Chapter 1: The Terrifying Snake Coffin

"Run! Run, now!" Wang Half-Moon stretched out his thick neck like a turtle looking for a mate, poking his rather round head out of the bronze coffin and shouting at the top of his lungs.

In the ghostly glow of the lantern, his bloodshot eyes bulged like a pair of great brass bells, wide with terror.

And with Wang Half-Moon’s oversized head emerged several triangular ones—serpents—snake heads!

Huge snakes with triangular heads had coiled around Wang Half-Moon's own, forming a grotesque wreath. Man and serpents, head to head, stared at each other in a silent stand-off.

More and more snakes raised their triangular heads high, hissing and flicking their blood-red tongues as they slithered out from the coffin in winding lines.

Crisscrossed patterns like demonic faces in red and green covered their bodies. Under the lamp’s light, the snakes’ scales shimmered in eerie, mottled hues with every ripple of their muscular forms.

With each massive serpent emerging from the bronze coffin, everyone present stood frozen like rabbits paralyzed by a tiger’s glare, their eyes round as grapes and bodies rigid with fear.

Time passed, silent as water dripping in a dark corner. No one knew how long it lasted until Wang Half-Moon’s wailing cry finally shattered the deathly quiet. "Ah! Ah... Master Jiang, save me!"

His desperate shriek snapped me out of my trance. By now, several enormous snakes had tightly wound themselves around him, binding him like a dumpling until he was utterly immobilized.

Sensing the danger, I snatched the military shovel from my pack with a metallic clang, and lunged forward.

The snakes, seeing me approach the coffin, immediately reared up like fighting cocks, hissing and baring their crimson tongues, ready to strike.

I swung the sharpened edge of the shovel down onto the snakes’ heads, hacking and slashing with all my strength.

The blade sliced through with a series of sharp cracks, and the snakes lunging at me were instantly beheaded, their skulls cleaved in half by my weapon.

This military shovel was forged by an elderly blacksmith in Song County, Luoyang, from pure steel, and its edge had been honed through more than twenty meticulous steps. It was razor-sharp, deadly efficient.

But the snakes coiled tighter and tighter around Wang Half-Moon. His face, ghostly pale at first, turned a bruised, blackish purple, and his expression—strained as if suffering from the worst constipation—showed death was near.

At that critical moment, a volley of deafening gunshots rang out behind me—bang! bang! bang!

With those shots, the triangular snake heads entwined around Wang Half-Moon exploded like watermelons under a truck tire, bullets tearing through them and scattering bloody pulp across the stone floor.

Snowy Grace coolly holstered her pistol and barked at me, “Retreat, now!”

"Half-Moon, are you alright?" I dragged him out of the bronze coffin, half carrying, half pulling him. His mouth hung open, tongue lolling out as he gasped for air, limp as a burst balloon from lack of oxygen, unable to answer me at all.

"Jiang Yuan, move! We fight our way out together!" Snowy Grace seized my arm, trying to pull me toward the exit.

But the entire tomb chamber had become a nest of serpents, their bloody tongues flickering and hissing as they surrounded us on all sides.

Wang Half-Moon seemed to sense the end. With his last ounce of strength, he shoved me hard on the shoulder and shouted, "Jiang—Master Jiang, we're done for this time. Don't worry about me—go! Both of you, go! Just go... ah!"

Before he could finish, a giant snake shot out, jaws wide as a bottomless pit, and in a flash swallowed half of Wang Half-Moon’s body.

"Half-Moon! Half-Moon—no! No!" I jolted awake to find myself in my bedroom, drenched in cold sweat from head to toe. It had all been another nightmare.

From the nightstand, my phone began to ring, the familiar melody filling the silence. Every time I awoke from such a nightmare, it felt as if I’d been beaten in my sleep—utterly exhausted and drained. I glanced at the screen. It was a call from Wang Half-Moon.

"Hello?"

"Master Jiang, what’s up? Guess what? I got up early today, wanted a bowl of beef soup, brushed my teeth but hadn’t washed my face yet, and then—"

I cut him off, annoyed, "Stop! Enough—just get to the point. Don’t ramble!"

He sensed my impatience, and on the other end of the line I could almost see him nodding vigorously, his voice sly and mischievous. "Alright, alright, alright! Heh heh..."

"You’re up to no good, I can tell! Spit it out already!" I snapped.

He chuckled again. "Alright, alright. No beating around the bush, Master Jiang, I’ll be straight with you—"

But before he finished, his voice abruptly vanished, replaced by a stranger’s. "Master Jiang, how do you do?"

I froze. "Who... who is this?"

A cold, faint laugh came through. "They say nine out of ten tombs in Luoyang are empty, and eight and a half of them were opened by the Jiang family. Master Jiang, your reputation precedes you. My employer has traveled a great distance to seek your help with a matter of utmost importance."

His words sent a chill through me. Clearly, he’d done his homework—he knew far too much about my family.

An ominous premonition crept into my mind. "Who are you people? Who is your employer? I have no idea what you’re talking about!"

The voice on the other end shifted from a cold chuckle to a sneering laugh. "Haha... Master Jiang, you’re a clever man—no need for games. If my employer can find you, he knows exactly who you are and what you do. To be blunt, he knows your family’s history inside and out. So let’s cut to the chase—shall we?"