Where there is treasure, there are explorers and treasure hunters, and where there are mausoleums, there are tomb robbers and guardians, who seem to be born enemies, and the fight never stops.

Prior to the 19th century, transportation from Egypt to Thebes (Valley of the Kings), or from Egypt itself, was difficult, time-consuming, and expensive. Only the most industrious European travelers in history arrived—and no one knew where Thebes was until the arrival of the French priest Claude Sicard in 1726. It is known as its location along the Nile, but is often confused with Memphis and other cities.

This is mainly due to the strict secrecy of the Egyptian pharaohs when they built the mausoleum, and the fact that all the craftsmen were killed after completion, and the fact that the Valley of the Kings was in the desert, and the surrounding climate was harsh and no one set foot on it, so that the secrets of the Valley of the Kings could be preserved for thousands of years.

The wheels of history have changed, though. The parchment scroll that Li Zicheng received led him to the Valley of the Kings, nearly a hundred years before the French priest Claude Sicard discovered the true location of the Valley of the Kings.

Li Zicheng led more than 5,000 elite soldiers of the Imperial Chinese Imperial Army to the Valley of the Kings, and first came into direct conflict with the indigenous Egyptians who guarded the Valley of the Kings, the pharaonic guardians known as Khamelaki.

The Pharaonic Guardians were the faithful retainers of the Egyptian pharaohs and the children of the clan who were degraded to guard the tombs, as well as their descendants.

Out of loyalty to the pharaoh and filial piety to the royal family, these people lived in the Valley of the Kings for generations and guarded the spirits buried in the Valley of the Kings for generations.

It was also their preservation that prevented many tomb robbers from digging up the mausoleum. However, not all Guardians were loyal, and with the Turks occupying Egypt, these Guardians could not survive without funds from the Egyptian royal family, and many Guardians became tomb robbers in order to survive.

The parchment scroll that Li Zicheng obtained was a map drawn more than 50 years ago by a descendant of an Egyptian royal family after being expelled from the Valley of the Kings after he became a tomb robber.

The main reason why Li Zicheng brought troops here was that he knew that the mausoleum keepers were a group of diehards, and they would not allow Li Zicheng to dig the mausoleum. The outbreak of conflict was inevitable, so Li Zicheng led a large army to come, and if necessary, Li Zicheng would resolve it by force.

The Valley of the Kings is divided into the East Valley and the West Valley, and Li Zicheng came from the east and entered the East Valley first.

The Eastern Valley was also the main burial site for Egyptian pharaohs, concubines, and nobles. More than ninety percent of the mausoleums are located in the East Valley, so the East Valley has also become a focal point of conflict.

After entering the East Valley, the sandstorms also disappeared one after another.

The soldiers of the Chinese Empire, who had suffered for more than a month, lifted their cloaks one after another and hid in the shade under the cliff at the bottom of the valley to cool off.

"Adjutant Lee"

"To"

Hearing Li Zicheng's call, Adjutant Li hurriedly trotted over.

"Have you found their nest?"

"Report to the general" Adjutant Li hurriedly replied: "Searching"

The nest refers to the residence of the guardian of the mausoleum. Ever since Li Zicheng led his army to approach the Valley of the Kings, he has been constantly attacked by the Guardians. Due to the huge disparity in strength, the Guardian's attack did not cause much damage to Li Zicheng, but it caused Li Zicheng to be vigilant.

After entering the valley, Li Zicheng ordered the soldiers to search everywhere, and be sure to encounter the guardians' nests, because this group of guardians should know the location and entrance of many mausoleums, which is very important for Li Zicheng's treasure digging plan.

"They have lived in this place where birds don't poop for generations, there must be a place where they can provide water for the attention of the brothers"

"Yes," Adjutant Li hurriedly ordered.

After seven days of carpet searching, Li Zicheng finally discovered a water source.

The water source is 300 meters deep underground from the water level, but the entrance is more than 400 meters high in the middle of the mountain, the vertical distance is more than 700 meters, and the valley tunnel is more than 1,600 meters long.

At the water source, Imperial soldiers killed more than a hundred mausoleum keepers and captured a dozen alive.

After a surprise interrogation, a young man named Vasha finally relented because he was afraid of death and confessed what he knew.

However, the young man did not know much, only the location of the entrances to a few mausoleums. However, Li Zicheng searched a lot of diaries from other places where the deceased lived, and learned about many mausoleum burial sites through research.

