Chapter Forty-Four: The Trap

  When coming and going, there was not a sound, in this thicket-filled forest, it's basically impossible. Unless... Ah, that ravine! Only there is no vegetation at all. And just now when we scattered the yellow powder, only there was not sprinkled.

  I think I understand now. He snatched the flashlight from Kakashi's hand and shouted in the direction that Su Haicheng and the others had left: "Su Haicheng, wait for me!"

  "Four One Jie, don't go over there!" KaKa Xi shouted from behind.

  In the not-too-distant distance, a flashlight beam shone over. They were probably only about ten or so meters away from me, and at this distance I could still make my way there myself. With flashlights in hand, they carefully stepped on those rocks, sometimes having no idea where the road was and where the ditch was, and even had an illusion that the next step would roll down the mountain slope.

  It took me a full six minutes to walk the dozen or so meters, before I finally arrived at Su Haicheng and Ah Tian's side. "Girl," Ah Tian said with furrowed brows, "what we're going to do next really isn't suitable for you."

  "Don't say such ambiguous things." I said, feeling like the two men were taking advantage of me in the dark. "Go take a look at that drain over there. When we scattered the yellow powder today, it just so happened to not be enough. And both Kakashi and I thought that snake wouldn't come out from there either."

  Su Haicheng nodded, holding my hand with one hand and walking forward while saying: "Be careful."

  We struggled to get there, and it wasn't until ten minutes later that we finally arrived at the latrine. In fact, the distance from our campsite to the latrine was not very far. It's just that it was too dark, and we were unfamiliar with the surroundings, so we walked slowly. The flashlight shone into the latrine, illuminating the muddy ground where water reflected the light of the flashlight. Su Haicheng said softly, "You wait here with Ah Tian, I'll go take a look."

  "This looks slippery, if you go down, you'll slide all the way to the bottom." I obediently leaned towards Tian, but still worried and said. Now I'm not worried that a big snake will suddenly appear here, what I'm worried about is that if he slides down, how can we find him? Do we have to one by one slide down like a slide in an amusement park and gather together?

  Ah Tian reached out and put his hand on my shoulder. If this little thing could stump him, then all these years of being a soldier would have been for nothing.

  Watching Su Haicheng put the flashlight in his mouth, then pulled out a smaller knife from his boot and stabbed it deep into the mud of the slot. Then, with a flip of his body, he went down. Moreover, his posture in the slot was that of a big character, with his legs open and his feet stuck on both sides of the slot, without standing on the bottom step. He held onto the knife handle with one hand to stabilize his body. He looked at it for a while, then used his other hand to touch the bottom of the slot before flipping over and crawling back up, spitting out the flashlight and saying: "The snake must have gone from here, there's some blood in the mud that hasn't dried yet. The soil is very slippery and has moisture. Whether or not there's a knife, it must be long."

  A Tian pulled out a knife about 40 centimeters long from his bag and said, "This is the longest one. It's for pricking snake gallbladders."

  "Give it to me, I'll use it once." Su Haicheng took the knife, pulled out the scabbard, and jumped back into the pit. I held a flashlight and shone light for him. Ah Tian shouted from over there: "Once? That knife is a high-carbon steel worth over 700 bucks!"

  "More than seven hundred, it's much cheaper than the losses we suffered when we faced that big snake again."

  "You young man don't know how hard it is to earn money!" Ah Tian said, but he didn't actually go to retrieve his knife.

  Su Haicheng inserted the handle of that knife into the mud, making the blade stand up. Then he used a stone to hammer it down, but the knife was not easy to hammer, and he was uncomfortable with the big character stuck in it. His movements were very difficult to fix the knife.

  "Is this a trap?" I said. I didn't quite understand what the point of putting the knife upside down here was, but it felt like having a knife stuck in the ground was some kind of trap.

  Su Haicheng climbed out of the groove and said, "It's injured, sliding down from here will take it straight to the foot of the mountain. But a snake that big can't possibly live at the foot of the mountain. The foot of the mountain is close to the town, so it must be living on the mountain. Once it reaches the foot of the mountain, it will definitely come back up through another route. But since this groove is so smooth, it must use it frequently. Next time it slides down from here, it will directly hit this knife. If it can stop in time, there's still a chance to save its life, but if it can't...

  "Divide into two?" Ah Tian said, "You little devil is quite formidable. Where did you learn this trick."

  "I don't know if it will work or not. Let's go back first. When the sky brightens, we'll head up and leave this place as soon as possible."

  On the way back, Su Haicheng was still holding me. I whispered to him: "Why don't we pull out the knife? This is too cruel. And that snake is so big, will it become a spirit?"

  "No, it's just bigger."

  "There are so many snakes here, and the spiritual energy is rich, maybe it really became a spirit?"

  Ah Tian walked ahead of me: "You can't tell that you're so into this. But it's true, women are more likely to believe in these things. When we were in high school, many girls played ghost-hunting games."

  "It's true, killing a snake is not good. A snake's resentment is huge. Even if it's dead, it will haunt us." I was getting anxious, feeling that this matter wasn't going to be good. After all, that snake was too strange. It had grown so big. I don't know how big it actually was, but when I saw it, it felt as thick as a bucket. However, the scene was chaotic at the time, and I'm not even sure if it really was that big.

  "Hey, we're on a mountain now, don't mention that. It's unlucky! The snake we hit earlier was probably knocked down by the stone you threw away. Can't tell from your slender arms and legs, but you've got quite some strength."

  I don't know what to say either, wasn't it an emergency at that time? How could I care about whether the snake can be beaten or not?

  "Rock?" Su Haicheng asked from behind me, "What rock?"

  "I took a big stone I had sharpened and smashed it at the snake. It probably hit it, which is why it ran away."

  Su Haicheng also stopped in his tracks, reached out and rubbed my head: "Awesome. Take care of yourself."

  It's too dark, I don't know if he's smiling or not. But from his tone of voice, it sounds like he is. And our current posture really does look like we're dating.

  When we returned to the campsite, what awaited us was a vast expanse of empty land! Empty land! It was just empty land! The fire on that empty land had been intentionally extinguished. And there were also heaters.

  My first instinct was that they had encountered danger and left. "Kakashi! Boss!" I shouted out loud. In the darkness, my voice carried far away. But we didn't get any response at all. It shouldn't be, really shouldn't be! The whole mountain should have heard my voice, in such a short time, they couldn't have walked out of this mountain. They must have heard us and responded. But there was no response at all.

  Atian crouched on the ground, pulling out the fire and said: "It's a planned withdrawal. They should be safe. But why did they want to leave?"

  "We've encountered snakes. There's more than one snake here, maybe some small ones too. No need to look for them, let's start a fire first. We'll wait here until dawn."

  "As soon as Su Haicheng finished speaking, I roared at him: 'Wait until dawn?! Kakashi and the boss are gone!'"

  "Haven't you noticed? That tall man is very familiar with this place. From the moment we entered these mountains, his various small actions have shown that he's very familiar with this place. When the big snake came, he was the first to stand in the direction of the snake with a spade. At that time, I couldn't even hear any sound. The way he swung the spade was just like using a military baton. He must have been a soldier before, and he knew that the snake would come from the tunnel, he knows the rules of the snake, he's very familiar with this mountain. Kakashi and your boss are absolutely safe with him."