Tomb Raider: What the hell is this strange commission?

In the face of absolute force, no amount of conspiracies or tricks will be of any use. Chi Yu's existence is Xie Yuchen's greatest reliance on this trip.

As for the extent of Chi Yu's abilities, Xie Yuchen could not give a definite answer until he saw it with his own eyes.

He had seen Chi Yu leap dozens of meters into the air, and he had also seen Chi Yu chop off the blood corpse that everyone found difficult to deal with with a single blow of his sword.

——That is something that ordinary people cannot do, but it is definitely not the limit of Chi Yu’s ability.

This ability that far exceeds that of ordinary people brings about a strong sense of inhumanity, so much so that people will experience both psychological and physiological tremors.

This is also the origin of Chi Yu's sense of danger.

But if you look at Chi Yu as a partner you can cooperate with, then the sense of danger he carries will turn into a strange sense of security.

Because you can entrust everything to Chi Yu, and he will never disappoint you.

——Everyone can think so, except Xie Yuchen.

So he always looked at Chi Yu calmly and restrainedly with a scrutinizing gaze to prevent himself from ending up in a dilemma where he couldn't make a decision.

Chi Yu obviously understood this, so he just watched Xie Yuchen's struggles coldly from the side and waited for his judgment.

as always.

-

"This is the third altar to be discovered."

Chi Yu pulled out his trekking pole and carefully swept away the rocks that blocked his view.

The area they are in now is a wildlife sanctuary. According to common sense or experience, this should be a relatively milder area in the harsh environment of Lop Nur.

But the fact is that all you can see here is the barren Gobi Desert.

The water source that needed to be sampled was almost dry, with no grass growing around it and basically no signs of animal activity - the role of the protected area was effectively useless, as the animals had apparently migrated away in search of a way to survive.

"The deeper we go into the no-man's land, the worse the environment becomes, not to mention the existence of human factors." Xie Yuchen looked at the altar and sacrificial vessels that had been destroyed by Chi Yu and sighed softly.

Chi Yu glanced at him and turned his gaze back to the messy props.

The inscription remained unchanged, and the repeated prayers and the arrangement of the altar were clearly the same as those before, and were written by the same person.

"These sacrificial vessels all have inscriptions that imply transfer and movement, but their ultimate direction is not obvious."

Xie Yuchen said, looking at Chi Yu and asked him: "You seem to know very well what that person wants to do. Can you tell me?"

"If you want to know," Chi Yu said, "of course, I can answer it for you."

He put away his cane, left the altar that was littered with debris, walked towards Xie Yuchen, stood beside him, and made a "want to go together?" gesture.

This means that Chi Yu thinks "there is nothing left to be dealt with here and they can leave."

And it just so happened that Xie Yuchen didn't like staying in an overly cold environment for too long.

——Not to mention that there is a humanoid refrigerator-like being beside him.

Although the coldness is not actually obvious in winter, the coldness that can be noticed by accidental contact makes Xie Yuchen miss the heating in the car that can provide him with warmth even more.

So Xie Yuchen nodded to Chi Yu and walked with him towards the direction where the vehicle was parked.

"According to my speculation, there are seven such altars in Lop Nur." On the way back, Chi Yu expressed his thoughts calmly.

"These altars surround the entire Lop Nur, forming an encirclement. They extend all the way, connecting two points, and at the center of the encirclement is the Sun Tomb."

Xie Yuchen nodded thoughtfully: "So the people who set up these altars want to borrow something from the Sun Tomb? Or..."

They returned to the car, and the soft warm breeze made Xie Yuchen breathe a sigh of relief. He took off his coat and put it aside, while Chi Yu took out a map.

That was something he had drawn casually in his spare time while thinking.

Chi Yu's thinking logic has always been very clear and organized, and the same is true for the drawings he draws - with a very obvious personal style that belongs to Chi Yu.

If I had to describe it another way, it would be: complex, yet easy to understand.

And because this is the product of Chi Yu's thinking period, it also contains some of his corrections and annotations, so it is not difficult to understand the content above.

It can even be said that it will make people who see it feel a sense of pleasure as knowledge naturally flows into their minds and can be easily remembered.

