Vollständiges Metamorphose-Handbuch

Kapitel 14

There was a protrusion on the rock, probably formed from a piece of rock that had weathered and fallen into the Yellow River. The young master glanced at his watch and, without letting us rest, said, "Hurry up, we don't have time. It's getting dark, we have to get into the mountains before nightfall. We need to use the little time we have tomorrow to find a place."

I waved my hand, I really couldn't walk anymore.

The young master pulled me up, then went to pull the maid, saying, "It's fine if you two don't want to live, but don't drag me down with you. Hurry up, hurry up, let's go."

I reluctantly slung my backpack over my shoulder, then grabbed the girl's hand, and the three of us started walking towards the back of this protrusion, where there was a very simple, almost man-made staircase leading upwards.

The side facing the Yellow River is very steep, with hardly any trees, except for a few scattered trees growing in the mountain crevices.

We used both our hands and feet to climb up the cliff. After climbing less than 10 or 20 meters, we turned sharply along the mountainside and I saw a crevice between two cliffs. The path here was of unknown age and covered in moss. Countless streams flowed down the mountainside, soaking our clothes.

Once we reached the other side of the mountain, we entered the mountainous area. It was still some distance from Peacock Mountain, which we were going to, but it should be within the Peacock Mountain area. We took out a map and found a place to observe.

The scenery here is indeed very beautiful. The mountains and water are green, and the green is a deep, refreshing green. This is also related to the humid climate, which has fostered the growth of a large number of unknown plants that are very lush.

Following the route we took to get there, and using the rudimentary lines on the map, we could barely determine that we were south of our destination. But beyond that, we couldn't recall any other information, let alone how to find it using the map.

The young master said, "I think the person who drew this map must be an idiot. This map is practically useless. If you take it into the mountains, you're bound to get lost."

Looking at the map, I said, "No, we're not in the right place. If we could find where we stood when the map was drawn, it would be easy to understand."

Needless to say, that's even harder to find.

Even if we found it, we couldn't go straight ahead because there was only one mountain path, and we couldn't get in from anywhere else. So we simply stopped looking at the map, took out our compasses, and blindly rushed into the primeval forest based on the general direction.

After a series of arduous journeys, our physical strength had reached its limit, so this kind of trek was extremely difficult for us. Even the girl who was full of energy just now started to pant heavily, and we all felt very uncomfortable.

We walked until dark, then the young master who was leading the group stopped. When he looked back at us, I realized that he had a nosebleed. I quickly tried to stop the bleeding, but he said he couldn't go on, that he had reached his limit, and that if he continued walking, he would die.

We found a place to stop, and I used my saber to scrape off the moss on the rocks before laying down a waterproof tarpaulin.

The young master kept saying he couldn't go on, and fell asleep as soon as he lay down. I noticed the temperature here wasn't actually low, but because of the water, it was easy to get sick, so I gathered some dry firewood and lit it in the smokeless stove to warm them up. The girl was also exhausted. At first, she said she would stay with me, but after eating a few pieces of chocolate, she fell asleep before even swallowing them.

When I saw that both of them were asleep, I couldn't help but feel a little annoyed. I straightened them up, but my own eyelids were drooping, so I lit a cigarette to keep myself awake. First, I boiled some water and washed my blistered feet, and then I wiped my body down.

I finished the cigarette quickly, and when I checked my pocket, it was gone. I knew I was in trouble. But you know, once a person relaxes, they have absolutely no willpower to hold on. I kept thinking, "Oh no, oh no," and then I turned around and fell asleep.

I don't know how long I slept, but suddenly I felt a coolness on my face. I rubbed it and tried to go back to sleep, but the feeling was still very strong.

I opened my eyes groggily and found that it was already completely dark. Everything in front of me was pitch black, and the coolness on my face was because it was raining.

I checked my watch; it was past seven. That meant I'd slept all night. We'd originally planned to venture deep into the forest, but it seems we're all just not cut out for hardship. If we'd been part of the Red Army during the Long March, we might be robbing the second Liu Qu's grave by now.

The young master and the others were still sleeping. I heard him snoring, and I thought that since he had already slept for so long, I would let him sleep a little longer. I turned on my flashlight, intending to cook something for them.

