Mysterious Country 1: Mist-Shrouded Champa,Volume 4: Chapter 2: The Telescope Project

The Russian White Bear scratched the four letters “MOHO” on the ground with his dagger. Only Yu Feiyan understood his meaning. This was an unacceptable fact: the bottom of the giant rift valley in Savage Mountain was composed of rock forming material. The six survivors of the expedition team had unknowingly penetrated deep into the “Mohorovičić discontinuity” between the mantle and the crust. To explain this matter, we must go back to the early 1950s. At that time, the two major opposing camps of the Soviet Union and the United States, driven by Cold War thinking, poured enormous financial and material resources into endless arms race competition. Military scientific research also advanced at a nearly deformed speed. Both sides exhausted every means to develop various strategic resources.

At that time, the Soviet Union had a secret plan codenamed “Earth Telescope.” The southern and eastern parts of Soviet territory were vast, surrounded by mountain ranges, with numerous natural caves and mines. To outpace the United States in mastering the abundant resources hidden in the depths of the earth, as well as the unknown world that humanity had never contacted, the Soviets used heavy drilling machinery and equipment in a dry valley within a natural basin, secretly carrying out an unprecedented depth excavation.

This project took nearly twenty years. The cave they dug reached a vertical depth of thirteen thousand meters, making it the deepest known cave in the world. Because it involved highly classified military secrets, the “Earth Telescope” plan was always conducted under absolutely closed conditions. Very few people outside knew the inside story.

White Bear Chegnev specialized in blasting and geological drilling. During the final phase of the “Earth Telescope” project, he had participated in it and came into contact with many related secrets. Humanity had designed astronomical telescopes that could use the naked eye to pry into the secrets of the starry universe, but human eyes could not penetrate the ground. Therefore they called the abyss that penetrated the earth’s layers the “Earth Telescope,” which could be used to directly observe subterranean materials.

According to different underground depths, the material composition was completely different. It was not solid soil and rock all the way down. Generally speaking, there were roughly three layers. The outermost was called the crust. Deep inside was the central layer of the mantle. Wrapped inside the mantle was the core. The boundary between the mantle and the different materials of the upper and lower layers was called the discontinuity. The outer one was named the “Mohorovičić discontinuity,” and the deeper one was the “Gutenberg discontinuity.” Back then, the Soviets excavated to more than ten thousand meters underground, obtained samples from the mantle below the “Mohorovičić discontinuity,” and discovered that the subterranean depths contained large amounts of radioactive material, causing the rock forming material to resemble paraffin wax. It was neither rock nor sand. Perhaps it contained microorganisms, which caused it to show rare liver colored stains. In appearance it looked like decayed artificial leather, completely different from the common geological formations in the Savage Mountain caves. White Bear had seen samples in the Soviet Union and knew that this kind of underground material boundary line had global characteristics. However, as surface regions differed, the depth of the Mohorovičić interface also changed. If this were in the Savage Mountain of Myanmar, one would need to penetrate at least ten thousand meters underground before this special material could appear.

Yu Feiyan raised her head and looked at that hanging crack in the rock amid the rain and mist. The astonishment in her heart was beyond description. At this time, wind and rain were raging outside the mountain, with thunder and lightning interweaving. She could not use the flash of lightning to estimate by sight. She only saw the altitude reading on her watch showing that the vertical drop between the cave bottom and the exit was approximately five to six thousand feet. Moreover, the top of the rift valley itself was located at a relatively high altitude in Savage Mountain. Subtracting the mountain body height, the distance to the ground could not exceed three thousand feet. This depth was certainly absolutely not shallow, but the transformation of the stratum material clearly indicated that everyone had already penetrated more than thirty thousand feet underground. That meant the depth they perceived was not even a fraction of the actual depth. Inside this abyss like rift valley, it seemed all logic and common sense had lost their meaning, making it completely impossible to judge what kind of situation they were actually facing.

Yu Feiyan’s heart was filled with confusion. She briefly explained to the others what White Bear had discovered. But Sima Hui and the others had limited education. Apart from knowing that one kilometer was roughly more than three thousand feet, how could they understand what the “Mohorovičić discontinuity” and “Earth Telescope” referred to? Perhaps if they used the unclear term “chaotic material,” they might understand a bit better.

Luo Big Tongue said: “We’ve already stepped on the bottom now, so what does it matter how deep it is? I really don’t understand what’s worth worrying about in this kind of thing. Falling from two thousand meters is death, falling from ten thousand plus meters is also death. You’ll definitely end up with your body shattered to pieces and blood splattering in all directions. Anyway, you can’t see what you look like after the fall, so there’s no need to overly consider the depth of this subterranean cave.”

