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Hai Rufeng has been searching in the Baguio area for nearly two months, but still hasn't found any trace of the gold mine.
Although we knew from the beginning that this would not be an easy task and were mentally prepared for a long search, we also brought two supply ships with us.
But as time goes by, everyone can't help feeling a little irritated.
Twenty days ago, Kana, the leader of the 500-man vassal army, learned from the local natives that someone had picked up a nugget of gold in the mountains.
The so-called nugget gold is a naturally formed gold nugget with varying degrees of purity.
Hai Rufeng and his men were extremely excited when they received the news. They gave the native a lot of benefits and asked him to take them to the place where the nugget gold was found. Then they began to dig extensively. As a result, after 20 days, the surrounding mountains and fields were filled with pits, but no substantial progress was made.
Hai Rufeng was picking his teeth with a willow twig. There was nothing around here except for a lot of wild animals, such as pheasants, wild rabbits, wild boars, wild foxes, and even three tigers were hunted yesterday. He was a little tired of eating them.
Lu Tian came over and said, "General, could it be that the natives are deceiving us? Damn, we have dug around here, and there is no gold mine, not even a place to soak dog shit."
Hai Rufeng said dissatisfiedly: "What are you yelling about? You are a sentry commander after all. If you keep yelling all day long, what will your brothers think?"
"The general has taught me a lesson. I will pay attention next time. But this is not a solution. How long will we have to stay in this desolate mountain? I will ask Kana to find that native and torture him to see if he is deceiving us."
"Go ahead."
After Lu Tian left, Hai Rufeng took out the nugget of gold found by the natives from his bag. It was the size of two fingers and weighed about two taels. Because it contained a lot of impurities, it was not pure golden yellow.
It was this piece of nugget gold that made Hai Rufeng and his team believe the natives' words and dig in this area for more than 20 days.
The native was captured by Lu Tian and tortured severely, but no matter how he was tortured, he still insisted that he picked it up on this hill and it seemed that he was not lying. Lu Tian was helpless now.
In the afternoon, a Qin soldier named Tienan ran up the mountain and reported, panting, "General, when we were hunting, we found a cave in the bushes at the foot of the mountain. The entrance of the cave was narrow, but after two feet in, it gradually became larger. We made a small makeshift torch. After walking less than twenty feet, we found some shining lights on the cave wall..."
"Are you telling the truth?" Hai Rufeng moved as fast as a rabbit and grabbed Tienan's collar and asked.
"General, I did see a bright light in the cave, but it was a little scary. When I saw the torch was extinguished, I didn't dare to stay any longer and hurried back to report to the general."
Hai Rufeng immediately shouted, "Come on. Prepare torches, prepare more."
He could not wait to bring a team of people and three experts in prospecting with him. Led by Tienan, they rushed down the mountain. In addition to tall trees, there were also low and dense shrubs. From time to time, wild birds flew away in fright, and there were also narrow paths formed by wild boars walking on them.
Everyone came to the small cave that Tienan mentioned. The entrance was only three feet square and hidden in the bushes. They pushed aside the bushes and bent over to barely get in. After everyone lit a torch, Tienan led the way, and more than 20 people entered the cave together.
Just as Tienan said, after entering the cave for two zhang, the cave became larger and wider. When it reached about ten zhang, the cave wall was already fifty or six zhang high and about ten zhang wide. Under the illumination of more than twenty torches, there was a bright light in front, but the end of the cave was still not visible.
The ground was bumpy, getting lower as you walked forward, and it was dark in front, as if it led to the underworld.
The structure of the cave wall is also very complicated, with both stones and mud, and it is very humid. The various stones are in strange shapes, some like animals, and some like monsters. It is dead silent inside, with only the tinkling sound of water droplets dripping from the cave wall from time to time.
"Tienan, where is the sparkling thing on the cave wall that you said is?" Hai Rufeng suddenly spoke, and the cave echoed with a voice so loud that it was frightening.
"General, we are still ahead."
Everyone held the torches as high as they could and looked around vigilantly. After walking forward another ten or so feet, the cave wall suddenly became narrower, and under the light of the torches, it looked like a bloody mouth.
Hai Rufeng was just about to check the cave wall when there was a sudden whoosh sound from between the rocks and a golden light shot down. Hai Rufeng screamed in fear and swept the torch over. He quickly retreated backwards, tripped over a rock and fell down with a bang.
"General!"
"What's wrong, General?"
