IHWL – Chapter 48

Chapter 48: Danger 3

“Crap!”

    Looking at the gray-black sky in the distance, Gao Ling, who was sitting in the passenger seat, couldn’t hold back a series of expletives. He now understood what it meant that misfortunes never come singly —— He thought that as long as they ran fast enough, the tsunami would not catch up with them, but then they ran head-on into a raging volcanic ash!

    They set off from the western coast; a convoy of dozens of buses roaring inland. The buses were followed by a dozen pickup trucks carrying people. Hence, such a large and conspicuous convoy became the most striking scenery on the road.

     The destination of the convoy was the nickel mine, where the terrain was flat and open and supporting basic living facilities. They could temporarily accommodate several thousand people. They were about to arrive when the volcano nearby suddenly erupted!

    The undersea earthquake shook off the communication lines, so the volcano and tsunami alerts came late. Gao Ling stared at the phone, popping with English messages, which were word by word translated into Chinese.

     “It says that the volcano suddenly erupted at blah-blah time, and all residents three kilometers around the volcano are prompted to evacuate immediately…” Gao Ling quickly took out the electronic map, looking for information on the mining area on it.

    “Fortunately, fortunately,” he breathed a long sigh of relief and faced Mu Xiulun who was sitting in the back seat and said, “Mr. Mu, your nickel mine is still some distance away from the volcano. the ash will drift over, but it won’t have much impact.”

    Gao Ling said in relief, but seeing the dark mass of dust in the horizon, his mood sank. Just looking at it from such a distance, you could feel the enormous deterrent brought by nature. He dared not imagine how desperate people standing at the foot of the mountain were feeling at the time of the volcanic eruption.

     “That’s good,” Mu Xiulun replied, “When we arrived at the mining area in a while, shelter them all in temporary dormitories to squeeze with the workers. Open the canteen and infirmary to them, too; at least until official help arrives.”

    Gao Ling was about to reply, when suddenly, an ear-piercing buzz burst from one of the buses’ speakers, making him frown. 

    “What’s going on?” Mu Xiulun asked.

    “A driver from one of the buses should have mishandled the frequency channel,” Gao Ling answered right away.

    In such large convoys, car intercoms were usually installed inside, with a receiving range of five kilometers. They could also be used in conjunction with hand-held walkie-talkies.

    A walkie-talkie used frequency modulation to determine a call channel, which could ensure stable transmission and reception even in places where there was no network communication signal.

    In their SUV, there was a special car walkie talkie. It was the “Boss” of all walkie talkies in the convoy and was responsible for dispatching all personnel in the team.

    Gao Ling pressed the walkie-talkie button and gave the order in fluent English, telling everyone to brace themselves for the last kilometers. Each of their cars carried hundreds of people. Neglect and carelessness wasn’t an option!

    However, before he could finish speaking, another ear-splitting sound erupted from the channel without warning. It was as if the microphone was unintentionally drawn close to the stereo, making people’s temples hurt!

    The most frightening thing was the intermittent female voice that sounded along with that noise…

    “Someone…I…help!”

    Gao Ling shuddered from head to toe. There was no female driver in their convoy!!! Not to mention a female driver who spoke Chinese!!

    It was still broad daylight, so haunting was absolutely impossible. Then, there was only one definite possibility —— it was a walkie-talkie crosstalk!

    Although theoretically speaking, there were thousands of possible walkie-talkie channels, and different channels didn’t interfere with each other. But in harsh natural environments, the electromagnets changed in the atmosphere, and walkie-talkie crosstalks were entirely possible!

    Therefore, it could be inferred that the person who was asking for help from them in the channel accidentally connected her mobile phone to their channel. The series of noise they just heard was emitted when she was tuning the channel!

    ……

    If a word was used to describe this distress, Su Jishi could only tell herself —— fate.

    The moment the black smoke engulfed her, her feet slipped, and she fell from the high bamboo bridge with countless images instantly flashing in her mind; her teacher, her unfinished doctoral thesis, her missing sister… And all kinds of people she met in the months of ‘replacing’ her sister.

    The sharped tongued, but tofu-hearted Fang Xie; the outwardly fierce, yet with the heart of a young girl Ashan; and also the scared red-eyed Xiao Xia just now…To her own surprise, the last one who appeared in her mind turned out to be Mu Xiulun.

    However, before she could think clearly, she was wrapped in black dust and fell heavily into the ditch!

    The expected pain did not hit her. Below her body was not hard dirt ground, but the rapid river —— 

    It turned out that when they looked down on the make-do bridge just now, they saw a layer of rotten leaves and branches at the bottom of the ditch, so they thought it was solid ground. Unsuspectingly, there was a stream under the rotten leaves. The surface was calm, but the underwater current was very fast.

    This kind of undercurrent and turbulent stream was without doubt a shadow killer if encountered elsewhere; but at this time, it had become a life-saving magic weapon!

    Su Jishi was immediately swept away by the stream, and was instantly swept out hundreds of meters, quickly leaving the black smoke overhead behind.

    Next, the stream merged into a small river, which in turn merged into a larger river…

    The Sulawesi Island had a dense network of rivers, with short and shallow inland rivers. If you fall into the river, your limbs will flop and you can easily choke or sustain injuries. Su Jishi immediately relaxed herself, closed her legs together, and straightened her upper body. She held her arms on her chest, covered her mouth and nose with one hand, closed her eyes and adjusted her breathing…Then while maintaining such a standard posture, she was sent all the way out of the danger zone by the river!

