Chapter 17 Chapter 17 Departure

The jeep team was speeding on the endless Gobi Gobi, the climate was dry, and the cars were far away from each other to avoid the yellow dust raised by the previous car. I was sitting in the car, looking out the window, thinking about the previous decision, and I didn't know if it was correct. At this time, I felt a little too reckless.However, now that he is on the thief ship, he has no face to go back on his word. Aning's plan was told to me before departure, and I found out that it was completely in accordance with Wenjin's route, starting from Dunhuang, crossing Dachaidan and entering the area of ​​Chaerhan Lake, leaving the road from there and entering the Qaidam Basin no man's land.Then Dingzhu Zhuoma led the way and brought the team to the place where she broke up with the expedition team back then.

This route is almost exactly the same as what Wen Jin wrote in his notes, so I was very puzzled, where did she get this information?Obviously, she knew about Tamuduo, Dingzhu Zhuoma, and the route. She looked as if she had read the notes, but the notes were in my pocket. The convoy replenished supplies all the way, and soon arrived in Dunhuang as planned.Someone told me that the route before reaching the Chaerhan area is equivalent to a self-driving tour route, which is relatively safe. The Yadan landforms on both sides along the way gave me a taste of the desolation of the Gobi. This feeling of the end of the endless world makes people feel a strong sense of abandonment.At the beginning, this feeling can be alleviated by the many ruined residential areas on the roadside, but when we leave Dunhuang, we drive on the Chaerhan Highway and drive directly into the Gobi Desert, and we can't get rid of it at all.Because of the continuous driving for more than ten hours, and the surrounding scenery is almost the same, this feeling is suffocating.Thanks to the huge team of Aning, the hustle and bustle of camping made us feel more comfortable.

I was in the same car with a Caucasian driver who took turns driving with another Tibetan driver. On the way, I asked him these questions to see if he could answer them. The Caucasian answered it very easily. After listening to it, I realized that my thinking was too complicated.I always think that I should read the notes and then know Tamuduo, Dingzhu Zhuoma and the route, but it is not the case at all.The first measure Aning took after receiving the videotape was to investigate the courier company that sent the courier. Through the memories of the courier company, they found the sender of the courier, and that person was Zhuoma Dingzhu.

After a visit, I took a courier and asked, and the tamutuo, guides, and routes were all asked.The current plans are all based on the information given by Ding Zhuo Ma. I was relieved after hearing this. In this way, the content of the first half of the third part of Wenjin’s notes is not important. What is important is the part when they broke up with Dingzhu Zhuoma and entered Tamuduo. Unfortunately, I didn’t read that part. Look carefully, and be sure to find a chance to secretly watch it again. Then, the Caucasian told me about what he knew about Tamuduo. The Caucasus told me that the concept of Tamuto was only known to Dingzhu Zhuoma. According to the memory of Dingzhu Zhuoma listening to Wenjin and their conversation at that time, it seems to be the last stop of Wang Zanghai. As for the place, Wenjin and the others I don't know, I just look for it.

However, Dingzhu Zhuoma later came to his own judgment based on what he saw and experienced during the journey.She found that the tamutuo that Wenjin and the others were looking for was the legendary West Queen Mother Kingdom in their area.According to the locals, it should be called Talmusduo, which means a ghost town in the rain. After she found out this, she was very scared, so she pretended she couldn't find her way and broke up with them. "The Kingdom of the Queen Mother of the West?" I was surprised to hear that, "Isn't that something in a myth?" "Actually not, the Kingdom of the Queen Mother of the West really exists, and it is an ancient country with a long history. There are legends from the time of the Yellow Emperor that the Queen Mother of the West is the queen of the country. Qinghai Lake is called 'Chixue Jiamu' in the Qiang language, and Jiamu is the king The meaning of mother, we think it is the fairyland of the queen mother, and Talmusduo is the capital of the kingdom of the queen mother. The Queen Mother of the West represents the divine power in the legends of the Western Regions. In the legend that Dingzhu Zhuoma heard when she was a child, This city will only appear when it rains heavily, and once you see it, your eyes will be taken away and you will become blind, so she is very scared."

"Then what you mean is that what we are looking for now is actually the ancient capital of Queen Mother of the West?" "It can be said that according to the analysis of current archaeological data, especially in recent years, the existence of the Queen Mother of the West has been confirmed." The Caucasian said, "In fact, if Tamu Tuo is in the Qaidam Basin, then it must be It is a part of the Kingdom of the West Queen Mother. This time it is said that we are looking for Tamutuo, but in fact we are looking for the remains of the Kingdom of the West Queen Mother. What you need to know is that we are not looking for the Kingdom of the West Queen Mother, but what we find will automatically become the Queen Mother of the West. country, this is an archaeological expedition."