Chi Yu showed the blueprint to Xie Yuchen, but did not try to influence his judgment. At this time, he was sitting aside, patiently waiting for Xie Yuchen to come up with his own answer through this map.

Xie Yuchen looked at the content above and found that if he observed the pattern from a bird's-eye view, he would be able to see a coiled dragon through the locations marked by Chi Yu.

"Is this a dragon vein?"

"Yes."

"Judging from the topography and the direction of the mountains, although this dragon vein is not very prosperous, it is enough to nourish the entire Lop Nur. At least it should not be as bad as we see now."

Xie Yuchen pondered for a moment and looked at Chi Yu: "So the person who set up the altar was not, as I thought before, to take advantage of the power of the Sun Tomb to nourish things, but to use this dragon vein to nourish the things in the Sun Tomb."

"That's right." Chi Yu said.

"If this is really the case..." Xie Yuchen thought for a moment, "It seems that we have encountered a big fish this time."

Chi Yu put away the blueprint and smiled at Xie Yuchen: "Who said it wasn't true?"

-

After pointing out the direction for Xie Yuchen, Chi Yu spent another two days taking everyone to visit the entire Lop Nur area and completed data collection at a total of ten survey points.

The work that was originally planned to take at least two weeks to complete was compressed into just four days under his command.

But since there were no accidents along the way, even though everyone had to run wildly in the desert, there were not many complaints.

——"Tomorrow, there will be a very large sandstorm in Lop Nur."

In the camp as night fell, Chi Yu reminded Xie Yuchen: "Before setting off, you need to be prepared for protection."

"I'll arrange it." Xie Yuchen nodded and gestured to the guy over there.

The guy who had been paying attention to the movements here immediately trotted over, waiting for the young boss Xie to give his orders.

Chi Yu listened quietly at the side.

Xie Yuchen had extensive experience in handling and settling these emergencies. He gave his assistants almost all the situations that could be considered and asked them to arrange them.

——There are even emergency preparedness measures in case of protection failure.

After Xie Yuchen finished speaking his thoughts, he thought for a moment, and then looked at Chi Yu with his staff: "Chi Yu, do you think there is anything else you need to add?"

It's a perfect arrangement, no additional rules needed.

Chi Yu thought about it and answered in the same way.

So Xie Yuchen's expression had a hint of pride that only people of his age could express. He looked a little childish, not quite like Xie the head of the family, but was full of the youthful vigor that only belongs to young people.

He smiled at Chi Yu, turned around and continued to talk to the waiter: "Let's arrange it this way first. If any problem is found, it must be dealt with immediately."

The waiter nodded seriously and left with Xie Yuchen's arrangements. Xie Yuchen and Chi Yu watched him go away together.

The wind was louder than usual tonight. Even though their camp was in a safe windproof area, they could hear the cold wind raging everywhere.

The unique topography of the Yadan landform makes the strong wind produce fierce friction sounds when it blows across the rock wall, and waves of ghosts howling and wolves howling never stop on this land.

It seems that tomorrow will not be a good day, Xie Yuchen thought.

He looked up at the sky for a while, then asked Chi Yu softly, "'The wind and haze are rising, and the sun is about to set.' Is this the time you mean?"

Chi Yu hummed and turned his eyes away from the display on the Moyu map.

——"It's about to enter a season of frequent sandstorms here."

The change of seasons is always abrupt and obvious, and the changes brought about by each different period can cause the death of explorers who are not fully prepared.

However, Chi Yu was obviously not among them, and he didn't care about the lives of those people.

Chi Yu thought about it, and his tone inevitably carried some nonchalant meaning: "For ordinary people, dust blocking the eyes is a fatal danger, but sometimes, it can also wash away some of the obstacles that prevent you from truly observing the world."

"The active sand and dust will bring those lost things swallowed by Lop Nur back into our sight. The same is true for the things you are looking for."

"Tomorrow, you will be able to see the real Tomb of the Sun." Chi Yu said, tapping his arm lightly with his slender fingers.

——"Or in other words, the true remains left here by the civilization that used the sun as its totem."