Chapter 24: Hearing the Bell and Moving
Cox Hendry, also known as Jude Cow. After Jude Kaw took over the German business, he also heard about what the Germans had been looking for, and it was the same as his own purpose.
According to the patterns on the heavenly stone, he decoded another layer of information from the Warring States Silk Book, the miracles in the snow-capped mountains.
The first half of the notebook focuses on the Germans' journey in the snowy mountains, followed by the picture in the middle, another bronze door in the depths of the snowy mountains.
According to the news that the interrogation of the horse team was in the snow-capped mountain, the Germans assembled the team and set off from another snow-capped mountain, and found the bronze gate by mistake.
The owner of the note copied the intricate pattern on the door with great reverence, intending to take the painting out of the snowy mountains.
From the delicate depiction alone, Zhang Qixun can feel that although this bronze door is very similar in appearance, it is far less magnificent and mysterious than the bronze door of Changbai Mountain.
The pattern on the picture is more like a turtle shell as a whole, and there is a figure as small as an ant standing on the edge of the bronze door for comparison.
It was a huge thing, and there were many very small cracks in the shell, and the painter took great care to draw all the cracks on the door.
These cracks seem to be expressing some kind of totem, if you have to say it, the middle part is very much like a hideous blackened unicorn, at first glance, but if you look closely, the unicorn and other cracks around it fuse together, forming another behemoth like a dragon and a snake.
There are also eight smaller turtle shells around the huge turtle shell, and the arrangement between them is not at all, and they are also full of patterns, and the large turtle shell in the center forms a lot of strange patterns.
Around all the shells, there are many tentacles-like things, connected like spider webs, completely covering the void around the shells, but the outline of these tentacles does not look flat.
Zhang Ji thought for a while, took out a magnifying glass from his pocket, and looked carefully at these tentacle lines, and then suddenly realized that these so-called lines were not tentacles at all, but chains.
Countless chains are tightly shackled to all the turtle shells like cages, and the turtle shell pattern in the middle looks more and more like many divine beasts are imprisoned by chains on that door.
The place where the chains converged and ended in the center looked like some particularly ugly spots, which reminded Zhang Qixun of the meteorite sinkhole he had seen under the Western Queen Mother Country.
Did the Germans open the bronze door in some way? There is a chance of this, but Zhang Qixun thinks it is not big, so how did the author of this painting look through the heavy bronze door and see the meteorite inside?
Or, these things are not seen with his eyes at all, but are deeply imprinted in his mind in another way, causing him to unconsciously imply the scene in his mind on the paper when painting.
A thought flashed in Zhang Qixun's heart, and a fierce color flashed in his eyes. God-granted! Whether the Germans who painted this work really experienced God's gift back then, and if so, that is, this picture is equivalent to being painted by him under God's control.
And most importantly, what is the purpose of God's bestowal? There is less to say in the back of the notebook, other than that they were badly injured when they passed a very beautiful lake on the way back.
Because there is a large white fish with a red beast's head in that huge lake, which can crash through the thick ice and swallow people directly into their stomachs.
"Smell the bell and move", this is the description of the notekeeper when he attacks the strange big fish.
But the owner of the note said
"Smell the bell" means that whenever the big fish attack them, it will always be accompanied by the distant sound of bells.
The big fish were moving so fast that they couldn't see the movements at all, they could only feel a huge black shadow passing in front of them, and some of them were dragged into the water before they even had time to scream.
However, some of the advisors in the team who knew about beast training guessed that there was another possibility that these strange big fish were acting according to the sound of bells coming from nowhere.
But in that critical situation, they were completely unable to tell the source of the sound. They had no choice but to take a detour from the dangerous peak far from the lake, which undoubtedly increased the difficulty of their actions.
There was still a large blank space in the back of the notebook, and it was clear that before the rest could be recorded, the group stopped breathing forever in the wind and snow.
