The Dragon Ridge Tombs

by Tianxia Bachang

  Kai and Gold Tooth nodded—my explanation was the most plausible one.

  Before now, I’d had two main worries. First, was there even a grave here in the first place? It seemed like a definite yes. Second, had this fake merchant managed to find the tomb and make off with any spoils? Looking at the temple, I could tell he was certainly a man who got what he wanted. Yet I thought it would still be worth our while to visit the tomb. If the merchant had been a gold hunter, the rules said he could take only one or two objects, so there’d be something left for us. Whoever he was, he must’ve been a true master of the craft to have found this tomb when so many others had failed. And a true master would surely value our rules more than his own life. Such honor is hard to find these days.

  We walked around the temple a few times but didn’t see any sign of a tunnel. Either it was well hidden or my predecessor had sealed it after he finished the job. Gold Tooth asked if there was any way to pinpoint the location through feng shui, and I said not while we were stuck in the valley—I’d need to be looking down from a height in order to know the lay of the land.

  Gold Tooth blanched at the thought of climbing up another hill. His life normally consisted of indulgence and no exercise, and he was already half-dead from the trek here. So I told him and Kai to stay close to the temple and keep searching for an entrance, while I went off to gain some perspective.

  I climbed up the nearest peak—it was so steep I had to use my hands as well as my feet. Before long, I was atop the ridge, gazing down at a piece of land that looked as if someone had scrunched it up, leaving it wrinkled and full of complex patterns.

  Shaanxi had high plains to the north and became hilly to the south, where Dragon Ridge lay. This area was relatively low-lying, and even this ridge wasn’t particularly high. If I were flying overhead, it would probably appear as no more than a scar on the earth.

  Holding up a rod to gauge the level, I analyzed my surroundings. Sure enough, this place was worthy of its name—there was the power of a dragon in this meridian, arising from a deeply buried “dragon palace.” This wasn’t the sort of power that ran through places where, say, emperors got buried—those were magnificent, sweeping vistas, whereas this was much quieter and stiller, buried far beneath the surface. Once upon a time, Dragon Ridge might well have been a suitable site for a royal tomb—but nature had ruptured that majesty, slicing it up, leveling mountains with earthquakes. With such severe damage, the place was no longer as potent as it once was.

  Even so, I could tell at a glance that the dragon palace still rested far below the ridge I was now standing on—and no doubt so did the Tang dynasty tomb. Calculating the length and angle of the meridian as it wound through the hills, I made a careful note of the probable sites of the grave.

  Gold Tooth and Kai were still scrabbling about the temple. I blew the whistle around my neck. They looked up at me and shrugged to say they hadn’t found anything, then went back to circling the building.

  It’s always easier to get up a hill than down. The way I’d come was too steep to return by, so I looked around, and a little to my left I spotted a shallower slope scraped out of the hill by wind and rain, or perhaps something like a mudslide. It would be easier to get down from there.

  Starting my descent on that path, I found so much loose shale underfoot that I was sliding more than walking. Noticing a slightly more level patch nearby, I hopped over to it. Barely two steps later, I found it crumbling beneath me, and suddenly my body was halfway beneath the surface. This wasn’t good—I’d stepped onto a hidden cavern.

  The villagers had mentioned these deadly traps, but I’d assumed the area around the temple would be safe, and had gotten careless. Up to my waist in the dirt, I had enough presence of mind not to struggle—as with quicksand, the loose soil here would suck me down faster the more I moved. The best thing to do was wait for help, keeping as still as possible. I didn’t dare breathe too deeply, for fear even that would pull me lower. If I got in past my chest, I’d be in real trouble.

  With both arms outstretched, I tried to keep my body in balance. When half a minute passed without my sinking any further, I gingerly reached for the whistle.

  I blew loud and hard, sending ripples through my chest and belly, and slid another few inches in. Breathing was getting difficult. I had to fight the impulse to push with my arms.

