Chapter 99: Battle with the Infant Corpse

A gust of cold wind brushed past my face, making me shiver inside the tunnel. Goosebumps broke out all over my body. The conclusion I’d just drawn felt ominous and unsettling.

Whoever dug this tunnel through solid rock using nothing but their bare hands must have encountered something truly bizarre. With no other way out, they resorted to this desperate measure.

I swallowed hard. Hunger was clouding my mind, making it difficult to think straight. So I pushed aside the jumble of thoughts swirling in my head and focused on crawling forward.

As long as I didn’t find the digger’s corpse in this tunnel, there was still a sliver of hope that I might survive.

The tunnel wasn’t very stable. As I crawled, small rocks kept falling from the ceiling. I wasn’t sure if it was just my imagination, but I kept hearing deep rumbling sounds from the mountain around me. The noise was loud, accompanied by tremors, and it was terrifying.

But I’d come this far. Stopping now would mean certain death. So I gritted my teeth and crawled another hundred meters or so. The beam from my flashlight started to blur in front of my eyes. That’s when I felt a stronger draft of cold air coming from the end of the tunnel.

There was hope!

Just as I was about to crawl forward with renewed excitement, I heard a sound behind me—a faint but familiar “squeak-squeak.” The noise echoed clearly in the narrow tunnel, snapping me back to full alert. It was the exact same sound I’d heard before I fell from the cliff.

That infant corpse had followed me into the tunnel. Judging by the sound, it wasn’t moving slowly either.

I instantly tensed every muscle in my body and scrambled toward the source of the breeze at the tunnel’s end. The passage was only about a dozen meters longer before it opened up.

Taking a deep breath, I tightened my core and squeezed through the final narrow gap. Suddenly, everything opened up. My hand brushed against a wall of bricks—it was the bottom of a well. The digger had tunneled straight into it, chiseling through the mountain to connect perfectly with the well’s base.

But this was a dry well, blocked at the bottom by a stone wall. It might have once been part of a channel connected to an underground river, but with the water gone, it had been filled in. The blockage was made up of four or five layers of stone—far too thick to break through with a chisel.

From the gaps between the stones, giant rats occasionally squeezed out. One of them leapt right in front of me, nearly making me slam into the wall in fright.

Meanwhile, the squeaking behind me was getting louder. I looked up and shone my flashlight toward the well’s opening. Thick vines hung down from above, their condition uncertain—some might still be alive. The well seemed about twelve or thirteen meters deep. If I climbed fast, I might be able to make it.

But one of my legs was injured. I wouldn’t be as fast as before. If that infant corpse attacked me while I was climbing, I wouldn’t stand a chance.

I stared at the dangling vines and weeds, and an idea came to me.

That infant corpse had never even been born, buried with the dead before it could leave the womb. Its brain probably wasn’t fully developed. I could set a trap. It might not kill it, but at least it could buy me a few minutes.

No sooner thought than done. I spotted a thick vine hanging just above my head, jumped up on one leg, and yanked it down. It was the thickest one I could see and still alive. I gave it a few tugs—it felt sturdy enough to hold my weight.

This vine would be my main safety line.

Then I grabbed a handful of weeds and thinner vines, quickly tying them together. They were long, many reaching all the way to the bottom of the well. Most were dry and brittle, with thorns here and there.

I tied the knots at intervals, leaving gaps in between. Fourth Brother had taught me this method when we went up the mountain to catch crabs. Combined with the friction from the weeds and thorns, it could easily trap pheasants or small birds—the more they struggled, the tighter they got entangled.

But an infant corpse wasn’t a pheasant. I needed bait. I pulled out the claw knife at my waist and glanced at the wound on my arm. I steeled myself several times but still couldn’t bring myself to cut it open.

Then I saw a few rats scurrying near my feet.

Sorry, little buddy. This isn’t my fault. Blame that damn infant corpse.

I silently chanted a few rounds of Amitabha.

Then I stomped hard on the tail of a large gray rat. Its companions scattered in panic. With a few swift slashes of my claw knife, I sent it to the afterlife. My hands dripping with blood, I gutted it and strung its organs across the trap I’d set.

