As the suspended rope ladder swayed, the people on it began to descend one by one.

The first to land were two tall, burly men. The moment they landed, they took off the submachine guns hanging on their shoulders. One of them guarded the rope ladder, while the other, holding a flashlight, began to patrol the room and headed towards us first.

Seeing this, Song Laosan, who was next to me, had already raised the muzzle of his gun slightly.

Although I was mentally prepared to stop him from firing, after a brief moment of thought, I also raised my gun.

I don't know the composition of Duan Jinyan's team, but I know that the first two people who came down must be in security roles. After we were discovered, we had to show our weapons in order to establish a standoff. Otherwise, in such a high-risk environment, the other side might just come over with a round of gunfire.

"Holy crap!"

Just as the burly man was about to reach us, a shout suddenly came from behind him, followed by a "thud": "Ouch, damn it, I've fallen and died! What are you all standing there for? Come and help me! If I get hurt, none of us will get out of here!"

"You piece of trash!"

The burly man who was about to find us saw the young man from Tianjin fall, so he got up and went back.

I peeked over the side and saw that five people had already come down the rope ladder. As the woman in the group climbed down, there were exactly six of them.

The number of people matched exactly the number of people remaining in Duan Jinyan's team that we had calculated when we first entered the tomb.

At this moment, I was confused. The number of people matched, which meant that Duan Jinyan should still be in the group.

If that's the case, why did that young man from Tianjin say that no one else besides him understands feng shui?

Isn't this Duan Jinyan's team?

Looking at the woman again, although she was quite far away, her black hair made her look like she was from China.

Going back further, when we first arrived in Komsomolskaya Pravda, the Yevgeny we were looking for was also taken away by a Chinese woman.

Could it be that my guesses were wrong from beginning to end, and that the group that kidnapped Yevgeny was not Wei Shengnan at all, but this woman's group?

And the group searching for the tomb of the King of Ze was not three groups, but four groups.

The more I thought about it, the more confused I became. The woman also asked the young man from Tianjin, "How are you? Did you break any bones?"

The young man from Tianjin was indeed skilled in martial arts. After falling backward from a height of six or seven meters, he was still full of energy: "It's alright. Luckily, I started practicing hard qigong when I was six years old. Otherwise, if someone else had fallen from that height, they would have been crippled or broken a bone."

The burly man who turned back asked impatiently, "Stop bragging, where should we go next?"

"Isn't it obvious enough that there's only one road here?"

The young man pointed to the long corridor we had come from and finished speaking. Then he took out a small compass from his pocket and turned it around: "Kun is in the north, its number is eight, and its element is water! Water represents life, so go forward, and there will be a way out!"

I was speechless when I heard what the young man said.

This guy is so unreliable.

He was located in the north, clearly facing the south, yet he used his own position to create a layout, mistaking the fire element of the south for the water element. If someone in the tomb were to use this orientation to break the mechanism, even eight hundred lives wouldn't be enough to save them.

The woman shone her flashlight down the corridor: "Time is of the essence, find a way out as soon as possible."

Hearing this, I breathed a slight sigh of relief, because the woman hadn't asked anyone else to destroy the rope ladder and was preparing to leave directly, which meant we could get into the tomb from here.

Although these people say there is no way out at the top, judging from the meager skills of these Tianjin youths, they may have been looking in the wrong direction when they were in those positions.

Unexpectedly, the young man did not heed the woman's suggestion: "Wait, I need to check this place first to determine our location and the space we are in before I can make any further judgments!"

As he spoke, the young man swept his flashlight around the hall: "Strange, why are there so many stones and pieces of wood here? Could it be an unfinished tomb? If that's the case, that would be wonderful!"

One of them interjected, "This tomb isn't even finished yet. It's clearly not the place we're looking for. What's so great about it?"

"Think about it, since this tomb is unfinished, it naturally won't have any traps or mechanisms. If we go through here, we can find other tombs, right?"

As the young man spoke, he walked towards us: "So that's why the entrance up there was so well covered up. It's because they wanted to hide this space. If it weren't for my keen observation skills, how would you have had the chance to get here!"

"ah!!"

Just as the young man had taken a few steps, a hysterical roar suddenly came from the corridor outside.

The six people in the hall were clearly startled by the sound, but I recognized it as Zhou Peng's roar.

At that moment, I was actually a little afraid of this madman.

He was covered in mercury when he was at the Stele Forest, and then he fell into the underground river with us from the tomb passage. In the end, he even dared to fight against a seven- or eight-meter-long ancient giant salamander.

It's one thing to be so reckless, but it also has such a tenacious will to live, still alive after all this turmoil.

Hearing the shout, the burly man guarding the passage assumed a firing stance: "Did you hear anything?"

"It's a human roar!"

The woman's bodyguard also became alert: "Miss, could this be the person we're looking for?"

Upon hearing the second shout, the woman drew a large-caliber pistol from her waist and hurried down the corridor: "Loaded, let's go check it out!"

Soon, all of them rushed towards the corridor.

The monkey didn't speak until it saw the six figures disappear down the corridor. "These people all went to the underground river. Aren't they just rushing off to become feed for the giant salamanders?"

"Ignore them, let's go!"

I seized this brief opening, rushed out from behind the pile of stones, and was the first to reach the rope ladder. I tugged at it to make sure it was secure, and then began to climb up using both hands and feet.

"Da da da!"

"Put-put-put!"

I had only climbed halfway up when I heard gunshots like firecrackers going off below, which made my eardrums ache.

Song Laosan, who was following behind, looked up and shouted, "Xiao Duan, the gunshots are too close. It must be those giant salamanders chasing us in through the cave and encountering these people."

By this time, I had deduced that these people were probably not related to Duan Jinyan. Based on the principle of "better to die than to die myself," I continued to climb up: "Protect yourself, don't worry about them!"

Encouraged by the gunshots, I climbed to the top of the rope ladder as fast as I could, crawled into a dark space, and then pulled Song Laosan and Monkey up as well.

We had just reached the top when we heard flashlight beams coming from the corridor below. Someone shone their flashlight upwards and was startled: "Damn it! Who's up there?"

"Da da da!"

A gunshot rang out, accompanied by questions. The bullet hit the exit, sending sparks flying.

Seeing how ruthless these people were, I decided to go all in. I grabbed the rope ladder, ran backward, and pulled it into the air.