The murals depict the origin of the Zhao clan's civilization—the Taiyi Forest, which is now Suicheng.

Sui City, a forested city, was different from the civilizations that had emerged in the major river basins of the past.

Judging from the murals, they were skilled in stargazing and had made considerable achievements in horsemanship, archery, and mural art. Until the Great Wei Dynasty, their traces can be found in almost every surviving dynasty. However, whether it was their fleeting rise or their sudden disappearance, everything is shrouded in mystery.

Upon seeing this, Xu Qian couldn't help but think of one word—the Mayan civilization.

In a sense, the two are quite similar.

Compared to the renowned Mayan civilization, the Zhao clan was much more low-key.

If they hadn't entered this curtained cave, their knowledge of the Zhao family might have been limited to just a few pages in a book.

Scanning and recording the twelve murals alone took nearly two hours. As time passed, the temperature inside the cave dropped several degrees.

"Brother Yang, I feel like it's getting colder and colder."

"It's...close to zero degrees now."

"I was wondering why it was so cold; it turns out I've been put in the refrigerator."

Xu Qian squatted down and picked up a piece of gravel from the ground—[Qi Han Shi], whose effects can be roughly guessed from its name.

However, this type of stone only appears in famine-stricken and cold places and was often used in ancient palace ice chambers. Before the invention of ice-making methods, its value was comparable to that of pearls and jade, and it belonged to the category of luxury goods.

Here, it's like cabbage in the market—common and inexpensive.

It seems that the claim in unofficial histories that the Zhao family was incredibly wealthy was not unfounded.

At this moment, Assistant Zhang noticed a fist-sized pearl on the platform beneath the stone statue. It was round and smooth, gleaming with a magnificent light, and possessed a unique beauty. Upon seeing it, he couldn't resist reaching out his hand.

"boom--"

In an instant, it would be an exaggeration to say that the sky collapsed and the earth cracked. Countless dust particles poured down from the sky, and the entire curtain cave seemed to be shaken by an earthquake.

"Professor Shen—" Assistant Wu quickly looked at their professor.

Xu Qian turned his head and saw that the platform, which was originally half a meter high, had suddenly sunk a certain height, and the stone statue was standing next to Assistant Zhang, who looked completely helpless.

"What's wrong?"

"what happens?"

Everyone was drawn to the commotion and instinctively rushed forward to help, only to find that the platform had suddenly dropped another notch.

"professor--"

"Don't go over there!"

The moment Zhang Ge finished speaking, the five-meter-high platform centered on the stone statue suddenly cracked open, and the people standing in the very center retreated as if their lives depended on it.

In just a few seconds, a huge, glowing red sinkhole replaced the stone statue and appeared before everyone's eyes.

All of this happened so suddenly that no one was in a state of shock. No one expected such a thing to happen, let alone that there was a mechanism underneath.

Yang, the leader, stepped forward, held up his flashlight, and looked down into the sinkhole. It was bottomless. The stone walls were wrapped with red ropes tied with copper coins, and the red glowing thing looked like a pile of... powder.

Xu Qian had already recognized the thing—the red firefly.

The trio recognized the item just like him, especially the young man named Zuo Yu, whose brows were furrowed deeply.

"Take some men down and take a look." Yang Ge understood immediately when he saw the professor's expression. He called a few men to take their tools and sent them down to scout ahead.

However, before going down, they first launched a scout drone to check for danger before sending people down with their equipment.