But when I looked at it, I was stunned. There was only the young master on the tarpaulin; the maid was nowhere to be seen.

I jumped up and ran around looking for her, thinking she might have gone to pee in the morning. But after searching twice, I couldn't find her anywhere, and I immediately panicked.

I slapped the young master a few times when we got back, and he still yelled at me, asking, "What did you do? Did you really get intimate with a woman? I chased you away."

I said, "Stop being affectionate, the girl is missing, get up and go look for her."

Upon hearing this, the young master quickly looked around and, sure enough, the girl was gone. He immediately stood up, washed his face with a puddle of water, and said, "What happened? Weren't you watching over her?"

I said, "You accidentally fell asleep!"

The young master said, "What kind of sentry are you? You—"

I said, "Alright, alright, hurry up and go find it. I'll let you hit me if you want."

We searched around but couldn't find it anywhere. There was only one set of footprints leading down into the valley, but it disappeared halfway down because of the valley's water flow.

We rushed down the valley and searched for several hundred meters when we suddenly saw the same footprints reappear on a muddy slope. Upon closer inspection, they were fresh. The young master drew his crossbow, grabbed me, and we followed the footprints, saying as we ran, "Look how strange, this girl walked there by herself."

I think it's unlikely. This girl may be willful, but she's also very timid. Why would she go into the jungle alone?

The rain was getting heavier and heavier, and the footprints could disappear at any moment. We were extremely anxious and walked faster and faster. We chased after them for about twenty minutes, and we didn't even know where we were.

Suddenly the footprints stopped. We looked up and saw a huge boulder in front of us. I rushed over and looked around. Suddenly I saw the girl crouching in the grass, trembling.

I rushed over, and as soon as she saw me, she ran over and threw herself into my arms, bursting into tears. I comforted her while draping a waterproof sheet over her and asked, "How did you end up here?"

The girl just kept crying and trembling. The young master told me not to ask anymore. I realized that we couldn't go back even if we wanted to. The footprints we left behind were gone. We would probably get lost in the jungle if we went back now. Fortunately, the young master was shrewd and had brought most of the necessary things with him.

I used tree branches to prop up a waterproof tarpaulin and set up a very makeshift tent. Then I carried the girl inside, gave her some baijiu (Chinese liquor) to drink to reassure her and warm her up. Seeing that her complexion had become rosy, I asked her what had happened.

The girl, who didn't usually drink, took a big gulp and choked terribly. Wiping away tears, she said, "Oh dear, you scared me to death! I thought I'd never see you again."

I said, "Don't cry. Aren't we here? What happened last night?"

The girl said pitifully, "I'm too embarrassed to say it. Could you please only tell one person?"

I thought to myself, what can't I say? Did you get raped by a savage? I glanced at the young master, who dusted his hands off and walked out dejectedly.

I leaned my ear close, and she pressed her lips to my ear, briefly recounting what had happened yesterday.

It turns out that she had her period these past few days. Last night, she pretended to be asleep, and when she saw that we were asleep, she ran to the woods to change her things.

After she changed, she prepared to come back. Normally, if she had returned to our place, everything would have been fine. But at that moment, she suddenly heard some strange noises coming from the valley next to her.

We were sleeping on a high slope with a very small valley below. She carefully walked to a rock, peered out, and saw that it was pitch black below the valley, but she could clearly hear some strange sounds coming up from below.

That was the sound of chains rubbing together, as if many people were walking on chains, but it was pitch black below, and she couldn't see who they were.

The girl is a very curious person. At this time, we were all behind the rock, and she wasn't afraid, but she felt something was strange. This place should be deep in the mountains, so why would there be such a sound? And judging from the noise below, there should be quite a few people down there. What are these people doing here?

She picked up her flashlight, turned it on, and shone it down the mountain, but because of the angle, she couldn't see anything. She could only feel a large number of raindrops falling from the sky and gathering below to form a small stream, but the sound below was definitely not the sound of a stream.

The sound kept coming up, and she felt as if someone was walking on chains.

Unable to contain her curiosity, and seeing that the artificial hill and valley weren't far from us, she tiptoed down and hid behind a rock to peek inside.

