Chapter 3 Chapter 1 The Spirit of Mountaineers

"Okay! Be careful and climb up!" Shuhei Akita, who had climbed to the top of the mountain, stood on the edge of a rock that looked like a protruding balcony, protecting Daxiong Xiong who was about 30 meters away from him. On both sides of the steep rock wall, there are sharp, jagged ice edges.The snow-covered gravel flakes are continuous, and there is a rattling sound when stepped on.The rocks under the snow layer are very slippery, and you have to be careful at every step to find a safe and firm place to put your hands and kick your feet before you can climb up.There is still slippery ice in the cracks of the rock formation.

Where the climbing rope reaches, even a pile cannot be driven into it.Akita's feet are not solid and firm.Both of them knew in their hearts that safety was just a kind of psychological comfort for them.If one stumbles and slips, the other must fall too.This is purely a sense of security that comes from caring for each other. "I'll go up!" Onishi replied.Relying on the rope full of friendship, in the air full of threats of death, slowly began to move his body. From the canyon on the Hida side, strong winds carrying snow powder continued to blow, making the weather even worse.Under the Baizhang cliffs on both sides of the sharp knife-cut wall, there are deep valleys full of snow, winding and extending to the rock wall. Shirazuwamoto Valley, extending to the Kamata River.

Here is the Hida Mountains at the top of the Peak Peak, which runs through the high Mount Hotaka and Nishihotaka Mountains known as the ghost gate, and is also the watershed between Nagano Prefecture and Gifu County. At the foot of Akita and Onishi, there is a sharp blade-like peak, located in front of the top of Mount Hotaka.The route they planned was to climb from Nishihotao to Hotao. This mountain road is also the last hurdle before reaching the destination. If it was in summer, this mountain road would not be too dangerous for them, but now it is midwinter, the ice and snow are as hard as iron, even a small rock will make people fall into the abyss of death.

As Onishi climbed, Akita slowly gathered the rope in his hands. "Yes, that's it!" Akita pulled the rope up and wrapped it around his shoulders, murmuring with satisfaction. However, the voice of the voice was blown away by the strong wind long ago, and it couldn't reach Daxi's ears at all.The rope was pulled up slowly and smoothly, and the distance between the two was getting closer.As long as you climb over this section of the mountain road, the journey to Hodaka Hut will be smooth.Then you can light a prosperous fire and drink a cup of strong coffee.Although the two of them are still in a state of extreme tension where they can't relax at all, they have already tasted the indescribable joy of arriving at the destination, and of course they will not relax because of this.

In the most tense and dangerous situation, I especially long for the moment of rest after overcoming the danger.This is a common thing in the hearts of mountaineers, but they will not be negligent in their actions.Yet the accident happened.In a blink of an eye, a terrible storm blew up all over the mountain. The weight of Akita's whole body rests on the iron rod and ice axe. When the storm that rises in the sky seems to blow Akita into the air, he suddenly feels a shock on his wrist wrapped with ropes, and his whole palm feels like it is being burnt. Feeling the pain, he couldn't help but let go of the rope in his hand, allowing the climbing rope to slide away quickly.

"Onishi!" Akita suddenly came to his senses and shouted.Onishi, who had just climbed to the front of the ice, disappeared.He fell!The gust of wind just now made him lose his self-control, and there was no place to climb under the 300-meter-high cliff in the direction of Shinshu, so Onishi must have fallen in the air. No, there should be a little buffer: when the rope connecting the two slipped out, even though his hands were burning like fire, he still held on to one end of the rope.Had Onishi already resisted the force of the fall? "Oops!" Akita's face turned pale because of despair. He didn't have a solid foothold, so how could he be safe?But there is no better place to stop than on this knife-edge section.Safety is built on the friendship between climbing partners and confidence in climbing skills, but accidents still happen. This is a cold reality that cannot be changed by friendship and technology.The moment of the accident, it will take the lives of two young people.

