Chapter 318: Robbed a Tomb, and Someone Died Too

Yan Wenjing grabbed a handful of cow dung, his eyes bulging.

Two Police officers were beaming with joy; one took a shovel, the other used his hands to dig, picking out the white granules one by one.

Make no mistake, this was cow dung—slimy, stinking, and still dripping with urine; three Police officers didn't even have time to put on their spare gloves.

Several leaders sensed something was wrong, and regardless of how dirty the ground was, they all crowded around in unison.

Watching the officer continuously pick out the white granules, Director Chen from the Municipal Bureau squinted: "What is this, lime?"

Sun Jiamu took a look: "No, it's Ancient Three-in-one Soil!"

Director Chen was suddenly startled.

How could there be Ancient Three-in-one Soil in cow dung?

Unless there was a tomb underneath, and it was dug out from the top of the vault when the Tomb Tunnel was being made.

But when they surveyed earlier, why didn't the instruments detect a Tomb Tunnel?

Nine times out of ten, the Tomb Tunnel was filled back in after the digging was finished.

Wu Hui looked at Sun Jiamu, but Sun Jiamu didn't make a sound, so he looked at Lin Sicheng instead.

Lin Sicheng didn't speak; he looked around, then walked closer to the enclosure wall and peered through the window where the dung was shoveled out.

Four cows—two large and two small—stared with curious, wide eyes. Chain-style tethers were tied to the pillars beside the concrete trough.

The ordinary poplar wood had already seen some years and was covered in fly-specked dung marks. Arm-thick wooden poles were laid across the top, covered with poplar branches and then mud.

There were many leaves, already dried to a grayish color.

The wall was also very old, just an ordinary mud-brick wall, with grooves and channels left behind by the traces of Rain washing over it.

At first glance, it looked normal; both the structure and the building materials were very common in northern villages.

What was abnormal was that the concrete cow trough and the concrete floor were newly built; by visual estimation, they were no more than half a year old.

This was very unreasonable: a concrete floor of several dozen square meters, a concrete cow trough eighty centimeters high, half a meter thick, and forty to fifty meters long—in a village that relied mainly on manual labor, the workload was by no means small.

But without tearing down the walls or the roof, how was it finished?

How were the sand, stone, and cement transported in, and how was the construction carried out?

Were they just carrying it in, shovel by shovel, from the outside?

"Paving a concrete floor in a cow pen?" Lin Sicheng exhaled: "Captain Yan, the Tomb Tunnel is in the cow pen; it was likely a Grave-robbing done under the guise of renovating the pen. The Tomb Tunnel was sealed after the robbery, and the seal was concrete."

Yan Wenjing could understand the second half of the sentence, but he didn't quite understand the first half: "Why can't you pave concrete in a cow pen?"

Lin Sicheng explained patiently: "Cows have a characteristic: they eat a lot and they excrete a lot. This place gets a lot of Rain and is so damp; if you pave it with concrete, how slippery would the ground be? In summer it's a mud pond, in winter it's an ice rink. An adult cow weighs at least half a ton; if it slips once, it's a fracture, and then it can only go to the slaughterhouse."

That's one reason. Secondly, the corrosive power of cow urine and cow dung is extremely strong, and cows are large and heavy, so their destructive power is not small. A concrete floor like this would crack in half a year and be trampled into a horse-trap pit in no more than two years.

"Replacing it every two years, how high would that cost be? It would also hurt the cows' hooves, so even in large-scale farming, concrete flooring is rarely used; most use yellow sand."

Yan Wenjing was invigorated and just about to arrange for his subordinates when Lin Sicheng shook his head and gestured with his chin to the side: "Captain Yan, don't make too much of a scene!"

What was nearby? The villagers watching?

No, there was still another tomb that hadn't been robbed.

Being able to dig out the Three-in-one Soil from the vault top, it was estimated that the one under their feet had already been robbed clean. But for a Grave Robber to be careful enough to backfill the Tomb Tunnel and pack it so tightly that high-tech instruments couldn't detect it—was it for the sake of environmental protection?

