I am still alive, I can be sure from the cold touch on my back and the pain all over my body.

But I fell from such a high place, why am I still alive?

Confused, I tried my best to open my eyes.

In my blurred vision, I vaguely saw a figure sitting next to me.

I gasped.

I'm already a bit neurotic now, and the frightening trip just now has made me deeply suspicious of all "humanoid" things.

"You're finally awake." When I heard him communicating with me in human language, I breathed a sigh of relief.

At this time I was slightly awake, half sitting up and staring at that person.

This man is tall and tall, with a pair of powerful arms exposed under his tight black short sleeves; his lower body is in a pair of loose overalls, with a handle exposed from the trouser pocket, which I guess is a knife; under his feet are a pair of thick

The boots, I recognized them immediately as military boots.

During the military training in college, I saw the instructor wearing these boots. The soles of the boots are steel plates. If you kick them out, you will not die but will be disabled.

"haven't seen you for a long time."

Hearing the sound, I moved my gaze to that person's face, and I suddenly realized that the light here was actually very bright. I could see his face clearly. His cheekbones were slightly high, his eyes were a little narrow, and his face was thin and strong.

It's like being carved by a knife or an axe.

I always felt that this man looked familiar, but I just couldn't remember where I had seen him.

"It seems you have forgotten us." He said.

I'm even more confused. It seems there are only two of us here. Who is the other person he refers to when he talks about us?

He smiled, took out his phone from the pocket of his overalls, swiped a few times, and turned the screen to his face.

The moment I saw the screen clearly, I panicked.

Before I could react, he had already turned off his phone: "But I will never forget you, my good brother, Chen Siyu."

"You...you are Fatty Zhang?!" I almost cried at that moment, feeling shocked and happy at the same time.

He shrugged.

"You're not dead!"

"Of course I'm not dead. What? Do you want me to die..." I heard Er Fat's tone getting colder and harsher.

He stood up and pulled out a saber from the pocket of his overalls.

I realized that he was here for revenge.

In fact, I should have been prepared to pay with my life, but I still feel unwilling to accept it. Where is Nizi? I haven't found her yet, and I haven't apologized to her yet.

"What? Aren't you going to run?"

I shook my head: "I'm sorry for you."

"No, you're not sorry for me. You're sorry for Nizi!" Erpang's eyes widened with bloodshot eyes. He glared at me fiercely, as if he wanted to eat me alive, "She likes you so much, but you didn't protect her.

Good for her!"

I could only keep saying I was sorry. Now that I know Er Pang is alive, I feel relieved.

"It's just that it's okay for me to die. I want to ask you to do me two favors. The first is to take care of my parents and grandparents. I can't be here to fulfill my filial piety. The second is to find Nizi..."

"You don't need to tell me, I will do it." Er Pang took a step forward and raised the saber in his hand.

I closed my eyes and wondered if it would hurt the moment I died.

Then he listened to the sound of a sharp knife cutting through the air.

"squeak!"

I clearly heard the muffled sound of the knife piercing the flesh, but I couldn't feel any pain. I only heard a very sharp and hoarse scream coming from my ears.

Then, I heard something fall to the ground.

I opened my eyes tremblingly and found the fat man sitting opposite me with an expressionless face, packing his luggage.

I turned back full of doubts.

I was immediately horrified. What fell on the ground was a bloody, skinned human head!

If you look closely, you can also see the colorful blood vessels all over the human head.

The head had been stabbed, but it was not dead yet. It was squeaking and whining on the ground, spinning continuously.

There was blood all over the floor, as well as colorful mucus all over the floor.

I thought again of the disgusting liquid that splashed all over my body when those blue-eyed bats exploded themselves.

Just when I was about to move my body to avoid it, the head suddenly stopped screaming and slowly turned around, staring at me with its pair of white eyeballs.

A chill in my heart.

I saw the fluid in the colorful blood vessels all over the skull begin to flow faster.

I guess, could this guy self-destruct like those bats?

Just then, the fat man next to him suddenly got angry!

A sliding shovel kicked the head away.

I watched helplessly as the human head deformed in mid-air, like a pulled rubber ball, and exploded into pieces with a loud bang.

