Outside the Six-Story Pagoda

  Luckily, my body fat easily sank to the bottom of the water, this wasn't a man-made passage, but rather some piled up rocks that coincidentally formed a natural underwater passageway.

  I couldn't feel the line's existence in the water at all, and could only rely on intuition to swim forward. Fortunately, this was a straight tube type, without so many bends. I adjusted my heartbeat and movements, not letting the oxygen in my chest run out too quickly.

  Just as I was about to reach my limit, I saw that the top of my head was no longer a dark boulder, but reflected the light of the flashlight, and immediately rushed up, only to realize how important breathing is to humans when I stretched out of the water.

  I took out the flashlight and looked around. Where there is water, there should be oxygen. This should not be far from the bottom of the sixth layer of the tower. Perhaps it was because the tower fell to the ground with an ungraceful posture, but obviously, this place did not preserve as well as the upper layers.

  Found a place to land, but didn't see Pengpeng and the coffin. Instead, saw a broken big hole, could it be the entrance to the sixth layer? Shone with flashlight, too dark to see the layout inside. Can't just stand there, go in and talk later, anyway I can still live for 30 more years, what's there to fear? Stepped on the exposed rocks above the water surface, jumped over two or three times to get there.

  "Hey!" I shouted first, if Pengpeng and the coffin could hear it, they would respond, this way three people are braver than me alone.

  "Friends! Coffin! Are you there?"

  All I could hear was the echo of the walls around me, were these two guys playing a trick on me? I steeled myself and walked in, just as I entered the door, I tripped over something. I thought I would fall to the ground, but instead, I leaned forward halfway and hit what should have been a wall with a "bang" sound. Under the counterforce, my whole body fell backward again. Unconscious movements are the hardest to control. Luckily, I fell into the water; otherwise, these chaotic stone pillars would have taken my life.

  Crawled out of the water again, first to see what had tripped me up earlier. Upon closer inspection, it was a person, a living person. I slowly shone my flashlight on his face, and it was Pengpeng. At this moment, he was sleeping very peacefully, with a slight smile at the corner of his mouth, I don't know if he was dreaming or not.

  "Brother, brother!" I patted his face, trying to wake him up, but he didn't respond at all.

  I checked him out, and he didn't have any injuries on his body, no blood clots or internal injuries in his head, his body was still very soft, his heartbeat was very stable, and the breathing from his nose was also very even, it looked like he was just sleeping.

  I pulled him to a corner of the wall, propped up his body and leaned it against the wall. I looked at him helplessly, wondering if I should leave him here alone. Then I continued searching for the coffin, Pengpeng was around here, the coffin must be nearby.

  At the same time as the flashlight beam swept by, a white figure flashed by, and before I could even see what it was, it disappeared. My heart tightened, what could this be? Was it another mutated monster like that octopus? Or was it the coffin that had vanished again? If it was the coffin, he would definitely come looking for me. It seems I can't leave Pengpeng alone here, and before figuring out what that strange figure is, I'll stay here to keep watch.

  Just as I was using the flashlight to search for the monster, Pengpeng slowly got up from behind me and suddenly pounced on me, pinning my entire body down so that I couldn't breathe. I flipped over and tried to push him away, but his two hands were clamped tightly around my neck, exerting a tremendous force that I couldn't pry loose. Was this also some kind of test for me? No matter how hard I punched him, he didn't react at all. The flashlight that had rolled to the ground nearby was still shaking back and forth, casting an intermittent light that allowed me to see Pengpeng's expressionless face with his eyes closed as he did such a brutal thing.

  My eyes were about to roll up, and my vision was blurry. My neck felt like it was going to break, and my hands, which had been constantly scratching him, lost their strength and slowly fell down, as if they had landed on something. With my last bit of willpower, I felt that it should be the travel bag he was carrying on his back. I pulled it over and frantically rummaged through its contents, although I didn't know what I was looking for, but somehow grabbing onto something made me feel at ease.

  Actually, there shouldn't be anything left in his bag either. Subconsciously, I wanted to find that dagger of his. I didn't want to kill him, but I thought the pain would sober him up. But no matter how hard I felt around, I couldn't find it. Just as I was about to lose consciousness, I grabbed something and flung it at his face. I knew it was futile - that kind of strength couldn't even kill an ant.