Dare to shirk responsibility? This adorable little one will tear down your military district!

Platoon Leader Li's kick was extremely powerful; the two rotten, thick wooden doors crashed to the sides with a loud bang, shattering into a pile of broken wood chips.

Several military flashlights immediately shone through the gap, their blinding beams sweeping back and forth in the pitch-black underground stone chamber.

The stone chamber was unusually large, with a ceiling made entirely of solid blue stone slabs and a floor paved with square black tiles. What relieved everyone the most was that the place was very dry, with no trace of underground river seepage, and not even green mold growing on the corners of the walls.

"Spread out! Take up positions at the four corners, check for any living creatures and the hidden door!" Gu Changfeng ordered coldly.

Thirty elite soldiers immediately leveled their semi-automatic rifles, their leather boots clattering on the black brick floor, and split into two groups, creeping along the walls. In less than two minutes, the entire stone chamber had been searched.

"Reporting to the Chief of Staff! It's a dead end, there's no other way out, not even a mouse hole!" Platoon Leader Li ran back and reported loudly, swinging his gun barrel and pointing it at the center of the stone chamber.

In the center of that open space, there was a large, square pile of things, stacked up like a small hill, about half a person's height.

Gu Changfeng loosened his grip, and Ya Ya landed on the ground like a slippery little eel. She wasn't afraid and ran over with her two short legs.

"Dad! This black box is so big! It can hold several big fat pigs!" Ya Ya exclaimed in her childish voice, patting the outermost wooden box with her two little hands.

Everyone gathered around to take a look, and they saw that they were all large military-style wooden crates made from whole pieces of old camphor wood. After being stored underground in this dry and sunless place for decades, the pungent insect-repelling smell of camphor wood was still there, and the crates were not damaged at all.

Each box had two intersecting strips of yellowish-brown paper on the outside, the words written in vermilion had long since turned into a blob of red mud, with only the outline of a large square seal still barely legible.

"Exactly one hundred, not one more, not one less." Platoon Leader Li shone his flashlight as he counted them row by row, his throat tightening.

Gu Changfeng strode forward and drew the three-edged military dagger made of fine steel from his waistband. He aimed the tip of the dagger at the gap of the rusted brass lock on the front of the wooden box and pressed his wrist down sharply.

With a crisp "crack," the two thumb-thick brass locks were snapped off by the military dagger and clattered onto the floor tiles.

Xiao Li quickly grabbed the edge of the box lid and forcefully lifted it upwards.

As soon as the wooden box lid was opened, there was a thick layer of oilcloth and moisture-proof paper inside. Gu Changfeng waved his hand and roughly tore off the yellowed and brittle oilcloth.

Several beams of strong light from flashlights shone into the box at the same time.

A bright, dazzling yellow light shot up from the bottom of the box and slammed into the eyes of everyone present.

Inside the large camphor wood chest, several layers were stacked high. All of them were perfectly square, pure gold ingots. Each ingot weighed ten taels, and the gold ingots were packed tightly together, with even the iron cross stamp of the warlord's army from the Republic of China era engraved on their surfaces.

The deathly aura beneath the desert did nothing to obscure the blinding brilliance of this pure gold.

Thirty veterans who had survived countless battles, along with Xiao Li, held their breath, the sound of them swallowing hard echoing in the quiet stone chamber.

They served in the army and received only a meager fixed salary each month. Who among them had ever seen such extravagant wealth in their lives! If all one hundred boxes were exchanged for large yellow croakers, that would be a full five thousand catties of pure gold!

This is not just money; it is a gold mine that can be exchanged for large machines and factories, and can carve out a bloody path for the entire country's heavy industry!

"We found it... The old commander wasn't wrong, this is the batch!" Gu Changfeng exhaled a heavy breath, his rough hand reaching in to casually scoop up a large yellow croaker. The cool, heavy feel of the gold bar reassured this battle-hardened chief of staff.

Ya Ya squatted beside the boxes, her little mouth wide open in a grin. She usually kept about a dozen gold bars in her spatial storage, which she had seized from smugglers, and she used to think of herself as a very wealthy woman. Now, looking at these neatly arranged hundred large boxes, she was so envious that her mouth was practically watering.

