I hadn’t finished speaking when I suddenly saw her hand move, and something instantly hit me on the forehead. I let out an “ouch” and immediately crouched down, holding my head. Once the pain subsided, I saw that what had fallen to the ground was her teacup from which she had been drinking water.

I got angry all of a sudden and scolded, “Old woman, do you know how much effort I put into dragging you here? And you repay me with this!”

“You didn’t drag me for nothing, either. You know how much I’ve been taken advantage of by you,” Zhang Haixing replied.

I retorted, “Who the hell wants to take advantage of you, you old fool?” As I said this, I noticed the fat guy laughing on the side, and I thought to myself, no way, it can’t be that he was making advances on her while I wasn’t around, right?

But then I remembered that although the fat guy indulged in food, drink, and gambling, his moral standards were higher than anyone else’s. Of course, his moral standards were his own—so I knew he probably wouldn’t do something so inappropriate.

Seeing me looking at him, the fat guy said, “Our little naive and handsome young lord here has plenty of girls throwing themselves at him. You, on the other hand, are like a zombie bull trying to eat tender grass.”

Looking at Zhang Haixing’s dark and unpleasant expression, I thought, forget it, forget it. I waved my hand to stop the fat guy from talking and said to her, “Stop messing around. I really didn’t take advantage of you; of course, you are definitely a girl worth taking advantage of. But think about it, we had to drag you back to the shore and then pull you here on a sled. There was no time for those boring things. I don’t know if the fat guy told you about the things we encountered along the way, but the situation here is a bit delicate. Can we just stick to the facts?”

Zhang Haixing looked at me, her expression still not good, but she was gradually relaxing. I touched the bump on my head, and then she suddenly smiled.

I saw that her smile was quite cute, and the fat guy wanted to continue making fun of her, but I waved my hand to stop him. I recounted the things that the fat guy and I had encountered along the way. After listening, she frowned and remained silent. I then asked, “What exactly did you encounter on the ice lake? How could you have hallucinations? Those dead Germans must have faced a situation similar to yours.”

“It was the bells,” Zhang Haixing said. “There was a section of the ice cover below the ice lake that was suspended, filled with those bronze bells. These bells made sounds as we walked, but due to the ice cover, the sounds were very faint. I didn’t pay attention at first, but when I realized that I was starting to burn up, I became aware of it. By then, my mind was already very unclear, and the only decision I could make was to run back. I knew there must be deadly traps ahead.”

“There should be pit traps ahead,” the fat guy said. “That group of Germans must have had the same experience, but they chose to run forward and all fell into the traps. They took off their clothes and drowned under the ice cover. When you were cooperating with the Germans, did they ever tell you that they had sent people here before?”

Zhang Haixing shook her head and looked around. I then recounted the situation here to them again, and the fat guy said, “If you didn’t see anything by yourself, could it be that this place is really empty?”

“The last time the young man came here was a long time ago, and many things should have happened during this time,” I said.

That night, we rested in that room, and it was particularly quiet. Nothing happened at all. In the morning, Feng also woke up.

The胖子 let Feng eat breakfast first. Just as Feng’s condition started to improve, the胖子 suddenly turned aggressive and lifted him up. Feng was still chewing on a piece of bread, and in his shock, he sprayed the胖子 with it.

The胖子 was furious and slammed him to the ground, shouting, “Are you hiding something from us?”

Feng was confused and mentioned the discovery of the German corpses. The胖子 replied, “That has nothing to do with us; that’s from another department.”

The胖子 said, “Damn it, there’s another department?”

“That was a year ago. If it weren’t for this team, our company wouldn’t even consider acquiring Qiu’s loss-making assets. Let me go, and I’ll explain it to you in detail.”

The胖子 released Feng, who twisted his arm, which was sore from the胖子’s grip, and said, “You are very rude.”

The胖子 glared at him, “Can that thing be eaten?”

Feng replied, “Before our company acquired Qiu’s assets, we had already poached many people from Qiu’s company to join us. This group conducted a previous investigation, which was handled by another department. Our department head believes in cooperating with locals, but the other department was too reckless. They went into the mountains alone and then went silent. I hadn’t joined the company back then, so I don’t know how they communicated, but I know that the company suffered significant losses because of this incident. The insurance alone cost a lot, which is why we are acquiring Qiu’s information and assets.”

The胖子 asked, “What about the other department’s current situation? Why didn’t you tell us in advance?”

Feng replied, “None of that group came back. We didn’t know what to say; we didn’t even know where they died.”

“That’s just making excuses.”

“I believe him,” Zhang Haixing said. “We have investigated them and have relevant information.”

“So you’re saying that group came here a year ago and died here, with no one to collect the bodies?”

“The traps in the lake have existed for a long time, right?” the胖子 said. “It wasn’t mentioned in the memoirs of the young man.”

“Regardless of whether it was mentioned or not, we at least know a few illogical points. First, the bodies of the people who died here a year ago were never dealt with; second, the lama temple looks like it hasn’t been visited in a long time. Today, when we enter Kangbala, if I’m not mistaken,” I said, “something may have happened here that we don’t know about, and this trip has taken an unexpected turn.”

We immediately set off for Kangbala. At that moment, I was taken aback and prepared for countless scenarios, such as a completely empty village, a vanished village, or a village full of foreigners. I mentally prepared for any strange future.

We traveled in silence, the scenery along the way was breathtaking, as if we were in a fairyland. After bypassing several mountain peaks, the village of Kangbala appeared before us.

However, what we saw was beyond our expectations.

In fact, we did not see Kangbala, but the village did exist. We saw the same expanse of snow, and faintly, we could see the tips of a few ancient Tibetan-style buildings peeking out from the snowfield.

We couldn’t move forward; the snow in the snowy field was deeper than anywhere else. The fat guy took a few steps ahead and found that the snow here couldn’t support his weight. With each step, the ground collapsed beneath him, revealing huge gaps and holes beneath the snow.

The entire valley was frozen over, and Kangba was covered in ice and snow, never to see the light of day again.

We looked up at the surrounding snow-capped mountains. Feng pointed to a particularly stark black rock exposed on one side of the mountain and said, “It’s an avalanche. There was once a massive avalanche that buried the entire valley.”

“How could there be such a massive avalanche?” I asked. “It seems like all the snow from the mountain was shaken down and spread across this valley.”

“The mountain has heated up,” Feng replied. “There must have been some change in the geological structure of that mountain, causing it to heat up and melt the snow.”

We followed Feng’s gaze to look at those rocks. The fat guy picked up a pair of binoculars and said to us, “We need to go over there.”

“Why?”

“There are a lot of bones: that mountain is covered with bones.”