The phosphorescent glow gradually moved away into the distance.
Yi Sa spoke in a low voice, “Bring your tools, let’s follow and check it out.”
Wasn’t it said that “when in a dangerous situation, don’t immediately expose yourself if something seems strange”? Zong Hang wanted to say something but swallowed his words.
His legs were already trembling from hunger. If they hid for another three to five hours, he probably wouldn’t even be able to walk. Whether you stick your neck out or pull it back, the blade falls the same – might as well face the challenge head-on. Who knows, they might make a discovery.
He gripped the fire shovel tightly and followed Yi Sa out.
Darkness surrounded them, with only that moving earth giving off light. As long as you had eyes, you wouldn’t lose track of it. The two followed closely without making a sound, constantly watching for any movement around them. After following for an unknown time and making several twists and turns, the glowing earth suddenly veered toward a large steel ship pressed against the rock wall.
The ship was seventy to eighty meters long, appearing as if it had fallen from a great height. Its bow was planted in the ground while its stern was wedged against the high rock wall. Its size, construction, and length strongly resembled the legendary Kobe Maru.
The two had been here before while searching for an exit, but because the ship was standing vertically, it was difficult to climb. To conserve energy, they had only checked the bottom level, and after confirming there was no way out, they had left.
It seemed there was something mysterious about this ship.
Yi Sa let out a long breath and looked up. They couldn’t see where the “end” of this glowing earth was, only knowing that its tail end was wrapped around Jiang Xiaoguang – now, Jiang Xiaoguang was being hoisted up head-down like being pulled by a rope from above, his body occasionally hitting protruding window frames and jutting equipment, making clanging sounds.
The sounds echoed down, making one’s scalp tingle.
Yi Sa shook her hand: “I need to climb up and see. Follow it – we might find a way out. Can you manage? If not, find a hidden spot to hide. If nothing happens to me, I’ll come back for you. If something does happen, you’ll have to figure things out yourself.”
She felt that in a situation where self-preservation was uncertain, it was better to be clear rather than ambiguous.
Zong Hang immediately nodded: “I’ll follow you. Don’t wait for me, I’ll keep up.”
He had never wanted to be a burden to others, but this was all he could do now. Yi Sa said “Be careful then” and quickly began climbing up.
Fortunately, it was much easier than climbing smooth rock walls. The ship’s body was uneven, with many steel cables, masts, and protrusions that could be used as footholds. Since this was a transport ship, there were many living quarters, and with the ship standing vertically, the cabin windows extended upward like floors of a skyscraper. When tired from climbing, one could temporarily crawl into these for rest.
The glowing earth wasn’t moving particularly fast. After climbing intensely for a while, Yi Sa was not far from it. She dared not get too close, fearing the earth might react strangely, so she kicked open a nearby window, intending to rest for a moment.
Unexpectedly, as she stepped in, she stumbled on something round, nearly falling. Yi Sa quickly grabbed the window handle to steady herself, then looked down.
In the faint light from outside, she saw the object was a crude purple clay teapot.
Looking around the room, it was a single cabin. The furniture was overturned, and a wooden box had fallen to the floor, its lid open, revealing glimpses of gilt Buddha heads and various strings of beads. Some gave off faint yellow-green and orange-red colors, clearly night-pearls.
The legend that the Kobe Maru was a treasure ship proved true. Yi Sa guessed this room must have belonged to an officer who had selected some items from the main storage to enjoy during the journey, not expecting that man’s plans would be thwarted by fate, ultimately unable to take them away.
She walked over, lifted the box lid, grabbed several of the brightest strands and put them on her arm, then went back out.
Looking up, she could still faintly see Jiang Xiaoguang’s dangling head.
Looking down, Zong Hang was struggling to climb up. Yi Sa whistled to him, waited for him to look up, showed him the beaded arm, and then continued upward.
The glowing earth changed direction again.
With a whoosh, it dragged Jiang Xiaoguang through a dark window.
Yi Sa agilely followed, and after entering, selected a string of beads to hang on the window handle before continuing to trail quietly.
The room wasn’t the endpoint – Jiang Xiaoguang was dragged out through the door.
Yi Sa broke off a string of beads, holding the beads in her palm to easily drop as markers.
Now they were almost entirely inside the Kobe Maru. Because the ship was vertical, the walls that had once been ceiling and floor were now on the left and right, while doors appeared above and below at intervals. Yi Sa walked very carefully, cold sweat streaming, having forgotten even her hunger. When passing doorways, she always tested with her toe first.
If those doors suddenly opened, whether falling or being yanked up like weeds, neither would be good.
She didn’t notice that after she passed, one of the doors above opened slightly.
This tense ordeal finally came to an end.
After turning another corner, a branching tunnel suddenly appeared.
The scene was extremely strange – the modern ship’s steel material seamlessly connected with the stone rock wall.
Before Yi Sa could react, the glowing earth accelerated away with Jiang Xiaoguang’s body, while the tunnel opening slowly began to shrink.
No wonder they couldn’t find the exit!
