The Explorer

A quarrel one night five years ago was followed by the disappearance of an archaeological team of dozens, who vanished without a trace. Five years later, a photograph marked with a time and place suddenly surfaced. Two members of the team, who had been leading the expedition, appeared in the Kunlun Mountains. What secrets lay behind it all? The mysterious phoenix-snake pillar, the last Lop Nur native in the desert: was it the property of the Queen Mother of the West, or the key that opened the gate for Yu the Great? What were they searching for, and why had they guarded it for a thousand years?