Chapter 28 Entering the Deep Mountains

  As the noise continued, Liang Zi and I were also startled awake, unsure of what had happened, and followed suit to go out and take a look.

  Such a village would not have streetlights, and I saw all the team members getting out of their sleeping bags, standing nervously and looking around, with rustling sounds coming from the mountain slope behind the house, as if someone was running, footsteps and panting sounds entering my ears.

  "What's going on..." Zhou Huan hastily asked a team member.

  "We don't know either. It seems like there's something on the mountain slope behind us. Someone's sleeping bag was just turned over." A team member replied while keeping his eyes fixed on the slope.

  Under the faint moonlight, I saw a grass thicket on the mountain slope swaying, and then a group of black shadows rushed out. I was caught off guard and didn't know what hit me, my feet lost their balance, and I fell directly to the ground.

  He fell heavily and felt dizzy, with stars flashing before his eyes. Liang Zi rushed over to help him up, just as Zhou Huan shouted: "Be careful, it's a group of wild boars."

  Dozens of flashlights lit up immediately, and as I looked along the flashlight beam, I saw one after another, all of which were pig butts. There were at least more than 20 of them. This group of wild boars surrounded us and crashed around without any sense of direction.

  Zhou Huan shouted: "Don't move the fire, use a trekking pole."

  I understand that what she meant by "don't move fire" is "don't move guns". If so many people were to shoot together, it would definitely scare the villagers here and we would also bring huge trouble.

  The team members shouted and held up their trekking poles to start driving, afraid of being knocked down by the wild boars that suddenly rushed over. Liang Zi also picked up a wooden stick and shouted loudly, for a time, the pigs grunted and people shouted, it was chaotic.

  That old man of the Xian tribe stood there for a while, then turned around and ran back into the house. Not long after, he came out with a cigarette in his mouth and carrying a broken frame. He casually took out something the size of an aerosol can from the frame, lit it with the cigarette butt, and threw it towards where the noise was louder.

  A loud "Boom" almost scared me to the ground, it turned out that his tin can was actually a homemade explosive, not very powerful but extremely noisy.

  Old Han continuously threw out several, I saw from afar that a few more villagers came running, each person holding a small basket in their hand. When they arrived nearby, without saying a word, they also took out tin cans and started throwing them towards the wild boar group's direction, shouting loudly with their mouths open wide.

  I suddenly felt like I was on the battlefield, and every time a bomb went off, I would shake along with it. The feeling was especially wonderful. Liangzi didn't care, he just reached into someone else's frame, pulled out a few bombs, and threw them up in the air while shouting: "Awesome, hahaha, so damn cool!"

  The villagers stopped again after a while, and Zhou Huan took a look at the crowd to find that except for me being hit once, no one else was injured. He let out a sigh and asked Old Man Cui, "How did a group of wild boars end up running into the village?"

  The old man smiled carelessly and said: "This is nothing unusual, there were many such cases in the past."

  I thought to myself, isn't this strange? City people don't even see a group of domestic pigs often, let alone a wild boar group. So I went to ask the old man who was driving us, aren't you guys afraid?

  He was amused by me and patted me, saying: "A group of wild boars, generally won't attack people, but will steal from farmers. The fierce ones are the solitary boars."

  I didn't quite understand, so I continued to ask him what is Gang'aozi?

  An old man told me that in recent years, there were herds of wild boars everywhere. They didn't have much attacking power and generally just caused trouble for the villagers. What is called a "gang liu zi" is a solitary wild boar that survives on its own. These wild boars are extremely large, with black bodies and exceptionally ferocious. Even tigers would yield to them.

  Although I think he's exaggerating, looking at the endless mountains in the distance makes me feel a hint of fear in my heart. Hopefully we won't run into any mountain torrents this time.

  Zhou Huan took a look and saw that everything was fine, so he urged everyone to hurry up and rest, saying they needed to recharge their energy for tomorrow's mountain hike. After finishing speaking, he turned around with Hei Lian team leader and walked back into the house.

  I now admire these tomb raiders from the bottom of my heart, if it were me, after being attacked by a group of wild boars once, I wouldn't dare to sleep outside again even if you killed me.

  Liangzi didn't say much, it seemed like the experience just now was quite fun, he said a few casual words and pulled me into the house to rest, a night without conversation...

  The next day, everyone got up early and urged the old man to make porridge for us as breakfast. I simply drank a few mouthfuls and ran outside to smoke. Lifting my head to look in the direction we were going, I vaguely saw a small hill far away and very high up. It was probably what they called Laoye Mountain. Here it was clear skies, but on that mountain top, dark clouds were densely packed, showing just how high it was.

  After everyone finished breakfast and got on the car, they continued to move forward. The road became more and more difficult to walk, with ups and downs, and the speed of the car was very slow. There were no houses to be seen on both sides, only trees and weeds. When I came to such a place, my heart began to panic.

  It's estimated that after walking for another hour, there will be no road ahead, unless a tank comes to clear the way, otherwise even an off-road vehicle won't be able to pass.

