novelraw Chapter 6 : Chapter 6
Chapter 6 : Chapter 6
Chapter 6: Falling into the Microcosm
The Tao Ancestor Tai Chi Fish originally had a missing fish eye, leaving a soybean-sized hole.
But when I pulled it from my collar again, the hole was gone, and both fish eyes were present.
One fish eye emitted a green glow, the other a red radiance, both dazzling and brilliant, like condensed stars from the heavens.
“Splash!”
“Splash!”
The green glow and red radiance wove together like gossamer light.
From a distance, one would see the two colored lights forming a Tai Chi disk, tens of kilometers in diameter, slowly rotating across the boundless ice plain.
“It really is the missing fish eye of the Tao Ancestor Tai Chi Fish. It’s true, it’s true…”
Zhao Meng had suspected as much, but witnessing the miracle before his eyes, his heart trembled with awe and reverence, and he knelt to pay homage.
I tilted my head to observe the green and red lights, my pupils reflecting their colors, and said in disbelief, “In these two lights, there seem to be profound Taoist texts and Buddhist sutras flying. Senior Brother, do you see them?”
Zhao Meng didn’t see any Taoist texts or sutras. Instead, he was shocked to find the ice around us cracking and sinking, pulling us rapidly toward the thousands-of-meters-deep Arctic Ocean.
Earlier, the Nine Infants had shattered the ice cover here.
As it fled, the ice collapsed.
Seawater engulfed us in an instant, dragging us toward the cold, suffocating abyss of the ocean floor.
In the distance, the deformed and shattered research vessel also sank slowly underwater.
“Crash!”
Though submerged, I was astonished to find the surrounding waters filled with green and red light, as bright as an eternal divine lamp. Even stranger, I heard the sound of sailcloth flapping in the wind and the low creak of a swaying mast.
Suddenly.
A surging, overwhelming invisible force field enveloped me.
It wildly pulled at everything around—Zhao Meng, the bear-like creature, the seawater, the ice, and the sinking research vessel in the distance, all swept up by the force.
“Splash—”
My body, from arms to torso, shrank rapidly in circles…
It felt like falling from a great height, like weightlessness.
But it was a hundred times worse than weightlessness.
The Tao Ancestor Tai Chi Fish around my neck floated slowly to eye level, mysterious and unfathomable.
Submerged in the icy seawater, I entered a serene yet bizarre state, my vision far sharper than usual.
I clearly saw the newly acquired pale red fish eye on the Tao Ancestor Tai Chi Fish, etched with patterns like mountains and rivers, as if a planet were before me. I had only seen such a sight in high school, observing the moon through a telescope.
Even more astonishing.
A rice-grain-sized bronze ship sailed out from the pale red planet, shrouded in celestial glow and ghostly mist, setting sail.
“Splash!”
My body shrank again, hit by weightlessness and dizziness.
When my vision returned.
The bronze ship, once rice-grain-sized, was now palm-sized, right before me.
“Splash!”
Weightlessness and dizziness struck again.
The bronze ship grew to the size of a fishing boat. Its eerie features—sailcloth masts, phoenix corpses, python skeletons, and a sea of tombstone forests—appeared like finely crafted art, imprinted in my mind.
Where did the bronze ship come from?
Why was it growing larger?
No…
It wasn’t the ship growing—it was me shrinking, circle by circle.
I no longer knew how to describe my emotions, unable to distinguish reality from illusion, science from myth. Was this… a hallucination born from drowning in the ocean, on the brink of death?
Satellites above the Arctic Ocean recorded a phenomenon shocking enough to stun the world.
Centered on the Dragon Pole research vessel, seawater and ice within a dozens-of-kilometers radius were pulled and devoured by a strange force, vanishing into nothing.
The shattered research vessel and the Nine Infants, which had fled over ten kilometers away, were also dragged in.
They didn’t truly disappear.
Under the influence of the bronze ship’s force field, they fell into the microcosm.
…
The numbing cold and suffocation of the seawater seemed to last days, yet also just an instant. With a “thud,” I crashed heavily onto an unknown surface.
The relentless weightlessness, dizziness, excessive blood loss, and this heavy fall overwhelmed me, even with my superhuman endurance. My vision darkened, my head spinning.
Fortunately, the air provided a noticeable buffer during the fall.
And the ground wasn’t hard.
“Such soft soil—what is this place?”
I had fallen face-up, creating a nearly foot-deep human-shaped pit. Pain racked my body—my back, head, and the left arm torn by the bear-like creature—leaving me too weak to move, even my eyelids heavy.
“Wrong… I’m still alive.”
When this realization hit, my eyes snapped open. The sky here was low, filled with dense, ghostly clouds, filling me with disbelief.
How had I survived falling into the Arctic Ocean?
