B&B (II) [Rule 3]
This conjecture is really a bit mysterious. Let me sort out my thoughts from the beginning.
Just eight years ago, in the heavy rain, the female tour guide and the couple drove the group of tourists out of the cave in order to save people.
At this point, I already knew that most of the tourists had ulterior motives. So facing the cave collapse, it was probably impossible to leave the valley. Most people probably chose to continue up the mountain, passing through those difficult paths that were almost suspended in the air, and arrived at the top of the mountain to enter the homestay.
As for whether they were asking the staff for help or just wanted to check in, I don't know.
However, at this moment, a very terrifying situation emerged.
Now, it is known that the storm is actually the movement of comb jellies, which means that the entire storm is alive and can move at its own will.
It is also known that the day eight years ago and this day today passed in parallel in time.
I can't help but ask myself a question:
The time scale for comb jellyfish colonies to travel back and forth is eight years, but if they are also constantly growing and dying, are these "eight years" also moving relatively toward the future?
For the tour team in the rainstorm, is there a corresponding incident eight years ago?
At this time, the construction time of the B&B tells me that this half-old and half-new building has indeed experienced sixteen or seventeen years of wind and rain.
Then, on "this day", two images appeared at the same time:
The first scene is a newly built homestay with a group of guests staying in it. These tourists have just finished climbing the mountain, took a shower, changed into hotel robes, put on slippers, and took a nap to avoid the scorching sun at noon.
They had a very smooth journey without experiencing any unusual changes. Now they were defenseless in their respective rooms, and some of them were talking enthusiastically about water monkeys.
Some people were sitting alone on the big sofa in the living room taking a nap.
That person may be the original tour guide.
This was today and at this moment sixteen years ago.
The second scene shows a group of people, each with their own purpose, being driven out of the cave by the female tour guide and the couple.
They were moving up the hill.
Now, bathed in a rainstorm, none of them realized that the rain had noticed its unexpected prey and was moving after them.
Until we arrived at the B&B.
This was today and at this moment eight years ago.
Then, at the beginning and end of the eight-year time scale, a huge group of comb jellies, wrapped in abundant water vapor, enveloped it.
Perhaps it was a cold joke, but the torrential rain that came from nowhere engulfed the original homestay.
In the ignorant and indifferent flashes of the comb jellyfish, the first overlap occurred.
This overlap happened long before I escaped from the bluestone, and before the raindrops left gently at noon today, just slightly wetting and weighing our clothes.
Eight years ago, those tourists were swallowed up by the overlapping and flashing rainstorms in their sleep.
There were no banyan trees sprouting, no comb jellies fighting and destroying the banyan trees, only the initial "rainstorm" that was not suppressed by anything.
All the lives came to a halt in the water, and they turned into floating corpses.
Frozen in this enclosed homestay is the scene that was triggered by the original "Flash" tragedy sixteen years ago.
Look at the stars.
I shuddered again.
Children may say something innocent, but they may be right. However, tourists are not looking at the stars in the sky, but the twinkling of comb jellies can be best seen here.
When we just woke up, we were told that this unknown valley was very close to the site of the old capital of Chu State, Ying.
Those tourists come here just because of its reputation, and distort the interpretation of the completely irrelevant myth according to their own selfish desires, hoping to be enlightened by having an immortal touch their head while they sleep in their B&B, just like King Xiang of Chu "met the goddess" in his dream.
Then, occasionally, someone will see images in the twinkling starry sky that are invisible to humans in normal time scales, and will see the past and the future and be ecstatic.
But the flashing of comb jellyfish has always been a primitive and instinctive murder.
I was once surprised. How could both the travel agencies and the tourists believe in the crazy talk of "wishes will come true" out of thin air and build homestays, organize tour groups, and come here in droves?
I only now realize that the B&B came first.
With this initial link, over a period of eight years, the comb jellyfish caused its first tragedy, leaving behind a crime scene that ordinary people could not understand.
For those who might have survived outside the room, it was a bloody miracle happening right before their eyes.