It was pitch black below, and she dared not use her flashlight, but she could still make out a line of figures moving forward in the dim light. These people all wore shackles on their feet, and they walked with a limp. The metallic sound echoed in the valley, accompanied by the rhythmic footsteps.

As the girl watched, she suddenly felt an urge to follow them, and soon realized that this urge had reached a point where she could no longer resist it rationally.

She went out and followed the group forward. As she walked, she noticed that the group had walked through a large rock. The girl was terrified. She knew she had touched something, but her legs wouldn't obey her commands.

Just as she was about to walk towards the rock, she suddenly heard someone call her name. She snapped out of her daze and looked around. It was already dawn, and there was nothing around her except herself. She was terrified and turned around and ran towards the mountain. She had no sense of direction and couldn't remember how far she had run. Eventually, she couldn't run anymore and hid in the bushes. That's when we found her.

At this moment, the young master entered and asked, "Are you finished? What exactly happened?"

I didn't know what to say, so I said, "I don't know, it seems like there's something unclean in this valley that's bewitching us."

The young master asked curiously, "Is there anything I can't know?"

Just as I was about to speak, the girl twisted her arm and said, "Don't say it!"

I quickly surrendered, but then I thought about it again. Something like this was unusual, and the girl was unlikely to lie. So I said, "I think there might be something wrong with the valley below. Should we go take a look?"

The girl shook her head, pulling at me, and said, "Don't go, it's too scary."

I picked her up and said, "Don't be afraid. Young Master and I are both tough guys. We're the kind of people that even the Black and White Heartless don't have the right to take. It takes the King of Hell himself to come and take us. Don't worry, once we get down there, those demons and monsters will have to make way."

As he spoke, he carried her down the steep slope of the bushes into the valley.

The valley was about two car widths wide, and the bottom was full of rocks, all of which had fallen from the cliff on one side. There was hardly any grass in the cracks between the rocks, which was very strange, as if someone had been walking on them every day. I asked the girl where the rock she was walking on was.

She pointed us in the right direction, and we walked for about ten minutes. Then I saw a large, black rock that looked like it had been burned by fire, lying across the end of the valley. We couldn't see anything behind the rock, but we could hear the roaring sound of water below, as if a great river was rushing by.

I put the maid down. The young master tried to carry her on his back, but she kicked him.

I told them to stop playing around, that these were the last few days for us, and to cheer up, and then I climbed up the rock.

The rock was huge, and once I stepped onto it, the sound of the water became even clearer. I took a few steps forward, thinking there was a stream behind the rock, but when I reached the edge and looked down, a sudden gust of wind whipped around me, and I felt a vibration before my eyes. Instantly, the world spun around me.

An almost spectacular scene unfolded before me: a huge, barrel-shaped pool, now dry and incredibly deep. Looking down, I saw numerous hollows in the pool's walls, from which nine white ribbons of water cascaded down, creating a thick mist that obscured the view. What I mistook for the roar of a great river was actually just the rumble of the waterfalls hitting the bottom of the pool.

"Where is this?!" The young master's mouth gaped open, as if he were about to fall. The maid also screamed, unsure how to express her emotions.

I could tell at a glance that this was the rarest feng shui pattern in the world, called the Nine Dragon Pit. I don't recall anyone having ever found such a thing before. This pattern is only created by calculating according to feng shui theory.

I was almost immediately certain that Liu Qu's tomb might really be here. There was no better feng shui location in the world. If he knew even a little about feng shui, or if he had someone who did, he would never have given up such a feng shui location. I never imagined that this freak, Liu Qu, would have such good fortune. Moreover, the map hidden in the patterns on the river-suppressing dragon coffin definitely points to this place as well.

Chapter Twenty-Four: Nine Dragon Pit

I hardly ever need to look at maps anymore, because I believe that if a map doesn't represent this place, then the person who drew the map is a fool.

The legendary ancient tomb was guarded by nine dragons, which actually did not refer to real dragons, but rather to dragons in feng shui.

Even if the young master was dim-witted, he could see something amiss in my expression and asked, "Old Xu, could it be that we've arrived at the place we're looking for? Is Liu Qu's tomb down here?"

