Under the shroud of night stood a mountain, not particularly tall. At the peak, a few faint sparks from cigarette butts flickered in the dark. Several figures sat perched high up, smoking while gazing through binoculars at the performance in the distance. The occasional murmur of conversation drifted over, but from this distance, their words were indistinct.
Judging by what Xin Yaoqiao had said, most of the squad stationed here had gone to watch the trial performance, leaving only these few behind—the ones who were supposed to be guarding the cave entrance.
This seemed to have become an ingrained habit and tradition. Strictly speaking, it counted as dereliction of duty, but no one ever checked or made a fuss about it.
"Back before the place was excavated, and even a dozen-odd years ago when they'd just started digging, people from the Cleansing Faction and the Self-Preservation Faction really did come and throw away a few lives," Qiaoqiao said. "Later on, everything usable was cleared out, and nothing has ever been found since. Over the past few years, it's gotten to the point where even if you invited them, they'd complain it's too far a walk."
She explained that this was how the discipline had gradually eroded.
Right now, the six of them were bent low, advancing along the mountainside. Xin Yaoqiao and Han Qingyu took the lead, Shen Yixiu and He Tangtang brought up the rear, and Liu Shiheng and Wen Jifei were in the middle.
Han Qingyu took a moment to glance back and ask Wen Jifei, "Why did you tag along?"
"I was dragged here by force! Those two couldn't keep watching, so they wouldn't let me watch either." Having said that, Wen Jifei muttered to himself, "No, this makes our squad look like a disorganized mess. Let me pretend I'm an indispensable part of this, and let's pretend we have a plan and a clear objective."
He Tangtang asked him, "How do we pretend that?"
"Let's come up with an operation codename. A really formal one, like those famous military operations. I heard Azure has that tradition too—the time they killed a Red Shoulder was called Broken Jar." Wen Jifei thought for a moment and said, "This is our first time coming into contact with anything related to Ne, right? Why don't we call it 'Hello, Ne'?"
It was rare for Xin Yaoqiao to take part in a group operation like this—and a rogue, sneaky one at that. In high spirits, she eagerly agreed, "Sounds great!"
No one else objected, though He Tangtang muttered under his breath, "Is that really fun? Why does it feel creepy to me? It sounds like we're actually going to meet that guy. He's the boss of Snow Lotus! Who knows how strong this Ne is in a fight? If it were called 'Hello, Ye Jian,' I'd probably advise everyone to turn back right now."
"Shh," Han Qingyu signaled, then took two paces to the side and dropped flat to the ground.
The other five immediately followed suit, dropping flat beside him and burying their heads in silence.
Han Qingyu was human, and naturally capable of making mistakes and misjudgments. But when it came to hitting the dirt, whenever he dropped down, following him down was guaranteed to be the right choice.
A moment later—snap, crack—faint footsteps and the occasional crackle of snapped twigs drifted through the dark. Someone passed by a dozen meters away, heading up the mountain.
"Incredible, Qingzi. What's the deal with your hearing?" Liu Shiheng couldn't help asking as he rose behind Han Qingyu once the person had moved off.
Han Qingyu turned his head. "None of you heard that earlier?"
"Nope." All five shook their heads.
"...Oh." Han Qingyu thought to himself that it was indeed a bit strange.
Still, now was not the time to dwell on it, and even if he tried, he doubted he would reach an answer. There were already too many baffling things about him that he couldn't figure out. With too many lice to itch over, he would just take things one step at a time.
After continuing forward for a short while, Xin Yaoqiao said they had arrived.
At the site, if the concrete-sealed former site of Research Institute 2 was viewed as a reservoir nestled between three mountains, then the excavated cave opening was situated roughly beneath where the dam would be.
The opening was unimaginably vast, seemingly large enough for excavators and trucks to drive in and out with ease.
Lying flat on the side slope, they waited a little longer until they were certain no one was guarding it.
Time to head inside.
Just as Xin Yaoqiao pushed herself up, a hand pressed against her shoulder blade, pushing her back down. She turned around. Han Qingyu said, "Why don't you stay outside?"
"Why?"
