Archaeological Notes

Chapter 15 Pig Skin
The body was probably squinting, and when we found him, he was buried inside a snowman, perfect hiding place.The state of death was appalling, as if someone had skinned him alive, and his whole body was frozen into a ball, making people think it was frozen meat taken out of the refrigerator.The white down jacket on my body was all stained, and my stomach was overwhelmed with nausea, and I felt a little overwhelmed several times.

"Why did you die so strangely?" the monk asked. "The skin was corroded by concentrated sulfuric acid?"

I stroked my chest, calmed my emotions, and shook my head, "It's not like, if I was scalded like this by sulfuric acid, I wouldn't be able to eat just now."

"Who did it?"

Scar is the closest among us to look at the problem. He thought for a while and said: "Maybe the murderer wants to get something from the dead. Let's think about it in another way. His purpose of doing this is to cover up some thing."

"Then, in your opinion, could it be related to the blood corpse in the ancestral hall?" The reason why I thought so was because they all had one thing in common, that is, the skin on their bodies was gone.

Scar didn't respond, but went straight back to the hotel, took out the shovel after a while, and buried the unsightly corpse on the ground with snow.After finishing his work, he clapped his hands and looked at us, "I don't have time to pay attention to this corpse now. Go back to the room and get ready. The situation is urgent, and I don't have time to talk about it. I know how to enter Xing'anling in the most time-saving way. Let's go tomorrow." Just go into the mountains."

I think so too, just judging by Master Shuan's urgency, he obviously went into the mountains to chase something important, the monk has long been impatient, and said that if he continues to grind, he will fall behind in everything, and in the end he won't even have soup Drink, time waits for no one, so we all go back to the room to clean up.

I hurried back to the hotel, ready to go upstairs to change clothes, but when I passed the stairs, I found something strange. The lights in the hotel room were not turned on, and the light was very dim.Called Yixiang but no one responded, I don't know where this girl has gone, just when I was wondering, when I went upstairs, I caught a glimpse of the end of the corridor from the corner of my eye.It was a kitchen, and a puddle of imperceptible fluid was dripping from under the door. It was blood.

I hurriedly called Dao Ba and the others, and discussed going in to have a look. The monk was very courageous, and pushed open the door.Immediately, I heard a disgusting smell of blood wafting from the kitchen, and my heart sank.Scar turned on the light, and then I saw the interior of the kitchen.

The kitchen was messy, pots and pans were all overturned, mixed with sludge.The water in the sink was rushing and overflowing everywhere. It was obvious that someone had left in a hurry and forgot to turn it off. A long bloodstain was dragged on the floor, extending all the way to a freezer.

It was a new flying freezer, and it was thrown there casually like a waste. When the scar went to open it, it was stunned, and it stood there with a solemn expression.The monk swallowed his saliva when he went over, covered his nose and didn't speak, but motioned for me to go over.

I walked to the freezer with lingering fear, only to see layers of pigskin frozen inside.I don't know how long it has been left there, but there are white flowers growing on it, which seems to be rotten. Although it is frozen, it is still difficult to cover up its rotten smell, and the stench is suffocating.

But there were bloodstains on the pigskin, which should have been sprinkled not long ago. Scar looked at it for a while, but felt something was wrong. He ran upstairs to get gloves, rummaged in the freezer, and suddenly pulled out an oversized The pigskin comes.

I didn't see it clearly for a while, so it's not too much to mistake it. It was a piece of pigskin that looked thinner, darker in color, and covered with sores.Scar unfolded it and placed it on the floor, only then did I realize that it was a skin bag, which was in the shape of a "big" character.

"Is this a piece of human skin?" The thing in front of me was unbelievable, and I couldn't help asking.

Scar nodded, turned over the skin bag on the ground, and I saw a tattoo of a fox head exposed on his arm. "I've seen this tattoo on Slant Eyes Three's arm. It should be unmistakable. This piece of human skin was cut from his body." Dao Scar said.

"But why is the face gone?" The monk pointed to the human-skinned head and said surprisingly.

Because we all dislike this face subconsciously, so we didn't even look at it, except for the monk who sees through life and death the most.After he said it, we were surprised to find that, as expected, the face of this pair of human skin and even the entire back of the head had been cut off.

No one expected the situation to come to this point. When I looked around the kitchen, doubts arose in my heart: "Could it be Grandma Xie? She's been haunted these days. Judging by my intuition, it belongs to She is the most suspected."

But Tian Rui said: "I pushed the small black room where Granny Xie lives, but the door is still locked from the inside, as if there is no one there."

Apart from us, there were only their mother-in-law and grandson in the hotel, but they disappeared strangely at the same time. Either the two were haunted, or the person behind the scenes had not yet appeared.Thinking of this, I finally realized, and then I felt bad all over, "Could it be... Yixiang cooks in this kitchen these days? Then what did she feed us?"

