hair
Brother Zhang's metaphors raised questions one after another.
In particular, it is difficult to tell whether his words are simply a result of his desire to create art or a vague cry for help.
For someone like me, when I find a puzzle but can't hear an organized solution immediately, I feel extremely anxious and want to tie him up and give him a bunch of ticklers.
I tried to exchange glances with him as a signal, but he continued to walk with me, as if the terrifying words he had just said were all made up on the spot.
I thought to myself, is this a joke? I felt a little uncomfortable.
However, in my interactions with these people, I have come to understand that many things are not as simple as two people accusing each other of not being submissive and cooperative enough.
No one knew me at first, and in many people's eyes I was just a second-generation person who was unexpectedly smart and deserved to be hung on the street lamp.
They are all veterans, and they have been through a lot, and they are all strong-minded. They are also the best in their own expertise, and they are used to trusting themselves in everything, and keeping some things to themselves. If they really bowed down as they said in a joke, I'm afraid the grass on their graves would be two feet high.
This is because everyone relies on different survival experiences, and I am sure I am not the only one who has suffered from the bumps and bruises during the adjustment period.
If I really thought I was so great and expected everyone to obey me, I would definitely be embarrassed in front of this group of unscrupulous bandits.
Of course, the reason I suddenly thought of these things is not to convince myself to remain calm.
Brother Zhang looked at me for a while and said, "How come you still have a voice when you talk about this long journey of your heart?"
I immediately stood proudly with my hands behind my back, thinking, nonsense! Of course I was intending to impress you with my mature and steady personality charm, so that you would reflect on yourself and speak out what you said.
At this point I still have to urge them to dig up some information. Wouldn't all my previous work be in vain?
Not only did I say it, I also recorded it, and when I got home I tied it to my son and played it eight hundred times next to everyone's pillow. If anyone dares to hide it from me again, I will make him so ashamed that he can't even hold his head up.
I was just about to put my hands on my hips in triumph when I heard someone chuckle. I couldn't help but laugh quietly and trembled.
It turned out that it was the team leader Zhang Jia who came with our new guide.
My face immediately turned red and I quickly pretended nothing happened and asked them what was going on.
The two of them couldn't help laughing, and tried to be serious and said, the valley is too big, and searching with just a dozen or twenty of us is basically a waste of time. If we just search aimlessly and rely on luck, it will take weeks to find the source.
I understand. It's my turn to work.
"Why don't we just walk along the tourist routes first? There are small paths in those places, which makes it more convenient to move around."
I thought about it and said, "Isn't Wildcat Gao Liu very good at mapping and exploring waterways? Let them explore the way together in the opposite direction. Then they can meet up and compare information together."
The tour guide looked at the blazing sun and asked in surprise, "We're leaving now?"
It turns out that although this valley is quiet, it is mostly steep slopes, and there is almost no shelter on the opened mountain path.
The tour guide originally chose to lead the group in the morning. The tourists would look at the lush greenery from afar on the mountain trail and walk for about two hours to the homestay on the top of the mountain, just to avoid the increasingly scorching sun.
At one or two o'clock in the afternoon, tourists who have finished their nap will follow the path that is slower.
At this time, you will pass by some small man-made mountain spring waterfalls, bypass an old wooden corridor with aerial viewing, look at the scattered statues and shrines on the roadside, and finally arrive at the dried-up lake bed. At dusk, you can watch the sunset next to the dead banyan tree. The scene is still quite shocking and desolate.
The tour guide was also very straightforward, saying that these were all tricks to trick people into buying souvenirs, and that we probably wouldn't gain much if we really took the whole trip.
I said it was okay, just take it as a break, and immediately ordered everyone to leave, bringing sunshade and heat protection items, and changing into mountain climbing equipment.
The guys who were originally searching the mountain still followed their own progress and plan. I only asked the team leader to accompany me to scout the area, and forced Brother Zhang to stay behind as a bodyguard.
There were eight people escorting Xu You. When they saw me arresting someone, they looked at each other for a while, hesitating and trying to find words to refuse.
I shamelessly said that the Zhang family had no shortage of elites, and in fact, five of you would be enough if you went back, just enough to make five golden flowers. I then pulled three guys down from the car and brought them to Brother Zhang.
This time the escort team ran really fast, without any excuses, for fear that they would steal something from me again.
I said farewell with a smile, and turned around to look at Brother Zhang and the three Zhang servants who looked very elite. The inexplicable uneasiness in my heart finally eased a little.
The wind was hot in the afternoon, and we were fully prepared to start climbing. The narrow mountain road was surrounded by cleared grass and trees that blocked the road, which were piled up in small piles. The fresh grass and wood smell in the air was refreshing.
After walking for less than fifteen minutes, I realized that the so-called "steep slope" was a bit modest.
The team leader spoke more roughly, and whispered directly: "You call this a slope? This is a meeting on a pile of graves."
The tour guide shook his head: "It's three miles up, three miles down, and only then is the slope considered complete. The graves are much more polite."
The team leader's face turned green after hearing this. He looked around and couldn't understand what the tourists were looking for.
"Hey, do you have any relevant stories?" I was sweating a little. I listened to their nonsense while walking and nudged Brother Zhang who was holding my hand with my elbow.
"If I stay in the sun for a while longer, I won't just be flashing, my whole body will be sparkling."