Zhang Qixun took a sip of the butter tea that had cooled, and felt that the taste was a little strange, so he didn't drink it again.
I thought in my heart that the very beautiful lake mentioned in the notebook should be the lake in the oil painting left by Dong Can, but the water surface of the lake in the oil painting reflects the blue sky and snow-capped mountains, and the gray and snow shadows are blended together, and the beauty is natural.
The calm water surface in Dong Can's painting has not yet frozen, and it is impossible to see if there are any strange big fish in the water. A big fish with a beast's head, what could it be?
Due to the differences in regional culture, foreigners are not very able to understand the ancient civilization of the East, like the big fish described in the notebook, in ancient times, it was often worshiped as a god by the ancients who did not know the details, and built temples and shrines by the water to worship, asking for good weather and blessings for the continuation of the descendants.
But there is obviously more than one big fish in the lake, and the weirdest and most suspicious point is the bell sound, which is suspected to be able to control the bell sound of the big fish.
Zhang Qixun couldn't help but think of the corpse cockroaches with hexagonal copper bells tied to their tails when he and Wu Xie and them passed through the corpse cave together a long time ago, and these big fish would be the same situation.
So who will keep the big fish in the lake there, and is it related to the bronze gate in the depths of the snow-capped mountains?
Zhang Qixun temporarily suppressed his doubts in his heart and continued to look through the records of the following books. ̅ ̅ ̅ ̅ ̅ ̅ ̅ After listening to the little brother tell the contents of the notes, Raba was very yearning for the legendary valley full of golden balls, and the idea of quitting had long been dispelled.
He asked the little brother,
"Boss, you came to this mountain for those golden balls?" The little brother seemed to be a little difficult to answer his question, and shook his head for a while,
"Probably not." Raba understood, even if it wasn't, it had to do with the golden balls, and there was meat to eat with the young owner.
If they can really find that fairyland-like place, he can stuff a few of them into his body casually, and after he goes out, he can live the rest of his life comfortably, and the dozen or so members of the family will no longer have to worry about their livelihood.
On the second day, the body of his nephew was buried in snow, and Raba and Luo Gongpo divided his belongings equally, and the group continued on their way.
They climbed from the cliff to the other side of the hill by picking up the rocks that protruded from the cliff, where the road was not so difficult and they had more time to rest.
On the eleventh day of walking in the snowfield, the little brother stopped and looked around, there was a vast white snow everywhere, and the towering and precipitous snow-capped mountains and clouds were always ahead, like a mirage, and they no longer knew where they were.
On the twelfth day, nothing happened. As Rabah was digging a snow cave and camping, he stumbled upon a glimpse of the fiery clouds that stretched for thousands of miles over the mountains, and suddenly realized that he didn't know where they were going, and that the place with the golden ball could be any part of the vast expanse of snow.
They had not found a map from the corpses of the Germans, it was too big, the snowy terrain had reached a place he had never touched, he was no longer familiar with the snowy mountains, and his previous experience was of little use in the subsequent advance.
The only clue was the huge lake in the snow-capped mountains, and Raba comforted himself that they had followed the direction the Germans had come, and that the direction was good, and that the lake was so huge that it could always be seen further on.
They built a fire in a dug snow cave, boiled water and roasted dry food, and prepared to spend the night. For the sake of life on the snowy mountains, there are many things that cannot be done, and the only way to pass the time is to be in a daze and sleep.
It was soon dark, and it was Raba's turn to be the first to keep vigil tonight, and he listened boredly to the sound of the wind coming in through the half-hidden snow cave, and vaguely he seemed to hear the faint sound of bells in the wind.
Raba leaned over to the cave and listened carefully, but heard nothing but the sound of whimpering, and he thought that he might be too bored to hallucinate.
However, the moment he turned his head, he saw a little cyan light flickering at a frequency in the darkness in the distance.
Rabah thought he was dazzled, and just wanted to turn around and call someone to look, but the little brother was already standing behind him, and he was also looking in that direction.
