Mountain and Sea Treasures

Chapter 8 The Death of Shorty
"Chang'an, what are you doing? Aren't you keeping watch until midnight?"

Company Commander Chen got out of the tent, probably just preparing for convenience.

I shook my head and said I was just coming out to take a look, then turned and went back to the tent.

Milkman was still huddled in the sleeping bag, his body trembled when he heard the movement, and he was relieved when he saw that it was me.I said helplessly that it was just the sound of the wind. We happened to be leaning against the short slope, so it was normal to have the sound of the wind.

He didn't speak, just grabbed my sleeve and asked me to accompany him.Seeing him like this, I couldn't sleep alone, so I sat with him like this all night, and only closed my eyes for a while when the sound faded away at dawn.

During breakfast, Naiwa and I were laughed at by several other people for having panda eyes, but Naiwa said seriously that we would definitely die.

The others ignored him, but Lao Yan snorted and asked him if he had something to say?
Seeing that someone paid attention to him, Naiwa leaned over as if seeing a life-saving Bodhisattva, and said with a panicked expression: "This is the legend of Lop Nur..."

It turns out that Naiwa, who lived in Bayingoleng since she was a child, has heard many rumors about Lop Nur, and ghost picker is one of them.

It is said that if you spend the night in Lop Nur at night, if you hear dense weeping, it means that you have been targeted by ghosts. Every night, ghosts will take away a person until they all die...

"What to do, we will die." Naiwa stared at Lao Yan with a pale face.

Lao Yan took out a cigarette and lit it, and after poking it twice, he said: "The night watchmen should be more vigilant, and if there is anything wrong, call someone immediately."

At first, everyone seemed to be in disbelief, but now that Lao Yan ordered him to do so solemnly, their hearts suddenly felt a little heavy.

"Okay, close the tent, it's time to do something." Old Yan dusted off the soot and stood up first.

When walking in the desert, if the tent is not put away, you must close it carefully, and when you come back, you have to tap the inside and the sides with a stick, otherwise, if a snake or scorpion climbs into it, you will die.

Naturally, we didn't dare to be negligent, and carefully pressed down the tent without leaving any gaps, and then we put on our backpacks and followed Lao Yan.

Lao Yan took a look at the map and directed us to search for signs of human activity nearby.

This is a slow job. I was in a group with the poisonous snake, and the others were also divided into groups, looking for it from different directions.

The scope of Lao Yanhua is centered on the tent, with a radius of about one kilometer. Our group is in charge of the west, but we haven’t seen anything in the morning, let alone traces of human activities, not even a snake.

"It's not right." I expressed my doubts during the noon break: "This no-man's land is dominated by those poisons in the desert. Why do you stay dead for half a day?"

The poisonous snake also frowned, grabbed a handful of sand and rubbed it in his hands for a while, his frown deepened.

I asked him what was the matter, and he said with uncertainty that either there was really nothing in this area, or there was something big.

"You mean this place has been zoned out?" I also grabbed a handful of sand, but I couldn't see why.

The poisonous snake hummed and then said nothing.

There are a lot of things like land marking in nature. Lions, tigers and other ferocious beasts have their own territory. They will urinate and spread odors in their own territory. Once other species approach, they will be regarded as provocations!

But this kind of situation is rare in the desert, especially in no-man's land. There are a lot of poisons in the desert, snakes and scorpions are the most common, and they generally have nests, so there is no such thing as dividing the territory.

Such a large piece of territory has been demarcated, what is it?

I still want to think about it for a while, the poisonous snake has already packed up and walked forward, so I had to keep up, but I still found nothing all afternoon, and we had no choice but to return to the camp now that the time was almost up.

Everyone was there when we arrived, and seeing their downcast looks, we knew that they, like us, hadn't found anything.

"What are you doing with all the mournful faces?" Lianchang Chen kicked the short man next to him first, but the short man muttered a few times but didn't dare to resist.

Lao Yan smiled and said that he had just entered the desert, so it was normal if he didn’t find it.

However, the atmosphere at dinner time was still a bit dull. Everyone finished eating quickly, and returned to the tent after sharing the task of vigil.

Today it was my turn to watch in the middle of the night, and it was supposed to be Naiwa who was with me, but once he got into the tent, he would not come out, so Lao Yan had to temporarily transfer Shorty to join me.

"Hey, do you think what he said is true?" Shorty winked at the inside of the tent with a piece of dead grass that he pulled out from nowhere.

I shrugged and said it was probably not true. There are so many legends in this desert. If they were true, no one would dare to come here.

"It's you, you dare to pick up the grass in the desert, be careful it's poisonous." I glanced at the withered grass in his mouth and said with a smile.

Autun raised his hand indifferently, saying that he was blessed and fateful, but before the words fell, he suddenly covered his stomach and yelled, which frightened me for a moment, could it be just what Crow's mouth said?
"Oh, it's too bad, you stand for a while, I'll go to squat on the side of the slope." Ao Tun stuffed the submachine gun into my hand, clutched his stomach and screamed, and ran away.

It turned out that I had a bad stomach, so I shook my head helplessly.

"Ahhh!" Before I finished shaking my head, I heard Ao Tun yelling a few times. He ran back, waving his hands and shouting for help while running.

I picked up the submachine gun but found that there was nothing behind him. I was about to run two steps forward when Shorty fell to the ground with a plop, motionless...

The moment he fell, I seemed to hear the sound of something going into the sand.

"Short, short?" I called tentatively, but he didn't respond.

The other people all got out, and when they saw the short pier lying on the ground, their expressions changed.

I stood there with a white face, my mind went blank, and I didn't come back to my senses until Poisonous Snake and Company Commander Chen pulled Houdun back.

The stump was gone, he was covered in black and purple, and there was a red and swollen mark the size of a thumb on his buttocks.

"What the hell happened?" Company Commander Chen had a dark face. He was naturally upset that he lost a person just after entering the desert.

I quickly recounted what happened just now, and then said with some uncertainty: "I, I seem to hear crying..."

"It's ghosts picking people up, look, it's ghosts picking people up..." Milkman's face was pale, and he kept muttering.

"It's a scorpion." The poisonous snake checked the wound with gloves on and came to a conclusion.

"Scorpion?" I felt a little weird. During the day, I discussed with the poisonous snake that this area should have been demarcated. Why did a scorpion come at night?
The poisonous snake nodded. He has studied these poisons deeply, so everyone has no opinion, but his heart is heavy. Scorpions come and go without a trace in the desert. Maybe you just sat down and got tricked.

The milk boy was already bewildered, and he kept yelling for ghosts to pick him up. Company Commander Chen hit him on the shoulder with the butt of his gun, and yelled with a dark face: Promise!

Milkman didn't dare to say anything more, but he knew from his appearance that he was convinced of the legend about ghosts picking people up.

Lao Yan smoked from beginning to end, without saying a word, and finally only ordered to find a place to bury the pier at dawn, then turned and returned to the tent.

As soon as he left, everyone fell silent. Aodun is a good-natured man with accurate marksmanship, and he is very popular in the army. Now that he has gone so vaguely, we all feel bad.

Milkman had already collapsed, and Company Commander Chen asked the poisonous snake to drag him into the tent to accompany him, so as not to cause any trouble. As for me, I had to keep watch, and Hawkeye had already kept watch for the first half of the night, so Company Commander Chen had no choice but to stay with me.

"Chang'an, did you really hear the crying?" Lianchang Chen frowned, looking at the corpse lying not far from us.

(End of this chapter)