Chapter Fifty-Seven Came Out

  The cave at night wasn't as cold as I had imagined. At least it was better than last night by the lake. But the temperature was indeed a bit lower. After all, this place isn't completely sealed off, and there's an unknown cold wind blowing in from somewhere. Darkness, complete darkness, nothing can be seen, only the faint light from the alcohol stove casting a glow on our five faces.

  Kakashi shrunk his body, moved closer to the alcohol stove, and glared at me. Because I was now wrapped in the only blanket we had.

  And here originally was Kakaxi first took out the blanket to wrap up, but was pulled by Su Haicheng's big hand, and directly put on me.

  Kakaxi is my classmate, a few months younger than me. Plus, he's often in the workshop and our boss likes him pretty well. Sometimes, he really doesn't show much care for girls. That's probably why he's still single.

  Su Haicheng sat beside me with a cold face, not saying a word. He gave Kaka a look that seemed to say "You dare?!"

  Hei Lian was hanging his head low, occasionally sighing, probably thinking of his wife and children at home.

  A Tian looked at us a few times, then burst out laughing: "Kakashi, stop glaring, you can't glare that blanket back. Let me tell you, the army wife is first protected by law, and secondly she's protected by her man. You don't understand what it's like for men who've been growing up in the military since they were teenagers. Far away from family, far away from women, under high-intensity training every day, a group of big guys yelling at each other. Suddenly, a little girl appears and says she's his woman, that she'll follow him for life. Do you know what kind of feeling that man has?"

  Kakaxi was still staring at me, not speaking. Ah Tian laughed: "Haha. That man is just that kind of person, excited in his heart, finally having a woman by his side, and it's only for him. He's holding on to her tightly, afraid of losing her, can only hold her in the palm of his hand. You say this person being held in the palm of his hand, if she gets cold, won't he rush to grab a blanket? That blanket, there's no share for you, stop staring. If you have the ability, go be a military wife too."

  "What... military wife? Ah Tian! What do you mean?" Kakashi brought the flames of war onto himself.

  I watched them quarrel over there, Su Haicheng lowered his voice and said to me: "Don't mind them, Ah Tian is like that. Xian Qing is still young and not letting others have their way."

  They were arguing loudly, and some low sobbing sounds came from among them. It wasn't until they all stopped talking that we noticed the black-faced man opposite us had lowered his head and was wiping away tears.

  Seeing us all stopped, he hastily turned his face away, sniffled, and wiped away tears: "Nothing's wrong, nothing's wrong, I'm fine."

  Su Haicheng patted his shoulder: "Big brother, after we get out this time, you don't have to worry about these things anymore. Whatever happened in the past, let's just investigate it later. You just focus on raising your child well."

  He hesitated for a moment, then nodded. I think that after experiencing the events of the past few days, he also felt the importance of family. The persistence at the beginning was important, but his wife and children were also very important. At this point, he chose his wife and child.

  I turned to look at Su Haicheng beside me, the light was very weak, and his facial features looked even more three-dimensional. Those eyebrows and eyes had always left a deep impression on me, but now his eyes were already in the shadows, and I couldn't see them clearly. I really wanted to ask him, if I let him give up this matter, would he be willing to just go on like this with me?

  But I still didn't ask in the end. After all, between me and Su Haicheng...it's hard to say.

  There is no concept of time in the cave, and who can rest well in such an environment? When I woke up, I found myself leaning on Su Haicheng's chest. He seemed not to have slept at all, and when I opened my eyes, he looked into mine as soon as he raised his head.

  I quickly sat up and found that the three men opposite me were sitting back-to-back, all of them asleep.

  I rinsed my mouth with water and said, "You're keeping watch? Haven't slept at all?"

  "Well, someone has to keep watch. I slept for a bit in the first half of the night."

  "What time is it?"

  The watch he was wearing was waterproof and after all this commotion, there were no problems at all. "It's past four. Let's sleep a bit more."

  Just as he finished speaking, the balance of the three men back to back was broken by someone, and the three people fell into a heap. Kakashi jumped up and shouted: "Ah? Run away? Oh, it's not dawn yet, sleep for a while."

  "What's with all this sleeping? Get up already. Can't sleep anymore."

  Half an hour later, we set off again, ready to walk once more, taking a different fork in the road from last time.

  The first lap, we walked back here.

  The second lap, we walked back to that skull place again.

  The third lap, we still walked to the skull place.

  Just as Kaka Xi was about to cry, Su Haicheng said: "It's okay, at least we didn't go back to that pond, which proves that the road we took is indeed different from before. So we may be able to find a way out."

  Atian patted Kakaxi and said, "You little guy won't even give us a few packs of cigarettes. Otherwise, we can show some respect to this senior, and let the senior guide us on the way."

  Just as Su Haicheng was about to continue walking, Ah Tian stopped and stared at the skull. "Hey, hey! Come back!"

  Atian's flashlight carefully swept the skull again. I didn't dare to look closely before, but now that I've seen it many times, I'm not as scared. The skull was stuck in a gap of about ten or twenty centimeters on the wall of the cave. It must have been lodged there when the person died, and then slid down after rotting. I don't think this gap is an exit, because this is an underground river channel. If the water rises, it will all spill out.

  A Tian's angle of observation seems to be different from mine. He said, "The painted words are on this side. Look at where the body is stuck, this person should have written with his left hand. See, if he wrote with his right hand, it should be written on the other side of the gap."

  Hei Lian's face changed color and he knelt down on the ground with a thud: "Yes, yes, it's Ma Zi!"

  "Who is the one writing the diary?" Su Haicheng said, "Shouldn't he have retreated with your troops?"

  "It must be Mazi, it must be Mazi. He's a high school student who writes with his left hand. At first, we even joked about him. This handwriting should be his, written with his left hand."

  "He's your comrade?" Kakaxi said. "Then tell your old comrade to stop playing tricks on us and let us out." No one paid attention to him.

  Su Haicheng gave Hei Lian a few minutes, letting him cry for a while before leading everyone to continue on their way.

  I don't know if it was that skull that helped us, but after Hei Lian knocked his head against the skull, we really walked out. Sometimes, even if you don't believe in superstition, it's hard to explain. Anyway, we just got out.

  Standing on the platform of that mountain in the golden sunset, our side is that grave. The golden yellow light of the sunset dyed the earth and this mountain with gold color.

  "Beautiful!" I blurted out. It's really not easy to come out alive. And we never thought that the exit would be at the slide of that big snake. At the highest point of the slide, behind it is the passage of the underground river, and we also crawled up with our hands and feet.

  The beautiful scenery was barely seen, and Su Haicheng urged us to hurry down the mountain and leave. Because we can't be sure if there will be a large-scale search for private hunting activities on the troops' side.

  Because we've walked these roads once before, now that we're walking them again, it feels a lot easier. Plus, since we've come out, our mood has improved quite a bit. Kakashi even joked that if we slid down the slide of that big snake, we could get down the mountain in just a few minutes.

  "Alright, go ahead and slide down. I wonder if that knife of mine is still there from last time? Can it still be retrieved? Be careful not to split in two when you're sliding down."

  It was past eight in the evening when we returned to the town. This experience that I will never forget in this life has finally come to an end.