Hearing my shout, one of the young men from the drilling team crawled out of the tunnel and stood beside me. He grabbed a handful of black soil, sniffed it, and looked at me with delight: "It really does smell like Tonglu soil! Boss, you'd better give us a big red envelope now!"
At this moment, the middle-aged man also came out, shining his flashlight ahead: "These are indeed traces of tamped soil and copper road, but what this young man just said is right, this is just a pit-shaped vertical shaft. How could bronze artifacts appear in this kind of chamber? Could it be that we dug two connected tombs together? Boss, if that's the case, we'll have to pay more!"
Knowing the value of the bronze artifacts, Song Laosan was eager to see what lay beyond and had no time to haggle with the middle-aged man. He glared at him fiercely and said, "I won't add a single penny to your price. If you can do it, then keep digging. If you can't, then retreat and we'll do it ourselves!"
The most difficult vertical tunnel has now been completed. Seeing that Song Laosan was about to call the people upstairs, the middle-aged man immediately waved his hand and said, "Forget it, we've known each other for a while now, let's get started!"
With the traces of the copper road, the subsequent digging became much easier. The middle-aged man had only dug forward about a meter when his shovel made a sound as it struck a hard object.
The three of them worked together and quickly retrieved a chime bell from the ground.
Old Song used a knife to pry away the soil, and his eyes widened as he looked at the layer of black rust covering the surface of the chime bells: "Little Duan, this is a good thing!"
I squatted down and examined the soil beneath my feet: "Based on the traces, this is not two tombs. I never expected that such an inconspicuous little tomb would use bronze artifacts as burial goods. But Western Zhou tombs usually only have one burial chamber. Why would there be a side chamber here?"
"Who cares? Finding something is always a good thing!" Old Song looked at the middle-aged man excitedly. "What are you standing there for? Dig!"
In a short while, they dug three chime bells out of the ground. The middle-aged man patted the dirt off his clothes and said, "The copper path inside is broken. It looks like there may only be these three chime bells here."
While the digging team was working, I had already cleared out two of the chime bells. After I finished clearing out the last chime bell, I waved my hand and said, "No, keep digging in, there must be something else inside!"
"Boss, we don't have to put people through this!"
When the middle-aged man saw me asking him to continue working, he immediately became unhappy: "When chime bells are used as burial objects, they are usually in sets of three, and at most three sets. Even the emperor cannot exceed this number. It's already a blessing from heaven that a set of chime bells can be found in a pit tomb. You can't be so greedy!"
"Ta-da!"
I tapped the chime bells in front of me with my finger: "Every set of chime bells will have one bell with an inscription explaining the origin of the set. But none of these three bells have an inscription, which means they are either pieced together or missing. However, judging from their shape, these three bells belong to the bass section, so it is unlikely that they were pieced together. Therefore, there must be other parts of the chime bells inside."
Old Song urged, "Each of you three gets an extra 50,000 yuan as a reward, hurry up and dig the thing out!"
The middle-aged man was a money-grubber. When he heard Song Laosan add more money, he stopped talking and led his two companions to dig in another direction.
Sure enough, as they continued digging, more and more chime bells were unearthed.
Even after the ninth set of chime bells was unearthed, no inscriptions appeared on them.
Even the monkey was dumbfounded: "Young Master Duan, didn't you just say that according to ancient tomb customs, even the emperor could only be buried with a maximum of nine chime bells? What's going on? Did we dig up the chime bell production base?"
I thought for a moment: "In ancient times, when chime bells were used as burial objects or ritual instruments, they were always arranged in sets of three, with three sets as the maximum. No one would bury more than nine chime bells in a tomb. But in the space in front of us, apart from the chime bells, no other bronze artifacts were unearthed. This indicates that these chime bells were not buried as ritual instruments, but rather were the tomb owner's cherished possessions, a complete set of musical instruments. This tomb used pottery as ritual objects, yet a set of chime bells was buried with it. If my deduction is correct, the tomb owner's identity during his lifetime should be that of a musician."
"That's great! We were just looking to dig up some junk, but we unexpectedly stumbled upon a complete set of bronze artifacts." Old Song gave me a meaningful look: "If that's the case, our plan will actually go more smoothly."
With our persistence, the team finally unearthed a total of twelve chime bells, as well as a large number of bronze artifact fragments.
After piecing them together, it was found that there should have originally been sixteen chime bells here. Song Laosan said that if these chime bells were sold as a set, the price would be at least seven million.
The middle-aged man trembled with excitement upon seeing the set of chime bells laid out on the ground: "This unremarkable pit has yielded a complete set of chime bells! This is a windfall! Congratulations to you all!"
I waved my hand: "Move the things up, keep digging back, and take out all the pottery that were buried with us."
When the middle-aged man saw that I could find a set of chime bells in this kind of earthen tomb, he thought there were some good things in the tomb behind it. Without saying a word, he led his men through it.
Three hours later, our group returned to the surface. Apart from a set of chime bells, the rest of our loot was worthless. In addition to two sacks of pottery fragments, I also dug up a sack of soil from the tomb.
When Liu Yu saw us come out, he and his group of men began to help us carry things down the mountain path.
As I got into the car, I saw that Song Laosan was still holding a chime bell. I glanced at him sideways and asked, "Aren't you worried about how heavy it is?"
Old Song replied with a pained expression, "This is the one with the inscription. I know the other chimes are useful, but it would be a waste to give this one away. I plan to sell it as a single antique. Although it's not as valuable as a set, this one can fetch at least 800,000."
I remained noncommittal: "Have you found a location and craftsmen to prepare for opening the kiln?"
Song Laosan licked his lips and replied, "Don't worry, I found them all through my own channels, avoiding the Qing family. The craftsmen were found in Shaanxi and have no dealings with the local forces. They'll leave as soon as they finish their work, so no one can find out the details. Now everything is ready, we just need the final push!"
Hearing what Song Laosan said, I didn't ask any more questions and just flashed the headlights twice in front of me.
To avoid being discovered, we covered the headlights of our vehicles with duct tape, leaving only a small gap that could illuminate the road ahead.
Liu Yu, who was in the car in front, received my signal and started his car, driving forward along the mountain road.
I was following behind Liu Yu's car, chatting with Song Laosan about the next plan, when suddenly a beam of light appeared on the road ahead, blinding me and making me squint.
My heart skipped a beat when I saw those lights.
To avoid being spotted, we covered our headlights, which meant that oncoming vehicles were definitely not our own.
There are no roads in this desolate wilderness, and that car was definitely not driven by pedestrians. The most likely scenario is that news of our tomb raiding has leaked out, attracting the arresting officers.
Just as this thought flashed through my mind, the car suddenly accelerated and, taking advantage of Liu Yu's blindness while he was driving, violently rammed into him.
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