Tomb Raiding: My Family's Last Clan Chief is Little Brother

Chapter 353 Obsidian Mirror
Huo Chu San, whose name was called, glanced at Huo Chu Shi. Seeing that the eldest brother nodded, he leaned over and asked, "What is it?"

This person was the most robust-looking of Huo Xiangu's eight protectors, and also quite tall. Zhang Wuxun was very satisfied and pointed to the bottom of the tomb door, "Come on, squat down, don't stick to the wall, I'll give you a little room to move around."

Although Huo Chusan did not understand why he did this, he still obediently squatted down two hand spans away from the tomb door.

"Hold on tight." Zhang Wuxun lifted his leg and stepped on Huo Chusan's shoulder, holding onto the tomb door. "Stand up at a steady pace, don't make me fall."

Huo Chusan frowned, his face stern, and reluctantly helped Zhang Wuxun slowly stand up.

The combined height of the two people was enough for Zhang Wu to reach the iron ring directly above the tomb door.

The iron ring was unremarkable, but it required two hands to pull it. One hand used a knife to pry open the buckle holding the iron ring, while the other hand grabbed the iron ring and pulled it hard towards his chest, pulling out a half-meter-long chain.

Zhang Wuxun didn't let go after that. Instead, he jumped down from above while holding onto the iron chain, using gravity to activate the small retractable mechanism connected to the back, and pried up the stone slab blocking the door.

The stone slabs were quite heavy, so he didn't let anyone else take over. He directly said to Huo Chu Shi, "Alright, you can push the door open now."

Doors that aren't in large tomb passages usually don't use self-locking stones weighing thousands of kilograms. If you were entering from the outside, there would naturally be an external mechanism to open the door. But since they've crawled directly into the room, they can only use brute force.

Huo Chushi and the others exerted all their strength, working together to push open the heavy tomb door.

The group filed out, and then, with the help of the young man, pushed the tomb door back in, leaving a gap in the middle large enough for a person to pass through.

After the Huo family came out, they saw the stone blocking the doorway hanging above their heads. It looked to be at least two or three hundred pounds. Then they saw Zhang Wuxun, who was holding the chains with both hands, his arm muscles were tense, but his face looked calm and breezy. They were secretly amazed. What kind of inhumanly strong monsters are these? No wonder he can hold a knife weighing more than a hundred pounds in one hand and wield it as easily as a fire poker.

Huo Chushi led his men quickly away from the area where the falling stones might hit them, and then respectfully said, "Master Yu, you may come out now."

Zhang Wuxun glanced casually outside, then suddenly let go and dashed towards the crack in the door. The moment he squeezed through the crack, he rolled to the side, barely grazing the stone slab that was about to hit the ground, and rolled half a meter away before getting up on his feet.

With a loud thud, the stone slab fell smoothly, and the tomb door was forced shut. Zhang Wuxun calmly brushed the dirt off his body, and the Huo family looked at him with even greater astonishment.

Outside the door was a narrow walkway, and five meters down were volcanic rock steps. The group said no more and walked down the steps, soon arriving at the next mezzanine.

Zhang Wuxun and the other man continued walking downhill without stopping. After passing through three mezzanine levels, they finally stopped in front of a stone wall, and the Huo family followed them down in a swarm.

The wall is engraved with many dense characters, which record the names of the Zhang family members buried in this annex, like an unfolded ancient scroll.

The first person in the far right column is Zhang Bihai, who is at the very top and whose name is written in the largest font. The person immediately below him is probably his wife, Zhang Biqing.

The names after that, only the first dozen or so, were also named Zhang Bi. The rest of the names seemed to be from their next generation, almost all of them being named Zhang Ye. The last few rows were from the grandchildren, named Zhang Qing something.

The names on the list are roughly estimated to be over two hundred. Zhang Wuxun doesn't know which branch of the Zhang family these people belong to, but the deaths at that time must have been of an unusually large scale.

He hadn't looked closely at the epitaph on the Tezuka sarcophagus in the mezzanine before, and now that he was clueless, he looked at the young man and found that the young man's expression was also somewhat confused.

The coffins of Zhang Bihai and Zhang Biqing should be buried inside the main building. These two people are of unusual status, and it seems that they were the leaders of their respective branches.

The volcanic rock staircase ends here, with solid walls on three sides.

Huo Xiangu made a few hand gestures, and Huo Xiuxiu immediately stepped forward and asked according to the gestures, "How do we proceed next?"

The young man reached out and tapped several spots on the stone wall, both above and below, and in the middle, noticing the differences in the sounds. He then traced the scroll down the right side, his fingertips resting on a raised area along the edge of the pattern.