This was to cover people's eyes and ears, preparing to rob the tomb next to it.

As the saying goes, those who live on the mountain live off the mountain, and those who live by the water live off the water. This village is so close to the imperial mausoleum; I wouldn't say everyone is a Grave Robber or a dealer in Cultural Relics, but there are definitely quite a few villagers who associate with criminals in those two lines of work.

Take a guess: is there anyone among them who happens to know the gang that robbed this tomb? It's even more likely that an accomplice is in the village, right there among the people watching...

Yan Wenjing suddenly realized: after keeping it a secret for so long, if the on-site work wasn't done well, it was all for nothing.

He was shocked and turned to report to the Vice President and the Branch Captain.

The two leaders then invited Li Zhijie and the Office Director of the Municipal Bureau to coordinate.

Suddenly, there was reporting and calling for people.

Director Chen was only responsible for making connections, not for specific operations, so he was idle for a moment. He peered through the window, sizing up the cow pen.

The cow trough was new; anyone with eyes could see that. But the floor was also new; not many could tell.

What Director Chen found strange was that without having lived in the countryside for a long time, it was impossible to know so much: why lime couldn't be sprinkled and concrete couldn't be paved in a cow pen.

It wasn't that Yan Wenjing wasn't professional, nor was he making excuses for him, but their focuses were different. If you don't believe it, go ask: find ten Police officers in the city, and see if even two of them know these things.

As these thoughts turned, he curiously sized up Lin Sicheng: "Has Teacher Lin lived in the countryside?"

"Of course!" Lin Sicheng didn't blink, "My home is in the countryside; I've seen these things since I was a child!"

Director Chen believed him, but Wang Qi Zhi curled his lip: Are you listening to his bullshit?

Because there was a family house in the old hometown, Lin Sicheng only had his household registration in the countryside. Plus, counting the holidays, the number of times he returned to the countryside in a year could be counted on one hand.

And right outside his door was Qujiangchi, a famous tourist attraction in Xijing City. Let alone raising cows, they didn't even allow chickens to be raised now; where would he have seen it?

Just as he was sighing, a burst of noise came from the side.

It seemed like the villagers were arguing; there were men cursing, women wailing, and even children crying.

It was a bit far away, so it wasn't very clear, and Lin Sicheng walked over.

Wang Qi Zhi was stunned: "Where are you going?"

"Going over to take a look."

"Villagers arguing, what's there to see?"

An ordinary argument of course had nothing to see, but Lin Sicheng was tall and could see far: the one hiding on the ground, throwing a tantrum and wailing at the top of her lungs, seemed to be the mistress of the house next door.

She was the sister-in-law of the family with the cow pen; the pile of corn that had just been pushed out belonged to her family.

Walking closer and listening for a few moments, Lin Sicheng roughly understood: there was a tomb under the threshing floor, and the tomb wasn't small, so relevant protection work definitely had to be done. The corn that had been pushed out certainly couldn't be pushed back, and it had to be hauled away.

The mistress said she had nowhere to put it, and if they wanted to haul it, they could haul it, but they had to compensate her for the market price, and she wanted the money on the spot.

Even if they were to compensate her, it couldn't be that fast: the Town Mayor said it had to be reported and approved, which would take at least three to five days. When the woman heard this, she thought they were trying to fool her, and then they started arguing.

As they argued, the villagers called the woman's parents-in-law, and the three of them argued together, and then the woman from the cow pen family joined in, demanding that they push the dung back for her.

Therefore, the women rolling on the ground were not one, but three: one mother-in-law, and two daughters-in-law.

The father-in-law stiffened his neck and roared at the people from the town: "Even if you pay me now, this corn cannot be hauled away. Whoever dares to touch a single grain of it, all eight of us in this family will die right here."

Four adults, plus four children...

Lin Sicheng squeezed forward: "3911?"

Yan Wenjing was confused: "What?"

"Phorate, an insecticide, that bottle of pesticide in the old man's hand!" Lin Sicheng pointed, "Highly toxic, one sip and you're dead for sure!"

