Chapter 81 Running Out of the Mine "Da da da." A rhythmic sound...
"Tap tap tap." The rhythmic tapping sound rang out in the quiet dormitory.
"Tap tap." Another tapping sound responded.
Sang Zhitao listened to the rhythmic tapping sounds, which were the secret messages exchanged among her companions.
After a long while, the sound disappeared, and Tou Lan slowly sat up, pretending to have a stomachache, and called out to Sang Zhi Tao, "Lan Xing, do you have any medicine?"
Sang Zhitao pretended to be woken up, sat up, took out her bag, and started rummaging through it.
"Is this it?" She held up something and gestured to Toulan, who shook her head.
"This one?" Sang Zhitao picked up something else.
Tou Lan shook her head again.
After doing this two or three times, Tou Lan finally nodded weakly.
Pretending to have taken the medicine, but actually throwing the black capsule into the corner, Tou Lan and Sang Zhi Tao exchanged a glance and lay back down on the bed.
Sang Zhitao glanced at the monitor and saw the miniature robot that Touhuang had mentioned. She relaxed and lay down on the bed to sleep.
A few minutes later, Sang Zhitao and Toulan quickly sat up and woke up the others one by one.
Tou Lan peered through the crack in the door for a while before turning back to nod at them and whispering, "It's done."
The door opened, and a shimmering yellow and purple hue flashed into the room.
“I’ve got everything sorted out on my end, shall we set off now?” Touhuang said softly.
“Yes, they’re too relaxed. There are hardly any people patrolling outside,” Sang Zhitao said.
“I had the robot scout out a path, and it’s safe,” Transparent Yellow continued.
The group didn't linger; they climbed out of the window and followed the pipes down to the ground floor.
"This way," Touhuang called softly.
The group quickly followed the yellowish-brown figure.
They soon arrived at the giant mining equipment they had seen during the day.
Before I even got close, I could hear a lot of snoring.
They peeked out and saw many people sleeping under the equipment, all of them ragged and emaciated.
The man in the yellow robes gestured lightly and pointed towards the mine shaft.
Sang Zhitao shook her head and pointed to the mountaintop.
Touhuang frowned, somewhat puzzled, but ultimately said nothing, nodded in agreement, and continued on the road ahead.
Sang Zhitao knew, of course, that Touhuang wanted them to go directly into the mine.
However, according to her original book, there was a path from the top of the mountain that led directly into the mine without attracting attention.
Tomorrow at noon, when the miners are mining, the mountaintop will collapse, completely concealing this special path, and no one will know what they saw in it.
By the time the group slowly climbed to the top of the mountain, it was already dawn.
"There's no time to lose, let's go down quickly." Sang Zhitao said hurriedly as she saw people with whips coming towards the giant equipment from the dormitory building.
Tou Lan and the others saw it too, and without hesitation, jumped into the hole, which was no wider than one person.
The hole wasn't big, nor was it very long; Sang Zhitao and the others slid down for a little over a hundred meters before reaching the bottom.
"Snap!" Touhuang twisted open a glow stick and handed it to Sang Zhitao.
Then, the translucent yellow one after another unscrewed and handed it to other people.
The cave was instantly illuminated.
"Are these all ores?" Touqing held a glow stick against the wall, looking at the sparkling gems with some surprise.
Sang Zhitao pulled out several palm-sized iron pickaxes from her pocket and handed them to them: "Pry some off first, we'll keep them for later."
Touhuang paused for a moment, then hesitated before saying, "But you mean these things are..."
Sang Zhitao replied without hesitation, "What if it isn't? Let's pry it open first."
Without further hesitation, Touhuang took the pickaxe and began to pry.
"Speaking of which, how's the signal for that girl from yesterday?" Sang Zhitao suddenly asked.
After thinking for a moment, Touhuang said, "I checked before I left, and the location has been moved to the cemetery."
Sang Zhitao paused for a moment, then said nothing more and buried herself in prying the stones.
After an unknown amount of time, the glow sticks began to lose their color, and the group started to feel tired.
Seeing the mountain of gems, they started stuffing them into their bags without waiting for Sang Zhitao's reminder.
Before I could finish stuffing it in, I felt the world shaking.
"Oh no, it's going to collapse!" Sang Zhitao immediately realized.
"Climb up?" Tou Lan looked at the hole above and touched the wall before asking.
Sang Zhitao shook her head: "No need, I know another way."
As she spoke, she pried open a narrow gap on the right.
Tou Lan and the others were initially puzzled, but after Sang Zhi Tao pried a few times, the gap widened and cracked open, revealing a dark hole.
"This is...?" Tou Lan leaned forward in surprise to take a closer look.
Sang Zhitao steadied herself against the still-shaking mountainside, watching as a lot of debris fell with the swaying, and hurriedly said, "Stop studying it, let's go!"
As she spoke, she jumped directly into the cave entrance.
Seeing this, Tou Lan also jumped in.
The others hurried to follow.
Soon, the once bustling cave was reduced to scattered ore fragments.
Not long after, there was a loud "bang," and the mine shaft, which no one knew who had dug, completely collapsed without a trace.
Sang Zhitao and the others slid down the narrow opening, not knowing how long they slid, until they hit a wall and stopped.
