Even though Wu Tianzhen had mentally beaten Hei Yanjing a thousand times in his mind, the Forbidden Land still had to be explored. He could only return to the cave with his exclusive (emotionless) polite smile.
This time, having made adequate preparations for the descent, he didn't land on his rear end like before, finally managing to preserve his precarious dignity in front of Xiao Hei.
As their lights shone, the dark cave finally revealed its full form. The inner earthen walls were indeed a strange, folded shape, appearing with continuous curves, like rolling brown waves.
It was likely that Hei Yanjing had hidden so perfectly beneath the cover of these folds just now.
The deep entrance to the Forbidden Land that Hei Yanjing had indicated was behind where he had just stood. There should have been some mechanism there, which had now been unlocked by Zhang Qiling, who had stayed behind, revealing a roughly shaped entrance in the earthen wall.
"Xiao Ge, Xiao Ge?" Wu Tianzhen, at first glance, couldn't spot the rebellious Xiao Zhang's position at all. He called out twice towards the entrance and accelerated inside with his flashlight.
To his relief, the rebellious Xiao Zhang did not exhibit his characteristic talent for disappearing at this moment. Wu Tianzhen only looked ahead from a distance and found the shadow of Zhang Qiling's hooded sweatshirt about ten meters inside the entrance.
But strangely, Zhang Qiling seemed to have discovered something on the ground and was now squatting down, struggling to observe the mud beneath his feet in the darkness.
Seeing this, Wu Tianzhen quickly hurried forward with his flashlight, helping Zhang Qiling illuminate the area.
"Xiao Ge, what are you looking at?"
The beam of light hit the ground, and Wu Tianzhen took a couple of glances, but it just looked like ordinary soil to him.
Hearing Wu Tianzhen's words, Zhang Qiling finally stopped his hand from digging in the dirt, maintaining a half-kneeling posture, and slowly raised his head to look at Wu Tianzhen.
His left hand was still tucked into his chest, and he was only using his right hand to dig. Perhaps it was inconvenient with only one hand, but Wu Tianzhen keenly noticed a streak of black ash smudged on one side of Xiao Zhang's cheek, unsure if it was from the wall or from digging.
The Black Gold Ancient Saber was placed steadily against the wall, not being used to dig at this moment.
The soil here was not clean.
Normally, soil would be somewhat unclean, but the soil here was exceptionally dirty, with a lot of deliberate gray and green mixed into the black color, making it impossible to tell what it contained.
Wu Tianzhen quietly glanced at the hem of Zhang Qiling's clothes, which were smudged with a lot of dirt. He had a feeling that Xiao Zhang wasn't using the Black Gold Ancient Saber to dig because he had suddenly realized its purpose wasn't for digging, but rather because he discovered his clothes were too dirty to wipe the saber with, and thus he reluctantly decided to dig himself.
...But Xiao Ge, don't you think dirty hands are even harder to clean?
Wu Tianzhen felt like laughing, but he held back. Since meeting Zhang Qiling and Pangzi, he felt his ability to suppress laughter was improving day by day, and it seemed he would soon reach the peak of being a master of suppressed laughter.
The dirty Xiao Zhang glanced at the suppressing-laughter Xiao Wu without answering his question.
He was always a person whose actions preceded his words. He slowly ran his Fafqiu fingers along the grooves in the soil, as if searching for a better spot to start.
Just as Wu Tianzhen was about to lean closer to examine the Fafqiu fingers' working process, he saw Zhang Qiling suddenly plunge his fingers into the soil and then pull—
A pale, dirt-covered object was directly pulled out by Zhang Qiling!
Only half of the object was exposed, with the rest still buried in the soil. It was long and slender, and under the strong light, it looked like jade at first glance.
It was clear that such things, related to wealth, often possessed a certain ability—to instantly summon Mr. Wang Pangzi.
"Holy crap, what kind of place is this? A treasure basin?" Pangzi had just come down with Xie Yuchen and Hei Yanjing. They had briefly hidden the entrance above with a monkey carcass to prevent other monkeys from accidentally entering and causing trouble.
As soon as he entered, before he noticed anything, his eyes were like magnets, "whoosh," and they locked onto that white object.
"As expected of our Xiao Ge, so thrifty!" He immediately rushed forward happily, but he was still somewhat concerned about Zhang Qiling's injured hand. "Xiao Ge, you rest on the side. Let Fatty show you!"
With Pangzi's bulk squatting down, he immediately blocked half the path. Zhang Qiling stood up, bewildered but obedient, watching Pangzi grab the white object with his palm and caress it affectionately, a hint of confusion appearing on his face.
Pangzi began to dig with passion, his movements almost rivaling an excavator. Hei Yanjing watched the scene with a smile, not minding the chaos, and started cheering them on.
Xie Yuchen, with a hint of disdain, moved a little further away from the splashing dirt. He took a clean white cloth from his pocket and began to wipe the monkey blood and dust that had gotten on him while moving the monkey carcass.
He didn't know how many white cloths he carried in his bag. After wiping his hands, he even took out a new one and handed it to Zhang Qiling, who was standing by like a handsome decorative piece. xxs壹贰
Xiao Zhang, who was about to wipe his hands with his clothes: (Slowly took the white cloth)
Xiao Zhang's clothes: Wuwuwuwu, I survived! (Weeping profusely!)
In this dangerous Forbidden Land, the group behaved like a group of young people on a spring outing or camping trip, but at this moment, Wu Tianzhen felt increasingly that something was wrong.
...This Hei Yanjing is so obsessed with money. Seeing hidden treasures, he has no reaction at all and is just cheering from the side as if it has nothing to do with him? Is this reasonable?!
When things are out of the ordinary, there must be a ghost, especially when it involves that scoundrel Hei Yanjing.
So, Zhang Qiling, who was meticulously cleaning each of his fingers, found the dog-like Xiao Wu sneaking over and whispering in a low voice, as if making contact in a tunnel warfare scenario, "Xiao Ge, do you know what this thing Pangzi is digging now?"
Zhang Qiling: ...
Zhang Qiling finally shifted his attention from the white cloth and regained the puzzled look he had when watching Pangzi excitedly digging.
He thought carefully:
"A dead person."
"Oh, oh, so it's a dead person. No wonder... wait, what? A dead person?!!!"
Wu Tianzhen almost choked on his breath. Just as he was about to pull Pangzi out of the sea of suffering, he heard the highly efficient digger Pangzi exclaim, "Holy crap, what the hell is this?!"
Pangzi's excavator-like hand speed clearly came into play at this moment, so much so that before Wu Tianzhen could attempt to save him, he had already acted with great efficiency and dug out the person's skull.
As the skull was pulled out, it was still muddy, overturning various components underneath. The slender, pale object that had made its first appearance finally revealed its true nature – it was a finger bone of that dead person!
Normally, Pangzi and Wu Tianzhen were considered well-traveled and shouldn't have failed to recognize a finger bone, but for some reason, this finger bone, unlike the usual angular shape of a finger bone, was extremely round and smooth to the touch, looking just like white jade.
This bone seemed to have been corroded by something...
"Xiao Ge! Why didn't you tell me earlier!" Pangzi shoved the person's skull in front of Zhang Qiling.
Facing his accusation, Zhang Qiling obviously paused, and his calm tone also carried a hint of confusion.
"...You didn't ask."
Pangzi looked at that innocent face and fell into a moment of contemplation.
He suddenly remembered that when he saw the "treasure" earlier, in his excitement, he had even leaned down and kissed that finger a few times, and his face gradually wore a mask of pain.