Chapter 49: Raging Sea: Opening the Coffin

Given our inference about the tomb chamber's upper and lower double-layer structure, I was no longer surprised to see a door here. It must have been that while we were talking, this room also shifted vertically. Although I still didn't know the tomb owner's intention behind such a design, I wasn't going to panic again.

But the coffin inside gave me a huge shock. This gold-thread nanmu was the finest material for coffins. For thousands of years, the size of a coffin was determined by the size of the timber. This coffin was enormous; the original nanmu log used to make it was probably as thick as the 32 gold-thread nanmu logs used for the giant pillars in Ming Changling. This thing might be even more valuable than a block of silver the size of a person.

But how could such a precious coffin be placed in an ear room? That was bizarre. If such a valuable coffin could only be placed in an ear room, then the main chamber would at least require a gold coffin. I felt more and more bewildered. The tomb owner showed no regard for rules, not only disrupting all the feng shui positions here but also setting up extremely clever traps everywhere, yet never taking lives. I had no idea what he was trying to do.

A tomb robber can't help but get itchy hands when seeing a coffin, especially such an imposing one. There must be plenty of good stuff inside. I saw Fatty staring with wide eyes and laughed, "What, seeing a coffin and you forget about your life? How about we go in and fish out a few things first?"

I was being sarcastic, but who knew he didn't catch it? He said seriously, "Your Fatty Lord here has high awareness. Our main task now is to find tools to break through this damn tomb ceiling. Don't get distracted. After we get the stuff, we can come back and fish out some items—it's not too late!"

I heard him getting cocky and found it funny. I said, "By the time you come back, who knows if this door will still be here? It might flip down again."

Fatty was still thinking about the grave goods. Hearing this, he thought it made sense and became hesitant. At that moment, Poker-face suddenly waved at us and said softly, "Don't talk."

Seeing his serious expression, we quickly covered our mouths, not knowing what was happening. He drew his knife and said softly, "This is no ordinary coffin. This is a corpse-nurturing coffin."

I didn't understand and looked at him in confusion, but he didn't want to explain further. He ducked and walked into the ear room with the coffin. Fatty was originally trying to maintain his image of high awareness, but seeing Poker-face heading straight for the coffin without ceremony, he immediately reverted to his low-awareness nature and hurried in after him.

I saw the corridor was pitch black, and staying outside alone was too terrifying. Not daring to lag behind, I ran in after them.

This chamber was exactly the same as the one we came from. On the vaulted ceiling were two giant python reliefs with a spring opening in the middle, but there were no burial ceramics—only a huge coffin placed three feet from the wall. Poker-face drew his military knife, directly inserted it into the coffin seam, and slowly slid it along, as if looking for some mechanism. Fatty thought he was about to open the coffin and shouted, "Slow down, slow down! You're usually so quiet, but how come you act like you have no regard for your life when you see a coffin?" As he said that, he took out a candle and ran to the corner to light it.

Seeing that, I cursed angrily, "Damn it, we have so little air left, and you're lighting a candle? Do you want to die?"

Fatty said irritably, "How much air can one candle burn? At worst, your Fatty Lord will breathe a few less times." As he said that, he lit his windproof lighter. The flame flared up and suddenly illuminated something in the corner. Even Fatty, usually bold enough, was so scared that he fell on his bottom. Seeing him fall, I quickly shone my flashlight and couldn't help but flinch in fright.

In the corner was actually a shriveled dead cat, unusually large, but already in a mummified state. Its empty eye sockets stared straight at Fatty. Most of its skin had fallen off, its jaw was hanging open, revealing a row of fangs. It looked very unsettling.

Since childhood, I had been most afraid of dead cats. When I was little, my family often hung stray cats caught stealing fish on trees to rot. At that age, I didn't understand what it was. One day while playing under a tree, a cat corpse's neck rotted and snapped, and the cat head fell right into my hand. Seeing those fangs and eye sockets, I was so scared I peed my pants and was dazed for days.

Fatty saw it was just a cat corpse, cursed, kicked it away, and then lit the candle. He walked toward the coffin. I felt something was wrong. A cat corpse in a tomb chamber? Wasn't he afraid of corpse rising?

However, there were too many things that defied reason here. I vaguely felt that the tomb owner was deliberately doing things contrary to the rules, doing the opposite of everything. Whatever shouldn't be in the tomb chamber, he put there. If this continued, I didn't know what we'd encounter in the main chamber.

At this moment, Poker-face had already found the eight-treasure exquisite lock on the coffin. He took out his treasure box, used the two hooks inside to hook the seam of the coffin, and with a click, the mechanism was unlocked. At the same time, the entire coffin lid popped upward, and a stream of black water gushed out instantly. Fatty, not caring about the disgust, shoved the coffin lid open and looked inside. He shouted in terror, "Damn it, so many corpses!"