"If we happen to get cornered, we can say we were just wandering around and happened to end up here, saw the unguarded cave, and went in out of curiosity. They probably wouldn't hit us with anything serious. But you're different—you're a researcher here. That excuse won't fly for you."
"Oh." A disappointed look appeared on Xin Yaoqiao's face. "But if I don't go, you won't even know what you're looking at. Didn't you want to see it out of curiosity? Let me come along, I can explain everything to you."
Her eyes were like those of a little girl begging for candy.
"Let her come. If we really get caught, we can all say it was curiosity. Qiaoqiao hasn't been inside either, after all," Shen Yixiu chimed in to help persuade him.
The silly girl didn't realize that aside from what he said, Han Qingyu had another consideration: there were secrets of his own that he didn't want Xin Yaoqiao—who clearly had high-level connections—to find out about just yet.
"Then let's hurry!" Chuckling inwardly, Xin Yaoqiao pulled a little trick: seizing the moment of Han Qingyu's hesitation, she was already the first to scramble down to the cave entrance.
The others hurried after her, and Han Qingyu had no choice but to follow.
Entering the cave and quickly passing through the outer mountain section, the group soon stepped into a space that made one's head spin.
Looking up, the ceiling above was riddled with holes and reinforced with various supports, while beneath their feet was packed earth... Recalling the path they had just walked, indeed, it had seemed to slope downward the entire way.
"So are we actually beneath the laboratory buildings right now?" Han Qingyu asked.
"That's right." Xin Yaoqiao gave an affirmative answer. Right above their heads was the former site of Research Institute 2's source energy laboratory. "Back then, the entire laboratory was encased in concrete—poured very thick. Do you understand? It was like someone pouring molten iron into an anthill."
The group pictured it and nodded.
"Because digging it all out directly afterward would have been too massive and difficult an engineering feat, Grandpa... they decided to excavate it like this. They used the original blueprints to locate specific areas, and whenever there was something they wanted to examine, they dug upward from below."
Understood. The group nodded again.
"But why seal it completely in concrete like that? It feels so drastic. Just because Ne came here?" Wen Jifei asked, puzzled. "Wait, Qiaoqiao, didn't you mention earlier that it was originally abandoned because of an experimental accident? ...Oh man, could people have died in here back then? Could this place be haunted?"
As a self-proclaimed scientist of the I Ching and eight trigrams, his sudden leap in logic instantly turned the atmosphere eerie and chilling.
Just think: if people died in an experimental accident and were then entombed in concrete, how immense would the ghosts' resentment be?!
"Well... though I haven't seen the files, to be honest," Xin Yaoqiao said with an awkward look, "there definitely were casualties. An entire section of the laboratory was destroyed back then."
Clack, rustle, shrrk.
A faint sound suddenly came from behind them.
"Ah!"
Thwack. Han Qingyu moved to cover a mouth again, slapping a hand directly over the mouth area of Shen Yixiu's sheet-metal armor.
How many times was this now?
One could easily imagine the furious glare beneath the metal plate. Shen Yixiu reached up, huffily swatting his hand away, brandished a fist, and turned to point Han Qingyu elsewhere, signaling that it wasn't her.
In his field of vision, Xin Yaoqiao was covering her own mouth with both hands, looking at Han Qingyu with eyes full of fright and guilt.
"It was just loose dirt falling off the wall," Han Qingyu said with a helpless chuckle. "You're a scientist, why would you believe in that stuff?"
"Only scientists really believe it," Xin Yaoqiao muttered under her breath, quelling her fear and trembling.
That put an end to the topic they had just started.
Xin Yaoqiao led the group further down.
The underground cavern excavated here covered an enormous area, but it wasn't laid out as a single open expanse. Instead, it resembled roadside courtyards connected by winding paths—a section here, a patch there, sometimes even courtyards stacked atop courtyards.
In some chambers, the ceiling had been almost completely hollowed out, exposing the concrete layer and the discarded outer shells of equipment that hadn't been salvaged.
"Holy crap, look at that rice cooker—it must be dozens of meters tall?!" He Tangtang craned his neck, turning in a full circle, marveling in shock.