He looked around and asked the female tour guide, "Who cleaned up the grass and trees on the trail?"
The tour guide was stunned and shook her head. After a while, she guessed that it must be someone sent by their travel company to do maintenance regularly. But judging from her expression, she probably couldn't convince herself.
Now I could tell something was wrong.
The slope is so steep now, and there are tourists during the day. Since the people who maintain the mountain trails have never met them, you may have to spend the whole night in the mountains.
Although there are no wild animals like bears in the mountains like in the 1970s and 1980s, for ordinary people, working in the mountains all night is no joke.
The team leader also exclaimed, and went forward to pick up the broken ends of the fallen weeds on the roadside. Unexpectedly, he easily squeezed a handful of fresh grass juice, and turned his head to look at me:
"This bright sun must have been cut open ten minutes ago at most."
The three guys at the end of our team immediately pointed out that there was no shelter on the trail along the mountain. There was a mountain wall on one side and hanging in the air on the other, and there was no place to hide.
If someone was clearing the grass and trees ten minutes ahead of us, there was no way the three of them would have ignored it.
That's the truth.
Besides, our trip was a spur of the moment plan. Unless there is someone who can lurk in the dark without anyone noticing, keep an eye on our movements, and then rush in front of us to cut grass and clear a path for us, and then immediately disappear.
It's hard to say whether it's arrogance or humility, but it's definitely a hole in the brain.
The tour guide didn't understand it either, and probably never noticed it before, so he asked suspiciously, "Could it be that your people just happened to have cleaned it up? Maybe they were here to search the mountain?"
The team leader frowned and said that there were fourteen pairs of eyes here, and it was a steep slope that went straight up for three miles. Anyone who was alive should have seen it, and it didn't matter who it was. But to be on the safe side, he contacted the guys who were searching the mountain and asked them to confirm with each other whether anyone had been there at noon.
It would take some time to confirm all the scattered groups over there, so we put aside our doubts and continued walking.
This time, everyone was much more cautious. The three Zhangs volunteered to walk in front to see which mandrill or fox spirit it was. The team leader and Brother Zhang surrounded me and the tour guide in the middle.
At the same time, we were surrounded by a group of people named Zhang. The tour guide and I were the only outsiders in the group and we were not allowed to lift our hands. The scene was quite delicate.
After walking for about ten more minutes, the end of the hillside was still nowhere in sight, and the road ahead suddenly stopped.
"Something."
The guy in the front said softly, walking to a haystack. "It smells like blood, but it's not right."
He gestured for us not to go forward, and used the handle of his engineer shovel to push aside the haystack. Amidst the faint fragrance of grass and trees, a strange pale color suddenly appeared.
It was a human head that was already in a state of advanced decay.
We were fine, but the tour guide suddenly turned around and started vomiting. Only bitter water was left, and his face looked extremely ugly.
Brother Zhang handed her a bottle of water, but she didn't want it. She just kept shaking her head in frustration.
The team leader went up to take a look and said seriously, I'm afraid our new guide can't be avoided, he must come up to recognize him.
Hearing this, the tour guide immediately realized something and shuddered. He gritted his teeth, looked up and froze in place.
“…This is a tourist in our group.”
Her voice became extremely strange. “But that day they all took your money and went back on the bus. I saw the bus leave with my own eyes.”
As she spoke, she suddenly raised her head and looked at us warily, then took a step back, stepped on the edge of the suspended mountain path, and her face flushed.
"If we were the ones who murdered him, why would we act mysterious in front of you?"
The team leader was still squatting and examining the head. He said to her firmly, "No, you have to come and identify it again. From my impression, this is indeed from your group, but... this head has been rotten for at least five or six days."
Five or six days? It was only two days since we woke up from the valley. The tour group arrived even later.
The tour guide then rinsed his mouth reluctantly and stepped forward again very stiffly, still very defensive.
I followed and found that the head was indeed very strange.
On the one hand, the face of the pale head almost melted like mud, and the eyes burst out;
On the other hand, it seemed as if something was supporting the details of his face, so that at a glance, many features could be found, allowing people to recognize his specific appearance at a glance.
The team leader also took out an engineering shovel, knocked on the head, opened a bottle of mineral water and poured it into the seven orifices of the head.
In less than a moment, after the rotten areas were washed away by water, we all discovered that the skin of this human head was actually very dry and tight, and it was probably a little smaller than its actual size.
Brother Zhang pointed at the lip gap of the head and said, "Look."
I instinctively felt something was wrong and asked the tour guide to turn his head away, but when I looked closely, my heart skipped a beat. A strand of black was faintly washed out of the mouth of the head by the water, which seemed to be hair.
"The smell is definitely wrong. There's almost no smell of blood or decay. Otherwise you should be vomiting in the corner now."
He said, taking the engineer shovel from the squad leader's hand, and tapping the man's head gently.
I don't know what kind of strength he used, but the head suddenly split into two halves like an overripe watermelon.
The sudden strong scent of grass and trees permeated my heart. The roots inside were twisted and completely hollowed out, and there was no sign of any marrow fluid or tissue that should be in the human body. It was like a potted plant that had been suddenly opened.
It was a miniature banyan tree that had grown extremely luxuriantly, but for some reason had died. The thin roots had turned completely black, pouring out of the head and blending into the hair, making it difficult to distinguish.
My mind buzzed.
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