"I don't think there is anything outside." Cao Shi stared at the door panel and said, "It must be a human being. Master Tian, you and Master Mian stand back."
I turned to look for Wei Mian and found that he had already slipped into a corner and huddled up. Cao Shi dispersed the people in the room and asked someone to open the door.
The old man's tough guys were very brave. One of them quietly touched the door, took off the wooden stick on the door, then pressed his body against the wall, stretched out his hand and pulled open the door panel.
thump!
As soon as the door was opened, two figures rushed in side by side. Judging from their clothes, they were not our people responsible for keeping watch.
These two figures didn't move again after they fell in, even their faces were half buried in the sand. But I was immediately sure that the weird sound of scratching the door was 100% caused by them, because after these two people fell heavily,
, the four hands were still mechanically grabbing around in the sand.
It was pitch dark outside the house, and Cao Shi immediately asked someone to close the door, and several guns were pointed at the two uninvited guests lying on the ground at the same time. But three minutes later, the two men still did not make any movement except scratching randomly in the sand with their hands. Someone was there.
Unable to hold himself back, he went over and turned them over.
"Brother Shi! It's them!"
I threw Wei Mian in the corner, sneaked over and took a look, and my head was huge.
The facial expressions of these two uninvited guests were quite strange. The black eyes rolled to the edge of the eye sockets, and almost only the whites of the eyes were left in the entire eye sockets. Their mouths were half-opened, full of sand, and blood foam kept coming out. But despite this
, I still recognized them at a glance, they turned out to be Mr. Fang’s two students.
Immediately I realized, had I made a mistake? Mr. Fang and the others really had a problem?
Mr. Fang's two students appeared in front of us again in this way, which was unexpected by everyone. Before Cao Shi could make up his mind on what to do, the door panel screamed and someone pushed it open from the outside.
Several people immediately turned their guns around.
"No, no, no, no..." The people outside the door quickly shouted: "It's us."
Everyone was relieved when they heard their voices. They were the two people we sent out to watch the night. Cao Shi grabbed one of them by the collar and asked with a stern face: "Where have you been!"
"Brother Shi, we are keeping vigil on the roof." Only then did the two watchmen see Mr. Fang's two students, and their expressions immediately became very nervous: "What...what is going on?"
"I have to ask you!" Cao Shi pushed the man who was keeping watch hard: "How did you keep watch at night!"
The two night watchmen seemed a little embarrassed. According to them, at two o'clock in the morning, the previous night watchman woke them up. The two were so sleepy that they crawled to the night watch and started to take a nap. Now they came to ask someone to take over.
If according to what they said, Mr. Fang's students were not outside the door at two o'clock in the morning, and now it is four o'clock in the morning. In other words, Mr. Fang's students should have arrived at the door between two hours and four o'clock.
Outside, as for how they became like this and how they came outside our door and scratched the door panel, only the devil knows.
"There are at least two of them." Cao Shi stared at the dark night outside the door and said, "A few people are going out. Don't go too far. Guard this house and wait until daybreak to take care of them."
Immediately, several people went out with guns to guard, and the rest also found suitable places to hide in the house. Fang Lao's two students were dragged to the corner. Someone squatted down and watched for a long time, and then told Cao Shi that these two people
He must have been injured internally, otherwise he wouldn't have been vomiting blood, but other conditions wouldn't be obvious.
These two very young students had no idea what strange experiences they had had beforehand. They had no consciousness at all. Only their hands were like clockwork machines. They kept repeating the same action. It made my scalp numb.
After this incident, the image of the dull scholar that Mr. Fang left in my mind has become a bit blurry. However, the person responsible for following them yesterday made it very clear, and I think these two students are completely victims.
They were seriously injured and would not pose a threat to us. After thinking about it, I doubted that they encountered some special situation on the way and ran back to us for help.
But I can’t explain the wooden stick that holds the door panel shut. The wooden stick holds the door from inside the house, and only our people can do it. This approach may seem funny at first glance, but it’s a bit scary when you analyze it carefully.
, did the person holding the door have some foresight? He blocked the door in advance to prevent Mr. Fang’s two students from entering?
As for who blocked the door, including his intention, there is no way to guess, but one thing is certain, he quietly blocked the door between 2 a.m. and 4 a.m.
