Volume 5 Chapter 3 Avalanche
“No one is allowed to speak, not even fart,” the fat man said to us in a very low voice, “Let’s look for any protruding rocks or crevices nearby. We’re in trouble.”
“Impossible.” Lang Feng was dumbfounded: “I calculated the weight…”
Hua Monk covered Lang Feng’s mouth and signaled him to say something later. The few of them were all sweating, looking up at the ceiling while tiptoeing to put their equipment back and looking for a place to take refuge. The snow layer on top is not thick, and even if there is an avalanche, it will be a small-scale collapse, but the place where we are standing is really not good. We are too close to the fracture surface, and when the snow rushes down, it is easy for us to be wrapped up. Below is a steep slope with a very high altitude, and there is no place to escape.
The best way to do this is to find a protruding rock, as Fat Man said, and hide under it, or find an ice crevasse, but this should be seen in the movie “Vertical Limit,” I don’t know if it works in reality.
The bare rock we are on is too gentle, and hiding under it will still allow the snow to directly impact us. Fat Man pointed to a huge walnut-like rock on the side, which has an angle with the rock, and should be more suitable.
The snow slope between us and the rock was gone, and all that was left was the ice surface of the glacier, which was deadly slippery. There was no time to change skates at this point, so we just had to grit our teeth and go for it. Fat Man tied the rope around his waist, gave us one end, and then bit his teeth and stepped onto the ice.
One step, two steps, three steps, every time I took a step it felt like I was stepping on an egg, and I was waiting for the sound of the yolk splashing. But the fat guy is always impressive from time to time. After three steps, he had already climbed steadily to the opposite rock, grabbed the rope around his waist, looked up at the top of his head, and waved for us to come over.
We pulled the rope, first Pan Zi and Mian Youping, then Lang Feng carrying Chen Pi A Si, then Ye Cheng carrying Shunzi, and I was last. Seeing that they all passed safely, I felt much more at ease. By now, snow blocks the size of watermelons were falling from above, and the crack in the ice could no longer support the weight.
I patted my face, tied the other end of the rope around my waist, and then took my first step, steadying myself as I went.
I have always had poor balance, and I had to fall and get hurt many times before I could learn to skate or ride a bike. I was even more panicked at this point, and I felt that the ice beneath my feet seemed to be about to disappear at any moment.
The fat guy knew right away that I was the most difficult person to deal with, and whispered, “Don’t think so much. It’s only two steps. You can jump over it.”
I looked at the distance between the fat guy and me. Sure enough, as long as I could exert enough force, I could definitely jump over it. I thought to myself, “I’ll grit my teeth and twist my waist to jump up.”
But what I didn’t expect was that just as I was about to jump, the ice I was standing on suddenly gave way. My foot slipped on the slope, and then I slid down the entire length of the ice.
I grabbed at the ice with my hands and feet, but there was nowhere to put any force on the ice. I fell straight to the end of the rope, which was taut, and hung on the ice cliff. I heard the carabiner click, and when I looked down, the carabiner had opened, and I saw that my body was about to be unhooked.
I cursed in my heart, this damn cheap stuff must be produced on a voluntary basis!
The fat guy pulled me, almost dragging me off the rock. Fortunately, Pan Zi grabbed his belt and several people held him back. They pulled the rope hard and pulled me up.
But every time I pulled, the rope would loosen. I was so anxious that I wanted to kick my feet to find a place to re-fasten the buckle, but the ice was too slippery.
I could only step on it for a few seconds before slipping down, and there was no way for me to use the force of my body. Seeing that the buckle was about to come off, I pulled out my ice axe and knocked it hard against the ice cliff, firmly pinning it in place. Then I stepped on the ice with my left foot and found a place to stand. I quickly looked down to change the carabiner, but before I could finish, a strange vibration came from above my head.
I looked up and saw several people looking at me with idiot eyes. Before I could react, a white snow fog suddenly exploded into the air, almost blocking my entire field of vision.
An avalanche!
