Looking at the mountains rising higher and higher in the depths of the forest, Zhuang Rui gripped the javelin in his hand, gritted his teeth, and walked deeper into the forest.
The coconut grove was much larger than Zhuang Rui had imagined. After walking for more than ten minutes, they still couldn't get out. The leaves and dead branches on the ground had become thicker, and they felt soft and spongy underfoot.
"Um?"
Half an hour later, Zhuang Rui finally emerged from the woods. A gentle slope appeared ahead, covered with low shrubs. A stream flowed down the mountain, forming a small pool at the bottom of the slope.
What surprised Zhuang Rui was not the pool itself, but the sight of more than a dozen goats drinking water beside it. This scene left Zhuang Rui somewhat astonished.
Zhuang Rui had imagined many scenarios, even dinosaurs appearing in the mountains, but he never expected to see so many goats.
If it weren't for the javelin in his hand reminding Zhuang Rui that he was on a deserted island, he would have thought he was back in the snowy mountains of Tibet.
"Does someone live here?"
A question mark popped into Zhuang Rui's mind. These goats didn't seem to resemble the wild goats he had ever seen before.
"Is anyone there? Is anyone there... Is anyone there... Is anyone there..."
Unable to contain his joy, Zhuang Rui shouted loudly. His shouts echoed through the forest for a long time, startling the dozen or so goats that were drinking water. They quickly disappeared into the bushes.
As Zhuang Rui shouted, several seabirds took flight from the mountains, but then fell silent again. No one answered Zhuang Rui; the silence, like a mountain, made it hard for him to breathe.
Such a loud shout, with such a resounding echo, would surely have alerted anyone. After standing there for more than half an hour, I couldn't help but feel disappointed and walked heavily to the stream.
With coconuts present, Zhuang Rui wasn't particularly excited about the fresh water. What he was thinking about now was how to leave this cursed island and return home.
More than a week has passed. Zhuang Rui wonders how worried his family must be. Especially Qin Xuanbing, who is pregnant. Will hearing the news of his disappearance harm her health?
Arriving on this damned island felt like entering a forbidden zone for humans. Although there were other creatures, the desolation was so profound that it felt as if Zhuang Rui was the only person left in the world, a feeling that was extremely unpleasant.
Every day, Zhuang Rui has to shout loudly to vent the frustration in his heart.
After squatting by the stream and drinking a few mouthfuls of water to wash his face, Zhuang Rui walked up the gentle slope. He wanted to climb to the top of the mountain and see if there were any islands around.
Zhuang Rui could endure being stranded on a deserted island for a week or two, but after a while, he felt he would go crazy. If there were other islands nearby, he would definitely risk swimming there.
After walking for more than 10 minutes, Zhuang Rui climbed up the gentle slope, but the scene before him made him involuntarily open his mouth wide, his eyes filled with ecstatic joy.
Before Zhuang Rui appeared a village made of wooden houses.
Chapter 830 Skull
Indeed, what appeared before Zhuang Rui was a row of wooden houses, about twenty in total. However, after Zhuang Rui examined them carefully, he felt a chill run down his spine.
Even from a distance, Zhuang Rui could tell that these wooden houses were already dilapidated. He was standing on higher ground and could clearly see that the roofs of many of the houses were gone, so the possibility of anyone living there was probably not very high.
Is...is anyone there?
Zhuang Rui gripped the javelin tightly in his hand, walked to a point about twenty or thirty meters away from the wooden house, and tentatively called out, his voice trembling slightly.
Although we've entered the 21st century, it's possible that the natives on this isolated island still retain the custom of cannibalism. While barbecued meat is delicious, grilling one's own flesh is not such a pleasant thing.
In short, it's always better to be safe than sorry. Zhuang Rui planned to turn around and run away as soon as he saw people with scribbles on their faces or people who were shirtless and naked.
Zhuang Rui didn't realize that his current situation was no different from that of the natives in those movies. Apart from the shoes made from his jeans, all he was wearing was a pair of briefs.
Moreover, the briefs had two holes in them, so they probably wouldn't last much longer.
At this moment, Zhuang Rui felt both anticipation and fear. He hadn't seen anyone for over a week. Even if they were natives, they were still people who could make a sound, weren't they?
However, after Zhuang Rui finished speaking, the situation he had imagined did not occur. Apart from the dust falling from the wooden house, there was no echo from Zhuang Rui's shout.
