The Torrent Big Gold Tooth was seasick, having vomited himself ragged, clinging to the ship's ropes, unable to move. The boat seemed snagged on something in the river; despite the fierce current, the vessel just couldn't push through.

Under the repeated, violent jarring, this boat felt like it could capsize at any moment. I thought about going to the bow to see what was blocking the river, but Fatty and I had both drunk a bit too much by the riverbank, and the alcohol was surging now. We weren't exactly scared, but our legs felt like they were treading on cotton batting. Combined with the ship's incline, we managed to shuffle for ages without taking a single step forward.

Then, battered by the current in the wide river, the boat spun sideways. Fatty was flung across the deck, his body braced against the gunwale. This sudden movement sobered him up halfway, and as he turned to look into the river, the hull shuddered again, throwing him back. Luckily, it was a mechanical boat; had it been a wooden vessel, two shoves like that would have torn it apart.

I held tight to the ropes along with Big Gold Tooth and managed to ask Fatty amidst the chaos, "What is it in the river? Did you get a clear look?"

Fatty cursed violently, "Damn it all, I couldn't see clearly. It was dark, huge as a truck, looked like a giant soft-shelled turtle."

Whatever monstrous thing it was in the river, a few more bumps like that and the boat would surely capsize. I yelled to Fatty, "Grab something, let's fight the bastard!"

Fatty shouted back, "Are you still drunk? What weapons do we even have?"

I was indeed a bit muddled, still instinctively looking for my submachine gun, but Fatty's words made me realize—we were deep inland this time; we hadn't brought any weapons.

The rain was pouring down like the sky was being ripped open, drenching us through. My hand instinctively found the folding entrenching shovel clipped to my waist. I roared at Fatty, "Get the entrenching shovel! I don't care if it's a turtle or a fish, we'll chop the bloody thing."

Fatty wasn't as drunk as I was; his mind was clearer, and he knew we needed to take precautions. He grabbed the rope and wrapped it around my waist twice. My drunkenness had receded by eighty percent. Taking advantage of a slight stabilization in the hull, I sprang two steps to the port side where the impact was occurring and stuck my head out to look into the river.

It was dark now, and the rain was heavy, making the river a pitch-black void. Under the flashes of lightning between the heavy clouds, I could vaguely make out something in the murky water, colossal, like a small hill, half above the surface, the rest hidden below. Visibility was limited; I couldn't tell what it was, only that it seemed like some kind of aquatic animal—whether fish or turtle, I couldn't distinguish.

The enormous object in the river was moving against the current, hurtling straight toward our hull. I clung tightly to the ship's ropes. As the thing swam closer, I swung the entrenching shovel down, but the shovel was too short; I couldn't reach it.

With another violent impact that slammed the boat, I was thrown off balance. The entrenching shovel flew from my grip and fell into the river. It was only because Fatty yanked the rope that I wasn't tossed into the water along with my tool.

By then, every drop of my alcohol was gone, replaced by a cold sweat. My mind was significantly clearer. The swaying hull made it hard to stand, and I crashed into the boat captain, who had been curled up in a ball. I seized the opportunity to tell him, "The boat is sideways now, figure out a way to steer us around, or your son won't survive either."

The captain was extremely superstitious, insisting the "thing" in the river was the true form of the River God. He had been prepared to close his eyes and wait for death, but mentioning his son made him remember the boy was still below deck. If they were all going to die anyway, he decided he would stake his life for his son. He struggled to his feet, attempting to rush back to the wheelhouse to take the helm.

The captain had barely staggered upright when he suddenly pointed into the river and screamed, "Bad news! It's coming again!"

I followed his pointing finger. This time, the boat's searchlight illuminated the area, and I saw it clearly: a dark, bluish mass fluctuating in the river, sometimes revealing a section as large as a Jiefang truck, circling the boat, clearly intent on capsizing us.

There was no time to examine it closely. I shoved the captain toward the wheelhouse. The door opened just as I spotted a bundle of thin steel pipes among the machinery parts stowed in the hold.

I don't know where the strength came from, but I called Fatty over, and together we yanked out several pipes, intending to use them as javelins, hurling them one after another at the object in the river.

In the darkness, we couldn't judge the accuracy or the effect of the hits, but after throwing over a dozen steel pipes, the monster's trace vanished entirely; it seemed to have been driven off.

