Book 3: Chapter 20: Shigong’s Mole
Book 3: Chapter 20: Shigong’s Mole
Book 3: Chapter 20: Shigong’s Mole
The stone table that Old Bing and his team were sitting around resembled a private booth. The area was enclosed by a white stone railing that had a gap in it and a group of ceramic figurines were standing nearby. The sign stood on the table next to those "black sarcomas". It was about the size of a modern fast food box, made of wood, and its edges were rotten. The ancient Mongolian written on it in black ink was faintly discernible.
A column of large characters about eight centimeters high was on the top part of the wooden sign while four columns of small characters the size of fingernails were on the bottom part. The big characters could be seen clearly but the small characters couldnt.
Shen Qianjue knew some ancient Mongolian because she had studied it before joining this operation and even brought some information with her. She carefully looked at the characters on the sign and figured out that the big ones said: Shigongs mole.
When I heard this, I had to repeatedly confirm with her: was it really a mole?
If the characters had said roasted or baked, I would have thought that it was normal. But I didn't think that they would stand for mole (1). My throat tightened at the somewhat disgusting image.
The literal meaning was easy to understand. Shen Qianjue told us that Shigong Mountain was the name of a sacred mountain in Mongolian mythology. Shigong was the mountain god and these black sarcomas were literally his moles.
I looked at the black stone sarcomas I had placed on the lounge chair and suddenly realized that the texture really did resemble a mole on the human body. Plus, they were the huge kind where you could see the blood vessels. Were the moles on this mountain god a delicacy or something? What was the logic behind their symbolic meaning? I didnt know much about the secret history of Mongolian shamanism. In fact, I really didnt have a clue. All I knew was that I felt a little disgusted so I couldnt even look at those black stones directly.
When Shen Qianjue and her partner got close to Old Bing and his team, they found that everyone was still alive, but they were sitting there motionless and breathing very slowly.
At this time, the moles on the table were exuding a strange fragrance. Shen Qianjue still felt that things were strange, but she suddenly found that there was drool at the corners of her mouth.
Her revulsion was very strong since the huge moles looked disgustingespecially since they were all piled upbut for some reason, she found herself wanting to eat them. In fact, the desire was difficult to contain for a while, which made all of her hair stand on end.
She glanced at her partner, who was looking at one of the mens mouth. Old Bings team member had apparently swallowed something so huge that it strained both sides of his mouth.
The two women looked at each other silently when suddenly, Shen Qianjues partner picked up a "mole" and put it into her mouth without an ounce of hesitation.
We all felt nauseous when we heard this on the satellite phone. Shen Qianjues tone was very hesitant as she spoke, making it obvious that she was unwilling to recall that moment. She was shocked at that time and immediately went over to make her partner vomit the mole up.
As her partner began retching, Shen Qianjue pulled her further and further away from the table. When the fragrance wasnt so strong, her partner vomited even more. Then, Shen Qianjue started arguing with her.
But after exchanging less than six or seven sentences, her partner suddenly covered her mouth and pushed her into the darkness. As it turned out, everyone at Old Bings table had suddenly stood up.
They were still silent at first and didnt even react to Shen Qianjue's flashlight, but slowly, they began moving around again.
In Shen Qianjue's narrative, Old Bing and his team gradually returned to normal after being in a complete trance-like state. But when the two womens flashlights first illuminated them, they still looked like corpses that were moving very strangely.
Shen Qianjue didn't insist on detoxifying them anymore since it was obvious that Old Bing and his team had been bewitched. Her partner told her to turn off the flashlight and hide in the dark. After coming out of their trance-like state, Old Bing and his team turned on their flashlights and started talking to each other. Based on their conversation, Shen Qianjue was certain that they had no idea what had happened just now.
The two women hid in the dark until Old Bing and his team left. The whole tomb fell into absolute darkness but they still waited for a while.
It was probably around the twenty minute mark when Shen Qianjue turned on her flashlight again. At that time, they saw that they were surrounded by a bunch of pale-faced people. They didnt know when it had happened, but those people were all standing very close to the two of them. They were so close, in fact, that they were almost half an arms length away.
This feeling of terror was so intense that Shen Qianjue immediately screamed.
It turned out that Old Bing and his menwho they thought had leftnot only didnt leave but had also surrounded them in the dark. They were all deathly pale and were looking at Shen Qianjue and her partner with wooden expressions on their faces.
At that time, Shen Qianjue immediately realized that there was something wrong with these people, but her partner had already jumped into action and started fighting them.
Her flashlight was knocked down in the chaos and her partner told her to hide, so Shen Qianjue ran into the dark at that time. By the time she came back to her senses, she had already fled to the edge of the giant octagonal coffin. She used the spare light source she carried with hera glow stickto illuminate her surroundings. There was a relief on the giant coffin that depicted a strange group of people with fins on the sides of their heads. The title of the tomb owner was written on the front of the coffin.
Shen Qianjue turned pale with fright when she saw it. This title made it very clear that no person was buried in this coffin.
Shen Qianjues voice was full of emotion as she spoke, but I felt cold all over as soon as I heard it. At this time, however, the satellite phone was suddenly full of white noise and her voice became distorted a few times. Gradually, we couldnt even hear her at all. We all looked at each other as we realized that the satellite was crossing the border and the signal was interrupted.
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TN Notes:
(1) Mole and roast have similar pronunciations in Chinese. Birthmark/Mole= zh (). Broil/roast= zh ()
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Hola guys! So a reader made a good point that pdfs don't always work great across different e-readers and recommended epubs. I had time to get Volumes 6-8 into the epub version but ran into a footnote snag on Tibetan Sea Flower. So, whenever I get around to it, the epub versions will be here (I had to put it in google drive since you apparently can't load epubs to wordpress. Who knew?). I'm also putting the epub and pdf links on the volume pages if you prefer to check that periodically. I know for a fact that 1 chapter in the vol 8 epub had a weird format but I couldn't fix it no matter what I tried so whatever. It's 1 short chapter, it won't kill you