Bones of Nanshan

In the seventeenth year of the Republic, Chen Ergou, a Northwestern cowherd boy, fell into a sinkhole while herding cattle on South Mountain. By chance, he discovered a treasure cave belonging to a salt commissioner from the previous dynasty. There was no gold or silver inside, only thirty-seven large chests. They were filled with a complete chain of evidence, secretly collected by the official over twenty years, exposing foreign missionaries colluding with warlords to loot ancient tombs and smuggle national treasures, as well as a secret treasure map with the power to reshape the Northwest. Overnight, the cowherd boy became the target of every faction. Only after he discovered that the schoolteacher’s daughter who always cheerfully brought him steamed buns, the widowed proprietress of the town pharmacy, and even the Chinese nun at the foreign church all hid different faces behind their own, did he understand: the deepest treasure in this world was never the gold buried underground.