Cui Hao turned back and glanced at me, his eyes full of confusion.
"Is there something wrong?"
I pointed out the way.
"Did you feel that the lights on the road when we came here seemed a little dim? Why do I feel like some of the candles were extinguished?"
As I spoke, another patch of darkness fell on the road ahead.
Cui Hao also opened his eyes wide.
"I go, it seems like the candle has really gone out."
Cui Hao quickly packed away the Four Treasures of the Study on the table, quickly stuffed a batch into his backpack, and held up his flashlight to stop moving forward.
"Let's go and have a look. Most likely, the candle is too short, and it should be burning to the end now. Let's go and renew the candle, so we don't get lost again."
What Cui Hao said makes sense.
The two of us have been shopping here for nearly half an hour, which is indeed a bit long.
It's not impossible that those thumb-sized candles will go out and burn out.
But for some reason, the warm yellow candle light coming dimly through these bookshelves made me feel uneasy.
The candle was extinguished very strangely, as if it had been blown out by something, and it didn't seem to be extinguished naturally.
Thinking of this, I took two steps forward, walked to Cui Hao, and grabbed his arm.
"Don't worry, let's go together. If there is any danger, we can take care of each other."
Cui Hao didn't say anything, nodded and continued walking forward with a flashlight.
The nearest candle to us had burned down half the length of a knuckle, leaving about two-thirds remaining.
Just as we were walking forward, one of the candles in front of us was extinguished again.
Cui Hao quickly took me around the corner, around two rows of bookshelves, and pointed his flashlight at the extinguished candles.
My heart sank, and I quickly drew my dagger and pointed it at the darkness ahead.
Cui Hao also immediately took out his weapon and held it in his hand.
in front of us.
The candle on the ground clearly still had half the length of a knuckle left, and it had obviously not burned to the end, but it was extinguished just like that.
It was obviously blown out by something.
Cui Hao's voice had a vibrato.
"Who's in front of you?"
He carefully took out his lighter and lit the flame as he passed the candles to relight them.
There was a thin layer of dust on the original ground, and after being stepped on a few times by the two of us, it was covered with our shoe prints.
But now there are actually several rows of messy paw prints scattered on it.
"Those rats!"
With just one glance, I immediately realized that it was probably those big rats that blew out the candles.
Cui Hao nodded and followed the messy paw prints.
The paw print quickly disappeared behind a row of bookshelves and disappeared.
"They got into the bookshelf and got out through the gaps in the books?"
Cui Hao turned around and quickly turned to the other side of the bookshelf.
I followed him, only to see Cui Hao's back stiffened, and he was stunned and motionless.
"What's wrong with you?"
I looked over his shoulder to the ground.
I was surprised to find that there was only one row of footprints of me and Cui Hao, which were left when we passed by this place before.
Other than that, the ground was clean and there were no traces left by the rats at all.
Cui Hao turned around and asked me stiffly.
"Are these rats immortal? There are no footprints in the direction of the bookshelves on both sides. Could it be that these things got into the bookshelves and settled down?"
Cui Hao loves to be serious, so he turned around and went to the row of bookshelves and touched the back of every book from top to bottom.
But of course there was no gain.
His face suddenly became even more ugly, but I smelled something unusual.
"Fat man, don't worry. I think this will do more good than harm to us. If you think about it, these mice will never disappear out of thin air, so there must be something wrong with this bookshelf."
I reached out and knocked on the wooden grid on both sides of the bookshelf, listening carefully to the sounds inside.
"The support under the bookshelf is about half a meter high, and there are vivid patterns of various colors carved on the outside. I used to think that this thing was just a special decoration for the bookshelf."
I squatted down and gently tapped the lower edge of the tree. I heard a hollow crunching sound coming from the bottom of the bookshelf, which seemed to be a solid wood support layer about half a meter high.
I looked up at Cui Hao.
"What else don't you understand? This place is empty."
I roughly estimated the height of the support layer under the bookshelf. It was more than half a meter, which is enough for one person to get through.
No wonder we can't find a way out, and these rats are so elusive.
They didn't just punch holes in the walls and dig themselves holes for communication.
Even the bottom floor of the bookshelf was deliberately hollowed out, leaving a special passage.
It would have been almost impossible to spot this if I hadn't looked closely.
Cui Hao suddenly thought deeply.
"Let me go, what kind of person dug a tunnel here, and where is the entrance?"
He also followed me and squatted down, stretched out his hand and knocked on the support layer, and it was indeed empty.