Mr. Fang's student struggled hard for more than an hour. At about five o'clock in the morning, he slowly stopped moving his hands, breathing and heartbeat. People in the room watched the two people dying from their positions, and no one went there.
Perhaps there was nothing we could do to save their lives. In the meantime, I asked Cao Shi if there were any suitable medicines and equipment in the first aid supplies we brought that could save them, and Cao Shi said there was none.
Before the two people died, I couldn't help but shine a flashlight on their faces. One of them's mouth was trembling slightly, and there seemed to be a gurgling sound in his throat. I felt that he seemed to want to say something, but Cao Shi leaned over.
It's too late to listen carefully.
We stayed like this until dawn with two extremely ugly corpses. Someone searched the corpses to see what they had brought with them, but the two corpses were completely clean and there was only some sand in their pockets. Cao Shi asked
The people dragged the bodies out and buried them, and then ordered everyone to search in and around Machan City.
After everyone dispersed, Cao Shi pulled me and said to me cautiously: "You and Master Mian must be careful! At least one of our people is wrong."
"You mean the person who held the door shut?"
Cao Shi nodded slowly: "I don't know who it is yet. Master Ba attaches great importance to Ma Zhan. We can't give up halfway. I will try my best to arrange the following things. You and Master Mian stay with me and don't move around.
.”
I have always had a vague feeling deep in my heart that Mr. Fang and another of his students are in Mazhan City or not far from the city, and it is already very dangerous at this time. Thinking of Mr. Fang, I subconsciously reached into my pocket to feel it.
He left me the address, but the note was missing. I looked for it several times, and it was indeed missing.
However, my feeling seems to be wrong. Our people carefully searched the entire Machan city and the surrounding areas, and found no trace of other people. Cao Shi was still uneasy and asked half of the people to continue to guard the city. He led
Following Wei Mian, me, and the remaining four people, we walked around and gradually approached a dilapidated building that was mostly buried in the sand in the northeast corner of Machan City. Although until now, he had not mentioned a word about the specific location of the operation.
, but when I looked at the four people he led, I realized that they were about to get started. Because these four people had a good personal relationship with Cao Shi, in other words, they were people whom Cao Shi could trust. There was a person in the team who was not very trustworthy.
We must be on guard against the hidden dangers of our enemies.
"We have to enter this house." Cao Shi said to the four guys: "Clear the way out."
At the beginning, we all thought that the building under the sandbags should not be big, but when we started doing it, we realized how wrong we were. This building was probably the largest in the entire city of Machan. It collapsed before being buried by the sand, and everything under the sand collapsed.
They are broken bricks and tiles. When I "communicated" with Mr. Fang the day before yesterday, he briefly mentioned that the culture and social system of the Dangxiang people before the founding of the People's Republic of China were relatively backward, and they evolved from a minority ethnic group based on tribes to a unified and powerful empire.
At that time, many things could not keep up with the development of the times, so they urgently needed to absorb and integrate a series of more advanced factors at that time to consolidate the country. Xixia successively bordered the Song, Liao, Jin, Mongolia, Tubo, Uighur and Western Liao, and had a complex and special geography.
The environment has led to the diversified development of Xixia culture. This diversification is not only reflected in culture, but can be seen in miniature from many places. The Xixia architecture in front of you has a strong Central Asian style, but it is also
It is completely different from the traditional Muslim architecture in Central Asia. You can feel that it was quite beautiful before it was damaged.
The main body of the building collapsed very seriously. After the sand was cleared, I didn't know where to dig a road out. Although the old man's people were highly skilled, they only did damage. Cao Shi took it upon himself to find a suitable entry point.
Finally, a hole was dug through a window whose original appearance was almost unrecognizable. People went in and began to clean up the construction debris inside bit by bit.
The house is full of sand, which is fluid and very troublesome. I dug out a little bit and added a little bit next to it. Fortunately, the sand layer was not particularly thick, so I finally cleared the area pointed out by Cao Shi. Below the sand is the house.
The fifty or sixty centimeter square stone slabs paved inside were very neat. We used small crowbars to pry open the stone slabs one by one, and the original brown calcium soil of Ma Zhan City before it became desertified was exposed.
"Just dig down diagonally from here, and there will be a big stone slab when you are about seven meters away."
