Krafft's Anomaly Notes

Chapter 215 Echo
"So what are you looking for?" The heat of the lamp flame rose along the black smoke of inferior oil, and his palms were faintly stinging through the thick calluses. Kupp retracted his hands, and lifted it to shoulder height in a pinch position as far away from the flame as possible. , so that the flames can reach the steps under Kraft's feet ahead.

"Frankly, I don't know."

Kraft slowly walked down the spiral corridor. Small stone bricks formed the first half of it, and arches were used to prop up the small space in the soil. Tall people had to stand in the middle and pay attention to lower their heads so as not to bump into it.

Slight unavoidable seepage seeps from the cracks between the bricks and accumulates into droplets hanging on the top of the wet arc, dissolved with soil ash that makes it a yellowish color, like a slow-growing and pulsating egg sac under limited light.

This masonry load-bearing structure has a depth of [-] to [-] steps. It is so monotonous that there are no words or patterns to express the intention, only for practicality.

At the end of the descent, a large masonry engraved with the holy emblem was embedded in the wall, and was polished by water and repeated touches. After that, a relatively spacious square passage replaced the brick-arched passage.

It is not because of a sudden understanding of cement technology that it can directly bond stone bricks.Compared with "construction", perhaps it is more appropriate to describe it as "excavation". The passage has passed through the deep soil and continued to move forward in the rock formation.

The geometric rock wall retains straight cutting lines, walking vertically or horizontally, dimpled or protruding, step by step, showing its former identity, a quarry.

Going forward, the width of the passage becomes more and more considerable, allowing two people to walk side by side, and the two sides expand to the side, leaving a square chamber after hollowing out, which may have also been used for transit and stone processing.

The need to build a large number of buildings above ground drives people to continuously extract stone from the ground and expand the space in the rock formation.The stone here looks solid, and there is no need to think about the problem of collapse, and it is free to play.

Among the arranged cutting lines, there are still some shallow carved patterns in the corners, which seem to have been made by the masons in their spare time.

This subterranean space is mostly meaningless.The air and light problems that are difficult to circulate underground severely limit the imagination of the use of the quarry. After all, as long as a person with a normal brain is absolutely unwilling to stay here for more than a day; the damp environment is also destined to be unsuitable for storage. .

But it turns out that there is nothing completely useless in the world.

Some strange structures are displayed, which are stone niches parallel to the ground, which are rough and long strips, with messy and rounded corners, which are completely opposite to the straight traces formed by quarrying. They were directly chiseled in rough work, Only fine-grained waste rock will be produced.

They are embedded in the stone wall like a honeycomb, with several layers up and down, similar to the closet shelves for placing items, but wider and more, and the size is not the same as the sieve holes on the hardwood that have been decayed, extending from the reach of the lighting to the depth of the passage.

Kupp followed Kraft into the road between the "closet" and looked curiously at the long stone pits.They were less than an arm's length deep, and it was easy to see the accumulation of things in the light of the lampflame.

The shelf supported by yellow and decayed, dirty gray-white blocks is covered with some fragile and weathered textile residues like cobwebs. In the joint gap where the filler is lost.

The cranial shell without the support of the cervical spine rolled in the broken bone, opening the dark hole leading to the dark interior. The multi-legged long worm was disturbed by the sound and fire, and crawled out of the bone sinus of the dry spongy lesion with shaking limbs, and jumped into another piece of bone. dark.

Even though the concentration brought by the experience made his heart constrict for a moment before returning to normal, he subconsciously reached out and rubbed his facial features to expel the illusory itching.

"Bring the lamp over here." Kraft beckoned nonchalantly, straightened his mask, covered his mouth and nose tightly, and approached the bones in the stone niche, like an experienced tomb robber accidentally discovering some rare and rare funeral objects.

He pointed to a stretched spine, "Look at this, it should have been there before birth, and the position is also very typical."

After observing carefully for a while, Kupp realized that what Kraft was referring to was a section of spine, which had damage that did not look like weathering or collision. It seemed that something spread and gnawed on one side of the vertebrae, forming a defect that penetrated into the intervertebral space. .

"A case of bone tuberculosis in the spine is very typical. Most of the people buried here are patients with infectious diseases. There must be a lot of tuberculosis. This position and this shape are basically correct."

"But isn't tuberculosis in the lungs?" It's a bit beyond the usual cognition. As far as Cooper's limited knowledge is concerned, he came to see a doctor because of a cough.

"Mostly, but not necessarily, it can go wherever it wants, but most of the time it stays in the lungs." Kraft rubbed his hands excitedly and fumbled in his pockets, but he didn't bring the tools he needed in his casual clothes.

"Is this what you're looking for?"

"That's not true." Disappointedly pulling his hand out of his pocket, he restrained the desire to flip it over, "It's just that I haven't seen it, it's the first time I saw it today."

Then why is it so familiar?Kupp held back the question, not going to pursue the inconsistency in his words, "You didn't plan to take it back, did you?"

"It's really not what I'm looking for."

Considering that funding the Gravekeeper is suspicious enough, taking anything away just doesn't make sense.After some not-so-difficult decisions, Kraft chose to bid farewell to the tuberculosis victim for the time being, and continued his aimless search.

The light of fire and the sound of knocking came from a passing stone chamber, and it was the group of people walking in front, who were trying to widen a stone niche so that the corpses they had brought could be stuffed into it.

Seeing someone passing by, they nervously stopped their work, gripped the holy emblem pendant at the neckline, and muttered something in their mouths. They relaxed a little after distinguishing the new and bright clothes, but they still did not let go of the holy emblem.

The act of trying to say hello only got a reluctant response. It seems that meeting a stranger who has never seen before in this kind of place will inevitably have a sense of horror. Remind not to go too deep into the fork.

"Thank you, don't worry, I won't get lost." Kraft responded with a kind smile. These words didn't seem to have the desired effect, but effectively increased the tension.

When he wanted to understand where his speech was inappropriate, he had already walked a long way along the passage.

The niche expanded to occupy the entire cave wall, and the bones were no longer placed in the form of a separate tool, but became the building material itself.

Relics of the Great Plague.

The strong long bones of the limbs are stacked one by one like the firewood in the winter warehouse of the castle, and the neatly embedded skull is placed on the upper layer.It's not that the builders didn't want to stack them randomly, but that it was impossible to pack such a huge amount of bones without using the space as rationally as possible.

The content contained behind the bones, secular dignity, fear of death, religious belief, and humanistic feelings are all stripped away and dissipated, returning to its material essence, a thing that is not fundamentally different from everything else in the world.

Stack them on top of each other like masonry.After the initial shock, he entered a state of numbness or some kind of ethereal state.

Kraft, who was leading the way, turned around and pressed Kupp's shoulder without warning, and the latter would slow down and listen carefully.It was the echo of footsteps that did not belong to him, and it was particularly obvious to those who had experience paying attention to it.

(End of this chapter)