Feng Yi woke up to find that the "family tree" had closed up.
The stone platform above had returned to its original state, sealing the "family tree" inside.
The stone column slowly sank until it became flush with the ground.
Feng Yi crouched down to take a closer look, even worried that his eyes were deceiving him, he took out his phone and used the high-definition camera to zoom in on the floor, trying to discern every detail.
However, no matter whether it was with the naked eye or the phone's high-definition camera, what he saw and captured was a solid piece of ground without any fine lines, let alone cracks.
It was as if everything he had experienced was an illusion.
After searching the room thoroughly several times, he still did not find any suspicious traces.
Feng Yi glanced at the time on his phone.
He had actually been here all night!
Now it was seven o'clock the next morning!
He might have just been standing here all night! Yet his body felt no stiffness or discomfort!
Unable to find more clues, Feng Yi had no choice but to give up and walk towards the mechanism that opened the door in the wall.
The door moved aside automatically.
As he approached the door, the lights that were on inside the room extinguished one by one, until when he had completely stepped out and the moving door closed automatically, the secret room was plunged into darkness.
Exiting the room, noise came from the courtyard outside.
"Good morning, Mute Uncle. Is it foggy?" asked Feng Yi.
"It will clear up soon," Mute Uncle's phone voiced out.
The fog blocked the sunlight, but the dawn had arrived, and through the gradually thinning fog, one could see the orange and gold hues of the morning sky.
In the old house's courtyard, all sorts of flowers, grass, and trees—big and small leaves alike—were covered with droplets of water. Yesterday's parched soil had either turned to mud or changed shape due to the moisture.
"Did it rain last night?" Feng Yi was surprised. He had checked the weather forecast, which had predicted clear skies for the next few days!
But he had also heard from others that the weather on the mountain was unpredictable, liable to change at any moment, and the local forecasts often changed multiple times a day.
So, Feng Yi simply asked casually.
Mute Uncle quickly typed out a message on his phone, which then turned into a voice: "Breakfast is buns and noodles, left in the kitchen for you to eat. They're all saved for you, don't go hungry, eat it all up! I'm off to pick some tea leaves in the tea garden."
"There's a tea garden here? Need any help? I'm not hungry right now," asked Feng Yi.
"No, you're hungry!" Mute Uncle replied.
Feng Yi wanted to say something else, but Mute Uncle waved his hand and walked out with his bamboo basket.
Seeing this, Feng Yi could only give up; he had been thinking of helping and taking the opportunity to gather some information.
The kitchen was easy to find, but the amount of food on the kitchen table exceeded his understanding.
A large porcelain bowl. Or rather, a large porcelain basin, so big he didn't know where it was purchased from, nearly the size of an adult's washbowl, filled to the brim with handmade noodles.
A large steamer. Inside were 10 buns with thin skins and generous fillings, each about the size of his palm, all stuffed with meat.
Feng Yi's eyes went wide.
What kind of misunderstanding did Mute Uncle have about him?
Why would he think he could eat so much?
Back when he was in school and working part-time filming commercials, he had to manage his figure with strict diet control, and until now, his appetite hadn't increased by much.
With his appetite, a normal serving of noodle soup with one bun... at most two, would suffice.
Food shouldn't be wasted!
So Feng Yi, very sensibly, took a regular-sized noodle bowl from the cupboard, portioned out some noodles from the large basin, grabbed a bun and began eating.
As he ate, he realized he had finished all his food.
And he still felt a bit hungry.
He portioned out another bowl, grabbed another bun, and continued eating.
The hunger grew more apparent.
15 minutes later.
Feng Yi looked at the large porcelain basin, not a drop of soup remaining, and at the empty steamer, and went silent.
Elsewhere.
Mute Uncle carried the bamboo basket to the tea garden.
Overnight, many new shoots had sprouted on the tea bushes.
The large leaves were covered in droplets.
Dew slid along the edge of the leaves, gathered, and swayed at the tip of the leaves.
The morning glow, piercing the mist, created strange rays of light in the clear droplets.
Mute Uncle's aged eyes watched the tea garden as the fog began to dissipate and he smiled, taking out a specially made carrying basket and strapping it to his front while weaving through the tea bushes.
He picked tea with both hands simultaneously, focusing only on the newly grown sprigs from the branches.
With each swipe, multiple fresh green buds leapt into his carrying basket.
His arms moved so fast that all that could be seen were blurred fan-shaped shadows and a sequence of faint clicking sounds.
Much neater than a robot vacuum's brushes.
His clothes quickly became damp with dew, and the carrying basket filled up with shoots at a visibly fast rate before he tipped it into the larger basket and continued the next round.
By the time Mute Uncle returned from picking tea, Feng Yi was sitting on the stone steps at the doorway lost in thought, as if contemplating some profound philosophy of life.
Seeing Mute Uncle, Feng Yi snapped to, glanced at the time on his phone and said, "You finished picking tea so soon?"
With the mist dispersed, the sunlight began to warm the earth, yet one could still feel the moistness in the air.
Mute Uncle set down the basket and his phone replied: "Wait two hours before you go down the mountain. I'll roast some tea and give you a couple of jars."
Feng Yi: "...Alright, thank you, Mute Uncle."
I wasn't planning on going down the mountain right away, anyway!
I still wanted to pry for more information!
But Mute Uncle quickly got involved in the tea-making process, looking completely engrossed, even putting his cellphone aside, which had always been with him, and not letting Feng Yi help.
Feng Yi could only wait.
Two hours passed, and Mute Uncle finished up, taking some of the tea and packing it into two specially made jars, handing them over to Feng Yi: "Wait two days before drinking."