Worried that the blood on my hands might attract the infant corpse, I wiped them clean on a few large leaves nearby. Only after making sure they were clean did I grab another vine, braced my foot against the rough brick wall, clamped the flashlight between my teeth, and began climbing toward the well’s opening.

I’d only made it halfway when I heard an unusual noise from below.

I quickly freed a hand and switched off the flashlight in my mouth, freezing in place to listen. After a few heart-wrenching squeals from the rats, there was a dull thud. Then the weeds and leaves on the opposite side of the well began to shake violently.

A moment later, the infant corpse let out a deafening howl as it got caught in the vines. The shriek was so piercing it felt like it was tearing through my eardrums, making my ears throb with pain.

Yes! It took the bait!

I didn’t have time to worry about my ears. I turned the flashlight back on and continued climbing without looking back. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw the vines on the other side snap with a loud crack. The infant corpse was thrashing so wildly that it was yanking entire vines and dead leaves down with it. I hadn’t expected it to be this strong!

That meant my trap would probably be destroyed within minutes.

I didn’t hesitate. I climbed faster. One hand grabbed the edge of the well, and I swung my right leg over, tumbling onto the ground above.

Just then, I heard a loud crash behind me. A rock, seemingly from nowhere, fell and slammed perfectly over the well’s opening, sealing it shut. It happened so fast. If I hadn’t pulled my leg up in time, I would’ve been trapped down there too.

Still staring at the rock that had suddenly appeared, I was blinded by a flashlight beam hitting me square in the face. I raised a hand to shield my eyes, squinting to see the person standing opposite me.

It was Tian Xiaoqi!

Where the hell did this girl come from?!

“A living person, huh!” Tian Xiaoqi grinned as she moved the flashlight away and crouched down toward me. It didn’t take her long to recognize who I was, and a flicker of surprise crossed her face.

“What the hell! It’s you? I thought it was some clueless thief who broke in through a side tunnel to steal stuff. What are you doing down in this well?”

I’d been crawling through the stone tunnel alone for so long that seeing another living person felt almost unreal. I was half-convinced it was a hallucination. If I didn’t eat something soon, I was definitely going to die down here.

I didn’t even have the strength to argue with Tian Xiaoqi. I just lay on the ground and pointed weakly at the stone that had flown over. My voice was barely audible as I said, “Did you seal it tight? There’s a corpse baby chasing me in there. If it gets out, neither of us is making it out alive.”

“A corpse baby?” Tian Xiaoqi stood up and went to check the seal again. After a thorough inspection, she came back and said, “It’s fine. It’s sealed tight. Not even a rat could get through. You look like hell. What happened on your end?”

I didn’t answer. My vision was already doubled, and I could barely make out Tian Xiaoqi kneeling beside me, rummaging through her bag. She gave me a quick once-over, then injected me with some glucose. I felt her hands move to my left leg, probing the bone.

“What are you doing?” I struggled to lift my upper body.

Tian Xiaoqi shot me a glare but didn’t stop. She kept digging through her bag until she finally pulled out half a vial of anesthetic. “You’ve got some nerve, climbing all the way up this well like that. Do you even realize your kneecap’s been dislocated for a while now?”

I was completely drained, but I managed a weak smile. “If I hadn’t climbed up, you’d be looking at a corpse right now.”

She looked at me, her delicate brows slightly furrowed. It was only then that I realized, by seniority, Tian Xiaoqi should be about the same age as me. But with all the chaos and running for our lives, this was the first time I’d really looked at her calmly.

She was beautiful, with flawless skin. Not in the stately, elegant way Liu Wan was, but with a refined, delicate look that was rare to come by. Sometimes I couldn’t help but wonder if the Tian Family had some secret beauty formula. How was it that every single one of them was either stunning or handsome?

Even if it was just genetics, for that many generations to all look that good—it just didn’t seem fair.

I was still lost in thought when Tian Xiaoqi jabbed the anesthetic into me. The pain nearly made me cry out. She rolled her shoulder, tossed the flashlight into my hands, and said seriously, “Hold the light steady. I’m resetting your knee.”