The hot and painful hands were bloodstained by the rope. If it weren't for this climbing rope, the two of them would have fallen from the 3,000-meter-high mountain along the wolf-like stone edge protruding from the rock wall to the hell of Yueze Mountain to go.Akita said in his heart: "Oops, it's over!" But at this moment, Akita's body was contrary to his thoughts, and he resolutely jumped towards Hida.What is the use of this action, Akita himself did not understand at the time, this is an instinctive self-defense reaction of a person in distress. Within a minute, he woke up.His body was suspended in mid-air, his chest felt suffocated by the rope, and he couldn't find a place to stand even with the iron rod.Due to the fall and impact, his whole body was injured, and the nails of his left hand were bleeding, and at the same time, he felt severe pain from his waist to his thighs.

It seems that the body was injured due to the violent rolling, but Akita only thought of friends. "Daxi!" "Daxi!" After trying my best to call several times, I heard a low voice from the other side of the snow slope, which seemed to be Daxi's answering voice.The voice was so weak that he could not hear what he was saying. This was not caused by the snowstorm, but probably caused by the injury caused by the fall.Onishi was definitely still alive, though.Akita thought to himself: "Although I was injured, it doesn't matter, right? Falling from a height of about twenty meters, the injury will not be too serious." Thinking of this, a thought suddenly popped up: "Now I have to rely on myself I have come to break through the level with my strength.” First, I had to get rid of the predicament of being suspended in the air, first stand firmly on the cut wall, then pull the distressed Onishi up the cut wall, and then carry him to the Hodaka hut.This is probably extremely difficult.If there is no one in the hut, you have to go down the mountain to the high ground to ask for help.He was already in a miserable state of bruises all over his body.How could Akita Shuhei do this?He instinctively realized that Onishi could not be rescued from danger, so he jumped into the deep valley opposite to the direction in which Onishi fell. In this way, the two ends of the rope were connected to Akita and Onishi, hanging on both sides of the watershed in Mt. Hotaka.

Fortunately, the rope was able to withstand the acceleration impact of the two young men falling downward.The stones brought by the fall of the two rolled down rumblingly, making a terrible piercing sound like a broken bone, and fell into the abyss. The huge winds blowing from all directions made Akita feel bitterly cold immediately.After the immediate danger passed, he slowly regained consciousness. He first moved his arms, kneaded his body, tried to grasp the protruding part of the rock that could be climbed, and then looked for a place to step in.Do not let your feet still hang in the air.With great difficulty, he stepped on the edge of the rock with his right foot and moved his body up.But the bondage on his chest was still not released, and the weight of Daxi's entire body was still hanging on the other end of the rope.He leaned on the almost vertical cut wall, and relied on the gravity on the other end to slowly climb up.The cliff is protruding, about ten meters long, and the rope is thirty meters long; then Daxi is hanging on the other side twenty meters away from the cliff.As Akita went up, Onishi gradually slid down.

"Daxi, can you hear me?" There was a faint answer from the rope, but the wind was still howling, and it was impossible to make out what was said.Akita shouted hoarsely: "Onishi, listen carefully! I'm hanging on the side of Hida, so I'm going to climb up the cliff and pull you up, but when I go up, you have to slide down. It's too strenuous. You cling to the rock with all your strength." hold on to the rope and try not to slide down. We both climbed hard to the top of the cliff! Did you hear me?" There was no answer, but the rope trembled slightly. "Okay, climb up! Hold on!"

