Chapter 9 The Nine Layers of the Demon Tower

This mountain crevice we fell into, narrow and deep, beyond the illumination range of the flashlight are all pitch black, limited by visibility, do not know what terrain is in the distance.

Big man probed Liu Gong’s nostrils with his hand, and said with a shake of his hand, “It’s over, it’s over, the gas is gone.”

I climbed over and touched Liu Gong’s carotid artery, it was indeed dead, the heartbeat was gone, so I sighed and said to Big Guy, “Let’s bury Liu Gong.”

I took out the engineer’s shovel and wanted to dig a pit, Ga Wa stopped me on the side and pointed to the ground, “Bugs, fire.”

When Ga Wa reminded me of this, I remembered that in the valley it was because I wanted to dig a pit to bury the engineer who fell to his death that I ended up digging out a demonic ladybug, there were fourteen people in the squad and ten died within those frightening minutes, it seems that you can’t just dig up the land here, God knows what other ghostly things are underneath.

I have a hunch that that weird bug is not as simple as some mysterious creature, it split from one to three after it burned two people, is that just a coincidence? Can’t figure it out how to think about it.

But we can’t just leave the bodies of our companions out there, we can only take a compromise. I used a flashlight to illuminate, Ga Wa and Big Guy picked up some broken rocks nearby to cover Liu Gong’s body, sort of building a simple stone grave for him.

In this process, Luo Ning always sat on the ground and did not move, quietly watching Liu Gong’s stone tomb, and finally could no longer hold back, wow cry out, suppressed in the heart of grief, such as the dike tide released.

I want to persuade her, but really do not know what to say, was touched by her crying, is also a sour nose, heart like a knife, remembered that last night, the squad is still surrounded in front of the campfire singing the military song, that loud and clear song seems to echo in the ears, however, today most of the comrades are forever and ever sleep in the Kunlun Mountains under the big glacier.

I helped Luo Ning to stand up, and together we held a moment of silence for Liu Gong and other comrades. At that time, no matter what the occasion was, we had to quote Mao’s Selection, and I took the lead in reciting, “The sky is all white, and the march in the snow is even more pressing.”

The remaining three people also echoed the same voice: “Head down the mountain, the wind spread the red flag over the pass. Only with sacrifice is there a strong will to change the sun and moon for a new day.”

The crowd then raised their right fists and swore, “May the great leader Chairman Mao live long and prosper, and may Chairman Mao’s close comrade-in-arms, Comrade *, be in good health forever. Comrades, comrades, please go without fear, some people’s deaths are lighter than a feather, some people’s deaths are as heavy as Mount Taishan, and your deaths are heavier than Mount Taishan for the interests of the people, and it is for the interests of the people that you have sacrificed your lives. We must carry on the legacy of the martyrs of the revolution, treading on the footsteps you have colored red with blood, and carry the proletariat* to the end; the final victory will always belong to us, the workers, peasants, and soldiers.”

At that time, I was still a new recruit, never participated in the memorial service of my comrades, I didn’t know what I should say, I just remembered that other people said so during the meeting, and there was nothing appropriate or inappropriate in that situation.

For a long, long time, the crowd calmed down from the pain, treated the wounds on their bodies, fortunately, they were all minor injuries that did not affect their movements. Casually ate a few mouthfuls of compressed cookies, gathered together, discussing to discuss what to do next, from the valley that was pressed by the snowboard to go out is impossible, I estimate that the entire valley may have been filled by avalanches, and now we can only find another exit.

Ga Wa patted the empty bullet pouch on his body, signaling that there are not many bullets, we entered the mountain because we have to carry a lot of equipment, so the ammunition equipped with the minimum limit, each person only three rifle magazines, after all, is not a combat mission, there are no bandits in the area, so the advance consideration is a little careless. The avalanche and threw away part of the ammunition, and now each person only has an average of about twenty rounds of ammunition left, and a total of two grenades. There should not be any wild beasts underground, so it is useless to have more bullets, just enough for self-defense.

Dry food is not at all, can eat just ate, must find a way to find the exit within two days, otherwise hungry will also starve to death in this underground. Unfortunately, Luo Ning still had a compass on him.

