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

Chapter 372 Take you home
"Fuck your grandpa, which son of a bitch dares to play tricks on your fat grandpa—"

Upon hearing that it was indeed a person speaking, the fat man cursed and tried to jump up, but unfortunately, one foot got stuck in the floor, and he fell back halfway up.

"Hey!"

"Ow!"

The fat man's cries of pain mingled with Wu Xiaoxie's screams. The two struggled under the waterproof cloth for a long time, but ended up tangled in a rope, their arms and legs seemingly disobeying their commands and fighting each other.

Zhang Wuxun sighed helplessly, raised his hand to remove the waterproof cloth covering them and rolled it aside, urging, "Stop fussing, get up quickly, we don't have much time left, Xiao Ge is still waiting."

Upon hearing this, Wu Xiaoxie and Fatty were stunned for a long while before they seemed to react and looked up at Zhang Wuxun's face.

Zhang Wuxun had no choice but to take off his gas mask again so that the two of them could see it carefully.

"You stinky wooden fish, you rotten wooden fish, you brat, you actually knocked me out before you left..."

The fat man gasped, his eyes instantly turning red. He burst into a tirade, his voice hoarse and choked with sobs, "You son of a bitch... why do you care about me? It would have been so much better if I just died in that cave. Dead and done with it, so much less trouble. Saves me from being a fucking idiot and worrying about you, running all over here looking for you. Where's Zhang Qiling? You guys are really something, leaving me all alone outside. Were you afraid I'd ruin your feng shui or something? Let me tell you, Fatty, I'm... cough cough..."

The fat man was so angry that he started talking recklessly. He became so agitated that he couldn't make a sound and began coughing uncontrollably. Black blood gurgled out of his throat, and his mouth was full of bloody foam.

Zhang Wuxun was terrified and quickly helped him up, patting his back to calm him down. He apologized repeatedly, "Fatty, Fatty, don't get agitated. Calm down. Can you wait until you've caught your breath before you start yelling? I promise I won't talk back, really, I promise."

Wu Xiaoxie was also startled. He had never seen Fatty so angry before. No wonder when they brought the exhausted Fatty back to the tent from the mountain, after he had been sleeping for a day and a night, Fatty woke up looking terrible and even wanted to run back up the mountain before the team was ready.

It turns out that the fat man had been hiding such an important detail: after waking up, he only said that he had encountered strong alkali, and when he woke up again after passing out, Zhang Wuxun and the others were already gone.

They assumed that Zhang Wuxun and Xiao Ge had left Fatty outside because he was too badly injured, but the matter of entering the ancient building was urgent. In order not to delay Fatty's treatment, they left him outside and made sure to leave enough food and a map so that Fatty could find his way out on his own.

It seemed that the fat man was really angry this time. His ear was close to the fat man's mouth, and when the fat man cursed, the sound was like a buzzing thunder.

Taking advantage of the fact that the fat man was too busy coughing to move, Wu Xiaoxie quickly pulled his leg out and, together with Zhang Wuxun, helped the fat man sit up so that he could exert force when coughing.

The fat man coughed for more than a minute, finally spitting out a mouthful of bloody froth. His face was deathly pale, and the veins on his forehead were bulging. He was panting heavily, and even the muscles in his back were straining.

Zhang Wuxun hurriedly took out an oxygen cylinder mixed with a weak acid and put it over his head, pressing his hand on his chest and using pulmonary rehabilitation techniques to slow his rapid breathing.

It took the fat man a long time to recover. He glared at Zhang Wuxun and opened his mouth to curse again.

Zhang Wuxun hurriedly put his hands together in a gesture of begging for forgiveness, "I was wrong, I was really wrong. You've finally caught your breath, so please stop cursing for now. Let's go outside, okay? If you're still angry then, you can kick me a few more times, or even hit me, as long as you don't hit my face."

"Pfft..." Wu Xiaoxie, who was watching the two of them from the side, couldn't help but laugh out loud.

Zhang Wuxun was looking rather pitiful with his head down and shoulders hunched, a stark contrast to his usual calm and carefree demeanor, which was quite comical.

Wu Xiaoxie's smile seemed to break down the barrier between Fatty and Zhang Wuxun, and their unpleasantness vanished in an instant.

The fat man had been trying to maintain a straight face and pretend to be furious, but his skin wouldn't cooperate. After several attempts, he finally couldn't hold back and started laughing too.

After laughing for a while, he cursed resentfully, "Damn it, I finally got to have you under my thumb, and you've already given up so quickly."

