Chapter 194: Insect Brain

These eggs were attached to the inside of the cranial cavity, gray in color, densely packed, and extremely disgusting upon closer inspection, like the eggs in a beehive.

Third Uncle was not like ordinary people; at this moment he was not afraid, but rather even more intrigued, so he got up and looked carefully.

Under the flashlight, the eggs appeared vaguely translucent. Third Uncle poked them with his dagger; they were as hard as a shell, seemingly completely dried out.

What is this? he thought. There were so many eggs inside the cranial cavity of this thing—could these be parasites?

Parasites in ancient corpses are plausible; they are often found on Loulan mummies. But normally parasites are in the internal organs; how could eggs appear in the cranial cavity? And to have filled the entire cranial cavity with eggs—what kind of insect is this? That's too incredible...

At that time, Third Uncle's scientific knowledge was very lacking; in cultural matters, most of what he knew were things he learned from Wenjin to save face. When it came to insects or ancient insects, the images that appeared in his mind were also of caterpillars and the like. He thought and speculated that when this insect parasitizes, the host must already be dead, otherwise having bugs grow in the brain would probably be deadly painful. These might be eggs of carrion-eating insects.

This was a major discovery, Third Uncle thought. He remembered Wenjin telling him about the intangible value of archaeological discoveries. In archaeology, discovering ancient texts, customs, or burial traces that predecessors had not found counted as significant discoveries. Such a discovery was, of course, worthless to Third Uncle, but to the entire archaeological community, it meant great fame and status, something that would go down in history.

He himself had no interest in this thing at all, but he was deeply in love at the time, and immediately thought of Wenjin. He figured if he gave this to Wenjin, the girl might find it useful, and besides it was worthless and useless just lying here.

Thinking this, he took out a leather bag—the kind used for salvaging things while diving, with a hole at the bottom that could be plugged so water would drain out when surfacing. Third Uncle closed the hole, then removed the skull, along with some other broken bones, stuffed them all in until the bag was bulging, and strapped it onto himself.

After finishing, he climbed out of the iron vat and went to find Xie Lianhuan. By this time, after two frights, he was freaked out, and his greed had been scared away. He didn't dare touch the coffin anymore. This tomb chamber was too damn eerie; he didn't want to stay a moment longer. If Xie Lianhuan had finished photographing things, they should immediately withdraw.

At this point, he also forgot that Xie Lianhuan's oxygen tank was running low. If he had remembered, he would have known that getting out would no longer be easy.

However, when he climbed out of the iron vat and returned to where the bronze figure and iron coffin were, he immediately sensed something wrong. First, he couldn't see Xie Lianhuan; he wasn't in his original position, and even after sweeping around with the flashlight, he wasn't there. Second, Xie Lianhuan's flashlight was on the ground, shining on a mural on one side, flickering on and off.

Third Uncle was stunned for less than a second before breaking out in a sweat, because he had seen this scene too many times. In ancient tombs, whenever something happened to someone, the flashlight would always fall to the ground. In the past, when organizing tomb raids, many people had been taken down, so as soon as he saw the flashlight on the ground, his heart tightened. Could it be that while he was in the vat, Xie Lianhuan had encountered something, triggered some mechanism? He hadn't heard any sound, but he indeed hadn't paid attention to what was happening outside while inside the vat.

What is experience? This is experience. If it were me, I would definitely run over, pick up the flashlight, and call out a few times. However, Third Uncle had already determined that something had gone wrong, even though he didn't know what it was. He took out his dagger again, and his entire being entered a certain state as he walked toward the iron coffin to find where Xie Lianhuan was.

He hadn't been inside the iron vat for long; if Xie Lianhuan had run into trouble, he should have fallen near the iron coffin.

Carefully but quickly, he circled behind the iron coffin, and sure enough, he immediately saw Xie Lianhuan lying behind the coffin, curled up into a ball, completely motionless. Third Uncle shone his flashlight on his face—no response—and swept around again, finding no foreign objects nearby.

Strange, there seemed to be no signs of a triggered mechanism. How did he fall? Third Uncle was a bit puzzled. After making sure there was indeed no movement around, he quickly stepped forward and helped Xie Lianhuan up.

Xie Lianhuan had lost consciousness, heavy as a dead weight, his body limp. Third Uncle felt his neck and found he wasn't dead. Then he touched several vital spots and discovered that the back of his head was burning hot. He turned his hand over and saw it was covered in blood.

Damn! Third Uncle was stunned. How could this be? This guy looked like he had been knocked unconscious by someone.

But this was inside an ancient tomb. No ancient tomb mechanism is designed to knock someone out. A zombie wouldn't be so kind as to just knock you out either. The only thing that can knock someone out is another person.

As he thought this, Third Uncle suddenly felt an intense chill. He quickly turned to look at the surrounding darkness, thinking, No way, could there be someone else here? (Third Uncle's exclusive interview reveals secrets of The Lost Tomb that no one has ever uncovered! And a big lottery for the protagonist! All on Qidian's public WeChat account: qdread. Third Uncle calls you to follow!)