How to enter the Mengjiang Canyon? There are two routes according to Huang Ya's guidance. One is to enter from the entrance at the bottom of the canyon. However, this way requires passing through a large area of ​​virgin forest. The bottom of the canyon is not flat. We cannot enter in a straight line. It actually takes seven days to walk down.

Time is far from enough, and the virgin forest is full of dangers. We scholars are probably going to die if we enter. The other way is to take a boat and cross the 20 kilometers of waterway along the Mengjiang River, and then stop at a beach in the middle and go directly over the mountain.

It only takes two days, but the mountain we want to climb is called Peacock Mountain, which is more than 3,700 meters above sea level. Although there is a mountain town on one side, it has a sparse population of only about 500 households. The other side is the hinterland of the virgin forest, not to mention the road.

There is no place for you to put your feet comfortably.

After much hesitation and no third way was found, we finally decided to take the water route, which was more practical and difficult to climb over the mountain. Although it was difficult, it was also a temporary pain. If I were trapped in the primitive jungle to survive and not to die, I would rather sleep on the bed in the city and wait to die.

I finally made up my mind and found out that there are very few boats willing to go upstream this season and we didn’t have much money on us. We asked several boatmen but no one was willing to take us. Then we heard that there was someone in Sanmile Monument who was willing to go out on the boat. It was like hearing about the founding of New China.

The news jumped up and asked Huang Ya where the boss of the ship was.

Huang Ya didn't know the specific situation. He just said that they were not greedy for our money, but that he had something urgent to do and wanted to go upriver. He happened to hear about our affairs and thought that since he was going to take risks, he might as well bring a few more people and make some money. As for who he was.

He couldn't tell what the situation was, where they were going, or what kind of ship they were on.

We had no choice but to follow him directly to see the boat owner. The boat owner was nicknamed Lao Cai and he was very strong and looked honest. When we told him the situation, he nodded while listening.

The young master is very shrewd and feels that this matter is not easy. If other people are beaten to death without getting out of the ship, but you want to do so, you are not a liar, so he asked around.

The captain was tough at first, but then he gave the young master a bottle of soup and said everything. I almost died of joy.

What Huang Ya told us was just hearsay. It turned out that the captain was a good gambler. He owed a lot of gambling debts a few months ago and got sick and had no money to pay back. The time was almost up, so he thought of taking a risk.

Otherwise he wouldn't have taken the risk.

The young master asked him: "Why are you so afraid that this section is as powerful as you say? Maybe they colluded to raise the price."

The old man sighed and said, "You have never been there. I don't know. In their local language, when this was still the Yellow River, this section of the legend is called "Yellow Soup and Weak Water". It means that even a feather would sink if you throw it into it. The reason is that this section of the ancient Yellow River has water at the bottom.

There are many holes and I don’t know where they lead. When the season of flooding comes, the water will swirl inward. People of the older generation say that this water is the underworld water. The nine underworld springs in the underworld pour down from here, so they are missing.

There is a saying that one will not give up until the Yellow River reaches the Yellow River.

Of course, now that we are liberated, people don’t believe this, but it is absolutely true that there are holes under the river. A few years ago, when the Yellow River dried up, the Mengjiang River also dried up. Scientists came to inspect the sandy bottom and it was uneven.

It is a six to seven meter pit filled with solid sand. No one can tell clearly what kind of thing dug these holes and what is underneath and what their purpose is.

However, the nickname of "yellow soup and weak water" is not wrong at all. The boat is basically out of control at this stage. No matter how experienced you are, the master will have to listen to the water flow. If you are lucky, you will bump along the way.

If you were unlucky in the past, it would be hard to say.

What's even more dangerous is that many times when a boat went in, there were more than a dozen people coming out of the gorge. When it came, there was no one on the boat. I don't know what happened, but no bodies were found.

In recent years, the situation has begun to improve due to the popularity of motor boats, but the overall situation is still not optimistic. Especially when there is a flood, the water flow is so weird that you don't know where it is going and there is no way to control it.

The young master said: "If you say so, then we are not just going to feed the fish this time? Oh, that will be hard on you."

The old man smiled and said: "That's not to say that even if our iron boat can't get through, it won't be easy to sink. But when you get on the boat, please don't say anything about whether to feed the fish or not. Everyone, keep your mouths shut. Although I can't guarantee that I can take you.

But I can still guarantee your lives."

The boat owner finally told us that the last time he forcibly took this road was three years ago. It was a fluke, but it was strange that the bottom of the boat was full of holes for some reason, as if it had been bitten by something. This year, the amount of water this time was greater than before.

