Chapter 16: Corpse Mutation

  I've always been glared at and lectured by this woman, feeling extremely unhappy in my heart. However, I still have to rely on their power to get out now, so it's not good to make a scene either. I'm fuming as I pick up an explosive and walk to another stone coffin, slapping it heavily with my hand.

  It seemed that I had used too much force or something else, and the stone coffin was actually moved by me. I was so scared that I quickly retreated a few steps. Was there something coming out? After waiting for a while, nothing happened, it seemed that I was just being overly suspicious. I took a look at Zhou Huan, she pulled out a bundle of detonating cord from the bottom of her bag and was connecting the explosives on the two coffins together.

  I still want to know the truth, so I continued to ask: "I'm asking you, Zhou Mei, are you daring enough to tell me what's inside this coffin? I don't even know if I can get out of here alive, do you want me to be a confused ghost?"

  Zhou Huan glanced at me, initially seeming quite annoyed, then let out a sigh and walked over to the next coffin, saying to me: "If you really want to know, it's not like I won't tell you. But if I do tell you, we'll be in this together from now on. Otherwise, you'll never get out of here."

  "Alright, no problem, we're in this together anyway, you tell me and I'll listen." As I continued her words, I also took out the thing from my bag and connected it up like she had before.

  In such a large space coffin, one after another, we two installed explosives side by side, and Zhou Huan told me about the course of events.

  She said that although they all looked like Chinese, they actually all had American nationality and were members of an international investigation company. She said it was an investigation company, but in fact it was a tomb raiding organization with strong funding and strength. The two professors themselves were originally part of the national archaeological team, but later they were poached by this organization. The rest, including her, had been trained from childhood in a base and belonged to the organization's internal executive team.

  Zhou Huan said that this ancient tomb is a project that their organization has been tracking for a long time, and they had sent teams here many times before but were unable to succeed, only bringing back some relevant information. This time, they also lost many people before finally reaching the location successfully.

  This passage left me stunned, thinking that it was said just like 'Naked Gun' and it's a bit too absurd. Have the current tomb raiding organizations developed to such a powerful state? It seems that I and Liangzi are not even considered low-level.

  I then asked her whose tomb this was, how it could be so grand, and whether it belonged to some king from a past dynasty.

  Zhou Huan's answer was quite unexpected, she said that in this area there was once a nation not recorded by history called 'Huli Guo', it is said that the king had a very powerful national teacher who was transformed from a female fox spirit. The fox girl helped the king rule the land, she had a special ability to make anyone or animal seen by her eyes lose their soul, and they would obey her and the king unconditionally, even if it meant going to death without hesitation, with absolute loyalty.

  This nation has been ruled by the Fox Spirit and the King for about a few hundred years, it is said that because the female fox gave the king an elixir, taking it for a long time would make him immortal, so the Fox Spirit and the King always looked very young, until later a powerful Taoist priest appeared here, using a special bow and arrow to shoot the Fox Spirit dead, the King without the protection of the Fox Spirit slowly lost his ability to rule, finally being overthrown by his people after many years in power, this mysterious nation that lasted for several hundred years was only then brought to an end.

  It is said that people hung the king on a tree in the forest, exposing him to the scorching sun and letting poisonous insects bite him wildly. When the king died, he had almost become a skeleton, with a terrifying appearance. After cremating the king, however, no matter how hard they looked, they couldn't find the vixen's corpse. From then on, the Daoist of Mao Mountain never appeared again.

  After Zhou Huan finished telling the story, he looked at me and said: "It was probably like that until later when one of our organization's older members found this place. Gao Cheng guessed that it should be the tomb built by the fox girl for herself before she died, so our mission this time is to open the fox girl's coffin and bring back what's inside."

  I listened to her story and expressed absolute disbelief. This trick of deceiving children was simply too old-fashioned. I asked disdainfully, "Then can't we just go open the fox girl's coffin and take things? What are you putting explosives here for?"

  "According to the records and our in-depth research, it can be roughly confirmed that although the fox woman's physical body has died, her soul still exists within her body. Every time the full moon is brightest, she will open her coffin to absorb the essence of the moonlight, and after a certain period of time, she can be reborn again. The small stone coffins we are facing now should be the burial guards for the fox woman, and it is likely that they have all become zombies. Therefore, we can only use this method." Zhou Huan said, urging me to speed up.

  Although I think she's getting more and more absurd, facing so many stone coffins is inevitably chilling. It seems that blowing them up is a more reliable option. Anything can happen in this ghostly place. The two of us stopped talking and focused on laying the explosives.

  After waiting for the others to finish setting up, Captain Blackface connected a relatively long * and pulled it to a distance from the coffin before igniting it. As the * sputtered with white smoke, we rushed quickly towards the center of the cave. I had just arrived at Professor's side when a loud explosion sounded behind me.

