Chapter 15

The Pixian Huiw.a.n.g’s appearance looked too good. Zhang Qiu had only seen the murals in the tomb corridor, but he went deep into the brain. Of course, his second brother Zhang YuShui was similar to the little emperor, and the spring murals of the little emperor and the Pixian Hui w.a.n.g were particularly impressive.

If Li Shu was the most beautiful man he had ever seen, then the Pixian Hui w.a.n.g looked more feminine, with some feminine beauty.

Zhang Qiu endured all the way, and when he got off the car, his face couldn’t be restrained. Jin LaoDa thought Zhang Qiu was hungry. He laughed at Li Shu and said, “Li Shu fellow, you guys can help yourselves. I’ll talk to you about that later.”

The driver was impatient with Jin LaoDa’s exchange greetings, and one of them said, “Mr. Jin, the boss is still waiting for you.”

“Right away, right away.”

Jin LaoDa left. Zhang Qiu saw people coming and going at the entrance of the hotel, he could not speak very well, especially when they were out in the sun, only said:  “Go back to the room and talk.”

The hotel in Changsha was decided by the boss behind Jin LaoDa. The location was somewhat off the city centre but luxurious.

“Sir, are you sure it is a King bedroom? Do you need to change or re-process one?”

Li Shu looked a bit cold, and he simply said, “No need.”

The front desk girl looked at them with ambiguous eyes. She smiled and handed the room card to Li Shu. She said thoughtfully, “I wish you two happy housing.”

Zhang Qiu: you seem to have misunderstood something, little sister.

When Zhang Qiu opened the door, he internally said f.u.c.k, thought he had misunderstood the little sister. Which fool booked the room?!

The King bedroom, the heart shape of the rose petal on the bed, and the pink balloon. Zhang Qiu was embarra.s.sed for a long time, stood at the end of the bed, hemmed and hawed: “it’s estimated that the room is wrong.”

Li Shu was very relaxed. He looked at the embarra.s.sed Zhang Qiu, hummed and said, “the room is nice.”

Zhang Qiu didn’t want to argue with Li Shu in this regard, in the end he would be the loser. He said directly about Pixian Hui w.a.n.g, “It’s a quick look, the appearance can’t be wrong, but Pixian Hui w.a.n.g has been dead for thousands of years. How could he possibly survive?” He thought of the spirit bead hanging around his neck. If it was really an empty coffin, where did it come from?

Li Shu seemed to see the entanglement of Zhang Qiu, and bluntly said: “it’s Pixian Huiw.a.n.g.”

“How are you so sure?”

Li Shu looked at Zhang Qiu, and said: “we hand-in-hand in the tomb, and the map was s.n.a.t.c.hed away by him.”

“It’s a thousand year old zongzi!!!” Zhang Qiu, though certain of his own speculation, still found it incredible, walked around the room, thinking that Pixian Hui w.a.n.g was a thousand-year-old jiangs.h.i.+, and then thinking that he still had a Jiangs.h.i.+ fetus in his stomach, sweating all over his head, and finally sat down and asked Li Shu, “A Jiangs.h.i.+ should be afraid of the sun. How does he come out in the daytime?”

“You watch too much TV.”

Zhang Qiu held his forehead, “you don’t stimulate me first, and I’ll say it slowly.” After a minute of silence, he couldn’t stay any longer. After he was afraid, he was just curious. He turned his head and asked Li Shu, “spirit bead that Big Uncle mentioned?”

Li Shu did not deny, nodded, “I brought it back from him.”

This was Pixian Hui w.a.n.g’s thing; Li Shu so straightforwardly said it, like taking his own stuff instead of robbing it from someone.

Zhang Qiu tensed. Suddenly afraid that Li Shu knew he was pregnant with Jiangs.h.i.+’s child, he didn’t care about it before, but in the face of Li Shu he was afraid that the other party would know, so he hesitantly asked, “How could you rob this bead?”

Li Shu didn’t see Zhang Qiu’s tension mood, said carelessly: “You guys went down to the tomb wasn’t it specially looking for this? I got the map back, and this was in pa.s.sing.”

Zhang Qiu breathed a sigh of relief, but he held back another breath; the bead was just in pa.s.sing.

Zhang Qiu, who was suppressing a sulky stomach was not interested in Pixian Hui w.a.n.g’s life, and was in a good mood to go downstairs and eat a big bowl of rice. Li Shu didn’t know what happened to Zhang Qiu, suddenly looked in a bad mood and unconsciously followed by low pressure. The waiter next to him was too scared to serve.