Zhang Wuxun also found a place with an unusual feel in the same spot on the other side. He and Xiao Ge exchanged a glance, then moved their fingers apart and exerted force at the same time. With a crisp bang, their two fingers pierced into the stone bricks in those two places, clamping the screws embedded inside and turning them.

At the same time, the stone wall slowly began to rotate around the central axis. It was actually a flip door, heavy on both sides and light in the middle. The hinges, made of a special material, were in the middle of the wall, allowing the entire wall to rotate.

Behind the stone wall was a wide and long tomb passage, but to their surprise, when they entered from the left and right sides of the overturned door, they saw similar scenes, but they were indeed in two different spaces.

Zhang Wuxun and Xiao Ge entered from the left, while members of the Huo family went into the right. When they entered, they found the place completely empty. Apart from the rows of coffins placed in the hollowed-out stone caves on both sides of the passage, there wasn't a single human hair in sight. They thought they were hallucinating and immediately ran out to check, only to find that there was no one outside either. They were nearly scared to death.

Before he could even let out a shout, he saw a flickering light on his left. He quickly ran inside and, seeing that everyone was safe and sound, breathed a sigh of relief and hurriedly reported the situation to Aunt Huo.

Everyone was greatly surprised and withdrew. They sent people to go in from both sides at the same time and found that there was indeed a secret inside. They tried it several times and were amazed.

Huo Xiangu was also quite surprised. Since they were two separate spaces, they needed to carefully consider their next steps and not act rashly.

Zhang Wuxun seemed to have figured something out. He told the people inside to come out, then turned off his flashlight, groped his way in, looked around, touched the wall on the right, and chuckled. Just as he had expected.

He came out and explained to the crowd: "This is just a simple mirror principle. It's like having several mirrors facing each other on the wall in a public toilet. Under the refraction of light, the mirrors will constantly create reflections, resulting in an illusion of space folding."

"A mirror?" someone wondered. "Why would the Zhang family install a mirror in the tomb? And if it really were a mirror, we wouldn't have failed to recognize it, the wall was completely black."

“That’s not an ordinary asphalt mirror, nor is it an ancient bronze mirror. It’s a special amorphous volcanic rock ore,” Zhang Wuxun said. “The mirrors inlaid here are what’s commonly known as obsidian. This pure black ore can indeed produce a mirror effect after being polished.” “If you don’t believe me, go in and see for yourselves,” Zhang Wuxun said casually.

Without light, the obsidian wall is just stone. For someone like Zhang Wuxun who can see in the dark, it's easy to see through the mystery without any light.

The Huo family went inside and found that there was indeed a special mirror wall in the middle. They also discovered that the mirror only appeared when there was a corresponding grotto or coffin directly opposite it, about two meters away. What was the explanation for this?
Zhang Wuxun walked over to a stone coffin and looked at it. He found that the head of the coffin was facing into the cave, meaning that the tail of the coffin was facing the obsidian mirror. He looked at two more coffins and found that they were the same. He thought of a saying in Feng Shui, which is said to have the meaning of distinguishing between true and false, but more importantly, it means warding off evil.

Therefore, it is likely that the remains in these stone coffins were sealed with molten iron to prevent any unforeseen consequences.

The same is true for the stone coffin on the right. In fact, there are a total of eight stone coffins in the tomb passage cave, distributed on both sides. The tomb passage is only twenty meters long. There were no traps or mechanisms to attack people along the way, and it was a peaceful and tranquil place.

Should they go left or right? For a moment, everyone was at a loss.

"How about we split into two groups?" Huo Xiaoyao, who had been silent the whole way, suddenly spoke up.

Without a second thought, Huo Xiangu refused outright, looking at Huo Xiaoyao with a stern and scrutinizing gaze. "I remember you were a maid in the household of Huo Laoqi from a collateral branch."

Huo Xiaoyao remained silent, her head bowed, her face pale.

"Seventh Brother has been getting a bit too wild lately, following that girl Ah Xue around. Even his daughter is so ill-mannered, she doesn't even respect this old man like me." Huo Xiangu sneered. "Xiuxiu, tell her what punishment she should receive for talking back to the head of the family."

"Yes, Grandma." Huo Xiuxiu walked slowly to Huo Xiaoyao and coldly rebuked, "Anyone who dares to defy the head of the family shall kneel in the punishment hall and receive twenty lashes. Anyone who betrays the Huo family shall have their punishment doubled and their head taken to fill the snake pit!"