  After everyone got off the car, Zhou Huan began to distribute equipment. Liang Zi chose a large bag and packed a lot of food, including over a dozen bags of compressed biscuits. Having had experience from our previous adventure, I picked up a long rope and several small flashlights, thinking that if we fell into another hole again, it would be too scary without any light.

  At this time, others have also packed up, their backpacks are very long, I estimate that there should be things like guns inside.

  We are now in a relatively flat mountain slope, Old Man Chui said that there are more insects and snakes in the mountains, let us all tie up our pants legs. As soon as I heard the snake, my whole body was covered with goose bumps. I found a thin rope and Liangzi tied both of them tightly to tie up their pants legs. Although it feels very uncomfortable, it makes me feel much more at ease.

  An old man led the way in front, and a group of people followed him to start walking down the slope. When they reached the bottom of the slope, they found a river appearing before their eyes.

  The river water is not very deep, the deepest place is probably just over a meter. It seems that this 'River Mountain Village' is indeed well-deserved, this place is really majestic with towering mountains and crystal-clear waters, vaguely seeing fish swimming back and forth, it's simply breathtakingly beautiful.

  I washed my face with river water, it's really refreshing, if the purpose of this trip wasn't to rob a tomb, I'd have stripped off and gone for a swim.

  This river used to have a very wide water level, but now only the middle section has water. We walked upstream along the riverbank, which was formed by years of accumulated sand and gravel. Walking on it was also very smooth, so it didn't seem particularly strenuous.

  We followed the old man who was urging us to hurry, looking at the scenery as we walked. Suddenly, Liangzi started singing: "The great river flows eastward, and the stars in the sky have not yet appeared..."

  I looked at him with disdain and cursed, "How frightening it is to be uncultured! Your singing is so out of place. You should be singing 'Little River Flowing Water Wah, Gurgling Gurgling...' now."

  The two of us were in high spirits and burst out laughing, I looked ahead and saw Zhou Huan covering her mouth with a slight tremble, seemingly also stealing a smile. With the beautiful scenery, I felt particularly moved. If she wasn't a tomb raider and we weren't here to rob a tomb, the two of us holding hands in this kind of place would be quite a romantic getaway.

  Time passed bit by bit, and the temperature slowly began to rise. We were all wearing windbreakers and carrying equipment on our backs. Before long, I started sweating profusely and didn't have the mood to look at the scenery anymore. The beautiful scenes had all disappeared, and I just kept walking with my head down. Except for this river, it was dense forest everywhere, and after a while, everything in front of my eyes was green.

  All that's left around me is the sound of footsteps and gasping, even someone like Liangzi has stopped talking. My physical strength has dropped drastically, I really want to rest for a while, but looking at Old Man Cui and Zhou Huan, neither of them have spoken up, so I can only grit my teeth and continue on.

  The weather is getting hotter and hotter, I can deeply feel why women have a special desire to take off their bras in the summer. The whole body is sweating and being stuck with thick clothes is really uncomfortable.

  "Wow, this place is great......" Liangzi suddenly shouted loudly and then ran forward.

  I looked up and saw that the river in front of me had formed a natural small lake, probably due to the terrain of the mountain. The water in the lake should be quite deep, making it an ideal place for swimming.

  I followed Liangzi and ran to the front, after which Liangzi started taking off his clothes. However, before he could finish removing his top, he was pulled back by Captain Hei. I then heard Zhou Huan say from the side: "What are you doing? Don't be reckless."

  "Little sister, it's so hot today, we've been walking for half a day, let's take a break. Look at your teammates, they're all overheated." Liangzi said while trying to shake off Hei Mian.

  Zhou Huan also looked up at the sky, actually I could feel that she was also tired and hot. In such weather, climbing a mountain with a heavy load, let alone there's a river in front of us, it's really unbearable.

  Look at those team members, each of them is expressionless, but they are already drenched in sweat. So I went forward and said to Zhou Huan: "Hey, why don't we take a break? You're not only being cruel to us, but also to your own brothers. Just look at how hot they are."

  Zhou Huan looked at me for a moment, then turned around to glance at the team members, and finally nodded helplessly and shouted to everyone: "Let's rest here, let's continue after lunch."

  Liang Zi listened to the end, jumped up high, shook off Hei Mian's hand and started taking off his clothes. When he was left with only his underwear, he puffed out his chest and plunged into the water with a loud splash.

  I'm a man who's shy in front of women, and seeing Zhou Huan by my side makes me even more embarrassed. Zhou Huan is also very understanding, knowing that she's the only woman, so she glanced at me and then turned around to find a shady big tree to sit under and rest.

  I immediately let out a loud whoop and shouted at the team members behind me: "Brothers, let's go..."

  After finishing speaking, he took off his clothes and jumped in. The weather outside was extremely hot, but the water below was exceptionally cool, this feeling was simply too refreshing.

  Look at the team members on the shore, no matter how strong their will is, they are also mortal bodies. After finding that Hei Mian and Zhou Huan did not stop them, they also started to take off their clothes. In an instant, more than a dozen people jumped into the water like dumplings, splashing around.