In 1942, the 56th Division of the Japanese Army captured Lashio from Taunggyi. They then advanced along the Burma Road, occupying places such as Ruihekou, Baoteng, Longsongkou in southwestern Yunnan, cutting off international transportation and supply lines. They continued their advance, attempting to occupy Spring City, but encountered fierce resistance at the Nu River.
Qingmu explaining to the Boss Coal what year Showa 17 was, Aoki also took the opportunity to organize his own thoughts.
The Boss Coal stood atop the Qingmu, craned his neck, bent his head close to the Qingmu, and looked up at the Qingmu's nose. "Wow, so knowledgeable! When did someone as lazy as you start reading history books? You're truly impressive!"
Qingmu didn't remember when he had learned these things, and said, "Maybe when I was little."
The Crow turned its head back, shook its feathers, and Tushu, "When I was little? We had to learn so much when we were little? Being human is so painful!"
At this moment, Du Juan came out dressed, head bowed, and said, "Thank you for saving me. How would you like me to repay you? Just name it, and I'll agree to anything."
Qingmu didn't even glance at her. "I'm not saving you, I just don't want to see a woman being violated by Japan devils."
Du Juan's clothes were torn to shreds by the Japan soldiers. Although she put them back on, she looked even more alluring than if she hadn't worn any clothes at all.
"Whoa~~~ That's so offensive!" The Crow raised a wing to cover its eyes, but then spread a slit in the feathers at the tip of its wing. "By the way, who is this woman?"
Seeing that no one answered it, it tapped Qingmu's head with its paw again. "Hey, you naughty boy! So that's why you got trapped in this godforsaken place! Oh, poor Ruhua!"
"Hey, your Mandarin is getting better and better lately!" Qingmu said. "Looks like you've had too much nutrition."
"Caw?" The Crow raised its neck in confusion. "What does speaking have to do with nutrition?"
Qingmu didn't explain. Instead, he circled the cave and returned to ask the soldier, "Is this all the men guarding this place?"
The soldier said, "Yes, our team has 54 people in total. Half of us are guarding inside the cave, and the other half are guarding outside."
"So where did these people come from?"
"They're everywhere. We have a regiment stationed in Mangdian specifically responsible for organizing and training the Chinese suicide squads."
"How many caves like these do you have in total?"
"I don't know, I heard places like this are hard to find," the soldier said. "Captain Guisun said there are places like this in the mountains of Mianyue."
Qingmu nodded; the situation was largely in line with his guess.
During World War II, in order to plunder and seize resources in South Asia and cut off the supply lines from the United States and Britain to China, the Japanese launched the Mianyue Campaign, and also used the 56th Division as its main force to occupy southwestern Yunnan. The 56th Division was an elite unit of the Japanese army, known as the "King of the Jungle." With 20,000 men, fighting on multiple fronts and facing an enemy several times their size, they were able to hold out until the end of the war without being at a disadvantage, and their casualties were much less than those of the Chinese and British armies. It turns out they used such a treacherous tactic!
Qingmu asked the Japan soldier a few more questions, but seeing that he couldn't get any more out of him, he said, "Go home."
The Crow then began to sing. "Sleep, sleep, my dear baby..."
The Japan soldier paused for a moment, then slowly closed his eyes and fell to the ground as if he were asleep.
Qingmu wandered around the cave again, then turned to Du Juan and said, "You said you would repay me?"
Du Juan raised her head and said, "Yes."
Anything is fine?
"Yes."
The Crow spread its wings and flew to the ground nearby. "Caw! Should I move aside?"
"No need," Qingmu said.
"Are you going to do something so shameful in front of the birds?!" The Boss Coal raised his paw and kicked the Guisun next to him. "Hey, Juduozhi, get up and check on the infantry!"
Qingmu shook his head, ignoring the Crow, and asked the Du Juan, "Tell me all the rules you know about here."
The Crow patted its chest with its wings. "You scared me to death, quack! My poor Ruhua still has a chance... Hey, Juduozhi, no need to get up, it's cavalry."
Du Juan said, "When I first discovered this cave, I just thought it was a good place to train my Mental Power. Every time I practiced in this cave, I progressed faster than outside. So my master often brought me here. Later Situ appeared and said that the magnetic field here had been altered, turning it into a natural hypnotic array. Everyone who enters here will be hypnotized and lose their conscious awareness, making it impossible to effectively retrieve memories. The person who controls this array can inject a seed of consciousness into the hypnotized person, turning them into a puppet."
How did he start it?
"I don't know. He talked to my master about some formations, but I was only thirteen years old at the time and couldn't understand a word of it. Later, I asked my master, but she wouldn't tell me and told me not to overuse my Mental Power in the cave."
As Du Juan spoke, she seemed to remember something, "That's right, it must be because I overused my Mental Power to control you just now, and this formation backfired on me, so I've become just like an ordinary person now."
She looked at Qingmu with pleading eyes, "You must have a way. Since you could save me, you must have a way to restore me, right?"
Qingmu shook his head and said, "I don't even know how to get out of here yet, how can I help you?"
"Impossible! You managed to kill all the Japanese soldiers here. You're more capable than I imagined. You must be able to master this formation, just like Situ." Du Juan sounded a little anxious.
"This is a Group Dream that has lasted for over seventy years," Qingmu said. "The problem is, it's still a Real-Scene Dream. I must master all the rules of this dream, or find the backdoor left by the people who created it."
Du Juan thought for a moment and said, "Yes, there is a place with a mechanism. Situ took me there, and that's how I gained control over this place."
"Where?" Qingmu asked.
"Come with me."
Qingmu, with the Crow following behind the Du Juan, passed through several caves and returned to the end of the underground river.
Du Juan pointed to the rock wall ahead and said, "Once the water level recedes, you'll see the small hole at the bottom; the mechanism is inside."
The water level was at its highest point, and they waited on the riverbank. After a while, the water began to shallow, and they could slowly see an arched cave about two meters wide and half a meter high underwater, from which the water flowed out.
The riverbed wasn't dry yet; when the water level had dropped to about ankle height, Du Juan eagerly ran over, lay down, and crawled into the cave, touching the ceiling with her hands and saying, "This is it."
She climbed out again after speaking, her clothes soaked through. But her clothes were already tattered, so it didn't matter if they were wet or not.
Qingmu slowly waded across the river, waiting until the water level had completely receded before diving in.
The cave was icy cold inside, and outside was a dark, deep valley where water cascaded down, forming a waterfall.
Qingmu slowly rolled over and lay flat on his back like Du Juan.
Although the light was dim, the symbol at the top of the arched rock face caught his eye like lightning:
It was an equilateral triangle with two vertices connected, and a straight line passing through the vertices connected the center points of the two triangles.