Yan Wenjing looked strange: "How do you know everything?"

Lin Sicheng blurted out: "My family is from the countryside!"

Yan Wenjing didn't make a sound, blinking her eyes.

Director Chen hadn't read Lin Sicheng's file, so naturally he believed it immediately, but he had read it.

"Captain Yan, have the people been called in?"

"Of course, they'll be here in twenty minutes!"

"Does something feel off?" Lin Sicheng thought for a moment, "These people seem to be deliberately trying to blow things out of proportion?"

The corn couldn't possibly be hauled right now, so the items were still there. Besides, the town mayor personally guaranteed that at most in three days, after the compensation was in place, it would be hauled, and absolutely at market price.

It was nothing more than piling it up for three more days; even if they weren't compensated in the end, they wouldn't lose anything. But if they were compensated, they wouldn't need to thresh it themselves, let alone hire a vehicle to haul it to the grain station; how much effort would that save?

Moreover, the town mayor gave his word, the village party secretary and village director guaranteed it, and they were even willing to write a promissory note, so what was there to make a scene about?

To the point of wanting to drink pesticide, or even dragging the whole family to their deaths?

"These few must know there is a tomb underneath; nine times out of ten, the one under the cattle pen that was robbed has something to do with them. Fearing the matter would be uncovered, they naturally have to obstruct it in every way."

Yan Wenjing lowered her voice, "I just asked around; the cattle pen was renovated during the Qingming Festival. They didn't hire people from the village, but several Craftsman from out of town. After finishing the cattle pen, the two brothers went out to work and never came back..."

"But don't worry, they can't stir up trouble. Even if someone wants to send a message, they can't get it out: the telecommunications bureau and the mobile company have both been notified. I'm not afraid of him sending a message, I'm afraid he won't..."

That night, why were Ma Long and Ma Shan caught so quickly? It was because they were tracked based on phone signals.

No wonder everyone was standing here watching, and no one was trying to persuade them?

Lin Sicheng was noncommittal, squinting his eyes to take a look.

The old man was shouting at the top of his lungs, occasionally waving the pesticide bottle. The three women stopped rolling and sat on the ground, wailing at the top of their lungs.

But it was a bit strange: the mother-in-law and the younger sister-in-law were crying for real, one with tears streaming down her face, the other heartbroken. Only the eldest sister-in-law, the mistress of this cattle pen family, was just sitting there dry-heaving, unable to squeeze out a single tear for a long time.

It was just moving some corn; if it couldn't be done, it couldn't be done, why be so heartbroken?

Subconsciously, Lin Sicheng remembered the time he bluffed Ma Long.

Afterwards, he turned his head back and looked at the cattle pen behind him, his eyelids twitching uncontrollably twice.

"Captain Yan, you just said that after finishing the cattle pen, the two brothers went out to work and never came back?"

"Yes, probably hiding out!"

After committing a crime, going out to avoid the Wind is normal.

The fear is that the brothers aren't just avoiding the Wind...

Lin Sicheng's heart stirred, and he just wanted to give Yan Wenjing a heads-up, but the words reached his lips and he swallowed them back.

Yan Wenjing probably wouldn't be able to handle it.

It wasn't that her ability was lacking, but it was her personality; she had been a Police officer for a long time and had always been in a leadership position, accustomed to giving orders. Unknowingly, whether it was her speech, her expression, or her gaze, all carried a bit of sharpness and scrutiny.

Such a person would subconsciously make people feel alert and secretly guarded.

But for the moment, there was no one else suitable?

Lin Sicheng looked left and right: "Captain Yan, I'll go over and persuade them, but you don't go."

Wang Qi Zhi was slow to react and was startled: "Lin Sicheng, don't mess around. What if they get desperate, the old man pins you down and forces you to drink some, what then?"

Lin Sicheng couldn't help but laugh or cry: How is that possible?

"Teacher, I suspect what's inside is water!"

Wang Qi Zhi glared at him: "Even if it's water, what if the old man kicks you twice?"