The depth of the mountain gap is beyond imagination, after walking south for a while, we came to the end, the cracks in the earth turned north, by the feeling like walking to the bottom of a big glacier.

We walked forward in the dark for more than ten hours, the more we go the lower the terrain, the underground space is also getting bigger and bigger, Luo Ning measured with a barometer, barometric data converted to altitude, but only more than four hundred meters, with the Sichuan about the same, much lower than the average elevation of more than 4,000 meters of the Tibetan Plateau, and then go on, I am afraid that we will have to go to the heart of the earth.

Finally the terrain finally leveled off, ear heard the sound of water flow turbulence, seems not far away from a large underground river. I saw that there is no longer a downhill road, so I used the flashlight to probe around, wanting to see if there is a way upward, and suddenly found that the flashlight shone out the light, in the rock wall produced a lot of weak reflection, like shining on the countless pieces of mirrors.

Luo Ning exclaimed, “It’s mica!”

The rest of the three heard her say something about mica and didn’t know what it was, but hearing his tone of alarm, they thought that there was some kind of emergency situation, and hurriedly blocked Luo Ning behind them, and took off their Type 5-6 semi-automatic rifles from their backs as fast as they could, pulling open the bolt a few times with a clatter and getting ready to shoot.

Luo Ning wondered, “What are you doing?”

I asked Loring while holding my gun on guard, “What female and male? Where?”

Loring said, “Not animals, I mean there are crystals all around here, mica and crystals usually grow in the same strata, ah, sure enough there are crystals too.”

Although Luo Ning is mainly responsible for the map mapping work, but often work with the geological exploration team, for the geological and mining knowledge also know a lot, we appeared around the crystallization like glass flakes, is a kind of monoclinic crystalline system of crystals, only in the ancient bipyramidal rock layer can appear, Hebei’s underground reserves are very large, but the mica here is extremely dark in color, in the form of a large hexagonal column. The quality far exceeds that produced in the interior of Hebei Lingshou County, and from this point of the depth of the mica color, we are in a position where it is already unimaginably deep.

Luo Ning was attracted by the rare large mica around, look at this piece and look at that piece, I casually picked up a small piece of look, also can not see what place worth rare.

At this time, I suddenly heard the big man shouting to Ga Wa, “What are you doing, Ramtso? Hurry up.”

I used a flashlight, see Ga Wa is on the ground in accordance with the Tibetan way kowtow, the whole body is lying on the ground, what is this kid doing? Who is he kowtowing to? I shone another light in front of him and couldn’t help but suck in a breath of cold air.

Surprisingly, in the underground towers a with thousands of giant wood built into the “gold” shaped wooden tower, tower body stars have countless red flash, through those weak flash to watch, the base of the wooden tower has nearly two hundred meters wide, rammed with mud and stone into a thousand years of cypress constructed into the tower body, a total of nine layers, each layer is piled up with wearing a strange Each layer is piled up with dried skeletons wearing strange costumes, men and women, young and old, and each big tree is carved with Tibetan secret writing, is this a grave? Is this a grave? It is so huge, who built it underground?

I went over and pulled up Ga Wa who was kowtowing on the ground, “Although our party and our army respect the ethnic policy, and you Ga Wa Zi is also a Tibetan, but when you wear a military uniform, you are a member of the Chinese People’s Liberation Army, since it is a communist don’t play with that set of materialistic mileage flange, it is not allowed to don’t engage in religious superstition of this set.”

The big man laughed beside him, “OK ah old Hu, this family this little word whole, have the potential to be an instructor ah.”

Luo Ning had been looking at the mica, and hearing the three of us arguing, she also came over and walked closer to watch.

I shook my hand at the big man to tell him not to interrupt and continued to ask Ga Wa, “What kind of tower is this? Do you recognize the words written on it?”

Ga Wa shook his head vigorously.

I said, “This waifu, don’t recognize what you kowtow ah, see so many corpses and bones, just scared you silly?”

Ga wa face is full of panic, with not too fluent Chinese said, “Hu this Ga bear, oh let you put Oh say, bias Oh come to pull, Lal Rados, nine …… nine layers of demon building.”

His first half of the sentence I did not understand, after the four words heard clearly, what nine layers of demon building? What for? Not just burying the dead?

