Fatty went to Qiu Dekao"s camp again and came back with two rifles. I didn"t think about it as he led the way and we all set off immediately.
It took much longer to go over the mountain than to go down through the ground. Fortunately, Fatty walked through it before and knew a lot about it. He led the team all the way and hardly spoke. I didn"t even have a chance to tell him my true ident.i.ty.
I had never seen such a Fatty before, and I felt even more uneasy. The way he traveled seemed to indicate that he was very anxious, but when he and I discussed the whole process beforehand, he didn"t appear to be. Did he really have something to hide from me?
I didn"t dare ask, but I had to keep going. Over the ridge that was across from the lake was a place I had never been to before, and Fatty took us down saying there was a shortcut. We climbed down and went into the valley where Fatty jumped into the gra.s.s and disappeared.
I didn"t expect the gra.s.s to be so thick and thought it was impossible. I jumped like Fatty and pa.s.sed right through, tumbling straight down—there was a tunnel underneath.
“Little Brother found it, it"s awesome. On top of the valley, this ancient road had been built using a huge wooden frame. It was too old and ended up covered with gra.s.s. It would have been easier to walk on the top originally, but the gra.s.s is too thick now. The gra.s.s below, however, didn"t get much sunlight and didn"t grow as much, so it"s easier to walk and relatively flat. The end is near the entrance.”
The sun shone through some gaps above, but it was not dark inside and we could see that the ground was full of large and small rubble. It wasn"t the best way to go, but it was better than hanging on a cliff.
"After walking more than ten miles from here, I made a mark and went up the mountain. It wasn"t far from the big tree at the entrance.” Fatty said, “It"s very humid further on so we might as well rest here. After that, we won"t stop until we get to the entrance.”
Everyone sat down one after another. Fatty winked at me and said, “Master Three, may I have a word?”
Fatty and I went further in and came to a place where a big stone lay. The two of us turned around and he squatted down.
I didn"t know what he was going to do, so I squatted down with him. He pinched my face at once and tugged so much that it almost made me burst into tears
“What are you doing?” I scolded.
“Mr. Naive, your original face is pretty, why do you need to be the same as your Uncle Three.” Fatty whispered.
I was surprised: “How can you tell?”
“That"s just like you. If others can"t see it, I can"t see it either?” Fatty said, “Do you think I was really fooled when you talked to me? My heart is like lightning, and I already knew what was going on.”
“Then you should have said so earlier, I couldn"t find a chance to talk to you.” I said, and then began explaining Xiao Hua"s plan to him.
“s.h.i.t, if you didn"t tell me, I wouldn"t know what your plan was. Of course I"ll cooperate with you. And don"t you know that your doctor is interested in your Uncle Three? When taking care of me, she treated me like a tree stump. When she had nothing to do, she would talk to me while I was half asleep, which was very annoying." Fatty looked over there. “Do you know what she said? It"s too sickening. I"m considered the world leader of sourness, but her love for your Uncle Three has made even my teeth ache. If I wasn"t too tired to sleep, I would have strangled her first. She said she thinks you"ve changed. I don"t know what your situation is, but I have to take care of this first.”
I relaxed a little and was just about to talk, when he motioned me not to, saying: “It"s useless to say more, you know I know who you are. If I ask you one thing, you have to answer me.”
“What?”
“Can you trust that Master Hua?”
I wondered why he asked that but still nodded: “He helped me a lot, I think he can be trusted.”
“Have you checked him out? Is he really your childhood friend?”
“I"m sure of that. What"s the matter?”
“Have you seen the old photos of The Mystic Nine?”
I shook my head. I really didn"t know about it so I said, “Just tell me, what"s wrong?”
Fatty paused before saying, “It"s fine. Maybe I"m just being paranoid. I just don"t think he"s very reliable in giving you this idea.”
I didn"t think Fatty was lying, so I said, “But there was really nothing I could do at that time. Otherwise, I couldn"t have come to save you.”
“There were some difficulties, but it may not have necessarily been as difficult as he said.” Fatty said, waving his hand immediately, “But I still want to thank him. This matter… forget I asked about it. We don"t have too much time to think so let"s get things straightened out first.”
Remembering my own worries, I asked, “About Poker-Face, you didn"t lie to me, did you? I keep feeling like you"re not telling the truth.”
Fatty patted me and said, “I could have hurt you long ago, so why wait till today?”
That"s true, but Fatty has lied to me more than once or twice. I said, “Just because you didn"t hurt me doesn"t mean you won"t lie.”
“Mr. Naive, you don"t understand.” Fatty pointed behind him. “You trust everyone, and you pour your heart out when you see them. I"m not like you. I don"t trust anyone behind us.”
“What does this have to do with trust?”
“It matters a lot.” Fatty said, “I saw much more in that mirror than I told you, but I can"t tell you now. You have to find a chance to spend some time alone with me. “
I looked behind me and found that both Leather Bag and Mute Sister were looking over at us, as if curious.
“See?” Fatty said, “The people here don"t trust anyone, and watch each other.”
I was uncomfortable with Fatty"s remarks, and he continued, “I didn"t want to expose you, but we"re going this way instead of climbing through the cracks. I must remind you that you shouldn"t be surprised at anything that happens from the moment you enter this mountain.”
“Will anything strange happen?”
“Anything can happen here.” Fatty said primly, “The evil spirit of the Zhang Jia ancient building affects many things, and it"s not surprising that anything can happen.”
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