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  After walking for more than three hours on the plateau, Sangba's complexion didn't change, but we were all starting to pant. Before setting out, I had specially changed into some equipment, and with my experience of crossing the Changbai Mountains, I wore a pair of long tube soft leather boots, which had very soft soles and anti-slip studs on the bottom to keep warm and prevent slipping on snow. Xiaohua saw them and joked, saying "Young master Sang has experience!"

  I said, when I was climbing Snow Mountain, you were still listening to music at New Moon Restaurant.

  All the way without a word, we arrived at the foot of the mountain and found several large stones to sit on and rest. The several big men who came with us were all from the Jie family, while that passerby A spoke little along the way, seeming to have some connection with Xie Yu Hua, nor did he get close to others, as for his surname and name, I was too lazy to ask.

  I sat on the stone, panting, looking at the road ahead, which was a low forest. The trees here were not tall and small, with some as thin as fingers and others no thicker than an arm. Since the temperature at the foot of the mountain is not lower than that at the top, these shrubs still showed some green color.

  Samba said that further into the mountain, after seeing snow, you can see some large trees, all of which are dead and withered, in various shapes.

  Sangba speaks fluent Chinese, so I asked him where he learned it. He said he learned from a Han girl who came to teach in the eastern highlands. The Han girl teaches children there. I also asked him what his mother's illness was, and he said that the lama said she had been possessed by an evil spirit and couldn't be cured. However, the county hospital at the foot of the mountain says that if you spend money on surgery, it can be treated, so he wants to try. After chatting with him, I found out that Sangba is still under twenty this year.

  After a brief rest, we set off again with our luggage, each of us carrying at least fifteen kilograms on our backs. From the outside, they looked like ordinary mountaineering equipment, but inside, everything was fully stocked, including guns, bullets and explosives.

  Next, Samba led the way in front, and we followed him through the rocks, our destination a snow-filled gully on the mountain slope, which would allow us to cross the mountain as quickly as possible. The originally flat grassland had turned into rocky terrain, and after more than two hours of walking, we saw snow. The rocks beneath our feet gradually became white, the trees were sparse, and not a speck of green could be seen. Another two hours of walking, and the snow deepened, with only withered trees and white snow visible everywhere.

  Dry branches are scattered all over the snowy ground, creaking underfoot. We're at an altitude of at least 3,500 meters now, and with the weight we're carrying and walking on foot, everyone's face looks terrible, panting heavily, at first we could still see the road ahead, but later we could only follow the footprints of the person in front, it seems like we don't even have the energy to lift our heads.

  Before long, Samba, who was leading the way, stopped and said: "We can take a rest here." It was only then that I realized we had arrived at Xuegou.

  In the snow ditch, there is a very small stream flowing in the small snow ditch, as if it came out of the ground, half covered with snow and half exposed to the sun. Sometimes it drills into the snow, hiding its head and exposing its tail.

  This snow ditch is very large, along the opposite side of the snow ditch is the road up the mountain, which is even more difficult to walk, but that's not our destination, our goal is to circle around the snow ditch and go to the other side of the mountain.

  Xiu Xiu wore a white mountaineering suit, black leather pants, and long boots, which outlined her beautiful legs in an alluring way. After resting for nearly twenty minutes on the spot, we casually nibbled on some compressed biscuits and continued our journey, striving to get around this snow-capped mountain by tonight and camp at its foot.

  Sangba said: "Don't look at the thick snow, under some places where the snow layer is, the snow water has already melted and become empty. If you're not careful, you'll step into a pit, and some pits are extremely deep, enough to swallow a whole person. You must follow my footsteps, if you take a wrong step, I'm afraid it will be disastrous."

  I know the danger of snow pits. If you encounter a shallow one, at most your legs will get wet and you can pull them out, but if you encounter a deep snow pit, if you're not careful and fall in, the surrounding snow will slide down with you, and all you can do is wait to be buried alive. If there's water in the pit, it's even more miserable - being frozen to death in the icy water, no matter how good your swimming skills are, after a while your body will stiffen up and you won't be able to move, then sink down and drown.

  Such incidents have been reported on TV many times. Generally, professional mountaineers will bring a kind of equipment similar to snowshoes, which are installed on the soles of their shoes to distribute the weight-bearing area, but if they encounter a large crevasse, such equipment is still unavoidable and will lead to disaster.

