Chapter 244 Skin

This is a...bag? !

At first glance, the thing in Lao Bai's hand looked like a fish basket used when fishing. It was dragged on the ground by him. Because it had been soaked in the mud for too long, it was covered with black mud and was extremely dirty.

"This smell is too strong..."

Lao Bai hurriedly tilted his head and immediately threw the thing aside.

However, this place has been sealed for more than 2,000 years. No bag can withstand the erosion of time. I am afraid it will rot long ago.

I squatted in front of this thing with my nose covered and observed it carefully for a while. I really couldn't see anything. It was all mud. In the end, I had no choice but to take out precious fresh water from my backpack and pour it on it.

In the splashing water, this thing gradually revealed its true appearance.

"This is...a piece of skin?!"

Zhang Xinya exclaimed, and said in a lost voice: "Human skin?!"

When she said that, my scalp was numb.

Don't say it, it really looks like it! !

This skin is completely flesh-colored. When Lao Bai dragged it out of the mud, it looked like a fish guard. If it was shaken open completely, it must be round and round, really like a human skin with the head and legs cut off!!

Although I work for the dead and don't like corpses, I still can't stand the sight of a human skin in front of me. I subconsciously stepped aside, and the smell lingering in my nose became nauseating.

Brother Yaozi was not vague. He walked up to me, took the kettle from my hand, and poured water on this skin bag with a "splash". He shook it hard, and the mud splashed everywhere. I couldn't dodge it, and it splashed all over me. Then he grabbed this skin bag in his hand like he was pulling oil from pig intestines, and pulled all the mud off it.

Lao Bai muttered in a low voice: "What a fucking nature."

After Brother Yaozi cleaned it, the true appearance of the whole skin was exposed in front of us.

This is indeed a cylindrical skin, about the same thickness as a normal-weight person's waist, and similar in thickness to human skin. The length is about 80 to 90 centimeters, with many holes on it. No matter how you look at it, it is the skin from the shoulder blade to the waist.

Brother Yaozi held up the flashlight and frowned to carefully observe this flesh-colored skin, looking at it inch by inch. If you don't know, you would think he is appraising a famous painting.

Soon after, Brother Yaozi said, "Don't be surprised. This is not human skin. It looks like snake skin!"

"Have you seen flesh-colored snake skin?"

Lao Bai said unhappily, "Snake skin is just a thin layer of skin membrane. Whose snake skin is so thick? This is not shedding, it's peeling!"

"I'm not lying. It really looks like snake skin."

Brother Yaozi rarely argued with Lao Bai. He said patiently, "If you don't believe me, come up and see!"

I went over there with my head held high. It's not that I was afraid of this thing. I just thought it was creepy to put a piece of human skin on it. It was too miserable to die.

With the help of the light, Brother Yaozi's fingers passed over the skin, pointing out his discovery to me.

I couldn't help but be startled and said softly, "Huh?" "This... is definitely not human skin!"

How should I put it? This thing didn't make me think of snake skin. It was more like fish skin after the scales were scraped off! !

If you look closely at the entire skin, you will find that it is full of wrinkles, and the skin is concave. Obviously, something once grew on it, but it just fell off.

"This should be just a part of it."

Brother Yaozi observed the two ends of the skin and whispered: "It really looks like a snake slough. It fell off automatically. During the shedding process, it was accidentally torn. It doesn't look like it was peeled off from the body by external force. It is very elastic and should not have fallen off for a long time!"

In a sense, it is indeed somewhat similar to a snake slough!

But what Lao Bai said makes sense. This skin is too thick. It doesn't look like molting, but more like peeling!

There is also this kind of flesh-colored leather similar to human skin...

This is completely beyond our understanding, at least it is not a known creature.

It's too weird for this skin to appear here. I don't care whether it stinks or not. I just get started and pull the skin like Brother Yaozi. The elasticity is really good.

So, can a human or other creature, without any antiseptic measures, be preserved intact after thousands of years of aging after its skin is thrown into the mud?

The answer is yes!

In places with sufficient water, such an ancient corpse often appears. It looks no different from a freshly dead body, but the body is edematous and contains a lot of water under the skin. Even after thousands of years, there is no sign of decay. It is not smelly, but very fishy. This kind of corpse belongs to a kind of wet corpse. The formation conditions are very harsh, which are related to the temperature, the environment of the tomb, the types of microorganisms, etc.

The skin peeled off from such an ancient corpse can naturally be very complete, but this kind of skin is very flat and has no elasticity! !