Back in the room, the roses and balloons on the bed had been disposed of, and the hotel attendants might have noticed that they had made a mistake, but Zhang Qiu saw such a clean room, and he had just had a good meal and felt a little better, so he lost it and went back to his usual mood.

It’s strange that he didn’t know that his mood could change so quickly and so complicated now, that he was as inexplicably angry, it’s strange.

“I’ll take a bath.”

Li Shu stared at the back of Zhang Qiu and looked at the clean sheets.

That night Zhang Qiu was still sulking, and when he fell asleep, he unconsciously rolled into Li Shu’s arms. The cold body temperature and the unique smell of Li Shu made the frowning Zhang Qiu relaxed and slept more steadily.

The next morning, Zhang Qiu woke up and Li Shu was not in the bed, nor in the room. He washed himself and the doorbell rang.

He thought it was Li Shu, but didn’t expect Jin LaoDa standing at the door. Jin LaoDa saw Zhang Qiu, who had just taken a shower, with an obscure look in his eyes, “Eh, I say little brother, we’re going to do this. Why don’t you help us? You can give Li Shu some strength.”

Zhang Qiu didn’t understand at first, but at last he did. He was so angry and kept a straight face, “What are you talking nonsense about? Li Shu and I are in brotherly relations.h.i.+p.”

Jin LaoDa wanted to say again, suddenly felt a chill behind him, and looking back, standing behind was Li Shu. Li Shu held a bunch of roses in his hand and glanced coldly at Jin LaoDa. Jin LaoDa immediately turned aside and smiled awkwardly, “Talking business, talking business.”

Li Shu ignored Jin LaoDa and handed the rose in his hand to Zhang Qiu.

Just now he said that he and Li Shu were in brotherly relations.h.i.+p. Who will send roses to his brother?! Zhang Qiu, who was. .h.i.t in the face, was very happy, but mouth said, “all are brothers, what even send flowers!”

Li Shu didn’t say anything, but Zhang Qiu, who was sweeping his eyes and grinning behind his ears, was in a good mood and turned to Jin LaoDa and said, “Come in and talk.”

“Everything’s ready, but the boss wants to send a team down with us, and you know the rich and powerful bosses don’t trust all of us, Earth Masters.” Jin LaoDa talked about the departure time, and eventually got into a good relations.h.i.+p with Li Shu, “This time down the pit, there’s still a lot of work for Li Shu fellow to take care of.”

Li Shu just nodded, Jin LaoDa didn’t dare to talk more and hurried away.

Zhang Qiu and Li Shu were left in the room. Zhang Qiu was a little foolish with a bunch of flowers. He was a big man who didn’t have a pa.s.sion for flowers, but he thought they were going to start at nine o’clock and gave the flowers to the front desk girls before they left, so the front desk girls could keep them for a while.

Li Shu saw Zhang Qiu gave the flowers to the girl. His eyes narrowed slightly, he was very cold. The girl, who was arranging flowers at the front desk had a s.h.i.+ver.

“Li Shu, let’s go.” Zhang Qiu at the front, yelled.

The front-desk girl looked up and the direction of the cold sense was only a pair of customers’ backs. She smiled and felt a little tired working overtime caused hallucination.

Three Land Rover SUVs were parked at the entrance of the hotel. The black body looked expensive. Two people were in front. Jin LaoDa was standing at the front pa.s.senger seat talking to a man. He saw Zhang Qiu and Li Shu came out and waved, “Get on, just waiting for you guys.”

They got in the last car, Jin LaoDa was in the same car with them, and the driver was a tattooed man with dark gla.s.ses and a long black sleeve coat. Zhang Qiu listened to Jin LaoDa calling him Lao Fei, but Lao Fei’s att.i.tude towards Jin LaoDa was not so enthusiastic.

There were only four of them in the car, it was very relaxed. Zhang Qiu and Li Shu were sitting in the back, and n.o.body was talking in the car. After the car sped up, Zhang Qiu sleepily squinted and fell asleep on Li Shu’s shoulder. He didn’t know it, first he leaned on Li Shu’s shoulder, then he felt boneless in Li Shu’s arms, and finally he laid flat on Li Shu’s leg.

The driver’s Lao Fei looked behind in the rear mirror at Zhang Qiu, with disdainful eyes though that the two were in the same-s.e.x relations.h.i.+p. Seeing this, what fierce character that Jin LaoDa boasting about? It was estimated that he want to pit a head of money.

Li Shu had closed his eyes and kept it closed; he didn’t pay attention to the probing eyes at the front.

