Tang Fan got up in a hurry, usually gentle and elegant, but his smiling face suddenly became completely gloomy, making Zhao Xiancheng scared when he saw it.
"How did you die? Didn't you do well last night!" But Tang Fan was shocked and angry, and he didn't lose his reason to take out his anger at the other party.
Zhao Xiancheng calmed down and said quickly: "It was suicide, he hanged himself, and his family was crying so hard! Pang Baihu also led people to guard there, why don't you go take a look?"
Of course Tang Fan went to see it. He and Suizhou didn't even bother to eat breakfast, and immediately put down the tableware and followed Zhao Xiancheng to the old village chief's house.
After a while, the death of the old village chief had spread throughout the whole village. The village chief's house was surrounded by water, but because there were Jinyi guards guarding it, no one dared to die just to watch the fun, so they timidly stretched their necks and looked around. Frightened and curious.
Although the people are ignorant, they are not stupid. When the strange cry sounded last night, most of the villagers heard it. Although no one dared to come out to see it at that time, the news of the death of the old village chief came early in the morning. Combined with what the old village chief had been talking about when he came back from the Emperor's Mausoleum, everyone couldn't help but link the two together, saying that the old village chief and the others had angered and disturbed the River God last time, provoking the River God's revenge.
When Tang Fan and Suizhou arrived, the Liu family was crying and grief-stricken.
The old lady of the Liu family had fainted and was taken care of by the female relatives in the side room. The two sons of the Liu family were called to the hall by the Zhao county chief and waited for Tang Fan's questioning. The two middle-aged men were also teary-eyed. .
Tang Fan first said two words of consolation, and then asked, "When did you find out that the old village chief died?"
Village Chief Liu said: "Last night, after the gentlemen left, my father was not very happy. He didn't say anything, and just kept talking there, so we had to take him back to rest first, but I didn't expect to get up in the morning. , people just hang on the beam..."
Tang Fan: "Your mother doesn't live in the same house as your father? Why didn't you know that he hanged?"
Village Chief Liu shook his head: "No, since my father was not well, sometimes he would suddenly punch and kick the people around him when he was sleeping. We had to let my father sleep by himself. Who knows, who knows..."
He was talking and talking, but he couldn't help but feel sad, and he didn't speak with tears in his eyes. When the second brother of the Liu family saw his elder brother like this, he also cried loudly. Who would have thought that the old man was fine last night, but today he wakes up and turns into a cold As for the corpse, whoever puts this on will have to collapse.
Tang Fan: "After we left last night, did your father say anything else?"
Village Chief Liu choked and said: "No, he has always been like that, sometimes he is the same as before, and sometimes he talks to himself. People in the village say that they collided with the river god that night, so the river god The lord will only lower the punishment..."
This is pure nonsense. Even if Tang Fan's original view was greatly subverted after what happened last night, he would never think that there was something to do with the river god.
He didn't listen to Village Chief Liu say any more, so he asked Pang Qi, who was guarding outside, to take Village Chief Liu to identify the corpse.
Naturally, it was not Village Chief Liu and his father, but the corpse they brought back last night.
This village is not big, and it is natural for Village Chief Liu to know whether they are from this village or not. If it wasn't for the fact that the two people were not from the village last night, then their identities would be revealed.
On the other end, Tang Fan and Suizhou entered again to check the old village chief's body.
The two of them have been sentenced for a long time. After examining the body for a while, they found that the old village chief had indeed hanged himself, not homicide, and there was nothing suspicious.
But this just made Tang Fan and the others more suspicious.
Others say that the old village chief has been crazy and rambunctious since he came back, but at most he can only deceive ordinary people, like Tang Fan and Sui Zhou, who deal with a group of people all day long and are observant. Naturally, they could find that there was always some flicker in the old village chief's speech, and the content of what he said might not be true. They originally planned to come over today to ask clearly, no matter what means they used, they must tell the truth from the old village chief's mouth.
It was a coincidence that before Tang Fan and the others could ask, the old village chief died.
If the cause of death was suspicious, it would make sense, but it was suicide, which made things even more confusing.
At this time, Pang Qi came in and said to Tang Fan, "Sir, Village Chief Liu said that that person is not from their village, and he has never seen him before. The subordinates asked a few villagers, and they all said the same thing. of."
Tang Fan and Sui Zhou looked at each other, and now the tacit understanding between them has reached a higher level, sometimes they can know what each other wants to express without having to say anything.
At this moment, both of them were thinking the same thing: since those two people were not from the village, and they would still climb out of the robbery hole in the middle of the night, they must be tomb robbers.