You really couldn't say.

If it were before, Lin Sicheng naturally wouldn't be afraid, but he had just been injured...

"Teacher, Senior Brother Fang, let's go together!"

Wang Qi Zhi nodded: That's more like it.

Yan Wenjing looked strange, as if saying: The village party secretary is here, the town mayor is here, and the leaders of the cemetery management committee are here, what can you persuade them to do by going over?

And she wasn't even allowed to go herself?

Wang Qi Zhi curled his lips and shook his head: Yan Wenjing's reaction ability wasn't very good.

Lin Sicheng didn't speak: Her quick wit was indeed a bit lacking. If it were Jing Zeyang, he would know what he wanted to do with a roll of his eyes.

Of course, Yan Wenjing was definitely better than Tang Nanyan.

With these thoughts, Lin Sicheng took out his Compass and walked up to the group.

Sure enough, looking pleasing to the eye really does have its advantages, and the key was that he was still young. The old man just glanced at him and continued shouting at the town mayor and the village party secretary.

Lin Sicheng patted the child's head.

The eldest sister-in-law stopped her dry-heaving, while the mother-in-law and the younger sister-in-law were still crying, grief-stricken and heartbroken.

The crying was real, and the sadness was also real.

The strange thing was that in the gaps of crying, the younger sister-in-law would look at the eldest sister-in-law from time to time, and at the two children beside her, her eyes filled with deep hatred, as if she were looking at an enemy?

Lin Sicheng gave a start, and his heart sank.

Seeing him standing still and not speaking, the eldest sister-in-law looked at him strangely: "Young man, what are you doing?"

"Just came over to take a look!" Lin Sicheng smiled, "I am a Yin-Yang master!"

A Daoist, so young?

But what is a Daoist here for? Surely not to say: the orientation of our corn and cow dung pile is wrong, ruining the Wind and water?

The eldest sister-in-law felt even stranger, but the mother-in-law and the younger sister-in-law stopped crying, staring straight at the Compass in his hand.

Lin Sicheng squatted down, the Compass spun around with a whir, turning several times, the Needle pointing straight at the cow pen.

"Big sister, do you know why the Compass Needle points there? Because there is a wronged soul, there is resentment!"

The younger sister-in-law froze, her lips trembling, tears streaming down incessantly. Suddenly, she glanced at the eldest sister-in-law again, the hatred in her eyes deepening, her teeth clenching with a chattering sound.

Finished, is this really a human tragedy?

If it was just a sudden whim before, a wild flight of fancy, thinking of taking a shot at it regardless of whether there were dates or not, now Lin Sicheng had at least fifty percent certainty.

He sighed again: "Ma'am, the palm and the back of the hand are both flesh; the son is gone, what is the use of being compensated with more money?"

The old woman was suddenly stunned, her two eyeballs bulging forcefully, that kind of feeling as if they would burst from their sockets and jump out.

Lin Sicheng turned his head again, looking at the younger sister-in-law beside him: "Big sister, the two children are still so young, and both are boys; with your man gone, what will you do in the future?"

The woman's face turned deathly pale, her tears flowing even faster.

Alright, now it is at least seventy or eighty percent.

Lin Sicheng raised his hand, pointing at the cow pen: "Bullied while alive, and not allowed to rest in peace after death, pressed by dung, trampled by livestock; Ma'am, eldest sister-in-law, don't you have nightmares at night?"

The mother-in-law and the younger sister-in-law shuddered in unison, with expressions as if they had seen a ghost.

The eldest sister-in-law looked blank, not knowing what this kid was talking about. The father-in-law beside her, however, suddenly changed color: "Labi, I'll fuck your mother, are you spouting nonsense?"

"Uncle, I am not spouting nonsense, I am a Daoist!"

"You Daoist your mother's..."

The old man cursed, and a bottle was smashed over.

The injury was to his arm and shoulder, but Lin Sicheng's legs were fine. Stepping back, the bottle flew past his eyes.

With a "clatter," glass shattered all over the ground.

