When the black bull explained to Anda, Avanti and several Uyghur men by the fire were already kneeling on the sand, muttering words in their mouths, and then threw their arms forward and bowed to the wind and sand outside the door.

The wind and sand continued to pour into the house from the broken hole, and I didn't worry if there was really a guardian god Anda outside the door, so I quickly ran to the place where the poplar branches were stacked next to the doorway, and pulled a few thick poplar branches to the breach. But the poplar branches were so many so entangled that it was difficult for me to tear them off the pile of firewood for a while.

"Don't worry, brother, I'll support you!" The black bull reacted from the sudden fright, walked to the hole in two steps, sat on the ground with his buttocks, and simply carried forward the spirit of the revolutionary ancestors to block the muzzle of the cannon, and used his wide back to block the steady stream of sand poured into the house.

I pulled and dragged a poplar branch to the edge of the hole.

The black bull shouted to Avanti: "Stop praying! The wind is too strong for Anda to hear! You should hurry up and let Lao Su come over! ”

Avanti took a few steps forward, sat down on the ground, and looked back at me and the black bull.

The wind was much stronger than before, and the sand piled up outside the door was already more than half a foot deep, and we hurriedly filled the gap in the doorway. Although the wind continued to creak in through the gaps overhead, the quicksand finally stopped.

"When the wind and sand stop, we have to get out of the gap in the wall, otherwise, as soon as we open the branch blocking the doorway, the sand will pour in like a tide!" While talking, Hei Niu and I had already walked to the fire where Gu Yixin, Sixth Master and Gao Moli were, and sat down.

Seeing that we had plugged the hole, Avanti didn't say anything else, but walked up to the group of Uyghur companions, and together with them, took naan out of the cloth bag and roasted it on the fire.

The sixth master gave me and the black bull a thumbs up, and praised: "In the end, it is young and heroic, looking at the skills of the two brothers, they should also be people who have seen the wind and waves." ”

I squeezed the belly of my thumb that had been cut by a poplar branch, and cursed in my heart: The old fox didn't call for help just now, but now he will talk about it. Although there was unhappiness in his heart, he still said a few polite words.

Gu Yixin smiled and handed me a cup of hot water and asked, "How long do you estimate this wind and sand will blow?" ”

I took a sip of hot water, felt warm, and replied, "To be honest, I have no experience in desert archaeology, and I have never encountered such a terrible storm, but, judging from the meteorological knowledge I have learned in the past, this wind and sand will last until tomorrow morning at most, or it will not take that long." ”

In fact, Gu Yixin's knowledge is no less than mine, she must have her own judgment on this storm, and the reason why she asked me may be just to ask for peace of mind.

She said worriedly: "Looking at the situation just now, this wind and sand seems to be bigger than expected, and I hope it will not affect the landmark ancient river channel on the map." ”

The sixth master smiled, covered up Ah Biao's clothes on his body, and said to Gu Yixin in a slow tone: "Miss Gu, if you think about it or not, it's better to have a good rest now, and when the wind stops, let's speed up the march." ”

After saying that, the sixth master showed a trace of tiredness on his face, squinted his eyes and pretended to sleep.

The fake mercenary and the people of the sixth master did not eat dinner, and consciously divided into two piles, sat on the ground, and listened to the roaring wind outside the house, but did not speak. Most of them should have seen the wildness of the desert for the first time, and this wildness made even the most fierce men fearful.

The bonfire was a little stronger than before, and the flames were silent, extinguishing the light in the earthen house.

I took out the leg of roast lamb wrapped in oiled paper from the inside pocket of my clothes, roasted it again on the fire, and with a knife I slice the meat and handed the rest to Gao Moli.

The black bull looked at the barbecue meat on the tip of my knife, swallowed his saliva, and complained that the group of Uyghur men who were distributing roasted naan had not been optimistic about the meat pot before, and let the sudden storm blow the meat all over the ground.

Avanti said: "Hey~ When you encounter a desert storm, it's good to have food!" We can still hide, those camels have to let the wind blow! ”

Avanti was worried about his camel, and I was worried about the earthen temple next to the camel pen. The wind and sand are raging, and I don't know how much sand has been poured into the temple, and I don't know if the hole behind the four-clawed stone statue has been affected.

Gu Yixin saw that my expression was different, and asked me while breaking the baked naan and putting it in his mouth.

I chewed on the barbecue and replied, "The wind and sand are so big, I don't know if the secret passage in the earth temple has been buried, there are warning murals about the Shahai Hades Palace, if the sand is poured in, I am afraid it will have an impact on those murals." ”

Without waiting for Gu Yixin to answer, the sixth master suddenly opened his eyes like a corpse, looked at me and asked, "What warning mural?" ”

I thought to myself, those murals are not a secret thing, so I told everyone about it one by one. The fake mercenaries and the strong men in black in the distance all looked at each other when they heard this, and it was difficult to tell whether it was true or false.

After I finished speaking, the sixth master's face returned to the tiredness characteristic of the elderly after a long journey, waved his hand, and said to everyone: "The mural is mostly alarmist, nine years before the desert, we have not seen the desert and the sky burning together. ”

I thought to myself, perhaps, that kind of sand sea connecting the sky to catch fire doesn't happen very often, and most of the time if you are lucky, you won't encounter it.

Tom. After hearing this, Li didn't care about the content of the mural at all, but asked in stiff Mandarin, with bright eyes: "Mr. Su, is the mural you said well preserved?" Can they be easily removed? You must know that the international price of your murals in the Western Regions is simply amazingly high! ”

Out of professional habits, I was disgusted by this kind of reselling murals and cultural relics from the Western Regions. Dunhuang is a living example, in the twenties of the nineteenth century, countless rare scriptures and portraits were bought by Stein and others by fraud, at a very low price, from the hands of Wang Daoshi, smuggled abroad, so that China's cultural relics in the Western Regions suffered heavy losses.

I'm interested in Tom. Li Leng sneered, and warned word by word: "I don't care about any agreement between you and the sixth master for the time being, but any mural in this desert can't allow you to get involved in half a point!" ”

Tom. The smile on Lee's face froze, and he complained in English to his entourage, whose entourage was nibbling on dry naan and not talking.

The sixth master opened half of his eyes, glanced at me, chuckled inexplicably, and closed his eyes and pretended to sleep.

The fire was burning in front of him, and the sand was everywhere outside. I faintly heard that the howling wind seemed to be mixed with a ghostly laughter! The laughter is far away and sometimes near, it seems to be real and illusory!