Archaeological Notes

Chapter 7 Night Coffin

The cold wind was howling, the sky was gray, the moon was shrouded in thick haze, and the ground of the sylvestris pine forest was covered with snow, reflecting a faint light.Tian Rui was lying on my left side, her pretty face was as cold as a snow lotus on an iceberg, her long eyelashes were condensed with tiny icicles, which almost covered her crystal clear eyes.Following her line of sight and looking in that direction, the bitter cold wind hit my face. I lay in the snow until my teeth were knocked, and my eyes were fixed on the four people carrying the coffin. I wondered if it was Carrying the coffin at night?

I know that some areas have very unique customs. If ghosts make trouble after someone dies, they need to hire someone to carry an empty coffin around the vicinity for 49 days after dark to exorcise the evil spirits.Within 49 days, if you meet a stranger on the way, one of the four coffin-bearers must ask questions. If the stranger responds, the four coffin-bearers will immediately abandon the coffin and leave, indicating that bad luck has passed to the stranger.The stranger will soon die, and the coffin is for him.This is a ghost story that my grandmother often told me when I was a child. Villages in the mountains rarely have this custom.

It was definitely not a good thing to carry the coffins around the mountains in the middle of the night. After those people went up the mountain, they carried the coffins into the pine forest not far away.As the distance got closer, I finally recognized the leader, a burly man wearing a miner's lamp, who was Slanting Eyes Three.

Since we were lying on the downwind slope, their voices could be heard faintly, but not clearly.

"Finally..." Slanted Eyes San's voice, panting heavily, "It's taken a lot of effort... This coffin is really not just nonsense, it's so heavy that it's a panic."

I recognized another young man named Liu Maodi, who complimented him: "Third brother, your trick to get rid of the golden cicada's shell is wonderful... Everyone in the village has been (deceived) by Tubi."

Slanting Eyes San lit a cigarette, and it flickered in the darkness, "It's not going to happen suddenly, you little Gaba knows what is a cicada and what is a shell? Remember not to chew your tongue in front of people..."

I lay down on the ground, the snow melted from my body temperature, and a large area was wet on the chest. The four of them did not move for a long time, and my teeth itched with anger.The three people carrying the coffin and Slant Eye Sanwei smoked kung fu cigarettes together, and kept fighting for nothing, competing to tout how capable Slant Eye Sanwei was, and he seemed to be quite useful.After the four of them were full, the third squint finally spoke, "Pry open the coffin, and your hands and feet will be more numb. There is a saying called early death and early rebirth, otherwise I will always feel tingling all over my body. Don't worry, I will wait until this transaction is finished." , After finding the treasure, it will be beneficial to you."

Everyone nodded like chickens pecking rice, and pried open the coffin with great interest.

Unexpectedly, the scene of Ben's cheering and jumping stopped abruptly, and the smiles froze on their faces. The atmosphere was so weird that it was obvious that something unexpected happened in the coffin.

"Bad bastard!" Slanting Eyes Three felt extremely angry, "Recite today, the matter has been stunned (disturbed)."

Then came Liu Maodi's voice, "What's the matter?"

"Go back to the village! I'll bury this coffin when Ming'er goes up the mountain to bring tools." Although Slanting Eyes' three words were very reconciled, they had no choice but to stomp their feet. They dropped the coffin and came out of the pine forest, cursing their parents and calling their mothers. headed towards the village.

After those people were far away, Scar stood up from the snow. I rubbed my numb arm, not knowing the purpose of Slanting Eyes Three.Scar said don't worry, go and see what's in the coffin first, and then ran to this barren mountain without sleep in the middle of the night, the motive is definitely not pure.

The big-headed coffin in the snow was just so open, but I became confused, and couldn't figure out what happened just now.This afternoon, when Ben was carried back to the village from Guiling, except for a headless bloody corpse, there were no valuable antique gold bars in the coffin.At that time, Slanting Eyes Three had fought with Master Shuan Zi for this, but seeing that there was nothing to gain, he left behind and swaggered away.But now in the middle of the night, it was stolen from the ancestral hall and carried to the forest. Could it be that there is some treasure in the coffin?
When we took a closer look, we found that the coffin was empty, and the bloody corpse inside had long since disappeared, leaving only a few tattered clothes. "Could it be that someone rushed ahead of Slanted Eyes Three and moved the body?"

Scar broke a section of pine branch, and picked up the rotten padded jacket in the coffin. I saw that the cotton had turned black, like the overcoats worn by Northeast people during the Anti-Japanese War.He stepped back a little further, looked at the coffin carefully, and suddenly found something, "This one costs four and a half yuan, not the one dug up in Ghost Ridge this afternoon."

"No?" I realized in an instant, because there was only one coffin in the village, so subconsciously I overlapped the coffin that I lifted up the mountain three times with squinting eyes. At that time, I ignored it because of the terrifying headless corpse. Looking back on the situation inside the coffin, the big-headed coffin in front of me is indeed much bigger than the one in the ancestral hall. "Since it's not the one containing the blood corpse, where did this coffin come from?"