Sima Hui thought for a moment and said: “There should still be a difference. Falling from two thousand meters, at most you scream once and before you have time to feel sad, you’re permanently healthy. But if you really fell from tens of thousands of meters in free fall, first you scream a few times, then take out a cigarette and light it up, then pick up a pen and write a will, settle your affairs, then review your entire military career in the tropical jungle. But when you look down, you’re still not even halfway to the bottom.”

Yu Feiyan saw that these two simply didn’t understand, so she said: “Whether it’s geological variation within Savage Mountain or our own sense of space becoming disordered, those are problems to consider later. Matters have priorities and urgencies. Right now, searching for the missing Mosquito transport plane is still the most pressing matter.”

She saw that the underground marsh stretched endlessly, with vegetation and darkness obstructing the search. Under these conditions, wanting to find the target was almost like a golden needle entering the sea, leaving people with no way to start. All the traditional methods of searching for tombs and digging for treasure in the mountains were completely useless here. There was simply no strategy to employ.

Sima Hui had followed the expedition team into the deep mountains and discovered that Yu Feiyan’s group of tomb robbers did indeed have some skills. But their traditional experience and techniques seemed not applicable in the Myanmar jungle. Initially, when Master Jiang decided to take the route through the “Elephant Gate” valley, he had committed a great taboo. During Sima Hui’s years with the Burmese Communist guerrillas, apart from killing and arson, his experience in “jungle warfare, wilderness survival, rescue searches, and direction identification” could also be described as thoroughly understood. He told Yu Feiyan: “The terrain in the Myanmar mountain regions is extremely complex. To ensure safety, one must try to follow these principles: walk high not low, walk large not small, walk lengthwise not crosswise, walk through forests not through grass.”

Now the expedition team was at the bottom of the giant rift valley in Savage Mountain. Wanting to search for the Mosquito special transport plane here, they had violated at least three of these four taboos. First, by entering the cave, they had walked low. Second, limited by terrain and environment, their field of vision was too narrow. Third, this underground area was entirely marsh covered with dense sawtooth grass, making it easy to suffer crocodile ambushes. One could say their situation was evil to the extreme.

When Sima Hui mentioned the crocodiles hidden in the marsh, everyone’s faces changed color. Back then in Myanmar, more than two thousand fully armed Japanese soldiers had mistakenly entered a marsh. Because there were too many wounded soldiers and the bloody smell on their bodies was strong, they attracted large numbers of crocodiles. In less than half an hour, all two thousand plus people were completely fed to the crocodiles. According to crocodile habits, when they discover prey, they don’t immediately launch an attack. They first observe for a while. But once one of them lunges first, it will immediately attract more of its kind to rush forward and compete. What kind of consequences would occur then naturally needed no explanation.

Sima Hui continued: “Currently we only know that the missing transport plane roughly landed in the southern end of the rift valley. But this subterranean cave is empty and deep. With just us few people and our guns, groping through the marsh in the rain and darkness, how long will it take to find it?”

Yu Feiyan’s heart went cold halfway through Sima Hui’s words. She said dejectedly: “According to what you say, we don’t have any chance of finding that Mosquito transport plane?”

Sima Hui said: “The more adverse the situation, the more opportunities will come knocking. Previously I also had no way, but after entering the marsh, I suddenly thought of a method. Perhaps it will work.”

British colonialists had ruled Myanmar for nearly a hundred years. During World War II, the British army fighting against the Japanese in Myanmar reached an unprecedented scale of over one million. Of course, most of these soldiers came from British colonies. Though they fought for Great Britain, many had never set foot on British soil in their entire lives, and couldn’t even clearly say where Britain was.

Among the numerous British colonies, the British valued India the most for its vast territory. Myanmar was also India’s natural strategic barrier, and at that time was established as a province of India. So the British had managed Myanmar for many years, making it once the wealthiest country in Southeast Asia. This period of colonial rule had an extremely profound influence on Myanmar. To this day, within Myanmar’s borders, many roads, railways, and airports were built by the British. Even more countless weapons were scattered everywhere, including heavy artillery, tanks, and fighter planes.

