Chapter 3238

【However, why eggs and apples?】

Xia De sat in the living room and curiously looked at the indoor furnishings and decorations, "she" asked softly again, and Xia De replied:

"Because I don't have packaged milk or boxed oatmeal on me."

So the thoughts of an outsider are sometimes really hard for others to understand.

Although Professor Lai Yin Ha Te was not at home, after hearing that Xia De wanted to see his research results on the island, Mrs. Lai Yin Ha Te took out some of her husband's collection of books and manuscripts from the study for Xia De to read.

According to the legends and stories of the Fa Tu people, the professor organized the history of the Fa Tu people in the form of a chronology. This work was being carried out when Miss Lai Yin Ha Te left the island, and it is still not finished today.

Of course, although the work is still in progress, the general framework of the chronology has been built, and the remaining work is to constantly fill in the content according to time.

The starting point of the chronology is "unknown ancient times", which should refer to the time when the Fa Tu people migrated to the local area, and the last major event recorded is the Fa Tu Meng Si Te Island earthquake 60 years ago, or the "Star Fall Bay" earthquake.

Xia De intended to find records of the Fa Tu people's worship of "snakes" in it, and then he really read some content. Professor Lai Yin Ha Te's textual research on this matter was inferred from the details of the ancient murals remaining in the local area and the decorative patterns on the remaining ancient buildings.

Although the professor could not find specific documentary materials, when organizing the stories and myths passed down from generation to generation by local people, he found that many stories involved creatures like "giant snakes" and "two-headed snakes".

And regarding whether something was buried under the snow mountain, Professor Lai Yin Ha Te's investigation was also quite vague. It was not that there were no records at all, but although a few sentences were mentioned, this topic would be avoided every time it reached a critical point.

So Xia De still had to talk to Professor Lai Yin Ha Te personally to see how much he knew about the Fa Tu Meng Si Te snow mountain from the perspective of an outsider.

When Xia De was reading these textual materials in the living room, Miss Lai Yin Ha Te was also helping to organize them on the side. But after a while, the witch was called away by her mother. Although she said she was going to the kitchen to help prepare lunch, Xia De guessed that the lady wanted to ask about his identity.

At eleven o'clock in the morning, Professor Lai Yin Ha Te still hadn't returned, so Mrs. Lai Yin Ha Te arranged for the three to have lunch first:

"I left food for him in the kitchen."

Because there were guests visiting, the lunch was very rich, but after lunch, the witch was a bit worried, and she didn't want to waste time:

"Mother, where did father go to visit friends? Let me and Mr. Watson go find him. Since he hasn't returned for lunch, he might have decided to eat at a friend's house temporarily."

"He went to visit old Ha Man who lives in the mountain. If you go, remember to remind him not to drink."

The so-called "old Ha Man" is actually a forest ranger living in the mountain, or a "mountain guard" arranged by the Fa Tu people in the mountain, responsible for patrolling the mountain and looking after the animals in the mountain.

This profession is usually passed down from generation to generation, and people in the tribe also admire them, and they often know many things that others don't know. So Professor Lai Yin Ha Te met and became friends with that old Ha Man during the interview process. The witch had seen him visit her home when she was a child, but her impression of him was not particularly deep.

Forest rangers usually live at the foot of the Fa Tu Meng Si Te snow mountain. If ordinary people don't know the location, it is difficult to find them in the vast primeval forest. The elderly Professor Lai Yin Ha Te didn't walk there with his own legs either. There was a donkey cart at home used for pulling goods from the pier, which was the professor's transportation today.

"The island really can't compare to big cities."

On the way to the next destination, Miss Lai Yin Ha Te sighed boredly. Xia De didn't comment on this; he cared more about the owl that flew over their heads again.

Xia De was originally worried that Professor Lai Yin Ha Te had encountered some unexpected situation because he didn't return home at noon, which was very possible combined with the current local situation, but it turned out that his understanding of the professor was really not as good as his wife's—Professor Lai Yin Ha Te was actually drunk when chatting with an old friend.

It seems that local people all know the witch. After the two knocked on the door of the ranger's cabin hidden in the cedar forest, the sturdy old man wearing a cotton hat who opened the door was stunned for a moment, and then greeted Miss Lai Yin Ha Te with a smile:

"Is it little Ke Lai Er? Haven't seen you for many years. Your father mentioned you when chatting with me this morning."

Afterward, he looked at Xia De behind the witch, so Miss Lai Yin Ha Te introduced him again as "Grandfather's friend". The forest ranger old Ha Man nodded knowingly:

"A sorcerer, right?"

Although the old man guarding the mountain is an ordinary person, it is impossible not to know these things, so Xia De also nodded directly:

"Yes."

