With this stone stairway, Wen Jiaren and the others could bypass the Death Tree and easily reach the underground stone chamber.
The male ghost said, "This stone passage can only be opened by this mechanism. There's no mechanism downstairs."
So this stone passage only goes down, not up!
It's like a door deadbolted from the inside: you can't open it from outside, only by undoing the lock inside can you push the door open—it's the same principle.
The male ghost said that this setup was meant to weed out those who entered the tomb but had no fate with it.
Once this stone passage is sealed, intruders have only one road left to walk—the Death Tree.
"In the past thousand years, countless people have broken into this tomb, but they either got wiped out here, or left empty‑handed."
As the male ghost finished speaking, Wen Jiaren's group successfully reached the underground.
