We followed behind, my heartbeat began to accelerate. It was a gamble; if this catfish led us into deeper waters, we were likely to run out of oxygen and drown underground on the way back. A fierce internal struggle between thought and intuition coexisted within me, but my body obediently followed the catfish as it swam upwards. The fat guy, Yue, passed me, and I could feel his saliva drifting out from the edge of his breathing tube.
After about five minutes of swimming upwards, my anxiety reached its peak. I had countless urges to turn back and flee towards the direction we came from. The white snake, which had long been left behind and had been closely following the catfish, signaled us again.
I saw hope and rushed up. The pressure of the water gradually lightened on my body, and soon I felt a coolness on my head as we broke through the surface. The fat guy lit a flare, illuminating the surroundings. We were in an underground riverbank, with a gap above through which daylight streamed in. Countless tree roots and dodder hung down from the crevice, accompanied by the sound of flowing water.
We slowly walked onto the riverbank, took off our diving gear, and realized that we had passed through the submerged area and had returned to a section where the waterway was navigable.
“Where’s the fish?” the fat guy asked me. I squatted down and saw a layer of white, clay-like slime floating on the water’s surface. I touched it with my hand; it was extremely foul-smelling—animal feces.
Looking up closely, I noticed that the walls here had been carved out to create numerous shrines, densely packed like those in Dunhuang. Many of the shrines had a human-faced bird resting on them, with its head buried under its wings, all in a state of dormancy.
Everyone immediately lowered their breathing. The fat guy held down his handgun. But we all knew that with just the three of us here, if we startled these birds, we would surely be doomed.
In the center of these shrines stood a massive bronze statue that had already collapsed, its surface corroded with patches of bird droppings.
“Those catfish were probably preyed upon here,” I thought. After last night’s battle, the number of human-faced birds had decreased significantly, but the shrines extended outwards into the darkness, and I had no idea how many more human-faced birds were lurking on the stone walls.
“These Dongxia people worship these broken birds as gods,” the fat guy said, kicking at the many bones on the ground and forming the words with his mouth: “All the beasts here have been eaten by them.”
The white snake picked up a human skull from the ground, still wearing a diving suit. This person was tall and thin, almost like a creature from the Heavenly Palace.
“Wu Xie, look at this.”
The white snake prided himself on being equal to everyone, considering himself a dignified subordinate, and had always called me by my name directly.
I walked over and saw that among the animal bones, there were a large number of human bones, some of which had nylon fragments attached to them. I rummaged through these bones and found a half-rusted belt buckle.
I knew whose belt buckle this was; Ye Cheng had died in the Heavenly Palace years ago. I estimated that the body had been consumed right here.
I never expected to see a relic of an old friend again, and it felt as if I had crossed into another world.
Returning the same way is no longer possible. I glanced at my watch; it was still early before dark. The best option is to climb out through the gap above. But upon seeing Ye Cheng’s belongings, I suddenly realized that here, I might find another person’s remains. There might be some information on him that could still be useful to me.
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