Apocalyptic Hoarding Diary

Xu Xiaoyan helplessly tossed the radio back into her spatial storage. She leaned back on the sofa, stared blankly at the bamboo shed ceiling for a while, and then glanced down at her watch.

At 1:40 p.m., the numbers on the dial gleamed with a pale green light in the shadow of the bamboo shed.

Even before the hottest part of the day had passed, the temperature inside the sinkhole had already reached its highest point of the day.

Even though she was sitting under a bamboo shed, with a shade canopy and an electric fan blowing, she still couldn't escape the stuffy heat in the air.

She reached up and touched her neck, her fingertips touching a thin layer of sticky sweat. Her lips were also a little dry, and when she licked them with her tongue, she could feel the dryness.

It was so hot that she decided to go to the cave to cool off and get some water.

The water storage container in her space is already half empty; she's used up a lot of water these past few days for planting vegetables and watering the fields.

The water in the pool inside the cave seeps out from cracks in the rocks and is naturally filtered through the limestone layers. I don't know if it's really natural mineral water.

Now that I'm going out to cool off, I might as well bring back some extra water to fill all the water storage containers in the space, so I won't have to worry about water for the next few days.

Xu Xiaoyan stepped out of the bamboo shed, and the sun shone down on her head, with heat waves rising from the ground.

She squinted and quickly walked to the cave entrance in the northwest corner, pushed aside the bushes, and squeezed inside.

The light in the cave suddenly dimmed, and it took her eyes a few seconds to adjust.

The entrance passage was narrow, but it widened after walking for a while. She unconsciously slowed her pace, not because the path was difficult, but because the coolness was so comfortable that she wanted to stay a little longer.

After walking for about half an hour, she found the pond she had passed earlier. When she swept the beam of her flashlight over it, the water surface remained completely still.

The miniature waterfall above is still there, with a thin stream of water cascading down from a small hole in the cave ceiling and falling into the pool, creating delicate ripples.

The water level in the pool was about the same as when she last came; it was still very shallow, and the deepest part only reached her calves.

The calcified sediments at the bottom of the pool are clearly visible in the clear water. The grayish-white sediments are spread out in layers, swaying slightly under the refraction of the water waves.

Because the water level was shallow, it was inconvenient to fill large buckets, so we could only scoop it out little by little with a water ladle.

Xu Xiaoyan took out seven or eight empty buckets from her spatial storage and placed them on a flat stone at the edge of the pool. Then she took out a stainless steel ladle.

She dipped the ladle into the pool, scooped up a spoonful of clear, cool water, and carefully poured it into the bucket.

The moment the water poured from the ladle, tiny droplets splashed up and landed on the back of her hand, feeling cool and refreshing.

The cave was very quiet; apart from the sound of the waterfall dripping and the sound of scooping water, there was only her own even breathing.

After filling the water tank, she shook her aching wrists, put the bucket and ladle into her storage space, then squatted down and washed her hands in the pool.

She originally planned to return to the sinkhole after filling it with water, but the thought of going back to that sticky, hot environment made her reluctant to move. She decided to stay in the cave a little longer.

Xu Xiaoyan sat down with her back against the stone wall and propped the flashlight on a protruding rock next to her, letting the beam shine obliquely on the top of the cave.

The stalactites and stalagmites take on all sorts of bizarre shapes in the light and shadow, some like inverted icicles, some like stacked plates, and some like figures in deep thought.

Xu Xiaoyan was resting with her eyes closed when suddenly, a strange noise entered her ears without warning. The sound wasn't loud, but it was amplified several times in the enclosed space of the cave.

She suddenly opened her eyes, instantly springing up from her relaxed state against the stone wall, tilting her head slightly to listen intently.

The sound was somewhat like a baby crying, sometimes high, sometimes low, sometimes intermittent, sometimes clear as if right next to your ear, and sometimes very indistinct.

The sound reflects, overlaps, and reverberates within the cave's cavities, creating a strange and chilling sound effect.

Her hands clenched involuntarily. Were there other people here?

In such a secluded place, the danger of encountering another person is far greater than encountering any wild animal.

Wild animals act only on instinct, while she can never predict what humans will do.

She quickly took out a precision-aiming crossbow from her spatial storage, put her eyes close to the scope, and turned on the far-infrared function.

This device is especially useful in dark environments; as long as the target has body temperature, it can display its location and outline in the field of vision.

Soon, a range of colors appeared in the scope's field of view. The rocks and pools in the cave were cold, appearing as dark blue and light blue in the infrared image.

She started by scanning the edge of the pool, where there were many crevices in the rock wall. If anything was hidden there, it would most likely be in that place, but she found nothing.

She shifted her gaze to the center of the pool, where the water was a deep blue with a uniform temperature and no unusual hot spots.

She began to wonder if she had misheard, perhaps it was some kind of echo of the dripping water causing her illusion, or perhaps she was just too tired and was hallucinating.

Just as she was about to lower her guard, the sound came again, this time clearer, closer, and from the direction of the pool.

She quickly aimed the scope at the direction of the sound source, and the far-infrared beam swept back and forth across the water surface twice.

Finally, at the deepest part of the pool, near the point where the waterfall falls, she saw an unusual heat source, an irregularly shaped orange-red outline about forty or fifty centimeters long.

The silhouette moved slowly across the bottom of the pool. She held her breath, her finger resting on the trigger guard, ready to pull it at any moment. But instead of acting rashly, she continued to observe.

The silhouette moved a few steps, stopped, and then the strange noise reappeared.

This time she heard it clearly, not because the distance was closer, but because the sound was synchronized with the movement of the infrared heat source.

Every time that thing moved, a sound would follow.

She increased the magnification of the scope and, while simultaneously using infrared imaging, shone a flashlight beam at the location.

The flashlight's powerful beam pierced through the clear water, illuminating the travertine deposits at the bottom of the pool and revealing the true nature of the orange-red heat source—a giant salamander lurked deep within the water.

The giant salamander wasn't very big, with a flat head and two small eyes on top of its head. It looked rather silly, even a little comical.

Its skin is grayish-brown, covered with dark spots and warts, very similar in color to the calcified sediments at the bottom of the pool.

If it weren't for its movement, it would be almost impossible to distinguish it from a stone with the naked eye.