Without any signs, they saw the rainstorm suddenly appear, covering the entire B&B with precision. In the extremely cold water, the rainstorm had a shape and boundaries, and did not leak out at all.
In the water mass, comb jellies spit out pharyngeal tubes from their stomachs. The tortuous and symmetrical organs operate together in their transparent shells. The blood squeezed out of their prey outlines their shapes as they sip, and turns blue because of the comb jellies' constant "deep dives".
Outside the water ball, they saw for the first time the "Goddess" in a green robe with a cloud-like shoulder draped over her shoulders, saw the fairy servant opening the door, and saw the pavilions and towers in the distance.
In the twisted state of extreme fear, in the wailing of collapsed sanity, those people thought that a divine sacrifice had been performed specifically for them.
After the “rainstorm” killed its prey, countless tiny comb jellies were scattered in the wind and disappeared without a trace, just like the goddess disappeared without a trace when King Xiang woke up from his dream. Only the floating corpses proved that everything was not just a fantasy.
Survival at this time would not be considered luck, but rather a cold reward and commendation from the goddess to her followers.
If they trace back further, they will find that the footprints of the goddess seem to be very organized along an invisible route, climbing up the stairs all the way to the front of the B&B.
It was along this trail that they meticulously rebuilt the mountain trail in order to meet the arrival of the "goddess". Even to normal people, this mountain trail was straight and steep, like a ladder to heaven, which was completely inconsistent with the common sense and requirements of road construction.
This road was followed by tourists who left the cave eight years later, not daring to go beyond it. The path of the rainstorm left a stable trace, which was then observed by the people eight years ago and was confirmed to be necessary.
This was the introduction to everything at the very beginning, and also the first "initial closed loop" caused by comb jellies and tourists in this valley.
In this regard, there was an ordinary B&B first, then the drowning tragedy happened, and then there were rumors that people believed later.
Then, these survivors suddenly grasped the "miracle" and became greedy, setting up travel companies and bringing subsequent tourists into the mountains to conduct experiments in order to make their wishes come true.
And now, after sixteen years, only the still terrifyingly thick water vapor is blowing in through the door and the long time.
We are already in the second new time scale of the natural growth of comb jellies, and thus we are lucky enough to see the traces left by the previous group of people in the life of comb jellies in the last period of time.
It is precisely because of this that I suddenly realized another thing:
In the beginning, there was no such thing as a banyan tree.
Looking back at the banyan tree in front of the B&B, the artificially created illusion of vitality is very subtle.
A large amount of facts and almost instinctive intuition tell me that people are not hiding in closed homestays to resist the banyan trees outside.
Instead, people are using the banyan tree to protect the things inside the B&B, and they are sealing and locking the B&B to prevent anything from coming out.
But isn’t the person in the B&B the “Goddess” who suddenly appeared and disappeared?
They didn't know the nature of comb jellyfish, so they didn't know that they were just dispersing and returning to their nests. There was no real fairy maid who would suddenly appear from the spot like a ridiculous land god when summoned.
In other words, their behavior logic is ridiculous:
Longing for the goddess's consort and the blessings of immortals, he strictly stipulated the travel route for the goddess's consort.
But they wanted to control the goddess and lock her up in this B&B, not allowing her to leave or move.
This makes it convenient for them to come here to "watch the stars" at any time.
So, they got a batch of banyan trees from somewhere.
It is very ceremonial and in line with traditional feudal superstition. In front of the newly reopened homestay, eight banyan trees are planted in a row, symbolizing prosperity.
A group of people made a pious wish that this Feng Shui tree would remain evergreen and fresh, and really lock in the Feng Shui energy and the goddess who was born from water.
For good luck, some people may even hang the first ever-fading silk banyan leaf on the banyan tree.
The "banyan tree" heard it and made a promise, while the man fulfilled his wish before that.
Make a wish - wish comes true - pay the price. The rules of "Banyan Tree" are fully triggered.