In a sense, Brother Yaozi's inference is completely correct. Whether it is natural molting or violent skinning, the skin can remain so elastic, it must have just been peeled off for a short time! !

"In other words, there are living things here?!"

I had to think so, and said, "And it is something completely beyond our cognition, with a body shape similar to that of a snake, with scales, and a skin color similar to that of a human, flesh-colored?!"

Brother Yaozi nodded: "At least from the current point of view, it should be like this!"

I thought about it carefully, and I really couldn't completely imagine the appearance of this thing in my mind, and my eyes subconsciously fell on the mushrooms around.

These mushrooms are edible fungi, which can fill the stomach and replenish water. This place is fully ventilated, and there are indeed conditions for the survival of organisms.

This matter makes people uneasy just thinking about it. Unknown things are lurking around here, and there is really no way to relax.

Brother Yaozi stood up, and while walking towards the giant tower in front, he kicked the mushrooms on the ground with his feet, almost opening up a path, and his eyes were always staring at the soil under his feet. Obviously, he also felt a thorn in his back and wanted to figure out what this thing was.

However, women are more careful after all. Not long after, Zhang Xinya suddenly squatted down and picked out a scale similar to fish scales from the mud, but it was much larger and could be compared with the palm of a baby.

I saw at a glance that the size of this scale was exactly the same as the dent on the skin bag, and it grew on that skin bag!

Zhang Xinya rubbed the scale with her fingers and wiped it clean quickly. There was actually a symbol on it.

It was a circle with a dot inside the circle.

The most important thing was that this symbol was not carved by humans at all, but was naturally carried by the scale!

"This is a witchcraft symbol!!"

I lost my voice and said, "I have seen it before! If nothing unexpected happens, this symbol represents the moon in countless ways, and it can also be understood as a 'yin' character. The sun is yang and the moon is yin. There are many interpretations!!"

So, where did I see it?

Heixiazigou! !

There I got a book about Yanshi mechanical arts. Yanshi mechanical arts is a trick, related to witchcraft, and it is difficult to predict ghosts and gods. There are a lot of witchcraft content in it. This symbol has appeared countless times, and it seems to have a very important position in witchcraft before the Qin Dynasty! !

"A scale on an unknown creature, with a witchcraft symbol on it?"

I fell into deep thought...

Soon, Lao Bai also found another scale.

There is also a symbol on this scale, and this symbol is more complicated, like a hexagram folded at 45 degrees!

"Soul! This means soul!"

I said: "If it is half of a hexagram, it means a living soul, and this 45-degree fold represents a half-yin soul!!"

What is a half-yin soul?

Life is a soul, and death is a ghost.

The half-yin soul is the soul of a dying person!

In witchcraft before the Qin Dynasty, it was believed that when a person was dying, his soul belonged to something between yin and yang, which could cross yin and yang and had inexplicable power. Therefore, this half-yin soul was often used to perform witchcraft.

Whenever this symbol representing the half-yin soul appeared, it generally meant that an extremely evil black witchcraft had appeared.

After that, we found many scales in the soil one after another.

It felt like this unknown creature had passed through these mushrooms when it shed its skin, so the scales on the skin and the shed skin were scattered everywhere.

Without exception, witchcraft symbols appeared on all these scales, and there was no duplication.

Some I knew, and some I simply didn't know. After all, the inheritance book of Yanshi's mechanical technique only recorded part of the witchcraft technique, not a complete set of witchcraft system. It was impossible for me to completely decipher these obscure symbols.

"This is so weird!!"

Brother Yaozi was so scared that he couldn't help but say, "What on earth is this? Do you think it has anything to do with the mystery before the extinction of this unknown race?"

Not only did he think so, but we were all thinking about it now. All the characteristics told us that this unknown thing is not simple, and it must be very important!

"Look, look again!"

I said, "I have a hunch that the witchcraft symbols born on these scales may record something very important, which can allow us to peek into the biggest secret of this place!"

However, it is too difficult to understand the content recorded by these witchcraft symbols.

It's like throwing five hundred cards with words in front of you, and then asking you to piece these cards together to form a story.

How difficult and error-prone is this?

But I still want to try it, after all, it is closely related to our lives!

As we walked towards the giant tower, we looked for these scales on the ground.

"Ah!!"

Suddenly, Zhang Xinya screamed, retracted her hand like lightning, stepped back, pointed at the ground and shouted: "There is something under here, it actually bit me hard!!!"