At that time, Thutmose I built the cave mausoleum in the Valley of the Kings to prevent tomb robbery, however, history destined the Valley of the Kings to become a paradise for tomb robbers.

The pharaohs buried their corpses with great luxury, which seemed too great a temptation to the tomb robbers, and the wealth of each chamber far exceeded the dreams of the most greedy man.

In the Valley of the Kings, the tombs chosen by the pharaohs were located close to each other, not scattered as in the past, in order to facilitate centralized protection, however, this was also convenient for tomb robbers. I don't know when the gangs gathered around the Valley of the Kings, and they either secretly displayed warehouses, fought in open flames, or colluded with the local government or guardians to carry out crazy tomb robbing activities.

It is unknown how long Totmis' body remained safely there, but less than 10 years after his descendant Totmis IV was buried, his tomb was ransacked, and tomb robbers left a smug message on the walls of the tomb. It can be said that in the hundreds of years before Li Zicheng arrived in the Valley of the Kings, more than 200 burial chambers buried there were all looted without exception. So much so that later pharaohs had to rebury their ancestors again and again. Ramses III's body was reburied three times, as were the remains of Ahmis, Armenophis III, Thutmose II, and Ramses the Great.

It was precisely because the tombs of the pharaohs were gathered together that Li Zicheng passed through several known tomb entrances and quickly found other burial chambers.

This was mainly due to the army in the hands of Li Zicheng, as well as advanced explosives.

From the summer of the 11th year of Shenwu, the explosives used by the engineering units of the Royal Army of the Chinese Empire were upgraded. This is due to the Shenwu Emperor Deng Haonan's Royal Solidary Chamber, after years of research and experimentation, the Royal Chambers finally succeeded in developing the powerful TNT explosive, which was mass-produced in the spring of the thirteenth year of Shenwu, and was able to be mass-equipped with the Imperial Royal Army Engineer Corps, which was specially used to blow up the enemy's fortified fortresses.

Of the soldiers of the two regiments brought by Li Zicheng, half were from the engineer unit, and there were a large number of high-standard explosives.

Li Zicheng's personality dictated that his way of robbing tombs would not be gentle, and the tombs of the pharaohs were in solid rock, so they used high explosives to be on the right track.

Ordinary tomb robbers have few manpower and poor tools, and digging solid rocks is time-consuming and laborious. But the army is different, Li Zicheng has an elite and capable engineering force, numbering as many as 2,000 people, plus the high explosives of the mountain, no matter how strong the tombs in the Valley of the Kings can not escape Li Zicheng's clutches.

According to the intercepted clues, Li Zicheng's subordinates were the first to find the entrance to the tomb of Siti II in the Biban-el-Muruk valley near Thebes. The entrance was halfway up the mountain, and as the sound of explosions came out one after another, the whole valley shook incessantly, like a thunderbolt on a sunny day.

Several captured old men, seeing the Chinese Imperial soldiers so savagely blow up the entrance to the mausoleum, were so angry that they beat their chests, and a few of them committed suicide directly against the wall.

"Report opens a large burial chamber"

After getting the news, Li Zicheng was very excited and couldn't wait to enter the mausoleum hall.

The main mausoleum chamber of Siti II is not too large, with a horizontal distance of 130 meters and a vertical descent distance of 30 meters, with a total of 70 small burial chambers, which are buried with Siti II's concubines, early princes and princesses, etc., and some nobles are also buried.

However, Li Zicheng didn't know the owner of the tomb, and he didn't want to know, he just plundered, as long as it was valuable, he took it all.

Inside the tomb, there are countless antiquities. There are pure gold masks weighing up to two kilograms with the symbols of the pharaohs, coffins weighing up to 800 pounds of pure gold, thrones carved with precious stones carved in pure gold, solid gold reliefs covering the walls of tombs, and unbroken mummies...... All of them are breathtaking.

Accompanied by his adjutant, Li Zicheng stroked one exquisite artifact after another, and in addition to his excitement about precious metals, he was also shocked by the level of craftsmanship of the ancient Egyptians.

"General" Adjutant Li said: "The things here are hundreds of years old, if they are antiques from 3,000 years ago, then each one is worth a fortune, this time the general has made a great contribution, and he will definitely have a bright future when he returns to China in the future."

