When I saw the scene in front of me, the first sentence that popped into my mind was:

That's impossible!

If such a huge ancient city really existed, we would have seen it when we were on the surface of the volcanic lake, but at that time, all we could see was the huge ice layer in the sky, but between the ice and the lake, there was nothing but the mist formed by the evaporation of the water vapor from the volcanic lake.

"Aggie, is it an illusion?" The old knife swallowed a mouthful of saliva, his eyes still staring at the ancient city beyond the stone gate.

My first reaction was also the question: Is it an illusion?

Illusion is not necessarily false, it can also rely on our minds to build a world in our brains, and all our actions are just mental actions.

But!

The terrible thing about the illusion is that it can sometimes "embody" your thoughts and actions - simply put, if you are injured in the illusion, your real body may also be hurt accordingly, and if you die in the illusion, you in reality will fall into a coma at least, or become a vegetative person due to the annihilation of the soul, or even directly brain dead.

Instead of answering the old knife question, I raised my hand and instructed everyone to be quiet first.

I walked slowly towards the stone gate, and in the process, I paid close attention to the passage that extended from the stone gate, and the strange city at the end of the passage.

When my hand touched the translucent channel with a pale blue sheen, my fingertips felt a very real cold touch, and I looked up at the front, just as a gust of wind howled by, blowing my clothes to the sound of hunting, and the lights of the city in the distance seemed to shake with the wind.

Accustomed to the knife-cold wind of the Himalayas, I felt that this gust of wind was not cold, but there was cold sweat sliding down my forehead.

I turned to the old knife and said, "Old knife, you go back to the room below, look up through the window, and see if you can see this volley passage." ”

"Okay." The old knife immediately agreed.

After a while, the old knife came back with a grim face.

"Can't see it?" Just looking at the face of the old knife, I had already roughly guessed the result.

Sure enough, the old knife shook his head: "You say, it's really evil, looking up below, you can only see a layer of ice in the sky, as for what passage or ancient city, you can't see anything...... So what's on the outside of this stone gate? ”

Everyone looked at me.

I took a deep breath and only felt my throat extremely dry: "Based on my experience...... What we see in front of us is not an illusion. If we step on this volley passage, we will definitely reach the city in front of us. ”

I continued, "Let's see if the ground under your feet is very clean, as if someone has been cleaning it......

Except for Shen Tangzhi and me, it was the first time that the others discovered this problem, and they all looked down at their feet, and their faces changed.

When we first entered the Tower of Babel, the stone stairs and stone walls of the tower were piled up with a thick return trip, but from a certain level of this ancient tower, the dust was gone, and both the stairs and the walls were spotless, as if someone had recently cleaned them, but this added to the eerie atmosphere.

Everyone's faces showed a look of confusion and shock, and the old knife said, "Does this have anything to do with the scene outside the stone gate?" ”

"This tower is very strange, and I suspect that the place where we are now is not in the Himalayas, but in another place." I'm afraid to point my finger at the ancient city outside the stone gate, "This ancient city shouldn't be here, but it actually appears in front of us—the only explanation is that this stone gate leads to a different dimension." ”

Shen Tangzhi was the first to show a sudden expression: "I understand, time in this different space is likely to be stagnant, so it is obviously daytime, but we see that it is night outside the stone gate, and the interior of the ancient tower is also spotless, because everything is stuck at a certain moment." ”

"That'...... Shall we go over and have a look? The old knife asked.

I gave him a roll of the eyes: "What are you going to do?" What if I can't come back after I go? The risk is too great. And have you ever noticed that the ancient city, though brightly lit, was actually dead - I had been looking at it for so long and I hadn't found anything alive in the city at all. ”

The night outside the stone gate is thick, and the ancient city in the distance is full of lights, which seem to be candles lit by the residents of the city, but if you look closely, you only see the lights, but you don't see people, and the whole city looks like a ghost town.