Even more outrageous, a wooden house collapsed with a crash right at Zhuang Rui's shout, raising a cloud of dust.
"Nobody's here..."
Zhuang Rui was now certain that this was an abandoned village. Although somewhat disappointed, it also indicated that humans had once lived on this isolated island.
The humans who built the wooden houses must have had contact with modern civilization. Since they are not here, there are only two possibilities: either they have moved to another part of the island, or they have already left this isolated island.
Regardless of the possibility, it's good news for Zhuang Rui. If others can leave, then he can too.
Zhuang Rui couldn't build a boat, but if he could find the tools here, he was fairly confident he could cut down a tree and make a canoe.
Approaching a wooden hut, Zhuang Rui reached out and pulled on the door. He didn't use much force, but the entire door came down, and the doorknob he was holding turned into splinters that slipped through his fingers and fell to the ground.
This situation made Zhuang Rui frown. The wooden house was so decayed that it must have been at least two or three hundred years old. Could it be that... the people here had already left hundreds of years ago?
Because the wood was badly rotten, Zhuang Rui didn't dare go inside the house, but instead walked around the village.
"It shouldn't have been built by the indigenous people..."
Zhuang Rui discovered that all of these wooden houses were built with round logs and rivets. Their architectural style was very mature, somewhat like that of Finland and North America. Although simple, they were extremely practical. There were also traces of a fence about 20 meters outside the village.
"Could this be a pirate's lair?"
Zhuang Rui suddenly had such a thought, but he quickly dismissed it.
Based on Zhuang Rui's understanding of pirates through movies and books, these pirates who roam the oceans pay great attention to their lairs and always build them in places that are easy to defend and difficult to attack. They would never build their lairs in such a flat place at the foot of a gentle slope.
Even in the 15th and 16th centuries, pirates would build their hideouts like castles, not something so simple, so that if they encountered enemies, they would have nowhere to run.
"Let's see if there's anything we can use..."
Although Zhuang Rui has a fortune of hundreds of millions outside, in this place he is truly penniless and a proletarian, and he even has to use leaves to go to the toilet.
Anything that humans can use is a treasure in Zhuang Rui's eyes now.
These wooden houses are so dilapidated that they could be listed as ancient protected buildings. Zhuang Rui dared not go in. Although the wooden beams on top were also rotten, they could still kill someone if they fell on their head.
After thinking for a moment, Zhuang Rui walked towards the collapsed wooden house. The roof of the wooden house was probably made of dried coconut leaves tied together and laid on top, but due to its age, it had long since turned to ashes.
Zhuang Rui picked up the javelin and started fiddling with the pile of wood. After lifting two beams that could be broken with a snap, all that remained on the ground was a thick layer of rotten wood chips.
"This is……"
Zhuang Rui suddenly launched an object with his javelin. The object was oval-shaped with a protrusion on top and curved back and forth. However, it did not seem to be made of cloth, otherwise it would not have been preserved until now.
"hat?"
Suddenly, a term popped into Zhuang Rui's mind: Isn't this the hat from the 16th or 17th century in the movie? It's exactly the same as the one worn by the pirate with black eye circles.
Using a javelin to pick up the object and bring it to my eyes, sure enough... it was a fur coat, covered with a thick layer of dust. In the parlance of the antique trade, it was an old object with a thick patina, indicating it had been around for many years.
Zhuang Rui shook the hat. He couldn't tell what kind of leather it was made of. It was very tough and hadn't deformed much after hundreds of years of wind and rain.
"I'll take this, buddy..."
Zhuang Rui picked up the hat and looked at himself. Since he was completely naked and had nowhere to put it, he simply put it on his head. Anyway, every morning after he got up, he could rub salt and alkali out of his messy hair, so Zhuang Rui wasn't worried about getting his hair dirty.
"Huh, what's this?"
After putting the hat on his head, Zhuang Rui picked up the javelin and started poking around in the wood again. Suddenly, a grayish-white object appeared in front of him. Zhuang Rui quickly squatted down, brushed away the wood shavings with his hands, and picked up the object.
"Holy crap, that's really scary..."
Zhuang Rui only realized after picking it up that it was actually a human skull. When he held it up, the two dark eye sockets stared right into his eyes, which startled him so much that he threw it away.
"Smack..."