There was no time to scream or be surprised. I don’t know what I was thinking at that moment, but I heard the fat guy yell, “Grab the ice ax! Stick to the ice!” Then suddenly everything went dark, and my body sank suddenly, as if a dozen people were pulling my clothes down. The rope around my waist suddenly dug into my flesh, and then a large amount of snow gas choked into my lungs.
Then I fell into a state of chaos, with a huge force hitting every part of my body. I couldn’t even lift my head, and soon my throat began to tighten. The feeling of extreme suffocation came from my lungs. I felt like I was being thrown into a sugar-roasted chestnut machine, with countless icy things pressing down on me from all sides, smashing me. In an instant, my nose and mouth were filled with the smell of snow.
It was only then that I remembered that ice is an excellent conductor of vibrations, especially extremely thick ice, which has extremely strong resonance.
I almost wanted to slap myself, but it was too late to regret it. The whole person was knocked around like a top, and I wanted to grab the ice ax, but I couldn’t even feel where my hands were.
Just when I was confused and didn’t know what to do, suddenly I felt the rope being pulled up, and then my body was also pulled up a little.
I was shocked. It was the fat guys pulling me on the other side. I suddenly felt hopeful. The rope could still react, which meant that the snowfall from the avalanche was not very thick, and their strength could still be transmitted to me.
I quickly dug my way through the snow flow, and after a few stumbles, I was able to reach the surface of the snow flow with the help of the rope.
The fat guy and Langfeng were hiding in a corner of the rock, and the snow flow rushed past them, forming a snowfall in front of them. The fat guy and Langfeng were holding onto the rope, and when they saw me being pulled out, they shouted, “Are you okay?”
I gasped for breath and nodded. The snow was still falling on me, but I pulled on the rope and started to move towards them. But the snow was too strong, I couldn’t stand up at all, and I couldn’t move my hands even if I tried. Fat Man had to pull me along, waiting for the snow to pass.
The avalanche came quickly and went just as quickly. In less than half a minute, the snow had passed me, leaving only a large amount of broken snow. I looked down and saw that the entire valley was covered in white mist. I was scared to death. If I had been swept down, I would not be alive now.
I was pulled under the rock, and everyone was still gasping for breath. The fat guy patted me and said, “You really are lucky. Fortunately, it was only a small avalanche with little snow. Otherwise, not only you, but I would have been dragged down with you.”
I didn’t know what expression I was making. My climbing hat had fallen off, my ears were red from the cold, and I couldn’t hear anything clearly. I could only pat him on the back and turn to look at the glacier surface.
The entire snow slope had already been completely dumped into the valley below, and a large, steep glacier was exposed in front of us. From time to time, pieces of snow would roll down from above, reminding us of the danger of a secondary avalanche.
The surface of the glacier is made of snow that has been compressed under a layer of millennial snow, which is what we commonly refer to as “gravity ice.” This ice is naturally formed and in high-altitude mountains it will wrap around the entire mountain, forming a glacier. There is usually a lot of broken snow on top of the ice.
Except for Fatso, we had never seen an actual glacier. In the snow-capped mountain valley, seeing such a huge piece of ice cliff exposed, under the setting sun, it was like a giant carved soap, it was really a shocking thing, we were all a little dazed.
Ye Cheng muttered to himself, “Lang Da’s shot was not without results.”
After a moment, everyone gradually reacted. Hua Monk lit up a few flashlights and shone them into the ice to look for traces of the tomb. It was chaotic inside, and it was impossible to see the bottom. The average snow mountain glacier is only about 10 to 20 meters thick, but the thickness of this glacier seems a bit abnormal.
The fat man had sharp eyes. At this moment, he suddenly exclaimed, as if he had discovered something, and snatched the flashlight from the monk to shine it.
We looked hard at the flashlight in his hand. Under the dim light of the flashlight, I saw that in the direction the fat man was shining, there was a huge shadow in the dark blue translucent depths of the glacier, almost taking up half of the ice cliff.