Yue Guanchao waved his hand and retorted: "Second uncle, you can't destroy your prestige like this. Steinhein can't be found. It's his misfortune. Maybe God doesn't want foreign devils to destroy our cultural relics."
Song Siyuan nodded towards him: "It seems that this trip to the northwest has been decided. Before that, we have to see what is the best way to get there?"
After saying that, everyone looked at Xu Xiake, and Yue Guanchao asked: "Taoist Xu, haven't you been to the northwest? Do you think it is more convenient for us to go to the northwest?"
When he was in Shu, Xu Xiake had already mentioned that since they separated from Shaanxi Province, he went directly to the northwest and met Taoist Wang Yuanlu in Thousand Buddha Cave. Now everyone has decided to go to the northwest, and of course they have to trouble this little Taoist. , come and ask for directions.
Xu Xiake coughed a few times and took Qiao's attitude: "I went alone at that time, and I took the route of these caravans. At that time, they were willing to take me, not only because I gave them enough money, but also as a Taoist priest. I have to solve a lot of strange things for them, and only with these two things will they be willing to let me follow."
Yue Guanchao teased: "Weird power and chaotic gods? What kind of strange power and chaotic gods can you handle? In addition to being able to dance like a master, you have other functions."
Xu Xiake was looked down upon by others, and he immediately wanted to save his face, "Then you are looking down on me. Although I have never experienced a serious crime, I still have some good practices. I have been traveling abroad in the past few years, and I have nothing to do with my strange powers and chaos. I haven’t seen the matter before, but I still have the ability to handle it.”
Mentioning this point, the little Taoist priest's face became mysterious: "These caravans are out selling goods all year round. If some bandits and thieves come, they can easily deal with it. The only thing they are afraid of is some shady things."
These things are likely to be unclean things, or they may be some secret methods. In short, these things will never appear openly and openly in front of the caravan people. They often have to work hard behind the scenes to make people unable to guard against them.
This was not nonsense or hearsay, but something he had actually seen with his own eyes. At that time, he was walking in the northwest wilderness with a camel convoy, and he saw a lot of strange things along the way.
These caravans set out from Ganliang Mansion and crossed the Loess Plateau to the Hexi Corridor. The closer they got to the desert, the more things happened.
For example, when they passed the abandoned ancient city near the Gobi Desert, they could clearly feel that the temperature in the ancient city was much lower. Although they could see the sunlight when they walked in, they could not feel any heat. Instead, they felt a layer of hair rising.
What's even more strange is that there are many caravans passing by, but none of them dare to rest in the abandoned ancient city. Even if they are camping in the wild, they are unwilling to get close to the ancient city.
They came and went but no one stopped. Caravans with experience usually knew that the ancient city was weird and stayed away as usual.
When night came, some caravan guys approached the ancient city and could clearly feel that the ancient city was bustling, as if there were countless people living in the town. The hustle and bustle of the market was extremely real. However, all they heard were sounds, and the ancient city was still in decline. Abandoned look.
Thinking about it, I got goosebumps.
In this regard, an old man who is used to traveling in caravans described it as encountering a ghost town.
There are many abandoned cities near the Hexi Corridor. The reasons for the abandonment of these cities are complicated and diverse. Some cities were massacred and destroyed by the enemy due to ancient wars. Over time, they were abandoned and became dead cities.
Some cities were abandoned due to drastic changes in the environment. The Hexi Corridor is close to deserts, deserts, and the Gobi Desert. These harsh natural environments are not static. Maybe after the climate changes, some places will continue to lose water and soil due to lack of vegetation, and eventually the rivers will dry up. , sand erosion, soil desertification occurs. Such an environment will continue to erode the human settlement environment, eventually making the area around the city no longer suitable for living. After most people move away, the city lacks maintenance and will rapidly decline within decades. was abandoned.
No matter what the situation is, many people once lived in the city. It is natural for it to gradually decline after being abandoned for a long time. If it is a city that has been moved away naturally, it will often not be in this state. Only those who have experienced wars and massacres will Only in ancient cities can such ghost towns appear.
In the opinion of these old people, this is the trouble caused by the souls in the ancient city. After they died unjustly, they thought they were alive and continued to live in the ancient city in the form of souls. The noisy sounds they heard all came from these souls who died unjustly.
There are not two such cities. As long as it is along the Hexi Corridor, there are often many such cities. If a caravan stays overnight in such a weird ancient city, even the scumbag may not be found the next day, and it seems to disappear out of thin air. Half done.
Experienced caravans will avoid this strange environment and would rather camp outside than take the initiative to enter the ancient city to rest.
