Surviving the Game as a Zombie - Chapter 61

Song Lengzhu had clearly thought of this as well. She stared intently at the carved snake heads, examining them closely.

The snake heads were a common inverted triangle shape, nothing particularly special. However, the eyes weren’t drawn in. Just a few simple strokes outlined the snakes flicking their tongues, giving the impression that at any moment, these red snakes would crawl out of the rock painting.

Song Lengzhu voiced her speculation: “The owner of this tomb chamber probably worshipped snakes, like a kind of totem.”

But there was an indescribable strangeness to it. Based on the information presented in the images, the person buried in this tomb was the man on the jade palanquin. If it were totem worship, he and his people should be the ones venerating the snake clan. Yet, these two paintings made it look more like these snake-headed, human-bodied monsters were submitting to the man on the jade palanquin.

Did such monsters actually exist? Or was this a scene fabricated by the tomb’s owner?

The two of them paused for a moment, unable to make sense of it, so they simply reached out and pushed open the stone door.

The structure of the stone door was identical to the previous one, rotating on a central axis, allowing it to be pushed inward or outward. After the door opened, a new tomb chamber was revealed.

Tang Yu paid special attention and noticed that the mural on the other side of the stone door was indeed the same as the one she had seen before, except that the court musicians and maids in the picture had become normal humans.

This new tomb chamber was slightly larger than the previous rear storage chamber. Various colorful paintings began to appear on the surrounding rock walls, still depicting grand scenes of ritual music and banquets, but more magnificent and detailed than those on the stone door.

Inside were stone tables and stools. On the left side were banquet wine vessels like fang and pei. Three enormous bronze titong with snake patterns were placed in the front left. Getting closer, one could even smell the aroma of wine stored inside.

On the right side were instruments like qin and se, and Liubo chess sets, items used for entertainment at banquets. The sheer quantity of them spoke of extreme luxury.

Directly in front, there were three sets of bianzhong (chime bells), two sets of bianqing (stone chimes), and one set of bronze goujiao. The bronze instruments were dark in color, casting long shadows under the light.

Upon closer inspection, the layout of the tomb chamber was identical to the banquet scene depicted in the murals. This discovery made Tang Yu pause, fearing that in the next second, those snake-headed, human-bodied monsters would appear before her, drinking and playing music.

The set of chime bells directly in front was very eye-catching. Tang Yu suddenly recalled her conversation with Jin Ye; the place where Jin Ye was also had chime bells.

Could it be the same place?

Tang Yu shone her light towards the ceiling of the chamber. A complete stone slab with colorful paintings came into view. Where was the looter’s hole? It was clearly not the same chamber Jin Ye was in.

Could it be a replica of the chamber Jin Ye was in?

Tang Yu opened her game panel and asked Jin Ye, “Have you found the exit to your chamber? The one we’re in also has a set of chime bells.”

Jin Ye was very surprised. She replied, “Just as you said, there are indeed two chambers with identical structures. We’ve already found another chamber with a stone door and are about to enter the passage.”

Tang Yu was confused. If Jin Ye had already found a second identical chamber, then what was the chamber they were in? Surely there couldn’t be three identical tomb chambers in this underground palace, right? Was it necessary to be so wasteful?

Tang Yu described the details of her chamber again from beginning to end. Jin Ye confirmed that the structure of the chambers was exactly the same, and that the mechanism they triggered was inside the largest, low-pitched yongzhong of the chime bells.

It was like seeing a ghost.

Jin Ye thought for a moment, switched to the ally interface with Tang Yu, and sent her a location marker individually.

The location marker didn’t show a map; the background was just a black expanse with two small white dots moving on it.

Tang Yu looked closely. The two white dots were very far apart. Since the map didn’t show a scale, Tang Yu couldn’t judge the distance in meters, but she could be certain they were not in the same place.

Song Lengzhu had also taken the time to contact her teammates. She rarely spoke; it was likely Xiao Qi and the twins doing the reporting. She reached a conclusion faster than Tang Yu.

“This underground palace is most likely symmetrical, left and right.”