Lin Sicheng glanced at it and sniffed: "Look, I said it was water!"

Wang Qi Zhi glared at him and kicked the old man who rushed up, sending him tumbling.

The old man scrambled up, looking around for a weapon.

Yan Wenjing was right there; he might lack quick wit, but he was not an idiot. Lin Sicheng had spoken so clearly, and with the old man, the old woman, and that younger sister-in-law so agitated, even a fool could guess what had happened.

He was quick-handed and sharp-eyed, tackling the old man to the ground.

Like a pig being slaughtered, the old man shouted and cursed with all his might, the filth piercing to the ears.

The three women woke up as if from a dream, scrambling to rush forward. Yan Wenjing raised his head, staring at his subordinates: "Stunned for what? Why aren't you pulling them away?"

"No, pin down the adults, take the children away..."

Several Police officers were confused.

But the leader gave the order, don't ask for the reason, just do it first. Even if they did it wrong, the leader would take the blame.

The others were even more bewildered.

A minute ago, the old man was still arguing with the village head, and the three women were still rolling on the ground crying. Then, this young man went up and said two sentences, the two women looked like they were scared silly, and the old man was even more like he had gone crazy?

Lin Sicheng sighed: "The eldest brother killed the second brother and buried him in the cow pen!"

Several leaders were stunned in unison: What is this?

"It should be an internal conflict due to uneven distribution of loot; it might not have been the eldest brother who made the first move, but he definitely delivered the final blow..."

Lin Sicheng looked at the eldest sister-in-law: "Eldest sister-in-law, wasn't it before the cow pen was finished being repaired that your brother-in-law went out to work? And it was many days later that your man left?"

The woman bit her teeth hard, her lips trembling, her gaze shifting back and forth between the father-in-law and mother-in-law with suspicion and fear.

Lin Sicheng looked at the old man again: "The eldest brother admitted that he killed the person, but the money was definitely paid by the boss. He was afraid the younger sister-in-law would see him, get hot-headed, and report it to the Police, so he hid away."

The old man struggled hard, but how could a sixty-year-old man struggle against the prime-of-life Yan Wenjing?

It was just that there were too many onlookers, otherwise Yan Wenjing would have used Handcuffs long ago.

Unable to break free for a moment, the old man cursed anxiously: "Labi, you're talking shit!"

"I am not Labi, I am a Daoist!" Lin Sicheng pointed at the cow pen, "Whether I am talking shit or not, we will know once we dig."

The old man paused abruptly, his face as white as dirt, his whole body trembling.

"My son... my son..." The old woman let out a tragic cry, rushing over to hug Lin Sicheng's leg. But before she could move properly, she was pulled back by the Police.

"Daoist, how is my son down there... how is my son?"

"Buried in a dung pit, worse than having no place to be buried, how do you think he is?"

The younger sister-in-law cried uncontrollably, biting her lips until they bled: "Report to the Police, I want to report to the Police: Zhang Zhong killed Zhang Xiao and buried him in the cow pen... Zhang Zhong is my brother-in-law, Zhang Xiao is my husband..."

Lin Sicheng sighed again: Alright, now it is ten out of ten...

A group of people looked at each other in dismay.

Things happened too fast, many people didn't even react.

Only a few Police officers managed to sort out some clues:

Lin Sicheng saw the father-in-law's reaction was too intense; just to move a pile of corn, he actually brought out a pesticide bottle and even wanted to drag the whole family to their deaths?

Suspecting there was a problem, Lin Sicheng acted on a whim and bluffed.

But how did he know there was someone buried in the cow pen?

Because Ma Shan had revealed a flaw: after tomb robbing, there was an internal conflict over the distribution of loot, and after killing to silence the witness, they buried him in the Tomb Tunnel.

If they robbed this place, then he must be buried under the cow pen.

How did Lin Sicheng know it was the eldest brother who killed the second brother?

Because the mother-in-law and the second daughter-in-law cried too sadly, and the second daughter-in-law looked at her sister-in-law and the two nieces as if they were mortal enemies.

