Chapter 67: Memory Distortion?

After changing the bandages and doing a quick rewrap, we all fell into silence. When Hou Jinshan woke up, he immediately started fawning over Lu A’yao, babbling nonsense non-stop. Lu A’yao didn’t respond to a single word, but that didn’t stop Hou Jinshan from chattering away like he was on fire.

I kept quiet simply because I didn’t want to deal with him. I also didn’t want him overhearing too much of our conversation. As for Lu A’yao, I figured he had something on his mind—he wasn’t usually this cold, not even back in Gansu.

Right now, I had zero trust left in Hou Jinshan. Since Lu A’yao didn’t seem in a hurry to leave, I figured I’d lean against the stone wall and catch a quick nap. But before I could even close my eyes, that bastard Hou came slinking over again, grinning at me with that shameless face.

“Heh heh heh, Little Master Gan, everything between us was just a big misunderstanding! I’m old and muddle-headed, and I offended you and your companion earlier. But as the saying goes, let bygones be bygones. You’re a bigger man, surely you won’t hold a grudge against someone like me. I promise, from here on out, I’ll give it my all—everything I’ve learned in this lifetime—to help you two find that great treasure!”

He went on apologizing for quite a while, but I acted like I didn’t hear a thing. Hou Jinshan tried to keep the conversation going, but then, out of nowhere, Lu A’yao suddenly kicked over the fire in front of him, snuffing it out in one go. My reflexes kicked in—I immediately grabbed the cold steel blade beside me and raised it in front of my chest.

Darkness swallowed the cave in an instant. Hou Jinshan was so scared his legs gave out, and he practically collapsed against me, trembling like a pile of jelly. I heard him muttering under his breath, “It’s happening again, it’s happening again, it’s happening again…”

What’s happening again? I was just about to ask when Lu A’yao suddenly reached over and pressed down on my arm. I felt him shift positions quickly, moving to stand in front of me, closer to the cave entrance.

I quieted down and focused on listening for any sounds beyond the ear of the Relief Sculpture. With the fire out, the cave returned to its pitch-black, primal state, and the crackling of burning wood was gone.

After about two minutes, I started to hear something strange from above. It’s hard to describe the sound—if I had to compare it, it was like the tip of a blade scraping against stone. The source of the sound was very close, probably right above us on the stone ceiling. It was the kind of noise that made your skin crawl and your insides twist.

Could it be Yu Jingzi? Had someone from Yu Jingzi’s group come back?

I wanted to whisper to Lu A’yao to go check, but for some reason, he insisted on keeping me pinned down. I didn’t understand why, but considering the situation, I figured he had more experience in places like this. So I stayed crouched with him for nearly twenty minutes. My legs were going numb by the time the sound above us finally faded away.

Hou Jinshan collapsed onto the ground. “It’s gone, it’s gone, finally gone.”

I frowned. “What are you guys so afraid of? What was that noise outside?”

Lu A’yao shook his head. “No idea. Ever since we climbed onto the copper pillar, that sound’s been around. They seem really sensitive to light. I don’t know if they’re living creatures, but they probably crawled down from the top of the pillar. Judging by the sound, it’s not something a human could make.”

That reminded me of something I’d forgotten to mention earlier. Ignoring Hou Jinshan, I said, “Wait, I forgot to tell you—after the bridge collapsed, I was rescued by Yu Jingzi’s team. I followed them all the way here, but then we got trapped in a looping path on the stone staircase. We decided to throw down ropes and climb along the copper pillar.”

“Hold on, hold on, little ancestor, what did you just say?” Hou Jinshan squinted at me with his yellow teeth showing. “Stone staircase? What stone staircase?”

His question caught me off guard. I replied, a bit impatiently, “The one next to the waterfall. It’s carved into the cliffside, clearly man-made. It spirals down for at least ten or so loops. If you follow it, it leads straight here. We couldn’t see the path clearly, so we fired three flares. You didn’t see any of that?”

Hou Jinshan blinked at me like I was telling some kind of joke. That strange look in his eyes made me irrationally annoyed. What the hell was that supposed to mean? Was he doubting me?

I stared back at him coldly. “What’s with that look? You don’t believe me, is that it?”

Hou Jinshan immediately backed down, waving his hands. “No, no, I wouldn’t dare doubt you! It’s just, that stone staircase you mentioned—we didn’t see anything like that when we entered the cave. We came down through the upper River Channel, but it ends at the waterfall. There’s nothing beyond it.”

I stared at him, full of suspicion. I was convinced he was scheming something again.