I remembered having hallucinations as I neared death—green and red lights, the fish eye of the Tao Ancestor Tai Chi Fish turning into a planet, and a sailing bronze ship…
As the thought struck, I saw the Dragon Pole research vessel plummet from the dark, ghostly clouds above, its massive hull tumbling, shedding fragments and human figures amid screams and wails.
Its descent slowed, the celestial glow and ghostly mist around the bronze ship counteracting its gravity.
“Rumble!”
The research vessel crashed nearby, the sound of twisting metal echoing.
The bronze ship trembled, the shock resonating in my heart.
My scalp tingled, my mind filled with absurdity and tension. I tried to prop myself up but failed.
A high-pitched infant cry pierced the heavens, sharp and jarring.
From the thick clouds above, the Nine Infants’ over-two-hundred-meter-long body fell, covered in scales, its ox-like torso and nine wailing heads in full view.
Chillingly, I was directly beneath its falling path.
Even with some mysterious force buffering, a direct hit would crush me to dust.
As the Nine Infants saw the bronze ship below, its fearful expression turned to joy, its cries shifting to laughter, as if it had awaited this moment for countless years.
“Splash!”
A golden claw, larger than the Nine Infants’ body, burst through the thick clouds, seizing it.
The claw, like forged gold, gleamed with metallic strength and sharpness, effortlessly piercing the Nine Infants’ body.
Behind the clouds loomed a terrifyingly massive shadow, exuding an aura that could swallow the heavens. But upon seeing the bronze ship, it retreated warily, vanishing into the endless dark chaos.
“What… what is this place? Am I really still alive?”
In shock and confusion, I gradually lost consciousness.
Blood from my arm’s wound seeped, mixing with the gray-white grave soil.
Defying reason, the blood flowed along the soil, accelerating into the grave.
“Weiyi! Weiyi…”
Zhao Meng shouted urgently in the misty tombstone forest, running and searching. He finally found me atop a grave mound, pulling me from the human-shaped pit.
The pit held no trace of blood, only my face, pale as paper.
After Zhao Meng carried me away.
On the tombstone before the grave, a string of bone wind chimes swayed in the breeze, emitting clear, pleasant sounds, adding an eerie charm to the silent, terrifying night.
…
I felt as if I’d dreamt for years, my weary consciousness like threads slowly returning.
The sound of waves filled my ears, a breeze brushing my face.
I slowly opened my eyes.
My vision, blurry at first, gradually cleared.
“You’re finally awake! I thought you wouldn’t make it!”
Qi Shanshan smiled faintly, her voice tinged with surprise, before heading toward the door.
Though I only caught a glimpse of her graceful white-clad figure, I knew it was Dr. Qi, who had joined the expedition.
“He’s awake, but still very weak…”
Dr. Qi’s voice came from outside, speaking to someone, though I couldn’t hear clearly.
I surveyed my surroundings. The bed beneath me was likely salvaged from the research vessel. The room was built from the ship’s fragments, like a spacious tin shack, with discarded scraps still scattered on the floor.
A blood bag hung from a wooden pole.
A needle in my right arm was transfusing blood.
Inside the tin shack, six others lay—some with broken legs, some half-paralyzed, some unconscious.
Through the makeshift door, I could see the bronze ship’s hull a few meters away. The hull’s thick copper rust carried an ancient charm and a sense of abandonment spanning centuries.
I could hear the rhythmic sound of waves and feel the slight vibrations of them hitting the hull.
The breeze came over the bronze hull, blowing through the door.
“Everything I experienced wasn’t a hallucination—it was all real?” I murmured.
“Of course it’s real. We’ve likely fallen into a completely unknown oceanic world, um… probably in the microcosm,” Cai Yutong’s cold voice preceded her arrival.
She and Dr. Qi, dressed in a white physician’s coat, entered together, both women tall and striking.
My heart skipped a beat: “The microcosm? What does that mean?”
“I don’t fully understand either—it’s what the leaders are saying. Something about the Buddha’s relic, microscopes, and the bronze ship. They seem to have known some details beforehand.”
Cai Yutong maintained her icy demeanor, touching my forehead and nodding with satisfaction: “Your fever’s gone. Good thing I donated blood for three days to keep you alive.”
Dr. Qi teased with a chuckle, “Oh, already taking credit? I knew you had ulterior motives when you donated blood.”
Qi Shanshan and Cai Yutong had been dormmates in undergrad, both standout prodigies in the chemistry department. Their relationship was close, like best friends.
But it wasn’t without rivalry—they’d always been subtly competitive.
Later, one pursued a medical graduate degree, the other dove deeper into chemistry, ending the competition and strengthening their bond.
For this Arctic expedition, Qi Shanshan learned of it from Cai Yutong and “ordered” her, as a best friend, to recommend her to the leaders.
She was pragmatic, skilled at seizing opportunities for advancement.