The monk rubbed his head, and he was still in the mood to smile: "Hey, it's hard to say, maybe the pancakes baked for us are stuffed with human flesh. But I heard that human flesh tastes sour, I don't know you Did you taste it?"

"Don't scare him." Dao Scar couldn't see it, and comforted me: "Don't worry, judging from the dust accumulated on the table in this room, it hasn't been touched for a long time. I usually see that little girl for meals." It was brought out from the backyard, she would not be so stupid as a murderer."

While talking, Dao Scar put the human skin back into the refrigerator and put the lid on it. After tidying up, he said that we can't delay any longer, don't think about it so much, and rush to Daxing'anling to talk about it.We went back to our room and tidied up hastily. It was freezing in Xing'an Mountains at this time, so it was necessary to bring some cold-proof clothes.Then I bought some reindeer jerky, deer milk tea, and some baked flatbreads in the village, and I can set off after finishing.

In the morning of the next day, we secretly boarded the train that drove into the hinterland of Daxing'an Mountains to pull mines, and hitched a ride without anyone noticing it.The Xing'an Mountains are very rich in mineral deposits, and there are only one ore truck that goes to and fro in a day.But I swear this is the most "tasteful" train I have made since I grew up. In the cold winter months and heavy snowfall, the top of the mine car has no cover. The four of us squatted in the coal pile, wrapped like a bear, still frozen His teeth chattered loudly.The Daxing'an Mountains outside the car were covered with lush forests, like emeralds everywhere. I was half asleep and half awake, and could only spend time with the sound of wheels and pines.

I squinted in a daze, and just when I was about to fall asleep, I felt a "snap", and someone slapped my cheek hard.I woke up immediately, and I didn't feel any pain. My face was numb from the cold wind, but it felt hot. I looked sideways and saw the monk next to me looking at me with a smirk.

Only then did I understand, and I got a little angry: "Are you full? Why are you whipping me if you have nothing to do? If you are really bored, just tie a rope to a stick, and then wave it vigorously towards the outside of the car. Well."

Now the monk is confused. "And why?"

I said angrily to him, "Those who don't know think you're having a convulsion."

"Then what!" The monk ate the turtle, but he refused to give in. "You are so heartless! I am afraid that you will fall asleep, and you will not see what is going on. If you do fall asleep, what will happen?" If it’s not good, you won’t be able to sleep forever, so you should prepare to be the son-in-law of King Yan.”

When he said it, I couldn't deny that it was true.Looking at Dao Scar and Tian Rui, they were both thinking about their own affairs, and they didn't intend to take a nap.Sitting across from me was Tian Rui, with a stern face covered with frost, her stubborn lips tightly pursed, and she was still leaning against the carriage with her knees hugged in silence.I noticed that his clothes were a little thin, a close-fitting leather jacket and an autumn jacket.

I couldn't bear it, so I took out a military coat from my bag, which I brought from Beijing, and I was reluctant to wear it all the time, so I slowly shook it off and put it on for her.I don't want her to be shocked like an electric shock. She was startled first, then looked at me defensively, ripped it off and returned it to me, without any expression, just said coldly: "No need."

Unexpectedly, this big beautiful girl is still a prickly head, and she was rejected for the first time she showed her attention to a girl, but if she doesn't want you, you can't force her to wear it, right?Resentfully stuffing the clothes into the bag, I found the scene very embarrassing, and I was afraid that I would fall asleep again, so I could only chat with the monk without saying a word.After a while, the topic shifted to the strange things that happened repeatedly in the village. Scar had nothing to do, so he joined in.

If you want to talk about those extremely weird things, you have to have a thread. It is obvious that "Squint Eye [-]" can be said to be such a character that runs through the whole story.From the first day we entered the village and we were involved in successive incidents in the village, he was a person with ulterior motives.The bloody corpse brought back to the village on Guiyan Ridge, the missing corpse in the shrine, and the fire in the ancestral hall. It is not difficult to see that all these things are inextricably linked with him.But people always have an indescribable feeling, that is, behind the whole thing, it seems that there is an invisible hand manipulating everything, but we have not discovered it.

"In my opinion!" The monk analyzed: "It's just that the squint-eyed three didn't find the right way to get rich. There are many ways for us to become well-off. If we learn how to touch gold and fight for money, he is good. He just wants to take it." People's lair, greedy for the treasures buried by the Guo brothers, ended up with retribution. First, they stole the corpse in the shrine, trying to find out the location of the ancient tomb of the Jin Dynasty. Burned. I think this person needs to be educated, and you have no ability to find it, so don’t do it so badly, yes! In the end, you will end up in an end that no one can imagine.”