The old knife looked at it for a while and said: "Hearing you say this, I will go to see the ancient city again, and I do feel a little panicked, those shaky fires are like common ghost fires in mass graves, not like fireworks in the world at all." “

I said, "It's good to know, our goal is to reach the country of heaven and sea at the top of the tower, and as for the strangeness of this ancient tower, we should not have seen it." ”

Then I proposed to continue up the stone staircase, and everyone had no objection to walk past the stone door and continue the ascent.

Ten minutes later, we reached a level above the tower.

But everyone was amazed, because we saw that in this flat room, there was also a stone door, and the scene outside the stone gate was also a light blue translucent passage, and at the end of the passage was also an ancient city, which was brightly lit in the night.

An ominous premonition came over me, but I immediately pressed it down, "Keep climbing." I said.

But, after about 600 steps, we were back in the room with the stone door!

At this moment, everyone was a little panicked.

Boche shuddered, "Mr. Ji, Mr. Ji, have we been spinning in circles all this time?" ”

The old knife also said: "Aji, it seems that we may have encountered a ghost hitting the wall......"

The so-called ghost hitting the wall, is to be trapped somewhere, no matter how you go, you will eventually go back to the same place, the old thought that this is the ghost of the five tricks, in fact, it is not that you can't get out, but people have been spinning in place.

I thought for a moment, "Well, let's keep going, and if that's the case, we'll think of something else." ”

As I continued to walk up, I noticed that Shen Tangzhi had been frowning and walking with her head down, and I asked her what was going on, but she asked me, have you figured out the meaning of those murals?

The frescoes in the ancient tower only appeared once, and then we entered the room with the stone door, and it went through the loop.

I replied to her, "The content of the other seven murals is not difficult to understand, but I don't know what the stars of those humanoid creatures worship refer to, and the last mural, I really don't understand the meaning until now." ”

Shen Tangzhi said: "The mural is a whirlpool figure, but now that I think about it, there are actually two lines depicting that whirlpool. ”

That's ...... The shape of a vortex drawn with two spirals.

But what does that mean?

"At the outermost edge of the vortex, there is only one helix, but in the middle, there is a second helix, and the two helixes are two parallel lines that do not intersect, and only the latter helix can reach the middle point of the vortex—then, Yoshimitsu, do you think of something?"

I didn't even notice this detail at the time, but after Shen Tangzhi described it to me again, I recalled that it was indeed true.

I vaguely felt a flash of inspiration in my mind, but when I thought about it carefully, I couldn't grasp that inspiration point.

Shen Tangzhi saw that I showed an extremely entangled expression, and understood that I was only one step away from being able to figure it out, and reminded me: "Suppose we are walking on one of the spirals now......"

As soon as this sentence came out, I immediately let out an "ah" and was suddenly shocked!

"Aji, what are you? People are scary, people are scared to death, you know? The old knife protested in front.

At this moment, my heart was full of joy after the epiphany, and I didn't have time to pay attention to the old knife, and I was anxious to confirm my thoughts with Shen Tangzhi: "You mean to say that if we go to the end point - that is, the Polar Sky Sea at the top of the tower, which is the center point of the vortex in that mural, then the spiral we stepped on at the beginning is actually unable to reach the end, and we can only reach the real end by jumping to another parallel line!" ”

And because we are walking on a wrong spiral, we are doomed to never reach the end – that is, the top of the tower.

That's why we encountered a phenomenon similar to ghosts hitting walls?

But the real question is, how exactly can we "jump" onto the right spiral?

Do you really want to try to go to that brightly lit ghost town?

A few minutes later, we found ourselves at the point where we came from—the room with the stone door.

The scenery outside the stone gate, the dead silence of the city, the star-like lights flickering, as if mocking us.

Poche was already covered in cold sweat, and he wanted to speak again, but was stopped by Tenzin Kawa, who signaled him to calm down.

"Aji, what should I do?" The old knife wiped the sweat from his forehead, just now we walked well, climbed nearly two thousand steps, and we were indeed very tired, "Damn, it seems that this ghost tower is going to force us to go out through this stone gate...... We keep climbing up, and I'm afraid we'll be back in this room. ”

Both Hyde and Shen Tang looked at me, waiting for me to make a decision.