Between eating and taking gifts, Feng Yi felt too embarrassed not to offer any money and was just about to say something.
Mute Uncle casually waved his hand and typed a few characters into his phone: "I don't need the money! You should hurry back, someone else will tell you the other stuff."
Feng Yi wanted to ask about the ancestral home, the family tree, and also wanted to hear about the old butler and great-aunt from Mute Uncle, but now, the way Mute Uncle spoke, it was clear that he wouldn't get any useful information.
It was obvious he was being sent away.
Feng Yi packed up the tea jars, tidied up a bit, and looked at Mute Uncle.
Mute Uncle made a gesture: Hurry up!
Feng Yi sighed inwardly, shouldered his bag, and walked away. He hadn't gone far when he heard a voice message coming from behind him, probably from one of Mute Uncle's friends—
[Online! Missing one for mahjong!!!]
Feng Yi turned his head to see Mute Uncle quickly typing and stepping back inside the house.
The old man was indeed busy.
With a sigh, Feng Yi headed down the mountain.
This time he didn't wear the helmet and mask, and even put the gloves in his bag.
He somehow knew that he would be fine without the helmet and mask.
The flying insects were becoming more active, but as Feng Yi made his way down, they actively avoided him, as if they detected some foul scent.
When he was about halfway down the mountain, Feng Yi saw the two men who had driven him up the mountain.
They were taking large boxes out of their car and walking them over to a barrier, where they placed the boxes on a machine that would transfer them to the other side of a protective net, then they would dump out the contents.
The boxes were filled with rats.
Considering their plump figures and glossy fur, those rats had been living quite comfortably.
Feng Yi greeted the two men and declined their offer to drive him down the mountain. He had just completed a major task, and although his mind was more perplexed than ever, he felt more grounded than when he arrived yesterday, and his body wasn't tired.
"Leaving already?" asked the two men.
"Yeah, what are you doing?" asked Feng Yi, walking over.
"Feeding them rats. We have to do this every few days. It's all about resource utilization, the rats are brought over from the city. Considering how fat they are, no telling how much they've stolen to eat."
They dumped another box and looked at the banded kraits on the other side of the protective net.
"Doesn't it seem like there are fewer snakes showing up today?"
"It's true, they are not as active as before, all skittish," said the other.
"But they're quite fierce when they swallow the rats, doesn't look like they're sick."
"Probably because of the rain last night, still a bit cool on the mountain. They'll be more lively when it warms up a bit more."
Upon hearing this, Feng Yi also approached to get a closer look.
"Not afraid of snakes anymore?" one of them asked.
Feng Yi paused, then nodded, "Doesn't seem as scary anymore."
Indeed, it was not as frightening as yesterday.
Just like he somehow knew those insects would avoid him, he also seemed to know:
[These gluttons can't harm me!]
To confirm this, Feng Yi stepped closer to the protective net.
On the other side of the net, a king cobra with a body length of over two meters and a trunk thicker than an adult's arm was swallowing a rat. When Feng Yi approached, the cobra paused, slowly turned, twisted its body with some difficulty to move further away, and then continued eating.
Not just this one, the other snakes nearby, whether in the middle of eating or about to start, also swiftly moved away.
Seeing this, the two responsible for feeding were astonished: "Why are they suddenly afraid of people? They are usually quite brazen, aren't they?"
Typically, these king cobras wouldn't be deterred from swallowing rats even with spectators around, so their sudden "shyness" was a first for them.
The two didn't dwell on it, speculating whether Feng Yi had sprayed some kind of snake repellent on himself.
Feng Yi continued his way down the mountain and sent a text message to the driver from yesterday. If the driver was driving and couldn't take the call, he'd see the message when he was free. If there was no reply by the time he reached the bottom, Feng Yi would look for another ride.
Luckily, the driver responded quickly and called back.
The driver had a lasting impression of him, "As long as you're safe... alright, I'm not far from there, I'll be right over, it'll take at most... 50 minutes.
Feng Yi wasn't in a hurry, and after making arrangements with the driver, he enjoyed the mountain scenery as he walked down.
He even saw a hidden frog.
It was said that the reserve also had frogs and toads, but they weren't many. Those king cobras had been so over-fed with rats that they had reduced their predation on frogs and toads, allowing a small number to survive on the mountain.
When Feng Yi reached the parking area where he had been the day before, the driver arrived right on cue.
The driver took one look at him and said, "You look fresh."
"Not bad," Feng Yi replied, placing his bag in the car.
As they were leaving Xiao Feng Mountain, they met the patrolmen from the reserve chasing a "jailbreaking" snake. The snake had its mouth wide open, swallowing a frog.
The driver commented, "Seeing snakes eat up close is quite scary, don't you think?"
As he turned to look for agreement, he noticed Feng Yi staring out the window, drooling.
The driver: ???
Feng Yi quickly wiped his mouth and, seeing the driver's inquisitive gaze, explained, "A classmate just messaged me, we're having a feast when I get back."
The driver nodded vigorously, fully comprehending, "Hey, I'm the same, if someone told me they were treating me to a feast, I'd drool even more than you!"
After that, the driver added, "But remember, one illegal capture, ten get you jailed! If you want to eat, go for the farm-raised bullfrogs and leave the wild frogs alone. Bullfrogs are common now, bigger and meatier, ah, I love basil-flavored bullfrogs!"
Feng Yi smiled in response, then when the driver turned back to the road, he lightly slapped himself.
What's wrong with me! How could I get hungry from watching that!