Everyone rushed over nervously, and Tienan shouted "Snake!" A poisonous snake with one ring of gold and one ring of black, a golden and black snake, was swept to the side of Tienan by Hai Rufeng with a torch, and Tienan was so frightened that he hurriedly retreated;
This is commonly known as the Bungarus bungarus, which is extremely poisonous. Once bitten, the person will fall to the ground and die before taking five steps, so it is also called the five-step snake.
When Hai Rufeng got up, the krait had already run away. He wiped the sweat from his forehead. The soldier asked with concern, "General, are you okay?"
"I'm fine. Everyone be careful, pay attention to your surroundings, and keep moving forward."
Hai Rufeng took the lead and continued to move forward. After only a few steps, he suddenly heard a series of strange popping sounds coming from the bottom of the cave. The sound became louder and louder and closer and closer.
"what?"
"What's that noise?"
Everyone couldn't help but scream, even Hai Rufeng was panicked. Such caves are usually places where ghosts appear in legends. The sound from the bottom of the cave came so quickly and was so strange. It was impossible for a human to come from there, because the ground was bumpy and one had to climb over the rocks blocking the way after taking a few steps. It was impossible for a human to move so fast.
Hai Rufeng shouted: "Hold up the torches, and everyone hide behind the rocks..."
Just as he shouted this, he saw a large black mass of things surging out from the bottom of the cave, making creepy squeaking sounds, coming in groups, like a black cloud.
"It's a bat! It's a bat!"
"Oh my god, so many..."
Amid everyone's screams, thousands of bats were seen flying in, almost filling the entire cave. Some were burned by the torches and made squeaking sounds, while others flew onto Hai Rufeng and the others. Everyone kept flapping their wings, causing a chaos.
"oops!"
"Bite me..."
"Ouch!"
Amid the squeaking sounds, Hai Rufeng and the others screamed in fear and swept with torches. There were so many bats flying out that even the firelight was blocked. It was pitch black all around and they could not see far.
It took a full half cup of tea for the bats to fly out completely. There were thousands of bats on the ground that were swept down by Hai Rufeng and his men with torches. Some of them were not dead yet and were still making strange squeaking sounds, which made people feel uncomfortable.
Hai Rufeng was panting heavily. After lighting a new torch, he stood on a high rock and looked around. Then he found that, as Tienan said, there were some tiny flashes on the wall of the cave under the reflection of the fire.
Hai Rufeng was overjoyed. He jumped off the stone and walked to the wall of the cave to take a closer look. He saw that there was indeed some bright golden light reflecting between the rock wall and the mud.
"Old Huang, Old Huang, come and see if this is a gold mine. Come and see."
Lao Huang is one of the three mineral prospecting experts with the most experience, his name is Huang Da.
He had been tossed about by the swarm of bats just now, and his hair was in disarray. He was busy tidying up his clothes. When he heard Hai Rufeng's shout, he hurried over with a torch in hand.
"Old Huang, look quickly, is this a gold mine?"
"Don't worry, General Hai. Let me take a closer look." Huang Da took a hammer and knocked on the rock wall. He put the sand and stones that came off on his hand and looked at them carefully. "Ah!" A scream suddenly rang out, making the whole cave buzz.
"Old Huang, what's wrong? What's wrong?"
"General Hai, yes, it is a gold mine, a gold mine, absolutely..."
"really?"
"really!"
"Ah... ... hahahaha... ... it's worth it for me to work hard for the past two months... ... gold mine, hahahaha, gold mine, Your Majesty is really... ...awesome!"
"I found it. I really found it."
“Is this the gold mine?”
"Hahaha... ... "
More than twenty people were like lunatics, shouting and jumping in the cave. For two months, everyone had been searching hard and had suffered countless hardships. Moreover, this was a task assigned by His Majesty. If they did not complete it, they did not know when they could return.
It is true that after searching for a long time, I finally found it without any effort. Today, I finally got some clues.
"Quick, everyone, split up and look, is there anything else? Look again!"
All dangers were forgotten. At this moment, everyone was filled with endless excitement. They continued to walk into the cave holding torches. After passing the narrow pass, the cave suddenly became bright, and the downward angle became steeper and steeper. The further they went down, the more golden light was reflected from the cave wall, dotted like stars, which made Hai Rufeng and the others' eyes shine.
"Hahaha, gold!"
"What gold? It's a gold mine!"
"It's all the same, hahahaha, now I'm rich!"
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ps: It's the second half of the month, getting closer to the end of the month, but the monthly votes are still so few. I'm so anxious. Please give me monthly votes, please give me monthly votes!
.(To be continued..)
...