Chapter 89: Snake Tide

He Yu and I stood in front of the rear cargo hatch. We exchanged a glance, I gave him a nod, and he stepped forward to kick the door open with a loud bang. The space where the diving gear, once covered with waterproof tarps, should have been was now completely empty.

I let out a long breath of relief. He Yu came over and clapped me on the shoulder. “See? I told you you were overthinking it. They probably found something, maybe even struck gold. Seeing that we were busy suiting up, they didn’t bother calling us!”

Even though the diving gear had disappeared along with the others, I still couldn’t completely set my mind at ease. When I was down on the lower deck, I hadn’t heard a single sound. What kind of emergency could have happened in just twenty minutes to make Han Jian and the rest abandon ship?

“What we should do right now is sit down and have a smoke. Who knows, maybe they’ll be back any minute,” He Yu said, hooking his foot around a folding stool to drag it out from under the table.

I was not as carefree as he was, and there was no way I could sit still. Sure, the missing gear proved they hadn’t just vanished into thin air, but where had they gone?

If it were just Han Jian and his men, I might think they had gone off to explore somewhere. But Lu A’yao was among the missing too.

I turned around. “No, He Yu. Lu A’yao was the one who told me to get you to change gear. If they really found something in those twenty minutes, there’s no way he would leave without waiting for me. He wouldn’t just take off with Han Jian and leave us behind.”

“Is it really that strange he didn’t give you a heads-up? That bastard met with Han in Yunnan behind your back, didn’t he? Gan Ji, you trust him too much. You treat him like one of us, but that guy has way too many secrets. Not like me; what you see is what you get.” He Yu was still trying to hook the stool with his foot, but it refused to budge.

I couldn’t stand watching him anymore. I walked over, bent down, and reached under the table while scolding him, “You lazy ass! Can’t you just bend that noble waist of yours for once?”

Suddenly, a strange sizzling hiss buzzed right by my ear. A bad feeling hit me, and I quickly tried to pull my hand back, but I was a second too late. As I jerked my arm back, I came face to face with a long, writhing creature clamped firmly onto my wrist.

He Yu saw it and cursed, drawing his knife to stab at the snake’s tail. “Son of a bitch! Where the hell did this thing come from?!”

I hit the deck with a thud, flailing my arm wildly. Bleeding from He Yu’s stab, the snake loosened its grip, and I flung it away into the water.

He Yu turned to check on me, and we both looked down just in time to see several more snakes slithering up out of the water. He Yu cursed, “What the hell?! Why are there so many damn snakes in the water? Is this ship a snake magnet or something?!”

My wrist was throbbing violently, the bite mark already beginning to swell. Everything had happened so fast that I hadn’t even gotten a good look at what kind of snake it was.

More snakes began leaping from the water onto the deck. He Yu started slashing at them with his knife, and I jumped in to help. We fought like mad, but no matter how many we drove back, more kept coming.

We were quickly overwhelmed. A snake slithered up He Yu’s arm, and he screamed, tossing his knife aside and running over to me. “This isn’t working, Little Yao! We-we need a new plan! This place is a damn snake pit!”

“We’ve got no way out. If this keeps up, our only option is to jump into the water!” I shouted.

In the time it took to say those two sentences, the deck beneath our feet was already crawling with snakes. It was clear we couldn’t stay on the ship any longer. Something on board was drawing them in, making them swarm the deck like lunatics.

“What?! Jump in? Aren’t there even more snakes in the water?! That’s not escaping, that’s suicide!” He Yu yelled.

I didn’t answer, but I was already edging toward the rear of the ship near the cargo hold. It wasn’t that I wanted to move, but the deck had become a nest of snakes. I pressed myself against the back of the ship and glanced at the pitch-black water. The surface was calm. It seemed the snake swarm was concentrated at the bow, and the stern was still untouched.

I said, “Quick, jump! There aren’t any snakes back here!”

“Are you serious?! Don’t lie to me!” He Yu shouted back.

Before he could finish, I yanked my diving mask down and leapt into the water. The icy cold swallowed me whole, sending a shiver through my entire body. I surfaced, gasping, only to have He Yu crash down right on top of me.

Caught off guard, I was shoved back underwater and swallowed several mouthfuls before I managed to come up again, coughing and furious. I shoved him away. “Damn it! Couldn’t you look before jumping?! You almost drowned me!”

“Hey! Little Yao, there really aren’t any snakes back here! This is nuts!” He Yu said, dog-paddling beside me.

His words made me pause. Back on the ship, everything had happened so fast I hadn’t had time to think. But now, the cold water jolted my mind awake.

Anyone with a bit of common sense knows that water snakes aren’t that common. Most of the time, they’re washed ashore by river currents or come up because they can’t survive in the water. The one that bit me probably attacked because I startled it while moving the stool.

The snakes that had climbed onto the deck earlier were just slithering around; they hadn’t attacked us directly. That meant whatever had drawn them on board wasn’t us. And the fact that the entire swarm was concentrated at the bow, that was really strange.

Could it be that what the captain said about the ship hitting something… was actually a submerged snake nest?

Just as that thought crossed my mind, I felt something brush against my flippers underwater. A flood of terrible memories surged up, and I instinctively pulled my legs in. He Yu pointed behind me with a trembling finger.

Before I could turn, a huge splash erupted right beside me. I looked back, only to be blinded by a headlamp shining directly into my eyes. I lost my balance and went under again, choking on more water. I was so startled I nearly passed out.

He Yu grabbed me with one hand and hauled me up. Only then did I see what had burst out of the water.

It wasn’t a thing.

It was Lu A’yao.

He Yu raised a hand to greet him, but Lu A’yao quickly made a silencing gesture. The moment he did, both of us froze. Whenever he acted like this, it usually meant we were in extreme danger.

We floated motionless on the surface of the water. Then Lu A’yao took the oxygen regulator out of his mouth and gave us a signal.

We understood immediately and followed his lead. After connecting our oxygen gear and taking a few test breaths, Lu A’yao put his diving mask back on and dove straight into the water.

He Yu and I exchanged a glance before quickly diving in after him. The water below was pitch black. We had jumped in such a rush that we hadn’t put on our waterproof headlamps, so I could only faintly make out the glow of Lu A’yao’s headlamp ahead.

Thankfully, he wasn’t being reckless this time. He stayed underwater, waiting for us instead of swimming off on his own. I reached out and grabbed his shoulder, then turned back to pull He Yu’s arm and gestured for him to grab the strap tied around my waist.

I hadn’t planned on doing this, but after the bizarre experience we had in Shennongjia, and considering how poor the visibility was now, I decided this was the best way to avoid getting separated.

Lu A’yao glanced at me. I thought he was asking with his eyes if I was ready, so I gave him a big thumbs-up in response. But after holding it there for a while, he still didn’t react.

I thought, what’s going on? Are things between us so bad now that he won’t even let me grab his shoulder?

Then I saw He Yu suddenly swim up from behind and snatch something from Lu A’yao’s hand, stuffing it into mine. I felt it, and it was the Soft Whip. That’s when it clicked. I had misunderstood. He wanted the three of us to hold onto the whip and swim forward together.

Realizing this, I passed the end of the whip to He Yu, then turned back and gave Lu A’yao another thumbs-up. Only then did he turn and lead us deeper into the pitch-black water.