The ship’s bottom must have had a huge breach, equivalent to a “door,” and then it was stood up against the rock wall. The glowing earth formed an “automatic door” at the point where the breach met the wall – closed when not needed, growing and expanding outward when needed, integrating seamlessly with the breach. To people below, it just looked like craggy protrusions in the rock wall.
Such elaborate concealment – if not for waking from that nightmare tonight, happening to see the glowing earth dragging Jiang Xiaoguang, and gathering the courage to follow and look, how would they have discovered what was going on here!
After another day or two, when she and Zong Hang had died of hunger or thirst, this glowing earth would unhurriedly stretch out again and drag them away too.
But drag them away for what?
The opening was shrinking smaller and smaller. Yi Sa sprinted forward, making a leaping bounce mid-way, her body shooting up like an agile monkey jumping through a fire hoop in a circus, whooshing through. After rolling to a landing, without thinking she threw a string of beads back toward the opening – coincidentally, the string was half-swallowed, with the other half presumably dangling outside, like night pearls on a string growing out of the rock wall.
Jiang Xiaoguang’s dragged body still led the way ahead. The passage wasn’t tall – Yi Sa had to walk half-stooped, but at least visibility wasn’t a problem here, getting brighter as they went…
Finally emerging from the passage, Yi Sa looked up and suddenly froze.
What she saw made her blood run cold.
How to describe it? This was another solution cave, seemingly even larger than the ship graveyard, but impossible to measure because huge curtains hung down from the ceiling, like cloth hanging from drying poles in an ancient dye house…
The width and height of those curtains made her feel like a crawling ant walking below them.
Yi Sa walked forward, dumbfounded.
Coming closer, she saw they weren’t cloth but formed by the glowing earth – countless small hexagons pressed together like individual cells in a honeycomb, the cells combining into panel-like combs stretching from ceiling to floor, and these curtain-like combs forming the entire large “hive.”
Or more precisely, an earth hive.
The glowing earth’s light flickered unstably, and in each cell lay a person.
Looking up, Jiang Xiaoguang’s corpse was being carried by that strip of earth, contracting toward a cell high up – from this angle, his corpse looked like a bean pod, the strip of earth like the pod’s thin stem.
Yi Sa’s mind was in chaos as she walked almost mechanically beside the cells as if she had wandered into an endless giant cargo hold, with shelves reaching from earth to sky, making it hard to breathe.
She looked into the cells.
This section contained young and middle-aged men, their corpses fairly well preserved, similar to bodies kept in burial jars. They wore ancient clothing that looked like battle robes, some with arrows and daggers still in their vital points.
Could this be… from when Zhu Yuanzhang defeated Chen Youliang at Poyang Lake?
Water ghosts were very familiar with river currents and knew the battles on Hanging Water Lake well: At the end of the Yuan Dynasty, various warlords fought for power, eventually leaving only two rebel armies competing for control – Zhu Yuanzhang’s Ming army and Chen Youliang’s Han army.
At that time, the decisive battle that determined Zhu Yuanzhang’s victory was the naval battle at Poyang Lake. The Ming army had 200,000 troops while the Han army claimed 600,000. This confrontation was called the largest naval battle of the medieval world, resulting in Zhu Yuanzhang’s victory despite being outnumbered, determining the subsequent course of history.
However, in the legends around Poyang Lake, Zhu Yuanzhang had divine help. They say during the naval battle, he was almost defeated and captured when a giant turtle appeared from the lake bottom and saved him from danger. After Zhu Yuanzhang became emperor, he thanked the turtle for saving him by granting it the title “King Who Stabilizes the River” and built the King’s Temple by the lake.
This King’s Temple is now the Master Temple.
These young and middle-aged men in ancient battle dress, so numerous – could they be Ming or Han soldiers who sank in the Poyang Lake battle?
Yi Sa turned to another curtain of cells.
This row was different, containing both men and women who appeared to be fishermen making their living on the lake, barefoot in short clothes, some wearing headbands, others with half-shaved heads and braids.
Turning to another, she unexpectedly saw what appeared to be Japanese people wearing boots, white shirts, and belts, some in military uniforms.
Continuing, she saw people in increasingly modern clothing – undershirts, rubber shoes, striped track pants…
Yi Sa had a vague feeling.
These were people who had died in these waters over time – if not all, at least a large portion of them.
Why were they arranged so neatly and orderly here?
Was the glowing earth giving these people proper burial?
Water ghosts traditionally showed respect for the dead, and for those who died in storms and waves, having their bodies properly laid to rest could be considered a good thing, but something about this scene seemed wrong…
A spark suddenly flashed in Yi Sa’s mind.
They’re coming.
She suddenly felt chilled to the bone.
Did “they” refer to these people? This way of storing them didn’t seem like for eternal rest, but more like preparation for something.
“They’re coming” – did it mean they would return to life?
That didn’t make sense either. It would be understandable if a small group of people sought immortality, but the people in these cells spanned ancient to modern times with nothing in common – why gather them together for resurrection?
As she pondered this, her back suddenly tensed.
She heard the slow dragging sound of chains.
Chains?
Yi Sa’s heart jumped.
Was it Jiang Jun? It must be – when at the lake bottom, she had seen chains wrapped around his waist, locked on with no key or suitable tool to remove them.
Was he moving around?