"If it were fully exposed, over sixty meters. Uh, this is one of the machines in the source energy conversion system—the system that refines metal blocks into blue crystal blocks." Xin Yaoqiao identified it and said, "All the useful parts inside were dismantled and taken out from below."
"And this one." She ran to the other side, pointing with keen interest at a huge hollow left in the ceiling. "I'm guessing this is what Grandpa mentioned—the experimental source energy treatment capsule. The goal was to sustain the lives of mortally wounded soldiers for a certain period via physical infusion until they could undergo surgery. Ne personally oversaw the project back then, and everyone was brimming with enthusiasm, privately dubbing it the 'life-prolonging capsule.' Unfortunately, in the end, it still failed."
"And look at that hammer-shaped thing over there..."
It seemed only these artifacts of Azure's advanced technology could make Xin Yaoqiao forget her fear. She truly treated herself as a scientific tour guide. Aside from the things she genuinely couldn't identify or didn't recognize, she enthusiastically introduced everything as they walked along. In this manner, the group gradually ventured deep into the belly of the mountain.
Yet in truth...
"In truth, we don't understand a single word," Wen Jifei said honestly. "Full disclosure: this scientist scored 230 on the gaokao, with 12 points in physics."
"All we can do is gasp and say how huge they are," He Tangtang added candidly.
Liu Shiheng was about to speak when he glanced back and froze. "Where's Qingzi? And Rusty Sister? Where did the two of them go?"
Gone.
Two people.
The strongest two among the six had vanished without a sound...
The cave instantly became eerie and chilling once more.
Had they been snatched by ghosts?!
"Qing—"
"Don't shout! What the hell are you yelling for? We just got caught up looking in the courtyard next door and lost track of time."
Han Qingyu emerged from the corner of the wall with Shen Yixiu, wiping his hands one last time on the back of his clothes.
Per his instructions, Shen Yixiu had brought along a plastic bucket of water tonight. Just now, he had asked her to pour some on the ground, then reached into the puddle to feel whether source energy was present.
It seemed there was. Han Qingyu didn't know if it was an illusion born of sheer longing, but at a certain instant, he seemed to have caught an extremely subtle surge of source energy.
Yet that wisp of movement quickly vanished. Perhaps because that small amount of water couldn't continuously seep deep enough underground, and because his perception range and distance were limited, there was ultimately no result.
Shen Yixiu still had half a bucket of water left, and Han Qingyu planned to find another spot to try again later.
"Let's move."
Han Qingyu played it off lightly, but no sooner had the words left his mouth—
Ch-ch-ch-ch, shrrk... shrrk... rustle-rustle-rustle.
A dense, heavy cascade of falling dirt peeled from the walls behind them.
Liu Shiheng instantly panicked, looking around wildly. "Is it an earthquake? Is this place going to collapse?!"
"No." Han Qingyu tilted his head toward the wall in front of them. "If it were an earthquake, there's no way the wall right in front of us wouldn't show the slightest tremor... It's only behind us, inside there."
He said inside there because the sensation was unmistakable: the vibrations were coming from deep within the mountain. Something seemed to be churning through the earth, boring straight toward them.
"A ghost wall?!" He Tangtang asked, trembling. By now, they could all hear it—something was churning within the wall behind them.
"That's not what a ghost wall means! That's when spirits trap you so you can't leave... This is more like ghosts tunneling through walls! Or maybe some abandoned machine turned itself on." Wen Jifei still had the presence of mind to lecture and analyze, but his face had turned completely ashen.
"Go! Run... quick, run!"
Han Qingyu snapped out of his thoughts and shouted urgently. He didn't know what it could be, but at the very least, it was something capable of burrowing through the dense mountain earth—most likely a living creature.
Yet it was too late.
Behind them came a tremendous boom.
The roar of something bursting through the wall rang out, followed by the heavy crash of an enormous, metallic body slamming onto the ground.
Everyone looked back. In an instant, people tripped and tumbled, scrambled on all fours, while the rest froze stock-still in shock.
"Holy shit, what the hell is that thing?!"
"Whatever the hell it is, I'd rather see a ghost right now!"
Chapter 166