Chapter 22: The Lone Lamp (Part 2)

Lao Sheepsie said: "I am so old, I'm so afraid of the ball. I'm worried about this girl. Oh... I've been obedient and vegetarian in this life. Although I haven't shave my head in my life, I'm just a monk. Why can't we catch up with the bad luck..." He couldn't say it halfway. I knew he probably thought that even if he returned to the pastoral area, he couldn't explain the major losses to cattle, sheep and horses. Lao Sheepsie's old man was full of bitterness. How could I find a way to help him and Ding Sitian turn the blame?

As we spoke, the fat man had completely removed the brick walls. The remaining walls were all parts of bricks and cement. I asked the fat man: "Can the iron lid be opened?" The fat man reached out and touched them: "80% can be opened, but there was an iron bolt that was not locked and it was not welded."

I pulled out the knife and asked Ding Sitian to light it up with matches so that she could see clearly what was behind the iron lid. Seeing that everything was ready, I reached out and patted the fat man on the shoulder. When the fat man got the signal, he raised his foot and stepped on the brick wall to leverage the force, and used his hands to pull the handle on the edge of the heavy iron door. Then the heavy sound of "Ki Chi" came from the darkness. Only a choking breath came out from behind the iron lid. The smell was so nauseous that it was so bad that it was so bad that it was, like a nauseous and pungent soot and oil mixed together. We quickly blocked our noses.

I listened to the movement and whispered to Ding Sitian: "Ray at the top." Ding Sitian immediately scratched a match, and the fire lit up. Behind the open iron lid was a layer of black stone bricks more than one meter thick. Inside was a cylindrical upward shaft, which was not upward or downward. The inside of the well wall was covered with thick black carbides, as if it was formed by smoke and fire all year round. I wrapped my nose with Ding Sitian's scarf and drilled in and explored. The bottom was pitch black and there was no bottom on it. There was a small hazy starlight on the top, as if there was a round skylight on the roof. The shaft was narrow. If you supported the well wall with your hands and feet, you might be able to climb to the position of the skylight bit by bit.

I turned around and the fat man also went in and took a look. Lao Sheepsie and Ding Sitian asked me what the iron cover was. I said with uncertainty: "I look like... it's a big chimney." Lao Sheepsie had never seen such a big chimney, so she was a little unbelievable. I explained to him: "When Fatsie and I were in a series of connections, I visited the old revolutionary base area and experienced the revolutionary spirit. I didn't eat a day, and when I went back in the evening, it was dinner time, but we still had to do the next day.

The revolution could not be hungry at night, so the fat man went to steal a piglet from the pigpen in the fellow villager. I was responsible for holding the piglet and putting it into a burning brick kiln. I wanted to roast it and eat the roasted suckling pig when I didn't know the heat well. The temperature inside was too high, so I roasted the fat piglet. Later, the fellow villager brought people to arrest us, and we retreated. We retreated into the scrap brick kiln chimney of the brick kiln factory and hid until dawn, so that we could escape the crime of stealing the socialist piglet by the revolutionary masses."

It was that experience that gave us an extremely profound and intuitive experience of the chimney, which we would never forget in our lifetime. I just used my hand to apply a hand to the flue behind the iron lid, which was full of smoke. After twisting it, it was so sticky that it looked like oil smoke. There must be a fire kiln or a furnace under the flue. It hasn't been used for so long, why is it still so greasy? In addition, there is the disgusting smell...

An ominous thought emerged in my mind. This was a cremation furnace for cremation. Even if it was not burned to death, at least a large number of animals had been burned. The grease brought to the flue by high temperature and thick smoke was left after cooling and solidification. Therefore, despite the long period of time, the thick grease still did not disappear. The iron lid behind the brick wall on the second floor did not look like a furnace, but was used to clean the flue and prevent blockage. Only the old incinerator in the crematorium needed this facility, because the ointment in the flue must be removed manually. I heard that after the German Nazis used gas chambers to massacre the Yuta people, they would use the cremation furnace to deal with the corpse. Did the Japanese also introduce this German equipment to destroy the corpse? The most important thing is that we don’t know. If this is really a big chimney, why is it necessary to be so tightly disguised and closed? I am afraid that this is not only a simple matter of covering up.

When I thought of the crematorium that might have burned countless corpses, I almost vomited out all the big-eyed thiefs I ate in the middle of the night and quickly wiped off the black greasy on my hands on my clothes. However, if I want to escape from the trap, someone must climb up from the flue of the crematorium. However, in this process, the matches cannot be used to illuminate the remaining combustible objects in the passage to cause fire to burn the body. Another way is to go to the basement in the dark, but there should be a large iron stove there, and there may not be an exit. It is not realistic to rely on the remaining matches to go to the basement.

As soon as I told my companions, the fat man immediately objected: "No, this is definitely a blind activism. I said, Lao Hu, you have to make it difficult. Although we have to go out of this chimney one day, it feels so different from climbing up alive. This is not for living people at all. Besides, such a thick layer of ointment is pasted on the flue, and it will definitely slip when it gets slipped. You may not think it's too much. At worst, you can fall down and fall into the stove and you won't feel embarrassed if you fall to death. But if the size on the top is narrow and stuck in the middle, it won't be uncomfortable if you can't go up or down or suffocate it? I can't accept this kind of cowardly death. I'm afraid there is no such precedent in the world from ancient times to the present, and I don't want to break this world record."

I said, "We have myopia-fitting mirrors - we must solve the current problem. There is no other way now. It is not my personal heroism. I see that this matter has to take a risk. You are waiting for me here. I climb out alone, and then try to open the iron gate from outside and let you go out. If it falls... Then even if I take a step first, let's see you again in the next life."

Ding Sitian grabbed my arm and advised me: "Don't go, are the chimneys of the crematorium crawling and playing? Even if you don't fall to death, you can choke people to death by being choked by the coal ash smoke inside. Let's find another way."
Chapter completed!