Chapter 95: A Strange Message

I lunged forward too quickly, and both my hands just barely managed to grab one of Chen Canghai’s. After everything we’d been through, my upper body strength had clearly improved a lot.

But I was panicking. With so many loose stones already falling from the edge, it was obvious that the rock here was unstable and brittle. If I pulled too slowly, the next ones to fall could be the two of us. I was desperate to haul Chen Canghai up.

So I shouted at him, “Give me your other hand! I’ll pull you up!”

But instead of doing that, Chen Canghai turned his gaze toward me and stared blankly for a long moment. Then he started making gestures with the hand that was still dangling in the air, as if trying to tell me something. But he made no move to reach up with his other hand.

I couldn’t make sense of the look on his face. Thinking he hadn’t heard me, I panicked and grabbed his one hand with both of mine, using every ounce of strength I had to pull him up.

“I can’t fucking understand you! Quit waving your damn hand! This platform’s about to collapse! Whatever you want to say, say it after I’ve pulled you up!” I shouted.

At first, Chen Canghai didn’t help at all. I figured maybe his legs couldn’t reach the edge yet. But once I’d managed to drag his upper body over the ledge, I suddenly felt the tension in my arms release. The next second, the guy pushed off a rock and rolled himself up in one swift move.

But the momentum sent me stumbling backward several steps, and I landed flat on my butt on the stone platform, covered in dust and looking like a complete mess. Before I could even get back on my feet, Chen Canghai rushed over and yanked me up.

He pointed ahead, and only then did I realize that the stone beneath us couldn’t bear both our weight. It was crumbling fast, falling away into the abyss below. Behind us, the stone wall’s flip-door had already sealed shut, tight as a drum. In front of us stood a series of naturally formed stone pillars.

These pillars were oddly shaped, their tops roughly level with the platform we were on. A quick glance revealed more than a dozen of them, each spaced two or three meters apart. This was probably our only way out.

Chen Canghai stood beside me, slapped his thigh muscles a few times, then took a short running start and leapt without hesitation onto the first pillar. I stood frozen, stunned. Damn, talk about karma—just a moment ago it was Chen Canghai in danger, and now it was my turn. I took a few steps forward, but my legs were already going weak.

This wasn’t just a meter or so of distance. It had to be at least two and a half meters! How the hell was I supposed to make that jump?! I couldn’t help but bitterly think, if only Lu A’yao were here. It might get a little messy, but he’d definitely be able to get me across with that whip of his.

The rock beneath my feet was crumbling fast. I figured I had maybe thirty seconds left before I’d be joining the rubble in the abyss. Chen Canghai had made it across, but unlike that heartless bastard Hou Jinshan, he didn’t just leave me behind. He crouched at the edge of the pillar and reached a hand out toward me.

I shouted, “It’s too far! I can’t make it!”

Chen Canghai made a big pulling gesture, and I guessed he meant for me to jump and that he’d catch me on the other side.

The stone was already crumbling beneath my heels. I gritted my teeth, took two strides, and leapt from the edge of the platform. My toes just barely landed on the pillar, but I couldn’t keep my balance and started to fall backward. Chen Canghai grabbed me by the collar and yanked me up onto the pillar.

I collapsed on the ground, legs trembling uncontrollably, sweat pouring down my face. When I looked back at the platform I’d just been standing on, it and the coffin—both inner and outer—had completely collapsed and vanished into the abyss.

At that moment, I wasn’t too worried about whether He Yu and the others would find the flip-door mechanism again. Usually, these kinds of doors require a pivot connection on both sides. Now that the platform behind the door was gone, it had become a dead gate. Without the corresponding mechanism, it shouldn’t be able to flip back again.

But what I was worried about was whether they might try to blow the door open.

Then I suddenly remembered the walkie-talkie clipped to my waist. He Yu had thought it was too heavy and didn’t bring his when we got off the boat, but Lu A’yao definitely had his on him. Whether or not it would work, it was worth a try.

I turned it on and said a few words. Chen Canghai sat beside me, clearly exhausted. After a short wait, we actually got a response, but strangely, the voice didn’t sound like it came from He Yu’s group.

What came through was a mess of static and electrical noise. Chen Canghai noticed it too and leaned in. I brought the walkie-talkie closer so we could both listen.

“Hello? Han Jian? Is this someone from Han Jian’s team? What’s your situation over there?” I spoke into the walkie-talkie.

A broken, fragmented voice came through quickly: “Shi…”

Shi? I wasn’t even sure that was the right syllable. It was hard to receive any signal in a place like this, and even the walkie-talkie wasn’t immune. The voice was faint, like it wasn’t even being spoken directly into the device.

I looked up at Chen Canghai. “What?”

The walkie-talkie crackled again: “Stone… first…”

Then the static cut off abruptly. Chen Canghai and I stared at each other, completely baffled. The only words I could make out were “stone” and “first,” but the more I thought about it, the more it didn’t sound like a real sentence. In fact, the more I listened, the less it sounded like something a person would say.

It didn’t sound human at all.

We waited a long time, but the walkie-talkie stayed silent. I figured no one on the team had heard us. And whatever we had heard earlier might not have been a human voice at all—could’ve just been the wind. No matter how I turned it over in my mind, I couldn’t make sense of it. So I decided to stop wasting time trying to solve it.

We were inside a massive cavity within the mountain, like a naturally formed giant cave. The ceiling was incredibly high, far beyond the reach of our small flashlights. Without cold flares, we couldn’t see the top. The stone pillars stretched forward, standing alone in the darkness, their ends disappearing into pitch black.

The pillar beneath our feet was relatively stable, but its top was far too small. If we fell from here, those jagged, uneven rock walls would tear us apart before we even hit the bottom.

These stone pillars looked like masterpieces carved by nature itself, yet at the same time, they resembled a path—one that stretched endlessly into the darkness. My instincts told me that something was waiting at the end of that darkness.

Chen Canghai pulled out his phone and typed a message for me. He said, “We can’t just stay here. Who knows if that infant corpse followed us through the Turning Gate? I only have one gun and five bullets. If we run into it, we won’t stand a chance. Moving forward might be our only way out.”

I completely agreed with him. We had no way of contacting the outside world, and waiting here served no purpose. If that cursed thing showed up again while we were just sitting around… with the speed and teeth it had, the two of us would be as good as dead.

But when I looked at the increasingly wide gaps between the stone pillars, I nearly lost the will to live. Still, there was no choice but to grit my teeth and jump. I swallowed hard and said, “You’ve got better jumping power than me. You go first, and I’ll follow.”

Chen Canghai turned to estimate the distance to the next pillar. Suddenly, something came to mind, and I quickly grabbed his arm. “When I pulled you up onto the platform earlier, you made some hand gestures I didn’t understand. Were you trying to tell me something?”

He froze, probably surprised I remembered. After a moment of thought, he shook his head and turned back to measuring the distance with his eyes.

I sat down, resting my face in my hands, frustrated. Fine, if he doesn’t want to talk, then forget it. The guy clearly had more skills than I did anyway. I should focus on mentally preparing myself for what’s ahead. This damn place seemed tailor-made to torment me—if it wasn’t climbing cliffs, it was jumping across pillars. Absolutely infuriating.

Thank god I wasn’t in here alone. If I had fallen in by myself, I’d be in serious trouble.