"You're wrong!" the monk interjected with the corner of his mouth raised, "there is more than one coffin in the village."

"In the shrine of the ancestral hall!" Dao Scar and I thought of this at the same time. There are indeed two large-headed coffins stuffed in the shrine of the ancestral hall. There are rumors in the village that they were used to enshrine the bodies of the two Guo brothers.But there is one point that I still don't understand, so I asked: "The squint-eyed three, by stealing this coffin, did you see something in the coffin?"

Dao Scar put his hands on the edge of the coffin, and his brows were furrowed. After all, he has more knowledge than I do, and he thinks more comprehensively: "It's not about the things in the coffin, I guess what he cares about may be the corpse! real body."

The monk sniffed his nose and became addicted to cigarettes. He took out a stick of Zhongnanhai from his pocket and lit it, "Monk, I don't understand. What is there to steal from the corpse of a dead person? It's not the golden body of the abbot master in my monastery back then. Buddhism or something. It’s not a mummy, and if you drag it out and get it overseas, you can exchange it for a doller, so why don’t you drag it back to make soup?”

What the monk said was reasonable, but Dao Scar didn't comment, "Your ears are purely for display. Didn't you hear what the squinting three said just now? He said that after this matter is done, the treasure will be found later, and their benefits will be indispensable."

"Then the meaning of these words refers to..." Tian Rui, who had never spoken, took the middle of the sentence.

As soon as I said this, a gleam of expression suddenly appeared on Scar's face, his eyes lit up, and I felt a little creepy. "After the Guo brothers excavated the ancient tomb of the Jin Dynasty in Daxing'anling, they were surrounded by Japanese troops. However, it is rumored in the village that the Japanese did not find any treasures, and they were all hidden by the Guo brothers."

Dao Scar's words were like enlightenment, and his thoughts suddenly became clear. It meant that the squint-eyed three stole the corpse in the shrine of the ancestral hall in order to find clues on him, and then followed the clues to find the fabled shocking treasure. "Could it be that if you find the location where the wealth is hidden, can you find some information on the bodies of the Guo brothers?"

Dao Scar rubbed his hands, and let out a sigh of relief, "Maybe that's the case, that squint-eyed three must know a lot, maybe he directed and acted the farce today."

"A farce?" The monk took up the conversation, "Cub! This afternoon, we are being led around by the nose by the cross-eyed one?"

Scar nodded, "That squinting eye three doesn't look like two hundred and five on the surface. The village rumored that the grave today was split open by lightning, but when I smelled the mud that was blown up, the smell of gunpowder rushed straight into my nose. It was obviously blown out by a detonator. Moreover, the unknown liquid seeping out of the coffin was actually strong sulfuric acid."

Tian Rui nodded and agreed with this: "I also learned from Grandma Xie that the most abnormal person in the village is Squint Three, who always likes to stroll around the ancient tombs, not to mention that he works in the mining area of ​​Xing'anling , It is not difficult to get strong sulfuric acid. The coffin you helped to open today, I noticed that the coffin nails are not rusty, obviously they were nailed in recently, coupled with the strange behavior tonight, it must be him."

What Dao Scar and Tian Rui said made me confused again, even if all this was arranged by Slanting Eyes, what is his purpose for doing this?Where did the corpse in the coffin come from?Because I had asked Yixiang privately, no one in the village disappeared for no reason during this time.It is reasonable to corrode the skin of the corpse with sulfuric acid to make a blood corpse, but what makes people puzzled is why he cut off the head of the corpse. This is obviously unnecessary, and it is unnecessary to paralyze the villagers Take off your pants and fart.

After listening to my explanation, Scar said that what Slant-eyed San did was not difficult to explain, and made a very bold guess: Slant-eyed three had quietly stolen a corpse from the shrine last night. , After doing the tricks, he buried it back in the grave of Shuanzi's grandfather, and blasted the tomb open. Because the blasting sound of the detonator was somewhat similar to the thunder, people would mistake it for being split open.There are rumors in the village that the bodies of the Guo brothers died without melting, and it is very likely that this statement is true.And that head should not have been there, because it was smashed to pieces with cobblestones by the Japanese back then, and if it is not intact, it is incomplete.Maybe the corpses of the Guo brothers are the key to finding the treasure. Maybe the answer to the mystery that Slant Eyes San wants to know can't be found on one corpse, or the information on the second corpse is needed, so he has nothing to do. Without hesitation, he drew the attention of another coffin in the shrine, trying to do the same, and cover up the matter smoothly again, and the village would not find out that his plot was wrong.

"Then, this coffin is empty, what does that mean?" I looked at Scar and asked, wanting to know the answer.

He was also very confused, "This is, maybe someone took the lead..."

Dao Scar was in the middle of talking, but was interrupted by Tian Rui waving her hand. I watched her turn her head to listen carefully, and her face changed slightly: "The mountain is on fire!"

We rushed to Lingzikou to have a look, and saw a house in the middle of the village bursting into flames, mixed with the sound of collapse and the noise of people shouting for firefighting. The shrine is on fire.

(End of this chapter)