Zhang Qiu didn’t know how long he slept. By the time he woke up, the high-speed scenery outside his window had been replaced by the smoke from the kitchen fire. In the distance, there were many wooden buildings and tiled buildings. He lived in a city far north. He had never seen such a rural scene. It was just as beautiful as the one in the doc.u.mentary.

The car went into a village; it was already a dirt road. Fortunately, the cha.s.sis of the car was not very high. When they arrived at a wooden building, the car stopped.

Jin LaoDa said, “We’ve arrived.”

Zhang Qiu stretched out and opened the door. Unlike the dry sun of Yuncheng, this was a humid subtropical monsoon climate. It’s humid and sultry hot, after a while he was sweating and the back was wet.

A pair of grandfather and grandson came out of the house. The Grandpa spoke the local language, Zhang Qiu couldn’t understand it. The Grandson spoke some Mandarin beside them and talked with Jin LaoDa. LaoFei took the luggage; saw Li Shu standing next to him, a malicious smile, “catch.” He threw two bags of luggage directly. He saw that Li Shu was tall, but thin and very white, and had long hair, like a woman, he had at least 40 kilograms of luggage. He didn’t believe Li Shu could receive the two bags at once and deliberately watched Li Shu make a fool of himself.

Unexpectedly, Li Shu took the luggage lightly. Zhang Qiu saw such a big bag and reached out for it. Li Shu held two bags in one hand. He looked very relaxed and said lightly, “No need.”

The house was not very big, two floors up and down, usually occasionally received visitors to travel climbing, things were still clean.

Zhang Qiu and Li Shu were divided into a room, a narrow bed of one meter and five, a small fan, a simple arrangement of clothes rack, table and so on. Li Shu put his luggage on the ground, and Zhang Qiu opened his eyes curiously; water can, flashlight, medicaments and ropes, in any case, remainder totally were complete.

The room was small and narrow, the floor was boarded, and Zhang Qiu always felt like it would collapse at any moment. He walked very cautiously. He opened the window, and a cool wind blew in. The sultry air in the room dissipated a lot.

“I didn’t expect to have a good view.” Zhang Qiu exclaimed.

The window was facing the gate of the small building, and the mountain was in the distance. Looking at it for a while, he saw another car coming this way. Zu grandson and grandfather stood at the door to pick up people, waiting for the car to stop slowly to the side of the road.

When Zhang Qiu saw the man’s appearance, he suddenly froze.

“Second brother?!”

Chapter 16

Zhang YuShui saw Zhang Qiu and was stunned. “How come you guys are here?”

“I want to ask you this too!” Zhang Qiu saw Zhang YuShui was back to the first time they met, as if Pixian Huiw.a.n.g had no influence on him. After thinking about it, he decided not to tell him, whether the one he saw at the airport gate was Pixian Huiw.a.n.g or not.

Zhang YuShui glanced at Li Shu and paused. He pulled a piece of paper from the jacket pocket and pushed it across the table to Zhang Qiu.

Zhang Qiu opened the paper with only one sentence printed on it.

[You and Pixian Huiw.a.n.g.] The last row of words on paper read the current address.

“Second brother, do you still think about Pixian Huiw.a.n.g?” Zhang Qiu looked a bit complicated. He turned the paper over and over, there was nothing special about it except the typesetting, “Who gave you this paper?”

Zhang YuShui shook his head. “Someone led me over.” He looked pale, unwilling to waste much time on the subject, he stepped aside and asked, “How did you get here?”

Zhang Qiu first looked at Li Shu, Li Shu nodded, and Zhang Qiu said that they had encountered them.

“It should be a place,” Li Shu said.

The trio was in a state of thought at the moment. Did the man who sent the paper to Zhang YuShui and the boss behind Jin LaoDa actually the same? What is the purpose? Zhang Qiu did not understand. Li Shu looked at Zhang Qiu, who frowned, and said, “Nothing, there is me.”

Knock.

Someone knocked at the door and Zhang YuShui opened it without inviting anyone in. Standing at the door, Zhang Qiu heard a familiar voice, Jin LaoDa.

“Mr. Zhang is here! It’s just the right time. I’ll inform Mr. Zhang about the plan tomorrow. This trouble Mr. Zhang to do this.”

Zhang Yu Shui faintly sent Jin LaoDa away and closed the door. Zhang Qiu whispered, “It was the boss behind Jin LaoDa who sent the letter to second brother.” Now he was getting more and more confused. “What does the boss behind this want?”

“We’ll know tomorrow.” Li Shu said.