The plasma fell like rain, white smoke emitted from where it fell, and the thick ice melted in the blink of an eye.

I was dumbfounded and heard the fat man explaining in my ears: "That's called a human-faced owl. Fortunately, it's just a cub. Once it grows up, it will be great. You seem to have been targeted by it, and it was just about to suck you dry when you weren't paying attention."

of blood."

"Then why didn't it do anything before?"

The second fat man pointed at the mucus on my body: "Maybe he's afraid of the blood of the blue-eyed bat."

I nodded my head unconsciously, and then the two of us fell into a very awkward situation.

We were silent for a while, and finally I couldn't help the doubts in my heart and the deathly silence, so I spoke first: "How did you escape in the first place?"

The fat man raised his eyebrows: "How you escaped is how I escaped."

I was stunned for a moment and then became very guilty.

The reason why I was able to successfully escape from that underground palace was due to the Feng Shui and the shallow Qimen Dunjia my grandfather taught me. It allowed me to identify the direction and escape even though I was in the underground palace.

Although the three of us were still inexperienced children at that time, it was normal for us to choose to protect ourselves when encountering something like that, not to mention that I really didn’t have the energy to help them at the time.

But the main responsibility still lies with me. If I didn't force them to explore Sanjianshan, nothing would happen next.

"Actually, I don't blame you." Erpang said, "After all, let alone you, even if it were done to ordinary adults, there's no guarantee they wouldn't do it."

"Besides," Er Pang said here, he paused, took out a cigarette from his pocket and lit it. I don't know when he got into the habit of smoking, "Nizi should have died there."

I was stunned: "What do you mean?"

"When I was young, you, me, and Nizi were the best friends. Especially you, Nizi has always liked you, and you may not even know it."

In fact, I know that Nizi even said in private that she wanted to be my bride. But I always thought that was just a child's joke.

"So, they didn't tell you. I also found out about it from my father later." Er Pang blew out a smoke ring, "Have you heard the story about He Bo's marriage?"

I nodded. The story in the primary school textbook about Ximen Leopard who cleverly broke up the River Lord to marry him is still fresh in my memory. I also like this story very much because it is very just.

"What do you think the continuation of that story is?"

"Justice has been upheld and the bad habit of human sacrifice has been abandoned?"

"How is that possible? You are also majoring in archeology. You should be very aware of China's traditional culture. Reality is always crueler than stories." Er Pang sneered and said, "Real human sacrifice was only replaced in the Qin Dynasty. Before that, China

There has always been a tradition of human sacrifice in ancient times.”

"The most ridiculous thing is that although Ximen Leopard prevented the tragedy of an innocent girl, the result was that the Yellow River changed its course that year and the river burst its banks, drowning countless people."

Zhang Erpang handed me the phone. On the screen was still the photo of me, Nizi and Erpang. I swiped my finger and saw a stone slab full of small seals.

I can pretty much decipher what's in it.

The general idea is that there is a dragon palace under the water of the Yellow River, and every year people on both sides of the Yellow River offer life sacrifices to the river god.

After that, there are sacrificial times written in different fonts. The most frightening thing is that this kind of living sacrifice has continued until the 21st century!

"This, this..." I deeply felt the evil of feudal superstition, but I was speechless.

After all, several changes in the course of the Yellow River in history were very strange, and people still cannot explain it. Therefore, many people attributed it to the theory of gods and ghosts. Originally, such feudal superstition was not a cause for concern, but it happened to harm countless lives.

"Originally, such a life sacrifice was once a year. Later, when the Qin Dynasty was established, the life sacrifice was changed to once every ten years. Then, in today's modern society, people are deeply disgusted with this harmful superstition, so those who are still obsessed with it

People who had the tradition of living sacrifices began to restrain themselves and changed it to once every hundred years."

"In that case, why didn't you call the police?"

"No one would do this." Zhang Erpang looked at me, "Chen Siyu, do you believe that there is really a Dragon Palace under the Danjiang River?"

I couldn't help but laugh. I thought this was simply nonsense. How could there be dragons in this world? There are no dinosaurs anymore.
To be continued...