Chapter 163: People from the Sea in the Sky Palace

I still had internal injuries, and now, as soon as I saw it, I almost coughed up a mouthful of blood, scaring the others badly. Panzi and the others had never seen this photo; although I had mentioned it to them, they didn't recognize it when they saw it, so they found it very strange. Fatty quickly helped me smooth my chest and asked me what was going on.

Trembling, I picked up the photo and pointed out Poker-face and Third Uncle in it to them. As soon as they saw it, the others' faces turned even uglier than mine, and none of them could speak.

I simply couldn't believe this was real. Turning to look at the several dried corpses nearby, my mind was in a complete mess.

This photo wouldn't appear on unrelated people. Could it be that the mysterious team that entered the Changbai Mountains ten years ago and got trapped and died here was actually the group from the underwater tomb? These dried corpses were Wenjin, Li Sidi, and the others? Trembling, I turned the photo over and saw a line of blurry writing on the back: "Xisha Archaeological Team, in memory of Li Sidi."

It seemed there was no mistake. It was highly unlikely that someone else brought this photo here; the person carrying a souvenir photo like this should be the person involved... No wonder Third Uncle searched and searched but couldn't find them—they had long died here! Looking at the clothes, they indeed matched, and the photo too. But why did these people come here? Could they have also discovered something in the underwater tomb that attracted them to the Changbai Mountains?

Wait, that's not right. I suddenly thought of Third Uncle and Poker-face. My god, almost everyone from the underwater tomb was now in the Cloud Summit Palace. This group came ten years ago, and Third Uncle and Poker-face had also arrived recently. Why did they absolutely have to come here? The puzzles I had gradually forgotten in my heart suddenly revived, and countless questions flooded my mind.

Panzi and the others didn't know about Third Uncle's past, and their shock at seeing the photo was even greater than mine. I had to patiently explain again, leaving the others stunned. Fatty said, "No way, wait, I'm thinking of more. It seems everyone who went to the underwater tomb, including A Ning and even us, have all come here. Is there a curse in the underwater tomb that anyone who goes there must climb the Changbai Mountains? No, that doesn't seem to make sense?"

Fatty was of course talking nonsense, but I felt a chill run down my spine. Some things in my mind were becoming clearer. It seemed the underwater tomb was not the key; the key was here. The underwater tomb seemed to be just a stepping stone...

I searched through everything I could find on the corpses, but there were no more clues. I couldn't even tell who was who. My mind was in a tangle, and dazed, I walked towards the tomb passage without even picking up the flashlight.

Fatty quickly grabbed me and told me to calm down. He said being anxious was useless—these people had still ended up trapped here. If you die, you could ask their souls what happened, but by then it would be too late.

He pulled me down to sit and catch my breath. Gradually I calmed down, and only one thought remained in my heart: "I have to get out. I have to find Third Uncle and get the truth, or I won't close my eyes even in death."

Fatty said, "But so far we haven't found any clue that any of them successfully got out. Maybe this place is simply inescapable, a sealed space. Even if you close your eyes, it's no use."

Once Fatty said that, the others had nothing to say. Originally we wanted to find some clues on these corpses, but instead we suddenly discovered such a huge secret. It was one thing after another.

Everyone was thinking about their own matters, and the atmosphere was terrible. My mind was groggy; I didn't dare look at the photo again, afraid that some monster in it would suck me in. My throat also started to itch, as if I had caught a cold. I began to cough, and coughed up blood again.

Seeing me like this, Panzi said to us, "Let's rest for today. Since we can't get out anytime soon, we might as well get a good sleep to clear our heads. Little Master Wu, don't think too much. I know you have too many doubts in your heart, but figuring them out isn't something that can be done in a short while."

I waved my hand. How could I sleep? I'd rather keep thinking here. I could only sleep when I couldn't hold on any longer; otherwise, I'd only become more tired from sleeping.

Fatty had no idea how many cigarettes he had smoked. He muttered as he smoked, "Actually, I just remembered. If I'd known, I wouldn't have followed those marks earlier. If only you'd listened to me—one group gets trapped, the other can still think of a way... Those marks, now that I think about it, might have been left by these corpses. See, things just happened to coincide. Maybe they also split up like I thought, and those two people actually went down the other side of the tomb passage."

