VOL.1 Chapter 3: The Truth of Man-Made Ritual Burial

The next dawn brought an abrupt end to the rain.

Overnight, the heavy dark storm clouds dispersed completely, leaving pale translucent daylight spilling over the land. Damp cool breezes swept across the Sanxingdui Archaeological Site, dispelling the stagnant heaviness that had lingered for days. The air carried a mingled scent of moist soil and corroded bronze, crisp yet weighty all through the excavation zone.

With sunrise, the site slipped back into its mundane, orderly surface routine. Security guards rotated shifts on schedule; staff arrived at their posts punctually; all overhauled equipment went back online. Journalists and media crews carried out routine filming and documentation. To outside observers, nothing was amiss—archaeological excavation had fully returned to normal rhythm.

That night’s inexplicable site-wide anomalies, the eerie enclosed weather dead zone, the mass silent paralysis of precision instruments, and the rhythmic subterranean tremors had all been officially classified as short-term geomagnetic interference. The full records were sealed into internal archives, never to be released to the public, never to spark public debate or mass panic.

The mortal world excels at covering up the unknown and smoothing away the uncanny, using vague scientific labels to quiet everyone’s unease.

Deep excavation work resumed right on schedule.

Clean-up operations inside Sacrificial Pit No.3 advanced layer by layer. As topsoil was stripped and brushed away meticulously, thousands of ancient relic fragments buried for millennia gradually came to light. Shattered bronze components, incomplete bronze masks, broken branches of the Bronze Sacred Tree, carbonized ivory segments, and charred jade shards stacked thick across the pit floor, crammed densely one atop another.

To mainstream archaeology, the jumbled, damaged artifacts had long yielded two dominant theories explaining their destruction: ancient warfare that ruined ritual treasures amid civil collapse, or sacrificial customs where vessels were deliberately smashed as offerings to deities.

These two hypotheses had underpinned decades of academic research and public understanding of Ancient Shu Civilization.

But as deep soil layers were fully cleared that morning, the complete stratigraphic layout, uniform damage patterns, and standardized burial order laid bare—all long-standing mortal academic conjectures crumbled entirely.

Dozens of senior archaeologists, researchers and field technicians stood silent, staring at the impossibly regular burial structure at the pit bottom.

Every bronze relic bore fracture planes formed at identical force angles, with strike points precisely calibrated. Every crack and broken shard split along pre-calculated trajectories, utterly inconsistent with random wartime destruction or wildfire damage.

All burn marks shared uniform temperature and controlled range; only the artifact surfaces were scorched, while core decorative patterns and underground stratigraphy remained intact. This was highly regulated artificial temperature-controlled incineration, ruling out battle flames or natural wildfires entirely.

Most shocking of all was the layered burial soil structure.

The fill, rammed earth and bedding clay across the entire pit had all been carefully screened, laid in uniform strata and compacted under standardized pressure. Each layer held consistent thickness and soil composition, stacked to form a fully closed, rigid system. This was an extremely mature, rigorously engineered artificial sealing structure.

This was not hasty abandonment after civilization’s fall, nor rushed burial amid wartime flight, nor casual sacrificial offering.

It was a cold, systematic ritual sealing spanning thousands of years, carried out with a definitive ultimate purpose.

Ordinary people only saw broken relics and a vanished civilization, sighing over Ancient Shu’s mysterious sudden disappearance. Only the Ruin Guardian Unit could peer through the wreckage and uncover the ancient secret hidden behind recorded history.

Sage suited up in full protective gear, squatting beside the pit edge with a macro high-definition lens and portable rune scanner. She leaned close to the relic fragments, scanning frame by frame and comparing every carved line one by one.

Regular archaeologists focused on artifact shape, ornamentation, chronology and craftwork. She sought the micro carvings tucked within decorative crevices, fracture edges and soil contact surfaces.

These faint, minuscule marks had been masked by three thousand years of soil corrosion and scorch, never detected by modern archaeological equipment nor identified by academia. The lens captured the delicate lines, and the terminal rapidly reconstructed them into complete Xia Dynasty ancient seal arrays.

