Tomb Raider: I Can Hear Antiques Talk

Chapter 169 The Mystery in the Temple
What's in your pocket?Hearing what Yan Jiukuo said, Xiao Ran quickly rummaged through his pockets.His fingers touched something hard and angular, and he remembered that it was given to him by Xu Er's little brother.

Because he was called by Xu Er to attend the hot dinner, he stuffed the thing into his pocket before he could see it clearly.He took out the copper lump and studied it carefully.

It was a roughly diamond-shaped thing, the size of an egg.Behind the hexagonal plane is a hexagonal structure with a hollow center, and six copper rods converge into a rounded tip at the tail.

In the center of the hexagonal plane, there is a freehand human figure like a stick figure, but with six hands and four legs like Niangniang Xia, it looks like a mutated ant.

"Xiao Gang, where did you get this? This thing... seems to belong to my younger brother." Xu Er asked.

Xiao Ran said: "It was indeed your brother who gave it to me. Even before dinner last night, I didn't know what the kid meant."

Xu Er scratched his head and said with a smile, "Maybe he thinks you are close. He won't give it to anyone. My dad picked it up for him."

"Your dad? Where did he get this thing?" Xiao Ran asked.

Xu Er's eyes were a little sad for a moment: "It was the last time he went home, he said he was about to find the medicine, and he never came back..."

Seeing that Xu Er's sadness was aroused, Xiao Ran didn't know how to comfort him, so he could only pat him on the shoulder to express his comfort.

He pretended to look at the structure of the temple, walked to the side, and asked: "Is this an antique? Is there any history?"

Yi Jiukuo said: "He is the same as the fat man's jade. It should be a key, but it is just a dead thing without a soul. I feel that he has something to do with this temple. You'd better study it carefully."

Xiao Ran made a big circle around this almost empty temple. The architecture of the Yuan Dynasty is reflected in a rough, completely exposed, not fancy. There can be no ingenuity.As for those murals, he has seen them several times. Even the most common stone carvings have nothing to do with the copper lump.

After going around this circle, he went back to the statue on the stone platform and took a closer look at the statue.Although the painted paint has peeled off, the statue remains intact on the whole, only the tip of the bun on the top of the head has fallen off.

Xiao Ran felt a little strange, even the thinnest fingers of the statue were still there, and the tiles on the top of the head were intact, why did the topknot of the statue's head fall off?
His eyes moved to the reliefs on the wall. In the images of Empress Xia, there is a cone-shaped hair crown on the top of the head.With a flash of inspiration, he put the copper hollow awl in his palm, closed one eye and pointed it at the top of the statue's head.

Could it be that……

He hurried around to the back of the statue, where some fragments of the statue were still scattered.He picked up the largest piece and compared it, and the shape inside was exactly the same as the copper hollow cone.

Sure enough!This copper cone was previously hidden on top of the statue of Empress Xia. I don't know how Xu Er's father found this thing, but he didn't know what it was useful for, so he took it home as a toy and gave it to his children.

Since the copper cone can be hidden on the top of the statue, and Yi Jiukuo said that it is the key related to Xia Niang Temple, we can only hope for the statue.

He carefully inspected the back of the statue, the whole back was seamless without any flaws.When Xu Er saw Xiao Ran's hands up and down Xia Niangniang's back, he smiled again, but was immediately held back by Liu Shengli's eyes.

Not at the back, so Xiao Ran had no choice but to go around to the front, stepping on the stone platform to climb up to the statue to have a look.Xu Er quickly chased after him, and said with some embarrassment: "Xiao Rangang, this can't be done, although we are in a new society now, but after all, we are in other people's temples, so don't let us get in the way..."

Xiao Ran carefully examined the face of the statue, and said without turning his head: "It's just a broken statue, I'm afraid she will bite me."

"No, Xiao Rangang, there is a god standing three feet up, what if someone is watching..."

Xiao Ran was a little impatient, turned his head and said: "Hey, you are Xu's second son, do I have to go back to the village chief to sue you, and let you free your mind? Who is watching? Her eyes are closed, look Ah look at her..."

Seeing Empress Xia's eyes narrowed slightly, Xiao Ran subconsciously glanced along the direction of her eye slits.Just at this glance, Xiao Ran was stunned lying on the statue.

On the back of the stone platform where the bronze statue is placed, there is a faintly visible brass-colored circular pattern. At first glance, it seems to be just an ordinary pattern, but now that Xiao Ran is holding the copper cone in his hand, no matter how he looks at it, he feels that it may be possible to penetrate into it. plug it.

When Liu Shengli and Xu Er saw Xiao Ran suddenly stunned, they thought that he had really been bewitched, so they quickly knelt on the ground and worshiped, babbling apologetically.

Xiao Ran lightly jumped down from the statue, kicked the two people's buttocks, and scolded them to stand up: "Forget about Xu Er, Liu Shengli, you kid was born under the red flag and grew up in the spring breeze, so follow suit. Superstitious, shame on your grandma's house!"

Xiao Ran ignored the two of them and ran directly behind the stone platform.There is about half a meter between the platform and the statue, which seems to be intentional.

He carefully inspected the copper-colored ring decoration embedded in the stone platform, and saw that there was a crack in the center, and a small piece fell off.It turns out that although the surface of the center of the copper ring is similar to the stone platform in gray, the inside is yellowish brown. It looks like it was filled with mud and painted with a layer of gray paint.

Xiao Ran picked up the copper awl, and lightly hit the crack in the center twice, the paint on the surface fell off piece by piece, revealing the dried ocher mud inside.

He let go of his heart, and smashed it hard several times. After the large pieces of dry mud fell off, the broken soil inside was also scattered out.In the center of the brass ring, there is a hexagonal gap, the size of which is exactly the same as that of the copper cone.

Xiao Ran was excited, it seemed that this copper cone was really a key, and now the keyhole was found.It seems that the person who designed this thing at the beginning was sure that no one would dare to climb onto the statue of the goddess to find the key.

"Old Xiao, you can think clearly, when the little fat man put the jade on his eyeballs, a bunch of worms came out. Are you not afraid of repeating the same mistakes?" Achilles Jiugui said.

After thinking about it for a while, Xiao Ran realized that there was indeed some truth in what Yue Jiukuo said.What's more, at the underground altar in the ancient city of Jingjue, there were a large number of them, with guns, fire and fuel in their hands, and his God's perspective could prepare in advance, so there was no danger.

This time he brought two useless oil bottles. Strictly speaking, the only weapon that could be counted as a weapon was a Guanshan knife. If there was any trouble, it would kill the two little followers.

He got up and told the two to go outside the temple first, pay attention to the movement around them, and if there was anything wrong, run back quickly and leave him alone.

Seeing the worried faces of the two men, they retreated outside the temple with some uneasiness, holding shovels on one side and the other on the right, ready to rush in to meet them at any time, Xiao Ran felt warm in his heart.Although these are the two babies in terms of strength, at least it makes him feel less lonely.

He felt relieved, and carefully inserted the copper awl into the inner copper hole according to the head and feet of the figure on the pattern.

With a "click" sound, the copper awl sank tightly into the copper hole.After a few seconds, the stone platform suddenly trembled. Under the surprised eyes of the three people, the bronze statue on the stone platform turned around while shaking, and slowly turned towards Xiao Ran.

(End of this chapter)