Volume 8 Chapter 23 Shadow Movement

The lighter’s gas was still burning, but it must have gone out quickly because I couldn’t see any light.

I didn’t react at all at that moment, and I subconsciously thought that something was covering my eyes, so I reached out to touch it.

Was it because the fog was too thick here? I turned on my watch and held it in front of my eyes. It was still pitch black, and I gradually realized that the darkness was incredibly uniform.

I was still very confused because I had no concept of this in my mind, so I was almost at a loss. I waved my hand hard, trying to dispel the darkness in front of me, thinking that I could just wave my hand to dispel the darkness. But it was useless.

It was so dark outside, and there was no sound. Could it be that something had happened while I was sleeping and had blocked out all the light?

But that didn’t make sense. I couldn’t see the light so close by. As I thought about it, I slowly came to my senses, and a thought came to me that made my heart race.

How could the light be blocked out? Could it be that—I was blind?

I couldn’t believe it. I had never had this concept in my head before. It was too abrupt. But my heart was already scared. That kind of fear was different from any kind of fear I had ever had before, and it was even far beyond the fear of death. I began to rub my eyes hard, and subconsciously blinked hard until my eyes hurt so much that I couldn’t open them anymore.

Then I immediately thought of Pan Zi, and I crawled over to push him, trying to wake him up and ask if he could see the light. I pushed him a few times, and found that he was very hot, apparently suffering from a low-grade fever. I shook him for a long time, but he didn’t wake up.

I sat down and thought to myself, “Oh no!” I took a few deep breaths, and immediately thought of Mufeng and Fatso. If I really went blind, then it would be a kind of “explosive blindness.” There must be a reason for explosive blindness, such as light burns or poisoning. So, it is likely that I am not the only one who has been affected.

If they are not blind, and only I have been affected, then they may be outside the tent, but they are not making any noise. I immediately climbed to the edge of the tent and listened to the sounds outside. I called out softly, “Fatso!”

After waiting for a while, no one responded.

I called out loudly, and in such a quiet place, they should have heard me, unless they were both asleep.

My cold sweat came down, and I thought to myself that something must have happened to them too. I sat back down, and I thought about the speculation we had made a few hours ago, and I was suddenly scared.

Could this be the sudden change that Uncle San and the others had encountered? Could camping here blind people?

My mind was in a complete mess, and I couldn’t understand it at all. We thought of countless possibilities, but we never thought it would be like this.

In such a place, for a normal group of people, this sudden blindness is equivalent to the death of all members, and it is even more terrifying than death.

I was shaking all over, and countless images flashed through my mind. I thought about groping around in the rainforest, unable to see anything, and without the adaptation of the blind to hearing, death was only a matter of time, and I was afraid that I would experience a long period of extreme horror before I died.

But what exactly caused my blindness? The food? The compressed biscuits we had eaten all the way had been fine, so was it this ruin?

I was still relatively calm, probably because I still couldn’t accept the fact that I was blind. At this moment, suddenly, from outside the tent, quite far away, came a strange voice.

I immediately listened with my ear, and I heard that it was the kind of human voice we heard in the rainforest, similar to the static on a walkie-talkie, high and low, indescribably strange.

The image of the hideous man standing like a snake appeared in my mind, and my throat tightened. How the hell does this thing keep haunting me?

What the hell is making this sound? Is it really Ning? If I could see, I would really like to take a peek. I can’t believe I’m blind at a time like this.

But even if this thing is not a snake, it must be acting with those snakes. Obviously, poisonous snakes have already appeared near this camp. Immediately, my mind tightened and I immediately thought of the tent curtain. Did I just close the tent door? I can’t see, I have to touch it.

Thinking of going to the tent curtain immediately, I was trembling when I touched it. Suddenly, a person rushed in from the door and knocked me down. I just got up and was immediately held down, with my mouth covered.

I was scared half to death, but then I smelled the sweaty smell of the fat man, and then something pressed against my face. I touched it and it was a gas mask.

