Chapter 43: Raging Sea: Lots of Hair

Discovering a strand of hair in the underwater ancient tomb, and it could even move, anyone would immediately think of ghosts. Fortunately, there was a stone slab between us; even if there were a ghost, it couldn't break through.

Fatty seemed unwilling to give up on not having grabbed that strand of hair. He shone his light into the gap to see what was behind it. I wasn't as bold as him—aren't there plenty of horror movies about hair? I kept my distance from the stone slab and watched for Fatty's reaction.

He leaned in for a few looks, as if he really saw something. He paused in doubt, then moved closer to look again. This time, he reacted strongly, suddenly backing off violently, swimming desperately for several meters as if fleeing for his life. He turned and wildly shook his fist at us. At first, I thought he was going to hit me, but then I thought, damn! That's the signal for us to escape.

But nothing seemed to have happened just now. I reflexively turned my head and saw the stone slab blocking the way suddenly rising upward. A mass of black ink-like substance seeped out from the gradually widening gap underneath. I quickly stepped back, thinking it was poison water. Taking a closer look, I was so scared my jaw went stiff—those black things were actually human hair!

Seeing how slow our reaction was, Fatty swam back to pull us. Only then did we snap out of it and flee in panic. Underwater, the more nervous you are, the more energy you consume, and the slower you swim. Seeing that I couldn't keep a steady rhythm in the panic, I simply imitated Fatty and pushed off the wall to move. Though it was inelegant, it was very fast, and it felt especially good to have my feet on solid ground.

After about twenty or so pushes, we reached a turn. Fatty grabbed us and made us hide behind the corner, signaling to check the situation first.

We took deep breaths of oxygen and glanced back hurriedly. Holy shit, the tomb passage behind us was full of hair—huge, pitch-black clumps everywhere. Just seeing it made my throat tighten. How many years without a haircut would it take to grow that long! Fatty cursed, picked up his spear gun, and aimed at the center of the black mass to shoot. He probably thought the shot would pierce through it, so when he saw the dart fly quickly for six or seven meters and then suddenly slow down before being wrapped up in the hair, his face turned white.

But the dart did have some effect. The hair actually seemed sentient, pulling back and then rolling. The rolling looked more like something inside the hair was about to come out. We became alert. Fatty loaded another dart, ready to move closer and take another shot. At that moment, the hair suddenly contracted and then released. In that instant, I saw a dead body being spat out from the deepest part of the hair.

That person was wearing a diving suit of the same style as ours, possibly one of the three. I only glanced and saw his nose and mouth were full of hair, and even his eyeballs had hair growing out of them. It was obvious he had suffocated to death. Now his body was bloated from the water, extremely ugly.

My scalp began to tingle. This hair was very sinister. Better leave quickly. I wanted to grab Fatty, but when I looked up, he had vanished. I was startled and quickly turned around, only to see him already far away, waving his fist at us.

I cursed in my heart—so he ran to safety first and then warned us. I quickly called out to Baldy Zhang and A Ning to follow. I saw Fatty still complaining about our slow reaction, so I immediately kicked him in the ass. Fatty was hurt by my kick and was unconvinced, wanting to come up and punch me. A Ning quickly stopped us and pointed behind. I saw that escaping was more important, and we could settle this score after getting out.

At this moment, the oxygen gauge on my wrist vibrated. I looked down—oh no, nearly half an hour had passed since we started this way, and we had been breathing so rapidly that oxygen consumption was several times normal. It was a bit excessive. I calculated the remaining time. The situation was very bad. If there was no progress, we would have to go back the way we came, or we'd run out of oxygen. But leaving like this without even finding the side chamber Third Uncle mentioned made me reluctant.

At this time, Baldy Zhang, who had been swimming at the back, suddenly grabbed our harness straps like a crab and scurried to the front, grabbing Fatty to make him stop. I saw him staring wide-eyed. I thought to myself, this guy knows more about the structure of ancient tombs than I do. Could he have found some clue? Sure enough, he gestured for us to follow him. Fatty was hopping with anxiety, but since he had performed so poorly just now, we all ignored him. He had no choice but to follow sullenly behind us.

Baldy Zhang clumsily swam back a few meters and pointed at a section of the tomb wall that was somewhat dented inward. It turned out that when Fatty had been pushing off the wall earlier, he had kicked this wall section inward.

My heart filled with joy. I gestured back and forth—this was indeed the end of a long corridor. The mechanism Third Uncle mentioned was almost certainly here. But once this mechanism was triggered, water would rush in violently. Third Uncle had been wearing a helmet back then, so he was fine. Now we only had diving goggles on our heads. If we got caught in the torrent, we could easily get banged up and bleeding. I looked back; the hair hadn't caught up yet, so I wanted to warn them. But at that moment, Baldy Zhang, not knowing better, suddenly pressed the wall. Before I could react, a massive amount of bubbles erupted.

I knew immediately that we were in trouble. I really hadn't expected Baldy Zhang's talent for causing trouble to rival Fatty's. Before I could even utter a curse, I felt a huge thrust from behind me, shoving me forcefully into the hole in the wall. The water flow was spinning. I immediately experienced what Third Uncle meant by 'internal organs being thrown to one side.' It felt like being stuffed into a washing machine. After being tumbled around a few times, I got so dizzy I couldn't see anything clearly.

I don't know how long passed. When I finally came to, groggy, my whole body felt like it had fallen apart. Especially my neck—it hurt terribly, almost broken. Fortunately, the breathing mouthpiece was still clenched in my mouth. I focused my eyes and saw pitch black all around. Fatty and the others were below me, also looking completely knocked out. Fatty in particular was still spinning in circles, like he was doing ballet.

I looked at the well wall—it was fine-grade white jade. Using such good material here meant we must already be inside the underground palace of this tomb. It seemed we had reached the spring in the side chamber that Third Uncle mentioned. I kicked my feet and floated upward. Suddenly, my head felt warm, and I broke the surface.

It was pitch black all around. The spotlight from the dive light was too concentrated, only illuminating a single point. I turned off the spotlight and switched to a flashlight, carefully examining the tomb chamber. The chamber was a sharp-cornered rectangle. Aside from the fifty-star chart painted on the ceiling, there were not many eaves or carved decorations, making it appear simple and unadorned.

There was no coffin platform or outer coffin inside, so this should be one of the side chambers. I looked around; there seemed to be no other exits, only a stone door on the left connecting to a passage. The tomb chamber walls were also sealed with very cheap white plaster soil. Originally, there were some mottled murals on it, but unfortunately they were badly corroded by moisture. I could no longer tell if the paintings were of a female spirit.

On the floor of the chamber were several rows of burial ceramics, just over a hundred pieces, including several very valuable blue-and-white cloud-dragon large porcelain jars. At the same time, I found some footprints on the floor—wet footprints left on the dusty ground. They looked very fresh, probably the work of Third Uncle.

I checked the air quality and had them come out of the water one by one. After A Ning climbed out, she first worried about these footprints and asked, "Were these left by tomb raiders?"

I frowned, not sure either, because among these footprints, I saw a very conspicuous bare footprint. The strangest thing was that this footprint was very small, looking like a child's, definitely no older than three years old.

I had never heard of tomb raiders bringing a child along, so I called Fatty over to take a look. He had more experience and might know what this was about.

Fatty also looked a bit bewildered. He said, "Don't worry about whether it's big or small for now. The footprint itself is abnormal. Take a closer look."

I examined it again and found a layer of yellow waxy substance on the footprint. I scraped some off with a knife and sniffed it, then clicked my tongue in surprise: "This is corpse wax—"