In ancient times, if the princesses were faithful, then sieges really needed to last ten years.

- French poet Bonnard

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"Everyone's posing, I'm going to take a picture!" A tour guide dressed in ethnic costume stood in front of a tripod camera and danced with his hands.

Several tourists from all over the world immediately smiled and stood in front of the ruins of a colonnade, ready to leave some video records of their trip.

On the evening of October 18, 2013, Giresun, a small city near the Black Sea, is a small tourist attraction on the northeastern border of Turkey, with rolling hills and river valleys, a rough coastline, and lush cherry trees and hazelnut trees.

Just as the tour guide was about to press the shutter, he pouted angrily and saw the young man in the group of tourists who had always been unsociable and unruly, the man was about twenty years old, about 1.75 meters, from East Asia, with black glasses and black hair, a gray casual jacket, long but not messy hair, wearing a pair of black-framed glasses, and the appearance of a standard college student. At this moment, the man didn't seem to hear the tour guide's invitation to take a group photo, and was standing alone in front of a cliff dozens of meters high, carrying everyone on his back, looking up at this cliff, thoughtful.

"This guest, please come and take a group photo, and when we are done, we will board the bus and go to the hotel in the city to rest." Although the tour guide was not happy, he still stepped forward very politely and walked to the man's side.

Out of curiosity, other tourists flocked to this cliff, which was actually a huge statue in section, which was a very common sight in Asia Minor - Anatolia, as the famous Turkish poet put it, "this region is like the head of a beautiful mare, galloping from distant Asia and plunging headlong into the blue Mediterranean." "If you compare it to the palm of a hand, the wrist is the towering mountain of eastern Asia Minor, the inward bend of the thumb is the Taurus Mountains, the palm is the undulating plateau and salt lake, the further west the terrain becomes gentle, the denser the market towns, and finally the fingers are the rivers that gently reach into the Aegean Sea. The head of Asia, the belly of the continent, where countless people and empires have left their footprints, the chariots of the Hittites, the kings of Lydia, the philosophers of Greece, the emperors of Persia, the eagles of Rome, the monks of Byzantium, the herdsmen of Turkey, according to Sir Hamilton of the Royal Geological Society of England in the mid-nineteenth century, "Anatolia, even the smallest place, has monuments." ”

Seeing that the guests were rushing up, the guide looked at the statue: a tall man, with a crown like a scorpion, dressed in military uniform, holding a strangely shaped scepter in his hand, and at his feet was a relief of a group of soldiers who had been deliberately reduced, either on horseback, or with spears and bows, in formation, charging in the direction of the man's scepter...... The whole sculpture gives people a sense of majesty and oppression of the emperor.

"Oh, everyone, this is the legendary relief of Alexander." The tour guide, who had a rich expression, began to explain by the way.

"No, this is not a relief of Alexander at all." The young man turned back and vetoed the guide, which greatly embarrassed the other party, but before the other party could defend himself, the man pushed down the glasses on the bridge of his nose, and with a proud expression, he said in fluent Turkish cannons: "The statues of Alexander the Great that exist in the world are all images of young men without beards, but the owner of this sculpture is full of braided beards, the standard Indo-European appearance—but his armor, including the soldiers' cameos, is a mixture of Greek Corinthian and Persian styles— Look at his scepter again! ”

All the tourists were attracted by the man's words, and involuntarily looked in the direction of his finger, which made the guide even more embarrassed, "At the top of this scepter, there is a sun, and there is an inscription on it - Mitra, Mitra, yes, it is the name of the Persian sun god, this is the scepter that Mitra, that is, the descendant of the god, can have." So, the owner of this relief is—"

The man exhaled, paused, and then said word by word: "It is the first century BC, the despotic monarch of the Black Sea, the fierce enemy of the Roman Republic, the self-proclaimed descendant of Darius of Persia, the leader of the Greek kingdom of Pontus, Mithridates VI!" ”

Then he went on to say quickly, "That's right, Gireson, the ancient Greeks called this place Calabi, which means the mountain where cherry trees bloom, and the Romans called it the City of Friends of the Gods, which means that this place is full of temples. Mithridates, the king of Pontus, converted this place into his palace, and the place where everyone was located was originally a vast palace, a hunting garden, and a camp......"

The tourists came to a standstill in front of this excited man, even if they were domestic tourists, their cognition was limited to the pressure mountain, Cyrus, etc., who was Mithridath? One of the fat women raised her hand and said to the guide, "Can we go down the mountain and eat at the hotel?" ”

Now, it was the turn of the tour guide to smile mockingly at the man and ask, "Are the guests here for archaeology?" ”

The male college student brushed his hair with his hand, looked pampered and unfazed, and said, "I am a Chinese student from X University, named Li Bida, majoring in linguistics. ”

The tour guide shrugged, slapped his face, turned to the other tourists, and said, "Let's go to the bus and get on the bus first, maybe Mr. Li will stay here for five more minutes and continue to communicate with Mitra." The surrounding tourists sneered a few times and left the cliff one after another.

Leaving Li Bida alone, still wandering in place, the evening breeze came slowly, the light of the setting sun slowly spread into this valley, the broken pillar piers and reliefs were gilded, and the air was full of a thin and cool smell. At this moment, Li Bida found that suddenly the giant sculpture of Mithridatis, the scepter of the sun god in his hand, and the sun symbol at the top, did not seem to be carved in ordinary stone, reflecting the sunset, flashing an extremely dazzling light, and the light converged into a divergent pillar of light, so that Li Bida could not open his eyes, and soon this light came to Li Bida's body, enveloping him, and before he could be surprised, his body turned into billions of particles and drifted away without a trace!

Five minutes later, the impatient tour guide grunted and walked to the bottom of the cliff where Li Bida had just stood, and then opened his mouth wide in astonishment.

Under the cliff, Li Bida was gone, not even a single hair was gone, there was no trace for miles, only a stall of clothes, pants, and watches, the tour guide trembled, touched the pile of clothes with his hand, and only picked up a pair of glasses, black-framed - the shadow of twilight gradually covered the canyon, and the surroundings were full of indescribable weirdness.

A few days later, Li Bida became one of the more than 5,000 travelers who go missing in Asia Minor every year.