I immediately stopped struggling, put on the mask, and heard the fat man say in a low voice, “Don’t panic. This fog is poisonous. You can see after wearing the mask for a while. Don’t speak loudly. There are snakes all around the camp.”

I immediately nodded after hearing this. The fat man untied me, and I asked softly, “Where did you guys run off to just now?”

“It’s a long story without a mother,” said the fat man. “Do you think it’s easy to find a few gas masks in the dark?”

I scolded him for not listening to me. At this time, the strange static sound came back again, much closer to us. The fat man immediately shushed nervously. “Don’t talk.”

I immediately stopped talking, and then I heard the fat man flipping things. I don’t know what he flipped out, and he stuffed it into my hand. I touched it and found it was a dagger. I thought to myself, what are you going to do? I heard him seem to be reaching for the tent.

I immediately reached out and grabbed him, not letting him move. He quickly broke free and whispered, “Little brother has been bitten. I have to go save him right away. You stay here and don’t move. I’ll tell you when I can see again!”

I heard this and my mind exploded. I said, “No way!” Before I could figure it out, Fatty was already out of the tent. I was completely stunned. I felt like I was spinning around.

The first thing that surprised me was that the fat guy was bitten. He didn’t say anything clearly, but those snakes were incredibly poisonous. I didn’t dare to think about whether he could be saved after being bitten. Then I was surprised that a guy with such skills and alertness as the fat guy could also be bitten.

I was so anxious that I really wanted to go out and take a look, but I couldn’t see anything. At this time, I thought of an ominous thought. What if the fat man was also bitten? I was alone here with the pan, and it was really scary.

The anxiety was indescribable. I didn’t know how much time it would take to recover, and the situation outside was extremely dangerous. I touched the dagger in my hand, and my whole body was stiff as if I were dead. I thought to myself, I don’t know if the fat man gave me this thing to kill myself or to defend myself.

But there was nothing I could do. I couldn’t do anything, I could only sit there. I listened to the sounds outside, while huddling up to suppress the feeling of my body shaking.

I couldn’t hear anything outside, and I could never imagine what it would be like to be surrounded by snakes. The sound of static electricity didn’t get any closer, but it continued to repeat itself. Judging by the distance, the closest place was at the edge of our camp, but it didn’t come any closer.

I don’t know how long it was—I had no sense of time, and my mind was completely blank during that time—but I gradually calmed down a little. You can’t maintain a certain emotion for too long. After reaching the limit of tension, the body will instead become limp.

Gradually, my vision began to blur, and the blackness began to fade. But it wasn’t like a tide, it was more like the blackness fading, and a layer of misty gray appeared in front of the blackness.

I breathed a sigh of relief, finally able to see the light. I didn’t know how to make him recover faster, so I kept blinking my eyes.

Slowly, the gray layer became whiter and whiter, and the progress was very fast.

It might be a bit like what you see with severe myopia. I turned my head and found that the light in front of me was probably caused by the miner’s lamp not being turned off. I held it up and looked around, and sure enough, the light and shadow in front of me changed. It was indeed my eyes that had improved.

However, I still couldn’t tell where the exit of the tent was, and I could only see some vague shadows.

I had heard that Mao Zedong wept profusely after his cataract surgery, and now I felt that I could deeply appreciate this mixed feeling of joy and sorrow. Just as I was about to use my blurred vision to take a look at Pan Zi, suddenly I saw that in the shadow in front of me, there was a shadow moving.

The situation in front of me was very blurry, and even the outline was indistinguishable, but I knew that there was something moving in front of me. I didn’t believe my vision very much, thinking it was an illusion caused by my vision recovering, so I didn’t pay attention to it and slowly moved towards Pan Zi. I soon touched Pan Zi’s hand, and the temperature was normal. I was surprised that I had actually lowered my fever. Well, there was no way to give him an injection in this state.

I went to the kettle to give him a drink, but when I turned around, I suddenly saw something flashing in front of me. This time, because my vision was gradually improving, I noticed that the movement of the shadow that flashed in front of me was very strange, not like an illusion.