Downstairs, the little grandson called them to dinner. This time, counting Zhang YuShui, they were thirteen people. Seven of them were under the boss behind the scene. Only two of them were Jin LaoDa’s, the two men who tied him up. The rest were Zhang Qiu, Li Shu and his second brother.

As one could see from the table, seven of the boss’s men were all in black, sitting at a big table on the far side of the table. Jin LaoDa took a place at a long table near the door, and when they came down, he stood up and smiled and greeted them. “Mr. Li Shu is sitting here.”

Lao Fei looked at them and sneered, loudly, without knowing what was said, the occupants of the big table burst into laughter.

Zhang Qiu couldn’t hear what Lao Fei said, but definitely wasn’t a good word at all. He was a little angry at the moment, but he also knew that this group of people should not be provoked, saved trouble for Li Shu.

Apart from the occasional annoying laughter at the big table inside, the whole dinner was delicious, featuring stir-fried wild vegetable with bacon from the farm, greasy porridge and yellowing mantou, a man’s fist-sized, steaming hot pot, accompanied by the old grandpa’s own pickled pickles, Zhang Qiu appet.i.te could swallow his tongue. One could not help but take one, and finally ended up eating too much, until he could not walk.

It’s getting dark early in the mountains, and the sultry feeling of the day would be relieved. Some cool breeze was blowing. Zhang Qiu held the table and stood up. After eating too much today, he always felt his belly was a little round.

Li Shu looked at the round belly of Zhang Qiu with a hint of tenderness that he himself had never noticed.

Zhang Qiu rubbed his stomach and cried, “After sitting for half a day, it is still hard to sustain.” After mentioning, it was a bit pathetic.

“Go out for a walk.”

Li Shu accompanied Zhang Qiu to go out. The old grandpa who cleared the table was anxious to see where they were going. He stopped them eagerly in the local language. Little grandson ran out and listened to his grandfather’s words and translated to them, “You can’t go to the mountains over there. There’s a witch G.o.d.”

Zhang Qiu looked at the direction of the little Grandson, the mountain in the southwest, this mountain was shorter than the mountain in the front, but the trees were dense.

“We aren’t going up the mountain; we just want to walk around.” Zhang Qiu said it well; the anxious mood that the old man had just stopped them was not faked.

The old grandpa said it again and told them, at the side, the little grandson translated. Only then Zhang Qiu knew that the old grandpa’s son had been missing in the southwest mountain when he went there a year ago. It was said that in the past few years, scattered people in the village had died in that mountain.

Because of this, Zhang Qiu didn’t want to go out. He and Li Shu returned to the room. After two laps in the room, he threw himself into bed.

Li Shu’s line of sight swept Zhang Qiu’s sleek b.u.t.tocks, maintaining his composure, “Sleepy, then bath and sleep.”

Zhang Qiu lazily got up from the bed. He didn’t want to move, but he didn’t want Li Shu to think that he was dirty. He went out to the water room, rushed to take a cold shower and went back in a cold chill.

“LaoDa, what is the background of this behind the scene boss?”

“What do you do with so much? It’s alright, there is money, remember to take the box, the price is a hundred times.”

The voice of Jin LaoDa went down, as if he heard the footsteps outside, urged: “Go to sleep, go to sleep.” The lights in the room went out.

Zhang Qiu slowed down and walked back, thinking that the box that Jin LaoDa said must be very important, at least it was important to the boss behind the scene.

When he went back, he told Li Shu what Jin LaoDa had just said. Li Shu looked like he had already known it. Zhang Qiu couldn’t help but wondered, “Do you know what box they are looking for?”

“You have seen it.”

Zhang Qiu recalled the box he saw, uttered ah, “is it the spirit bead box?”

Li Shu nodded. “It contained part of the map.”

The boss behind the scene was looking for a map, and Li Shu was also for the map. Where is the final destination of the map?

Zhang Qiu’s mind was stuffed full of problems and when he climbed the bed, he fell asleep. The next morning, they had breakfast. Jin LaoDa had already found a local guide. Zhang Qiu knew they were going to the southwest mountain where the Witch G.o.d was, which the old grandpa anxiously reminded yesterday. The guide was hard to find because of the idea of sacrificing his life to the witch G.o.d, and eventually it was Jin LaoDa who paid him a lot of money.

The guide was a short, thin, middle-aged man named Na Wu, with flexible legs and feet, easy movement, leading the way.

Zhang Qiu carried a shoulder bag with only canned noodles and compressed biscuits. Li Shu held heavy things like water tools. If he hadn’t objected, Li Shu would have taken them all alone.

