Choosing to make it public meant they had to be mentally prepared for tomb robbers to come sniffing around — there was no way around it.

Lu Beicheng was a formidable businessman; there was no way he hadn’t considered that.

Before Lu Beicheng could answer, Ji Mingyu spoke up first to explain: “At first, Ninth Master had no intention of making this public. We don’t know how the news leaked out.”

“Once it was already known, there was no point trying to hide it anymore — especially since something like this requires official documentation from the bureau first. There’s no concealing it even if we wanted to.”

Jiu’er nodded, only half understanding.

Different trades might as well be different worlds — she could roughly grasp the gist of it, but the specifics of how things actually worked left her completely lost.

Still, she understood the basic principle: matters like this needed approval to be handed down layer by layer from above before anything could proceed.

“So now that we’ve discovered the imperial tomb, can we go in and take a look ourselves first?” she asked.

Ji Mingyu nodded. “The professor has the approved documentation, so he can lead the team straight in.”

Zhen Jiu’er’s gaze couldn’t help drifting toward the professor not far away.

It seemed this Professor Xiao was no ordinary professor — there was quite a background behind him.

Across the entire city of Jiangzhou, professors of this caliber were probably few enough to count on one hand.

Earlier, as Jiu’er had pushed Lu Beicheng over, she’d already explained the situation with this imperial tomb to him clearly.

“Not the Tomb of the Northern Emperor?” The professor, upon hearing this, hurried over.

“Ninth Master, you’re saying this imperial tomb isn’t an emperor’s tomb?”

But the scale of it… it certainly didn’t look small.

Lu Beicheng glanced at Zhen Jiu’er.

Jiu’er shook her head.

No one would believe anything she said — it simply wouldn’t carry any weight.

Only if Ninth Master said it would people believe it.

Though, she couldn’t even be certain Ninth Master himself would believe her.

Lu Beicheng looked at the tomb entrance, his tone unhurried. “The entrance to this tomb faces south, angled slightly west by a dozen or so degrees. This should be the tomb of a prince, not an emperor.”

The professor looked up, then looked again at the tomb entrance, and without the slightest hesitation immediately re-measured it with his equipment.

Sure enough — it deviated sixteen degrees from due south!

Ancient measurement techniques hadn’t been as precise as modern ones, so this deviation was probably intended to be fifteen degrees.

Still, he prided himself on holding the highest academic credentials of anyone present, yet he’d never once heard of a prince’s tomb being angled more than ten degrees off from due south.

If what Ninth Master said was true, then he, an archaeology expert, couldn’t even match a businessman in this regard.

Truly humbling.

A commotion suddenly stirred from within — it was Xiao Shengyuan and Meng Xiao, who had just gone in, coming back out.

“Ninth Master. Professor.”

Xiao Shengyuan pulled off his specialized protective suit and helmet, and hurried over to the two of them.

“Professor, this tomb isn’t the Tomb of the Northern Emperor. We found this inside.”

Xiao Shengyuan glanced back at Meng Xiao.

Meng Xiao was still cradling a stone slab, not too large, not too small.

Everyone hurried over to look, and there it was — the two characters for “Northern Emperor,” but only in the lower right corner of the stone tablet.

“So the stone tablet we saw earlier, carved with the characters for ‘Northern Emperor,’ was just a corner of the original tablet?”

Seeing the characters for “Northern Emperor” carved on it, everyone had assumed this tomb belonged to the Northern Emperor.

“Looks like that’s exactly what happened,” Xiao Shengyuan said, nodding.

The professor examined the writing on the tablet again.

Though it differed from the simplified characters used today, it bore a striking resemblance to the ancient script he had studied — as if they shared the same roots, branches of the same tree.

“The Xiao Prince?”

Zhen Jiu’er frowned.

She’d never heard of him.

Probably some prince enfeoffed later on, under the Kingdom of Bei Mu.

But then… who exactly was the Northern Emperor?