He is not sure. To be honest, we have to be mentally prepared. If we are really unlucky and the ship sinks, he will not be able to save us. Let's fill the Yellow River together and no one can take any chances because it is impossible for anyone to escape from the Yellow River in this season.

.

Also, you have to give enough money and not even a penny less.

I said to the boat owner: "You don't have to worry about money. We have urgent matters just like you. If things really can't be done, money means nothing to us and everyone gets what they need. Don't be afraid of us talking nonsense. Look at this young master, his last name is

Li's and Dragon Prince are relatives, so don't worry, I'm sure everything will be fine."

The two of us agreed on the price and we took the time to move the equipment onto the boat. In addition, I asked Huang Ya if he could get me some weapons. After all, this time we were entering a primitive jungle. We had to have something to defend ourselves. Huang Ya asked his daughter to escape from him.

I rummaged through the house and found an old crossbow and handed it to me. I said the gun was gone. It had been melted by Dalian Iron and Steel a long time ago. You need something for self-defense. Now this is all you have. Seeing that you bought so many things from me, I'm just a one.

Tiantou will sell it to you. Before liberation, people here used this for hunting. It is much easier than the current air rifle.

I took it and took a look at it. The pine wood crossbow butt is really good. I can see that it is made by experts. It has a heavy leather mouth and is easy to sharpen. The arrows are made of bamboo. To hold the crossbow, all you need to do is place the bamboo arrow on the arrow butt.

Use both hands to pull the string in the opposite direction of the arrow until it hooks the target. Then pull the trigger and the bamboo arrow will fly towards the target. Compared with a gun, this thing has almost no sound and its recoil is very conducive to sneak attacks.

I tried firing a bamboo arrow, and in a blink of an eye, it shot more than a hundred meters and landed in the Yellow River. The vibration produced by the crossbow was very strong. It seems that shooting an arrow is not that fun. The only drawback is that the ammunition is too heavy.

Forty bamboo arrows are heavier than a hundred bullets and may be a burden when climbing mountains.

Thinking about the dangers in the primitive jungle that Huangya told me, it would be better to keep this crossbow. I threw this thing to the young master. He is stronger than me, so the responsibility of protecting everyone belongs to him.

I thanked Huang Ya and the three of us got on Lao Cai's iron boat. Not long after the boat started sailing, we were still in the slow flow area for the first few hours. We walked from Maoerling to here with almost no rest or food. It was time to eat something.

Chocolate, a little wine, to replenish our strength and temperature. The young master and I were both militia reservists when we came here to prepare for war. We all received the same training as the regular army, so running around like this is nothing. What surprised me was that the little girl Wang Ruonan was also in high spirits. She seemed a little bit energetic.

I didn't feel tired either.

Regardless of whether we are tired or not, we will definitely have less and less time to rest in the future. After we have eaten, we will take the time to sleep. However, we did not sleep much before we were woken up by the old man's cry.

When I walked on the deck, I saw that I had gone down the Shazhen Gorge with the river and reached the towering cliffs on both sides, which seemed to have been shaved off. There were almost no visible slopes on the cliffs. There were unknown trees growing horizontally in many places on the cliffs. The tops of the cliffs were even more leafy.

I originally thought that only pine trees could grow so long, but it turns out that plants can do it.

Below the cliff is the rolling Mengjiang Ancient Yellow River. The entire Shazhen Gorge is like a pot of boiling mud soup with mud waves rolling over the water. You can feel the chaos of the water flow with the naked eye.

The old man was already concentrating on steering the ship and slowly sailed into the mouth of the canyon. For a while, we couldn't feel the terrifying undercurrent, but our nerves were stretched to the limit. All the cliffs in the mouth of the canyon showed an expanding trend. Obviously, this canyon

The water between the mouth is wider than the ends, forming an olive shape and we are heading towards the center of the cocoon.

There are some poles on the boat, which are one of the necessary things for boating in the river. The young master and I both picked up one and inserted it into the Yellow River to help the old man in times of danger.

As soon as the bamboo pole was put into the water, we all immediately realized that this section was too deep and the six or seven meter long bamboo pole could not touch the bottom.

Moreover, when the bamboo pole is inserted into the water, it is obvious that there are turbulent currents in different directions under the calm river surface. If you fall here, there will be no chance of even a floating corpse.

The young master asked me: "Old Xu, this place is really not good. The fierce river will cause chaos when it reaches here. Why don't you let me speed up the power and we can rush over in one go?"

I told the young master not to express any random opinions. It seems that there is not much of a straight line distance from the mouth of the gorge. But anyone who has been on a boat knows that the actual distance is several times higher than the boat. If you rush over, the only result will be to be sucked in by the current.

