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

Chapter 499 Jade Meteorite Magma
Unsurprisingly, the fat man also fell victim to the trap, hanging motionless on the cave wall with his eyes tightly closed.

Wu Xie quickly climbed up, shone the light on and looked closely. He found that the two grayish-white eyeballs on the snake's head were still intact, and he breathed a sigh of relief. Then he pinched the soft flesh on the fat man's arm and twisted it hard.

"Ouch—" The fat man shuddered and cried out in pain, his eyelids twitching wildly.

Wu Xie woke himself from the illusion by cutting off his wrist, but he couldn't use that trick on Fatty.

Intimidation and threats will only backfire on someone with a fat personality. You need to use methods that can stimulate his intense emotions to wake him up, such as anger caused by pain.

So Wu Xie once again mercilessly pinched the soft flesh on the inside of the fat man's thigh. This was where the most flesh was, so he used even more force than before, twisting it hard.

Fatty's eyes snapped open, wide as saucers. He grabbed Wu Xie's hand and yelled, "You damn little bastard, how dare you bite your Fatty! I'll rip out all your teeth!"

Wu Xie's hand was gripped tightly by him. He tried to shake it off but couldn't break free, so he hurriedly called out, "Fatty."

The fat man grabbed the vicious dog that was biting him, pried open its mouth to pull out its teeth, when he suddenly heard Wu Xie calling him.

"You dog... huh?" The fat man suddenly felt something was wrong. He looked down and realized that the dog tooth he was holding was actually Wu Xie's finger.

"Naive?" The fat man's anger froze, and he was somewhat bewildered. "What's going on? Where's the dog? Where's the dog that pounced on me and bit me twice?"

"Let go right now, you're about to dislocate my shoulder." Wu Xie winced in pain. "There are only the two of us here, you and I. Where did this dog come from?"

The two climbed down from the cave. Fatty looked left and right, and finally came to his senses. He muttered, "I thought we had reached the bronze gate, but we've been walking for ages and we're still stuck in the same place."

Wu Xie briefly told Fatty about the hallucinations he had experienced. The two of them discussed it and found that the scenarios they had experienced in the hallucinations were roughly the same, which meant that their thoughts and consciousness were likely mixed up at the time.

Wu Xie pondered, "We still don't know what exactly caused our hallucinations. It's very likely that there's something strange about those stone statues, or it could be something else that's hard to detect, and we fell for it without even realizing it."

"Where are those two?" The fat man shone his lamp around for a long time, but couldn't find Zhang Haixing and Feng. He was furious. "Damn it, I knew those two were up to no good. They just abandoned us and ran away like that."

"Oh no, did they take all our food?" The fat man's face changed drastically. He hurriedly checked their backpacks and saw that the canned dried fish was still inside. He snorted coldly, "At least they still have some conscience."

Wu Xie put away the big white dog's leg and patted his shoulder reassuringly, "We're just each serving our own masters. Now that we've already gained the upper hand, we need to hurry up too."

The two immediately set off, jogging along the gravel beach. A few minutes later, they indeed came across the rocky mound covered with corpse grass.

Wu Xie was surprised, "A coincidence?"

"That's too much of a coincidence," the fat man clicked his tongue. "How did this illusion come about? It's so magical that it can even predict what we'll encounter later."

"Naive! Do you think that bronze door really has a huge hole in it? Maybe Zhang Haixing and her friend blew it open," the fat man said angrily.

Wu Xie shook his head. "It's hard to say. We'll have to see it for ourselves to know."

The two dared not delay any longer and quickened their pace through the thicket of corpses and grass. Just as they were about to reach the end of the rocky beach, they both stopped.

At the end of the rocky beach, there was indeed a large, irregularly shaped opening, but it was on a dark green wall that stood tall and emitted a faint glow. In other words, the bottom of the crack did not lead to a bronze door.

Before them lay an incredibly towering, arc-shaped wall of meteorite jade, like a divine sword descended from the sky, piercing straight into the middle of the mountain. It was covered with countless twisted and intricate spirals, circle after circle, much like the patterns on ancient and mysterious sacrificial vessels.

Wu Xie leaned closer and shone the light on it, and he knew that the meteorite jade wall was formed naturally, without any trace of human intervention.

This is a very large jade meteorite vein. Although its composition is somewhat mixed, its research value is beyond imagination. It was formed by a huge high-temperature meteorite falling directly onto the mountain. Under the influence of Earth's gravity, it carried the force of creation and split the mountain open.

