Chapter 36: The Huge Bronze Bell

  Lin San and Gu Jialan walked while carefully observing their surroundings.

  As they walked further east, they encountered fewer and fewer animals until finally no more animal shadows could be seen.

  "There's no road ahead." Lin San suddenly stopped in his tracks.

  Gujalan looked up and found that the road ahead was blocked by a small hill.

  "Boom......" A loud noise came from behind the small hill, shaking the ground slightly.

  "What shall we do? To continue on our way, we must climb over this small hill." Lin San looked at Gu Jialan with inquiring eyes.

  Gujalan hesitated for a moment, then said: "We've come so far with great difficulty, we can't let a small mountain block our way." On the one hand, Gujalan was very curious and wanted to figure out the source of the loud noise. On the other hand, he also didn't want to be stumped by a small mountain.

  Lin nodded: "Alright, let's get over this small hill." After saying that, he led Gu Jialan to start climbing the mountain.

  The height of Xiaoyan is not very high, but it's quite steep and tiring to climb.

  Lin San and Gu Jialan spent a great deal of effort, finally climbing to the top of the mountain.

  "Ugh..." Lin San plopped his butt down on the mountaintop, panting heavily: "I'm exhausted to death."

  Gujalan was also uncomfortable at this time, with sweat all over his face, sitting on one side and constantly wiping the sweat.

  "Rumble...!" A loud noise suddenly came, and the entire small mountain began to shake violently.

  Lin San and Gu Jialan were shocked, hastily lying on the mountain top, stretching out their hands to grab the protruding stone blocks, stabilizing their bodies to prevent themselves from falling off the mountain top.

  Soon, Xiaoshan stopped trembling and the loud noise disappeared.

  Lin San raised his head and looked at Gu Jialan beside him: "Miss Gu, are you okay?"

  "Cough, cough, cough..." Gu Jialan coughed a few times, shook her head: "I'm fine... huh? What's that?" Gu Jialan suddenly stared straight ahead, her eyes fixed intently on the opposite side of the small hill.

  "What?" Lin San turned his head and was immediately stunned.

  In front of the small mountain, there is a huge stone platform with a height of several tens of meters. The platform is very smooth and flat, obviously man-made. In the center of the platform stands a gigantic bronze bell, so large that it's hard to believe. The surface of the bronze bell is covered in rust spots, indicating its great age. In front of the bronze bell stand two stone pillars, with a black stick hanging from them, as thick as a bucket. For now, it's unclear what material the stick is made of.

  "How can there be such a large stone platform and copper bell here?" Lin San said in surprise: "Could it be that someone had come to this deserted island before?"

  "Looking at the copper bell's rusty exterior, it must have been here for a very long time." Gu Jialan was also extremely surprised. It was clear that this stone pedestal and copper bell were man-made. She really hadn't expected that someone had come to this deserted island before.

  "Hoo...hooo..." A strong gust of wind blew in.

  The black stick on the stone pedestal was blown by the wind and quickly collided with the copper bell opposite.

  "Boom..." A loud sound, the bronze bell emitted a huge echo.

  Lin San and Gu Jia crouched on the mountaintop, pressing their ears tightly, barely avoiding eardrum damage.

  "It was this bronze bell that made the huge noise." Lin San and others stopped the huge noise, slowly lifted their heads, and looked at the bronze bell in surprise.

  "How can this bronze bell produce such a huge sound? It's simply too magical!" Gu Jialan's eyes were filled with incredulity.

  "No matter why the bronze bell can make such a loud noise, what we need to do now is to stop that black stick from continuing to strike the bronze bell, otherwise our eardrums will be deafened sooner or later." Lin San took a deep breath.

  "But how can we stop it?" asked Gu Jialan.

  Lin San pointed at the two stone pillars on the stone platform: "In the past, I just took down the black stick from the pillar and that was it."

  "Ah, you want to go up on the stone platform?" Gu Jialan hesitated: "No way, this stone platform suddenly appeared on the small island, it must be suspicious. You're recklessly rushing up there, who knows if there will be danger."

  "Now can't afford to think so much, wait a while and the wind will blow again, the black stick will strike the copper bell." Lin San stood up, looking at Gu Jialan: "Miss Gu, rest assured, I'll be careful, nothing will happen." After finishing speaking, he wanted to go down from the small mountain.

  "Wait!" Gu Jialan suddenly reached out and grabbed Lin San.

  Lin San turned back with a puzzled expression: "What's wrong?"

  "Gujalan took a deep breath: 'I'll go with you, more people will be better for taking care of each other.'"

  "No way!" Lin San directly refused without hesitation: "It's too dangerous."

  "You've saved me so many times, I won't let you go on this adventure alone." Gu Jialan said firmly.

  "Miss Gu, listen to me..." Lin San wanted to persuade her further.

  "Don't try to persuade me anymore, my mind is made up. Let's go, it'll be windy again later." Before Lin San could say anything, Gu Jialan bent down and directly climbed down from the small hill.

  Seeing Gu Jialan being so stubborn, Lin San also felt a bit speechless. He sighed and could only follow Gu Jialan down the mountain together.

  Going down the mountain is much easier than going up, at least it saves a lot of physical strength.

  Ten minutes later, Lin San and Gu Jialan climbed down from the small mountain.

