Unparalleled medical and martial arts skills, saving the CEO's fiancée at the start.

After driving for almost a day, it was already completely dark when we reached the outskirts of the old town on the south bank.

This area was even more desolate than Ye Chen had imagined.

Apart from a few half-dead streetlights, there were large areas of bulldozed ruins along the way.

Broken walls, rubble, and rusty corrugated iron fences looked like piles of dead objects washed ashore by the waves in the night.

In the distance, barges slowly passed by on the river, their lights flickering like ghostly flames before disappearing.

The air was filled with the smells of silt, diesel fuel, and damp earth from the rainy weather, mixed with a very faint fishy smell from the river breeze.

Song Tiezhu's men had already arrived and rented two inconspicuous houses on the outskirts of the old city.

The house is old, with badly peeling paint, but the doors and windows are intact, and there is a small yard in the back where you can park.

Han Song and several veterans kept watch on the perimeter. When they saw Ye Chen's car approaching, they used their walkie-talkies to announce that the truck had entered the alley, and the group dispersed like water into sand.

When Jiang Ruoxi got out of the car, she stepped on a broken tile and swayed.

Ye Chen helped her up and asked in a low voice, "Are you tired?"

Jiang Ruoxi shook her head and simply wrapped her trench coat tighter around herself.

The ghost servant didn't rush into the house. He stood at the alley entrance, sniffed, and looked up at the sky.

He turned and came in, closing the door behind him. He said to Ye Chen, "This place is not right. There are not many people on the surface of the old city, but there is the smell of fire burning downwind, as well as a very faint smell of kerosene lamps. This means that there are people living nearby, and they are people living underground. We have already been drawn in. From now on, we must act like cats."

The group ate some dry rations in silence.

Han Song laid a hand-drawn sketch on the wooden table, marking the main alleys of the old city and the approximate location of the fish warehouse that Tu Er had mentioned.

He said, "During the day, I had two brothers disguise themselves as scavengers and go in to look around. There was no one in the alleys near the river, but there was a black jacket hanging out to dry, half-dry, and a well. The well ring was new, but the water was murky. Tu Er said the fish warehouse was behind, and we had to cross a ditch first. Tonight, we'll explore it first, without taking any action, just to memorize the route."

Ye Chen nodded, selected Gui Pu, Han Song, and Ayiguli, and then asked Song Tiezhu to choose four nimble veterans to follow.

Jiang Ruoxi wanted to go too, but Ye Chen stopped her: "Tonight we'll just scout ahead, we won't bring anyone. We'll take you after we've thoroughly understood the terrain. You stay here, with Brother Song and the veteran guarding the area, it's the safest place."

Jiang Ruoxi opened her mouth, but in the end she didn't argue with him. She just pulled him aside and put a tiny brass whistle in his hand: "Blow it if you need anything, I can hear you."

Ye Chen hung the whistle around his neck and then playfully flicked her nose: "Give your man some face, don't make it look like you're sending him off to war."

Jiang Ruoxi rolled her eyes at him and ignored him, but the worry in her eyes was so deep it couldn't be hidden.

As night fell, Ye Chen and his group, like several dark shadows, crept along the broken walls and piles of rubble towards the riverbank.

The alleys in the old city are crooked and twisted, and many places have been demolished to the point that only narrow gaps remain, so dark that moonlight cannot see in and you cannot see your hand in front of your face.

The ghost servant walked in front, relying entirely on memory and scent to find his way.

Ye Chen followed behind him, and behind them were Ayiguli and Han Song.

The four veterans, two in front and two behind, moved with a gait as light as a cat's.

After walking for about 15 minutes, the ghost servant suddenly stopped.

He slowly squatted down, picked up a clump of soil from the base of the wall, smelled it, and pointed to the left.

Ye Chen looked in the direction he pointed and indeed there was a drainage ditch covered by rubble.

There was an iron fence at the mouth of the ditch, two of which had been pried off, just enough for one person to bend over and crawl through.