During its descent, the burning meteorite was continuously cooled and solidified by the cold snow-capped mountains, eventually settling in the middle of the mountain. Over tens of thousands of years or even longer, it was transformed by geological processes, climate changes, and the formation of silica into the magnificent landscape they see today.

After Wu Xie finished explaining, Fatty said quietly, "I suddenly have a feeling of returning to my hometown. Just wondering, is this thing valuable?"

Wu Xie nodded and said, "Common jade-like meteorites are worth around a thousand yuan per gram, but a jade meteorite vein as large as this one has immeasurable scientific research value. Roughly estimated, it would be worth at least fifty thousand yuan per gram."

The fat man gasped, quickly rolled up his sleeves, and stretched his arm out in front of Wu Xie. "Tianzhen, why don't you pinch me again? I feel like we might still be stuck in the illusion."

Wu Xie pushed his arm away and sighed, "No need to pinch anymore. Although it's rare for such a situation to occur at the places where the meteorites fell, as marked on the Warring States silk manuscript, it's not surprising when you think about it."

"This dream is so damn wonderful, I almost don't want to wake up."

The fat man wiped the suspicious water stains from the corner of his mouth with the back of his hand, and in a few quick steps, he ran to the foot of the jade meteorite wall. His eyes shone like searchlights as he searched through the pile of stones and found more than a dozen pieces of jade meteorite without cracks, stuffing them into his backpack.

Wu Xie waited until he finished packing before speaking, "Zhang Haixing and the others have been inside for a long time, and they're probably close to getting what's inside. We need to speed things up too."

"Oh, open the chicken neck!"

The fat man picked up two smaller pieces and ran back to shove them into Wu Xie's hand, muttering to himself, "We've come all this way, we should at least get some souvenirs to take back with us."

The hole in the meteorite wall is about half the size of a small truck cab and is more than three meters above the ground. The fragments of jade meteorite that have fallen to the ground must have fallen when this large hole was drilled.

Wu Xie glanced at the pile of stones at the base of the wall, which Zhang Haixing and the others had probably stepped on. He then called to Fatty to move a few more stones from the surrounding area and stack them on top. He then stood on the stones and said, "I'll climb up and take a look first."

Fatty gave him an OK sign, and Wu Xie nodded, took off his backpack and let Fatty hold it. Then, he bent his knees slightly, exerted force with his legs, and jumped up, grabbing the edge of the cave entrance the moment he leaped up.

Wu Xie used his arms to climb up, only halfway up, before he could even see what was inside. The scorching heat that hit him made him stumble, almost falling back down. Fatty, seeing the situation was bad, immediately dropped his backpack and supported Wu Xie's backside. "What's wrong, Tianzhen? What's up there?"

"I'm not sure yet, but I feel a bit of danger," Wu Xie replied, bracing himself with his elbows, holding his breath, and climbing up with all his might.

Above was a short tunnel. Looking ahead, Wu Xie saw large swathes of dark green and red-yellow interwoven with colorful jade light.

He felt as if he were in a magnificent, richly colored oil painting, with scorching firelight shining through the tunnel, giving him the illusion that he was standing inside a kaleidoscope being scorched by flames.

The air was scorching hot. Wu Xie reached out and touched the side wall; it was frighteningly hot. He suddenly had a very ominous premonition.

Fatty was still waiting downstairs. Wu Xie turned around and asked him to throw both of their backpacks up, then pulled Fatty up with him.

"Holy crap? Why is it so hot here?" the fat guy exclaimed as he peeked out, touching the meteorite wall in bewilderment. "Have we two brothers been suddenly teleported to the legendary Flaming Mountain?"

Wu Xie glanced at him silently, "Maybe... I guess so."

"Why do you look so constipated? Is there something really amazing behind you?" the fat man asked.

Wu Xie sighed and said with a sigh, "The situation is more troublesome than I expected. There is likely a large pool of lava ahead."

"What the hell?" The fat man picked at his ear, incredulous. He slung his bag over his shoulder and started walking forward. Wu Xie quickly followed.

The two quickly passed through the five- or six-meter-long tunnel and stood at the edge of the tunnel entrance. Looking down at the surging, boiling, crimson magma that occasionally spewed out fire spikes, they exchanged a glance and saw fear in each other's eyes.