  We all covered our ears and looked towards the explosion, it seemed that the amount of explosives was well controlled. The coffins were blown up one by one, and after each coffin was shattered, the flames from the explosion would ignite the object behind it, which resembled a sunflower. I was surprised to find that those sunflowers were actually specially made oil lamps, and I had no idea who came up with this trick - it was simply perfect.

  Just then, another unexpected accident occurred. When the stone coffin exploded in sequence to about half of it, the explosion sound stopped, and the next coffin was unexpectedly unresponsive. I took a look and found that the unresponsive coffin had reached the place where I previously placed the explosives. Could it be that one of my *was not plugged in properly?

  Just as I was about to go over and take a look, I found that the brightness of the light in the cave had increased again. It seemed that this was exactly when the moon was completely covering the entrance of the cave. Immediately afterwards, I heard Hei Lian's captain shout "Not good..." and quickly ran towards the direction of the unexploded stone coffin.

  He had only run halfway when I heard the sound of rummaging through boxes and cabinets coming from that area at the same time, and then saw the coffin lids opening one after another and falling to the ground, and a group of humanoid monsters all jumped out.

  Those monsters were all short, hairless, and had dry, dark green skin all over their bodies. They hunched over with their hands hanging down, and then I saw their fingernails start growing rapidly. Next, a layer of green fur appeared on their bodies, and they lifted their heads, opened their mouths to reveal rows of sharp teeth, let out a shrill cry towards the sky, shook their heads from side to side, and charged towards us.

  My goodness! There are still twenty or thirty zongzi left, even if Mr. Xu Xin were here, he wouldn't necessarily have the upper hand. This time the bullets are almost gone, this is much harder to deal with than that giant snake, do I need to hold a dagger and ride on them one by one? I reckon those zongzi can't be ridden either.

  The black-faced captain fired his gun while retreating, and every time he fired a shot, one of the zongzi would fall to the ground. However, they had all become zombies after all, and bullets couldn't kill them at all. They got up, gnashed their teeth, and continued to charge towards us. Everyone was firing their guns while retreating, and when all the bullets were gone, it turned out that not a single zongzi had been killed, only slightly slowing down their speed.

  I thought this time was a thorough settlement, we were just a few people with the old, weak, sick and disabled, but they were a group of evil spirits who couldn't be hurt by knives or guns. There's no way to look at it, so I can only keep running. However, the speed of the dumplings is extremely fast, and in an instant, several have already arrived behind everyone. The black-faced captain held his gun like a club, he had great strength, and with one blow, he knocked out a dumpling that had just jumped up to attack.

  That zongzi rolled around on the ground a few times before getting back up, roaring as it continued to charge towards us. The injured team member was protecting the old professor and running the slowest. When he saw the zongzi catching up, he pushed the old professor forward with force. Then two zongzis crashed into him, instantly knocking him to the ground. The other zongzis immediately gave up chasing us and swarmed towards him instead. I heard a heart-wrenching scream, and before anyone could react, the team member had already been torn apart completely.

  Witnessing this scene, I feel like I'm on the verge of collapse. Although these people have nothing to do with me, watching one by one die in front of me has pushed my mental endurance to its limits. I don't know how much longer I can hold on without losing my mind.

  Everyone stopped in their tracks, watching helplessly as the zombies fought over and devoured the corpses of their own kind. I felt like others were also starting to lose the will to fight, it seemed that before long we would all become a pile of minced meat, serving as a midnight snack for these ghosts.

  Zhou Huan suddenly seemed to have an idea, turned around and shouted at us: "Quickly, who still has explosives, use the explosives." I thought about it, yes, we were so busy escaping that we even forgot about the explosives. Everyone started searching their backpacks, but after emptying them all out, only two were left. The black-faced captain picked one up, lit it and threw it into the dumpling crowd. With a loud explosion, several dumplings immediately flew into the air.

  However, the explosive range of this explosive is very limited. Except for a few that were blown to pieces, all the others are safe and sound. A new wave of attack has begun again. I'm really anxious, picking up an explosive, igniting it, and rushing towards the dumpling group, shouting loudly as I throw it into their midst. Turning around and running a few steps, the explosive didn't go off. Following the hissing sound, I lowered my head to take a look, and found that the ignited fuse was actually caught on my cuff button.

  I was so scared to death at that time, how could I be so unlucky? I cursed myself for being a jinx, but there was no time for regret now. Those rice dumplings were right behind me in an instant. I stopped and turned around, looking at this group of evil spirits, thinking that this time I'm done for, even if a god came down to save me, it would be too late.