We unearthed a broken iron shovel from a corpse, dug a large pit in the ground, and with great effort, buried all those dead bodies within it. Before the fresh mound, we lit three cigarettes and bowed in reverence.

Having finished that grim task, we arrived at the edge of the underground river and immediately fell into a worried silence.

This hidden river was at least thirty meters wide, its current churning with a terrifying force. Although the water wasn't excessively deep, a sweep of the torchlight revealed numerous jagged reefs jutting up from the depths. At this velocity, the current looked capable of sinking the Titanic all over again. If one tried to swim across, hitting those stones would likely result in nothing but murky silt in one's mouth.

So, I asked Da Xiong, "You said you escaped from this very river?"

Da Xiong nodded firmly. "That's right. If I hadn't been lucky, I would have smashed my head to pieces long ago."

Da Xiong then turned the inquiry back on me. "By the way, I never asked how the two of you ended up here."

I replied that it was a long story, one I would tell him slowly later.

Just as I finished speaking, a chilling, invisible wind suddenly swept past us. The small bonfire Da Xiong had started began to sputter and die out, and the torches in our hands started to shake violently.

Xie Yuting glanced back only once before whipping the long saber from his back. His face instantly hardened, and he commanded, "Gear up!"

Since we had lost our flashlights, we relied solely on the flickering torchlight. I was at the very back, so I couldn't see what was happening, but I knew Xie Yuting must have spotted something truly formidable.

Da Xiong hesitated for a moment, his eyes wide as he stared into the darkness. "Holy hell, there looks like a person over there. I'll go check it out first."

Da Xiong was always recklessly brave; when danger loomed and others scrambled to retreat, he insisted on getting a closer look.

However, after taking two steps, Da Xiong abruptly stopped. He spoke with a seriousness I had never heard from him before. "Damn it, why are the corpses we just buried climbing out of their graves..."

Hearing that, my blood ran cold. The hand gripping my Type 14 pistol grew slick with sweat.

I don't know where the courage came from, but I advanced two steps. Sure enough, the mound where the bodies lay beside Da Xiong had been dug open. A woman stood not far ahead of Da Xiong, her back completely turned to us.

I recognized immediately that she was not one of the corpses. She wore a white short-sleeved T-shirt and tight-fitting jeans, holding a pistol in one hand while gazing up at some point on the cavern roof.

The clothing and the familiar stance with the weapon sent my heart racing. I called out, "Liang Qian?"

Liang Qian seemed to have been aware of our presence all along. She slightly turned her head, pointed toward the ceiling, and said, "Something climbed up there."

Seeing that the woman was actually Liang Qian, Da Xiong became extremely animated. "Comrade Liang, I thought you were dead! How did you get here?"

Liang Qian frowned slightly and addressed Da Xiong. "This isn't the time for chatter. I'll tell you later."

I recalled Xie Yuting mentioning earlier that Liang Qian wasn't allied with Old Huang, and a wave of relief washed over me. Though I couldn't fathom her reason for being here, I felt she was someone I could still trust. However, I decided against exposing my knowledge; if she stayed close to us, she would eventually reveal her true objective.

Xie Yuting gave me a meaningful look, likely thinking the same thing.

Just then, a rustling sound echoed from directly above us. Without hesitation, Liang Qian fired two shots towards the ceiling.

I only saw two sparks bloom against the rock overhead; they hadn't hit anything solid, but I did perceive a massive shape scrambling across the cavern roof just above us.

The thing was enormous, perhaps the size of a truck, seeming to possess countless limbs as it walked inverted along the ceiling. Yet, its movement was impossibly swift; it darted downstream along the river channel in an instant.

What kind of entity could be so colossal and yet move with such frightening speed? We were all stunned. By the time we gave chase, the creature had vanished deep into the river channel.

"The bodies are gone, taken by that thing. You all need to be careful..." Liang Qian's voice trailed off weakly. When we turned back to her, she had fainted, her body suddenly limp.

Da Xiong rushed over and steadied Liang Qian, telling me, "Jinggangshan is still ahead; a comrade can't collapse on the road."

I snapped, "Stop the nonsense, saving her is the priority."

We gathered another pile of dry wood from the bank and rekindled a large bonfire near the water's edge. We placed Liang Qian close to the heat, and I took off my leather jacket to cover her.

We examined her injuries. The bruising on her head seemed to be from a collision during a fight with a Zongzi, and her body was covered in abrasions. Her forearm alone was mottled with bruises, and I suspected there were more hidden underneath. It was a mystery how she had accumulated such damage.

I placed my hand on her forehead, then frowned at Xie Yuting. "She's hot enough to boil an egg... We don't have any fever medicine here. If this continues, she might not last much longer."

I couldn't think of an immediate solution, so I simply treated Liang Qian’s superficial wounds. The three of us sat back down, helpless, staring blankly at each other with rueful smiles.

I suddenly thought of Robinson Crusoe; that American had food, water, and hunting grounds on his island. Here, we couldn't even find a single bird dropping. In another couple of days, we’d starve to death.

Xie Yuting said to me, "I don't think all those corpses came through the cave. It’s likely they were washed in from upstream. Maybe if we go against the current, we can get out."

Da Xiong scoffed. "Forget the fierce current, we don't even have a broken log, let alone a boat, so going upstream is impossible. Besides, we haven't found the person we were looking for; we can't just leave yet."

After a moment of silence, Da Xiong shouted, "Come look! There are fish in this water! Huge fish!"

Xie Yuting and I were already famished, so this news energized us immediately. We ran to the riverbank and saw, illuminated by the torchlight, several dark shapes moving in the murky water—the largest nearly half a meter long, the smallest about thirty centimeters.

But given how large the fish were, I frowned and asked Xie Yuting, "This... don't you think they grew big eating dead bodies?"

Da Xiong snorted dismissively nearby. "I don't care what they ate to grow. Let's just haul one up first."

Seeing that he had stripped down to nothing but his bare skin, I couldn't stop him. With a plop, he plunged into the water.

Fortunately, the current near the bank swirled and was calmer. Da Xiong thrashed through the water like a giant bear, shouting, "God, it's freezing!"

I hadn't expected him to swim so quickly. In an instant, he had pounced onto one of the large fish, disappearing beneath the surface with his catch.

Our torchlight was dim, and Da Xiong had swum almost to the edge of the illumination. I couldn't see clearly, but what happened next chilled me to the bone.

One second, ten seconds, a full minute passed. Da Xiong never surfaced.

My face grew ashen, on the verge of tears. I told Xie Yuting, "I'm going down to check!"

Xie Yuting grabbed me. "If there's something strange about that fish, you going down there is just offering up another life."

Seeing his expression was no better than mine, I knew he was genuinely worried, so I stopped arguing.

About three minutes later, Xie Yuting’s face was even darker than mine. He muttered, "That fat fool, why is he always so reckless? The toxic centipede didn't kill him, the stinging bees didn't get him, the flood didn't drown him, but he's done in here..."

I knew my face must have been uglier than pig liver. I screamed at the water's surface, ready to jump in.

Suddenly, several huge bubbles erupted on the surface, and a massive, dark object shot out of the water with tremendous force.

"What the hell is that monster? Give me back my brother!" My voice cracked with a sob. Without thinking about the consequences, I fired two shots at the gigantic shadow.

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