Combining the robbery holes discovered by the villagers in the Emperor Mausoleum over and over again, it is not difficult to come to a conclusion: this group of people who want to rob the Emperor Mausoleum is definitely not only the two people they saw last night, like the old village last night. Chang said that it was because they were chasing a few tomb robbers that they encountered a change by the river.
But those people can't make any waves now. It is very likely that they all died under the robbery cave. This also indirectly shows that under the robbery cave, in Yonghou Mausoleum, there may indeed be some incredible and mysterious hidden objects. A terrifying existence.
What's more, if the cry is related to the monster that killed last night, and there is a passage between Yonghou Mausoleum and Luo River, then the monster is likely to come and go freely between the underwater and the mausoleum, so it sometimes hides in the tomb. Underwater, the villagers are dragged into the water to be eaten, and sometimes they will perch in the mausoleum. The unlucky tomb robbers just hit it, and naturally there is no return, and there is no life or death.
But there is also a problem with this assumption. If there are monsters, why has there never been a rumor that Luohe "River God" cannibalize people in the village so many years ago? You know, these things happened only a year ago.
Going forward in time, this place has always been a peaceful and peaceful, unsurprisingly small village. Except for the tomb of the Northern Song Dynasty Emperor, Luohe Village is no different from other places.
Here, things seem to have turned into a dead end.
Tang Fan said to Suizhou, "Just do as we said last night, I'm sorry to bother you."
Sui Zhou nodded slightly.
The two brothers of the Liu family were standing outside, and the villagers who heard the news came to watch the fun, blocking the outside of the Liu family's yard. Yin Yuanhua, Cheng Wen and others were standing at the door of the hall of the house. They saw Tang Fan and the others. Come out and come forward.
They lived together in the same room last night. It is impossible to say that they did not hear the cries of ghosts at all. It was just that the three of them didn't have the guts to go out to see what was going on. They went to see it in person last night, but as a subordinate, they were still sleeping in the house, and they couldn't help but feel a little embarrassed.
Cheng Wen and Tian Xuan didn't need to say it, they felt uneasy in their hearts, for fear that Tang Fan would hold them accountable. Even Yin Yuanhua and others who couldn't get along with Tang Fan felt a little wrong.
Fortunately, Tang Fan was not in the mood to care about them, and only let them follow Pang Qi and others to search around the village and the emperor's mausoleum to see if the bandits who wanted to rob the tomb last night had any survivors.
The imperial envoy rested here. Of course the magistrate He couldn’t sit back and relax as soon as he returned to the city. As soon as the day dawned, he hurried over with people. When he heard that something happened again last night, especially when he saw the two incomplete sentences. When he was dead, his face turned pale with fright, and he came over to apologize to Tang Fan, not knowing whether he was afraid that his black gauze hat would fall off, or that monsters would come out and eat him.
On this end, he was still tremblingly reporting to Tang Fan to plead guilty. On the other end, Pang Qi brought someone to report, saying that he had really caught someone. Hiding in the grass near the Emperor's Mausoleum, because of the incident last night, Tang Fan and the others were all focused on the robbery hole, and the man was able to take the opportunity to slip away, but he was really tired and hungry, so he slipped away. After he left, he couldn't help but ran to the village to steal food, and because the officers and soldiers were searching, he didn't dare to go out.
When Pang Qi brought the man to Tang Fan and the others, the man was about to shake into a sieve, and he kept begging for mercy, and said it was none of his business.
The words come from the heart, this sentence is indeed reasonable, this person looks a bit squeamish, even when crying and begging for mercy, his expression is so wretched, it is really unsympathetic.
Seeing Tang Fan frown slightly, Pang Qi slapped the man on the back of the head: "Who made you cry, please reply to your words!"
"Yes yes yes!" The man knelt on the ground and kowtowed again and again: "Whatever the adults ask, the young ones say what!"
There was no need to ask any questions, the man poured all the beans out of the bamboo tube.
His name is Qian San'er. He was kidnapped and sold by traffickers when he was a child.
The gang is called the Yellow River Gang. Don't think it sounds very big, but in fact, dozens of gangsters get together to do some deceitful things. Tomb raiding is a zero-cost, high-risk, and high-return industry, naturally. Within the scope of Qian San'er's business.
In terms of scale, the largest mausoleum in Henan is the Northern Song Emperor Mausoleum, and the best one to start with is the Yonghou Mausoleum of Song Yingzong Zhao Shu.
Yonghou Mausoleum is easy to use, everyone knows, because the location and underground layout of the imperial mausoleum are recorded in detail in the works of Li Zi of the Northern Song Dynasty, the unlucky Song Yingzong is not only a short-lived ghost, he has only been emperor for three years, and sleeps after death. The place has also been dug up and dug up again, and it can be called the most emperor of the Song Dynasty.