The monk poured out all he knew in one breath, but in my opinion, this was only a superficial phenomenon, and Scar immediately overthrew him, "Then according to you, Slant Eyes Three's original plan may be right, but what happened later However, it is completely unreasonable. After Slant Eyes San was infected with the corpse poison, the strange behavior of the villagers is also incomprehensible. The most obvious is that Slant Eyes Three's body was stolen and hidden in the hotel, and then skinned. From this point You can see that things are not simple.”

I agreed, rubbed my nose that was red from the cold, and thought that there is one more thing, that is, we will go to Maoer Pier this morning.I still don't understand the strange patterns on the stone wall in the cave, but I think it's very likely that Scar discovered something he shouldn't know, and it's trying to silence people.Trapped by the fire at the entrance of the cave, and thinking about their strange behavior after returning to the village, maybe they were the ones who set the fire.When I told them, the monk slapped his thigh: "Those villagers are so bad to the bottom of their bones. It's like sticking cigarettes on the graves of their ancestors. Smoke is coming out of the ancestral graves. Who the hell stipulates that we are not allowed to enter the cave for sightseeing and pay respects?"

I smiled lightly, and there are two things in my heart that I actually concealed. One is what the vat that Scar stole from the ancestral hall was for, and the second thing that made me sleep and eat more disturbed was squinting. The little golden coffin entrusted to me before I died.These two things seem to be irrelevant, but it cannot be said with certainty that they have nothing to do with each other.In this regard, I did not tell the whole story to Scar, because I knew that he was also a Tibetan wearing a leather jacket to me, showing his hand and keeping his hand. I have no reason not to be smart.

The monk remembered the corpse of Slanting Eyes Three in the hotel today, and when he mentioned it, Scar's opinion was very unique.He said, "Grandma Xie's is undoubtedly the most likely, or Yixiang, and of course there is a third person. The murderer stole the body back at night, after skinning it in the kitchen, due to time constraints Unable to move quickly, we could only build the corpse into a snowman and hide it in the yard. But what I didn’t expect was that the most dangerous place was really not safe, and Cao Xuan’s accidental discovery made this matter known to us.”

"Yixiang!" Tian Rui, who was silent across from me, couldn't help but said, "This girl is not simple."

"How?" I asked quickly.

"I can't tell," she shook her head, "You don't stick to small things, but I see people differently. That girl usually pretends to be playful in front of you, but I rarely see her laughing in private. It feels like she looks bitter and bitter. And you haven't noticed that she will actually be there every time something happens in the village and pay close attention to our every move."

I was surprised when she said that, women's natural sensitivity is really far behind us, and I suddenly recalled what happened a few days ago.From this point of view, Yixiang is at least related to Xieyan San. On the night of the fire in the ancestral hall, Xieyan San once wanted to rape Yixiang.After analyzing this point, they all felt that we had overlooked too many things, so the monk asked, "When you entered the room that day, did you see that the squinting-eyed San Yixiang was doing Fa-rectification on the spot?"

I said no, I saw something strange in the room at the time, and when I entered, I saw Slanting Eyes San naked to the waist, Yixiang was very surprised.

"Think about it again!" Tian Rui seemed to think of something, "It's just a surprised expression? Is there any element of fear?"

After thinking about it seriously, I shook my head and answered with certainty: "No."

Dao Scar also understood, "That's right, maybe there is a possibility that these two people are involved at all. From my guess, it may be that Yixiang discovered something on Slanting Eyes San that shocked him at the time."

The monk also nodded: "Taking off his shirt doesn't mean he's playing hooligans. It's also possible to show off his pectoralis major. Show off."

In this way, the matter seemed a little clearer, I thought for a while and said, "That is to say, Slanting Eyes San does have something very valuable, Master Shuan also wanted it, but in the end Yixiang got it. But But she fled to the Xing'an Mountains,

This is probably why the villagers recalled Xiang. "

Several people discussed and discussed, and finally only had a general understanding. Scar said that all of this is just our subjective inference, and the truth may be even more unbelievable than what we know.I didn't say anything on the face, but my heart was open, who can say that you, Dao Scar, are so busy, not because of the important thing in Yixiang's hand?Now that I've learned to be good, I think it's better not to speak out about some things until the truth comes to light.

So the time passed between our conversations, and the sky gradually darkened, and only the dark outline of the woods under the moonlight could be seen, stretching endlessly.When I was thinking about how to spend the night, the train pulling the mine stopped slowly. I asked if Scar had arrived, but he said that he stopped to pull wood and the driver changed shift.

As soon as the car stopped, I felt warmer instantly. I leaned against the car and wanted to squint for a while, planning to ask the monk to wake me up later.I patted him on the shoulder, but found that he was looking at the open area not far below the car, and when he hurriedly pointed it out to me, I saw clearly that there seemed to be a young girl standing beside the pile of dead wood, wearing a pale dress, in a dazed state. look.

It's Yixiang!I was stunned.

(End of this chapter)