Even if Sima Hui didn’t understand British circumstances, after participating in the Burmese Communist People’s Army for so many years, he was extremely familiar with all kinds of British made weapons. Among them, he had seen no small number of Mosquito planes. Previously when following troops marching through deep mountains and dense forests, he occasionally encountered some crashed Mosquito bomber wreckage, and heavy bombs that had been dropped back then but hadn’t exploded. Soldiers in the Burmese Communist People’s Army, upon seeing Mosquito outer shells, would dismantle them and take them away. Relatively intact ones could be sold in the market for money or goods. Because the light plywood used in this kind of plane was entirely made from a wood called balsa, equivalent to the Asian paulownia. This wood doesn’t warp or crack, is easy to process, has good resonance properties, and is not easily deformed or combustible. It is very suitable for making furniture or repairing houses. If you saw simple furniture made from old plywood splicing in local homes, without asking you would know the material definitely came from the British Royal Air Force’s “Mosquitoes.” These matters were common knowledge, the most ordinary and unremarkable things. What was special about them? But Sima Hui had received the teachings of a Golden Dot master and understood the principles of “Xiang Wu.” That was the foundation upon which his ancestors built their family business. In the present world, apart from him, no one else possessed this skill. As for what “Xiang Wu” was: in ancient times there were physiognomists who read living people’s faces, using facial features and complexion to determine people’s fortunes and misfortunes. There were also “Xiang Di” earth masters, who through the layout of feng shui formations could distinguish mountains and rivers and geography. There were even more miscellaneous items like reading cats, reading oxen, reading horses. Actually, when summarized, all these ancient methods belonged to the path of “Xiang Wu.”

The “Xiang Wu” path of old times, as the name suggests: “Xiang” means to look with the eyes. “Wu” covers a broad range. Between heaven and earth, whether living or dead, all are “Wu.” Whatever is a thing must have its nature, none not conforming to the principles of yin and yang, facing and turning away. The ancients once explained the principle of “Xiang Wu” thus: “Heaven and earth are fundamentally without action, assisting the nature of all things to complete them, pointing out all things, observing their subtle transformations, distinguishing temporal numbers of auspiciousness and inauspiciousness, responding like divine observation.”

These words were too profound. If we speak more plainly, we might use a more intuitive example to describe: “Take a drop of tears stored in a test tube to a laboratory. One can very easily analyze its chemical composition, learning what molecules this drop of tears is composed of. But why did this drop of tears emerge from within the human body? Was it from sadness or joy? Even with the most advanced scientific methods, it is completely impossible to distinguish. This is knowing its form but not knowing its nature. What can be seen and touched is always easy to identify, but the intangible and invisible temperament is difficult to judge. Only through the ancient method of Xiang Wu observation and analysis can one achieve this. The saying goes: observe its form, know its nature; know its nature, then one can fully understand its principles; fully understand its principles, and ultimately one can obtain its Dao.”

Although Sima Hui’s comprehension of this family transmitted skill was not deep, having only acquired some superficial aspects, merely reaching the shallow level of “observe its form, know its nature.” But when he placed himself in the underground marsh, carefully distinguishing the surrounding conditions, he couldn’t help but see it with his eyes and be moved in his heart. He knew that the material used to manufacture the Mosquito special transport plane had another characteristic: if balsa plywood was stored in a damp and lightless environment, the longer the years passed, the more yin the wood’s nature would become. If the Mosquito transport plane had fallen in the depths of this rift valley for decades, even the sinister wood buried deep in the underground forest for a thousand years could not compare to it.

The sawtooth grass and reeds in this marsh also all subtly conformed to the principles of transformation and change. If in a normal environment, within the same clump of reeds, the side facing north would be lush and dense, while the side facing south would appear slightly sparse. However, in the giant rift valley of Savage Mountain, which was covered by dense fog all year round, the vegetation growth patterns did not distinguish between north and south. But that Mosquito transport plane missing for over twenty years must certainly be the place with the heaviest darkness in this entire region. In other words, it was the “yin pole.” The reeds facing it would inevitably appear slightly sparse. If one carefully distinguished, it would not be difficult to find the correct orientation of the Mosquito transport plane.

If Sima Hui and the others hadn’t followed the Burmese Communist guerrillas, rolling and crawling through deep mountains and old forests for many years, and also understood a few tricks of Xiang Wu, they could not have possessed this special experience. With a strategy in his chest, Sima Hui feared that delay would bring changes, so he immediately took the lead to walk forward. He told Yu Feiyan and the others: “You just follow me and walk. Today there will definitely be results.”

And he instructed: “When walking in the mud marsh, one should advance in single file. The distance between people should not exceed one arm’s length. And one must pull the leg lightly, land the foot steadily. All personal items such as firearms, backpacks, and canteens must be kept tightly against the body. Anything taller than the head or wider than the shoulders must be discarded. This way, in case of sudden situations like falling or sinking, one can as much as possible ensure that the equipment carried on the body won’t be lost or scattered. It can also avoid making too much noise from brushing against and colliding with the grass, which might attract crocodiles, and is conducive to swift action.”