I nodded and said, "That should be right. If he really is building his tomb here, he definitely won't do it anywhere else. Even if he doesn't know anything about feng shui, he would know that this place has good feng shui. I'm even thinking of moving my ancestral graves here now."

The young master looked down; the wind blowing up from the pool was extremely fierce. He clicked his tongue and said, "It's so deep, how are we going to get down?"

I pointed to some old trees growing horizontally on the pool wall below and said, "We can go down along these things, it shouldn't be a problem. There must have been water in this pool originally, but the water was diverted out when the mausoleum was built."

I thought of the caves below the Shatian Gorge and wondered if the water had been diverted there. No wonder the Mengjiang River there was so clear.

But looking at this deep pool, I felt a little strange. Why was there a map carved on the Zhenhe Dragon Coffin showing how to get here? Did the owner of the dragon coffin just want the person who found it to come here, or was there some other purpose? I felt uneasy thinking about it and vaguely felt that there might be something wrong with the place below.

By this point, I could hardly contain my excitement, whether from the pressure of time or from my curiosity about the ancient tomb below. After discussing it with the young master, we realized it was getting late, so we decided to head down.

We checked our equipment and found that we had already brought the rope and some essential items with us. Most of the things we hadn't brought were food and some tools like binoculars, which weren't particularly necessary for us. So I decided to go down now and not turn back, otherwise, if we got lost in the forest, we wouldn't have much time to struggle.

The young master was worried that our food and rations would be eaten by wild animals if left there. I told him that the food was a minor issue. First, I didn't believe that wild animals would be used to eating compressed biscuits; second, we had crossbows and could find a way to hunt some game, so we wouldn't starve to death.

The young master convinced me, and we pulled out a rope and measured its length. This deep pool was at least one or two hundred meters deep. I estimated that it would take at least a morning to get down to the bottom, and the pool walls were covered with moss because of the very humid environment. I figured we'd be sweating bullets while climbing up.

I said to the girl, "It's too dangerous here. You shouldn't go down. Just wait for us up here."

The girl tied her hair up, ignored me, and started packing her gear.

I repeated myself, and she glared at me but still didn't say anything.

I sighed inwardly, finding it amusing that I'd been rebuffed; it seemed there was no way to negotiate. This girl and I were exactly alike.

After everything was tidied up and secured, the young master threw down the rope, and we tied one end to a rock, then secured both sides to make a sailor's ring. I took the lead and climbed down.

As soon as I stepped on it, I slid down. The pool wall was too slippery, and I couldn't get my foot on it at all. I tried to push myself up several times, but I just kept spinning in place and couldn't get down.

Fortunately, there were many vines growing from the cliffs or crevices nearby. I tried to pull them down for leverage, anticipating that the journey would be very difficult.

It took me a full twenty minutes to step on the horizontal pine below. I stomped on it twice and found that there was no problem. The roots were firmly gripping the crevices of the rocks and should be able to support the weight of the three of us.

I whistled to those above, signaling them to come down on their own, and then I clung to the side of the pool wall, looking down. We were now very close to the waterfalls, and nine enormous waterfalls, some near and some far, were cascading down all around us. The cylindrical Sound Pool was like a sound amplifier, filled with the roaring sound of water.

The air below was thick with mist, but you could see a huge rock in the middle of the pool. Water from the waterfall cascaded over the rock, then gathered around it and flowed into several caves at the bottom of the pool. There seemed to be no man-made structures there.

If Liu Qu's tomb were built here, how would the problem of surface water seepage be solved? I find that strange. This location, considered an auspicious burial site according to feng shui theory, shouldn't be suitable for underground structures in our common sense. Is this feng shui nonsense?

The young master and the maid came down to my side one after the other. The pine tree made a painful, hoarse sound. The young master was a little dazed and dared not look down, but the maid was stunned by the scenery around her.

We rested for a while, then repeated our previous plan and continued down. The next section was much longer than the first, and because there was a waterfall near the bottom, I couldn't just force my way through it vertically, so we had to move laterally for a distance.

I'm not a professional cliff climber at all; I could only move cautiously, inch by inch, clinging to the vines. The light here was already quite dim. When we started climbing, it was just dawn, but now the sun had risen, and because of the angle, it appeared even darker. I had to take out my flashlight and hold it in my mouth.