Zhang Wuxun cautiously glanced at the fat man, and seeing that he had indeed calmed down, he breathed a sigh of relief and gave an awkward laugh.

The fat man coughed twice more, and Zhang Wuxun quickly handed him a water bottle to moisten his throat.

"Alright, I'm done being angry." The fat man wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, handed the water bottle back to Zhang Wuxun, and softened his voice. "Look how scared you were. But then I thought about it, and I knew that you and Xiao Ge must have had your reasons for doing what you did. As long as you're both alright, let's just turn the page."

“Okay.” Zhang Wuxun smiled from the bottom of his heart and extended his hand to him.

The fat man grabbed his hand and used it to stand up. Wu Xiaoxie supported him from the side. The fat man waved his hand and said, "No need, no need. We're not old men and women who need help to walk. I just had a stitch in my side and didn't have the strength."

The fat man's right foot was still stuck in the hole in the wooden board. Zhang Wuxun squatted down beside him and used a dagger to pry open the crack in the board so that the fat man could pull his foot out.

The fat man only felt the pain after his foot was freed; several splinters on the cracked wooden board had pierced his trouser leg, causing it to bleed profusely.

Zhang Wuxun took out a first-aid kit to treat his wounds and took the time to answer Wu Xiaoxie's questions.

"How did you suddenly appear here? You just popped out from behind us like that. We thought we'd run into a monster. It scared us half to death," Wu Xiaoxie asked, shining a light on him. "Where's Xiao Ge? Isn't he with you?"

"It's a long story." Zhang Wuxun used tweezers to remove the thorn and used a cotton swab dipped in disinfectant to clean the fat man's wound. "Actually, I left here two days ago. I was originally going to catch the rats hiding in the group, but I found that the Miluotu in the mountain were acting strangely. Their actions seemed to be driven by something."

“After opening the third door, my brother and I realized that the password was likely wrong, but the error was already there and couldn’t be fixed. Moreover, time was of the essence, so we had no choice but to bite the bullet and go in. We knew that if you found out the password was wrong, you would definitely bring people to Banna to rescue us immediately. So, on the third day when we were trapped in the stone passage, after my brother and I discovered the strangeness in the cave, we decided to take the Huo family directly in.”

"Unexpectedly, Fatty accidentally led a group of people to blast open the cave wall and meet up with us. Because we were unsure what dangers might follow after we entered the wrong password, Xiao Ge and I decided to send the Huo family away and go inside to scout ahead. Fatty figured it out and started working with us from the outside."

“Fatty has already told you everything that happened after that.” Zhang Wuxun wrapped the fat man’s ankle with gauze and then took out four protective suits and gas masks from his backpack. “Put these on. This alkaline gas is too potent; it can kill without you even realizing it. That’s how Old Madam Huo died.”

Wu Xiaoxie's heart skipped a beat, she was extremely surprised, "Grandma Huo is dead?"

“Yes.” Zhang Wuxun nodded. “After the alkaline gas device was activated, we didn’t have time to evacuate, so we found a secret room to hide in temporarily. Old Mrs. Huo had already inhaled a lot of alkaline gas and eventually died of lung failure.”

"What about her body?" Wu Xiaoxie frowned and sighed. Although he wasn't familiar with Old Madam Huo, she was still an elder he knew. It was saddening that she died here with such regrets. "We have to take the body out and give Xiuxiu an explanation." During the days he was making preparations outside, Fatty had told him in detail what had happened on Mount Banna. He also knew that Huo Xiuxiu who entered the ancient building was an imposter.

“I’ve already left the body with Xie Yuchen and Pan Zi, and told them to take it out beforehand,” Zhang Wuxun said.

"You've already met Xiaohua and Panzi? Did they pick up Xiaoge too?" Wu Xiaoxie was even more surprised. "So you actually came out to see them off, and then picked up me and Fatty?"

Zhang Wuxun shook his head, got up and walked towards the fake stone wall. "No, Brother is still here. I didn't see Xie Yuchen and the others either. I just left Old Madam Huo's body and clues on their usual route because when I went out to meet you, I discovered a terrible change in the jade vein in the mountain, which is the anomaly I mentioned before."

Wu Xiaoxie and Fatty immediately put on protective suits and masks and followed him, listening to his brief account of what had happened during that time.

As Zhang Wuxun spoke, he reached into the hole in the wall and activated the mechanism, opening the hidden passage in the stone slab above.

Zhang Wuxun grabbed the railing on one side, stood on it, then jumped sideways and leaped into the air, using one foot to step on the wooden frame of the coffin chamber for leverage, and flipped onto the top of the coffin chamber.