Hou Jinshan quickly tried to prove himself. He slapped his thigh. “If you don’t believe me, ask Granny Yin! He was with me the whole time!”

I turned to look at Lu A’yao. He raised his eyes to meet mine and nodded. “He’s not lying. The River Channel ends at the waterfall. There’s no stone staircase on either side. And since we arrived here, it’s been pitch black the entire time. We didn’t see any flares or anything like that.”

His words left me completely disoriented. But I was just telling them what really happened. Now I felt wronged and frustrated, unable to explain myself. I spread my hands helplessly. “So what are you saying? You think I’m lying too?”

“No,” Lu A’yao said, “but are you absolutely sure you came down using a stone staircase?”

I took a deep breath, stood up, and pulled him toward the cave entrance. “That thing is real. Why would I make something like that up? The staircase spirals down right across from the ear of the Relief Sculpture. If we shine three flashlights over there, we should still be able to see part of it.”

“Give me your flashlight. I’ll show you.” I grabbed Lu A’yao’s flashlight and pulled out my own, adjusting both beams to their widest setting. Together, we aimed the twin beams at the stone wall across from us.

But in the very next second, my eyes widened in shock. I couldn’t believe what I was seeing. Hou Jinshan saw me freeze and came over to pat my shoulder.

“My dear little master, did you sleep too long and get confused? Think carefully now—how did you really get here?”

I yanked my hand away from him, my mind overwhelmed and unable to process the flood of chaotic information. Everywhere I looked, there was nothing but a vast, smooth stone wall. Embedded in the wall weren’t neatly arranged stone steps, but countless hanging coffins, piled together and stretching endlessly downward.

Some of the coffins had already had their lids pried open. Many were so old and decayed that it was impossible to tell what they once looked like. Now, they were just heaps of rotting wood. The stone steps I remembered—those had never existed.

I turned on both flashlights and jumped onto the convex surface of the bronze pillar, circling it twice on my own. What I saw confirmed it: the stone wall was completely filled with those broken coffins. There were no stone steps at all.

How could this be?! Then how did I make it here? Did I walk over coffins the whole way? Were the things I saw earlier all illusions? But how much of it was real? I remember climbing over on a rope, but when I tried to go back, the rope was gone. Was the rope also fake?

And if the rope was fake, then what about the people? What about the Liu family members I saw and spoke to? What about Yu Jingzi—was she fake too?

“Stop thinking about it,” Lu A’yao said, jogging up beside me and taking the flashlight from my right hand. His action snapped me back to reality.

He turned slightly, casting a sidelong glance at Hou Jinshan, who was still lagging behind, moving at a snail’s pace. Then he said quietly to me, “You don’t need to be afraid. In the illusions you saw, at least part of it must have been real. Where exactly did you and Liu Wan get separated?”

His words brought me back to my senses. The tangled mess of thoughts in my head slowly began to unravel. Liu Wan—so that was Yu Jingzi’s real name. It was the first time I’d heard it, and I immediately felt like something crucial had just clicked into place.

I glanced at Hou Jinshan, who was huffing and puffing his way toward the bronze pillar, and signaled with my eyes toward the massive bronze relief sculpture we’d seen earlier. Then I said in a low voice, “She said she’d come over using the rope, but after I got here and circled around, the rope was gone. And the Liu family members—they vanished too.”

Lu A’yao thought for a moment, then said, “With Liu Wan’s abilities, there’s no way she’d get trapped by a ghost wall. She must’ve sensed something was wrong early on. The fact that you made it here safely through the illusion means she was helping you behind the scenes. Besides, if you were wearing that piece of Blood Jade, there’s no way a ghost wall could affect you.”

Just as he finished speaking, Hou Jinshan finally caught up.

“You two ancestors, could you slow down a bit? These old bones of mine can’t keep up!”

Seeing him arrive, both Lu A’yao and I fell silent in unspoken agreement.

Hou Jinshan braced himself on his knees, panting heavily for a while before asking, “Granny Yin, where do we go from here? It’s coffins on all sides. Damn it, this place is practically a corpse pit. We’re not like you. If we just walk through that mess, something’s bound to go wrong.”

I raised my flashlight and swept it across the bottom of the cavern. The deeper it went, the more coffins there were—so many that they were soaking in water. Judging by the size of the fish swimming in that water, I’d say those coffins were at least half the reason they’d grown so big.

“There are too many coffins below. We can’t go any further down. We’ll have to keep climbing up,” Lu A’yao said.