Chapter 192: Urine

Third Uncle instantly broke out in a cold sweat. How was smoke coming out of the coffin? Seeing Xie Lianhuan's expression, he felt something was wrong. Could this kid have done something? He grabbed Xie Lianhuan and pulled him off the iron coffin, asking what the hell was going on.

Xie Lianhuan stammered, making strange gestures, but he was clearly too nervous to say anything clearly. After a long time, he finally got out two words: "I... I... fire... fire."

Third Uncle watched his movements and saw what he was holding—it was the cap of a fire striker. A fire striker is something that ignites upon contact, so it's usually wrapped in a reed stem—and he immediately understood what had happened.

Xie Lianhuan must have been curious about what was inside the coffin, lit a fire striker, dropped it into the coffin hole, and then pressed his eye to the hole to look down.

This is called "borrowing light by chiseling through the wall," a technique imitated from the Northern School, and also a common trick among earth-pilferers, especially for novices opening coffins—"three steps forward, four steps back," caution upon caution. The Northern School's grave-robbers could even use this technique to take things from a coffin without entering the tomb, quite impressive. But this is considered an unorthodox method in the sand-digging trade, with many restrictions in practice and great risk, so experienced hands generally avoid it. Whether Xie Lianhuan figured it out on his own or learned it from some half-baked practitioners is unknown.

The biggest risk of "borrowing light by chiseling through the wall" is that it might burn the burial goods inside the coffin, especially if the corpse is dry, as the decayed silk fragments on the body are nearly flammable at the slightest touch. Once a fire starts, things like ancient bamboo slips or pearl dou vanish in an instant, leaving no time to extinguish it. So the person doing it must be extremely careful, yet Xie Lianhuan used it without even thinking.

Third Uncle cursed in frustration, thinking that not keeping an eye on this kid was a real mistake. He was very interested in this coffin set—not only were there bound to be good items inside, but Third Uncle also wanted to see the corpse. If the things inside got burned, it would be such a pity, and he would be laughed to death if word got out.

Thinking this, Third Uncle shoved Xie Lianhuan aside, rushed to the coffin, bent over, and blew hard into the hole, trying to extinguish the fire. Unexpectedly, when he blew, black smoke billowed out even more fiercely, choking Third Uncle almost to the point of vomiting. He quickly turned his face away, then pulled out the water pouch at his waist and poured it into the hole.

On the way over, the sea breeze had made him thirsty, so there wasn't much water left in the pouch; after one pour, it was empty. Such a small amount was useless.

"Damn it!" Third Uncle was so anxious he was sweating. He turned to Xie Lianhuan and saw that the water pouch at his waist was still somewhat bulging. Seeing him still standing there dumbfounded, he cursed angrily, "What are you gawking at? Give me your damn water pouch!"

"Water? Oh! The water pouch!" Xie Lianhuan finally reacted and hurriedly untied his pouch. Third Uncle grabbed it, opened it, and poured half of it in. The black smoke wavered, but instead of suppressing the smoke, flames leaped out of the coffin hole.

Third Uncle saw that something was wrong—why was it reacting like this? He smelled the pouch and couldn't help cursing: it turned out to be liquor. He looked again at the coffin; the opening of the iron coffin hole had caught fire, and thick smoke almost filled the entire tomb chamber.

At that moment, he was stunned and didn't know what to do. The fire inside the iron coffin had grown large, and it was impossible to reach in to extinguish it. Besides, if he hit some trap, he could lose his life. Using water, a small amount was useless. But if he ignored it, the coffin would be finished. Such a fire could even crack jade. The tomb owner was clearly no ordinary person—if the items were burned, and if there really were things like night pearls inside, wouldn't he be devastated?

(In fact, at that time, all they needed to do was plug the hole with something, but in their panic, Third Uncle and the others never thought of it.) Watching the fire grow larger and black smoke sputtering from the coffin hole, he and Xie Lianhuan were frantic with anxiety.

Just as Third Uncle was feeling desperate, thinking that their oiled haul would turn into scorched remains, suddenly Xie Lianhuan on the side made a jaw-dropping move. He jumped onto the coffin, knelt down, untied his belt, and with a focus of qi for urination, poured a stream of yellow liquid into the coffin hole. Instantly, the stench of urine, corpse odor, and burnt smell mixed together, extremely foul.

That was an idea born of utter desperation. His action was so unexpected that Third Uncle had no time to stop him. By the time he realized what was happening, it was too late.

Third Uncle was stunned. Since ancient times in tomb raiding, although the Southern School was unrestrained, with a casual attitude of "death solves everything, open the coffin as you please," given the dangers of this activity, in actual practice the Southern School was also very careful. An outrage like pouring urine into a coffin—Xie Lianhuan was probably the first to do it. It was fortunate that Old Master Xie was not present, otherwise he would have been furious to death.

However, Xie Lianhuan's old urine did have some effect. Soon, the smoke inside quickly diminished.

