The shadow of the Teotihuacan pyramid cut through the morning mist like a sharp blade. We stood on the Avenue of the Dead, the bronze bell rubbings in our hands were hot from the sun. Tang Ren wiped his sweat, and the bronze fragments suddenly bounced from his palm - the magnetite veins at the bottom of the pyramid were humming strangely.
"Sun, the location of the sundial!" Qin Feng pointed to the Quetzalcoatl Temple. The sunlight of the spring equinox penetrated the holes in the stone carvings, casting a Q-shaped light spot on the ground. I squatted down and touched the hot projection, and the stone slab suddenly sank halfway, revealing the stairs leading to the underground river.
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As Tang Ren walked forward in the knee-deep Yin River water, his trouser pockets suddenly bulged - the bronze bell fragments obtained in Milan were resonating with the cave wall. Qin Feng used a flashlight to scan the rock paintings that were leaking water, and stuttered, "This, this is the score monument of the Mayan ball game!"
The stone ring of the stadium glowed coldly in the moonlight. I inserted the broken pieces of the bronze bell into the groove of the scoreboard. The ground suddenly shook, and 23 rubber balls rolled out from the secret passage, each with a Mayan number engraved on it. Tang Ren kicked a ball and it hit the stone wall. The secret door opened with a bang, revealing the crystal skull soaking in the well.
"The head and the lower jaw of the skull can move!" Qin Feng pried open his teeth and a roll of parchment paper fell out. Unfolding it was a nautical chart with the coordinates of Puerto Rico marked with cochineal red paint, and a Taino thunder god's mask painted at the end.
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The blue brick walls of Old San Juan groaned in the hurricane, and we ran into a colonial pharmacy for shelter. An obsidian knife rolled out of the cinnamon jar that Tang Ren overturned, and the blade reflected the secret door of the underground wine cellar. Qin Feng used candlelight to heat the stone knife, and a tooth-marked sugar trade bill emerged.
The secret room behind the wine barrel was filled with ceramic jars, each sealed with human skin paper. I opened a trembling cover, and found a book of Taino witch doctor's curses with gold foil inside - after splicing it together, it turned out to be an isometric map of the Bermuda Triangle. Tang Ren suddenly pointed to the bottom of the jar: "These salt stains are in the shape of tears!"
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At dawn, we boarded the rusted cargo ship. A copy of the Storm Journal was soaking in the water on the deck. Qin Feng turned to the record page of December 5, 1945, and his stuttering voice was torn apart by the sea breeze: "We saw the glowing green waves..."
Tang Ren pried open the compass cabinet in the captain's room, and found a jade cong embedded in the bronze instrument. When I pressed the fragment of the tiger talisman obtained by Milan into the groove, the whole ship suddenly shook as if it was electrified. After the rusty shell fell off, the silver-white hull was exposed, and the Q logo flashed in the morning light - this was the "Cyclops" that had been missing for 80 years!
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The star map on the bridge console slowly rotated, and Su Chen recognized that this was the bronze sacred tree shape of Sanxingdui. He pressed the button representing the end of the Mayan calendar, and the holographic projection intertwined all human characters in the air. Qin Feng suddenly stuttered and laughed: "This, this is the genetic chain of language!"
Tang Ren kicked open the secret door that suddenly appeared. Twenty-three historical figures were lying in the freezer. From Egyptian priests to Ming Dynasty sea merchants, each had the letter Q branded on their chests. When the alarm sounded, I glanced at the observation window of a freezer - it was clearly my great-grandfather when he was young!
The moment the huge wave smashed the porthole, the GPS of the rescue boat automatically located the Bangkok pier. In the salty sea breeze, Tang Ren chewed moldy coconut candy and muttered: "Next time, should we go to Antarctica?" Qin Feng wiped the jade cong and smiled, while I stared at the copper shavings in my palm - they were slowly gathering into a new Q under the effect of the magnetic field.
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