In addition to these man-eating ancient cities, caravans also have to be careful when choosing to camp. Firstly, they must not be close to an abandoned ancient city. Secondly, they must not be close to too dense woods, forests, shrubs, etc. The former is to prevent the ancient city from causing trouble, and the latter is What we are guarding against are these strange plants in the Gobi Desert.
The Gobi desert is dry and rainless, and vegetation cannot easily survive. But if you can take root and survive here, it is often not a soft persimmon.
For example, camel thorn, tamarisk, sea buckthorn, Populus euphratica, tumbleweed, Haloxylon ammodendron tree, Elaeagnus... These plants seem to be naturally born for barren sandy soil. They are extremely resistant to drought, wind and sand, salt and alkali, and can even withstand exposure and strong winds. , as long as they take root in the sandy soil, they will definitely search for water desperately. Their rhizomes are the longest and can be dozens of times longer than the part that grows out of the sandy soil layer.
These plants desperately trying to survive are a characteristic of the Gobi desert, and of course there are countless strange things.
For example, there once was a plant called coral willow in the desert. This coral willow is also called blood willow. Its appearance is no different from tamarisk, but it is bright and beautiful. The branches are like red coral, and the flowers are shaped like ears of acacia. , exuding bursts of vague fragrance, but beneath the beautiful appearance, it hides a bloodthirsty and terrifying nature.
They will release a slightly salty liquid, attracting some beasts or animals that need to replenish salt, to lick its branches. As long as these animals are fooled, they will be knocked down by the venom in the liquid when licking the salty juice. , collapsed to the ground completely weak.
At this time, the blood willow will continue to grow branches until the branches cover these living creatures. Then in two months, the living creatures will be digested until only skeletons are left. Even the skeletons will eventually be weathered into slag.
They are extremely bloodthirsty, and of course they cannot differentiate between humans and animals. Even if a living person passes by these blood willows, they will be attracted by the smell of the blood willows. If you look carefully at the branches of these blood willows, they are as beautiful as corals, and you will want to pick them. thoughts.
As long as people reach out and touch these branches, they will eventually lose consciousness under the paralysis of the liquid and fall headlong into these beautiful and brilliant blood willow bushes.
At this time, because the force of the fall is relatively strong, the blood willow will directly pierce the person's skin. If the contact area between the body and the blood willow is large, it may also pierce the abdomen and internal organs.
These branches that pierce the human body continue to grow and eventually penetrate from other parts of the body. They can also use the tentacles between the branches to continuously digest the human body until the human is digested until only a skeleton is left. Be released.
Perhaps because of devouring flesh and blood, these plants grow extremely bright and lush, often in dense clusters like forests, completely different from the surrounding thin and barren desert vegetation, as if they are species that do not belong to the desert.
Those caravans traveling west of Hexi, whenever they encounter desert plants that are too bright, or woods and shrubs that are too dense, they will wonder in their hearts whether they have entered a jungle of some bloodthirsty plants.
The only way to deal with it, apart from staying away from them, is to chop and kill. They will cut out the isolation zone directly along the camping position, and just wait until the vegetation near the isolation zone is burned, and these plants will be gone. Opportunity to show off your skills.
That is to say, but because there are many plants like blood willow, Populus euphratica, sea buckthorn, and camel thorns may turn into killers that devour humans and animals, they make it difficult for people to guard against. More caravans are worse than less, and they are often far away from the lushness. Bushes farther away.
The elders of the caravan didn't know why these plants became like this. They only heard from local herders that the Gobi Desert was barren and barren, and it was simply not suitable for plants and animals to survive. These plants wanted to survive so much that they either took deep roots to accumulate nutrients, or that Just find another way.
Over time, some plants gradually took a "wrong path". In order to survive in the desert with scarce nutrients, they could only evolve murderous viciousness, causing people who came near to be unaware of it and be paralyzed. When they felt something abnormal, they would already Unable to move anymore, he became a meal for some plant.
These strange monsters are still dead things. During the process of the caravan transporting goods, some living creatures appeared, which were stranger and more terrifying than these dead things.
The black cloth bat is a very terrifying creature in the Gobi desert!
Black cloth bat is the name given to this terrifying creature by the local people in the desert. It is just because these things seem to be bigger than the head and look like a piece of black cloth that can cover the entire head, hence the name black cloth bat.
In fact, very few people are alive who have actually encountered black cloth bats. No one knows whether they are bats, butterflies or other monsters.
The only thing that is known is that they will chase living people and devour brains, and they will never be satisfied. As long as they catch someone, they will inevitably suck their brains out.