"It's a blessing or a curse, it's a disaster that can't be avoided, it seems that the only way to break through is to break through." I paused and glanced at everyone, especially Tenzin Kawa and Poche, "Explain in advance, there is a high chance that we will encounter unbelievable events after we walk out of this stone gate, maybe in this volley passage, or in that ancient city - but no matter what the situation is, please follow my command and don't act on your own, okay?" ”

Shen Tangzhi's old knife and others naturally have no problem, and when I say these words, in fact, it means to listen to Tenzin Kava and Poche, especially Tenzin Kava, he is deep and ruthless, if I don't beat him in advance, I really don't feel at ease.

The corners of Tenzin Kava's mouth curled, and he nodded: "Don't worry, I won't joke with my life." ”

Since it is tacitly understood, it can be regarded as reaching the same understanding.

But before this is the departure, I asked everyone to sit down and eat something here, after we escaped from the underground river, we have not rested and eaten, everyone's physical strength has been seriously reduced, and must be replenished.

There was still a little solid fuel left, so we set up a soup pot, and Poche and Tenzin Kava had some ghee and dried milk, boiled with water, and added yak jerky to make a big pot of soup.

The hot soup was boiling and fragrant, and everyone's stomachs suddenly rumbled.

The old knife was the first to clamo for dinner, and Porche served the first bowl of hot soup to be handed to Tenzing Kava, but was snatched by the old knife, and Porche looked stunned, but Tenzin Kava didn't care.

The old knife poured a mouthful, and was immediately scalded straight out of his tongue: "Hot, hot, hot...... But Poche, your kid is good, it's so fragrant! Ho, it's strange to say, I didn't feel hungry before, I just couldn't smell the aroma of food, and I couldn't stand it when I smelled it...... Sir, you don't hold a grudge against me for this, do you? ”

Tenzin Kava waved his hand to show that he didn't care.

The old knife nodded and said to Pope: "Pope, don't look at me like that, your knight didn't say anything." Besides, now we are sharing weal and evil, how can we spoil our friendship because of a bowl of soup. ”

I touched him: "Drink your soup, talk so much, and don't be afraid to flash your tongue." ”

Drinking hot soup, just this dry food, everyone dealt with a meal, since they had already decided to go to the ancient city, there was no hurry, and then, we took turns to rest for about four or five hours, and the spirit was almost recovered.

Another problem is even more acute: we are no longer running out of weapons and ammunition.

Old Dao and Tenzin Kawa each had an M4 carbine in their hands, and there was no problem with the firearms, but there were less than 100 rounds of ammunition left.

Especially on the old knife's side, there are only two bullets left.

I originally thought that Tenzin Kava would threaten us on the matter of bullets, but Tenzin Kava was surprisingly reasonable, and before we could speak, he took the initiative to give half of the ammunition to the old knife, and the old knife's jaw was almost happy.

After sorting out the equipment, we stood in front of the stone gate.

I said a few words of mobilization, like the boat going straight in front of it, but when we walked out of the stone gate and officially stepped on the suspended semi-transparent passage, we suddenly found that the stone gate behind us had disappeared!

What was supposed to be a stone gate has been turned into a stone wall!

"How-how can this be?!" Pope was so surprised that I was about to reach out to the stone wall, but I quickly grabbed him.

"Don't move!" I said, "Forgotten?" After stepping out of the stone gate, all actions must be under my command, no matter what strange things happen, don't act indiscriminately! ”

Polche nodded, his chest heaving a few times, finally calming down.

I had time to look at the stone wall, and I saw a mural carved on the stone wall, which we had seen before, and it was the scene of some kind of humanoid creature worshipping the stars shining in mid-air.

But I noticed something strange right away:

Those humanoids who worship the stars don't have eyes on their faces!

And the shape of that star is like a huge eyeball!

At the same time, we suddenly heard a strange "creaking" cracking sound, and when we looked at our feet, our hearts suddenly burst into fear—

I saw that the translucent passage glowing with pale blue light under our feet was disintegrating into countless tiny fragments......

It looked like it was going to shatter in an instant!