Ye Chen peered inside and listened for a while. He could hear very faint sounds of flowing water and wind, along with the smell of dead fish.

"This is the one," Han Song said in a low voice.

The group crawled into the dark ditch one by one. The ditch was extremely narrow, and they could only crawl on all fours.

The water underfoot was shallow, but icy cold and had an indescribable slippery feel.

After climbing for about a hundred steps, light appeared ahead. It was a small, downward-sloping opening, half-covered by an old wooden plank, from which a very faint kerosene lamp shone.

The ghost servant gently lifted the wooden plank, and the group filed out, standing in a narrower alley.

On either side of the alley are two old walls, the corners of which are covered with black moss, and a few old bamboo poles are laid across the top, with a few pieces of cloth of indistinguishable color hanging out to dry.

At the end of the alley was a narrow door covered in rust.

"Fishing warehouse," Ye Chen said in a low voice.

The door was half-open, and the space behind it seemed extremely empty.

He didn't rush in, but instead went around to the side, climbed over the wall by the brickwork, and peeked inside.

Below was an abandoned warehouse, filled with rotten fishing nets and broken boat planks. In the very center was a hole about the size of a well, covered by half an iron plate.

Two black snakes, each as thick as a wrist, were coiled around the edge of the cave, one on the left and one on the right, their heads facing outwards and their tails hidden in the shadows.

The snake remained motionless, like two sections of oil-soaked iron chains.

Ye Chen slowly stepped back and whispered the situation to everyone.

The ghost servant sneered: "As expected, it's a black vine. This thing is afraid of realgar, and even more afraid of the snake-repelling powder from Medicine King Valley. I brought it with me before I came down, but I can't touch it now. If Wen Jiuhong's men are down there, they'll be startled faster than people when the snake makes a sound."

Han Song said, "Then let's wait for them to change shifts. Tu Er said that this place is guarded day and night, and the shift change at the entrance is at 1-3 AM. Let's wait another half hour."

Ye Chen nodded in agreement.

The crowd huddled in the shadows of the alleyway, like stones that blended into the wall.

A night breeze blew from the river, causing the few tattered pieces of cloth above the alley to flutter wildly.

Ye Chen leaned against the wall, his hand resting on the Ku Zhao sword, glancing at the luminous watch on Han Song's wrist out of the corner of his eye.

With Jiang Ruoxi not by his side, he became even quieter. Su Qinghan's words slowly surfaced in his mind: "Upside-down gourd" was the place where the people of Blackwater Pass were held.

His father was probably imprisoned here back then.

Could there still be traces of his father beneath this well?

Ye Chen closed his eyes and slowed his breathing to its lowest point.

No matter what you see later, you must not panic.

He came to uproot the problem, not to die.

Time grinds away inch by inch in the darkness.

Finally, Han Song touched him.

The hour of Chou (1-3 AM) has arrived.

Very light footsteps came from the well, and two dark figures walked from the other end of the warehouse, exchanging a few words in hushed tones with the person guarding the snake.

The snake keeper picked up a small lamp, waved it towards the well opening, and then withdrew it.

A few minutes later, the two people taking over the shift stood still, and the original two people slowly walked out.

Ye Chen seized the opportunity and waved his hand.

Aygul and Ghost Servant simultaneously shot into the warehouse like arrows, heading straight for the two people who hadn't gone far.

With just two very soft thuds, the person collapsed.

Ye Chen and Han Song then flanked from the flank and pinned the person who had just taken over the shift at the wellhead to the ground.

The ghost servant scattered a handful of snake-repelling powder, and the two black hairs, as if scalded by fire, instantly shrank into the cave and disappeared without a trace.

Ye Chen squatted at the well opening and looked down.

In the darkness, there was a distant, cool breeze, as if rising from the bottom of water.

Ye Chen knew that the deepest part of the Blackwater was right beneath his feet.

He looked up at the crowd and said in a low voice, "Down."

Then the first one flipped over.