The Lost Tomb Vol. 6

Chapter 16: Shuiniutou Gouzi

We wanted to help them search the mountain, but Agui didn't initially agree, and after discussing it for a while, we ended up following along anyways. Agui ended up asking his youngest daughter, Yunyun, to follow us to keep us from getting separated. The villagers gathered about twenty people, and with torches and flashlights, they followed the hunting dogs to Shuiniutou Gouzi.

It was dark along the mountain road as we called Father Pan Ma's name and had the hounds smell the clothes that had been found.

The roads weren't difficult to walk since the forest here had been cut down before, but there had been a lot of rain recently, so there were many puddles on the mountain full of leeches. We walked all the way to Baolin District, where the road became more difficult to walk, but these mountaineers were all hunters with rich experience so it wasn't difficult for them. And for the two of us in particular, these kind of mountain roads were like a walk in the park compared to Tamutuo. In this manner, the search party walked to the depths of the mountain.

As I walked along, I asked Yunyun what the situation was with Shuiniutou Gouzi, and whether Father Pan Ma would be in any danger.

Yunyun answered, "There's the boundary line between Dabao Forest Region and the forest protection area of our village. Yangjiao Mountain is in Dabao Forest Region, Zhoudu Mountain is in the forest protection area, and Shuiniutou Gouzi is in the middle. Behind Yangjiao Mountain are deep mountains and forests. People in the forest set up a sign at the mountain pass telling us not to go in, so we usually don't go to Yangjiao Mountain. Besides the old hunters, we haven't heard of anyone going into the forest behind Yangjiao Mountain."

Agui piped up from behind me, "I'm afraid the only one in the village who knows Yangjiao Mountain best is Father Pan Ma. It's said that only ancient Vietnamese merchants dared to walk there in the past. In ancient times, Vietnamese jade traders traveled through the forest for a month to sell jade in order to escape customs duties. I don't know how many people are buried in the depths of these mountains."

Jade trading was the most profitable, cruel, and mysterious commercial trade on the ancient Sino-Vietnamese border. I had heard of the terrible struggle between Vietnam and Burmese jade gangs, and overnight poverty and wealth were more common than usual here. Under the huge benefit of ten million yuan, human nature would rear its ugly head.

Agui said that we weren't far from the place where jade trading was most popular. Jade merchants from Banai to Guangxi all did small business with some of the gangs in Guangdong. They were the most ruthless group of jade traders, so they were also extremely vicious. It was especially prevalent in the Qing Dynasty, when Vietnamese businessmen and bandits working in groups created problems for the locals.

I thought that if this was the case, then the remains of the Vietnamese jade traders might be found in the woods, and the jade stones they brought could also be found. These days, raw stones with good jade color were very rare, and the price of jade was ridiculously high. The quality of jade back in those days was much higher than that of today, so if one or two pieces of good jade were found, then they would be worth more than any other tomb wares. But on second thought, those Vietnamese jade traders valued their jade more than their own lives, and it would be a great injustice to grab them now. This was completely different from grave robbing, and I was afraid it would lead to something more ominous.

It was just before midnight when we reached the ditch. The man who found the bloodstained garment pointed to a tree and said that the garment was found in the tree. He first saw blood stains on the trunk and looked up, finding the garment. At first, he thought it was a night owl killed by a wild cat, but later he found that wasn't the case.

The flashlight shone on the tree. The copper flashlight had little lighting power, but it was clear that there was nothing else on the tree. It was obvious that Father Pan Ma had climbed up there and left the bloodstained garment behind.

Pan Ma was nearly eighty years old, and although he used to be a master tree climber, he wouldn't climb a tree for no reason. Obviously, he had encountered some danger. When I asked Yunyun what kind of beasts were here, she said that there had been talk of tigers a long time ago. Now, the strongest thing in the mountains was probably leopards.

Hearing that, I comforted myself that tigers were definitely out of the question now. But leopards were good climbers, so we would be in trouble if there were really any present. Besides, leopards had a habit of hanging food on trees and hiding it, so maybe Pan Ma had already been killed.

But Yunyun added that leopards were deep in the mountains, and since we weren't deep enough, the probability of encountering them was too small. Father Pan Ma didn't bring a gun, so why would he go so deep into the mountain?

I thought of the plot of soldier Zhang Jia hiding the captured pistol in the bird's nest, and told myself that Father Pan Ma had also learned this trick, but there was no bird's nest in the tree.

We searched around the tree for a moment, but found nothing besides some small traces of blood leading in several directions. This was where the dogs we brought with us came in handy. The hunters were all armed with guns, and after they loaded the bullets, they dispersed in different directions to try to find any clues. I followed Agui all the way to Yangjiao Mountain.

Shuiniutou Gouzi was so long and deep that no one had ever reached the end. The middle part of the valley was the mountain pass where Yangjiao Mountain met Zhoudu Mountain, and it looked like a tropical forest. It felt very similar to Tamutuo and made me uncomfortable. I kept hearing a "hehehe" sound and broke out in a cold sweat, but there was no way around it. I had to bite the bullet and follow.

The hunting dogs were quite fierce and stood taller than me, and although they were all mongrels, they were well trained. They soon caught a scent and led us all the way to the depths of the valley.

Nobody spoke the entire way. The dogs seemed to find their target around midnight, when the crescent moon was over our heads, and we stopped near the Yangjiao Mountain Pass. It was a slope on the mountainside, and because of landslides, the trees were very thin, the slope was very steep, and the soil was wet and soft as snow. We used branches as crutches to keep our balance, and when we occasionally stepped on the wrong spot, whole pieces of mud slid down.

The hounds pulled us forward and half-crawled under a tree before they stopped and barked at a large piece of grass behind the tree.

Yunyun was a little scared, and even my heart was stuck in my throat. If Father Pan Ma had met a leopard, then whatever was in the grass may be horrible.

Agui stepped forward and poked through the grass with a branch. Under the flashlight, he found that there was no body inside, only a big stone. When we came over, we found that it was a fragment of a stone tablet, completely eroded after so many years of wind and rain.

Agui and the others were searching through the waist-high weeds all around, when a hunter suddenly cried out and appeared to have shrunk.

When we rushed over to help, we saw a big pit hidden in the grass, as if it had been washed out by rain. There was mud in the pit, and Poker-Face and I looked at each other with racing hearts when we saw the bottom. A few pieces of rotten wood were faintly visible in the pit, completely covered in mud. Looking at the shape, I could basically confirm that it was a coffin that had been torn to pieces.

This was a shabby tomb that had been washed out by the rain.