After standing on the edge of the cliff for only a short while, the gas masks on their faces were already showing signs of softening from the heat, so they hurriedly retreated back into the tunnel.

Wu Xie removed his old, malfunctioning gas mask. The hot air, now unobstructed, slammed into his face, instantly turning his skin bright red in the firelight, as if he had been branded with a red-hot iron.

He had only taken off the gas mask a short while ago when his face became unbearably hot, so Wu Xie quickly grabbed a new one and put it on to block out the heat.

When I was free, I lost my grip and the old gas mask, like a bird that suddenly died in mid-air, plummeted straight into the fiery abyss below. Before it even hit the lava below, it was already reduced to ashes in the surging heat.

Watching helplessly as the gas masked man died a violent death, the fat man's lips trembled uncontrollably, and he swallowed hard. "They say that living in hell means never seeing the light of day."

"Naive. We're really standing at the gates of hell this time. The King of Hell is probably already holding the Book of Life and Death, and has sent two little devils to wait for us at the station."

Wu Xie's forehead was covered in beads of sweat. He licked the dry skin that had peeled off the corners of his mouth and gritted his teeth, saying, "Even if we have to cross the Bridge of Helplessness, since Zhang Haixing and the others were able to cross it, we will definitely be able to cross it too."

As he spoke, he raised his hand and pointed upwards, "Look, the Bridge of Helplessness is right up there."

The fat man looked up and saw more than a dozen bronze chains, each as thick as a water bucket, hanging horizontally above the cliff, stretching between the two sides of the meteorite cliff.

The large bronze chain was wrapped with many thinner chains, which climbed up like vines. Every so often, a pear-shaped black object hung from the bottom of the chain, tightly wrapped by the thin chains, like the cocoons of butterflies.

Wu Xie squinted and looked closely, discovering that the "cocoons" were actually iron cages, deformed by the intense heat. Inside the cages, there must have been something heavy, the chains were so tightly wrapped that it was impossible to see what it was.

The heat was unbearable, so the fat man pressed his hands together and used them to make a lens in front of his eyes.

Suddenly, as if he had seen something, the fat man, ignoring the stinging heat in his eyes, pointed above the bronze chains and shouted, "Zhang Haixing, the grave mound, hey, those two bastards are walking on the Bridge of Helplessness."

Hearing this, Wu Xie quickly moved to a different spot and looked up in the same way as Fatty. Sure enough, he saw two black figures above the bronze chain, one thin and one strong, struggling to walk on the chain. However, they had gone up earlier and were already almost at the other end.

"Hurry, hurry!" Wu Xie urged, "Let's get on the 'bridge' too."

After saying that, he turned around and looked behind him, and sure enough, he saw the rock nails that Zhang Haixing had driven into the meteorite wall.

Wu Xie and Fatty grabbed the rock spikes and climbed up, quickly reaching the same height as the bronze chains.

The two stood on the chain one after the other. Looking down, a wave of dizziness washed over them uncontrollably. Although neither of them had a fear of heights, the threat of this height, coupled with the potentially deadly lava below, made their legs tremble uncontrollably. They almost collapsed onto the chain and immediately retreated.

Fatty cursed a few times to bolster his courage and said to Wu Xie, "Fatty will go first, Tianzhen, you go behind. If it really comes to it, we'll crawl over on our knees. At worst, our knees will get burned raw, but that's no big deal."

The two switched places. The fat man took a deep breath, carefully stepped on the chains, spread his arms to maintain his balance, and kept his attention focused on what was in front of him. It wasn't too difficult to walk.

The chain was very wide. When you got closer, you would find that the thickest bronze chain was actually made up of several slightly thinner chains twisted together like a rope, and then wrapped with many even thinner chains. If you were careful, you wouldn't slip and fall off.

The fat man had already walked ahead for a while, and the more he walked, the smoother it became.

Wu Xie closed his eyes and tried to reassure himself, silently repeating "There's water below, there's water below." After repeating it several times, his fear lessened considerably, and he quickly stepped onto the chains.

Zhang Haixing and Feng, who were at the front, had reached the end. They looked back and did not show any surprise at Wu Xie and his companion catching up.

Zhang Haixing waved her hand casually, then led Feng into the meteorite cave opposite.

Thank you to [Eat-Not-Full-Adorable] and [Drinking Wine and Savoring Sweetness] for the generous donations! Sending love and goodnight.

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(End of this chapter)