The Skull Pillar

"Let's go take a look," Li Ming Hao said excitedly after having discovered a whole tower full of skulls. From their position, where they could not stretch their necks fully, it seemed like the tower was as high as the roof of the dome shaped space. But again, where was the top? It was pitch black around and just that tower was illuminated for some reason.

Was there any light coming on the top? This place seemed to defy the laws of phyiscs.

"It has an ominous aura, why are you so excited?" Su Xin Yu frowned. She had never had any encounter with human remains till now. Now she felt like she had wasted all those years just exploring everything on the surface.

But this guy, right here, took her directly to humans, or ancients or whoever they were. Did he have some form of secret or did he naturally attract such stuff. Come to think of it, did he not fall into the ancient river just like that on the first night she saw him?

Ah! This was a revelation. He must be one of those chosen ones, the ones that were always protected by the spirits, the one who the spirits wanted to communicate with.

However, it was not the time to think about such stuff. They had to get out of here.

"Psst, Xin Yu, it has more engravings of that ancient language you just learned," Li Ming Hao had already reached the tower in a flash. Did he know wuxia style martial arts or something? Su Xin Yu rubbed her temples. She should have paid more attention and seen how he reached there. This guy was hiding a few secrets too.

"Sh*t this over enthusiastic guy," she rolled her eyes, mumbling to herself. Before she could plan anything, he had already taken action! She had no choice but to go to him. She took her steps very carefully to not trigger any more mechanisms.

"It must have been a terrible practice though. I wonder if the bones we saw earlier belong to these heads," Li Ming Hao wanted to touch one of the skulls when Su Xin Yu slapped his hand away.

"Can you be more tactful please? This is not a playground," she scolded him for being reckless. Examining was the first step, what if it also had some kid of trigger?

"Anyway, it depends on what kind of civilization we are talking about. It could be a punishment of a sort for slaves where their heads were decapacitated. Or it could be a ritual by a cult, may be an altar to pray to the lord of underworld. Historically, similar statues have been found in Mexico, I think," Su Xin Yu tried to explain the grotesque details possible behind this large statue. She was still walking around and looking at minute details of the pillar.

It looked like that the skulls were cemented with some aggregate after the skulls were placed on the top of each other, like building a wall with bricks and cement. There were in total seven lines and the column was cylindrical, the skulls being symmetric.

"Your theory suggests that it would have taken dozens of years to accumulate that many skulls. Looking at the height, this pillar should be more than 10 meters tall. Seven in each row makes it around 300 skulls. I think it was an en masse killing," Li Ming Hao copied Su Xin Yu and was just examining the column.

"Did you notice that the rows have alternately made by male and female skull. This was a very deliberate thing, like some decoration," Su Xin Yu pointed out. Li Ming Hao also checked and agreed.

"I did not realize you had that much knowledge about human anatomy. How much have you studied all these years? You are barely, what, seventeen or eighteen years old? Yet you show such profound knowledge." Li Ming Hao glanced at her from behind the column who was focused on looking for more information from the column.

She looked very pretty to him, dirt all over her face, the sweat rolling down her forehead, but her concentration never broke. It was as if she would dig a hole in the column with her eyes.

Hearing sudden words of praises, Su Xin Yu looked at him calmly. This guy knew how to flirt even at such a morbid place. Seriously?

"It is not a big feat to differentiate between male and female skull, I mean it is pretty apparent, the difference. The female skulls are smaller, rounder from front, even their eye sockets are rounder than men. Human anatomy is basics of basics we study in middle school. If one is a bit more curious, they could go and look for more information. How about you though? Don't you have enough knowledge for a person who is what? Twenty? Twenty one?" she glanced at his changing face and went back to her work, corner of her lips curling upwards.

What she meant to say to him was that if he were looking to find her secrets, he had to give his. This had to be a fair trade. Moreover, he was the one working for her enemy.

"Look here, I understand your concern, but you know what, I think of my dad more of as an enemy myself. I am not as loyal to him as you think." Li Ming Hao understood perfectly what she had wanted to say.

Whether she believed him or not, he had finally let go of the biggest secret that had burdened his heart. It was of no advantage to Su Xin Yu, for sure. After all, even if she went and told his dad, who would believe her?

Su Xin Yu understood this too but she was still wary of his intentions. Not to mention he caught on quick, whether it was dungeons, or her words.

"What do you think, did you find anything?" he asked her, changing the topic. The girl had gone too silent, not even replying to his honest confession. Well, they both were far too intelligent for their own good.

"These engravings are different from the ancient language. I think it is more of a sign language, and it might be a map," she kept looking at the new engravings. "It is interesting though, that even with all the oxygen available here, there is no other life form after that tree. I would have expected spider webs and other bugs but it's squeaky clean. Either this place has something that keeps the living beings away or…,"

"Or?" Li Ming Hao swallowed his saliva with nervousness. The girl was right. Even if there were no bugs or anything, plants or at last mushrooms could spring up. But the path and the column, both were clean as if…

"Someone comes here regularly and cleans it up," she concluded. It was the same inference that Li Ming Hao had drawn. However, they did not even know how they had arrived here and there did not seem any way to leave. So then, who was coming here regularly?

"Where is Rocky by the way?" Su Xin Yu asked. It had been quite some time she had heard the animal's voice.

From under the roots, the dog was dragging something or someone. Both of them looked eagerly. Chen Chen had arrived at the spot.