After Sima Hui finished speaking, he immediately used his hunting knife to cut a section of dry branch, stepped into the mud to probe the path. He searched for the area in this marsh where the sinister and decaying atmosphere was heaviest, walking slowly step by step. The others followed closely behind, passing through clump after clump of dense sawtooth grass. In the pitch blackness, they didn’t know how many li they had traveled, when they saw in the depths of the wild grass, a massive object lying horizontally.

With the help of the searchlight beam, examining its outline and shape, it faintly resembled the appearance of a Mosquito special transport plane. It had lain here motionless, sleeping for over twenty years. The fuselage was already half sunk in the mud marsh. The surroundings were all uneven wax like substances, with almost no gaps to be found. And many stone stalagmites emerged from the wetland surface, covered with moss like gelatinous substances, looking like candle wax. The Burmese called them “water candles.” Actually they were the nests of a kind of flying moth called “mirror moths.”

The group had just walked near when they startled countless moths into scattering in all directions. In the rain and mist filling the sky, they fell one after another into the nearby reed clusters. Many moths dampened by the rain, seeing light beams swaying in the darkness, clumsily flew toward the searchlight and collided with it. The moth wings had white spots, transparent as mirrors, all things grown from damp and decayed places. “Water candles” were formed from the phosphorus powder on night moths’ bodies solidifying. Even in the pitch black rain and mist they would emit cold light. But in this special environment, it was difficult to see them from a distance. Perhaps one would only discover them within a distance of several tens of meters. This Mosquito special transport plane had slept underground for many years. Even though balsa wood had been processed, in excessively humid and hot underground conditions, it was extremely prone to decay. Now the surrounding area had long become a gathering place for large numbers of “mirror moths.”

But Sima Hui and the others had no time to brush away the night moths flying onto their bodies. Braving the rain, they raised their lights to examine. The fuselage before them was covered with moss and ancient vines, but using the duck billed shovel to clear away the vegetation, the transport plane’s tightly closed cabin door was revealed. Examining the various characteristics, it was indeed the “Mosquito” that the expedition team was searching for. When everyone reached this point, they couldn’t stop their hearts from pounding wildly.

Yu Feiyan reached out and touched the cold, slippery fuselage, seeing the moth nests also covering it. Though this was within expectations, her confusion was even deeper: “The real Mosquito transport plane indeed fell in this rift valley over twenty years ago. Could it be that what the Black Snake II collided with in the dense fog was truly a ghost?”

She was eager to see whether the cargo in the cabin was intact, so she urged Luo Big Tongue to pry open the cabin door.

Luo Big Sea had no choice but to hand the hunting rifle to Sima Hui, take the duck billed shovel and pry at the cabin door. Following a low, muffled sound of rusted friction, the transport plane’s cabin door was pried open by him into a large crack. Immediately a pungent musty smell emerged from inside. The searchlight beam seemed to be swallowed by darkness, completely unable to see the situation inside the cabin.

Sima Hui saw that the situation was unclear, so he stopped Luo Big Tongue, telling him not to enter rashly. He himself quietly approached, trying to see the interior of the transport plane as clearly as possible. He raised the searchlight, looked inward, and saw that the cabin was dark and silent. The distant areas were unclear, and the nearby areas also showed no abnormal conditions. He suddenly sensed something moving before him, but the searchlight in his hand was as dim as if it had been extinguished, completely unable to see what was before him.

Sima Hui vaguely felt something was wrong in his heart. He immediately wanted to withdraw and retreat. But who knew that suddenly a mass of black, hazy things surged out from the cabin. Before he could dodge, his body seemed to be firmly gripped by iron pincers. He only felt an extreme cold piercing his bones, his chest suffocating, instantly unable to even catch his breath. And his body was like being seized by a tremendous force, involuntarily being dragged toward the depths of the cabin. He hurriedly raised his hand to block, but when he pushed with his hand, what he touched was an empty void of nothingness. There was only dense fog.

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Translation Notes:

“Mohorovičić discontinuity” (摩霍不延续面): The boundary between Earth’s crust and mantle, named after Croatian seismologist Andrija Mohorovičić. In the story, the characters have somehow descended to this impossible depth.

“Earth Telescope” (地球望远镜): A fictionalized version of the real Soviet Kola Superdeep Borehole project, the deepest man made hole in the world. The real project reached about 12,262 meters deep. The story exaggerates this to 13,000 meters and adds supernatural elements.

“Gutenberg discontinuity” (古登堡不延续面): The boundary between Earth’s mantle and outer core, named after seismologist Beno Gutenberg.

“Permanently healthy” (永久健康): A dark euphemism for death. The phrase comes from Chinese bureaucratic language where “永久健康” was once used in official documents to describe deceased leaders, becoming a sardonic way to say someone died.