Chapter 131: Suicidal Act

Poker-face's action startled us greatly; we had no idea why he knelt before the snowy mountain and performed a very respectful grand bow, as if he had some special feelings for this mountain.

After finishing his kowtow, he returned to that expression of not caring about anything, only about sleeping, climbed onto a bare rock beside him, and closed his eyes to rest. I couldn't help but grow curious again—truly, it was impossible to see through him; what exactly was hidden in those dark, unfathomable eyes of his?

Throughout the journey, everyone had come to understand his character, especially the few of us, so no one asked him what was going on, assuming he wouldn't answer anyway. However, judging from the looks of Chenpi A'si and the others, they were clearly also quite puzzled. Only Shunzi thought nothing of it, probably assuming Poker-face was also Korean.

Each person had their own thoughts, resting while enjoying the scenery. After a short while, our strength recovered somewhat. Fatty lit a smokeless stove, and we gathered around to boil tea and warm ourselves. At the same time, Shunzi began his usual routine, taking a few sips of hot liquor to regain his energy, then pointed to the surrounding snowy peaks and explained their origins to us.

This was his duty as a guide—the kid was very professional.

He said that in the legends of the Changbai Mountains, the Lesser Sacred Snow Peak, the Greater Sacred Snow Peak, and the mysterious Three Sacred Mountain were originally one mountain in ancient times. When Yu the Great was controlling the floods, he passed by here and split a mountain into three with a divine blade.

Before the liberation, this area wasn't open to the public yet. He had heard from his grandfather that once you climbed these three snowy mountains, the scenery around you would be completely different. For example, on the Lesser Sacred Snow Peak, you could see both the Three Sacred and Greater Sacred peaks, while on the Greater Sacred Peak, you could only see the Three Sacred Peak, not the Lesser Sacred Peak—very strange. The most peculiar was on the Three Sacred Mountain. Besides seeing the two Sacred Peaks on either side, you could also see beyond the Three Sacred Mountain, far opposite, an even more majestic snowy mountain called the Heavenly Ladder Peak. That peak was shrouded in clouds and mist all year round, never revealing its true face. Legend had it that there was a heavenly ladder on that mountain, leading straight to the celestial palace, a passage between the mortal world and paradise. When the weather was clear and crisp, you could see a rainbow-like glow between the Heavenly Ladder Peak and the Sacred Peaks, as if painted by an immortal hand—magnificent, beautiful, and utterly wondrous.

After hearing this, Fatty said to us, "This legend must be wrong. The heavenly palace is clearly on the Three Sacred Mountain; how could it be on the Heavenly Ladder Peak? The person who passed down this legend must have had bad eyesight."

Monk Hua thought for a moment, shook his head, and explained, "No, I researched this legend before we came. I guess it might be a mirage created by the refraction of white snow between the Heavenly Ladder Peak and the surrounding snowy peaks when the Cloud Summit Palace was built. Since the Heavenly Ladder Peak has fog all year round, the thick fog acts as a reflective screen, casting the image of the Cloud Summit Palace hidden in the mist, as if the celestial palace were truly in the sky."

Mirage phenomena mostly occur in deserts or lakes; it is very rare in snowy mountains. It might not be a coincidence, perhaps related to this being the source of the dragon vein. In Feng Shui, this phenomenon is called 'Shadow Palace.' I've only seen it mentioned once in an ancient book, and I don't know the specific significance. In a treasure cave, strange occurrences happen; nothing is surprising.

We were speaking in dialects—I used Hangzhou dialect, while Monk Hua and the others used Changsha dialect. Shunzi couldn't understand what we were saying and didn't pay attention. After explaining the scenery, he stood up and said to us, "Bosses, you all rest for a while, have something to eat, then do whatever you need to do. But we need to hurry; it's getting dark soon. There's no way to set up tents here. Once it gets dark, the road will be hard to walk. We'll still need to find a relatively flat place to camp overnight, and the wind might pick up." With that, he poured tea, handed it out to us, and tactfully stepped far away to rest.

I looked at my watch; there was still over an hour until sunset. Time wasn't long nor short. We had rested enough, and it seemed time to get down to business.

However, everything around was covered in white snow, with no special traces. If there were a sacrificial tomb here, it would definitely be buried under the snow. The entrance should be in the snow layer beneath our feet. The snowy mountain environment was too different from the ground, and none of us had experience; we didn't know where to start.

We all stood up and gathered around Chenpi A'si, wanting to discuss what to do next.

Chenpi A'si still hadn't recovered from such an intense trek. Lang Feng handed him a wine gourd, letting him take a couple of sips. Monk Hua massaged his back to promote blood circulation, and his complexion gradually improved, but he still looked very listless. When he heard us asking him, he only briefly looked at the surrounding mountain terrain and said to us, "The treasure cave is right beneath our feet. I don't have any special methods. Let's take a few probes with shovels to see what's under the snow, then decide what to do."