Sage’s gaze stayed fixed on the screen as she traced each rune, her cool voice cutting through the quiet pitside air.“None of these are sacrificial decorative patterns.”“All hidden incisions belong to closed-loop ancient sealing arrays—downgraded replications of the original foundational formations first created at the Erlitou Site.”“Every bronze artifact acts as an energy node for the seal. Every intentional fracture seals one segment of the Void Rift barrier. Every layer of rammed earth reinforces a stretch of underground spiritual energy vein.”

No one spoke. Only wind whispered over the pit, carrying three thousand years of silence.

Daipithy stood on the opposite pit bank, golden bloodline runes warming faintly across her palm, her perception of the underground spiritual veins crystal clear. She gazed down at the standardized sealed layout, her vision piercing soil and relics to stare straight into the Void Rift far beneath the earth, speaking slow and resolute.“The ancient ancestors did not destroy their own civilization.”“They shattered sacred vessels and burned relics of their own free will, burying their entire cultural iconography to patch the rift’s flaws and reinforce the barrier separating the mortal realm from the Void.”

Jam leaned against the pit-top guardrail, overlooking the full sealed layout of the sacrificial pit with a cold tone.“Historical records erased the truth, and mortal scholars have misunderstood for a thousand years. The world sees this as an ending to a civilization—yet it was martyrdom of the ancestors.”

Banbandin finished stratigraphic modeling in tandem, the hologram displaying a fully closed sealing loop.“The entire pit complex forms a complete secondary pressure-stabilizing array. Relics serve as nodes, soil strata as barriers, carved runes as locking fasteners, nested layer upon layer to divert Void corrosion and ease strain on the original Central Plains Void Core Anchor.”

Bangbangtu kept high perimeter watch, sweeping the surrounding woodlands with a low warning tone.“The enemy is exploiting the ancient weak points in this formation to continuously pry open the seals. Kaelor knows every crack within the Wood Ruin Seal is an entryway into the mortal world.”

As his words faded, light flickered faintly deep within the distant mountain woods; a wisp of faint Void energy brushed the excavation zone’s perimeter.

Bangbangtu’s eyes sharpened instantly, locking onto the trace source.“Outer scouts are still spying. They are recording our analytical progress to map out our full capabilities.”

Jam’s expression remained unyielding, voice hard and steady.“Let them watch. We maintain the facade of routine archaeological assessment, letting them believe we only grasp surface clues and have not uncovered the core sealing secret. Showing weakness is our best defense for now.”

Sage delved deeper into rune decryption, more ancient truths emerging from the patterns.“Rune records confirm: when Void Rifts spiraled out of control in the late Xia Dynasty Central Plains, the ancestors split the original core anchor power and fled south to build underground seal strongholds. The Wood Ruin Seal acts as both decoy and sacrificial buffer, absorbing endless Void erosion to shield the mortal realm.”

The burning warmth in Daipithy’s palm intensified, countless fragmented ancestral echoes flooding her mind. She finally understood completely: Sanxingdui’s decay was not extinction, but sacrifice; the broken relics were not ruin, but protection; the civilization’s historical gap was not an ending, but silent endurance.

For three thousand years, they endured uncomplaining. For three thousand years, they bore unending strain. For three thousand years, they drained their own power to sustain the Central Plains Xia Core Anchor and hold back apocalyptic darkness from humanity.

Now the martyr’s seal forged by all ancient ancestors was being pried apart, eroded and breached step by step by the Orb Reavers.

Far off, deep within the western mountain woods.

Kaelor peered through gaps in the branches, silently watching the Ruin Guardian Unit gathered beside the pit. His silver-grey eyes held no emotion, only icy mockery.

“You finally grasp a fraction of the truth.” He muttered low to himself. “But it is far too late. Three thousand years of attrition have sealed our fate. You may hold the line temporarily, yet you cannot defy destiny.”

He raised one hand, and Void energy rippled quietly through the forest. A new round of seal erosion began, soundless and unseen.

· Ruin Guardian Unit

· Orb Reavers

· Void Core Anchor

· Wood Ruin Seal

· Void Rift

· underground spiritual energy veins

· ancient seal runes

· Sacrificial Pit No.3

· Ancient Shu Civilization

· Erlitou Site