Li Shu grabbed only part of the map from the Pixian Hui w.a.n.g, didn’t know how they were going to determine the southwest mountain of Xianxi, because after thousands of years of change, the exact location of the mountain had been blurred. It happened that Zhang YuShui was a master of feng shui positioning. After walking all morning, Zhang YuShui soon found a place.

He pointed to one place, “there.”

Na Wu’s face suddenly changed and shook his head violently, in stiff Chinese he said, “No, no, there’s no going there, there’s a Witch G.o.d, there’s going to be death.” When he said death, his face was solemn and dignified, and his eyes were full of fear.

Zhang Qiu was influenced by Na Wu’s fear. Looking at Zhang YuShui’s pointing at a bare stone wall halfway down the hillside, the more he saw, the more it seemed wrong. There was a lot of vegetation here, but only the stone wall with white flowers was exposed outside and the gra.s.s was bare.

Lao Fei of the black clothes team came out impatiently and said, “Lead the way!”

“No, No.” Na Wu shook his head violently.

Lao Fei quickly grabbed Na Wu’s collar and picked him up straight. Na Wu, whose neck collar was grabbed, cutting off air, turned red. Lao Fei’s eyes were malicious, “No more lead and Lao Zi will kill you now, and let you meet your Witch G.o.d.”

Na Wu gasped and nodded, Lao Fei slackened his hands, Na Wu was thrown to the ground and coughed, and Lao Fei kicked impatiently, “Get up quick.”

As the procession went on, Zhang Qiu followed Li Shu and Zhang YuShui at the end. The black men were in the front. Lao Fei followed Na Wu with an occasional shout. Zhang Qiu pouted and whispered, “That Lao Fei is a nuisance.”

Li Shu hummed.

Because Na Wu avoided a lot of detours, by noon they had climbed the southwest mountain and reached the foot of the mountain, and the stone wall mountain was in front of them.

Jin LaoDa flashed a flashlight and went inside, could not see his head at all in the dark. They stood outside braving the mountain breeze whimpering like ghosts crying, the eerie forest scratches sound like bones grinding gave them a headache, but Zhang Qiu felt refreshed.

“Come on!”

Lao Fei grabbed Na Wu’s collar and walked along. Na Wu’s legs were flabby with fright, gesticulating with hands and feet somewhat in madness, “Don’t- don’t go, there’s a witch G.o.d in it. Say- say it was only mountain climbing.”

It turned out that Jin LaoDa told Na Wu that he wanted to see how to climb down the southwestern mountain without telling the truth. It was never possible to tell Na Wu that they were Earth Masters and tomb raiders.

LaoFei was so impatient that he pulled out a gun from his waist.

“Hey!” Zhang Qiu subconsciously shouted, originally Jin LaoDa and they cheated Na Wu, now if taking out a gun, the person life could not bear.

Lao Fei s.h.i.+fted the black hole of the gun toward Zhang Qiu, Li Shu blocked in front, his eyes looking coldly at each other, “Put it down.”

Jin LaoDa saw that the atmosphere was not right. Lao Fei was stared at like this by Li Shu. Not long after his forehead was covered with a cold sweat, he put down his gun unconsciously and felt like sweeping his face. He was just about to attack, Jin LaoDa broke in laughter and finally persuaded Na Wu to go on.

Na Wu also saw that the force was coming. The man had a gun in his hand and had to push his head forward.

After a few minutes of walking, the ground was getting damper and wetter, and the pitted bones of some animals smelled fishy. Zhang Qiu quickly took the mask out of his bag and sent it to Li Shu and Zhang YuShui, he felt nauseating.

As he walked in, the water in the pa.s.sage reached between his calf and stomach, and all around the mountain wall was blackness, Zhang Qiu slipped off without stepping on it. His flashlight shone on the mountain wall, and Na Wu suddenly screamed in horror, “Ghost! Ghost!” The sound echoed back and forth in the mountain road, it sounded particularly sad.

Zhang Qiu nearly fell to the ground, scared by Na Wu’s scream. Fortunately, Li Shu took his arm. Lao Fei’s patience with Na Wu was at its limit. He slapped back. “What the h.e.l.l are you talking about? What ghosts are there in this world!”

Na Wu was already crying, pointing with trembling fingers at Zhang Qiu’s flashlight, which had just hit the top of the stone wall. “You- you see.”

All their flashlights shone in the direction of Na Wu’s finger. The dark stone walls were covered with holes. Zhang Qiu took a quick breath of cold air. All these black holes were stuffed with coffins. He didn’t know if his eyesight was wrong, but just now he saw a skeleton with black holes in its eyes and smiled at them.