Chapter 97: The Forbidden River Section

No matter how difficult the road ahead may be, life must go on, day by day, without a trace, just like the Ganges River, flowing on quietly…

In the blink of an eye, it was already three months later, and the footsteps of spring were about to leave. The smell of summer had already spread through the earth through the scorching sun overhead.

After these months of sailing, I have developed an inexplicable dependence on the Penglai, just as I have accepted my tanned skin after nearly six months of staying on this land.

“This is perhaps more manly.” In the morning, after washing up, I looked at myself in the mirror and couldn’t help smiling to comfort myself. I then habitually went to get a glass of wine. The months of sailing life had also brought me a bad habit, which was a very strong dependence on alcohol.

I walked onto the deck with a glass of wine in my hand. The diligent Singh was already cleaning the deck, Johnny was still fishing, and Huigen looked at me and said disapprovingly, “Brother, you started drinking without having breakfast. I don’t think it’s a good habit.”

I walked over and, as I always did, put my hand on Hui Gen’er’s bald head and said, “People don’t always live for good habits, do they? Especially after seeing so many messy underwater creatures.”

Hui Gen’er pouted and stopped talking. He drank a glass of milk in one gulp, just like he was drinking, and sighed with satisfaction.

He knew I was telling the truth. We had drifted along the legend, sometimes diving to explore, sometimes not, but we had indeed seen a lot of strange and weird underwater creatures, including fish, turtles, and water snakes. The only thing they had in common was that they were all extremely aggressive and polluted creatures.

The three-month drifting actually did not have a fixed route, sometimes in the tributaries, sometimes in the main stream.

Now, we can no longer find the mysterious underwater murder legend, but we have drifted down the river to this place. Johnny said that today he will use a magic weapon left to him by my master to finally locate it.

This is not a hasty choice. In fact, three days ago, we experienced the last place where the legend took place. There, Walmar almost died in the water, surrounded by a group of brutal and bloodthirsty fish, one of which was the giant catfish. If it weren’t for the sudden power of the mighty Tao Bai, Walmar would definitely not have returned from the water.

Despite this, he is still very persistent in his adventurous life and eagerly looks forward to meeting the ultimate existence.

But… thinking about this, I took a sip of the wine in my glass and sensitively discovered that the place where we were now was a small town. According to Johnny’s map, after the small town, there would be a large area of wasteland, and the Ganges would pass through a no-man’s land. Johnny judged that the place where the final being would stay was under a section of the riverbank in the no-man’s land. But was there any other deeper meaning in this?

While I was thinking, Singh enthusiastically served me a Western-style breakfast: fried eggs, hash browns and bacon. It was simple and filling.

I couldn’t wait to ask Johnny to confirm my suspicion, so I walked over to him with my plate of breakfast and a potato pancake in my mouth.

“This bacon is actually very fragrant.” Seeing me sit down next to him, Johnny didn’t hesitate to grab a piece of bacon from my plate and put it in his mouth to chew.

I didn’t mind, and I just said my judgment in front of Johnny: “Mr. Johnny, what do you think? Is that existence wise? Why choose a deserted place to avoid something? But it’s so close to a small town?”

Jonny’s expression was originally very happy, but after hearing my question, his expression stiffened for a moment, and the action of chewing bacon stopped. Then a look of pain appeared on his face. He was silent for a long time before turning to me and saying, “Don’t make specious judgments. I don’t want to think about this! I don’t want to recall some things… Since I can’t escape, can I make my mood a little easier?”

What does this mean? I received some inexplicable words from Uncle Johnny, and my heart became a little heavy. Whenever he mentioned that existence, Johnny always spoke vaguely. The most reliable information we have now is that the existence is a corpse, and we don’t know anything else.

But what kind of corpse? The corpse of the old village chief? Thinking of this, I also showed a look of pain on my face. If it was the old village chief, I didn’t want to face it a second time.

At this time, it was 7:00 in the morning, and everyone was getting up one after another. Because the sun was already very fierce at this time, it was too hot to sleep any longer.

