novelraw Chapter 311 - 307: Fox Tail Mountain [2]
Chapter 311 - 307: Fox Tail Mountain [2]
"Nothing much. Just here for some sightseeing, to clear my head."
Hu Qi said with a slight smile.
The driver heard this and didn’t think much of it.
He’d driven so many people, and there were plenty of young men like Hu Qi traveling alone to unwind.
Just then, Hu Qi’s tone shifted, and he asked with a hint of curiosity, "You’re pretty familiar with Shidun County, aren’t you?"
"Of course."
The driver chuckled, a hint of pride in his voice.
"I’ve been a taxi driver for over a decade. I could navigate the areas around Hanyang City with my eyes closed.
And as for Shidun County, I know it like the back of my hand. I lived there with my grandma for five or six years. It’s just... the old lady passed away recently, so I don’t go back as often..."
As he spoke, a touch of sadness unconsciously tinged his words.
Hearing this, a flicker of light flashed in Hu Qi’s eyes, and he immediately asked.
"In that case, do you know about Fox Tail Mountain?"
The middle-aged driver was taken aback by the question and didn’t respond right away.
Instead, he studied Hu Qi in the back seat through the rearview mirror, a strange look crossing his rugged face.
After a moment of thought, his expression turned serious.
He spoke up. "Young man, don’t tell me you’re thinking of climbing Fox Tail Mountain?
You’re about the same age as my own kid, so let me give you a piece of advice. The scenery there might look nice, but it’s really not a place for sightseeing.
Besides, there’s a wire fence set up at the foot of the mountain, strictly forbidding outsiders from entering."
Hu Qi, sitting in the back, remained expressionless.
’His very purpose for coming here was Fox Tail Mountain.’
Previously, in the Security Bureau’s archives, Hu Qi had stumbled upon some records concerning Nightmare events.
Nightmare events were bizarre and varied.
Some only appeared in a fixed area.
Others possessed powerful mobility, able to change locations at any time.
However, they all shared one common trait: once they killed everyone within the Nightmare event,
the Nightmare would temporarily disappear, only possibly reappearing after a certain period of time.
However, there were always exceptions.
Among them was an extremely special type of Nightmare event.
After appearing, it would remain entrenched in a certain area.
It wouldn’t move, and even after killing everyone within its range, it still wouldn’t dissipate, almost like some kind of special natural phenomenon.
During certain times, or under specific conditions, anyone who got close would be pulled inside.
These types of Nightmare events were extremely difficult to handle.
Combined with their immobility, Sword Holders generally wouldn’t choose to brute-force a confrontation.
Instead, they would opt to seal them off,
strictly forbidding anyone from approaching.
There were over a dozen such places in the Yu Country.
And one of them existed on Fox Tail Mountain.
’That’s why Hu Qi had decided to come and take a look.’
As for why he chose this place, it was because according to the Security Bureau’s records,
the One who had once sealed all the world’s Nightmare events for eighty years had been here before.
He was very interested in this person, and it was possible that clues about them might have been left behind here.
Hu Qi didn’t really care whether this was true or not.
’Anyway, he had time to kill. He could come take a look, and even if there were no traces of that person, at the very least, he could resolve this Nightmare event and obtain a Dream Eye.’
Seeing now that the driver seemed to know something about the situation,
Hu Qi was naturally happy to chat with him.
’He might even be able to get some useful information out of it.’
Thinking of this, Hu Qi said casually,
"I’m not going there. I just happened to hear about the place online and got curious. Is there something wrong with the mountain? Why won’t they let people in?"
Hearing this, the driver’s expression visibly relaxed.
He let out a long sigh of relief and said,
"That’s good. Don’t go near that place. Let me tell you..."
Just then, something unexpected happened.
A red SUV suddenly swerved over from behind them, changing lanes without any warning.
The maneuver was fast, abrupt, and completely unforeseen.
Fortunately, the driver was an old hand with plenty of experience. Faced with this sudden emergency,
he reacted instantly, whipping the steering wheel, and the car scraped by, narrowly avoiding a collision.
"Do you even look where you’re going?! Driving like that, are you in a rush to get reincarnated?"
The middle-aged driver flew into a rage, immediately rolling down his window, sticking his head out, and yelling at the top of his lungs.
The window of the SUV ahead also slowly rolled down, only for several hands to stick out, middle fingers raised.
Then, the sound of men and women laughing mockingly came from the car, and the driver floored the gas pedal.
It shot off in an instant, leaving only the deafening roar of its engine behind.
"Hmph! If I were younger, I’d have taught those classless punks a lesson!"
The driver muttered a few more curses, but he quickly took a deep breath and forced himself to calm down.