After the skull rolled a few times on the ground, a crawler more than two inches long crawled out of its eye socket, seemingly quite displeased that Zhuang Rui's sleep had been disturbed.
"Ignorance is no excuse, please forgive me, please forgive me..."
Zhuang Rui clasped his hands together in a gesture of respect towards the skull on the ground, muttering a few words under his breath.
When Zhuang Rui met those dark, hollow eyes just now, he couldn't help but think of the cursed pirates in Pirates of the Caribbean, and he couldn't help but feel a little creeped out.
"This hat isn't one he wore, is it?"
Zhuang Rui touched the hat on his head. He had originally wanted to throw it away, but considering that he was penniless and it wasn't easy to accumulate any wealth, he decided to keep it on.
After all, Zhuang Rui is also an insider in the antique industry. Which of those valuable antiques wasn't handled by countless people who have already died?
In addition to his current status as an archaeology graduate student, Zhuang Rui had calmed down after the initial panic. He took a few steps forward, picked up the skull, and examined it in his hand.
To be precise, this should only be half a skull, because the mandible and pharynx are gone, leaving only three dark holes for the eyes and nose.
In archaeology, the history of human evolution is also an extremely important course. Archaeologists must master the skeletal remains unearthed from tombs to determine the approximate age, gender, and cause of death of the deceased.
Zhuang Rui certainly didn't have that ability, but he did notice something: the owner of this skull was probably not a local native, but a Westerner.
According to Zhuang Rui's knowledge from books, the bridge of the nose of indigenous people is usually flat, while the supraorbital rim is raised. However, the nasal bridge of this skull is high and the supraorbital rim is flat, which is more in line with the physiological characteristics of Westerners.
Archaeology, like solving a case, is a process of reasoning. Archaeologists use physical objects to determine what happened hundreds or even thousands of years ago. Holding this skull, Zhuang Rui couldn't help but fall into deep thought.
Judging from the color of this skull, it's yellowish-white, indicating it's quite old. Why did these Westerners come to this island hundreds of years ago? And how did they leave?
Comparatively, Zhuang Rui was more concerned about the latter question. After a week of observation, Zhuang Rui found that the island was surrounded by numerous reefs on all sides.
Let alone a large ship, even a regular yacht could easily run aground and sink. Zhuang Rui didn't know why those people came here, or how they managed to avoid the reefs.
After standing there blankly, deep in thought for a long time, Zhuang Rui shook his head. He couldn't deduce anything from a dead person's skull alone, and there were no wounds on the skull, so the cause of death was unknown.
After respectfully placing the skull back on the ground, Zhuang Rui began searching through the wood shavings again, but this time he was much gentler, almost like an archaeological excavation. To unravel the mystery of this person's death, more physical evidence was needed.
Zhuang Rui's efforts were not in vain. After more than two hours of cleaning, a relatively complete skeleton appeared in front of him.
Although the collapse of the wooden house caused some damage to the remains, Zhuang Rui could still tell at a glance that this person had definitely not died an unnatural death and had been murdered. The reason was very simple: a rusty piece of iron was stuck in the ribs of the skeleton.
After Zhuang Rui and Huangfu Yun got to know each other, they also did more research on weapons from the foreign cold weapon era. If Zhuang Rui was not mistaken, this should be a knight's sword from the 16th or 17th century.
Chapter 831 The Cave
The hilt and guard of the knight's sword were rotten, leaving only a rusty blade. Zhuang Rui squatted down and examined the blade carefully for a while, and a rough outline appeared in his mind.
This person must have been killed by a sword piercing his heart from behind without his notice, because the decayed hilt of the knight's sword was on the back of his skeleton, meaning that he was ambushed and killed.
But for some reason, the murderer did not pull the sword out again, but left it inside the victim's body, which puzzled Zhuang Rui.
"Damn, why think so much? I'm not here for archaeology..."
Zhuang Rui glanced at his watch; it was already past 11 a.m. For him, finding something useful was far more important than solving the mystery of the man's death.
After moving the remains aside, Zhuang Rui sped up the cleanup. Half an hour later, Zhuang Rui found an iron pot in the ruins with a happy expression.
Although the handles of the iron pot are broken and the pot itself is covered in rust, it is not broken. It should still be usable after being polished with sand.
This discovery thrilled Zhuang Rui. Having this thing meant he could have fresh fish soup. Just thinking about the thick, white fish soup he was cooking made his mouth water.