  Each minute felt endless. Where were Kai and Gold Tooth? If they hadn’t heard the whistle, then I really was doomed.

  Just as I was gasping for air and my thoughts were starting to break up, they finally appeared, strolling casually over the ridge, laughing and joking.

  As soon as they saw me, they ran over. Kai unfastened the rope coiled at his waist. He had the bamboo cage on his back, and the two geese squawked in alarm at the sudden motion.

  They stopped ten paces away, afraid of getting sucked in too, and threw the rope over. I grasped at this salvation, winding it tightly around my wrists. The two of them pulled hard, and I slowly rose from the dirt that held me captive. As my legs kicked free, the entire crust caved in, and just like that there was a huge hole in the side of the hill, growing by the second as more dirt funneled in.

  Panting hard, I wrenched open my water bottle and took a few big gulps. Then I poured the rest over my head, wiping my face clean. As I looked at the gaping cavern behind me, I realized I’d lost count of how many times I’d escaped death. It never stopped being terrifying, and this instance was much worse because I’d had time to process what was happening. There could be no worse mental torture than that realization. It was a full twenty minutes before I was calm enough to think again.

  Seeing how pale I was, Kai and Gold Tooth waited awhile before asking how I was. “Better,” I told them as I got to my feet.

  We went over to the edge of the giant hole and looked into the void. “Could this lead to the tomb?” asked Gold Tooth.

  I shook my head. “No way. Gold-hunter tunnels wouldn’t be this loose. This is a mountain cave that’s gradually eroded from the inside, leaving only a thin bit of soil over it.”

  Then I filled them in on what I’d discovered earlier—the tomb being one kilometer from Fish Bone Temple, which was consistent with the tunnel starting at the temple itself. A kilometer-long route would be no sweat for an expert, though it would take more than a day to dig.

  “This guy had too much time on his hands!” exclaimed Kai. “Why not just build the temple directly over the tomb?”

  “My guess is he wanted to enter the tomb from below,” I said.

  “From below?” Gold Tooth seemed puzzled. “Do you mean because the walls and ceiling would be too secure, so the floor’s the only vulnerable point?”

  “I would guess so. This was at the height of the Tang dynasty, and with all their resources, I’d expect a mountain tomb to be especially secure. The underground vault would be solid rock reinforced with metal bars. But even the most airtight ancient grave must have at least one point that’s permeable, in order to allow some air to circulate. If not, that’d be bad for feng shui.”

  “So there’s a back door?” Kai asked.

  “Not exactly. It’s only a way for air to move around. It wouldn’t be an actual opening, just an area that’s not as solid as the rest.”

  We discussed it a bit more, then decided it was worth the effort to pay the Dragon Ridge tomb a visit. The Fish Bone Temple tunnel would be our point of entry. It had only been a few decades, so its position shouldn’t have shifted too much, and even if parts of it had collapsed, we’d just dig our way around—that would still be easier than finding our own way in, and far safer, given the likelihood of tumbling into another hidden cavern.

  Having made our decision, we headed back to the temple. Kai and Gold Tooth had searched for a long time with no luck. Feng shui wouldn’t help us here—this wasn’t a real temple and hadn’t been built along those principles. What h
ad this gold-hunting predecessor of mine been up to?

  Then a lightbulb went on in my head. “Let’s have a look at the Dragon King statue. If there’s a tunnel, I bet it’s hidden under the altar itself.”

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  The roof of Fish Bone Temple trembled in the mountain winds, letting out alarmingly creaky noises. After studying it for a while, we realized that despite its dilapidated appearance, the place was surprisingly solid, perhaps because of the sturdy fish bones.

  Only the bottom fifth of the clay Dragon King statue was left, with no sign of the rest. Before the altar was an imitation coral mound, also made of clay, once brightly painted but its color now rubbed off.

  According to my theory, if there was a tunnel, it would be beneath the mound of earth. Kai asked what I was basing this on, but I ignored him, not wanting to reveal that I’d been inspired by a martial arts thriller I’d read recently.

