Tomb Raider: What the hell is this strange commission?

"Come here, some people, move this place out of the way."

Zhou Zixu saw that Chi Yu seemed to have discovered something, so he hurried over to watch the fun. With him watching, the bodyguards quickly cleared out the rubble.

As the rubble on the surface was removed, a sunken pit was formed, and the stone slab that had been hidden for many years was finally rediscovered.

The bluestone slab is engraved with a relief that is a little blurred by time but still exquisite. There is no trace of any connection on it, and it is carved out of a whole piece.

The most eye-catching part of the image is a tangled mass of tree roots, with disordered yet orderly lines overlapping each other. At first glance, it looks like a group of snakes entangled in a desperate struggle.

The thick trunk grows straight up, and the thriving branches are full of plump fruits. There are also some humanoid creatures on the side stretching out their hands, as if trying to pick the fruits from the tree.

Chi Yu looked at the content on the screen and was a little confused.

Those creatures looked like humans, but they all had tails behind them. But if you said they were monkeys, there was no hair on them.

"Is this a hairless monkey?" Chi Yu heard a low murmur behind him, almost making him think that he had just been distracted and accidentally said what he was thinking.

Chi Yu glanced back and found that the person who spoke was indeed Zhou Zixu.

Looking at the stone slab, Zhou Zixu sighed inexplicably: "There is a door on it. I didn't expect there is another door hidden here. It's really one thing after another. It must be that you have sharp eyes to find this."

Chi Yu hummed, accepted his compliment, pointed to the groove on the side of the stone slab and said, "This is where the mechanism of the movable stone slab is located. It is a simple pressure-sensitive switch. As long as you stand on it, the mechanism will feel enough pressure and the stone slab will be opened."

Zhou Zixu chuckled when he heard that, and was about to step on it, but was stopped by the bodyguard, allowing another bodyguard to get there first and stand on it.

"Master, we can do the job of opening the mechanism, you just need to watch from the side."

Facing Zhou Zixu's accusing gaze, the other party calmly advised, "Before we came, the master told us to protect you. None of us knows what will happen after the mechanism is triggered. I hope you can pay more attention."

"No, my brother won't hurt me. He even let me step on the mechanism, so there must be no danger. I don't know why you are so nervous."

Zhou Zixu missed the opportunity, but he couldn't say anything harsh in response to the bodyguard's concern. He could only look on gloomily as people stood in the position where he should have been.

Chi Yu didn't care who was asked to open the mechanism. He just saw that Zhou Zixu was a little bored, so he planned to find something for him to do so that he could have a sense of participation.

After all, when it comes to the end, Zhou Zixu probably won’t be able to help at all, and can only try to run away to save his life.

With a sound of mechanism, the dusty stone slab opened, bringing up the dust deposited on the ground. Chi Yuxu covered his mouth and nose, and looked out, only to see nothingness, and there was no way down.

Chi Yu thought for a moment, took out a glow stick from his backpack, broke one, then let go and let it fall freely.

The light of the fluorescent stick gradually dimmed in just a few seconds and then stopped. Chi Yu estimated that the bottom was about 20 to 30 meters deep.

"Prepare the rope, I'll go down and take a look first." Chi Yu stood up and began to put on and take off his equipment.

The land below was automatically unlocked after Chi Yu approached. Although he could tell from it that this was a safe area, words were not enough. No one would be willing to take the risk without any preparation just because of Chi Yu's words.

...Except Zhou Zixu, of course.

In this makeshift exploration team, the only person who can unconditionally trust Chi Yu is probably that silly kid Zhou Zixu.

It just so happened that Chi Yu was also aroused by the black glasses' interest in exploration, so even though he could order the bodyguards to go down and investigate first, he still chose to go down and check the situation himself.

"We're all going to go down anyway, so I'll go with you." The man with black glasses spoke slowly, and faced Chi Yu's puzzled look, he grinned, "Two people in a group, we can take care of each other - that's what you said before."

No, he was just surprised that the man with black glasses, who had previously been lazy whenever he had the chance, would actually take the initiative to work.

Chi Yu was speechless for a while, too lazy to refute the man with black glasses, so he simply nodded and asked him to get ready together.

With the joint efforts of several people, Chi Yu and Black Glasses successfully reached the ground below. Chi Yu loosened the rope, turned on the light and walked around, and found that this seemed to be a room for storing items.

There were many shelves in the hall, and the shelves were full of leather made from unknown creatures. The fur was very complete, as if it was peeled off in one piece, and it seemed that the process was very mature.

The man with black glasses was standing in front of a shelter made of several frames. He stroked his chin and looked at the fur on it, then walked forward and pushed it aside.

Looking at the blocked object, the man with black glasses showed an expression of "as expected".

"Mr. Hei, what did you find?" Chi Yu turned around and saw the man with black glasses smiling happily at the wall, and he immediately became curious.

"You'll know when you come and take a look."

The man with black glasses smiled and didn't tell Chi Yu what he saw. He just waved at him and asked him to come over and take a look.

Chi Yu was suspicious of Black Glasses' mysterious behavior, but he still walked over honestly.

When Chi Yu walked to the side of the man with black glasses, he discovered that behind the place he had opened, there was a wall with murals engraved on it.

After who knows how many years, most of the murals on the wall have become blurred. Chi Yu squinted his eyes, carefully identifying the pictures, and pondering the content while looking at them.

The pattern on the mural is very abstract. The picture begins with several women with snake heads and human bodies holding pots gathered together. They perform a sacrificial dance around a giant tree. After the dance, they leave the pots under the tree, repeating the cycle over and over again.

The giant tree soon blossomed and bore fruit, but on the day when the fruits were ripe, the snake women went there with baskets, only to find a monkey jumping down from the tree, and all the fruits on the tree had been eaten by it.

Chi Yu felt that the content looked very familiar, but he couldn't remember it for a moment, so he had to continue reading.

The snake women were horrified and caught the monkey, taking it to see a very majestic woman who was sitting on a throne.

When the woman learned that the fruit had been eaten, she was furious. She skinned the monkey alive, threw it into a cave, sealed the entrance, and left it to fend for itself.

But after a while, the monkey broke out of the stone and had invulnerable skin. The woman was very curious about the reason and conducted various experiments.

……

Chi Yu couldn't read any more of the following content.

At this moment, there was only one thought in his mind -

Which version of Journey to the West is this?