"The future is immeasurable, that's certain"

Li Zicheng did not hide his excited expression, and said with his hands rushing to the north: "The emperor is particularly fond of antiques, and tens of millions of antiques have been collected in the Royal Museum, which shows the emperor's deep interest. If you can really get 3,000 years of antiques, dedicate them to the emperor to win the dragon's face, and get promoted to make a fortune, it is certain"

Adjutant Li hurriedly said yes, and Li Zicheng added: "Sue the brothers, be careful to carry it, don't break it." The emperor is a perfectionist, don't mess up good things."

"Xia Guan understands"

Adjutant Li hurriedly ordered, and then asked, "General, should these gold and silver artifacts be melted down and distributed to the brothers as wages?"

"No," Li Zicheng waved his hand and said, "Explain it clearly to the brothers, don't be confused by the gold and silver in front of you." These things are worthless when they are melted, don't lose the watermelon and pick sesame seeds. Give the whole thing to the emperor, and get more rewards"

"Xia Guan understands"

Adjutant Li understood what Li Zicheng meant, and he knew what he meant, so he ordered him to go down, and all the soldiers involved were in favor.

The sacking of the tomb of Siti II took three days, and everything that could be taken was loaded and taken away, and a total of more than 14,000 artifacts were obtained, and the value of the artifacts alone exceeded 20 million silver dollars, regardless of the antique factor.

Li Zicheng was overjoyed when he received the report, and sent a letter to Li Yan, asking Li Yan to send more troops over and bring a large number of supplies, explosives, and transports. Because Li Zicheng is preparing to stay in the Valley of the Kings for a long time, there are still fifty or sixty pharaonic tombs, as well as more than thousands of burial tombs waiting to be excavated, which is not a task that can be completed in a short time.

For the rest of the day, the engineering unit was able to open several mausoleums every day. Because Li Zicheng only came for money, no matter who owned the mausoleum, and did not do archaeological work, the progress was very fast, but it was also very destructive, and the tomb after being looted was almost unrecognizable, which brought great difficulty to later archaeologists.

A month later, the engineering unit opened a huge mausoleum.

This mausoleum is next to another small mausoleum, and the engineering troops accidentally blew up the rock wall of this mausoleum when they blew up the small mausoleum next to it.

Li Zicheng knew that many of the pharaoh's tombs were next to each other, so he ordered the engineering troops to carry out spider web excavation operations around each tomb when excavating each tomb, so many tombs were found in this situation.

This mausoleum is the largest of all the tombs excavated in this month.

From the mouths of several captured guardians, it is known that this is the tomb of Seti I of the 19th Dynasty, from the entrance to the last burial chamber, the horizontal distance is 210 meters, the vertical descent is 45 meters, the huge rock cave is dug into an underground palace, the walls and ceiling are covered with frescoes, richly decorated and unimaginable. The entrance to the tomb was also opened halfway up the mountain, but the engineer troops dug it directly from the adjacent tomb and did not enter through the entrance. The tomb has a small passage leading to the depths of the tomb, and the patterns and hieroglyphs on the walls of the passage are clear, proving that it belonged to the tomb of Seti I.

The tomb of Seti I is very large, but the contents do not match the size of the tomb, a total of about 15,000 pieces, and the value is not high, less than fifteen million silver dollars, but if the age factor is added, the value of antiques sold is much higher than that obtained from other tombs.

Over the next month, the Chinese Empire's engineering units dug holes in the mountains, and as long as the hill was relatively high, they immediately drilled holes in the middle of the mountain to plant explosives. With this method, the sappers dug up more burial chambers, including the tombs of the pharaohs and other nobles, and harvested large quantities of gold, silver, jewelry, and priceless antiques.

Soon, Li Yan was also very excited when he learned that Li Zicheng had found a large number of treasures. A large number of engineering troops were immediately mobilized to carry a large number of explosives and vehicles into the Valley of the Kings.

The addition of the second group of engineers increased the number of people involved in the excavation of the entire Valley of the Kings to more than 10,000. The entire mountain peaks and valleys around the Valley of the Kings were full of soldiers of the Chinese Empire, and the catastrophe of the Valley of the Kings was unavoidable.