Everyone nodded. I also knew there was no better way. Grave robbing, after all, never changes its essence: after locating the dragon vein and the point, the next step is to probe and determine the location. Over the dynasties, the only difference was the tools used for probing; the process was almost identical. So, without the excitement of opening the coffin, grave robbing is actually a tedious job.

The snow was much softer than dirt, so the probe shovels went in smoothly. Monk Hua and the others were very quick, and soon there were more than a dozen probe holes in the snow. However, almost all the shovels hit something about five or six meters into the snow slope that they couldn't penetrate. Fatty thought Ye Cheng, being as thin as a monkey, lacked strength, so he went to help and used brute force, but still only got a little deeper. Every time they pulled out the shovel, nothing came up with it.

Monk Hua examined the shovel head and found a bit of ice crystal stuck to the tip, so he understood what was happening. Below was a glacier surface formed by frozen soil and ice, as hard as concrete. The shovel couldn't penetrate it, and nothing could be brought up.

"It's been snowing here for thousands of years. Accumulated snow turns into ice. Do you think the sacrificial tomb might be frozen inside the ice below?" Fatty asked.

We all nodded; it was very possible. But if a Luoyang shovel couldn't penetrate the ice, even if we knew the thing was down there, we couldn't find it.

Panzi said to us, "The main trouble is all this snow. Do we have any explosives? When I was in the army, I heard some brothers say that in the Greater Khingan Mountains, the production teams there regularly go up the snowy slopes to clear snow. Just one blast hole can blow all this snow off—very simple. Once the snow is blown away, we can see the situation underneath clearly, making it much easier to search, and we won't have to dig a tomb tunnel."

I knew what he was talking about. Each layer of snow formed by snowfall had gaps in between. A small explosion would shake the entire mountain, causing the whole snow layer to slide down, triggering a chain reaction, and eventually layer upon layer would collapse.

In the Greater Khingan forest region, there were a few small snowy mountains. To prevent avalanches from damaging the forest due to excessive snow accumulation, the local engineer corps often had to manually clear snow after heavy snowfalls. Back then, conditions were simple, and personnel had to go up and set blast holes themselves, which was somewhat risky. Nowadays, they directly use mortars.

Monk Hua pinched the snow. "I do have explosives, but look above us—would setting off a blast here be suicide?"

We looked up. Above us was a towering, ten-thousand-zhang snow cliff. It extended forward and backward, connecting to the entire horizontal mountain range like a snow dragon. The few of us beneath it were like ants, far too insignificant. If even a little snow came down from above, we would be buried here forever.

Panzi also felt a bit dizzy looking at it, but he still insisted, "The Changbai Mountains are a tourist attraction, and snow clearing is done every year here. I think the problem isn't big. If you don't clear this snow, then we might as well go back early. Trying to dig something buried in snow in a snowy mountain is like fishing for a needle in the ocean, isn't it? I'm telling you, searching for a lost mountaineering team in a snowy mountain is done the same way. There's no other good method. Even if the old man wakes up and pinpoints the cave, you'll still need explosives, otherwise you absolutely won't be able to dig the tunnel. This blast is definitely necessary."

I thought it over and felt it was unwise. I disagreed, "This risk is too big. I'd rather spend some time shoveling the snow."

Panzi said, "Young Master Wu, we're using explosives precisely because we don't have time. If we had time, we would have waited until summer to come. We have to try, no matter what. Third Master is still waiting for us."

Monk Hua waved his hand to stop us, pointed at Lang Feng, and said, "You don't need to argue. What we say doesn't count. Let's hear the opinion of a professional."

I was taken aback. Along the way, I didn't know what role Lang Feng played among these people. Hearing Monk Hua say this, I was a bit confused—was he an expert in this area? Everyone looked at Lang Feng to see his reaction.

Lang Feng, seeing us looking at him, felt a little uncomfortable. He said to us, "I think what Old Pan said is feasible. Actually, I anticipated this situation before we came and made some preparations. Besides, this is my specialty. I can control the power of the explosives, and the sound won't be too loud. In fact, a very small vibration under the snow can achieve the goal. Sometimes, just a firecracker would be enough." "Are you sure?" Fatty asked. "This isn't blowing up a tomb. We're essentially setting off a firecracker inside tofu—making a hole in the tofu without showing it on the surface. That's a delicate job."

Lang Feng nodded. "When I worked as a miner, I set off no fewer than ten thousand blast holes. This is not difficult."

Monk Hua looked at us, pointing at Lang Feng. "Don't let his usual silence fool you. This guy is a veteran miner with twenty years of experience. He started setting blast holes at fourteen and has flattened no fewer than twenty mountain peaks. He's been in this trade for only a year after the old master took a liking to him, and people already call him the 'Cannon God.' No one knows explosives better than he does."