After urinating, Xie Lianhuan was also stunned and collapsed onto the coffin.

Tears came to Third Uncle's eyes. He looked at the cast figure on the iron coffin, wiped the cold sweat from his forehead, felt a chill down his spine, and had an ominous premonition in his heart.

"Whistle coffins" have ghosts whistling inside—a great evil object. Now it's been burned and then doused with yellow urine. This time the grievance is huge. Even if it's not a zombie, but a living person, if you burn his mouth and then pour urine into it, he would fight you to the death.

Soaked in cold sweat, he stared at the iron coffin, wondering what would happen. Would something come out of that hole? The smoke grew smaller and smaller, until it was almost invisible. It seemed the fire was truly out. Both of them stared fixedly at the coffin until no smoke could be seen.

But there was no movement at all from inside the coffin, as if nothing had just happened.

Third Uncle wiped the sweat from his forehead and breathed a sigh of relief. He thought to himself, "The Yellow King bless us. It seems Xie Lianhuan is lucky. Although this coffin is a whistle coffin, it is also a dead coffin."

A dead coffin means the zombie inside has long since decayed, leaving only some harmless rotten bones. Most coffins in ancient tombs are dead coffins; otherwise, no one would dare to be a grave robber.

A dead coffin is harmless. Having just lit a fire and poured in urine, if it weren't a dead coffin, something would have happened. With no reaction for so long, it should be certain.

After waiting a while longer and still nothing, Third Uncle finally relaxed. He slumped to the ground. Xie Lianhuan, seeing him relax and knowing it was safe, also sat down and started crying.

Third Uncle shook his head and smiled bitterly, thinking, "What a disaster. To be going underground with this kind of character has shortened my life by years. Never again. It's lucky there was no danger, otherwise I might have been killed by him

Thinking, Third Uncle suddenly had a thought: since there was no danger now, why wait until tomorrow? He could reach in today. Coming here and back each time still carried some risk; after all, they were Wenjin's people, not very convenient. Moreover, the position of the coffin's hole—if one reached in, if it faced the head, then one could touch the forehead, both sides of the head, and the chest, definitely. If it faced the feet, then the soles of the feet, which is where jade items were placed; there might be good things, but not too many, and could be taken in one trip. If he took the items out now, he wouldn't need to come down tomorrow.

Although the hole was full of urine, as a grave robber, what disgusting thing hadn't he seen? Besides, it was his own. Even if he had shit in there, he would still dare to reach in and feel around.

On one hand, there was the unique greed of a grave robber; on the other, there was fear of this hole. Third Uncle was torn between heaven and man. But soon greed won; one wouldn't dare to be in this trade without courage, Third Uncle told himself, "Fuck it, I'll just take a gamble."

Thinking this, he stood up and climbed onto the coffin, bowed to it, rolled up his sleeves, gritted his teeth, closed his eyes, and first thrust his hand into the coffin hole, reaching downward.

But as soon as his hand entered an inch into the coffin hole, the temperature inside transmitted to him and Third Uncle regretted it. In the old days, the legendary Zhang Yancheng didn't rely on luck; he relied on true skill in his fingertips. Now he had recklessly thrust his hand in like this—this was really too rash, dammit.

He wanted to pull back, but turning his head, he saw Xie Lianhuan staring at him dumbfounded from below. At this moment he couldn't lose face, so he steeled himself and continued reaching downward.

Reaching into a hole with one hand gave an indescribable feeling. The deeper his hand went, the faster his heart beat, and the number his fingers became. On the surface his face showed no expression, but in truth, when his hand finally touched the corpse, his back was soaked, and his fingers inside trembled with no strength at all.

This experience was imaginable. When I listened, I felt myself trembling all over. Even if it were just a ordinary box, digging a hole and letting someone put their hand in would cause an inexplicable fear, let alone a coffin.

After Third Uncle touched the corpse, he pressed a few times and found his fingers sticky, making his scalp even more numb. By feel, it should be the ancient corpse's mouth. He felt a few times and only sensed that it should be a blackened, bloated corpse with its mouth strangely open, its posture seemingly identical to the bronze figure on the coffin. But he couldn't make out the details. What made him extremely uneasy was that he felt the fire starter had fallen into the ancient corpse's mouth and was still very hot.

He thought to himself, "This is really sinful," then gritted his teeth and probed deeper with his finger. First he pushed the fire starter aside, then touched a hard, ring-shaped object.

Damn, it's a tongue-pressing jade disc, Third Uncle rejoiced inwardly. "Got it! This thing can't burn!" He pinched it at once and wanted to pull the thing out of the hole.

But as soon as he hooked it, Third Uncle felt something was wrong. The jade disc was astonishingly heavy; he lifted it a fraction but couldn't move it further. When he tried harder, he felt the entire iron coffin give a slight tremor, and then a heavy, rusty metallic dragging sound, "clank clank clank," came up from beneath his feet.