“Ah!”
While walking, a sudden scream of terror echoed from behind, courtesy of Rita.
“What’s wrong?” The four of them asked in unison.
“I-I feel like something flew over my head.” Rita’s voice trembled with fear as the bright flashlight scanned erratically, revealing nothing.
Brook approached her, comforting, “Don’t worry, Rita, I’ve got you.”
After another ten minutes, they finally finished descending the stone steps. However, contrary to their expectations, there was no grand entrance to a burial chamber ahead. Instead, they were met with a bare rock wall.
It seemed the stone steps terminated here, leading to nothing. All eyes turned to Leo, waiting for his decision.
Leo approached the rock wall, feeling and inspecting it meticulously with his hands and flashlight, hoping to discover some sort of mechanism.
However, he was disappointed; the rock wall was featureless, with no sign of any mechanism.
This was entirely unscientific. Could it be that the tomb wasn’t completed?
Absolutely not. Leo began searching his mind for knowledge about ancient tombs, hoping to find some clues in ancient Feng Shui texts.
“The door of life and death, standing and enduring, separating yin and yang,” Leo murmured to himself.
Brook couldn’t help but interject, “There’s only a stone wall here. Where’s the door?”
“This stone wall is the door of life and death, separating yin and yang,” Professor Orlando said calmly. “Leo, do you have a way to open the door of life and death?”
To open the door, one needed the fresh blood of a virgin. Leo couldn’t help but look at Rita in the darkness.
“There’s a way. To open this door, we need a drop of a virgin’s blood, coupled with the corresponding incantation,” Leo explained. The four of them suddenly looked at Rita, making her blush even in the darkness.
“Cough, cough.” Professor Orlando coughed awkwardly. “Rita…”
“Professor, no need to say anything. It’s just a drop of blood,” Rita said, and in the darkness, the sound of a mineral water bottle being opened was heard. After a while, she handed the bottle cap to Leo.
Taking the bottle cap and looking at the fresh blood Rita had dripped into it, Leo placed it against the base of the wall.
He motioned for the others to step back, and then Leo started walking in strange patterns, forming a figure-eight, while chanting ancient incantations.
In the darkness, the blood droplet slowly floated up. When it reached about a meter above the ground, it gradually approached the rock wall until it completely merged into it.
In the next moment, there was a rustling sound, and the rock wall began to disintegrate into fine sand. Finally, a door appeared before them.
“Truly amazing,” Rita exclaimed in the darkness.
Brook and Frederic also praised in unison, and Professor Orlando, after giving Leo a profound look, signaled everyone to enter.
Inside, they found a large stone chamber. Oddly, the chamber was empty, devoid of any burial items. There wasn’t even an extra stone.
“Professor Orlando, why are there no burial items in the tomb? Could it have been raided by tomb robbers?” Brook scanned around with the flashlight but found no burial items.
Professor Orlando was also puzzled. Normally, there should be some burial items in the tomb. It seemed like it had been thoroughly plundered by tomb robbers. His excitement was now dampened.
At this moment, the voices of Rita and Frederic came from afar, “Professor, there’s a door over here!”
The northwest corner of the stone chamber did indeed have an open stone door. The group didn’t hesitate and walked through the stone door.
Another corridor awaited them, and as the flashlight swept the corridor walls, Rita suddenly cried out in fear, “Ah, monsters!”
Startled by Rita’s scream, the group gathered and shone their flashlights around, only to discover murals on the walls.
These murals were exceptionally eerie. Unlike those depicting the life stories of the tomb’s owner, these murals portrayed various monsters and demons.
There were creatures with long nails piercing through the hearts of the living, those with menacing fangs and wide-open eyes exhaling black mist, and even ones completely decayed into skeletons feasting on the living…
The predominant color of the murals was blood red, invoking a nauseating and fearful feeling in the hearts of the five.
Staring at the murals for an extended period induced a sensation that the monsters within were coming to life, followed by an illusion of these creatures lunging towards them.
Leo quickly focused his mind, dispelling any distracting thoughts to avoid being influenced by the murals.
However, the other four were clearly affected. Rita sat on the ground, crying; Frederic, terrified, screamed and ran ahead; Brook, holding a flashlight, wildly swung it around, repeatedly shouting, “Stay away! Stay away!”
As for Professor Orlando, he fainted directly on the ground.
Leo hurriedly went to lift Rita, secretly activating his spiritual power to dispel the illusions in her mind.
Only then did Rita calm down, her teary eyes fixed on Leo, and suddenly, she tightly hugged him.
Leo understood that this girl must have been terrified. As a graduate student in archaeology, she had likely seen many ancient corpses, but illusions that could deceive the mind were apparently beyond her control.
After consoling Rita, Leo helped Professor Orlando, who had fainted on the ground, back to consciousness.
Using his spiritual power, Leo then dispelled the illusions in Brook’s mind.
“What happened to me?” Professor Orlando stood up, supporting himself, and noticed that only Leo, Rita, and Brook were around. He asked, “Where is everyone else? Where’s Frederic?”
“Professor, Frederic is heavily affected by the murals. He ran deeper into the corridor. We need to catch up with him quickly; otherwise, he might be in danger,” Leo reminded.
The group hastily ran to catch up.
Surprisingly, the corridor was quite long. Despite running and panting, they couldn’t reach the end, and Frederic was nowhere in sight.
Based on their estimated speed, Leo speculated that this corridor was about five hundred meters long.
If the corridor exceeded five hundred meters, how large would this tomb be? Probably the entire mountain couldn’t contain it, which was obviously unscientific.
Could it be the legendary ghost wall? Leo quickly shone his flashlight on the corridor walls but found no more murals of monsters. The walls were clean, with nothing on them.
“Look, there’s light ahead!” Brook pointed forward, shouting.
“Hurry, it must be Frederic.” Professor Orlando, concerned for his student, rushed forward with labored breath.
However, to his disappointment, the light wasn’t from their flashlights but emitted from the top of the rock wall.
Finally, the corridor reached its end, revealing another stone chamber. The top of this chamber was adorned with luminous stones, emitting a faint blue glow that illuminated the entire chamber.
Different from the previous chamber, this one was filled with various burial items, mostly made of gold. Although many were covered in dust, the outlines were still discernible.
There were golden bowls, hairpins, combs, pendants, bracelets…