"Lao Cao, are you so accurate?" I patted the sand on my body and said to him, "Have you been here before?"
Cao Shi didn't say anything, but handed me a cigarette to cover my mouth. The person next to me quickly put down the shovel. The climate in this place is very dry, and the soil is as dry as compressed biscuits, but very brittle. I imagined using a drill bit for oil field drilling.
You will definitely have a great time drilling if you come here.
The four guys were responsible for the work. Cao Shi went out to see the surrounding situation from time to time. I was really bored, so I just teased Wei Mian. I was frightened by what happened last night, and because I was short of water, I usually wiped it with water.
His fair and moist little face now looked like a potato. As soon as I talked to him, he puckered his lips and wanted to cry. I raised my hand and said, "If you cry, I'll slap you."
"God...Uncle Tian...what...when shall we go home?"
"Can you please be more gentle? Come here, I will tell you a story."
"No...don't listen, scary..."
I only had so much fun in a place like this. I spent a few hours of boring time with Wei Mian. The laborer came out of the hole and actually dug a big stone slab. Cao Shi kept worrying about it.
After waiting for a long time, after hearing the news, it was like a shot of chicken blood. He hurriedly asked the man to come up, and then he picked up a shovel and drilled into the hole. A few of us gathered around the entrance of the hole and looked inside. Within a few minutes, Cao Shi returned
On the ground, if you plan out the stone slabs, there will be a double-layered brick wall behind it. If you remove the bricks, a hole will be exposed.
I'm a little confused. Before coming to Ma Zhancheng, Cao Shi didn't seem familiar with the situation here, but at this moment, he felt as familiar as his own home. Many jobs in this industry rely on people's experience to make decisions.
, because there is no particularly accurate information for reference, how can the old man know so thoroughly about the situation several meters underground without leaving home?
The hole drilled by the man was very narrow, so it was difficult to move around inside when removing the stone slab, which took a lot of time. The wall behind the stone slab was a piece of cake. The actual situation was exactly as Cao Shi said in advance. There was indeed something behind the wall.
A hole. I don’t know whether the underground hole is naturally formed or artificially dug, but it has been buried underground for so many years and is closed. The air quality must be bad. If the ancients did something worse, people would be suffocated if they went in.
in.
Cao Shi asked people to try to see if the cave could be entered. He also comforted everyone by saying that Master Ba had told them that as long as they could find the entrance to the cave, it would be more than half the battle. The cave itself was very safe. The two guys put an open fire into the cave and the flames were burning.
It was normal, so Cao Shi said that the first two people should take a look and feel what was going on inside.
The next steps were all done underground and could not be seen from the ground. The two men responsible for exploring the path stayed down there for nearly half an hour and came back to report that the hole was very large and had four extremely thick pillars.
, they walked around and found nothing out of the ordinary, but they found a square pit made of stone slabs, filled with black water like ink.
"Fangkeng?" Cao Shi frowned and thought for a while, then said, "Is there anything in it?"
"It seems there is, but it's soaked in black water and I can't see clearly. I haven't fished it out yet."
"Be careful. If there is no danger, just fish it out and take a look."
The messenger took some equipment and tools and re-entered the cave. Cao Shi turned around and asked Wei Mian and I if we were tired. I really didn’t feel tired, but my legs were numb from squatting. Wei Mian whispered beside him, wanting Cao Shi to
Finish your work quickly and leave this hellish place as soon as possible. I echoed, saying that it would be done early. Cao Shi shook his head and said that the situation below was unclear and it was best to deal with it carefully.
I think Cao Shi is a bit contradictory. Sometimes he is confident, and sometimes he is unclear about the situation. I really don’t know what he is thinking. Thinking back on the strange things that happened last night, I feel more and more inexplicable.
Unknowingly, I lost my mind in my thoughts, and it wasn't until the people below came back to report the news that I was able to break free from my chaotic thinking.
"Brother Shi, it's a little weird."
"What's wrong?"
"The thing soaked in the black water was fished out, and it's a dead man." The man suddenly turned his eyes to me, and his face turned ugly: "That dead man is indeed a bit strange."
Cao Shi also followed the other person's gaze and looked at me involuntarily, which made me feel a little scared.
"Don't beat around the bush, just say it's OK!"
"Master Tian!" The man took courage and said, "The dead man in the pit looks very much like you!"