?

  Pangzi let out a sigh of relief, hastily snatching the lighter from my hand, and said urgently: "Tianzhen comrade, you can't be so impulsive at this time. Maybe there's still a way." A way? What way could there be at this point?

  I stared at the swollen eyes of Sanbo in the puppet, which were still staring back at me. I took a deep breath and said, "Third Uncle... are you still conscious? If so, move your eyes." The eyeballs then rotated in a circle, and Pangzi let out a cold gasp, saying, "Third Master is really alive!" My emotions at this moment were indescribable. Next, I asked Sanbo, "Third Uncle... what do you want me to do?"

  Its eyeballs turned towards the lighter in my hand and then back at me.

  Then there was a long silence, and even the fatty couldn't say a word. My hand holding the lighter was trembling. If this were just a corpse, I would have taken action without hesitation. But what lay inside wasn't just my third uncle, but also a conscious person. If I lit it on fire, wouldn't that be the same as killing him with my own hands?

  My mind was in a mess, the flame of the lighter flickered for some reason, and then Fatso snatched it away, gritting his teeth: "I'll take care of this." Next, he saluted the corpse with a military salute, saying in a low voice: "Third Master, don't bother your nephew anymore, I'll send you on your way, go well." Then, I watched as Fatso brought the lighter closer to that bundle of hair, which seemed to be afraid of pain, tightly wrapped together, wrapping that deformed body firmly.

  The hair was very wet and did not catch fire at first, but with the persistent efforts of the fat man, it began to emit a faint smoke, a pungent smell mixed with the stench of burnt hair spread out, and on that pile of hair, a small flame started to burn, the flame danced and grew bigger, gradually spreading out, until finally, I saw the corpse of the woman in the wooden frame twisting in agony, but because her body was nailed to the frame, her struggles were completely ineffective, and the flames burned mercilessly upwards.

  At that moment, I seemed to see the pain spreading in those eyeballs, the kind of pain that was being burned alive but could not resist.

  No, this is my third uncle, no matter what kind of monster he is, I cannot treat him like that.

  Subconsciously, I rushed up and tore off a piece of clothing to put out the flames that had started burning. Fatso suddenly pulled my arm, and I turned around and gave him a punch, shouting: "Get out, get out!" That punch landed on Fatso's face, and his mouth corner instantly started bleeding. Fatso was furious, and he violently pressed me down to the ground, roaring: "Get out of here, you son of a bitch, Wu Xie! Don't be like a woman, or I'll lose respect for you... This is your third uncle's own choice... Let him go." By the time Fatso finished speaking, his tone had become very low, and I could barely hear it.

  All I could see in front of me was a blurry flame, and that stench. Then I said to Fatty, "Let me get up, I'll send Third Uncle off." Fatty made sure I wasn't going to do anything stupid again, then got off me. We stood beside the bronze statue, watching as the Corpse King struggled inside it, its deformed body powerless against the piercing bronze thorns.

  It struggled for a long time, until it turned into a piece of black charcoal that was still twisting. I don't know how long this fire burned, but Fatso and I stood guard by the bronze statue, our legs stiffened, but I had already lost all feeling. The fire had gone out, leaving only a small piece of black gel-like substance in the bronze statue, about the size of a fist, but in my eyes, it seemed as if I still saw the raging flames burning fiercely.

  That fire, no matter how hard it tried, couldn't be extinguished, and continued to burn. The monster writhing in agony within the flames gradually merged with Third Uncle's appearance, as scenes from the past flashed through my mind one by one - from childhood to adulthood, carrying me on his back to play arcade games, taking me to fight for the first time... everything he silently shouldered over these twenty years was now completely gone, consumed by this fire.

  In this world, there is no longer a person named Wu San Sheng, his existence only remains in our memories.

  The fatty seemed to be saying something in my ear, I wanted to listen clearly, but what I heard was Third Uncle talking to me, that fire was still burning in front of me, as if it would never go out, burning my eyeballs painfully.

  Right after that, Fatty seemed to have stuffed something into my bosom and then there was no sound.

  I fell to the ground, all my strength seemed to have been drained away. In my mind, apart from those memories, I kept thinking of one thing: Third Uncle was dead, I watched him being burned alive with my own eyes. The fire was set by Fatso. Actually... it was me who set it.

  That pungent smell had already spread to the tip of my nose, I didn't know how long I'd been lying on the ground, my whole brain was in a daze. After a while, a sharp pain suddenly appeared on my face, and then I was slapped several times. Then I heard Fatso scolding: "Wu Xie, what are you learning from Xiao Ge? You're making me wake up! If you faint, I won't care about you, did you hear that?"