Cui Hao's eyes were full of excitement.
"That makes sense. How could such a big building only have these three rooms? It seems that there is no space here. Let me look for it. Where is the entrance?"
Cui Hao excitedly knocked left and right, trying to find the direction of the entrance.
I followed him and observed.
While we were focusing our attention on the bottom of the bookshelf, neither of us noticed that the candlelight behind us had dimmed slightly.
Breathe.
The surrounding light suddenly disappeared, leaving only the light of the flashlights of the two of us shining on a space in front of us.
All those candles went out at the same time.
"Cui Hao, be careful."
I shouted and quickly grabbed Cui Hao and hid in the corner.
I raised my flashlight and pointed it in the direction I came from.
The candle on the ground that we had just lit was extinguished again.
And this time, not one candle was extinguished, but all the candles in the whole room were extinguished.
We were so angry that we didn’t dare to breathe.
Except for the slight breathing of both of us, the only thing left around us was our beating heartbeats.
A long time passed.
There was no other abnormality. Cui Hao couldn't help but shake his body, and the fabric of his clothes made a rustling sound.
The moment the sound sounded, it was as if some switch had been pressed.
The sky above our heads was suddenly overwhelming, and groups of black shadows were crushing down on us.
"run."
I grabbed Cui Hao and quickly turned around and ran out after the candle on the ground.
Although the candle has been extinguished.
But the traces of wax on the ground still helped us guide the way out.
However, the moment the two of us left the hiding corner, the sound of mechanisms suddenly sounded around us.
The sound of clicking mechanical parts rubbing against each other is endless, as if thousands of troops are gathering here to attack.
"What the hell?"
I was so anxious that I didn’t dare to stop dragging Cui Hao, and ran forward quickly.
Just as I was looking around on both sides, I bumped into a bookshelf with a bang.
The momentum was too strong and knocked me to pieces. I dragged Cui Hao and fell to the ground.
Cui Hao rubbed his butt and complained.
"How can it hit the bookshelf directly? Aren't all the bookshelves arranged in the north-south direction?"
I quickly grabbed Cui Hao and crawled backwards, away from the bookshelf in front of me.
The moment he said these words, he realized something. His face turned pale and he squeezed my arms tightly with both hands. I grinned in pain.
"Fat man, please slow down your strength. You are so strong that you almost broke my elbow."
I shouted, and he came to his senses and slowly let go of his hand.
Cui Hao dragged me up from the ground and looked at the bookshelf in front of me in confusion.
"How is this possible? How is this possible? All these bookshelves are oriented north-south. How could such a bookshelf oriented east-west suddenly appear?"
I lowered my head and pointed my flashlight at the ground.
A ball of wax oil was spread out in front of me in the center of the floor, half of it held underneath the bookshelf.
Obviously, the bookshelf was moved to this place, and it covered the candle oil that was originally spreading here.
"Cui Hao, this bookshelf can move. It seems that the mechanical sound we just heard is the moving position of the bookshelf."
I looked around and dragged Cui Hao, holding up the flashlight, around a bookshelf and to the other side.
My heart suddenly sank.
"As expected, look at this. The layout of the bookshelves here has also changed, which means that all the bookshelves have been moved. It is simply impossible to get out based on the marks we made before."
Cui Hao looked bleak and quickly pointed to the traces of candles on the ground.
"Then let's look for these traces of wax, and maybe we can find the way out through these marks."
I nodded, not wanting to dampen Cui Hao's confidence. But in fact, I have thought about this method for a long time, but I don't have much hope in my heart.
The layout of the bookshelves here has changed, and there are no papers and pens around us...
"Fat man, give me everything you just hid."
I immediately called to the fat man and reached out to squeeze his backpack.
I almost forgot.
Fatty had just stuffed all the Four Treasures of the Study into his bag, and now he could just hold the items for marking.
Cui Hao reluctantly opened his backpack and took out a jade pen from inside.
He held the jade pen and refused to let go for a long time.
"This thing is very expensive. If you use it, it might be discounted. I..."
Before he finished speaking, I grabbed the pen directly and took out the ink stand from his backpack.
"Don't talk nonsense. We will use this thing to mark the surrounding bookshelves later. You can also find a piece of white paper and draw a rough top view of this place."
Although I don't know the layout of this place yet, I have walked here twice with Fatty before.
So I roughly know the original space and the number of rows of these bookshelves.
Now even if the location moves, I can use paper and pen to roughly draw the distribution space under the ground.
As long as they don't continue to move, they will find a way out sooner or later.