A cold glint flashed silently from her sleeve. Huo Xiaoyao suddenly looked up and swung her knife straight at Huo Xiuxiu's slender neck.

Unexpectedly, Huo Xiuxiu was not alarmed. Instead, she took a step to avoid the attack, then grabbed Huo Xiaoyao under the armpit and used a grappling technique to throw her to the ground. At the same time, she used her knee to hit Huo Xiaoyao's lower back, twisted the short knife out of her hand, and kicked her away.

"Wow." Zhang Wuxun, who was watching the show from the sidelines, clapped his hands and said jokingly, "This act of turning against one's own people is really wonderful. The people that the old lady has raised are all outstanding."

Huo Xiangu ignored his sarcasm, tilted her head, and called out, "Chu Shi, go and break her bones."

Upon hearing this, Huo Xiaoli, who was standing nearby, was so startled that she hiccuped and quickly covered her mouth, afraid that the fire would spread to her.

Huo Chushi nodded, stepped forward and twisted Huo Xiaoyao's arm, starting to disassemble it from the largest joint.

Huo Xiaoyao struggled desperately in pain, biting Huo Chushi's arm, but he dislocated her jaw.

A few minutes later, Huo Xiaoyao was tortured to the point of looking like a dead fish lying belly up on the deck, her joints twisted and contorted, lying on the ground, her clothes soaked with cold sweat, and her face as pale as a ghost.

While everyone was busy on the other side, Zhang Wuxun idly picked at his fingers. Seeing that it wouldn't be over anytime soon, he simply found a place to sit down and took out two self-heating meals.

The young man sat next to him, staring blankly at the coffin in the grotto.

Huo Xiaoli looked left and right, and seeing that no one was paying attention to her, she hurriedly tiptoed to Zhang Wuxun's side, put her hands together in a pleading gesture with a bitter face.

Zhang Wuxun found it somewhat amusing; this little brat was even more timid than Wu Xiaoxie, who was going down into a tomb for the first time.

Huo Xiuxiu looked contemptuously at Huo Xiaoyao, who lay on the ground like a corpse, "This is the price you have to pay for daring to betray your family."

Upon hearing this, Huo Xiaoyao, who was on the verge of death, suddenly raised her head. Her hair, wet with sweat, clung stickily to her face, making her look like a vengeful ghost.

At this moment, she actually raised her head and slammed her dislocated jaw against the ground. After a few hard slams, she managed to push her jawbone back in, but the joint was slightly misaligned, and her speech was a little slurred.

She glared at Huo Xiuxiu with hatred in her eyes and roared at the top of her lungs, "Why? Why should I, a member of a collateral branch, have to grovel before you legitimate children just because I was born into a collateral branch? What era are we living in? Why are you still so old-fashioned and stubborn? From childhood to adulthood, apart from assigning us some deadly tasks, have you ever cared about our lives?"

“What’s wrong with me following Huo Youxue? At least she’s not as hypocritical, cold-hearted, and selfish as you all. You even caused my brother’s death.”

Hearing her words, Huo Xiuxiu was somewhat shocked, and then sneered, "Don't forget, Huo Youxue, whom you keep saying will protect you, is also a legitimate daughter."

Huo Xiuxiu clearly understood the principle of killing by destroying the mind. "You don't know yet, do you? Your so-called brother has long been replaced by someone from some force wearing a mask. He has been using you all along, using you to get close to Huo Xiaoli and Huo Zhizhi, and to steal Huo family secrets."

Huo Xiaoyao chuckled softly, her face carrying a chilling coldness. "So what? The only person I've ever hated is you, only you, Huo Xiuxiu."

As she spoke, she laughed more and more heartily, becoming almost maniacal, her body convulsing. "I never thought, I never thought, the beloved third young lady of the Huo family, you'd have your day! Hahaha, what did you think you'd find here? Nothing at all!"

Huo Xiaoyao turned her head with difficulty, staring intently at Huo Xiuxiu's face, and said intermittently, "From the moment you stepped into the Zhang Family Ancient Building, you were destined to die here. No one can escape. This is your grave. Your death is not far off, hahaha..."

As she laughed, her neck suddenly snapped back sharply, a trickle of black blood spilled from the corner of her mouth, her chest heaved violently a few times, blood began to seep from the corners of her eyes and ear canals, her eyes widened, and she breathed her last, dead beyond any doubt.

Huo Chushi examined her and found that she had bitten open the poison sac that had been hidden in her teeth and committed suicide.

Thank you so much to the generous donor, 〔年少时最是天真〕! Sending you a huge heart (v)
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(End of this chapter)