Have not waited for Ga Wa to speak, Luo Ning tiptoe from the tower side ran back to us to do a do not make a sound gesture, she pointed to the tower behind us quietly said, do not make a sound to startle them.

I saw her look solemn, know that there may be trouble, but I do not know what she was referring to, so I lowered my voice and asked: “Alarmed what? The dead in the tower?”

Luo Ning said extremely nervously, “No, it’s the kind of ladybugs with fire, all sleeping on the dead bodies, too many to count.”

After hearing Luo Ning’s words, I realized that the dense red flashes on that wooden tower turned out to be all from that kind of transparent ladybugs.

Although I had more or less the fearlessness of a revolutionary soldier, I felt panic in my heart as soon as I thought of that kind of weird ladybug. This kind of creature that surpassed common sense was too difficult to deal with, and the fear left by that tragic scene in the valley was too strong for me.

I made a gesture, and the four of them silently retreated back towards the way they came. Before they could take a few steps, Ga Wa’s feet suddenly stepped on the ground and fell into a ditch.

This ditch was very hidden and parallel to the route we were traveling, so we didn’t even notice it when we came. Although the ditch was only about a meter deep, Ga Wa still let out a muffled grunt from the fall, I hurriedly jumped down to help him, and saw that Ga Wa was covering his feet, and his face was filled with a pained expression.

At this time Luo Ning and big man also separately down to the ditch, with a flashlight, found that Ga Wa’s foot was a sharp white bone stabbed, even with the shoes with the foot was pierced through a transparent hole, the blood flowed like a stream. The ditch was filled with layers and layers of white bones of various animals, too many to estimate. It looks like this ditch should be the animal martyrdom pit for cows, horses, sheep, dogs, and so on.

In order not to startle the ladybugs in the nearby wooden tower, the big man covered Ga Wa’s mouth with his hand to prevent him from screaming out, I pulled out the white bones inserted in his feet, Luo Ning with the first aid kit in Yunnan Baiyao sprinkled in his wound, and took out a white bandage to help him bandage to stop bleeding.

My hands were covered with blood on Ga Wa’s legs, and I wiped a few handfuls on my own uniform, and a thought suddenly flashed through my mind that this cow and horse burial pit was dug in an odd way, not square and round, but dug into a long ditch shape, and the long ditch leads to the wooden pagoda where the body was put, and this shape is exactly the same as that mentioned in the “Feng Shui Mysteries”, a layout known as the “Deterrence”, similar to the one mentioned in the book. This shape is similar to the layout of the “deterrent” mentioned in the “Secret Art of Feng Shui”. If it is really the same, then there should be a martyrdom ditch of the same size in the parallel position.

Two martyrdom ditch parallel to each other sandwiched wooden tower structure of the tomb, constituting two dragons sucking the pearl of the situation, according to so deduced that the ditch next to the tomb should be the owner of some of the artifacts used in life. I just don’t know whether these two burial ditches are artificial or naturally formed, it seems that the latter is more likely.

The sound of the river flowing in this vicinity is very loud, judging from the sound of the river rapids, it is in the northwest, that is, behind the Nine Layers Demon Building, there is an underground river, because dragons are inseparable from water.

If this is really what I expected, then the map of this underground world has long been in my head, only that I need to find another martyrdom ditch to confirm my deduction.

Big man pushed my shoulder: “Old Hu, what is the whole thing?”

I was lost in thought just now, and it was only after he pushed me that I came back to my senses, and I asked Luo Ning, “Luo Gong, can you estimate where we are now? Approximately where on the map?”

Luo Ning used the north pointer to calculate with reference to the map, pondered for a moment and said, “We have been underground non-stop toward the north for more than ten hours, according to our speed speculation, long past the head of the big glacier, should be out of the Kunlun Mountains soon.”

I said my idea just now, if we go back, we can only go back to the mountain crevice covered by avalanches, if my estimation is correct, we walk along the underground river, there should be a way out. But to do so, we have to risk passing underneath the Nine Layer Demon Building, which is a program to survive in death.

The four of us totaled up and felt that doing so was worth the risk even though it was fraught with danger, but I decided to find another martyrdom ditch next to it to confirm it first.

Before the operation, I asked Ga Wa, what exactly is the Nine Layer Demon Tower?