Therefore, since the Southern Song Dynasty, there have been countless tomb robbers who have been targeting Yonghou Mausoleum one after another. Especially in the Yuan Dynasty, where tomb robbery was legal, the imperial court directly sent people to rob the tomb. It has been contained, and because of this, the treasure of Yonghou Mausoleum has long been dug up.
The person who led Qian San'er and the others to rob the Emperor's Mausoleum was Li Kui, a small leader of the Henan Gang. Their real target for this trip was the Empress Mausoleum next to Yonghou Mausoleum, because the emperor and empress of the Northern Song Dynasty were buried separately. Although the Yonghou Mausoleum has been visited by countless people, the Queen's Mausoleum is finally better, and there may be some treasures left.
Li Kui's idea is to start with Yonghou Mausoleum first, find out the layout of the underground palace, and then go to Hou Mausoleum, so as not to take too many wrong roads, and the efficiency will be higher. If they can find it in Yonghou Mausoleum A piece that the predecessors have never discovered, and then dig some treasures that were missed by the predecessors, it will be even better.
So the group did what they said they did. They first figured out the terrain near Luohe Village, and then sneaked over in the dark.
Before that, there had been rumors of the river god eating people by the Luohe River, and strange cries were heard from the riverside from time to time at night, but the mausoleum was still a little far from the riverside, and Qian Saner and others were a little scared at first. But after lurking for a few nights, and seeing that nothing happened, I didn't take it to heart.
They did not use the robbery hole dug by the tomb robbers, but dug another robbery hole by themselves. The orientation was also chosen by Li Kui. In the book "Song Dynasty Chronicle" that I wrote, I did a lot of homework on Yonghou Mausoleum in advance.
According to Li Kui, the position they chose was easy to start with and guaranteed a tricky angle, which no one had ever dug before.
Since the boss said so, the younger brothers must follow suit. Everyone went out day and night and spent a lot of time, digging deeper and deeper, taking turns to go into battle. After digging for more than a month, they finally dug a road leading to the mausoleum. Qian San'er just joined the industry because of his lack of experience, so he didn't get the chance to go in and dig for treasures, so he could only play outside.
Although the villagers of Luohe Village have the responsibility of guarding, they are farmers after all, and they have their own lives to live. Keeping the mausoleum, Qian San'er and the others can avoid the attention of the villagers as long as they pay a little attention, and carry out their own deeds recklessly.
After the robbery hole was dug, Li Kui and the others chose a day to go to the tomb.
That night, Qian San'er's master also went down, and Qian San'er stayed outside according to Li Kui's instructions, holding in his hand an oiled paper bag that had just bought from the county town during the day and contained butter chicken.
Although the chicken was cold, it didn't prevent Qian San'er from feeling delicious, especially on a night like that, when the cold wind was blowing outside. In the grass behind, looking at the moon in the sky is not difficult.
Qian San'er still remembered that when he slowly gnawed the chicken in the oil-paper bag until only the bones were left, it was estimated that almost two hours had passed, and suddenly there was a strangeness that seemed to exist in the robbery hole. The cries were the same as the cries they had heard from the river before.
The cry was weird and terrifying, Qian San'er couldn't help but worry when he thought that his companions were still below, but he didn't dare to disobey Li Kui's order, so he had to stay on top.
Time passed by a little bit, and I don't know how long I waited, but the voice has not disappeared, and it is getting clearer and clearer, as if something is coming out from the bottom of the robbery hole at any time.
He stared at the robbery hole, just when he was so nervous that his heart was about to jump out of his mouth, a person suddenly appeared in the robbery hole!
Qian San'er let out a whimper, and the whole person jumped up in fright, turning around and running away.
His master's voice came from behind him: "San'er, come and help me!"
It was only then that Qian San'er realized that it was a human being and not a ghost, so he quickly regained his senses and ran forward to drag his master out.
Behind his master, another person climbed out, and Qian San'er took a closer look, it was Fatty Lu who had followed Li Kui before.
"Master, what's going on?" Qian San'er asked.
His master dragged him up and ran without saying a word. Qian San'er didn't know why, so he had to run after him. Fatty Lu followed behind. All the way, it was almost at the boundary of Yongzhao Mausoleum, and it was worthy to stop.
Qian San'er ran for half his life and almost lost his life. He didn't know where the jug he was holding in his hand was thrown. His master and Fatty Lu were both terrified and confused, so he told Qian San'er about them. experience below.
It turned out that after Li Kui and the others went down the robbery cave, they soon reached the underground palace of Yonghou Mausoleum.
As expected, the upper and lower underground palaces of Yonghou Mausoleum are not large, and they have been stolen long ago. Not even the hair of the treasure is left. Empty.