  I put down everything I was carrying and rolled up my sleeves, and we shifted the altar together. Some of the little clods of dirt got trampled, but most of it remained in place. Could this be the mechanism?

  Kai was in a bad mood now and decided brute force would be simpler. Bringing his shovel down hard on the altar, he found the packed earth surprisingly sturdy. He was drenched in sweat by the time he’d demolished half of it, revealing the pale stone surface beneath. So there was no tunnel there—all that work for nothing.

  Gold Tooth, who’d been standing some distance off to avoid the flying dirt, suddenly shouted, “Tianyi, Kai, look—isn’t there something behind the altar?”

  I crouched down and peered at the back of the altar, which was about half my size. I’d assumed it was built into the wall, but now I realized there was just enough room behind it for one person to pass. When I knocked on this area, it sounded hollow.

  A couple of kicks and the altar split apart. It was a layer of clay over wooden boards, and behind them was a hole in the ground. So it was under there after all, but we could never have guessed that by looking at the front portion, which was solid clay.

  “Nice work, Gold Tooth,” I called. “We’re in. Maybe we’ll still be able to get a big haul.”

  This thought buoyed us up, and we quickly grabbed our things and hurried over to the hole. Shining my flashlight inside, I saw it was about average size, large enough that even someone chubby like Kai could enter without much difficulty.

  “What great craftsmanship,” I said. “Look at it—the shovel marks on the walls are evenly spaced, and these curves are so perfectly round they might have used a compass.”

  Gold Tooth was equally appreciative, but Kai couldn’t see anything special about it. He waddled over with his two geese in tow and said, “All right, let’s shove these birds in first to see if it’s safe.”

  “Hang on,” I protested. “The tunnel’s been sealed up for years. Give it a chance to air out before you send the geese in. We could do with a break anyway.”

  Kai put the geese back in their cage and got out some beef jerky. This was a fake temple, so we weren’t worried about desecrating it, and we happily sat on the altar to have our breakfast.

  As we chatted about how best to enter the tunnel, Gold Tooth came up with a question: If this ridge was hollow, why bother digging a tunnel through Fish Bone Temple? Why not just find a cave and enter from there?

  I’d been thinking about this and reasoned that these hollow veins would actually be hard to come upon. After all, wasn’t that what the names Coiled Snake Hill and Dragon Ridge implied? That this place was a tangle of pathways? Everyone who’d been through said these limestone caves were a maze, and it wasn’t like there was just one big hollow inside the ridge. Anyone wandering in might not easily find their way out.

  The gold hunter who built Fish Bone Temple must have had great abilities to pinpoint the location of the tomb within this confusion.

  The tunnel sloped as it went down, at an angle I was sure had been carefully chosen to lead straight to the tomb. Even if it broke through into a cave, as long as we continued in the same direction, we wouldn’t get lost.

  I really did admire whoever made this tunnel. If only I’d been alive back then, I’d have been glad to pay my respects to this predecessor of mine.

  “There’s a good chance we’ll enter a cave on the way,” I said to the other two. “They’re everywhere around here. We just need to remember that every time we take a breath, we’ll be releasing carbon dioxide into the air, so—”

  “That sounds dangerous,” Gold Tooth interrupted. “Now that we’ve found the tunnel, why not cover it up and come back when we’re fully prepared? It’s not like the tomb is going to sprout legs and run away.”

  “We don’t need to worry about that. I’ll have a gas mask on, and I’ll light candles along the way. If they go out, that’ll mean there isn’t enough oxygen, and we’ll double back. Besides, we’ll make the geese go first, and if they start to get sluggish, that’ll also be a warning sign. Our gas masks might not be top quality, but they’ll be enough to get us out safely.”

