Chapter 1640: Gone
Translator: Nyoi-Bo Studio Editor: Nyoi-Bo Studio
The light drizzle stopped as quickly as it started and the sun peeked out again after the day broke the next morning. The radiance in the east was a sign that the weather today would be great.
After a night’s rest and the medicinal cream, the boy’s pain dissipated in this short period of time. He left to use the toilet early in the morning and there were no more signs of pain on his face.
Li Du did not forget about his goal for a moment.
He took out the photo of the Steve and Ford brothers to show to the teen and asked, “Have you seen them?”
This was something he should have asked the moment they met yesterday, but the boy was so scared that Li Du was worried he would not say anything even if he knew about them, so he waited until they were a little more comfortable with each other before asking.
The boy took a look and then shook his head, and Li Du was disappointed. But then the boy shook his head, then nodded, then muttered something under his breath that Li Du could not understand.
Brother Wolf was the only man he could trust. He was truly meticulous, fishing out his phone to record what the boy was saying. The bunch of them might not understand, but they could find someone who spoke his language to translate later.
Young Markelov had an idea. He said, “Since we can’t understand each other, why don’t we use sign language? Wait, let me through, let me give this a shot—”
He signed for a moment but the teen just stared at him in a daze. The teen then signed back for a while, and Markelov stared back at him in a daze. Just like this, the plan fell through.
Li Du wanted to know who else was on this island but his question was going unanswered.
It was useless for them to keep staying on the island, so Li Du decided to take the teen to town and find him a doctor to examine that knee of his. At the same time, he was going to find someone who spoke the teen’s language so they could finally communicate.
They did not exchange many words because of the language barrier, so he went straight to looking for people to build a stretcher out of wooden sticks and the cloth from the tents, then they hoisted the teen up and walked towards the lake.
The teen did not have much of a reaction at first, but he regained his cheer the moment they reached the side of the lake. He waved his arms excitedly and shouted towards the lake.
Markelov teased him, “Stop shouting, pal. It’s not like the lake can speak. But even if it did, it doesn’t know your tongue.”
The others cracked up. They brought the raft out to inflate it again, then got onto the boat and rowed towards the opposite shore.
The teen grew anxious after he stepped onto the boat. He waved his arms aggressively as he called out incessantly. Li Du could not understand what the boy was doing but the shaking was disturbing the balance of the boat, so he hurriedly said, “Hey, calm down, pal. Calm down, OK?”
Not that it had any effect. The teen was not listening to him at all; he grew increasingly agitated the closer they got to the opposite shore.
The raft shook more and more vigorously. All of a sudden, the teen dived into the water.
Although it was already June, the temperature was not exactly high where they were, this close to the North Pole. Jumping into the lake water on such a day couldn’t be comfortable.
Li Du grew impatient. He said, “What are you guys standing around for? Hurry and get him, his legs aren’t even working right now!”
Young Markelov chuckled carelessly, “It’s alright, boss. He’s obviously able to swim if he could get to the Island of the Lost. He’ll still be able to swim even without his legs, so at least he won’t drown.”
Brother Wolf was a man of action. He took off all his clothes and jumped into the water.
Li Du waited for a while. Brother Wolf, who had been the first to dive in, came back up to the surface of the water. He wiped the water off his face before saying, “Boss, there’s no one in the water!”
Li Du was stunned. He asked in response, “What do you mean there’s no one? Where did he go?”
Brother Wolf shrugged. “I don’t know.”
The rest of them came back up one after the other and they all said the same thing, “Boss, I don’t know where the kid went. I can’t find him!”
Li Du sucked in his breath, then said, “Do we have goggles? Wear them, then dive and take a look. How could he disappear? He just dived in.”
The water here should have been clear since the place was not affected by pollution, but the exact opposite was true. The lake water was extremely murky; only its surface was clear so the waves looked clear as well, but visibility was low as one looked into the water.
Those who have gone diving would know this: visibility was low without the help of diving goggles, so one could only see their surroundings clearly if they wore goggles.
However, the goggles they had brought along were in the car and not on the island with them, and it would be too late if they went back to retrieve them.
Li Du stared vacantly at the surface of the lake, straining his eyes. He waited for a whole half hour but even then, he did not catch a glimpse of the teen resurfacing.
The Markelov brothers were not superstitious by any means. They jumped in as well to join the search and combed the surrounding area, going as far as ten meters deep without any diving equipment. Even then, they could not find any traces of the boy.
“This is so f*cking cursed,” Young Markelov shouted out. “Damn, this doesn’t make any sense. Even if he drowned, the corpse should have floated up, right? The water’s really deep, so much that he wouldn’t be tangled in the plants.”
Li Du turned back to glance at the Island of the Lost. It rained the whole of last night and the island was enveloped yet again in the mist. From this distance, the fog made the island look even more mysterious.
The mist was also rising. It moved with the wind, making space look like it was being distorted. The island was mysterious enough with the fog, but its movements made the island seem bizarre.
Li Du waved his hands and said, “That’s enough, we’re leaving.”
Their priority for this adventure was safety. Ever since they stepped onto this island, he had felt that things were too abnormal. For the sake of their safety, he did not want to stay on the lake any longer.
Angikuni Lake was deep and expansive, and there were no other signs of life on the surface of the water save for some waterfowl; signs of human life were even rarer in the surrounding area. As such, Li Du felt very unsafe waiting on the lake like this.
Light bounced off the surface of the lake and the sun was shining brightly, but why did Li Du feel so gloomy?
Black Bull and Whirlwind, who were tasked with keeping an eye on the car, welcomed them immediately when they were back on land. They asked, “Anything?”
Li Du shook his head. Black Bull hurried to say, “There’s news from Fruity Town. We left our numbers back there and someone called to say that a strange person appeared in town.”
“We tried calling you guys but it wouldn’t go through because there was no signal. We were prepared to go look for you in the afternoon, but then you came back,” Whirlwind added.
Li Du said, “That’s right, the island was strange. There was no signal for our phones. Who’s the weird person that turned up in town? Come on, let’s go take a look.”
Li Du had also left his number in the town back then but he had no signal on the island, so he did not receive the call.
His phone rang while they were on the road — it was the bartender. The man’s voice rang out after he picked up, “Thank God, you finally picked up! I called you a few hundred times, man, a few hundred times and you never picked up!”
The bartender was so enthusiastic, among other reasons, because Li Du had once said that the man would be rewarded if he provided useful information.
Big spenders like Li Du were a rare sight in such a small town on the borders, so he had to hold on tightly if they ever came across someone like that.
