The atmosphere in the team was a bit heavy after leaving the main force. None of us spoke, and we all kept our heads down and hurried on in silence.

We hadn't gone more than a few steps when Biantou in front of us suddenly tripped over something. He cried out, "Ouch!" and looked down to check, but was surprised to say, "Damn? This is a... hoe?"

Hearing him say that, we also crowded over to see what was going on. Sure enough, there was a tool that was very common in farmers' homes – a hoe!

However, this hoe looked very old. The front was covered with rust, and a section of the wooden handle at the back was broken off. What was left was so decayed that it was beyond recognition.

In addition to this hoe, we also saw many shovels, dustpans, and other digging tools nearby. Like the hoe, they were all badly corroded, and some were even integrated with the soil.

Shopkeeper Wang squatted down to take a look and said with a wry smile, "Well, well, this should be the tools left behind by the *tufuzi* (grave robbers) who dug this tunnel. But I don't know what kind of accident they encountered at the time. This group of people stopped digging halfway, threw down their hoes and shovels, and ran away."

Biantou picked up the hoe and looked at it carefully, and asked, "Shopkeeper, this hoe is at least a few hundred years old, right? If you take this thing out, you can probably sell it as a cultural relic!"

Shopkeeper Wang nodded and said, "What you said is really right. This group of *tufuzi* originally came here to dig up cultural relics, but they didn't manage to dig up any cultural relics. Their equipment was left in the tomb tunnel, and after a few hundred years, it turned into new cultural relics and was picked up by us, haha... haha..."

After that, he looked at the tomb tunnel and speculated, "Judging from the scale of the tunnel, this group of people should be government robbers. I don't know which dynasty they were from, and who was leading them."

The so-called "government robbers" refers to tomb robbing behavior permitted by the imperial court. Cao Cao, who first established the positions of *mojin xiaowei* (treasure seeking commandant) and *faqiu zhonglangjiang* (tomb raiding lieutenant), initiated tomb raiding activities that were considered government sanctioned.

In ancient times, the level of technology was limited. Being able to dig such a wide tunnel was basically the work of government robbers. Ordinary petty thieves and *tufuzi* couldn't make such a big commotion.

Just as we were buried in studying these "cultural relics", Uncle Mei, who was not far away, suddenly shouted, "There's a dead person here!"

When Shopkeeper Wang heard this, he quickly stood up and walked over. Sure enough, there was a skeleton lying on the ground in front of Uncle Mei.

Because of the age, the skeleton had already turned into a pile of white bones. The clothes on his body had rotted beyond recognition, leaving only some simple fragments. Shopkeeper Wang walked over to take a look, but suddenly said with certainty, "It should be a government robber from the Ming Dynasty."

I couldn't help but ask curiously, "Shopkeeper, how do you know?"

Shopkeeper Wang said, "You can roughly tell from what he's wearing that it's the attire of the Ming Dynasty."

Sister Hong asked in surprise, "Shopkeeper, the clothes on this person's body are almost completely rotten. You can still recognize that it's the attire of the Ming Dynasty?"

Shopkeeper Wang shook his head and said, "It's not just about the clothes, it's also about the shoes. Judging from the fragments of this person's clothes, he was dressed quite well, and he definitely wasn't an ordinary coolie, so he had some status. But look at the shoes he's wearing, they're the most shabby straw sandals, not even *zaoxie* (black cloth shoes) or boots."

I glanced down and saw that what Shopkeeper Wang said was indeed correct. The skeleton was indeed wearing only a pair of straw sandals, nearly rotten straw sandals.

Shopkeeper Wang continued, "Throughout the dynasties, the Ming Dynasty was the only one that had such strict requirements for wearing shoes. Do you know what the founding emperor of the Ming Dynasty, Zhu Yuanzhang, did in his early years?"

I said of course I knew. Zhu Chongba herded cattle for the landlord when he was a child, and begged on the streets when he grew up. He was a member of the Beggar Clan.

Shopkeeper Wang nodded and said, "That's right. Zhu Yuanzhang came from a humble background and suffered all kinds of humiliation in his early years. When he was begging for food, he was often kicked by rich people wearing high boots, so he hated boots very much. He stipulated that not only commoners were not allowed to wear boots, but even ordinary officials had to wear simple shoes. Only imperial relatives, musicians, those serving the emperor, scholars, and guards on duty were allowed to wear boots. Even the *jinyiwei* (imperial guards) in their *feiyufu* (embroidered uniforms) and *xiuchundao* (spring embroidery blades), if you lifted their fancy clothes, you would see that they were wearing the most shabby straw sandals."

After listening to this, I suddenly understood, and I couldn't help but admire Shopkeeper Wang's erudition again.

At this time, Uncle Mei pointed to the distance and said, "There's another dead person here... No, there are several dead people here!"

We looked in the direction of the sound and were immediately dumbfounded.

Looking forward along the tomb tunnel, there were a large number of corpses lying all over the ground!

Without a doubt, they were the tomb robbers who had dug this tunnel, but for some reason, they had all died in this tomb tunnel!

Seeing this scene, Sister Hong was already scared. She hugged my arm and asked timidly, "Rongsheng, do you think they encountered some kind of accident back then? They ran away before the tomb tunnel was finished, and they didn't even make it out, they all died here..."

I have to say, Sister Hong's reasoning made a lot of sense.

Judging from the way these tomb robbers died and the tomb robbing tools that were scattered everywhere in the tunnel, it did seem like they had encountered some kind of accident while digging the tunnel. This accident caused them to turn around and run away, but they didn't run far before they died on the spot, so the tunnel wasn't completed.

Shopkeeper Wang's expression had become solemn. He lowered his voice and said, "Now is not the time to think about these things. We have to leave this place of trouble as soon as possible! Let's go, let's go, don't delay for a moment!"

However, as soon as he finished speaking, I suddenly heard a "pa ta" sound behind me. I couldn't help but shudder and turned my head to look at Sister Hong. I saw that Sister Hong was also looking at me in horror.

"Rongsheng, there's a sound behind us!"

Sister Hong said in a trembling voice.

"Oh my god! Could it be that the ancient Shu king has come back to life?!"

"Bullshit! Xiaohong, don't scare yourself!" Before I could answer, Shopkeeper Wang scolded, "Get out of here, don't look back! Go!"

While shouting, Shopkeeper Wang took the lead and ran outside.

Biantou and Uncle Mei quickly followed.

Sister Hong and I didn't look back either, but took big strides and ran away. We used almost all our strength, and the sound of the wind was whistling in our ears.

But there were obstacles everywhere in the tomb tunnel ahead. There were the bones of these tomb robbers, and hoes and shovels scattered on the ground. Shopkeeper Wang had only taken two steps when he was tripped over. Uncle Mei and Biantou, who were behind him, couldn't stop in time and fell on top of him.

Sister Hong also stumbled while running and fell. Because she was holding my arm all the time, she also brought me down with her.

A group of us fell to the ground, tumbling and crawling, looking as embarrassed as we could be.

As a result, after falling to the ground, I grabbed around with both hands and suddenly touched something soft and elastic.

I thought it was Sister Hong's jade peak and said sorry, but when I touched it again, how could this thing be furry?

When I looked closely, I was immediately scared into a cold sweat!

The soft and elastic lump of flesh turned out to be a blue-furred rat the size of a wild cat!

It had its back to me, but when I grabbed it, it suddenly turned its head, glared at me with a pair of scarlet eyes, and bared its two sharp, long rat teeth, squeaking!