The point of glitter was moving, and it seemed to be coming towards them.
"What's that?" Raba was a little flustered, he stood up, and subconsciously took a few steps out, trying to see more clearly.
The little brother grabbed him by the collar and dragged him and Luo Gongpo behind a shallow slope outside the cave, where they could hide their figures.
The green light moved at an astonishing speed, as if it was flying directly through the snow, and appeared at the bottom of the largest snow slope in front of them almost in the blink of an eye.
At the same time, the three of them also heard a series of faint bells, and in an instant, the wind around them seemed to freeze, and the bells seemed to be particularly ethereal in the snow, as if they were far away from them, and as if they were close to their ears.
As he listened, Rabah was in a trance, and a deep canyon seemed to emerge before his eyes, and it was shining with gold, as if it were piled up with a lot of sand made of gold.
Raba was a little dazed, he subconsciously wanted to talk to the two little brothers next to him, but found that he was alone here for some reason.
What about people? Where did the other two go? Wasn't it still here just now? Raba panicked, he had completely forgotten about the green light just now, wondering if the two men had just gone back, but before he could inform him, he immediately stood up and wanted to walk towards the snow cave they had dug out for the night.
Unexpectedly, when he walked out of the snowy slope, he was shocked to realize that the scene around him had suddenly changed, and the original snow-capped peaks had really turned into golden canyons.
Rabah was stunned by the sound of gurgling water, the Golden River, it was a thin golden river, the water flowed slowly over the golden gravel, crystal clear, and countless golden sands glittered in the sun.
Rabah was completely fascinated by the sight before him, and he completely forgot that he was now in a cold snowfield, where even the saliva from the corners of his mouth could be frozen, and how could a flowing river appear, and the sudden immense wealth obscured his reason.
He thought to himself, could this be the place full of golden balls that the Germans were looking for? It was really a nowhere to be found, and it took no effort to get it, he had forgotten everything, and his heart was full of ecstasy, and his eyes were full of this river of gold.
He threw himself into the water with an arrow step, picked up a handful of golden sand, and his face bloomed with joy, but he didn't want to, when a sudden change occurred, and the sand under his feet suddenly began to sink.
Before Rabah could react, his knees had sunk in, and something in the sand seemed to be tugging at his legs, pulling him down.
The fear of death finally awakened Raba's senses, and he screamed and struggled to pull his legs out, but the sound irritated the creature beneath the sand, and he fell faster.
His feet were trapped in the sand, and in less than thirty seconds, the river had reached his waist.
The unidentified creature under the sand also revealed its true face at this time, it was a golden tentacle covered with suckers, poking out of the water, tightly wrapped around Raba's body like a snake, and still climbing upward.
Raba's neck was soon entangled in tentacles, and he began to gasp for breath, his eyes were bloodshot, and everything in his vision turned blood-red.
The pain of suffocation filled Raba's chest, and his eyes were completely darkened, and after the sound of bones shattering, everything in the space returned to silence.
Below the slopes, green light slowly flickered behind the hills, and soon bypassed the several snow hills in front of them, getting closer to them.
The little brother also saw clearly what the green light was, it was a very strange group of people, they were wearing Tibetan robes, carrying something wrapped in thick felt, and the green light came out of one end of the thing.
The leader was dressed in a blue Tibetan robe, and his face was covered by a half-silver mask, and his face looked blank when the snow was reflected.
The little brother noticed that the man was carrying an octagonal lantern with a cyan candle in his hand, and a bell fell from the bottom of the lantern.
The men behind the leader also carried something on their shoulders, which looked very much like carved wood with some kind of pattern, and it was wrapped with red silk threads, as if wrapped in a layer of blood-red fishing nets, which was very penetrating.
There were also many small bells falling from under the wood, much like tassels of peace. As the movement and the wind blew, all the bells were ringing, and there seemed to be countless voices whispering in his ears.