Sang Zhitao gritted her teeth, bent her legs, and kicked down with all her might.
With a loud crack, the wall shattered like paper, and she slid out using the force of the impact.
There was a small lake outside. She quickly swam forward a few strokes and made way for them.
As soon as they left, several figures fell down from the spot where they had been standing.
"There's actually a lake here?" After being safely rescued, Toulu looked at the broken cave entrance on the mountainside with a surprised expression.
"Everyone, take a break, let's continue." Sang Zhitao instructed, then looked at Tou Lan, "Take a look, how long is it from our current location to the Holy Mountain?"
Tou Lan took out the blueprints and carefully compared them.
The others quickly set up tents, intending to change out of their wet clothes first.
After everything was finished, Tou Lan said, "According to the blueprints, we should head east and go straight to the Holy Mountain."
Sang Zhitao looked at him with some surprise: "We don't need to go through other districts anymore?"
Tou Lan shook her head: "No need, this is already the location of the Holy Mountain. But we need to go down from the top of the mountain to get to the Floating Mirror Lake, so we still need to go up the mountain."
"This is it?!" Sang Zhitao looked surprised and murmured softly, "No wonder."
"What's wrong?" Tou Lan asked curiously.
Sang Zhitao shook her head.
In her novel, she wrote that after escaping from the mine, Lan Xing went on adventures and unintentionally entered the Holy Mountain.
On the sacred mountain, she met miners who had escaped from the mine. The miners told Lanxing that there was a mine tunnel on the mountaintop with a hidden path inside, and that's how they escaped.
In the original book, Sang Zhitao did not explain why the people who escaped from the mine would go directly to the Holy Mountain. Now it seems that the world has automatically filled in this line, placing the mine near the Holy Mountain.
Looking down at the towering mountains she had descended, Sang Zhitao understood why it was impossible to reach them directly and why one had to take a detour from a distance. Ordinary people couldn't even cross these mountains; they were merely using this mysterious secret passage.
Tou Lan and the others didn't pay attention to Sang Zhi Tao's thoughts.
After resting, the group looked at the gems in their backpacks and then at Sang Zhitao, unsure whether they should eat them or not.
Sang Zhitao held the gemstone in her hand, sighed, and tossed one into her mouth: "If we don't eat, we'll just starve to death."
The others looked at each other, and no one spoke for a moment, but they did not hesitate and ate the gem.
"...That signal appeared at the mine." The man in yellow gripped the monitor, his fingertips turning white, the veins on the back of his hand bulging.
For a moment, everyone was speechless.
"Ugh!" Tou Dian suddenly turned around and ran to the tree to vomit.
The others clutched their stomachs, seemingly lost in thought.
Sang Zhitao suddenly said, "After the Blood Moon War, the Gem People began to eat the corpses of their own kind, which is why the Contamination Disease was born. Because the corpses only appear in the public graves of each region, the symptoms are different in each region."
"Why did you suddenly start eating corpses? Why didn't you eat them before?" Tou Lan's expression was rather grim.
“Three hundred years ago, the Mirror Clan became a sacrificial clan. I think the answer might be in the Floating Mirror Lake,” Sang Zhitao sighed.
Tou Lan pursed her lips, looking at the gem in her hand, which, though somewhat hazy, was far purer than the one she had found in the garbage city, and was speechless for a moment.
"Alright, stop thinking about it. If you really can't eat, then don't." Sang Zhitao sighed and looked at everyone.
After thinking about it, everyone realized they couldn't eat right away, so they had to put the food away for the time being.
"What exactly is the difference between a perfect gem and other gems?" Touhui asked, his face somewhat grim.
“Based on what we’ve been told before, perfect gems contain absolutely no contaminants, while other gems are graded according to the proportion of contaminants. What we found is considered to be the most contaminated gem.” Sang Zhitao’s lips curled into a cold smile. “Even so, it’s still a very precious commodity in Garbage City.”
"If we classify them by grade, wouldn't the least polluted gems come from gem people who are not polluted?" Tou Lan rubbed her face and said softly.
The gray-faced man's expression remained grim: "So, in other words, the nobles, who are already less polluted, eat the food of the nobles, while those in the heavily polluted garbage cities eat the food of the people from the garbage cities?"
The scene fell silent for a moment.
After a long silence, Sang Zhitao finally spoke, "Let's go to the Floating Mirror Lake first. Perhaps all the answers will be there."
Touhui didn't say anything more, just stared at that ugly face.
Touhuang stepped forward and patted him on the shoulder, a silent comfort that made Touhui's expression improve.
After quickly packing their things, the group continued on their way.
After walking for almost a day and a night, they finally felt the howling of the wind and knew that the summit was not far away.
"We're probably almost there." Sang Zhitao thought for a moment and asked, "How do we get into Mirror Lake from the mountain? Do we really have to jump off a cliff?"
Tou Lan shook her head: "No, our people have their own methods, don't worry."
Sang Zhitao raised an eyebrow. Her original book didn't mention any special methods; the Mirror Clan friend she saved ultimately chose to jump off a cliff.
Driven by curiosity about the corrected world line, Sang Zhitao followed the others up to the mountaintop cliff.
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