Chapter 95: Crack

My heart tightened as I thought of Uncle Tai. We'd had no word from them since we rushed down from the waterfall. Could they have followed us now? But on second thought, that wasn't right—the Thousand Coffin Fire Dragon Formation outside wouldn't go out anytime soon, so they couldn't get through. Second, to climb up they'd need lighting tools. The torches below were out, and there were no flashlight beams. They had no reason to come up in the dark.

Then who the hell was coming up? Thinking of that, cold sweat broke out on me. We were suspended only a dozen meters or so up, with limited room to move—couldn't make any big moves. If we really encountered something bizarre, I had no idea how to deal with it.

Laoyang gave me a wink, suggesting we strike first and charge down to check. I waved my hand for him to calm down. We were in the open while the enemy was hidden; we absolutely couldn't be rash. If it really was Uncle Tai and his group groping up in the dark, a face-off below would inevitably lead to a fierce fight. Bullets had no eyes, and at such close range, we might both suffer heavy losses. Thinking it over, I had a plan. I took off my belt and tied the torch to a branch, then signaled Laoyang and Liang Shiye to hide in the darkness beyond the torch's reach.

Those below would only see the light of our torch. That way, we'd also fade into the darkness, turning the tables and catching them off guard.

The three of us held our breath, cupping our hands to our ears and pressing them against the bronze wall. We could sense a very faint vibration sound approaching from a distance, its frequency chaotic and fast, as if many people were constantly scratching the bronze tree's patterns with their fingernails. The more I listened, the more uneasy I felt. Uncle Tai's group only had two people; they couldn't possibly make such a dense sound. Could it be that the rats from outside had followed us in?

I regretted not properly dealing with that robbers' tunnel earlier and cursed under my breath. I switched the Paiziliao to my right hand. Laoyang, standing above me, chambered a round. We both prepared to spring into action at any moment.

The newcomers moved very quickly, without hesitation. In the blink of an eye they were right below us, but still not within the torch's illumination. I could only vaguely see a few blurry shadows—seemed human, yet not. I was so nervous my palms sweated, my concentration razor-sharp. For those few seconds, time seemed to stand still.

Suddenly, Laoyang's face turned extremely terrified. He yelled, "Holy shit! Up, up, up! Hurry up!" Before he could finish, Liang Shiye seemed to see something too and let out a miserable shriek. The two of them fled upward like they'd seen a ghost.

I didn't know what terrifying thing they'd seen. Subconsciously I looked down and saw something writhing in the darkness, but couldn't make it out clearly. Seeing me not moving, Laoyang shouted, "Old Wu, what the hell are you standing there like an idiot for? Run!"

I saw that his face was deathly pale. A chill ran through me. Without bothering to figure out what was going on, I pulled out the torch, clenched my teeth, and followed them.

I was infected by Laoyang and the others' expressions, my heart extremely tense. Not knowing what was climbing up, the more I climbed, the colder I felt; the colder I got, the faster I climbed. In the end, I fell completely into a frenzied state. My scalp went numb, my body stiff, my mind only focused on following behind them—I couldn't care about anything else.

After climbing for the time it takes to smoke half a cigarette, Liang Shiye ahead finally stopped. I climbed up beside him and saw that it wasn't that he didn't want to climb—he simply couldn't anymore. His face was bloodless; he had reached his limit.

He was sweating like rain. Seeing that I was still going up, he actually grabbed my leg and said to me, "Wait... wait! Don't... don't leave me. I... I'll just rest a moment, then climb with you!"

He pulled me to a stop. My legs went weak and I couldn't muster any strength; they started trembling uncontrollably.

Swimming and climbing the cliff earlier were all high-intensity movements under extreme tension. My muscles had long been overloaded. Now with this extremely exhausting climb upward, not realizing it was one thing, but as soon as I stopped, my muscles immediately lost control. Even gritting my teeth didn't help.

I was burning with anxiety but had no strength to exert. I looked up—pitch black, no idea how much higher. My heart turned cold. I thought, climbing like this, when would it ever end? Even if we reached the top, so what? It would still be a big fight, and by then I'd be too exhausted even to lift my gun. At that thought, I hardened my heart. I handed the torch to Liang Shiye, swung out the Paiziliao aiming downward, and said to him, "Climb my ass! I can't fucking climb anymore either. Forget it, whatever the hell it is, I'll fight it to the death!"