"You're the Cannon God?" Panzi on the side widened his eyes, clearly having heard of this reputation.

Lang Feng scratched his head a little sheepishly, abandoning his usual aloofness from the past few days. "It's just praise from colleagues, just a nickname."

Monk Hua said to him, "You don't need to be modest. In this situation, you need to use your expertise." Then he turned to us. "Lang Feng has never failed yet. He says something will blow into several pieces, and it does. I absolutely trust him. Since he says so, I think we should give it a try. Any objections?"

Fatty glanced at me. He had experience with snowfield expeditions and had heard many stories about avalanches, so he obviously found it a bit mysterious too, but he was on my side. He was looking at me, waiting for me to state my position.

I thought it over. Chenpi A'si and his group were true professional grave robbers working in an organized manner, unlike Third Uncle, who was still more traditional and liked to use old methods to enter tombs. Their reliance on explosives was beyond our imagination. And since Monk Hua said so, Lang Feng must have considerable skill.

So I steeled myself and nodded to Fatty. Might as well go for it. At this point, there was actually no turning back. Even if I said not to blast, would they really listen to me? After we agreed, Lang Feng and Ye Cheng took out a special Luoyang shovel, started screwing on a unique shovel head, and made several test holes in the snow.

Then Lang Feng mixed several powders to formulate an explosive and buried several low-yield detonators deep inside. I knew this explosive was originally specially formulated, with a power roughly equivalent to about ten firecrackers, used for drilling holes to break the sealing stones of ancient tombs. After Lang Feng re-mixed the formula, the power was certainly even smaller.

Modern grave robbers mostly have considerable engineering knowledge. With just a few very low-power detonators, they can blast a hole large enough for a person to pass through anywhere. I had known this for a long time, but seeing it with my own eyes was the first time.

Shunzi was drinking tea nearby. As soon as he saw this situation, he went crazy. He had seen pilgrims planting flags, poachers sneaking out at night, and people smuggling across borders, but working so hard to come up here and then pulling out detonators to blast the mountain—this was definitely his first time. He ran over and grabbed Monk Hua, shouting, "What are you doing? Boss, are you crazy!"

Before he could finish, Lang Feng knocked him out with a pickaxe from behind. Shunzi collapsed onto the snow and was dragged aside.

I watched and felt a pain in the back of my head. I thought to myself, being our guide was miserable enough—not only having to cover a lot of ground, but also getting hit like this. But on second thought, there really was no other way. Shunzi could tolerate everything, but he would never tolerate us blasting the mountain. After all, he still had to make a living here. There was no way to continue the work without knocking him out.

Fatty asked Monk Hua, "What do we do with this guy later?"

Monk Hua said, "Forget about him for now. We still need him to get back. Take him down into the underground palace and dump him aside. When the time comes, just stuff some extra money in his hand. What can he do about it?"

Lang Feng's performance was extremely professional. He hardly let us intervene. He worked alone, arranging the detonators according to a stress-distribution model. He waved for everyone to climb up onto the bare rock to prevent any chain reaction from sweeping us all down with it.

I had originally thought the detonator explosion would be very loud, at least raising a wave of snow. But to my surprise, as soon as Lang Feng pressed the detonator, I heard absolutely nothing. I just saw the smooth snow surface suddenly crack, and then large chunks of snow began cascading down the slope like a waterfall. The slope instantly became even steeper, and the ground beneath our feet suddenly vanished.

However, this cascade did not continue far. The falling snow stopped, and beneath the snow slope emerged a large area of murky, uneven white ice-and-snow composite layer. This was what the textbooks called the surface of a fourth-century ancient glacier.

Fatty was standing nearby with his eyes closed, still thinking there had been no blast. I shook him. He opened his eyes and looked, exclaiming in surprise, "Aha! There really was no sound. Amazing." Then he immediately looked up at the top with unease.

Whether it was luck or Lang Feng's exceptional skill, aside from a little snow above us sliding down due to the loss of support below, there seemed to be no problem. After waiting a while and seeing no major loosening, we gradually relaxed.

I gave Lang Feng a thumbs-up. Panzi also patted him and made a "you're awesome" gesture.

Lang Feng smiled sheepishly, but before his grin could fully spread, a chunk of snow suddenly hit him on the head.

Everyone's expression changed. Fatty quickly waved at us and whispered, "Shh!"

We all instinctively fell silent. A few of us looked up again and saw, about a hundred meters above our heads on the snow slope, an inconspicuous but chilling black crack slowly spreading. Countless fine cracks were extending across the snow surface. As the cracks spread, small snow pellets rolled down and landed around us.

I immediately felt ice-cold all over. I knew what had happened.

It seemed that Lang Feng's title of "Cannon God" was going to end today.