Mist hurried to Song Heping's side.
"Check this out."
Song Heping pointed upward.
Following his gaze, Mist saw a ventilation fan, about 60 centiters in diater.
"A ventilation shaft?!"
Mist's eyes lit up.
"Did you plan this all along?"
"Not really," Song Heping said. "When I ca in, I thought there had to be a ventilation system. Otherwise, wouldn't people suffocate in such a big cave?"
"You're willing to bet on that?" Mist said. "Unless you have the blueprints for this place, how can you be sure it leads out?"
"I really don't know."
Song Heping moved closer to the wall and looked up.
Through the rotating blades, he could faintly see that there was space above.
A 0.6-ter-diater tunnel might just allow an adult to squeeze through.
He turned to size up Mist.
Mist wasn't one of those particularly tall and stout Caucasians; he should be able to crawl through.
And Rabbani, even less to worry about.
There weren't many overweight people in Afghanistan.
"Let's get to work."
He walked over to a table and pulled it over.
While dragging it, he said, "Hurry up. If you don't want to die, follow out. Everyone co help."
Rabbani snapped out of his daze.
Crawling through a duct?
It seed feasible.
Better than sitting here waiting to die.
Nowadays, there were no tracking devices, and there was no signal in this place.
They couldn't even find a single mobile phone on the bodies.
Let alone sothing like GPS.
In fact, Song Heping was well aware that even if they had mobile phones, it would be useless.
In such a deep mountainous area, being at least two hundred ters inside the mountain, there would be no signal.
Even if Mist hadn't dropped his treasured device into a latrine pit, it would be of no use here.
"We need to stop this thing."
Mist pointed at the fan.
Song Heping looked at the rotating blades and started searching around.
Eventually, he found a rechargeable ergency lamp, picked up a cutting knife, and handed the lamp to Mist.
Then, he climbed onto the table and ripped out the fan's power cord with one tug.
As the ventilation fan slowly stopped spinning, Song Heping used all his might to jab his knife into the edge of the fan and pried it open.
The ventilation equipnt here was crudely installed, so it didn't take him much effort to pry open one corner of the fan.
The whole fan was actually clamped onto the top and then tamped down with no screws at all, he felt like he was prying open a tire that was leaking air.
This was a factory that had been converted from a cave in Afghanistan; you couldn't expect delicate craftsmanship in such a place.
Song Heping grabbed the loosened ventilation fan and pulled it down forcefully.
Chi la—
Dust and sand poured down, and the fan ca off with them.
Song Heping threw the exhaust fan on the ground and gestured for Mist to hand him the ergency lamp, then turned on the lamp and shone it into the vent.
The ventilation duct extended upward but seed to narrow the higher it went.
"Damn it!"
Song Heping felt his heart drop.
If it was too narrow, it ant they wouldn't be able to get through and would get stuck in the middle.
Were they really going to die here today?
"What's wrong?"
Standing by the table, Mist looked up with concern and asked, "What's the problem?"
"This passage gets narrower the higher up. I reckon none of us can get through!"
Mist broke out into a cold sweat.
Then, more banging on the door ca from outside.
"Thank goodness they haven't found a machine gun yet..."
Mist wiped the sweat off his forehead.
"Are we going to die here today?"
He couldn't help but give a wry smile.
Song Heping continued to shine the light into the ventilation shaft.
About five ters up, the beam seed to catch a shadow.
This caught Song Heping's attention.
The presence of a shadow ant either the wall of the shaft was uneven or there was a recessed area.
Song Heping raised the light above his head and stretched it into the shaft.
With this illumination, he finally saw the spot clearly, and his blood surged with excitent.
"There's a horizontal opening about four or five ters up!"
Biting the ergency light, Song Heping said to Mist, "I'll climb up first. You keep watch here. If you see enter, that ans it's passable for people."
Mist at first was pleased, but then he imdiately beca worried again: "Where does that sideways duct go? Can people fit through? If we can't, we'll all get stuck inside, unable to go forward or back, waiting for soone to drop a hand grenade and kill us..."
Song Heping was incredibly anxious and couldn't stand to hear Mist speak so pessimistically. With a stern face, He said, "Then you stay here and wait for them to blow open the door with a machine gun, and co in to torture you slowly to death before cutting off your head. I am not going to wait here to die!"
Without wasting any more words with Lao Mi, he bit the ergency light and leapt up, propping his elbows against the wall of the shaft.
It must be said, most people certainly wouldn't be able to sustain themselves like this.
Fortunately, as a forr special soldier, Song Heping had no problem with arm strength.