If she could take advantage of a moment when no one was looking and wave her hand to store it all in her spatial storage, her two hundred square meters of land would definitely expand into a large medicinal herb field. But looking at the thirty pairs of wide-eyed eyes around her, Ya Ya could only sigh in her heart and obediently give up the idea.

She stretched out her chubby little hands, held the ten-ounce yellow croaker in both hands, weighed it in her hands, and looked up at Gu Changfeng.

"Dad, how many White Rabbit candies can we exchange for this golden lump of iron? Can we take a small piece home to buy meat?" Ya Ya pretended to be a money-grubber, raising her little eyebrows high.

The veterans around him burst into laughter upon hearing this, and the tense atmosphere they had just been stunned by the huge sum of money immediately dissipated.

Gu Changfeng's lips curled upwards, and he gently rubbed the top of Ya Ya's head with his thick, large hand.

"You little glutton, one of these big yellow croakers could buy out the entire candy box in the Beijing Department Store. But these are all government property, we have to exchange them for some sophisticated foreign machinery. If you want some milk candy, Dad will use his whole month's allowance to buy you a whole sackful so you can eat your fill!" Gu Changfeng chimed in protectively, his words full of doting affection.

Lin Wanrou walked over, bent down and pinched Ya Ya's chubby cheeks.

"Ya Ya, be good, put the gold down quickly. This thing is so heavy, don't slip and hurt your foot." Lin Wanrou was a proper person after all. Although she was shocked by so much gold, she kept her hands steady and would never covet a single penny of public property.

Ya Ya obediently said "Oh," threw the big yellow croaker back into the box as it was, and then took out a White Rabbit milk candy from the pocket of her tactical vest, peeled it, and stuffed it into her mouth.

"Chief of Staff, we've found the items, but this is a huge problem." Platoon Leader Li shone his flashlight on the rows of camphor wood chests, scratching his head in worry.

"Each box weighs at least fifty pounds, so a hundred boxes would weigh five thousand pounds. The passage outside is full of rotten wood chips and crossbows, not to mention that man-eating quicksand pit further out. Camels can't get in, so how are we, with only thirty or so people, going to get it out?"

After considering what Xiao Li said, everyone was stumped. The underground palace was dozens of meters deep, and moving something so heavy by hand would be exhausting.

"There's no other way, it's like ants moving house." Gu Changfeng turned around, his voice resolute. "Leave two people to guard the entrance. The rest, two people per group, chop up all the boxes. Pack the gold bars directly into military canvas, each person carrying sixty pounds, and get the stuff out of the quicksand pit first!"

"Yes, sir!" the elite soldiers answered in unison. Several impatient veterans had already slung their guns over their backs, pulled out their entrenching tools, and were preparing to pry open other camphor wood chests.

Just as everyone had removed their gun guards and were focusing all their attention on the box.

Niu Dan, who had been silently following Lin Wanrou, suddenly shuddered. The veins on his neck throbbed, and he abruptly flipped the cast iron boning knife in his hand, blade facing outwards, and pressed it tightly against his forearm.

Those wolf-like eyes snapped shut on the only entrance to the stone chamber.

"Dad! Don't touch the box! Someone's come in!" Niu Dan growled in a low voice.

Gu Changfeng reacted extremely quickly. Almost at the same second as Niu Dan spoke, he grabbed Lin Wanrou and Ya Ya and pulled them behind him to protect them. He had already drawn his Type 54 pistol from his waist and loaded it with bullets.

Just as Ya Ya finished chewing the milk candy, the white jade safety amulet hanging around her neck suddenly felt hot. Her wood-type ability core was also issuing a frantic warning—a chaotic aura was rapidly approaching from the passage!

The underground stone chamber was originally filled only with their breathing sounds, but now, from the top of that deep blue brick passage, came a series of "rustling" friction sounds.

Those were the sounds of thick-soled suede boots stepping on broken bricks and bits of dry grass! And judging from the noise, it wasn't just one or two people, but at least twenty!

"Take cover! Use the boxes as cover! Load your guns!" Gu Changfeng roared.