fluorescent forest

I have experience diving, whether it's during tomb raiding or while swimming during leisure time.

However, this is the first time I've jumped into a whirlpool.

This is different from underwater swimming. Not only did the current make me dizzy, but the pressure of the whirlpool was like an invisible hand squeezing me up and compressing the air inside my body.

Before I jumped into the underground lake, I saw several people surfacing from the water, all wearing diving equipment, but the two people running down from the shore had no protection whatsoever.

This shows that Duan Jinyan and the others must have surveyed the underground river here in advance and determined that people could swim safely to the bottom of the lake without protection. That's why I dared to let Jiang Man and the others jump into the lake with me.

I spun faster and faster in the water, until I was spinning like a top, feeling like my head was about to be flung out. At the same time, I realized that I was getting close to the location of the second door.

When I first entered the water, my body was upright. But as I approached the second door, I was almost sideways when a tremendous force pushed me out.

Amidst this turbulence, I felt as if my body had collided with something, but because of the rapid current beside me, I was slightly pulled back, thus avoiding any fatal injury. Otherwise, with the speed of the current, I would probably have been smashed into a pulp.

After being propelled by this tremendous force, my body stopped spinning and began to sway from side to side like a leaf falling in the water, changing its direction from top to bottom to back to front.

Based on the direction my body was swept away by the water, I felt that although the second door was in the underground lake, it was not directly below the lake bottom, but on the side of the lake bottom. After being swept a distance further by the water, I suddenly had a feeling that my body was floating in the air.

I know this sounds strange because my body was in the water, but the feeling of falling really made me feel like I was being thrown down from a great height.

"Splash!"

Suddenly, my upper body burst out of the water.

Air rushed in through the gas mask's filter, relieving my suffocation, and then my body was swept back by the water flow.

I'm really falling!

Behind the second door is an empty space, and the water from the underground lake flows in and follows the terrain.

And where I am now is a waterfall.

"Thump!"

The free fall lasted for about six or seven seconds, and my body, along with the water flow, fell into a larger pool.

Because I fell while encased in water, a large portion of the impact was absorbed.

After I stabilized my body in the water, I swam across as if I were on the surface.

At this moment, ripples spread across the water, creating a dazzling display of light and shadow, making it look as if many police cars were parked on it, shimmering with a deep blue light.

"Splash!"

I quickly swam to the surface and looked toward the shore.

Exquisitely beautiful and dazzlingly bright!

They had now fallen into another underground lake.

The banks of this underground river are covered with bioluminescent plants.

There are many bioluminescent plants in nature, such as the luminous tree, aloe vera, night-queen, lantern tree, star chrysanthemum, African luminous tree, candle tree, and so on.

In the primeval forests of North America, there is a luminous tree whose roots contain phosphorus. At night, when the phosphorus encounters oxygen, it emits a bluish-white cold light, and after nightfall, it glows with fluorescence, like a tree full of stars.

There are also African lighting trees, which look no different from ordinary trees during the day, but at night, they emit bright fluorescence from trunk to branches, illuminating the surrounding area like a dazzling display of lights.

In addition, in the deep forests of Guizhou Province in my country, there grows a rare luminous tree. This tree has a thick trunk and lush foliage. When night falls, the edges of its leaves emit a small semicircle of fluorescence, resembling the arc of a crescent moon. Therefore, the local Shui people call it the "moon tree".

The trees mentioned above can glow because they contain phosphorus, but we are in the second underground level, where there is no sunlight to support plant growth, and the way these plants glow is different from the ones mentioned above.

The trees here look as if they have been artificially created with LED strips installed inside, emitting a blue glow from the trunk to the branches and leaves.

In addition to the forest that emits blue light, there are also many flowers that emit other kinds of light, as well as some shrubs.

These plants are characterized by their thick trunks and lush foliage, emitting a light that illuminates the entire cave, though the pale blue glow gives one the feeling of being in the underworld.

My first thought upon seeing these plants was that they were all man-made. Unsure of what dangers lay in the water and wanting to gain the upper hand, I swam faster toward the shore.

As soon as I stepped ashore, bathed in the glow of the plants, I saw a trail of water on the riverbank ahead. I took two throwing knives from their sheaths and slowly walked forward.

The water stains on the ground only lasted until the edge of the woods before disappearing.

Looking at the large expanse of glowing plants ahead, I didn't dare to approach rashly. Instead, I used a knife to make a cut on a nearby tree, wanting to see what it was made of.

When I made a cut with my knife, I easily cut through the bark of the tree, and a dark brown liquid flowed out from the cut, covering the luster of the bark.

As I watched the liquid flowing from the tree trunk, I instinctively took a step back.

The plants here are not man-made, but real plants.

This is the first time in my life I've ever heard of growing a luminous crop in a tomb.

Faced with this unexpected situation, I felt an instinctive fear.

Although these trees don't move, no one knows whether the sap is poisonous, or whether these trees secrete any toxic gases or the like.

For safety's sake, I quickly retraced my steps, intending to return to the riverbank to find my other companions who had become separated from me.

Previously in the Centipede Cave, we all jumped into the underground lake at almost the same time. However, the underwater conditions were complicated, and during the process of me getting ashore, no one else did.

I went back to the riverbank and took a look. I found that the place where I had just fallen was not a pool of water, but an underground river with a long flow of water.

This means that after people fall into the water, they will not all reach the shore in one place, but may be swept away by the river to a more distant place.