When Liang Shiye heard me say that, his face twisted. He nearly fainted and fell off the bronze tree. I quickly steadied him, looked around, and found that Laoyang had disappeared. I hurriedly asked him, "Where's Laoyang? Was he above or below us just now?"

Liang Shiye

I remember that when we were climbing just now, we were sprinting all the way. Old Yang, seeing that I was holding a torch, insisted on covering my rear and indeed let me get ahead of him. I hurriedly told Master Liang to lower the torch to check. Under that light, I was almost scared out of my wits—there, in the darkness below, was a person crouching like a monkey on the bronze tree, with a huge, pallid face staring at us without any expression.

This person's face was a full one and a half times the size of a normal person's, with features carved like stone, utterly devoid of life. When Master Liang lowered the torch, it suddenly recoiled, as if wary of the approaching flame. Yet at the same time, a peculiar half-smile appeared on its face, extremely eerie. Seeing that face, I shuddered, thinking that Old Yang was below us and now nowhere to be seen—could he have already met with disaster? But then I thought, if something had happened to him, he had a pistol at hand and would have fired a few shots at least. Since I heard no gunshots, maybe he was hiding down there.

Master Liang saw that face, was terrified out of his wits, let out a strange yell, and fled upward as fast as he could. I wanted to stop him but it was too late. Looking back down, I suddenly found that bizarre giant face had already pressed up, practically right beneath my feet.

It was fine when seen from afar, but now it was so close, that whole face grinning right by my feet. Taken by surprise, how could I not panic? I reflexively swung my hand and fired a shot. With a loud "bang," the Paizi Liao spat a tongue of flame, hitting the giant face right in the forehead.

The shot was too close, and the iron pellets directly blew the entire giant face to pieces. The force tore the body of the giant face away from the bronze tree, and it fell into the darkness.

I hadn't expected the pistol to be so effective. I breathed a sigh of relief and was about to climb up to grab Master Liang, when suddenly from where the giant face had fallen, two more pallid giant faces emerged. I was terrified, swung my hand to fire again, but pulled the trigger twice with no response. Then I remembered that the Paizi Liao only held two bullets; after firing, you had to manually eject and reload to use it again.

But there was no way I could calmly reload in this situation. I had just pried open the chamber when a claw, five fingers long and short, gripped my shoulder. I turned my head and saw a giant face pressing up against my nose—someone had somehow circled around behind me.

Master Liang had already taken the torch farther away, and the light was dimming. I couldn't make out the creature's features, nor figure out what it was, so I resorted to desperation and headbutted it.

I put all my strength into that blow, but unexpectedly the face was as hard as stone. My head buzzed, and I nearly fell off the tree. Then I suddenly heard Old Yang somewhere shouting, "Dodge!!" At the same time, a gunshot rang out, a streak of fire whistled past, hitting the bronze tree right next to my head, sending sparks flying everywhere.

The shot nearly stunned me. I quickly retreated to one side and touched my face, horrified to find that the bullet's air current had left a bloody scratch on it.

Old Yang kept firing from below. For a moment, bullets flew everywhere, sparks scattered, but unfortunately none hit the target—almost all struck the bronze tree. A few bullets even ricocheted several times, whizzing around in front of me like marbles.

I could no longer spare a thought for those weird creatures. I dodged left and right, cursing inwardly that Old Yang's marksmanship was terrible. At this rate, I might end up dead by his hand today.

But those shots bought me time. The creatures, wary of the bullets, all retreated. Taking the opportunity, I pulled two bullets from the iron box under the Paizi Liao's barrel, loaded them into the chamber, cocked it with a flick, took aim at the nearest giant face, and fired, sending it flying off the bronze tree and into the darkness.

The immediate threat was gone. I quickly looked down to find Old Yang, but instead saw even more monsters poking their heads out of the darkness—already a dozen or more giant faces visible. These things seemed to have their eyes on me. As if with one mind, they all moved at once, like ghosts, converging on me.

My heart pounded with terror. I couldn't imagine what these things were. Judging by the shape of their bodies, they looked human, but how could a human climb in such a monkey-like posture? And these monsters had heads so big—far beyond normal human proportions. But if they weren't human, what else could they be?

In the blink of an eye, two monsters jumped to my side. One grabbed my foot and pulled me downward, while the other crawled directly onto my neck. I knew I had no chance to reload again, so I turned the pistol into a hammer and slammed it hard into the face of the monster that had closed in.

I intended to knock this monster off the tree, but it only leaned back for a moment before pressing in again. Just then, I suddenly heard a crack from that giant face, and a fissure appeared.