Just before sunset, we found the waterfall marked on the map. It wasn't massive—just water cascading down a thirty-foot cliff into a deep, roaring pool below.

"The entrance must be behind the waterfall," I said, pointing.


"Great, now we're playing Journey to the West," Mike grumbled, killing the engine and hauling our gear from the trunk.

We changed into waterproof gear, shouldered our packs, and waded through the ice-cold pool. Behind the waterfall, we found a cave entrance barely four feet high—natural and inconspicuous. But after just thirty feet inside, everything changed.

The rough cave walls gave way to precisely fitted blue-black square bricks. They were slightly smaller than standard Qin dynasty bricks, with smooth surfaces and dark red mortar filling the joints between them.


"Hold up." Leo's voice cut through the darkness. He crouched down, training his tactical flashlight on the bricks, eyes gleaming with excitement.

"These bricks," he murmured, tracing the surface with a gloved finger. "Not from official kilns. Wrong dimensions, over-fired. These came from private kilns—they mixed iron powder and volcanic ash into the clay, making them incredibly dense and resistant to decay. And this mortar…" He scraped some with a small knife and sniffed it. "Glutinous rice paste, lime, tung oil, and… blood. Animal blood. This technique is called 'Golden Soup.' Regular tools couldn't scratch this surface."


Was this tomb owner really flaunting his wealth right from the entrance?

Mike clearly had the same thought, as he started muttering about hitting the jackpot.

Suddenly, a cold draft whispered from the corridor's depths, carrying a faint, sweet scent like bitter almonds.

Mike sniffed the air. "Hey, that smells pretty good."

The blood drained from Leo's face in an instant.

"Gas masks! NOW!" he screamed, fumbling for his own.

Too late. We scrambled for our masks, but the sickly-sweet scent had already filled our lungs. My head grew heavy as the world before me began to warp and spin.

"Treasure… treasure… we're rich!" Mike's voice echoed strangely beside me. I turned to see him pawing at the empty wall, his rifle abandoned on the ground, face contorted in delirious joy as if he were seeing mountains of gold.

Then it hit me too. The floor beneath me turned to quicksand, and pale, cold hands shot up from the ground, clutching at my ankles, trying to drag me into endless darkness. I could feel their icy fingernails digging into my skin, smell the grave-dirt stench rising from their rotting flesh.

"HELP ME!" I screamed, my heart hammering against my ribs, cold sweat drenching my shirt. I thrashed wildly, but more hands emerged, their grip inhumanly strong. Despair washed over me like a tidal wave.

Just as I was about to surrender, I heard a pained groan and labored breathing nearby.

With tremendous effort, I turned my head. Leo was slumped against the wall, knife in hand, blood streaming down his arm. Pain had twisted his features into a grotesque mask, but his eyes remained unnaturally clear—bloodshot yet focused, burning with that same obsessive fire.

"Hallucinations… all of it!" he growled through clenched teeth. "The wall! Look at the wall!"

I forced my eyes to follow his gaze. There, growing from the walls at regular intervals, were palm-sized patches of blood-red moss, garishly bright. The sweet almond scent was wafting from these growths.

"Seven Toxin Red," Leo gasped, voice ragged with pain. "Ancient texts mentioned it… fungus cultivated with cinnabar and snake venom… they actually grew it… Hold your breath! Run down the center! Don't touch the walls! GO!"

His shout hit me like a sledgehammer, momentarily breaking the hallucination's grip. I bit my tongue hard—the sharp pain and coppery taste of blood exploded in my mouth. The world snapped into slightly clearer focus, the phantom hands weakening their grip.

Now's my chance!

I rolled away from the ghostly grip and lunged toward Mike, who was still frantically "gathering treasure." I kicked him hard in the ass with every ounce of strength I had left.

"Snap out of it! We're going to die!"

Mike staggered forward, momentarily lucid. I grabbed his arm and yelled to Leo, who was barely conscious: "MOVE!"

The three of us—one bleeding, two half-delirious—stumbled down the center of the narrow passage, not daring to look back. Mike's panicked curses and Leo's agonized gasps filled the air as nightmarish visions swirled around us. That hundred-yard corridor stretched like an eternal gauntlet, each step an age of torment.

Finally, we stumbled over an unexpected step and tumbled down a staircase like rag dolls, crashing hard onto stone below.