Akita squirmed like an insect on the frozen cliff.It was only after climbing the cliff that he saw Onishi's figure.Daxi was 20 meters below, lying tightly on an exposed rock.The rope was still tightly wrapped around Akita's shoulders, but how much more effort it would take to pull Onishi from the cliff.From the place where it fell to the snow-covered rock wall, there was a long bloodstain. "Onishi! Onishi!" Akita cried out in horror when he saw the bright red blood stains on the white snow. "Akita? I'm unlucky, it seems that my feet don't work." Onishi lay on his back facing him, and said with a sneer.However, the voice sounded energetic, and Akita finally breathed a sigh of relief. "The rock is very brittle, and the rope cannot be fixed. I pull up, and you try to climb to me." "Okay, let me try." Akita straddled the cliff, struggling to pull the rope up.It's a tough job.Climbing the cliff had exhausted all his strength.In order not to make his friend fall, he intentionally let himself fall, almost in a desperate situation.Now it is necessary to pull Daxi weighing 60 kilograms up from a depth of 20 meters, and there is no rock to support it. If there is another mistake, the two of them will be like crabs strung together. He fell from a cliff more than one meter high into the snow-covered abyss of Yueze. Such a tragic picture appeared in Akita's mind: at the bottom of the valley covered with mist and clouds, two bloody corpses... He couldn't help but shudder at this horrible scene.In order to get rid of this tragic ending, he used all his strength to hold on to the rope, and the blood gushing from the wound on his nails made the rope turn bright red. "Onishi, work harder, use more strength!" Akita's words were also encouraging himself. However, Onishi's body did not pull up at all.The blizzard intensified.The deep valley of Tenguzawa under his feet, which was still vaguely discernible just now, has been hidden by the snow wind at the moment.The strong wind blowing from Hida to the Shinshu side poured in along the mountain wall to the snow-covered wall where the two were, quickly depriving them of the little heat left in their bodies. The most frightening thing in the mountains is not the cliffs and ice and snow.But the wind.When the wind blows, the skill and experience of any mountaineering veteran is useless.The source of people's motivation-the heat is taken away, and even the strength to open the mountaineering backpack stuffed with food will disappear.Mountaineers are often found starving to death with plentiful food bags on their backs. "Akita, I really can't do it, I can't move anymore, leave me here, you go!" Onishi finally said in despair. "Don't say stupid things!" "It's not silly. We're both going to suffer if we do that. You can always get to the hut by yourself." "Don't be discouraged! Keep climbing up, even elementary school students can walk to the cabin. Come on!" Akita reprimanded Onishi for his cowardice and tugged on the rope. The road leading from here to the Hodaka hut, in the severe winter season like now, is full of gravel mountain trails covered with snow and ice, and there are many more that elementary school students cannot walk.How can Onishi who can't move arrive?If you take someone to climb together, you can't move a step at all.Then stay with him?Or as he said, leave him alone and go first?In this way, Onishi's life will not be guaranteed.If you're lucky, there will be someone in Hotaka's hut, and he will rush back to rescue him. His depleted body may die before that time.Moreover, it is more likely that there is no one in the Hotaka hut, and it is estimated that it will take a whole day to go back and forth.Although the injury is not serious, it is still a bit sure to go alone.He hesitated.At this time, the spirit of mountaineering suddenly rose in his heart, and he severely condemned this selfish and despicable idea.This was a voice from the heart, but it made him feel ashamed: "You want to abandon your friends in order to survive yourself? You despicable villain!" "During hard work, sacrifice your life for your friends and give your precious life." On the top of the northern peak of Gundake Mountain, the scene of the heroic sacrifice of the M mountaineer who sacrificed his life for his friends lingered in Akita's mind. Should he accompany Daxi, or go alone to ask for help?Akita, who had to make a choice between death and life, felt ups and downs. "To go or to stay? It's not too late to bring Daxi up to think about this question." Akita didn't hesitate for a long time before making a decision, and the whistling wind and snow would never allow him to hesitate any longer. "You have to climb up whatever you say!" Akita roared. I don't know how long it took, the bodies of the two people overlapped and lay on the rock, motionless, as if there was no breath at all, the last pull just now, when Daxi's fingers had climbed to the edge of the cliff, he used I did my best to say thank you.Akita grabbed Onishi's wrist fiercely with his hands, and pulled him to his side, but he fell on Onishi involuntarily.In this way, the two of them seemed to be dead.After a long time, Onishi said in a soft, almost inaudible voice: "My good climbing partner!" "Yeah." Akita nodded slightly, and in order to take on the difficult task of sending his bruised and bruised partner to Hotaka's hut, he got up again.Previous hesitation has evaporated. "My good mountaineering partner!" Onishi said inadvertently, but it hit Akita's heart forcefully.Because of this sentence, in this world, people can be trusted with each other. With this sentence, on the long and dangerous road, in order to save a friend, I can risk my life.Akita felt a little complacent about his pure thoughts. This day is January 18, 1963.

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