    Fortunately, she passed through an area of gentle terrain without waterfalls. Otherwise, she would have died if she swept down a tall drop.

    Soon, the river swarmed and washed her in the shallows. She rolled to the ground, heavily coughing up water from her mouth and nose, and sat down on the ground, hugging a big tree by the river.

    …Regardless of how rich she was in theoretical knowledge and practical experience, this risky encounter absolutely ranked in the Top 5 of her life experience!

    From a distance, the gale blew the volcanic ash high into the sky, heavy and repetitive. The gray dust obscured the sky, and puffs of smoke and clouds covered all places in sight. Even a layer of gray debris floated in the lake that aided her escape. In her experience, the volcanic ash would float in the sky for at least five or six days, spread for at least ten kilometers, and affect communication and transportation…

    She had no time to be afraid, to avoid the wildlife running around, she immediately rolled over and climbed up the tree, looking for a branch that could hide her figure for a rest.

    She examined the wounds on her body first. Fortunately, they were not serious. She had some minor abrasions and cuts, but they weren’t bleeding anymore.

    The river washed away her backpack, her medicine, emergency food, and even her geological hammer, which she had always kept with her. They all disappeared together.

    The only thing left on her was the portable walkie-talkie hanging on her waist. She even didn’t  know if it would still work after soaking in water.

    She shook off the water and tried to contact Xiao Xia and the others —— As expected, there was no reply.

    She had long been washed out of the river far away, and the walkie-talkie range was limited. It was especially more affected in such extreme weather.

    Thinking of the moment she fell, and Xiao Xia’s desperate expression and red eyes, Su Jishi sighed slightly —— That silly girl, she has no idea that I can escape. I hope she won’t be so stubborn and wait for me in place, ah.

    Su Jishi dumped any sentimental feelings and quickly decided to save herself.

    She was now in an uninhabited mountain without any GPS. Relying on her own to get out of this uninhabited area was a complete nightmare.

    Since she couldn’t go out, she had to call for help.

    But before that, she’d better fill up her stomach and replenish her strength.

    She rolled down the tree, picked up stones, branches, vines, and tied them together to make a simple stone hammer. In fact, she wanted to make an axe, but unfortunately, she searched for a long time at the lake, but could not find a suitable stone piece. Plus she was used to hammers, so she might as well make a self-defense hammer.

    After which, she used this hammer to kill a pheasant that fell into her trap.

    Su Jishi didn’t blink an eyelid when gutting, plucking the feathers and bloodletting. The fowl_chicken was so cute. Of course, she must eat chicken_fowl.

    After wrapping it in yellow mud, she buried it under the fire (Is it rare for an old geological old dog to make fire bare-handed?). While waiting for the two chickens to cook for dozens of minutes, Su Jishi washed her hands and started to study the hand-held walkie-talkie.

    It had a thick antenna and two knobs, used to tune the channel.

    Su Jishi abandoned the original channel and tried to tune the frequency. With each channel she tuned out, she repeated her pleas for help in Chinese and English, and basic French and Spanish. Unfortunately, time and time again, all attempts failed.

    She was well aware that there were thousands of channel possibilities, and even if she tuned in on the right channel, it would be a wasted effort since nobody would receive the signal because of the distance.

    However, Su Jishi’s conviction was never to give up on this route. If she fails once, try eleven times. If she failed a thousand times, try one thousand and one times.

    If she failed to find help before the power ran out, then she would walk out on her own!

    Luckily, the heavens always favored those with strong faith.

    After an hour of non-stop attempts, an intermittent English message finally came out of her walkie-talkie!

    It’s a convoy!!!

    She heard it. It was a convoy passing by her perimeter!!!

    She immediately bucked up and repeated the distress call over and over again.

    “Please respond if received. Please respond if received. I am a Chinese tourist. I got separated from my friends during the eruption. Requesting rescue, requesting rescue…”

    Su Jishi used four languages in turn, speaking faster and faster. She did not know if the crosstalk was unilateral or mutual; she also did not know if the people on the other side of the channel could make plans; she was even more if they would send people to rescue her at such a dangerous moment…She just didn’t want to let go of any bit of hope of survival!

    She let go of the walkie-talkie button and looked at it in her hand with bated breath, expecting the person on the other side of the radio wave to receive her message…

    A dozen seconds later, a magnetic male voice came over the receiver ——

    —— “Su Jin, is that you?”

    The question was in Chinese, and the voice was slightly distorted because of the radio waves. The man’s tone carried a touch of veiled urgency. 

    Su Jishi: “????”

    She hesitated for a couple of seconds, and the burst of joy she had just felt suddenly dropped by three points. She finally connected to a channel with great difficulty here in the deep mountains only to run into a fanatic fan who recognized her by her voice alone?

    Even third-rate dog-blood((dog-blood – something unbelievably cliche/ embarrassing/maladroit/exaggerating.)) plots weren’t dared to be written like this.

    She hesitated to reply: “Uh, this is Su Jin. May I ask who you are…?”

    Facts had proved that terrible dog-blood plots were far more daring than she imagined.

    —— “Your ex-boyfriend.”

—–

    The author has something to say: 

    Mr. Mu: I’m your ex-boyfriend.

    Sister Su: Who? I have an ex-boyfriend?