The cabin is made of stone, with a fire pit in the center, and a pot on the fire pit is boiling hot water. A faint smell of alcohol permeates the room, and Professor Lai Yin Ha Te is lying on the bed in the corner, dead drunk.

"Father is not a drunkard... he just isn't good at drinking, but he always likes to drink."

The witch explained a bit awkwardly, and Xia De stepped forward to check the situation.

Professor Lai Yin Ha Te is a middle-aged man with black hair, and his glasses are worn crookedly on his face. Although he is lying on the bed, Xia De can see that he is not very tall, at least not as tall as his wife and daughter. Or rather, Mrs. Lai Yin Ha Te is much taller than her husband.

However, after seeing the couple, Xia De believes that all the advantages of the couple's appearance are concentrated on Miss Lai Yin Ha Te. Only the color of her hair does not come from her parents' inheritance, otherwise, she should be black-haired or pure blonde.

Although there is a donkey cart parked outside the door, Professor Lai Yin Ha Te is obviously not suitable to return to the town now that he is so drunk. Sorcerers have many ways to relieve drunkenness, but the witch belongs to the kind of young lady who doesn't like to use sorcerer's means on ordinary people.

So she just took out a black gem that looked dim and handed it to Xia De, letting Xia De activate the strange art inside to sober up her father. The strange art stored in it should be some kind of strange art to relieve negative states, but the effect of the strange art is very weak. Xia De guessed that this was probably made by Miss La Er Sen when practicing.

Because the sobering effect was very weak, Professor Lai Yin Ha Te still needed some time to wake up, so Xia De and the witch sat around the fire pit with old Ha Man, drinking tea and chatting.

Xia De mentioned that his purpose for seeing the professor was to know about the snow mountain, so the old man guarding the mountain told him and the witch about the strange things he encountered in the forest at the foot of the mountain for more than forty years.

He had seen corpses of poachers who died tragically in the mouths of wild animals, seen strange sorcerers fighting at the foot of the snow mountain, seen strange outsiders who came to ask for directions, and even seen several roads that he didn't recognize suddenly appear in the snow mountain.

"Can you talk about this in detail? I heard Elder Ha La Er De say that the actual area of the snow mountain is much larger than what we can see."

The old forest ranger smiled and held the teacup:

"I don't know much about this either, just some of my own stories.

That was about twenty years ago. At that time, Ke Lai Er, you were less than ten years old. A very heavy snow fell that winter. After the snow stopped, I originally wanted to take advantage of the good weather to patrol the mountain, but I didn't expect it to snow again during the patrol. Seeing that it was too late to go back, I found a cave nearby to hide."

He saw that the young people were listening very carefully:

"I clearly hid in the cave from the foot of the southern slope of the snow mountain, but after the snow stopped, I found myself appearing in the southeast of the snow mountain. I thought I was possessed, holding a hunting gun and carrying a steel fork, wanting to return to the town first, but it snowed heavily again on the way. At that time, I had nowhere to hide and could only continue to set off.

After the sky turned completely dark, even the big trees around became sparse. With nowhere to hide, I saw something emitting white light in front, so I subconsciously followed it, and then I arrived in front of a towering ice and snow castle."

The old man sighed endlessly:

"That white light disappeared. At that time, I also thought I was dead. After all, that's how it's said in stories. But I hid in the city tower and slept for a night and nothing happened. After dawn, I left in a hurry and stumbled until noon before returning to the town."

When I took people to look for it again, whether it was the cave, the white light, or any ice and snow castle, I found nothing."

"Grandfather was already a priest at that time. Did Grandfather also know about this?"

"Know. At that time, he also participated in the action of following me to walk that road again, but we only found some strange animal footprints on the snow, so that incident could only be attributed to me getting lost in the wind and snow, then following animals like snow leopards or rock sheep to find a temporary shelter, and then having hallucinations due to the cold—that's what was said to the outside world."

But the elders all believed that what I said was true, and my encounter should also be true, but no one knew what happened."

He said with a nostalgic face about the story of his youth:

"For me, I at least believe that the white light that guided me to find the castle in the dark night was not my imagination. Over the years, I have always wanted to find it and repay it. Oh, speaking of which, I even brought things out of that ice and snow castle at that time. The elders said it was just ordinary items, so they let me keep it myself. Do you want to see it?"

Xia De, Miss Lai Yin Ha Te, and the owl hanging upside down on the eaves were all very interested, so the old man got up and took out a small box from the cabinet. It could be seen that he kept the box very carefully. After carefully opening the lock, there was a small piece of folded silk cloth inside.

(End of chapter)