From being squeezed on a cliff to one side, at worst...

The young master did not believe too much in the local legends and said with a smile: "That's not to say that although it is dangerous here, it is not dangerous to the extent that the boatmen said. It may be an exaggeration of history -"

Before he could finish his sentence, suddenly the ship's hull shook violently. We were all shaken and staggered, and we hugged the iron bar on one side to keep from falling.

I shouted to the old man: "What's going on?"

The old man in the cab obviously didn't know what happened. He stuck his head out and looked at the water of the Mengjiang River and said, "It seems that I hit something."

As soon as I finished speaking, there was another vibration and the ship tilted to one side. I quickly used my feet to support the sliding luggage and then looked to see where the vibration came from on the side of the ship to see if there were any reefs.

In the churning muddy water, there was a huge snake-like black shadow twisting and wandering under our boat. The width of the shadow was almost the same as our boat. Judging from the twisting movements, it was obvious that this must be a living creature, but it was definitely not a fish.

.

The young master's face suddenly turned pale and his words were stuck in his throat and he refused to speak.

The turbid river water connected here is very rich in biological species. Fishermen fishing in the Yellow River often find strange fish in their nets that they have never seen before, but it is so strange to be so big. Judging from the blurry shadow on the water, this fish

The thing was about seven meters long and more than one meter wide. It swam very fast and was obviously very interested in our boat and kept wandering around us.

The young master turned to me and asked: "What kind of monster is that, Lao Xu? Why is it so big!"

I looked at the turbid muddy water and didn't know how to reply. He quickly turned around to look at Lao Cai, only to see him kneeling in the cab and kowtowing constantly. The steering wheel was spinning around.

The young master was so frightened that he shouted: "Old man! What are you doing! You are about to hit the cliff!"

Lao Cai shouted: "That's the Yellow River Dragon! The two bosses are the Yellow River Dragon! Kneel down quickly or we will be dead!"

The young master yelled: "What a fool you are! How can there be a dragon in this world?" As he said this, he wanted to rush over and grab the steering wheel.

I watched the young master suddenly move quickly when he called something in the water and quickly made a gesture to tell him not to call. Then he gave Wang Ruonan a look and asked them to squat down and said softly to Lao Cai: "Turn off the motor!"

Lao Cai nodded in panic and turned the motor on and off. The sound of the motor suddenly stopped, and the only sound left in the entire space was the sound of the rushing water.

I held my breath and lay on the side of the boat to see how this black shadow reflected the rapid movement of underwater things. It must be a carnivore so big. If it pushes against the side of our boat, we will definitely have to go into the water to fill the yellow soup. The water on the ancient Yellow River road seems to be turbid.

Fish must rely more on hearing. I hope this thing will swim away on its own after we turn off the motor.

However, it is obvious that the sound of the iron boat here is still very loud without a motor. The black shadow still passes under our boat again and again. Every time, there is a slight scratching sound below. It seems that the dorsal fin of that thing scratches the bottom of the boat, making us uncomfortable.

Standing in the cold.

We had no power, so we started to spin along with the current. Soon the bow and stern of the boat changed direction and started to hit the cliff on one side.

Lao Cai and I picked up the pole and pushed it against the cliff in an attempt to stop the boat, but without using the current and the inertia of the boat, I couldn't even hold the pole. In the blink of an eye, there was a loud "bang" and we looked at the stern of the boat.

It hit the cliff hard, and the hull made a heart-wrenching groan. We were all knocked down on the deck and there was a series of sounds of smashing things in the upper cabin.

I already knew something was wrong. When I stood up and turned around, I saw that the shadow in the water had disappeared.

That's something very bad, maybe it's sinking underwater and trying to attack us. Just when I wanted to warn others, suddenly the hull suddenly shook with a loud noise, and the hull was almost knocked out of the water. As soon as we stood up, we all fell again.

Staggering this way and that.

In the panic, a long dorsal fin pressed against the side of the boat and it shot out of the water like lightning, then dived down and disappeared again.

Lao Cai got up and ran to the bottom of the boat to check the damage. Fortunately, the bottom of the iron boat was bulged due to the collision, but there was no leakage. If it was hit a few more times, I really didn't know what to do.

The young master picked up the old crossbow and strung up the bow. One hand held the side of the boat and the other went to aim into the water. I told him that it was useless like this. Although the old crossbow was quite powerful, compared with the size of the thing underwater, the arrow was just like inserting a toothpick into it.

tiger.

Before I finished speaking, there was another violent shock. My head hit a bag of luggage and a cut was made. Blood started flowing out. Wang Ruonan was so frightened that he screamed and told me not to move.
To be continued...