Slow, silent, firm.
The expedition walked among the pipes for about fifteen minutes and came to a new cave.
The dark hole could not see the contents, like a fierce beast with its mouth wide open, big enough to devour the whole world, waiting for food to come to its door to fill its stomach.
The party stopped at the mouth of the cave.
"Yacharin, check to see if the walls of the cave here are the same as the tunnel, and don't alert the others."
Yacharin nodded silently.
Lorraine and Haina took the torches from the sailors, two each, and walked into the cave side by side with them held high.
Reflecting the firelight, Lorraine saw the smooth, almost milky rock wall, still in that egg-shaped echo wall-like shape. It's just that this hole was much larger than the fluorescent hole in front of him, and standing at the entrance, he couldn't see inside the hole at all with the four torches.
The two walked along the wall, and in a short time they saw artificial creations on the wall.
It was a torch, propped up against the stone wall by a rough iron frame, the tarpaulin on the torch charred and blackened, seeming to have burned but not to have burned out.
"Hina, we brought kerosene, right?"
"Brought some just in case."
"Tell two of the sailors to make some burlap for wrapping torches; I have a feeling that we have come to the end of the line."
Lorraine's needs were quickly met, and the sailor carefully wrapped the tarpaulin around the torch, took the fire and drew it, lighting it up instantly.
They dispersed along two paths, seeking along the cave walls left and right, and lit a full forty-eight torches, illuminating the huge cave like a small theater.
Lorraine saw a white hole!
The four walls of the cave are white, as is the center.
The white center was a gentle dune nearly three meters high made of quartz sand, sprinkled with scattered gold coins and gold artifacts that became denser the higher you went.
At the top of the dune, the gold objects had been piled up in contiguous pieces, and amidst the great expanse of gold rested a curious and ancient, backed wooden chair supported on tall carved pillars.
A skeleton sits in a chair with a large horse, a golden helmet on its head and a long sword at its waist.
His legs were forked and his back was leaning forward. His left palm was supporting his left knee, and his left foot was on gold. The right arm, on the other hand, is resting on the right leg, which is slightly higher, with a hideously stylized giant crossbow at its foot.
The skeleton of a giant bear accompanied the side of the throne, limbs curled together, head sleeping peacefully on its side.
There were also four skeletal, stout, silver-helmeted skeletons crouched on their knees beneath the throne, facing the king and the giant bear. They had cut themselves, and the long rusted Viking swords still lodged in their rotting, bony chests.
Haina stared at all this, her emerald eyes permeated with confusion, "Is this the tomb of the ... king?"
"This is Yinger. Arnason's burial place." Lorraine said softly, "My ancestor, the King's Wolf of Iceland, Yinger. Jarnasson."
"How do you know?"
Lorraine raised his hand and pointed to the tall flagpole-like carved pillar behind the throne, "See that pillar? It's called the Pillar of the Throne. To the Vikings during the tribal period, it was a symbol of the power of the tribal lord, and the chieftains placed the pillar behind their own thrones, which in turn were placed on their longships as they traveled across the seas and plundered the riches."
"Legend has it that Yinger's longship sailed near Iceland and his strut fell from the ship. According to Viking tradition, where the strut landed was where the tribe settled, so he followed the currents in search of the strut, found Iceland, and became king of Iceland."
"After him, his family ruled Iceland for three centuries, and each of the kings took the name of Ynger as their surname, and were known as the Ynger dynasty. It was not until Iceland was later conquered by Norway that the descendants who had lost their authority reverted to the surname of Arnason, until my mother, Helena, Helena . Arnason passed the bloodline down to me."
Lorraine narrated slowly, and unbeknownst to him, the members of the expedition gathered behind him, full of reverence, looking in awe at the King's Wolf at the top of the dune.
Hina asked softly, "You already knew he was here?"
"How could that be." Lorraine laughed bitterly, "When Yacharin discovered the remains of the longships and the Fokas gold coins, I only suspected that Yinger was using this sea cave as a final burial place. But I never thought that he actually built a crazy mausoleum here."
"Built here ...?"
"The white sand, the gold artifacts, and the stone grooves ... that surround the cave walls," Lorraine said, looking at the cave's arrangement in confusion, "He wanted to build a ship city, Nooton. Only for whatever reason, he didn't end up moving his longships in, and instead the remains of the longships outside the cave became a clue for us and Nasbolt to find his tomb."
"A drink and a peck is God's will." Hina sighed with emotion, "What are you going to do?"
"What about?"
Hina pointed to the King's Wolf on the dune, "This is the tomb of your ancestors."