As for why he had to carry a Compass and pretend to be a Daoist from beginning to end?

If you do no evil, you need not fear a knock at the door; at this time, in this place, a Yin-Yang master is ten thousand times more useful than the Police.

Just like the younger daughter-in-law, it was only because she believed he was a Yin-Yang master that she spoke of calling the Police...

Lin Sicheng looked at the two elderly people again: "Old folks, don't be stubborn. They will dig the person out in a moment, and no matter how much money the Grave-robbing boss paid you, you won't be able to hide it."

"Besides, your second son was not killed by your eldest son; he was forced by someone else to deliver the final blow. If he hadn't delivered that blow, he would have been the next one..."

"So even if he is caught, at most he will be sentenced for Grave-robbing. But if he doesn't turn himself in and the real murderer isn't caught, he will have to take the blame for this murder whether he did it or not..."

"Furthermore, human life is at stake. If the boss can kill one, he can kill two, and it won't be long!"

Lin Sicheng pointed at the threshing floor, "After they finish robbing this tomb, your eldest son will also be silenced..."

The old man froze and began to tremble, trembling more and more violently. After a long while, he lifted his head with effort: "Did the second son's soul tell you that? That it really wasn't the eldest who killed the second?"

Lin Sicheng thought for a moment: "I calculated it myself. It's not very precise, but at least seventy or eighty percent!"

It was merely a deduction, not fortune-telling: they were flesh and blood; no matter how desperate things got, it was impossible to kill one's own brother in front of an outsider.

It would be a different story in private when no one was around...

"Eighty percent... that's enough!" The old man gritted his teeth and spat out two words from between them, "I'll talk!"

The crowd was shocked once again: this actually worked?

It really did work, because the old man believed it at least seventy or eighty percent: very few people knew that someone was buried under the cow pen.

The Grave-robbing boss wouldn't say it, the eldest son wouldn't say it, and the old woman and the second son's wife wouldn't say it either. The old man just felt that, other than the second son visiting him in a dream, it could only be through fortune-telling.

What was more critical was that the corpse would be dug up in a moment. If the money were confiscated, and there was neither the person nor the money, the second son's wife would definitely call the Police.

The old man couldn't hide it even if he wanted to; there was no other way, so he had to take a gamble.

The old man and the two women were taken into the vehicle, and the villagers who were watching the commotion were all persuaded to return home.

The loader drove over and began to dismantle the cow shed. After tearing up the concrete floor, Lin Sicheng poked a few times with an Exploration Probe and found the Tomb Tunnel.

They brought over two Excavators and dug around the Tomb Tunnel. After digging less than a meter, a corpse was revealed in the night soil used to fill the hole.

The soil was alkaline and low in microorganisms, so the body was only half-decayed. It was already unrecognizable, but fortunately, the clothes were still there.

They called the two women and the two elderly people over separately to identify it, but they all said it was not Zhang Xiao.

The clothes were wrong, and it wasn't this short: the forensic doctor estimated the deceased was between 1.65 and 1.7 meters, but Zhang Xiao was 1.85 meters tall.

They continued to dig down, and after digging only two buckets' worth, they dug out another one.

But it still wasn't him.

Immediately after, two more were dug out from below, but it still wasn't him.

A group of leaders from the local Public Security Bureau and Cultural Relics Bureau looked as if they had all been stunned.

He Zhuguan and Li Zhijie had dark faces; they looked at each other, not knowing what to say.

Just as they had thought before: if it were just a case of Grave-robbing, even if they had dug up an imperial tomb, it wouldn't be anything extraordinary.

But what if people had also died?

Four bodies had already been dug out, and they still hadn't found Zhang Xiao; didn't that mean there were at least five people buried down here?

Three wounds from sharp weapons, one gunshot wound—could this still be suicide?

Five people or more, and involving firearms... this was already a major criminal case among major criminal cases. If the scale of the tomb was large enough and the loss of Cultural Relics was great enough, this could already qualify as "extraordinarily major."

Damn it...

(End of this chapter)