Then he said to Wu Xiaoxie and the other person looking up at him, "Little Brother is in the secret room up there. I'll put down the ladder for you when I get up."

After saying that, he crawled into the cave. In the dark, cramped space, only a flashlight with a nearly dead battery was shining. The light was very weak and could only illuminate a small area at the edge.

He immediately spotted a figure dressed entirely in gray and white leaning against the wall in a corner near the hidden door.

"Bro!"

He called out softly, quickly went over and squatted down to check on him. He found that although his pulse was beating very slowly, it was not very weak, and he breathed a sigh of relief.

It seems the guy did get the injection. Plus, he was wrapped in several layers of protective clothing, so the poisoning wasn't too severe. The drowsiness was just a side effect of the injection, and the effects hadn't worn off yet. He couldn't move right now.

They quickly removed the gas mask from his face and put an oxygen mask on him.

The young man's eyelids twitched, and he slowly opened his eyes, staring intently at Zhang Wuxun.

Zhang Wuxun smiled at him and said softly, "Don't worry, we've found Tianzhen and Fatty. They're downstairs. We're here to take you home."

The young man blinked very, very slowly, a hint of a smile appearing in his eyes.

Fatty and Wu Xiaoxie couldn't wait any longer downstairs. They thought something had happened upstairs, or that Zhang Wuxun had disappeared again. They couldn't help but worry and shouted at him, "Muyu? What's going on? Where are you? Or has Xiao Ge disappeared again?"

"Yes, yes," Zhang Wuxun replied, turning around. "I'll lower the rope for you right away."

After speaking, he turned his head to put the young man's hand back, but felt the young man's fingers move slightly in his palm, typing out a series of coded messages.

Zhang Wuxun paused, then immediately turned to look at the package he had placed to the side. Upon inspection, he discovered that of the dozen or so protective suits he had left inside, only two remained, and the food was gone as well.

Thinking back to what the deliveryman had just said, I immediately understood, "You gave him all the extra protective suits."

The young man blinked, his lips moved slightly, but no sound came out. "Hurry up and go."

“Okay.” Zhang Wuxun nodded, put the young man’s hand into the sleeve, put on gloves and tied the cuffs to prevent the poison gas from leaking in.

With those protective suits there, the person should be fine, but he was inevitably a little annoyed. The guy was really honest; he let that guy take all the food and left nothing for himself.

But it doesn't matter now, they're leaving soon and there's no need for anything extra.

Seeing that the young man's eyes were still open, she raised her hand to cover them for him, saying, "You should get some sleep. We'll be outside when you wake up."

The young man didn't insist any longer, closed his eyelids, and fell into a deep sleep.

Zhang Wuxun put a new gas mask on him, pulled up the hood of the protective suit to cover his head, grabbed the backpack, and gently laid him flat so he could lean against it.

He then turned around, put on gloves, found the rope ladder they had used last time, lowered it down from the stone cave entrance, and beckoned Wu Xiaoxie and Fatty to come up.

"Where's the young man? Where's the young man?" The two of them went straight to the young man as soon as they arrived, but when they saw a person completely wrapped in white, they stopped in their tracks, somewhat incredulous, and dared not go forward.

"What happened to him..." The fat man lowered his voice and turned to Zhang Wuxun for confirmation, "Didn't you say that Little Brother was alright?"

Zhang Wuxun was putting away the rope ladder and moving stone slabs when he heard this, and he was a little puzzled. "Nothing's wrong. Who said something happened to Brother Xiao?"

"Then what is he..." Wu Xiaoxie's voice trembled slightly.

Looking at the grayish-white clothes that resembled mourning attire, his mind went blank. He didn't dare to lift the lid to see the man's face, so he could only peek out to check his hands, only to find that the hands were nowhere to be found either. He was immediately on the verge of collapse, "Why did you wrap him up like that?"

"Shh, don't make a sound, keep your voice down, he's just asleep." Zhang Wuxun moved the stone slab back to block the hole and seal the gap, then got up and walked over.

To Wu Xiaoxie and Fatty, these words sounded like something a person talking to in a mental breakdown and delusions outside a hospital or funeral home, unable to accept the death of a family member.

The fat man glanced at Zhang Wuxun several times, but couldn't discern any expression from his vacant face. His heart sank, thinking, "That's it, someone here has probably gone mad."

Thank you to [Book Friend 20180316133228028] and other generous donors! Sending love and goodnight~
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(End of this chapter)