"You're overthinking it." Lorraine lost his smile and stretched his back, "I respect Yinger. But I'm the son and grandson of pirates, even if Yin Ge wakes up and stands in front of me, there's nothing that can stop me from taking the treasure, that's what my sailors deserve, it's what they traded their lives for."
This is an official proclamation.
A startled cheer erupted from the expedition as the sailors swarmed up the dunes and began picking up the gold objects scattered everywhere.
The composition of these gold objects is quite complex, ranging from works of art of the first few centuries B.C. to ordinary gold coins and ceremonial vessels of the eighth and ninth centuries, all without any semblance of a system, and, at a glance, summing up the entirety of Yinger's plundering career.
They don't have chests for storing gold artifacts.
Several of the wooden crates on the gold pile had long since decayed with age and rotted at the slightest tug, and the sailors dumped out the packets of medicine, ammunition, and even kerosene, freeing two large crates and a barrel, which were set up on the gun carriage used as a trolley to collect the gold.
It was even suggested that the artillery should be unloaded as well, to make room for an extra wagon with more gold, only this suggestion was rejected by his sensible companions.
Others took off their clothes, tied them into parcels, and wrapped the heavy gold around their bodies, too excited for their own good.
But from start to finish no one touched the bones of the four Viking warriors, nor disturbed the peaceful sleep of Yinger and the great bear at his side, even if they had the richest gold at their feet.
Lorraine said he respected Yinger Arnason. The sailors respected their captains and had a heartfelt respect for those who had gone before them on the sea.
It was their right as adventurers to scavenge for treasure, and their duty as sailors not to disturb the sleep of the dead.
The aroma of the harvest was everywhere in the cave, pungent and smoky, the smell of kerosene.
Lorraine and his seamen stood at the mouth of the cave, avoiding the strange odor and smiling as they watched the sailors busying themselves on the dunes.
Noa casually toyed with a gold bracelet, her little face scrunched up in a frown, "Captain."
"Hmm?"
"There's something I can't figure out."
"What don't you understand?"
"If this cave is a mausoleum created by Yinger. If this cave is a mausoleum created by Yinger Arnason, why are there only five men and a bear? Could the mausoleum have been built by their own hands? Even if the cave is natural, right ... so much sand, and so many gold artifacts ... and that fishing spear cannon ... how many trips did they have to make to move it? "
"The warriors of the Silver Helm aren't drudges, they're honorable Viking Praetorians." Lorraine smiled and explained, "Every forbidden guard is a slave owner, and Yinger is even the biggest slave owner. There must have been hundreds of slaves who created the mausoleum back then, and if he wanted to build Nooton, he couldn't have used just one longboat."
"Where did the other ships go?"
"After all these years, it probably sank. Only Yinger's flagship was towed onto the reef, and that's what survived."
"And where did so many slaves go?"
"This ..."
Noa looked serious, "Captain, the slavers like to capture wandering Roma. I've heard from the old men of Sara's section that once the Roma are captured, they are no longer human and are the property of the slavers."
She waved her arms as if she couldn't find the right words for a moment, "Slave owners will not allow their property to leave. Even in death, they would execute their slaves first, or treat them as an inheritance to be passed on to their children and grandchildren. Isn't that the Viking tradition?"
"Pretty much ..."
"If it's almost ... how come we don't see any slave burial pits here? Are they all buried in the dunes?"
"Dune ..."
Lorraine subconsciously went to look at the dunes, and in a trance, she seemed to see the loose silver sand move.
He was stunned for a moment, rubbing his eyes as he was about to take a closer look, when, just for a moment, the dune collapsed violently!
The dune collapsed, right under the two sailors who were picking up the gold. The sailors screamed and fell into the sandy hole, and soon flew out like baseballs, hitting the dome of the cave with a thud, their brains bursting out and blood pouring down like rain.
The calm dunes swell up in big waves!
A pure black tail swung out from between the white sands and probed, jerking Yinger and his loyal forbidden guards to pieces.
The harpoon gun at Yinger's feet shot over like a cannonball, heading straight for the hole and knocking over three sailors along the road who couldn't escape.
Lorraine leapt out and tackled the stunned Noa and Acharin to the ground.
The harpoon guns flew over their heads and hit the four-pounders on the gun carriage with a boom, flying left and right.
The huge boa slowly raised its head from the dunes.
A dozen meters long and nearly a meter thick, the loose, dry, fine sand slid down its dark body without leaving half a speck of dust on it.
The terrified sailors surged madly toward the cave entrance, and Lorraine slowly stood up straight, bucking the flow of people to stand in one place with Haina at the entrance of the cave.
"The Python that Coils the Atrium, Yemon ... Gad."