Chapter 1381 — Elder Yu Injured
The Blossom Guardian · Page 2 of 2
"Oh?" By now Old Black and Elder Yu had seen it too. Not far down the gallery, display pieces began to appear one after another - bookshelves, display racks, and boxed compartments.
"We're here at last!" A smile broke across Elder Yu's face; his feet and his crotch pained him less, and he hurried over in a few strides, ready to search out what he wanted. But when he reached the displays he stopped again, turned his head to Old Black, and said, "Go open these chests for me. Let me see what's inside them!"
Clearly, once bitten by a snake, one fears a rope for ten years. Elder Yu dared not act rashly again.
Old Black gave a wry smile. He did not dare disobey. He went over as told, approached one of the chests with care, and studied it front and back, top and bottom, for a long while, his face working with indecision...
"What are you dawdling for?" Elder Yu demanded impatiently.
"Elder Yu, forgive my bluntness, but these things all sit at the very edge of the underground palace. They won't be anything good - they're meant to fob off low-grade tomb robbers. They're surely nothing of value..." Old Black was speaking the truth. Whatever lay out in the open was seldom worth much.
"I told you to open it, so open it. What are you dithering about?" Elder Yu knew nothing of such matters and merely snorted.
"Lady Yan, how would it be if you opened the chest, and whatever is inside went to you?" Old Black did not dare open it. There was one thing more he did not say: that these prizes left in plain view were mostly bait to fool idiots, and the moment you opened one, the danger came with it.
"That won't do. My things are mine, and I'll give them to no one!" Hearing Old Black's words, Elder Yu cut in to forbid it.
Old Black felt a surge of disgust. If not for the fact that you saved my life, he thought, I would call you a fool to your face. The things you want are so precious - how could they be laid out in the open? Do you take the men who built this tomb for idiots?
"Then you open it, and everything inside is yours," Wei Zhao said mildly, glancing at Elder Yu.
"You..." Elder Yu had come off the worse in every exchange with Wei Zhao; needled like this, he flushed red.
"It's only one chest, isn't it?" Wei Zhao walked over and flipped the lid open as if it cost him nothing. When he did, the jade pendant gave no warning, so Wei Zhao had no fear of trouble.
The chest opened to reveal a neat, tightly packed layer of gold ingots, and nothing else besides.
Old Black and Elder Yu glanced at it, and neither showed much interest. Elder Yu's purpose in robbing this tomb was those three items; and neither the worldly Yu family nor the hidden Yu family lacked money, so a chest of gold ingots held very little temptation.
Old Black was an old hand in the tomb-robbing trade and cared nothing for such yellow-and-white stuff. It was solid wealth, true, but far too heavy and too bulky to carry with any ease. A tomb robber of Old Black's caliber had a very lofty eye; in a single raid he would take only a few things, but those few things were worth a string of cities.