Everyone turned around in a circle, disappointed, and was about to leave, but Li Kui found a more hidden secret passage near the entrance they had dug earlier, connecting to the lower level of the underground palace, and they didn't know where to go.
Out of the psychology of thieves not empty-handed, everyone unanimously decided to go down this secret passage and see what they found.
This passage is very tortuous, and it is not long. When everyone has not seen the arrival of the exit, they have already seen the faint luster of treasure from below. Everyone can't help but get excited, thinking that they may have discovered the real thing. Baby, he quickened his pace again.
When they reached the exit, they were stunned by the sight in front of them.
What appeared in front of Li Kui and the others was a small ear room.
And this ear room is full of innumerable gold and silver treasures like a small valley. As far as the eye can see, there are at least a few hundred bright pearls on the head. Blind Li Kui and their dog eyes.
Li Kui and the others were so excited, they thought they were going to come back empty-handed, but I didn't expect to accidentally bump into it by mistake, and there was such an adventure. At the moment, everyone jumped one by one, jumped into the treasure mountain, and threw the treasures as much as they wanted. Put it in their pockets, some people can't even fit it on their body, they took a night pearl and stuffed it into their mouth, ready to go out and then spit it out.
These people don't even think about it, if there are so many treasures and there is a ready-made channel, why did no one find it before, so they have to wait for them to come and get it
Wealth moves people's hearts. Under the huge wealth, greed has already overwhelmed their reason.
Just as everyone cheered and was urged by Li Kui, and finally reluctantly prepared to leave, the nightmare came.
From the incoherent descriptions of Master and Fatty Lu, Qian San'er could only hear a general idea.
It sounds like their movements have attracted some kind of monster, and Li Kui and the others have never seen such a terrifying monster. The monster was attracted from nowhere, and when they came in, they used to bring one of their companions with their head to the upper body. They were all bitten in.
The companion didn't even have time to struggle and shout, and his body instantly turned into two ends, one end became the monster's belly lunch, and the other lower body was sprayed with blood and fell on the piles of treasures.
Everyone was stunned by this scene. Many people didn't have time to react, and their bodies were torn to pieces immediately. Qian San'er's master and Fatty Lu were the closest to the secret passage, and they responded quickly. The wailing sound, squeezed the body into the dark passage, desperately trying to escape from here.
After the two ran out, they found that no one else came out except the two of them.
Qian San'er listened to them in horror, and hurriedly demanded to escape from here, but after his master and Fatty Lu regained their senses, they were a little unwilling, because the belongings they carried were in the process of escaping regardless of them. , has been completely wiped out, just thinking about the countless treasures there, the two of them feel embarrassed.
After returning, the shadow of the experience inside gradually faded away. After the three of them spent a long time together, Fatty Lu and Qian San'er's master finally decided to go again.
As a result, they are really reluctant to bear that large amount of treasure. Even if they can bring a night pearl, it is estimated that they will have enough to eat and drink. As long as they think about so many treasures there, they may be taken away by others in the future. This kind of regret is enough to outweigh their fear of death.
Second, Li Kui and his gang were all folded inside, and only Fatty Lu ran out. They really couldn't explain it when they went back. Maybe the people of the Yellow River Gang would think it was Fatty Lu and the others who wanted to make money and kill people for treasures. At that time, even if they jumped into the Yellow River, they couldn't wash it, so Fatty Lu and the others wanted to go down and take out two treasures, so they had an explanation to the gang.
Qian San'er had never seen so many treasures. Although he also sounded greedy, as long as he thought that Li Kui and the others would never come out again, he felt scared from the bottom of his heart, so he urged Master and the others not to go out.
But he said no, in the end Qian San'er was left on the ground to control the wind. Both his master and Fatty Lu felt that as long as they were careful, they would run away when they found danger, and they should not lose their lives.
To be on the safe side, the two also brought two more daggers.
Qian San'er couldn't persuade them, so he had to stay on it.
Facts have proved that anyone who is lucky will encounter unexpected events in the end.
The two people Tang Fan and the others met last night were Fatty Lu and Qian San'er's master.
After listening to Qian San'er's explanation, things became much clearer.
Tang Fan's guess was not wrong. There must be a passage between the underground tomb and the Luo River, so monsters can appear in the river and under the robbery cave, and the cry must also be from the monster. Monster, all is well.
But Tang Fan and the others did not feel relieved, but became heavier.
Because according to Qian San'er's description, the danger under the ground may be difficult to describe in words. Otherwise, Li Kui and his party are numerous, a dozen people in total, and armed with weapons, although they are not as good as Jinyiwei. One of the masters, but certainly not the weak seedlings without the power of the chicken, but with so many people, it is not to say that they are gone.