Chapter 54: Into the Water

I no longer had the energy to complain. Clutching the yellowed slip of paper, I held up my phone—already sealed in a waterproof pouch—and began frantically searching for a signal beneath the massive waterfall. But in a place this remote, cell reception was even rarer than the scenery.

After scouring the entire area and coming up empty, I could only find a shaded rock to sit on. I glanced at the paper in my hand, feeling utterly helpless. All I could do now was take out my phone and start saving the numbers on the paper into my contacts, one by one.

“Young Master Gan, what are you looking for?” Hou Jinshan had somehow appeared behind me without a sound.

I quickly shoved both the phone and the paper into my pocket, brushed the dust off my hands, adjusted my posture, and pretended I hadn’t heard his question. “How’s Boss Li doing? Is the situation down there what you expected? When are we heading out?”

Hou Jinshan squatted on the rock beside me, took a drag from his cigarette, and nodded. “There’s a huge fissure beneath the waterfall. It should lead straight to the River Channel of the ruins. There might be other possibilities, but we’ll only know for sure once we get down there.”

“As for Li… he’s probably not making it out of here.”

His sudden remark caught me off guard. I hesitated before saying, “If he’s seriously injured, we can leave him up top to rest.”

“You think he’d agree to that?” Hou Jinshan shot back, giving me a sidelong glance. “You’d better worry about yourself first.”

With that, he went off to find Lai Qi. Lai Qi had a rat-like face and shifty eyes—your classic petty thief type. In the real world, he’d be the kind of guy who couldn’t keep his hands to himself.

But according to Hou Jinshan, Lai Qi didn’t have the guts for anything big. He’d never be more than a lackey in this life. Still, he had one redeeming quality: he was an excellent swimmer.

I stood up from the rock and gauged the depth of the water. The area closest to the shore was just over a meter deep, but a few steps toward the center revealed a steep drop-off—just a few meters in, and it became an abyss.

The pool stretched all the way to the back of the cavern, which was partially hidden by the spray from the waterfall. No one knew how deep the cave went. If geological shifts had altered the terrain here, then the River Channel we were looking for might be completely submerged.

We were only equipped with light diving gear. When Hou Jinshan had made his plans, he hadn’t anticipated such drastic geological changes. None of us were experienced divers, and with the gear we had, forcing our way in would be far too risky.

If the River Channel was indeed below the pool—or even deeper—we’d have to come up with a new plan.

Li Wanchou had Lai Qi suit up and dive in alone for a preliminary look. I shielded my eyes from the blinding sunlight and checked the time on my phone. It had been ten minutes since Lai Qi went under. Everything was still calm.

The sun crept higher, and I decided to move to a shadier spot. Just as I stood up, I spotted a head breaking the surface of the water in the distance. The sudden splash startled all of us. I was closest, so I jumped off the rock and rushed over to pull Lai Qi ashore.

He grabbed my hand with such force that he nearly dragged me in with him. He scrambled out in a panic, ripped off his breathing tube, and collapsed on the rocks, coughing up water. It looked like he’d swallowed a lot. The way he clung to the stone, gasping and trembling, made it seem like he was running from something.

Hou Jinshan ran over and smacked him a few times. “Well? How deep is it in there? Did you see the River Channel?”

Lai Qi’s eyes were bloodshot from coughing. He nodded frantically, then suddenly started shaking his head. He looked like he’d lost his mind. Li Wanchou came over too, while I slowly straightened up and stepped aside. Watching Lai Qi’s condition, I felt a chill creeping down my spine.

“You bastard! What’s with the nodding and shaking? Did you see it or not? Speak!” Hou Jinshan snapped, grabbing Lai Qi by the collar and yanking him to his feet.

Terrified, Lai Qi stammered for a long moment before blurting out, “I—I saw it. Part of the River Channel is in there… but we can’t get in any deeper.”

If the River Channel was visible, that meant there was a constructed bank. And if there was a bank, we wouldn’t need to deep dive—we could just swim a short distance and then walk along the edge. According to Hou Jinshan’s research, the River Channel was a critical part of the ruins—a drainage hub. If we could access it, we’d be able to reach the central area.

But Lai Qi had only glimpsed the outermost edge. Why was he so certain we couldn’t go further?

“Why? Why do you say that?” I couldn’t help asking.

Lai Qi slowly turned to look at me. I saw unmistakable terror in his eyes. His whole body trembled as he said, “It’s… it’s full of people in there.”

Full of people?

The moment he said it, everyone fell silent. A cold draft seemed to slip down the back of my neck. What kind of sick joke was this? There wasn’t even a bird out here—people? And not just one or two, but so many we couldn’t even get through?

The sky darkened. I swallowed hard and instinctively took a step back. Lai Qi’s words had poured cold water over everyone’s adventurous zeal. Li Wanchou gathered us for an emergency meeting.

A group of grown men huddled by the shore. Li Wanchou was the first to speak. “What now? This place is supposed to be completely uninhabited. How could there be people inside that waterfall?”

“Could he have seen… water ghosts?”

The one speaking squatted beside me. He was one of Lai Qi’s underlings, called Chou Zai. I figured his nickname probably had something to do with the large burn scar covering half his face.

Hou Jinshan raised his hand and smacked him across the head. “Quit spouting nonsense, damn it! A water ghost? I’ve been in this line of work for years—what haven’t I seen? Besides, this place is remote, surrounded by mountains and rivers, peaceful in all directions. Even if there were ghosts, they wouldn’t amount to anything! Probably just that brat Lai getting spooked and seeing things, and now you’re all panicking for nothing!”

At that, Li Wanchou followed up with a question. “Then what do you suggest we do next, Marquis Hou?”

Hou Jinshan stroked the small tuft of beard on his chin in a show of thoughtfulness and said in a deliberately mysterious tone, “Doesn’t matter what it is—ghost or not. Since there’s a river channel, there must be an entrance. We’ll go down and take a look. That’s the only way to find out.”

Surprisingly, I actually agreed with Hou Jinshan this time. After all, hearing is one thing, seeing is another. In a place like this, Lai Qi’s claim that it was “all people” didn’t sound convincing. If we wanted to know what was really going on down there, we had to see it for ourselves.

So everyone started gearing up. I’d never gone diving before—zero experience—so after putting on my equipment, I had Xiao Wu take me snorkeling a few times in the shallows. I needed to make sure I could swim with a steady breathing rhythm once we were inside, to avoid choking on water.

Once all the preparations were done, Lai Qi had more or less calmed down too. He was terrible at expressing himself, and even after settling down, he still stammered and couldn’t describe what he saw. In the end, we didn’t press him any further.

We packed our emergency supplies, strapped on our fins, and began making our way from the rocks closest to the waterfall toward its center. The rushing water pounded against my face, blurring my vision. I wiped the water away just in time to see Lai Qi dive headfirst into the pool.

I adjusted my breathing. Xiao Wu patted my shoulder and made a few hand signals, telling me he’d be right behind me and to stick close to the team ahead.

I nodded, then followed Hou Jinshan and plunged into the water.