I froze for a moment, then turned my face in the direction of the shadow and looked hard. I saw a black shadow that was as blurry as fog, and it looked like it was something with limbs.

I got goosebumps all over my body and thought to myself, “Could there be something else in this tent?

Did something come in while I was blind? But they wouldn’t be silent, so I clenched my dagger.

The shadow moved again, very quickly, and I couldn’t help but say softly, ”Who?”

The shadow suddenly stopped, and then moved even faster. I saw it run to a place and shake it non-stop. My vision gradually gathered, and the movements became more and more vivid. I realized that it was turning over a backpack, looking for something. And I smelled the smell of swamp mud.

I immediately exclaimed, “Oh, my!” I thought to myself, “This person must also be covered in mud. Who is it?” Thinking about it, I slowly moved my body, wanting to get closer and take a look.

Before I could even jump, the shadow moved again, then stood up and moved quickly. I couldn’t react fast enough, and my mind went blank. I turned around and realized that he was gone.

It all happened so fast that I was a little confused. I thought to myself, “Is it still my illusion? I suddenly thought of what I saw in a TV series. After recovering my sight, my vision would be delayed. Could it be that what I just saw was the situation when the fat man came in?

But almost at the same time, there was a sudden flash of light and a sudden darkness accompanied by a loud gasp. I saw a large overlapping shadow rush in, almost falling in. I heard the fat man panting in a panic: “Turn off the lights! Turn off the miner’s lamp!”

I couldn’t react in time, so he snatched it away from me. The lights went out, and the light around me sank. He immediately whispered, “Lie down, be quiet, no matter what happens, don’t make any noise.”

I immediately lay down, and could feel the fat man also lying down. At first I could still hear him panting, but I could feel that he was trying to restrain himself. Soon his panting became very weak. I was wondering why I had to lie down, when suddenly I heard a muffled “bang,” as if something had hit the tent next door, very hard. Then I heard the sound of a tent collapsing, and it was clear that the tent next door had been destroyed.

My face turned pale, and before I could react, our tent suddenly shook, apparently hit by something.

I immediately felt a stab in my head, and immediately covered my head, thinking that the next blow would definitely be to this tent.

But what I didn’t expect was that no attack came, and after I covered my head like this for a few minutes, the loud crash came from a relatively far distance.

I thought to myself, what the hell is going on? What is it outside? I was about to tell the fat guy that we should run, but before I could open my mouth, he covered my mouth with his hand.

There were loud noises outside, and then the sound of the tent collapsing. Then, after a few minutes, there was the same noise again. This continued for half an hour. From far away, I estimated that more than a dozen tents had been destroyed. We were lying there, and every time something hit, our hearts stopped. The torture was like being bombed, and we didn’t know when the bomb would fall on our heads.

It was only after a very long period of silence that we gradually realized that the attack might have ended. Slowly, I don’t know who reacted first, we all sat up, and I realized that my eyes had basically recovered. Although there was still some haze, I could see the colors and outlines of the people.

Later, I touched it and realized that the remaining blur was also due to the fog on the gas mask lens. After wiping it off, it was clear.

I saw the fat guy and the mummy. The mummy had a wound on his wrist and the fat guy was covered in blood. They were both covered in mud and looked like they had just come out of a pigsty. It was clear that they had experienced a terrible and chaotic night.

We still didn’t dare to speak. After a while, the fat guy secretly lifted the curtain. Suddenly, there was light coming in. It turned out to be dawn.

Then he walked out carefully. I asked Mian Youping, and he waved his hand to say that everything was fine. He also looked out after him, and I followed.

The fog had almost disappeared, and the morning light was very heavy, but I could already see everything. I came out and turned around to look, and I was stunned.

All around us, the entire camp had collapsed, and all the tents were ruined. It was as if we had been hit by a powerful tornado. There was nothing around us, nothing had attacked us, and there were no traces of snakes.

The fat guy cursed and sat down by the fire, which had almost gone out. I was stunned and unable to react. At that moment, I heard a sound of a body falling behind me. I turned around and saw that the oil bottle had fainted on the ground.