You can get a glimpse of the chaos and bloodiness of that moment. Banyan trees parasitize and sprout in people's cavities, and the huge, gnarled roots of the banyan trees dig up the soil, spread everywhere, hunt, and collect rewards.
As for the processed floating corpses they had placed there, the "banyan tree" had no idea that these were "products of miracles" as defined by humans, and it stretched out its aerial roots to treat them all equally, injecting seeds into the bodies that were beginning to heat up due to corruption.
In order to protect this unexpected and suitable breeding ground, the aerial roots of the "banyan tree" continuously gushed out foam and oxygen like beaten resin, filling the thin root systems and even beginning to inject toxins into the floating corpse to prevent it from rotting too quickly.
At this time, the chest of the floating corpse was almost transparent, bulging high, with worm egg-like foam surging, as if it was wearing a suit of flesh and blood armor.
It is easy to imagine the scene in which the only survivors after the riot were in such a state of fear and madness that they scattered large amounts of pyroalkali on the land in an attempt to kill the mutated banyan trees.
But the problem is that, because of these manifestations of mutation, they got it wrong.
They interpreted these as punishment for the goddess's rebellion, the incorruptible state of the corpse as hope for "eternal life", and the black aerial roots of the dead and rotting banyan tree as the goddess's long black hair.
As a result, the banyan trees in front of the B&B died one after another, but the wishing mechanism still responded and operated from time to time. When they went to observe the rainstorm, they found that the goddess seemed to be still safe and sound.
The frightened people, even though they still had greed in their hearts, bowed their heads. They bowed to the dead banyan trees and decorated them with silk leaves. This time, they made a sincere wish for evergreen.
Groups of tourists once again stepped into this crude and deadly trap that they had built themselves.
With the repeated operation of this wishing mechanism, the "Banyan Tree" has become more mature, stable and powerful.
This was not enough, they also built corridors along the way and placed a large number of shrines and statues with the appearance of the goddess. Finally, they threw the banyan tree seeds and the floating corpses into the lake at the end.
This extremely cold lake is where the comb jellies return to their nests. The siphons I have experienced and the tiny air currents I have tracked are the comb jellies breathing in and out water and filtering aquatic life in their long breaths.
At this moment, both sides were running on their own. The two strange stories that were constantly misinterpreted by people would not even recognize what twists and turns humans had done. Because of this pious "release" offering, they smashed into each other directly.
The extremely powerful "banyan tree" continuously extends aerial roots in the water. The floating corpses that belong to the breeding ground of banyan tree seeds are suspended one by one, protected by the root network and entangled by tiny aerial roots, releasing oxygen and some heat inward.
Therefore, the upper layer of the lake is warmer, just as I had initially perceived.
The water is extremely clean and sweet because after accommodating two such huge creatures, the lake is indeed empty except for "pure water" rich in oxygen and minerals. Everything else has been eaten up, including the smallest plankton.
Under the stratification, the comb jellies, whose means of self-preservation is to drown their prey with water and then strangle them, have united into bluestone to avoid the banyan tree and have to dive deep in the part of the water that can still remain cold.
Two clear boundaries were drawn in the lake.
I once wondered how such a lake could provide food for creatures as big as Bluestone. It seemed difficult to get oxygen and food.
Only now do I realize with horror and humor: there is a constant supply of oxygen; the food is outside; and the comb jellies can "fly".
The main food of this "banyan tree" is the shrubs of the woods. Throughout the valley, its black aerial roots continue to spread and grow deep, robbing the entire land of its vitality.
Inexplicably, a fragile food chain that both parties were very reluctant to establish was actually established.
The "Banyan Tree" always fulfills the original wish and indeed locks up the goddess, so it constantly demands for rewards.
In addition, there is a group of people who are ecstatic because their "guesses" are correct. They come and go on this tourist route, constantly delivering food and battlefields to the two ghost stories.
"——Master! I found something!"
The guy climbed over the wall from the second floor of the B&B. "I saw their travel brochure on the small terrace on the second floor."
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Rule 3, see this chapter for instructions
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