After a slow night’s sailing, the Penglai had already completely left the city’s range and officially entered the barren no-man’s land. To be precise, in this remote area, apart from the occasional scattered villages, there was almost no sign of human habitation.

I don’t know why, but as soon as the ship sailed here, my mood became a little gloomy, and the strong summer sun couldn’t dispel the gloom in my heart.

Not only me, but everyone seems to have this feeling, as well as a sense of crisis. Chengqing has been repeatedly wiping the magic weapon, and Chengqing is also arranging his bottles and jars in an orderly manner. Lushan, Taobai and Huigen are also working harder than ever on their morning exercises on the deck.

Everyone felt like they were making final preparations, except for Wal-Ma and Johnny.

Worma didn’t understand the definition of a dangerous situation at all, and Johnny was really calm. He hadn’t taken out the magic weapon that his master had passed down to him, but he felt more serious about fishing.

I took a deep breath, grabbed a stool, sat down next to Johnny, and asked, “When will you start searching for the magic weapon, Uncle Johnny?”

“When I have more to harvest.” As he spoke, Uncle Johnny glanced at the fish basket beside him. Unlike the lack of fish along the way, there were already two or three fish in the basket. I lifted the basket to see that the fish were struggling violently in the basket, giving off a violent feeling just by looking at them! There was even one that almost bit my finger… Of course, I didn’t ignore the faint purple marks on the fish, but I also discovered that almost all of the fish were carnivorous.

“Originally, they were not so aggressive in nature, except when dealing with their prey! Now every one of them will attack people. Fortunately, there is no human presence in this part of the river except for the occasional cargo ships.” Uncle Johnny’s eyes were very worried. I didn’t know what he was thinking about. Was it the past that he always refused to talk about?

So, I cleverly avoided the topic and asked directly, “What is a good catch?”

“That’s the special bait. Every time I cast it, it will attract a fish within five minutes. That’s pretty much it,” said Johnny in a light tone.

At this point, I noticed that Johnny’s bait was a light red bait. I had never paid much attention to it before because I had never had any luck. I picked up a little bit and put it on my nose. It had an indescribable flavor that made me crave it and resist it at the same time. Finally, I couldn’t help but ask, “What exactly is this bait?”

“There is a special talisman ash in it, and your master left it. He didn’t explain it in detail, only telling me that the talisman was written with a special kind of blood. If you want to determine a large area, you can use this to explore. The contaminated creatures will definitely be sensitive to it… Then I decided to burn it into talisman ash and put it in the bait.” Mr. Johnny took a sip of wine and calmly explained.

“What a genius idea.” I couldn’t help but mutter.

At the same time, Uncle Johnny’s fishing rod sank, and another fish was hooked. In the distance, a smaller cargo ship than ours was passing by, and the crew on board waved at us.

Singh, who was driving the Penglai, moved a little closer to the cargo ship, and the crew on board greeted us: “Are you newbies, taking cargo for the first time? Then I advise you to follow the tributary ahead and bypass this stretch of river. Don’t think about taking the shortcut. We just came back from taking the shortcut. This stretch of river is not very peaceful. The river god here is not very nice.”

Johnny translated the sailor’s words for me, and Singh thanked him and threw a bottle of wine to the enthusiastic sailor.

The cargo ship had already left, and I couldn’t help but ask Uncle Johnny why Singh didn’t even ask a single question. Uncle Johnny closed his eyes, rubbed his brow, and said, “This has nothing to do with the existence we are looking for. It’s an ancient legend about navigation! There are some river sections where ships cannot go. They are forbidden places of the river gods. The uninhabited area ahead is just such a place.”

“Why would it be in that place? Is it a coincidence? Or is there something in those river sections?” In fact, I myself don’t believe it’s a coincidence.

But Johnny was clearly getting a little irritated. He shouted, “I’m not an expert on everything. Don’t ask me about everything. The taboo has been around since ancient times, not something I decided.”

As he spoke, his fishing rod sank again, and another bloodthirsty fish was hooked!