  That fat guy's several slaps made my head dizzy, my cheeks stinging with pain, but the flames burning in front of me suddenly went out. My eyes were once again plunged into darkness, and the dim halo of light from the flashlight seemed to be getting even fainter, as if it was about to run out of power.

  The fat guy sat next to me, looked at me silently for a moment, and asked: "Alright?"

  I looked down at the thing in my arms, it was the black solid residue left after burning, Pangzi had taken off a thin layer of clothing to wrap it up, and now it was stuffed in my arms. I wrapped the thing tightly and tucked it into my body, then nodded and said: "It's done." These two words took me a lot of effort to say out loud, whether it was really done or not even I couldn't tell, but I knew that this trip to Kunlun had finally come to an end.

  Third Uncle found the real Zan Sheng Jing in this cauldron, perhaps just as he was about to leave, petrification occurred, and then he was locked into this bronze statue.

  He was locked in or lay down by himself, now everything can't be verified, but the eight caves in front of us have no meaning at all. As for the third ghost seal, it may just be something out of thin air, and the one left by the oil bottle is enough. Now the only thing I want to do is to take the last thing left by my uncle back to Hangzhou.

  I didn't have the heart to speak, and the next route was planned by Fatso. His idea was that even if we followed the original path back, we would still end up returning to that impassable ice river in the end. It's better to go straight to the top and see if we can break through the ice layer directly.

  I think it's unreliable, after all, that ice layer has been there for over 3,000 years, and its hardness is probably stronger than pig iron. Moreover, the distance is so high that even if we can break it, we have no way to get up there. Although I didn't want to speak out, I still had to remind Fatty, saying: "Don't talk nonsense, this method won't work."

  The fatty didn't drag on the topic either, seemingly taking care of my feelings. He spoke very briefly: "So what do you think we should do?"

  My mind is still in a mess, stiff like a piece of iron, but I have to think. After a long time, I finally sorted out my thoughts and said: "We didn't bring any tools to dig through the tomb, even if we did, the outer layer is all rock and hard ice, it's useless. The only way out now is through the tomb's own passage. The first passage is the main tomb gate, that bronze door, but its exit is a pile of ice that can't be walked through, unless absolutely necessary, we can't go back the same way. The second passage is the tomb chamber's birth gate, also known as the sealed entrance. This tomb is located in the mountain body, it's hard to say if there's a sealed entrance or not, but now we can only try, if it doesn't work, we'll have to go back."

  Fatso listened to me finish, stood up and looked around, finally saying: "The places we need to find, we've all searched almost thoroughly, now it's just these eight stone caves. If I'm not mistaken, either your Second Uncle or Jie Xiaojiu, one of their teams must have entered, Wu... San Ye had also entered one of the caves back then and brought out the Zan Sheng Jing. Now we need to think carefully about which cave to enter."

  The design of these eight caves has a lot to do with the Feng Shui array method of the Mokan School, but strangely, Fatso is only half-versed in it and can't figure out what's going on. I'm even more clueless, and based on my superficial understanding, the birth gate should be in the Qian Yang position. The Qian position represents the ultimate yang, clarity, and brightness, with the meaning of endless life. The other seven positions correspond to wind, thunder, mountains, rivers, water, fire, yin, and xu, which are not good positions. But wouldn't this be underestimating the intelligence of our ancestors? If it's that easy for me to find, wouldn't the design of this mechanism be too childish?

  Although I had this idea, I still felt it was unlikely. Finally, Fatso suddenly patted his bag and said: "Forget it, we two stinky craftsmen don't understand this thing at all. No matter how much we think about it, we can't figure it out. Let's just try one by one. If something doesn't feel right, we'll immediately retreat. First, let's start with the dry position you chose." Fatso's words didn't make sense, but now there really was no other way to think about it. So, we two equipped ourselves, each holding a gun, with Fatso carrying a flashlight in front, and began entering the cave of the dry position in front of us.

  The cave was pitch black, with only a faint glow of electric light, and the line of sight was only about three or four meters. Everywhere was hazy, and the floor was paved with dense green bricks. The entrance to the cave was two meters high, just enough for people to stand upright and walk. On top of the cave, there were still lush green mosses.

  This ancient tomb does not follow the principle of "feng shui" and is not enclosed, with mountains and water blending together, completely breaking my understanding of ancient tombs. The air is filled with mist, and everywhere is damp.

  I followed Fatso with bated breath, carefully making our way forward, highly concentrated in spirit, using my eyes, ears and nose to pay attention to every change around us.

  Just then, the fat man in front of me suddenly stopped and gestured to me to come forward. I was startled and quickly walked up quietly, and then I saw a blood-stained red shirt on the ground.