"Lao Mi, co give a push!"
Mist hurriedly climbed onto the table and gave him a push, and Song Heping easily crawled into the vertical ventilation duct.
He braced himself against the walls of the duct and said, "Lao Mi, you'll be the last to enter, Rabbani goes first, and you'll give him a hand."
Mist cursed, "FUCK, I'm your teammate!"
Song Heping said, "You're telling you can't move a chair over to stand on when it's your turn to go in?!"
Mist was suddenly speechless: "..."
When with Song Heping, Mist always ended up the loser in any argunt.
Song Heping carefully navigated the narrow and dark passageway, as if each step was entering an unknown domain.
What was waiting for him ahead?
Could a person enter that horizontal ventilation shaft?
Was it like this duct, narrowing further inwards, impossible to pass through?
A series of questions flashed through his mind.
But now was not the ti to think about these things.
During his training, Song Heping had been told by his instructor that no matter how skilled a person was, they still needed a bit of luck.
Because experience and expertise may not solve all problems, at certain critical monts, what often determined victory or defeat was luck.
Song Heping rembered the words of the fortune-teller from his village.
The blind man had told him that he would have great luck when he grew up, a future without limits.
Let's assu what he said was true then.
Good words should be heeded, bad ones regarded as superstition.
He kept giving himself ntal suggestions, telling himself it would be okay! It would be okay! There must be a way out!
The duct was eerily silent.
Song Heping could even hear his own heartbeat and breathing echoing in the silent duct, each beat reminding him of his own existence.
He bit down hard on the ergency light, its beam flickering uncertainly in the darkness, illuminating the path ahead.
About forty seconds later, he reached the entrance of the horizontal ventilation shaft.
He quickly shone the ergency light into the shaft to check inside.
The scene in front almost made him cry out like the crow in the fable.
There was a passage wider than the vertical vent he'd been in!
He felt his head heating up, the temperature rising rapidly—this was the physiological response caused by blood rushing to his head.
After adjusting his position a bit, Song Heping pushed forward and finally squeezed in.
The horizontal ventilation duct was actually a ter wide!
It was spacious enough for Song Heping to prop himself up a little, the previous sense of constriction swept away.
Looking ahead, wherever the light reached, there was a passageway about a ter in diater.
The walls of the duct seed to be naturally ford.
The previous vertical duct was man-made, which showed there had originally been a cave here, only to be later modified by the Revolutionary Brigade.
It might have been created during the Soviet Union's invasion period or it might be newer.
But none of that mattered now!
None of it mattered anymore!
The most important thing was there was a way out!
He felt an unprecedented sense of relief and joy.
"Lao Mi, hurry up here, this duct is long and wide, we might really find an exit!"
He called out loudly to Mist and Rabbani, then continued crawling forward.
Now, the only thing to worry about was whether there were snakes in the duct.
Encountering a snake in a narrow tunnel was like opening the door to unluckiness—complete misfortune!
It took about two more minutes for Rabbani and Mist to co up.
Every second that passed while Song Heping waited in the duct put enormous pressure on him.
If they hadn't fully escaped by the ti the door was breached, the guards of the Revolutionary Brigade would surely discover this entrance quickly.
Just one grenade thrown in here would be enough for the three of them.
Indeed, luck did play a role on the battlefield.
When Mist and Rabbani finally climbed up, there still seed to be no movent in the loading workshop below.
Song Heping felt that he should thank the worker who made that door, for crafting its quality so well.
If not, they'd have been sure to die here within days.
The three of them continued along the horizontal duct.
Song Heping could sll the sweat on his body and the pit-pat of drops falling into the soil.
Finally, after crawling another forty ters, Song Heping suddenly realized there was no way forward!
"Why did you stop?!"
When Song Heping stopped, Mist behind him realized sothing was wrong.
Song Heping said, "There's no way ahead!"
"Damn it! How could this happen!"
Mist started pounding the floor.
Song Heping crawled forward to check the end of the duct, realizing it was indeed a dead end.
There was a way.
Above, a duct; below, another.
Song Heping illuminated the shaft above.
After seeing it clearly, his heart almost leapt out of his chest.
Just like the passage in the loading room, the further up it went, the narrower it got, no way to crawl through.
He could only look down toward the opening below, hoping for a miracle.
Because judging from the general direction, the one going downward would definitely lead back into the factory.
Had they crawled all the way out just to go back in?
Wasn't that like throwing themselves into the lion's den?
"Lao Mi, there's good news and bad news, which do you want to hear first?"
He turned his head, chuckled softly, and said to Mist, "We have to make a choice now."
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