curse

Chapter 2

It is now AD 2001.

Jiang He was suddenly thirsty, and a nameless hot air was rising from his throat. This hot air rose from his belly and slowly permeated his whole body. Then, the vast and boundless saline-alkali desert appeared in front of his eyes.The scene became clearer and clearer, covering everything in front of the eyes, the violent wind and sand, the dry lake bed, the cracked salt flat, and the mirage transported by the sun for thousands of years...

He looked at his watch, and it was already 10:[-] in the evening. The room was large, with several desks and computers. One of the computers was still on, and beside the computer were some sophisticated archaeological instruments.There is a row of glass cabinets on one wall of the room. Inside the cabinets are some pots and jars that are being repaired. From the Neolithic Age to the Qing Empire, there are almost every dynasty.These are either incomplete with only a few pieces left, or restored like freshly fired tributes, and they are arranged in a room, which is like a silent general history of China.

In a corner of the cabinet, there is also a dead man's skull, which was dug out by Jiang He himself from a Tang Dynasty tomb in Guanzhong, Shaanxi Province when he was practicing in an archaeological activity before graduating from University.When the skull was just dug out, intern Jiang He's hands were trembling, as if his hands no longer belonged to him, and had entered another dynasty.Although he knew that those bones had decayed for thousands of years, he was still afraid that a dead eyeball would suddenly fall out of his skull, and then he began to retch, the instructor patted his shoulder to comfort him, and those involved in the excavation All the migrant workers laughed out loud in a strong Guanzhong accent.After that excavation was completed, he was in charge of cleaning the skull again as a fledgling. He used a small tool like a bamboo stick to remove all the dirt from the dead man's bone. At that time, he felt that he was cleaning a skeleton. It's like the pedicure master in the bathroom is manicuring the toenails of the guests.Until he removed all the impurities, and then cleaned it with a special substance, finally revealing the hideous face of the dead skull.Later, his mentor told him that the skull belonged to a prince of the Tang Dynasty who died young in a palace coup.

Jiang He stood up, walked to the front of the cabinet, and stared at the skull.Then he shook his head, and turned his gaze out of the window again. Through the glass, he could see the bushes outside the window. In the dark night, the branches and leaves were shaking in the wind, and the projections of the branches and leaves spilled into the room, like some elves about to move .When he looked through those branches and leaves, he could see the moon. The moon was very round tonight. Although a small part was covered by those annoying leaves, the bright and clear light clearly entered his eyes through the bushes.The house has stood here for many years, and the groves existed before the house was built.The house, which is an archaeological institute, is surrounded by these groves, which is rare in our city.Outside the gate of the research institute is a deserted look, a small road leads to the outside world, and it takes three or four intersections to experience the prosperity of the city again.Looking at the bushes outside the window and the wall behind the bushes, Jiang He suddenly had a strange feeling. He felt that this place was like a prison. He was imprisoned in it, and he was destined to be unable to escape.

Jiang He turned on an electronic instrument, and then placed several slices of human tissue into the scanning window of the instrument.He clicked the mouse a few times, and there was a slight sound in the scanning window, and a set of graphs were displayed on the computer screen connected to the instrument.He is usually responsible for using this machine, and not many people can understand those graphs, especially some older researchers, who are not used to using computers, and talk about old experience.He watched the computer screen carefully.With the complicated changes of the curves on the computer screen, his head was a little dizzy, and his eyes became tense.He shook his head violently, trying to make himself more conscious, but it was all to no avail.He could only stare at the screen, looking at those amazing curves.

Suddenly, Jiang He seemed to discover something surprising from the graph on the screen, and he opened his eyes wide in surprise.Panting heavily, he left the instrument and computer and sat down on a chair.His eyes turned to the skull specimens in the cabinet again, with a terrified expression.

He thought of something again, stumbled to another table, picked up the phone with trembling hands, dialed a familiar number, after two rings on the other end of the phone, a young female voice was on the phone It rang: "Hello?"

This is a fine sand-like sound, evenly soft and rich in texture.Jiang He let out a breath, he wanted to tell her everything, but when the words were about to flow from his throat to his lips, he paused, and a moment later, the words were forced by him again. Swallowed it back vigorously.

"Hello—" She was still waiting for him to speak.

His hand holding the phone trembled slightly, but he remained silent.

Her voice on the phone was a little anxious, "Hello, please speak, who are you? Hello."

When he was about to hang up, she suddenly said on the phone: "Jiang He, is that you? Jiang He, talk."

Jiang He hung up the phone.

The room was dead silent.Only the tree branches shaken by the evening wind outside the window gently slapped the windowpane, making strange noises.Jiang He walked to the computer, and was about to click the mouse to stop the task, but found something important on the computer screen, the curve pointing to a most unexpected point.

He felt something was wrong, and things had gone beyond any of his imagination. He didn't care about shutting down the computer programs in order, but directly pressed the computer switch to shut it down hard, and then directly unplugged the instrument's wire plug.The red light in the scanning window went out immediately, and he took out the tissue slices.

The phone rang suddenly.

He knew it was her calling, but he didn't want to answer the phone now, so he let the phone keep ringing, and every ring irritated his heart.Then, his cell phone rang, and he checked the caller ID on the cell phone, but he still didn't answer.

Jiang He was finally leaving. He didn't want to stay here anymore, but he couldn't move now.His eyes stared blankly ahead.

Jiang He shook his head helplessly, and sat on the ground with a desperate expression.

The ringing of the phone still echoed in the house.

(End of this chapter)