“Huh?” Tang Yu looked up at her. The other woman stood tall and straight in the center of the chamber, her brow slightly furrowed.

“It’s symmetrical east-to-west, with the main tomb as the axis. We and our teammates happen to be on the east and west sides, respectively. Judging from the direction of the tomb passage, the palace is oriented north-to-south…” She turned in a circle on the spot, corrected her orientation, and continued, “We should be in the eastern side chamber.”

How could she deduce so much information from that? Tang Yu was dumbfounded.

Her own panel didn’t indicate north, south, east, or west.

Song Lengzhu looked at Tang Yu’s strange expression, her brow relaxing slightly. She said, “Xiao Qi told me. They brought a compass.”

Only then did Tang Yu close her dropped jaw and pretend nothing had happened.

In that case, they just needed to head towards the main tomb to rendezvous.

Tang Yu didn’t want to stay in this eerie tomb chamber for a second longer, so she began searching all around for another stone door. To give her brain a rest, she temporarily deactivated her precognition ability.

But after walking a full circle, she found that the chamber only had the one stone door they had entered through, with no other exits.

Could there be a fork in the passage leading to another chamber? Tang Yu immediately dismissed this guess. She had checked every brick in the passage and hadn’t triggered any mechanism leading to another chamber.

After Tang Yu stopped, she realized Song Lengzhu had been standing in front of the snake-patterned bronze titong on the stone table the whole time, not having moved a single step.

Tang Yu curled her index finger and made a question mark gesture above her head. This had already become her usual gesture for asking a question.

Song Lengzhu looked up at her and said, “It’s better if you don’t know.”

Her saying that only piqued Tang Yu’s curiosity. Song Lengzhu was stopping her from going over, so she must have seen something bad, but Tang Yu was just too curious.

It was a classic case of being both scared and wanting to see.

Tang Yu decided to take a look anyway; otherwise, her active imagination would have already conjured up all sorts of things.

The snake-patterned bronze titong resembled a large wine vat, only much more exquisitely crafted. It was so large that two people might not be able to wrap their arms around it. The faint smell of wine in the chamber was wafting from these jars.

This wine had been steeping for nearly a thousand years. Who knew what it was like now.

Tang Yu stood before the rightmost snake-patterned bronze titong, cautiously leaned over, and glanced into the wine vat.

Just one glance was enough to make her scalp tingle.

Floating on the surface of the wine was an infant’s skull. The bone had been stained by the wine to a dark red color. The liquid was thick, and some unknown tissue-like floating matter clung to the skull, which was utterly horrifying.

More than horrifying, it was nauseating. What kind of person would drink such wine?

Tang Yu’s stomach convulsed. She squatted on the ground, uncontrollably covering her mouth and dry-heaving.

A warm hand was placed on Tang Yu’s back, patting her gently twice through her clothes. Song Lengzhu’s voice held a hint of amusement and helplessness, “I told you not to look.”

Tang Yu couldn’t be bothered that Song was so close. The feeling in her empty stomach was unbearable, and the image of the two black, empty eye sockets on the skull lingered in her mind.

The hand on her back was quickly removed, as if it had been Tang Yu’s imagination.

Song Lengzhu said from the side, “From the looks of it, the owner of this tomb was no benevolent figure.”

Combined with the bizarre scenes carved on the stone door, the tribe established in these steep mountains was likely vastly different from conventional society.

The infant in the wine had not been put in as a skull. Song Lengzhu had looked closely; the floating matter included fingernails and other un-decomposed body tissues.

No matter how cruel a normal person was, it would be difficult to drink human wine. Could it be that this wine wasn’t meant for human consumption?

Just as she made this guess, she heard a very faint sound, like the soft splash of disturbed water.

Tang Yu also heard the sound. Her body reflexively jumped up, and in a single leap, she distanced herself from the snake-patterned bronze titong on the table.

The source of the sound was clearly the titong. There was something alive in the wine.

The soft sound in the water quickly disappeared, as if it had only been startled by their voices and had now returned to calm.

