Chapter 128: Crack (Part 2)

From the moment I heard Poker-face speak to the moment I saw him vanish in front of me, no more than five seconds passed. Even a mouse couldn't disappear that quickly in such an environment, let alone a person.

I immediately sensed something was wrong. Subconsciously I took a step back, trying to get a clearer look. In a daze, I then saw Poker-face appear again ahead of me.

Fatty was right behind me. My backward step startled him, and he asked, "What's up?"

For a moment I was completely baffled, and stammered, "No... nothing."

Poker-face seemed unaware that anything odd had just happened with him. He paused, then called out to us and began to crawl forward faster.

That disappearance and reappearance happened in an instant. Although I had perceived it very clearly, seeing the scene before me now made me suddenly lose my conviction. I felt very puzzled. Could it be that the air here was making me hallucinate?

The situation didn't allow me to think too much. Fatty tugged at my foot from behind, urging me on. Still perplexed, I crawled on for a while longer. When I passed the spot where Poker-face had disappeared, I paid special attention to my surroundings. There was no depression or anything that could have created an illusion, but I had a vague sense that something was wrong.

After passing that section and advancing about ten more minutes, Poker-face suddenly relaxed his body and extended himself forward completely. I saw the space ahead widen and knew the exit had arrived.

The end of the crevice was filled with a large pile of rubble. After crawling out, Poker-face lit several glow sticks and tossed them around. The warm yellow light illuminated the whole area. I turned to look and found that this was probably a relatively spacious part of the entire mountain fissure, about the width of four or five minivans and about the length of one and a half basketball courts. The floor was covered with broken stones of various sizes, all torn loose by the geological activity that had formed this fissure.

Fatty widened the beam of his flashlight and looked around, saying, "Strange—there are even murals here. Looks like we're not the first people to come here..."

We walked up and saw that the walls of the crevice were indeed covered with large colorful murals, but they were in very poor condition. The colors were faded, and we could barely make out the patterns, which seemed to depict celestial maidens flying.

The entrance into this place was blocked by a huge stone slab, and there were murals inside. What kind of place was this? I felt puzzled once again.

We walked back and forth. Among the rubble, we found several small hot spring vents, all very shallow but steaming with heat, irresistibly inviting. But we found no traces of any other human activity.

Further inside, the crevice gradually narrowed again, turning into a gap barely wide enough for two people, leading deep into the rock. Hot air occasionally blew out from the gap. I walked over, shone my light inside, and saw it was bottomless, with no way to tell where it led.

We exchanged opinions and decided there was no need to go further in. This was already a good place to take shelter from the blizzard. Fatty tested the air and found it acceptable, then set up a storm lantern for sustained lighting. Poker-face crawled back through the narrow gap to notify the others outside.

In no time, Monk Hua and Ye Cheng entered one after another. Shunzi was also pulled in by Panzi. I immediately went to check on him. I saw that because of the temperature here, his face had started to regain some color, but his hands and feet were still ice-cold. I wasn't sure if he could pull through.

He had been the one leading us up here. If he died, although it wouldn't mean we couldn't get down, it would definitely add a lot of difficulties. Besides, I really liked this guy and didn't want him to die innocently because of us.

Monk Hua checked his heartbeat and pulse, then told me to move aside. He soaked a towel in the hot spring water, let it cool a little on the rock, and used it to wipe Shunzi's body. After wiping him until his whole body was flushed red, he fed him some hot water. Shunzi began to cough violently, and his eyelids twitched.

We all breathed a little easier. Monk Hua said, "Alright, he won't die now."

The atmosphere relaxed. Fatty and Ye Cheng both took out cigarettes and lit up. Just then, Chenpi A'si was also helped in by Panzi.

After this series of events, we were all exhausted and didn't have the energy to talk. Each of us found a comfortable spot to lean against. The snow on our bodies melted into water from the temperature change, and our clothes and shoes began to get damp. We took off our clothes and laid them on dry rocks to steam dry. Ye Cheng took out some canned food, heated it in the hot spring water, and distributed it to everyone.

As I ate, I went with Monk Hua to look at the murals we had just discovered. This place was clearly naturally formed, and the space was cramped. Why would someone paint murals here? The fact that Poker-face had suddenly vanished in front of me earlier, along with the huge sealing stone at the entrance, gave me a very unnatural feeling.

People who deal with antiquities are always very interested in murals and reliefs, which convey a lot of information. Seeing us looking, the others gradually came over as well.

However, the murals didn't contain much information. Murals of celestial maidens flying are mostly found in ornate palaces or ritual vessels, simply depicting a scene of song, dance, and peace—there's no real meaning. Most of the mural fragments here were of this type. Since we were all people who crawled out of ancient tombs, we had seen plenty, and we quickly lost interest.

I was about to go back and rub my toes—after all this walking, my feet had sweated a lot, and my toes were numb and sore from the cold—when I heard Fatty say, "Huh?" He extended his thumb and started peeling at the mural with his fingernail.

I asked him what he was doing. Even if this stuff wasn't valuable, it was still a relic left by our predecessors; you shouldn't go damaging it.

Fatty said, "Bullshit—are my fingernails worthless? I don't peel just anything. Come look for yourself—this mural has two layers!"

"Two layers?" I grunted, frowning. What did he mean? Everyone gathered around again to see what he was talking about. He showed us his finger, which had red vermilion pigment scraped off on it. Then we looked at the spot in front of him. Sure enough, in a corner of the mural, the composition was clearly different from the surrounding area, and the painting was also different. That spot was extremely inconspicuous; if Fatty's eyes weren't so sharp, no one would have noticed.

It was clearly a case where someone had painted a new layer over an existing mural, covering up the original one.

The upper layer, exposed to the air, had gradually fallen off, revealing the mural underneath. This often happens in oil paintings.

Fatty continued scraping with his finger. The areas he scraped off began to show bright colors.

I also scraped at the mural with my finger and found that the top layer didn't seem to have been finished through all the steps. That's why Fatty could easily wipe the color off with just a scrape. Otherwise, according to the complete procedure, after the Tang Dynasty, a special clear coat would be applied over the mural, protecting it like varnish and preventing the colors from fading and peeling so easily.

Chenpi A'si frowned deeply. Soon, a large area of mural the size of a washbasin was peeled off. Underneath this mural appeared half a carriage painted in multicolored pigments. The carriage was clearly floating on clouds, with several women in Mongol attire attending to it on either side. The occupant of the carriage was a fat man, and I had never seen the style of his clothing before.

This was a narrative mural. I suddenly grew tense.

Obviously, someone had first painted a narrative mural but then, for some reason, very hastily replaced it with another one. Moreover, the time was probably extremely tight back then, so the outer mural hadn't even been given its final finishing steps.

Chenpi A'si looked at the entire mural, then looked around at the surroundings, and said to us, "This... is related to the Celestial Palace. Clear the entire wall—let's see what the mural tells."

I had already wanted to do that. So together with the others, I brought out my fingernails and began the meticulous work of stripping the mural off the stone wall.

Large pieces of the mural flaked off. Soon, a picture scroll of brilliant colors and majestic momentum gradually unfolded before our eyes......