  As they got closer, Lin and the three Gu Jialan could feel the grandeur and majesty of the stone platform.

  "It's too beautiful, too magnificent, this stone platform is simply perfect." Gu Jialan stood beside the platform, reaching out to touch the smooth and flat stone wall, a thread of coolness spreading from her fingertips.

  Lin San circled around the stone platform for half a circle, then found a stone ladder on the west side, and beckoned Gu Jialan to follow him up the stone ladder to the top of the platform.

  He climbed to the top of the stone platform, Lin San didn't hesitate, took a few steps forward to the two stone pillars, stretched out his hand to untie the black stick hanging on it, but Lin San's hand had just extended halfway and stopped in mid-air, with a look of surprise on his face.

  "What's wrong?" Gu Jialan walked over and asked.

  Lin San swallowed his saliva: "Unexpectedly, what was binding Black Stick was an iron chain."

  "Ah?" Gu Jialan was taken aback, looked up and saw that the black stick in the middle was tied with an iron chain as thick as an arm, and the two ends of the iron chain were smashed on two iron pillars.

  Lin Sansheng pulled the iron chain and smiled: "Very sturdy, can't be broken at all."

  "What's to be done?" Gu Jialan asked anxiously.

  "If only there were tools." Lin San's words were useless now. Where could they go to find tools?

  "Hoo... hoo... hoo..." Another strong gust of wind came.

  The black stick was blown by the wind and naturally hit the copper bell.

  Gu Jialan's face changed: "Not good!" She subconsciously retreated, her hands tightly covering her ears.

  Lin San lightly shouted, rushed over and grabbed the black stick, wanting to stop it from hitting the copper bell. Lin San's idea was good, but reality was cruel. The black stick was extremely heavy and its surface was very smooth. Lin San used all his strength, but still couldn't stop the black stick from crashing into the copper bell.

  At this time, Gu Jialan ran over and hugged Lin San's waist from behind, pulling hard.

  With the addition of Gu Jialan, the situation improved slightly. The speed at which Hei Gunzi was rushing towards Tong Zhong slowed down significantly, but Hei Gunzi still didn't stop, and the distance between him and Tong Zhong gradually narrowed.

  Just as the black stick was about to hit the copper bell, Lin San hastily released the black stick and turned around to hug Gu Jialan, rolling over to one side. Gu Jialan covered Lin San's ears with her hand and buried her head in Lin San's arms.

  "Boom..." The black stick finally hit the copper bell, but the sound it made was much softer than the previous few times. It's probably because Lin San and Gu Jialan were desperately pulling on the black stick, reducing its impact force, which is why the copper bell's resonance was lowered.

  After the sound of the bronze bell disappeared, Lin San and Gu Jialan finally crawled up from the edge of the stone platform with a look of embarrassment.

  "That was close!" Lin San let out a breath.

  Gu Jialan glanced at Lin San and suddenly burst out laughing.

  Lin San Yi was taken aback: "Miss Gu, what are you laughing at?"

  "Your face is really dark now."

  Lin San wiped the dust off his face with one hand: "It must have been stuck on the black stick just now, Miss Gu. You were really brave just now. If it wasn't for you, we would definitely be deafened by now."

  "I didn't think that much at the time, I just wanted to help you." Gu Jialan also secretly felt a chill thinking about her actions earlier.

  "No, we must think of a way to get the black stick down. Otherwise, next time when another gust of wind comes, we'll be done for." Lin San said as he walked over to the stone pillar and carefully examined the iron chain on it.

  "We don't have the tools, and it's impossible to break the iron chain anyway." Gu Jialan walked over and said.

  Lin San furrowed his brow in thought, then his eyes lit up: "There's still another way we can try."

  "What's going on?" Gu Jialan asked hastily.

  Lin San turned around the stone pillar with his hands behind his back and said, "Shorten the distance between the black stick and the copper bell, so that the black stick cannot strike the copper bell."

  "Shorten the distance? How can we shorten it? You're not planning to move the bronze bell, are you? This bronze bell is huge, at least tens of thousands of catties. Even if we exhaust ourselves to death, we won't be able to move it an inch." Gu Jialan said in surprise.

  Lin San smiled: "Miss Gu, who said I wanted to move the bronze bell? Lin San would not dare to have such an idea, even if he was overconfident."

  "What do you mean?" Gu Jialan asked in puzzlement.

  "Miss Gu, look, the iron chain wrapped around the black stick is so long. If we wrap the chain around the black stick a few more times, it won't be able to hit the copper bell again."

  "Ah, yes! How come I didn't think of that? Lin San, you're really clever. With the iron chain shortened, the black stick won't be able to strike the copper bell again, and it won't make that frightening loud noise anymore."

  "Miss Gu, help me out, we need to hurry up, otherwise it'll be bad if the wind blows later." Lin San said as he walked under the black stick.

  Gu Jialan nodded and stepped forward to help Lin San start winding iron chains onto the black stick.

  "Hoo... hoo... hoo..." The wind is blowing again.

  "Damn it! This wind is really weird, how can it blow and stop like that, just like someone's controlling it!" Lin San cursed loudly while quickly wrapping iron chains around the black stick.

  "This wind is somewhat suspicious." Gu Jialan also had the same feeling.

  The wind grew stronger and stronger, and the black stick began to sway slowly. It seemed that at any moment, the black stick would strike the bronze bell.