1622 Chapter 12

The dead bodies frozen against the rock face ahead looked particularly vivid. Although they were only dozens of meters away, in such conditions, it would take four or five hours to actually reach them.

When the young man turned back to look, he realized that there was no real path here; their way of moving was essentially climbing the rock face. This place was full of towering peaks and numerous ravines. While it wasn’t impossible to find footholds, it was extremely dangerous.

He remembered what the great lama, Derin, had told him before leaving: a mountain that seemed certain to cause death if one tried to climb it wasn’t truly dangerous; the real danger lay in mountains that appeared to offer a chance to ascend, as those were the ones that would claim more lives.

Even so, he had no thoughts of retreat.

Laba, being older, leaned against the cliff and rested for a long time before he could bring himself to look at the frozen corpses. There were too many of them. By observing their positions, Laba could tell how they had died—all the bodies were tightly pressed against the cliff, just like his current posture. They must have been trapped here by the previous strong winds, just like her; they had wanted to rest before moving on, but the temperature suddenly dropped, and many had frozen to death in a state of exhaustion.

In cold places, death and sleep can sometimes be indistinguishable; often, it only takes a few seconds for someone to freeze to death.

“Boss, these people must have tried to come out from that mountain. While resting here, the sudden temperature change and strong winds caused them to freeze to death. They were the lucky ones; many others may have frozen to death and then fallen off the cliff, their bodies buried in the snow, never to be found.”

“Come out?” The young man asked with curiosity, “Are there people moving in the snow mountains?”

“It’s not quite what you think, Boss. Foreigners often go in, but it’s not really about being active inside; they just want to know the paths that cross these mountain passes to traverse the uninhabited area ahead, not for any search,” Laba replied, his tone implying that the place was indeed a no-man’s land.

The young man merely nodded, his gaze naturally drifting towards the direction from which these people had come, prompting a sigh from Laba.

At that moment, another porter resting nearby shouted a few words in Tibetan. The young man didn’t understand, but Laba did. He then said to him, “They’re all strangers.”

Laba turned to look at the bodies. In the wind and snow, he couldn’t see clearly, but he could still make out the bluish faces of the frozen dead; they were indeed unfamiliar faces.

This was unlikely. The porters from Motuo might not know everyone, but they would recognize at least nine out of ten.

If it were such an accident, at least half of them should be their people, but those faces were clearly too strange.

“They’re not from Motuo,” Laba said, noticing the young man’s gaze, which seemed to ask for clarification. He hadn’t heard of any unfamiliar groups of this scale entering or exiting Motuo, so where had these people come from? Could they have entered the no-man’s land from elsewhere and happened to pass through here on their way out?

Laba was filled with confusion because, as far as he knew, there were only a few paths that could traverse this uninhabited area, paths that had been known only to the local porters throughout history. These paths had always been passed down from the elders to the young through a tradition of mentorship, as describing them in words or depicting them in drawings was utterly useless. One had to walk these paths dozens of times to even begin to remember them. Therefore, it was completely impossible for them to be leaked.

Another porter continued to speak to him in Tibetan, suggesting that there was something to be gained—encountering a corpse in the snowy mountains was sometimes not a bad thing. The corpse might carry many items that could be exchanged for money; moreover, if one could ascertain the identity of the deceased, they might also receive some information fees from the family.

His companion pointed to a corpse in the distance, and Laba immediately noticed that it belonged to three foreigners. Their clothing was entirely different from that of others, and nearby, a group of Tibetan attendants was helping them carry many packages.

It was well-known that foreigners often carried many items from previous expeditions. Generally speaking, Laba and the others would not touch the belongings of foreigners. First, the lamas had a good relationship with them, and if a foreigner was involved in an incident with the sea, the matter would not easily conclude; they would ultimately face severe punishment. Second, foreigners typically kept their money to be paid upon their return, and while the items they carried were precious and unique, selling them would likely lead to discovery by the temple or the government.

However, this time was somewhat different, as it was clear that these foreigners had not set out from Motuo. Therefore, their belongings appearing in Motuo would not pose any problems.

After considerable effort, they managed to retrieve a few backpacks and continued on their way. There’s no need to elaborate on the entire process, as it was not described in detail; in short, it was not an easy task.

Around the time of sunrise that day, Laba brought everyone to a snow slope. They dug a hole in the snow to shield themselves from the wind and take a break, giving them a chance to see what was inside the backpacks.

The bags were mostly filled with instruments and rock specimens. Foreigners always took some stones with them, and Laba knew they were specimens, but he didn’t know what they were for.

As they rummaged through the bags, speculating on the value of the instruments, they discovered two golden spheres inside one of the bags. The spheres were placed in an iron box, which was also tightly wrapped with another cloth-covered object.

With these three items, the two golden spheres were exposed, while the other object was so well wrapped—could its value be higher than that of the golden spheres?

However, when they opened it, they found it to be a piece of ugly black metallic stone.

Throughout the process, the young man was fixated on the one item in the backpack that was considered absolutely worthless: a notebook filled with dense writing in a foreign script.

Seeing the young man’s focused expression, Laba decided not to disturb him for the time being. They had obtained two golden spheres, and he felt they didn’t need to go any further; perhaps they were already wealthier than this young man. Laba was immersed in ecstasy, believing this was the most important day of his life.

As he was feeling joyful while pondering how to explain to the young man his reasons for retreating, the young man handed him the foreigner’s notebook and asked what the line meant. On one page of the notebook, there was a drawing, and next to it, the foreigner had written a note in crooked Tibetan.

Laba didn’t know many characters, but he could understand this sentence in Tibetan because the lama had mentioned it during his prayers. The meaning of this Tibetan phrase was “the actual limit.”

Laba didn’t understand it fully; he glanced at the drawing next to the Tibetan text and then made a face to the young man that conveyed he only knew this much.