  Gold Tooth seemed reassured by my explanation—perhaps too reassured, because now he was insisting on going down himself. I’d initially thought it would be just me and Kai, but that’s the trouble with this line of work: once you know where the grave is, it’s hard not to want to see it for yourself. I understood how Gold Tooth felt—after all, he worked with antiques, and his reputation in the market would surely go up if he could brag he’d been right to the source.

  I tried to talk him out of it, but when he remained stubborn, I gave him a mask and told Kai to lead the way with his geese. I followed closely behind, and Gold Tooth brought up the rear. Slowly we crawled forward. There were wooden reinforcements every so often along the tunnel, so we didn’t need to worry about it collapsing, but it still felt like the darkness was pressing down on us. I lit my candle every so often, and it burned brightly.

  It still felt like something was squeezing us, though. Gold Tooth tapped my leg from behind, and when I looked back, he was covered in sweat, panting hard. I told Kai to stop for a rest, then placed the lit candle on the ground. Before I could ask Gold Tooth what the matter was, the candle suddenly flickered out.

  “Do you think it’s a ghost?” Gold Tooth asked in a whisper.

  “Not sure,” I answered.

  We were still some distance from the tomb, so I really didn’t think so. I put my hand to my mask, wondering if enough of my breath had escaped to blow out the candle. Not a chance. I pulled off my gloves to see if there was any kind of breeze. Nothing.

  Thinking I’d try lighting the candle again, I struck a match, but I saw that the candle had vanished. How could that be? It should have been easy to retrace someone else’s route down a tunnel they had carved out, but now it looked like this place was haunted.

  I reached out to feel the spot where the candle had been and touched something cold and hard—a paving stone. Ripping off my mask, I tapped Kai’s leg. “Let’s go back. Something’s wrong here.”

  Hearing this, Gold Tooth immediately turned and started frantically crawling back the way we’d come. This was hard on Kai, who fit so snugly into the tunnel he wasn’t able to turn around. He was forced to move backward now, still holding on to the two geese.

  We’d barely traveled five meters when Gold Tooth suddenly stopped. “Keep going,” I called. “Just a little farther. We can rest when we’re out.”

  Gold Tooth looked back, the blood drained from his face. “The tunnel’s blocked. We’re trapped.”

  I shined the flashlight up ahead and made out an enormous stone slab closing off the path. I’d examined our surroundings every step of the way, and there had been no sign of any mechanism that could have done this. The entire tunnel was made of dirt, so where could a giant rock have emerged from?

  There was no option but to try the other way again. I gesture
d to Gold Tooth to turn around and nudged Kai to start moving forward again.

  Not knowing what was going on, Kai lost his temper. “Tianyi, are you trying to torture me? Pushing me this way and that. I can’t move another inch. If you want to go forward, you’ll have to crawl over me.”

  I had no idea what we were up against, but this was definitely not a good situation, and staying put wasn’t an option. “Stop talking and keep moving,” I snapped at him. “Go on, just do it.”

  Sensing the urgency in my tone, Kai stopped complaining and started shooing the geese ahead of him. We quickly crawled more than two hundred meters before he stopped again. I thought he had run out of steam, but then his voice came back to me: “Hey, Tianyi, there are three openings up ahead. Which way should I go?”

  “Three openings?” These sorts of tomb tunnels usually only went one way. What kind of reverse dipper would have time to make a three-pronged fork? I couldn’t figure out what was going on.

  I told Kai to get into the center tunnel so I could get far enough forward to study the three branches. Behind me, Gold Tooth was too exhausted to speak. I shouted back that he should have a rest while I took a look at the situation.

  The three tunnels ahead, along with the one we were presently on, formed a perfect crossroads. The one going forward had smooth walls and good construction. As for the other two, they’d clearly been dug in a hurry. There were heaps of dirt at the junction, probably dumped there when the two side tunnels were dug.

  Could this have been the work of the same person who built Fish Bone Temple? Had his escape route been blocked by a stone slab, forcing him to dig these other tunnels in an attempt to escape?