Two months later, almost all the tombs in the Valley of the Kings were discovered, and more than forty-three pharaonic tombs were excavated in the East Valley, and most of the Western Valley were the tombs of the concubines, which were not as large as the pharaonic tombs in the East Valley, and there were not many belongings. However, the artifacts in the West Valley are very old, the furthest is the pure gold dresser used by the concubine of the first dynasty of Egypt, Menes I, the scorpion king, and its value cannot be estimated, because it is more than 4,700 years old, and it is a first-class antique.

Li Zicheng carefully packed it, together with a batch of jewelry, and sent additional people to load it on a ship and transport it to Beijing as the first gift to the emperor.

On this day, Li Yan suddenly sent another legend to Li Zicheng, which was about the mausoleum of Tutkamon. For thousands of years, countless tomb robbers have been searching for this mausoleum because it contains countless gold and silver treasures.

Since Li Zicheng entered the Valley of the Kings, his interest in finding treasures has grown, and finally it has evolved into an obsession, even exceeding his feelings about being a soldier.

The Valley of the Kings is full of grave-digging soldiers, all of whom are looking for the tomb of the legendary Chinese king Tutkamon.

Tutkamun was a young Egyptian pharaoh more than 3,300 years ago who managed a vast empire from the throne of the golden eagle. His reign was short-lived, and he died suddenly at the age of 18. During Egypt's long pharaonic era, Tutkamun was not well known due to his short reign, and his sudden death prevented him from building a luxurious pyramid mausoleum. Because of its inconspicuousness, its mausoleum remained undiscovered for a long time.

In order to find this mausoleum, Li Zicheng personally led the sappers to search every inch of the Valley of the Kings, and after three months of hard work, he finally found the entrance to the Tutkamon mausoleum. It is actually located under the mausoleum of another famous pharaoh, Ramses VI, and is carved into the rock.

It is the only intact pharaonic tomb in 3,300 years, never touched by tomb robbers or opened by later pharaohs, and is the most luxurious mausoleum in Egypt.

The entire tomb is made of gold, the pure gold mask that symbolizes the Egyptian civilization, the coffin, the guardian, the throne, the funeral bed, the relief, and all kinds of funerary objects made of pure gold. All one qiē is amazing because this mausoleum is more than 3300 years old and the splendor of the Egyptians is astounding.

More than 20,000 artifacts have been unearthed from the Tutkamon Mausoleum, each of which is a priceless treasure for more than 3,000 years. However, it was very difficult to transport all the treasures out of the mausoleum. Because this pharaoh's things are made of pure gold, and they are very large. For example, the goddess Hartol bull-headed spirit bed, if you want to transport it out, you need to blast all the tombs above it and open a 500-meter-long tunnel.

It would take hundreds of sappers a month to get everything out of the Tutkamon Mausoleum.

However, Li Zicheng didn't care about the time of this month, because the tomb digging operation that took half a year immediately dug up the tombs of pharaohs and concubines in the Valley of the Kings for thousands of years, a total of fifty-four pharaoh tombs, and more than 2,200 tombs of concubines and nobles were looted. Li Zicheng mobilized 5,000 engineering troops, 10,000 troops, 30,000 catties of high explosives, and obtained a total of more than 2 million pieces of various burial goods, not counting the antique factor, the actual value of more than one billion silver dollars. Even if all the precious metal items were melted down, they would be worth 200 million silver dollars.

In the past six months, Li Zicheng has been smiling from ear to ear every day. However, just when Li Zicheng was elated, another question made him sad.

It turned out that such a huge treasure, as many as more than two million precious treasures, was very troublesome to transport all of them to the Suez Fortress by land.

Fortunately, the Valley of the Kings is only seven kilometers away from the Nile, and inland river boats are available every year during the autumn flood and when the Nile River is swollen.

However, it was less than a week. Two million pieces of treasure had to be transported to the banks of the Nile and loaded onto ships within seven days, which was a huge transportation problem.

Li Zicheng thought that there was nothing he could do, and in the end Li Yan had to send more than 30,000 soldiers and apply for help from the Royal Navy's Mediterranean Fleet.

In the end, under the joint action of the navy and army, 10,000 camels, 50,000 heavy horses, 70 transport ships, and more than 68,000 people were dispatched, and finally ninety percent of the treasures were loaded from the Nile to Cairo.

The last treasures will either have to wait until next autumn flood to be transported out of the Valley of the Kings, or they will be transported directly to the Suez fortress by land. In the end, Li Yan was afraid of long nights and dreams, so he decided to transport it by land to the Suez fortress. V