  I followed Samba carefully, and our group was very cautious. The road ahead would be fraught with the danger of avalanches, so no one dared to be careless. The journey was quiet, with only the sound of the wind whistling through the trees, causing the dry branches to rustle. From time to time, we could also hear the sounds of unknown birds and beasts, but it was unclear whether they were snow rabbits or something else.

  We proceeded with caution in the snowy valley for more than two hours, and the road ahead was still a high and low snowfield. From time to time, we could see some wild berries in the forest, which was probably the last dinner of the vegetarian animals in the mountains.

  As we calculated the time, we had been walking with heavy loads on the plateau above 3,000 meters for more than five hours. The sunlight that was originally obscured by fog and haze above our heads became dazzlingly bright. Sambo said: "We call this snow mountain Ni Ma, which means sun. Because the top of the mountain is very narrow, the waist of the mountain receives strong sunlight, and in summer, when the sun is at its strongest at noon, from a distance, the entire snow-capped mountain looks like a sun that has landed on the grassland, emitting golden light, it's extremely beautiful."

  I looked at Samba's yearning expression, seemingly able to understand his reverence for the snowy expanse in his heart. Unfortunately, such a beautiful scene can only be viewed from afar. Now that we have ventured deep into the snow-capped mountains, all I see is a vast expanse of white, and nothing else is visible.

  Here, due to the snow gorge's terrain, the wind is particularly strong. Although it's noon and the sun is shining brightly, the chill only increases. The howling north wind blows along the snow gorge, at first I could still squint my eyes, but later I felt like I couldn't even open them. As soon as I opened my eyes, all I saw was a flurry of snowflakes flying everywhere. I felt something was off, this wind didn't seem normal. Just as I was about to ask Sangba what's going on, a sudden cry came from behind me. I quickly turned around and saw that a large section had been blown away.

  Our team was moving in a single file, I followed behind Samba, each person keeping a certain distance from the other, and the distance between me and the one behind me was even greater. My heart skipped a beat as I saw a cave not far behind me, with snow slowly pouring into it, and an increasingly obvious trend of more and more people going in that direction.

  "I immediately shouted: 'Oh no, I stepped on a snow pit!' And the snow pit was getting bigger and bigger. Subconsciously, I took a few steps back, just in time to bump into Samba. Samba saw this situation and panicked too, saying: 'What do we do? This is a big hole.' He's still young after all, so there's no use counting on him at this moment. I quickly counted the people behind me and found that the passerby was gone. So it must be him who fell into the snow pit."

  A passerby followed Xiao Hua from behind, and I immediately made a hand gesture to him, saying "Let her go."

  "Samba said immediately: 'Can't use rope, using rope will make us lean forward, this cave is still cracking, if we use force on the rope, the snow will rush down all at once, people will be smashed, who knows, maybe even we'll get trapped.'"

  That passerby, no one bothered him on the way, holding his hands leisurely, if not for the occasional upturned corners of his mouth, he had a very reserved demeanor. I thought that people who dared to be so unscrupulous must have some real skills hidden away, and even if someone stepped on a landmine, it wouldn't be him. Unexpectedly, indeed, you can't judge a person by appearance.

  But now is not the time to think about this, I cursed in a low voice and shouted at the person opposite me: "You're good at rock climbing, can't you jump in and dig people out?"

  Jieyu Flower shouted back, "Shut up! Which eye of yours saw that I could climb here? Screw it, let's just use the rope!" As soon as she finished speaking, one of the big men immediately swung out a rope and threw it into the snow cave. The distance between the cave and the rope was about five meters, with Jieyu Flower holding the other end of the rope.

  The snow on the edge of the cave kept pouring in, not a sound was heard. I wasn't even sure if passerby A had been knocked unconscious by the snow. The rope was thrown down for half a day, and there was no reaction at all. Just as I was about to shout again, I saw that not far from the snowy cave, a hole had actually collapsed, and in this hole, a person's head suddenly popped out.

  A head poked out of the snow, with a face that couldn't be seen clearly, but those glasses with a special glare were particularly eye-catching. Then, two hands also stretched out from the snowy hole, and with a burst of strength, the entire body sprang out of the hole.