Vanished Without a Trace
Zhang Heng climbed down the uneven wall of the pit. Because he had to keep his weight distributed throughout the descent, he was not moving very quickly. Still, thirty meters was not far, and he soon reached the bottom. After quickly surveying his surroundings and confirming there was no danger, he waved his flashlight upward.
This was the signal Zhang Heng and Ma Lu had agreed on. When Ma Lu saw the beam, he knew Zhang Heng had landed safely and tossed his travel bag down afterward.
Hearing the sound of something falling from overhead, Zhang Heng stepped half a body length aside. After a muffled thud, his travel bag landed beside his feet.
Zhang Heng picked up the bag and brushed the dust from it before carefully examining his surroundings.
Before him lay an underground pit roughly sixty meters in diameter. Other than the passage he had climbed down through, there were no other entrances or exits. In the middle was a pool of water. Strangely, however, there was no sound of water nearby. The entire pool was unnaturally quiet, without even the faintest ripple on its surface.
Zhang Heng shone his flashlight down into it, but could only barely make out the outline of a massive shadow.
The distance was too great and the light too poor for Zhang Heng to tell what it was. He took out the Filter Lens, but this time, the device that had never failed him before proved useless. It could not reveal the true appearance of the thing below.
Still, out of caution, Zhang Heng made his preparations before the battle.
After the Yonaguni Island incident, he had unexpectedly gained the abilities to breathe underwater and control water currents. He could now remain underwater for extended periods without