But immediately after, the sound of splashing water also came from the other two titong. The sound grew louder and louder until, finally, all the bronze vessels on the table that contained wine began to shake.

The entire tomb chamber seemed to have been activated. The wine vessels on the table shook erratically, the metal clanging together. Then, a bronze jue tipped over on the table as if knocked by a hand. Dark red wine spilled out, and a slender black shadow shot out like lightning, heading straight for their faces.

Tang Yu subconsciously raised her knife to block. With a dull thud, the black shadow hit the blade and fell rapidly. Tang Yu immediately reversed her blade, swung down, and chopped the black shadow into two pieces.

The two pieces of flesh fell to the ground, still writhing and jumping. Tang Yu quickly struck again, angling the tip of her knife downward and smashing the creature on the ground into a pulp.

It was a small snake, similar to the red earthworms they had seen, but not entirely the same. This snake was darker in color, and its eyes and the nostrils on its snout were nearly degenerated. To call it a snake was less accurate than calling it a fleshy worm.

Tang Yu raised her knife and retreated to Song Lengzhu’s side. Following the death of this small snake, more and more wine vessels fell from the table. One or more small snakes crawled out of each, leaping from the vessels and attacking the two of them.

Tang Yu and Song Lengzhu defended as they retreated. Tang Yu’s knife movements were an impenetrable defense. Although she was scared, she didn’t hesitate when it was time to act. Besides, they were just small snakes, not some ethereal ghosts. Tang Yu suppressed her nausea, her knife flying up and down in her hand.

They already had experience dealing with the red earthworms and knew how to kill these creatures completely.

But more and more small snakes swarmed them. Nearly a hundred emerged from the enormous titong, completely blocking the way to the stone door.

A melodious clang suddenly rang out. Tang Yu looked back and saw that they had unknowingly retreated to the vicinity of the chime bells. The hilt of her swinging knife had inadvertently struck one of the bronze bells. The collision sent a humming sound exploding right next to her ear, drowning out the sound of Song Lengzhu’s gunshots.

Only then did Tang Yu remember what Jin Ye had said. Jin Ye had found the mechanism in the low-pitched yongzhong. If the east and west chambers were perfectly symmetrical, the mechanism for this chamber might also be hidden inside this bell, and they could use it to find the next stone door.

Tang Yu didn’t know which one was the low-pitched yongzhong. She just went towards the largest bronze bell on the lower left, reached inside, and felt an iron ball shaped like a clapper.

Tang Yu pulled it with one hand. The iron ball moved down a bit but quickly retracted.

Tang Yu gritted her teeth, brought her other hand back, and pulled the iron ball down with both hands.

During this time, about ten small snakes suddenly attacked, darting from the ground towards Tang Yu’s back like lightning. She was currently bent over, pulling the iron ball, and couldn’t defend herself.

Song Lengzhu stepped to the side, blocking Tang Yu’s front. She fired several shots, repelling the flying snakes. Without looking back, she instructed Tang Yu in a cold voice, “Focus on the mechanism.”

Fighting the corpse-centipedes earlier had used up a lot of Song Lengzhu’s ammunition. Now, she only had the one magazine in her hand left. She fired with restraint, conserving bullets whenever possible.

The repelled snakes attacked again. Just at that moment, Tang Yu, using all her strength, had pulled the iron ball out. The other end of the ball was connected to an iron chain that led to an unknown location.

The chime bells didn’t change, but the original stone door began to rumble. Before their eyes, the entire wall connected to the door suddenly flipped one hundred and eighty degrees. The old stone door sank into the ground, and a brand-new stone door appeared before them.

But its style was identical to the previous door.

Tang Yu finally understood that the similar rumbling sound she had heard in the rear storage chamber was the stone door changing.

Could it be that this stone door connected to the passage behind it, and the passage had also changed?

Tang Yu tried letting go. The iron ball retracted, and the entire stone door flipped back again.

A chill went through both of their hearts. Wasn’t this clearly designed to require one person to stay behind and operate the mechanism?

They couldn’t escape at the same time.