I shook my head and said no. If one group was trapped and the other came back to look for them, they'd just fall into the same trap, and it would be even more frustrating. Besides, taking the side without marks might be more dangerous; we didn't know what was waiting for

But thinking deeper, that was impossible, because if we were already trapped, by the time the other group came back, the tomb passage would have changed and they wouldn't be able to find this chamber. Could those numbers be marks left by survivors from the other side—signs of a lost team? As I pondered, suddenly my whole body trembled... a flash of lightning shot through my mind... marks....

I sat up abruptly and said to them, "It just hit me—there's a very weird flaw in this. The tomb passage is a paradox!" "What?"

I frowned, thinking about how to phrase it. "I'm afraid you won't understand. For example, let's say we walk out into the darkness. No matter what causes us to behave this way, there has to be a moment when we turn around—even though we're completely unaware of it, right?"

The others nodded. I continued, "Say I'm holding a pen, drawing a line on the wall as I walk forward. Then on the wall at the exit, there will definitely be a long continuous mark following me. So the moment I unknowingly turn around, what do you think would happen?" Fatty practically jumped: "You'd see that there's already a mark you made on the wall of the passage ahead!"

"Not just that!" I said. "What's most critical? After I turn, left and right swap, so the hand holding the pen starts drawing on the opposite side of the wall."

"This—!" Panzi also frowned. "That's logical deduction," I said. "In other words, if we explain it logically, there must be a turning point in the middle of the passage! At that turning point, it's like we walk into a mirror, going straight into our own opposite direction. Do you agree?"

Everyone nodded. As long as it was logical, it had to be exactly as I said.

I said, "Alright, now think about this: if we actually walked that way and really encountered that 'reflective surface' I mentioned, how thick would that reflective surface be?"

"How thick?" The others were still digesting my previous words, completely baffled.

"Exactly. There must be a thickness. If there were no thickness, then when the front half of your body passed through, the back half of your body would—"

Panzi instantly understood what I meant. Cold sweat broke out all over him, and he blurted without thinking: "Overlap each other!"

"Right! Because at that position, the front half of you has already been reflected back, but the back half hasn't passed through the 'mirror' yet. So if my reasoning is correct, the moment we pass through the reflecting 'mirror', we'd die for sure! We'd turn into a monster! Your face would smash into the back of your head!"

"But we've walked through so many times and haven't died yet," Fatty said in confusion.

"That's what I'm getting at. That mirror surface must have a thickness far greater than a human—a transitional segment of reflection. After we step into that segment, we enter from one end, walk a certain distance inside, then come out the other end, completing a fold in space."

Everyone nodded again in agreement. The deduction was flawless.

"The problem is, we don't know how long that distance is. Let's assume it's only two or three steps. Here's an example: suppose we walk into that 'mirror space' segment, but Fatty doesn't go in—he stays outside the mirror space. And the mirror space is only two or three steps long, so you can see both ends. What do you think would happen?"

Panzi understood the fastest, his throat almost stiff. "You'd see... two identical Fatties, one at each end."

"Good. Here comes a paradox. When the Fatty behind you looks forward, can he see the Fatty in front? And what if you go and grab one of the Fatties' hands—what would happen?"

Panzi quickly made a stop gesture: "Don't... don't say any more!"

"What does this mean?" Fatty's face was also pale.

"Without even testing further, we can be certain that this so-called 'mirror space' doesn't exist. And the logical basis for the tomb passage reflecting so we can never walk out of it doesn't exist either. The existence of this passage is illogical." I lowered my voice: "Wang Zanghai isn't a god—he can't create his own laws of physics. The trap here has nothing to do with Wang Zanghai. Those people didn't die trapped because of this. What we're facing now is a special case, a new kind of situation. We've been misled by those corpses. And the most likely cause of our current state seems to be only one possibility..."

I cautiously pointed my finger at the fourth item Fatty had written, and mouthed silently: "There's a ghost among us!"