Ga wa Chinese speak very hard, said half a day I finally understand a part, in his hometown blood Wei, there is also a and this nine-layer demon building exactly the same ruins, rumor has it that this “nine-layer demon building” is the ancient demon country successive generations of monarchs of the family mausoleum of the funeral form, the demon country destroyed, the tomb has been destroyed by the hero king Gesar king, the highland plateau of Tibet in the only a pile of rotten wood. In the Tibetan plateau, only a pile of rotten wood frame, and herdsmen’s mouth passed down the narrative poetry, in the generations of King Gesar like the sun in general unparalleled martial arts.

When the Tibetan herdsmen pass by these ruins, they have to pay homage and chant the epics. This is not to fear the tombs of the demonic kings, but to express their respect for King Gesar. Ga Wa also said something about religion, which I couldn’t understand, and it was unknown if that ghostly fire-like bug was the resting undead in the tomb.

I put Luo Ning and other three people stay in place, their own creeping forward, and cattle and horses in the burial ditch separated by more than a hundred meters, there is indeed another martyrdom ditch, which are ancient leather boots, ancient Tibetan wooden pieces, ancient Mongolian wooden documents, painted wooden pieces and gold ornaments, wooden plates, wooden wings, wooden birds and beasts, copper, grain and a large number of silk and other burial objects.

It seems that I inferred no error, nine layer demon building behind the underground river must be connected with the outside world, so dive back to the animal martyrdom ditch to greet the other three people action.

I was the first to open the way, the big man with a gun behind me, followed by Ga Wa, his feet stabbed not light, Luo Ning in the back to help him walk.

The Nine Layer Demon Tower is very large, the underground cavity was originally extremely vast, but the tower and the large swaths of mica on either side of it blocked the road to the north nearly to death, with only a very narrow area on either side barely passable.

We passed under the wooden tower with fear and trepidation, and when we saw those ladybugs in the tower that flickered with the breath of flames, we felt that our hearts were going to jump out of our throats, and every step in the two hundred meters under the tower seemed so far away.

It is not easy to rub through the nine layers of the demon building, less than two hundred steps forward, suddenly a soft foot, like stepping on what a huge animal, I used the flashlight to shine, under my feet is a huge reptile never seen, it spits out a long tongue, the skin color and the color of the ground is very close to the appearance of the giant lizard, the shape of the crocodile, but not so rough skin, and the front kiss is not as sharp as the lizard, grows more round, tongue, the lizard is not so rough, and the front kiss is not as sharp as the lizard, and the tongue is more round. The front muzzle was not as sharp as a lizard’s, it was more round, the tongue was like a snake, red and long, with a fork in the front, and the whole body was dark, covered with large white echidnae, from the appearance alone, it could be said that it was basically a super large frog with a long tail.

I have never been afraid of anything in my life, but I am afraid of this kind of disgusting things, so scared that I shrunk to the back of the big man, the big man also saw this peculiar animal, his feelings may be similar to mine, but also startled, perhaps the only partner that the soldiers can rely on is the rifle, he reacted out of instinct to raise the gun to fight, snap a point shot, the reptile twisted a few times, and then died.

At this time the last walking Loring came over, looked at the dead animal on the ground, breathed out and said to us, “This is a salamander that lives in the ground, eats insects and mayflies for a living, and doesn’t hurt anyone.”

I don’t care about killing an animal, I am worried about whether the big man’s bold shooting will wake up the bugs in the tower, heck, if a person has a bad luck, he will stuff his teeth with a mouthful of cold water, the ladybugs in the “Nine Layers of the Demon Tower” were obviously alarmed by the sound of the gunshot, and countless blue fireballs like a bright light were illuminated.

The entire underground space is reflected by the light of the fire into the blue, the wooden tower was also ignited, the fire is getting bigger and bigger, hundreds of fireballs pounced towards us, such a big fire, but we can not feel a trace of heat, on the contrary, we feel the cold air, teeth chattering.

Big man saw the situation is not good, took out the armed belt inserted two grenades to pull the line to throw over to blow up those fireballs, I hurriedly pressed his hand: “Throw a, leave us a glory bomb, I do not want to let that ghost fire burned to death.”