The torrential rain began to subside, and a brief calm settled. Everyone on board, having narrowly escaped death, had faces ashen white. Big Gold Tooth had wrapped himself tightly to the deck with ropes, suffering horribly from the ship's pitching and rolling. Luckily, his asthma didn't flare up; he just bared his prominent gold tooth and kept mumbling prayers to the Bodhisattva.

Some situations demand flexibility rather than rigidity; you have to look for the easiest way out. Although our clothes were soaked, the continuous rain meant we had fortunately stored money and documents in a waterproof travel bag beforehand.

Though the situation earlier was sudden and critical, Big Gold Tooth had held onto the travel bag the whole time; it hadn't fallen into the river. This is one good thing about businessmen: they'll risk their lives, but not their wealth. Even if the sky fell, they'd clutch their wallets tight.

I told Big Gold Tooth that once we reached our destination, we needed to find an inn immediately for a hot shower, otherwise, we’d surely get sick.

The boat captain's son had hit his head in the hold and was bleeding profusely; he needed to get to a hospital quickly. Gutian County town wasn't far ahead; the plan was to dock there. I looked up and, in the dim distance, indeed saw sparse lights—that was the small town of Gutian we were heading for.

However, just as things stabilized on the boat, the hull was struck again by a massive force. This impact was stronger than any of the previous ones, sudden and catching us completely off guard, sending us all tumbling to the floor.

The boat listed violently. Fatty managed to grab a rope. Big Gold Tooth and I each grabbed his belt and thigh, respectively. Fatty yelled, "Don't... don't pull my pants off, you bastards..."

Before he finished speaking, the boat tilted the other way. I tried to scramble toward the steel pipes in the hold, but the rocking was so severe I couldn't get up. Forget seeing the surroundings clearly; it was a miracle our heads weren't cracked open by now.

The hull rose and fell in the churning muddy water. Water sloshed everywhere in the deck and hold; everyone was soaked to the bone, looking like drowned rats.

To get his son to the hospital for emergency treatment, the captain no longer cared whether the creature was the River God or the Ancestral Dragon King; he was fighting to pilot the boat toward the Gutian County dock.

The Yellow River twists and turns in ninety-nine bends; after passing Longmen, it's one curve after another. This area near Gutian is a relatively stable bend in the river. As the boat entered this curve, the thing that had been relentlessly pursuing us in the water stopped advancing.

The lights ahead grew brighter and brighter. The captain brought the boat alongside the dock. Setting foot on solid ground finally calmed our nerves. Fatty pulled out his money and paid the captain extra beyond the agreed price. The captain, being acquainted with the dockworkers, found a few men to help rush his son to the county hospital.

Gutian's history traces back to the Yin-Shang Dynasty, and the city walls preserved today are a Ming Dynasty product. Though the place has an ancient lineage, it's not widely known, and the county town is small, with few outsiders.

Big Gold Tooth, Fatty, and I, looking like three drowned rats, asked for directions and found the nearest guesthouse. Coincidentally, this guesthouse only provided hot water for showering for one hour each day, and only half an hour remained.

After a hasty hot shower, the three of us finally felt somewhat revived. We asked the guesthouse attendant if they sold any food. The attendant said they only had noodles, so we ordered several bowls, loaded with chili peppers, sweating profusely as we ate.

Midway through our meal, the old man responsible for boiling noodles in the guesthouse kitchen came over and struck up a conversation, asking if we were from Beijing.

Hearing his accent, I realized he wasn't from the Northwest, so I chatted casually with him. The old man's surname was Liu; his ancestral home was Tong County, Beijing, but he had lived in Gutian for decades.

Old Liu asked how we ended up in such a wretched state, looking as if we’d just been fished out of a pot.

I recounted our experience on the Yellow River. I asked what exactly was in that river? How could it be so powerful? We never clearly saw if it was a fish or a turtle, or some other animal. I’d never heard of anything that large in the Yellow River. It was a blessing the small boat was sturdy; if it had been wood, we would probably all be drowning in the river's murky soup right now.

Old Liu said, "I've seen that too. The boatmen call it the River God. The water is high this year, isn't it? When the water rises, the strange things in the river multiply. I’ve lived by this Yellow River for half my life; back then, before the Liberation, I was barely fifteen, and I saw this thing with my own eyes. Someone once even caught one alive. If you really want to see it, I can tell you a place where you might get a chance to look."

(For the next update time, please refer to the Side Story)