Chapter 8: The Water Jar

I took out a snakeskin cloth bag and squatted down, stuffing the bronze vessels inside. Those round and square ding cauldrons were heavy and difficult to carry; my third brother took care of me, telling me to pick up the smaller ones. So, I packed the bronze dou and the smaller jues. It wasn’t strange to find these bronze vessels piled together because, during the Western Zhou and Spring and Autumn periods, these items were all kitchen utensils. The bronze ding was used for cooking meat, the jue for drinking wine, and the bronze dou was for holding salt or seasoning—its function is comparable to a vinegar dish for dipping dumplings in modern times.

What does it mean to gather money with a sack? At that moment, I was essentially doing just that. I was rather thin and not very strong; once I felt the sack was nearly full, I prepared to make a trip upstairs. I turned my head left and right, and just then my headlamp caught a corner inside the ear chamber.

“Hm? What’s that? A water jar?”

“Second brother! Look! There’s a jar!”

Second Brother Sun was busily stuffing bronze ding into his sack and jumped in surprise at my sudden loud shout.

“Damn, Yunfeng, why are you yelling? You scared the hell out of me.”

I told him there was a huge jar in the corner.

Without looking up, he said, “That’s coarse pottery, not worth any bronze money. It’s too big to carry down the mountain. Even if we sold it for a thousand or eight hundred, it wouldn’t be worth the effort. We’re not taking that.”

After hearing Second Brother Sun’s words, I glanced again at the large water jar covered with a stone lid and decided not to go over.

Straining under the weight of the sack full of bronze vessels, I waded back through the water. At that moment, a rope was lowered from the shaft above.

The team leader’s voice came from above: “Yunfeng, tie the snakeskin bag securely. Once you’re done, come back and pack more. Hurry up; we don’t have much time.”

I twisted the full snakeskin sack a few times and tied it to the rope. Then the bag slowly ascended, pulled up by the leader. For over an hour afterward, we worked overtime, hauling out a total of eight full sacks of bronze vessels.

Then, the walkie-talkie crackled with the team leader urging us: “You three, come up quickly. Dawn is breaking soon; we need to get down the mountain fast.”

You know the human pyramid, right?

The Sun brothers used a human pyramid to boost me onto the shaft platform, and then the leader lowered a rope to pull me up.

The Sun brothers were even more impressive. After reaching the shaft platform, they didn’t even use the rope—they climbed the tunnel wall with both feet.

Once up there, Second Brother Sun’s smile was impossible to hide.

He looked at the bulging snakeskin sacks on the ground and chuckled, “Boss, how many points do you think this is worth?”

The leader shook his head with a smile. “Specialists have their fields. For points, you’ve got to ask the boss. He estimates those right on the money.”

Later, I learned that when they said “points,” they meant tens of thousands. One point equals ten thousand, a hundred points is a million. At the wage levels back in 2000, many people didn’t earn even one point in a year.

Big Brother Sun was responsible for lookout and sales.

As long as nothing was wrong, he wouldn’t speak on the walkie-talkie. Conversely, if Big Brother Sun spoke during an operation, it meant strangers were nearby.

“Boss, this is only the western ear chamber. There’s still the eastern ear chamber. It’s strange—we still haven’t found the main tomb chamber. I think we need to establish a base here. Who knows how many treasures are inside? This job will take at least ten days, maybe eight.”

A “base” in tomb-robbing slang refers to a situation where a large tomb is found, and it takes more than a day or two to clear out—so a base must be set up around the large tomb.

In earlier days, when tomb robbers met, they often asked, “Hey, so-and-so, I heard you set up two big bases last year?”

The reply might be, “No, no, just got lucky. Those were small bases.”

Setting up a base is risky because it’s easy to get discovered. If an elderly person decides to take a stroll up the mountain and accidentally falls into our tunnel, we’re done for.

So, the higher the profit, the higher the risk.

After weighing the options, the team leader nodded: “Western Zhou artifacts have been skyrocketing in the black market these past few years. It’s worth the risk. Let’s make a base.”

Once word got out that we’d struck it rich, Big Brother Sun immediately contacted “One Mole” to send people over to help move items and cover up the tunnel.

“One Mole” was a remarkable woman. From a few encounters, I learned that the “brothers” she recruited mostly had powerful backgrounds. She not only handled logistics for the team leader but reportedly also served as logistics for other groups.

Normally, this would break the rules, but One Mole was so capable that the leader winked and looked the other way.

It’s like those professional managers in big companies who hold key positions in multiple firms.

One Mole supported several young men who willingly followed her wholeheartedly. They delivered generators and water pumps at night and helped hide the tunnel—all under her command.

Without One Mole, our gang simply couldn’t operate.

The soil from the shaft, mixed with blue-green clay, was too conspicuous. We didn’t dare discard it recklessly given the time crunch, so they brought it back with them.

This soil was like a ticking time bomb. Our circle lost countless people because of it. Back in the day, the Babao Mountain tomb-robbing gang in Beijing was wiped out after an old lady stumbled upon a small pile of this bluish-white soil while walking in the mountains, leading to over a decade of prison for the entire gang.

The next day.

Back at a small inn in Shunde, I squatted by the sink brushing my teeth, pondering where to scatter the bluish-white soil.

At that moment—

“Smack!” Someone slapped me hard on the butt from behind.

I was mid-brush and hadn’t spat out the mouthwash yet, so I ended up swallowing it all.

I turned around angrily to see One Mole wearing a camisole, laughing.

Though a generation older than me, she maintained a well-preserved figure, thanks to her wealth and use of the finest skincare products. The pale, shining thigh exposed beneath her pink camisole made my throat dry just looking at her.

“Hehe...” One Mole teased, “Little Yunfeng, I heard from Second Brother yesterday you haven’t even touched a girl’s hand? Is that true?”

I blushed and retorted, “None of your business.”

Seeing me embarrassed, she laughed uncontrollably, her laughter as turbulent as waves.

She beckoned me with a finger. “Little Yunfeng, want to be your big sister’s forty-fifth man...?”

I was young and naive then, so I casually replied, “No way. By the time you’re forty, you’d have to wear ninety-nine green hats. You shameless woman, don’t even think about ruining Xiang Yunfeng!”

One Mole got mad, grabbed a mop from the inn, and chased me around the courtyard.

At noon, during lunch hour, I slung my black backpack on and dressed like a high school student, wandering aimlessly around Shunde city.

My backpack was stuffed full of the bluish-white soil, and I needed to find a suitable place to scatter it.

As I walked, one thought lingered in my mind.

I couldn’t shake the feeling that something was off about that large water jar covered with a lid in the corner of the western ear chamber last night.

I just felt there was something not quite right.