After all, he had a family to support now, both old and young. He couldn’t be as impulsive as he was in his youth.
At this thought, the driver turned his head to look at Hu Qi in the back seat.
He said apologetically, "Sorry about that, young man. Didn’t mean to startle you."
"It’s fine."
Hu Qi waved his hand, then steered the conversation back on topic.
"So, can you tell me more about Fox Tail Mountain?"
"Sure, if you want to hear it, I’ll tell you. But this is all stuff I heard from the older generation, so just take it as a story. We still have to believe in science, you know."
The driver first offered this disclaimer, establishing himself as a staunch materialist, before he began his tale.
"This story about Fox Tail Mountain, I heard it from my great-grandfather when I was a kid. It was a winter more than eighty years ago. The Yu Country was mired in war back then, but luckily, Shidun County’s unique geography spared it from the worst of the fighting.
Back then, Dunshi County wasn’t called that; it was called Black Stone Village.
Later on, due to development, it was relocated and merged with several surrounding villages to become Shidun County.
Normally, it’s like spring here all year round, but that year was an exception. The temperature dropped unusually low.
Because of the severe cold, food became essential.
My great-grandfather and a few of the village’s strong Young Men decided to go into the mountains to hunt.
Back then, there was no such thing as wildlife conservation.
Naturally, no one refused the proposal. They were all hoping to hunt more game to help the villagers survive that rare and difficult winter.
Who could have known that this trip would be like stepping into an abyss of no return."
"After they entered the mountains, things went smoothly at first. It wasn’t long before they’d caught several animals, including plump wild rabbits and roe deer with sharp antlers.
Everyone’s face was beaming with the joy of the harvest, as if they could already see the villagers living comfortably for a while on their catch."
"But who would have guessed that the heavens had other plans? Just as they were preparing to descend the mountain, a blizzard came roaring in without warning.
Huge, thick snowflakes fell like a vast white curtain, blanketing the sky and the earth.
In the blink of an eye, the path down the mountain was completely buried under a thick layer of snow.
Staring at the endless white, the group had no choice but to find a cave, planning to make do on the mountain for one night.
The sky gradually darkened. The wind howled savagely outside the cave, its sound like the roar of an Evil Ghost.
It was as if it wanted to tear the entire mountain apart.
The men huddled together in the cave, warming themselves by a small, weak bonfire.
Their hearts were pounding with anxiety, and everyone felt a vague sense of unease.
’If this keeps up,’ they thought, ’it’s a question of whether we can even get down the mountain tomorrow.’
Just then, one of the men seemed to spot something and pointed into the distance.
Following his finger, they saw several points of light glowing in the distant woods. In the dim night, the light was exceptionally bright.
Seeing this, the men looked at each other. They were both curious and afraid. After hesitating for a long time, their curiosity finally won out.
They thought it might be other Hunters who were also trapped, so they decided to go take a look together. It would be good to have each other for support.
And so, the group trudged toward the light, stumbling through the deep snow.
The closer they got, the more the chill seeped into their bones, as if the very air around them was frozen solid.
With every breath, they could feel ice shards scraping their lungs, making them shiver uncontrollably from the cold.
When they finally made it closer,
they discovered that the source of the light was a small village.
In the village, a few houses glowed with dim yellow light, and smoke curled lazily from the chimneys.
Although they had never heard of a village on Fox Tail Mountain before, they didn’t think much of it.
In those chaotic times, they just assumed it was probably people who had fled into the mountains to escape the war.
Such things weren’t uncommon.
Their arrival seemed to have alerted the villagers. After a short while, a few figures emerged from the houses.
These people wore strange, old-fashioned coarse-cloth clothes, and their faces looked exceptionally pale in the reflection of the snow.
After hearing about the predicament of my great-grandfather’s group,
they warmly invited them into the village to stay for the night.
My great-grandfather and his companions were filled with gratitude at the time. Thinking they had met kind-hearted people, they followed them into the village without hesitation.
But once inside, they discovered the village was unnaturally quiet. Apart from the few people who had come to greet them,
they couldn’t see another soul, nor could they hear the slightest sound of chickens crowing or dogs barking, which were common in any village.
But at that moment, everyone was so overwhelmed by the rare warmth and the chance to rest that they didn’t pay it much mind.
The group was split up and assigned to several houses. My great-grandfather was put in a room with two of his companions.
The night grew deeper. My great-grandfather had trouble sleeping in strange beds.
After tossing and turning for a long time, he finally started to feel drowsy. In his half-asleep state,
he heard a rustling sound.
The sound was like someone chewing on something. In the dead of night, it was exceptionally clear, and exceptionally creepy.