I smiled wryly after hearing that, Queen Mother Xi?I remember that thing is not something to mess with.Wang Zanghai's last envoy was the Queen Mother of the West?Does this make sense? After thinking about it, I thought of the legend about Hou Yi asking for the medicine of immortality. I wondered if Wang Zanghai also went to ask for the medicine that time?It felt very outrageous, so I shook my head to get rid of this idea and didn't think about it. Afterwards, I counted the equipment I brought from Aning in the car. Their company had special clothes. My clothes would die in the sun during the day and freeze to death at night when traveling in the Gobi, so I changed into desert clothes in the car.When I was wearing it, I was surprised to find the number 02200059 on the belt of this dress.

I asked the Caucasian what the number was, and he said it was the barcode number of their company. Their boss was fascinated by this number, and it was said that it was also translated from a silk book of the Warring States Period. I was very surprised in my heart, thinking of the password on the Qixing Luwang box, I wondered if this number had any special meaning? In the next two days, we penetrated deep into the Gobi, and the "Land Rover" was very fast. In these two days, we entered the hinterland of Qaidam. The people in A Ning are not familiar with other people, and they camped several times. The people who were in Jilin with me and I got along very well, and the others became familiar with me. With my personality, it is quite easy to get along with others.In this way, there is at least one advantage, I don't have to face the expressionless oil bottle all day long.And he didn't seem to care about me at all.

This is actually a bit abnormal, because in the previous contact, although Poker Ping was also difficult to get along with, he didn't feel so alienated this time. I always felt that he was avoiding something.On the contrary, it was the black glasses who seemed to be very interested in me and always came to talk to me. After the car entered the Gobi, it left the road very quickly, and Dingzhu Zhuoma began to lead the way. She was accompanied by her daughter-in-law and a grandson, and she was in the same car with Aning, at the front of the convoy.I don't know their situation. I only know that after the old woman started to lead the way, it became difficult for the car to walk. It was either a gravel beach or a dry riverbed in a river canyon. Soon the team complained.

Dingzhu Zhuoma explained that in order to find the mountain pass she saw back then, she had to find a village first. They started their travels in that village, and Wenjin bought all his horses and camels in the village.The village may be deserted now, but the ruins should still be there. Find it to proceed to the next step. The old woman's memory is still quite good. Sure enough, in the evening, we came to the small village called "Lancuo". There are still people living in the village. There are four families with more than 30 people. This discovery makes us ecstatic. First, it proves the ability of the old woman. Second, things are going smoothly, and we have been traveling in the Gobi for a long time, and we are always very happy to see places where human beings gather.It was late at that time, so we decided to camp in the village.

Unfortunately, there was an accident when we entered the village. A car fell into a wind-eroded ditch. People were fine, but the car was scrapped. At this time, we were quite far away from the nearest road, and it was impossible to get any aid.This meant that another car had to stay behind to take care of it. After this incident happened, Aning began to appear preoccupied.That night we were resting next to the scrapped car, and Aning told us her worries.She is a little worried. Although they are equipped with first-class off-road vehicles, the surrounding conditions are too harsh. If they cannot find the mountain pass in a short period of time, these vehicles will definitely be scrapped here one by one. Sometimes they may be repaired. Very small problems in the garage, but here it can cripple the car. And the farther they go into the depths of the basin, the abandoned car and the people with it may not be rescued in time and may encounter danger in the Gobi. Cars are different from camels and horses. Camels will heal themselves when they are injured, and minor injuries will not affect their journey. However, once an accident occurs in a high-tech car, it is so fragile that it makes people sad. After all, these are civilian cars. No military sturdiness. But this is not Aning's mistake, because in this era, it is impossible for this team of nearly fifty people to enter Qaidam on camels. First, it is impossible to find so many camels at one time. People, including camels carrying luggage and spare camels, may require nearly a hundred camels. Such a huge camel caravan is too conspicuous and will definitely be noticed by the government. The mechanic accompanying the team told her that there is no need to worry so much. The Qaidam Basin is not a big place at the speed of the "Land Rover". Twenty years ago, the Qaidam Basin might still be as popular as the Taklamakan Desert. The sea of ​​death, which is feared by people, can now cross half of the development area in just a dozen hours. There are a large number of exploration bases and industrial bases, so there is no need to worry about it. However, this statement was immediately rejected by the grandson of Dingzhu Zhuoma. This young man named Tashi said that we trust the power of machines too much. Although Qaidam has been conquered, the safe place is only limited to the place where the road network radiates , about 2% of the entire basin, and the other 98% are deserts, swamps, and salt caps. We, a dozen or so people with less than 50 cars, don't care about this tens of millions of people. Insignificant in the land devouring life years ago. He said that even along the least dangerous tourist routes designed, people get lost and die in accidents every year, not to mention that we are now planning to go deep into no-man's land. He also said that the people he met before were all travelers with the purpose of crossing the basin. These people would not stay in the basin for more than two days, and our purpose was to search in the basin.That is to say, our journey has no end, so going around in circles in the Gobi was the biggest taboo of the shepherds here before, so Miss Ning's worry is not unreasonable, it's better to be careful in everything. Tashi's words made us fall into silence. Aning thought for a long time and asked Tashi: "Then what advice do you have for us?" Tashi shook his head and said: Since you are going to enter Qaidam, your head must be pinned to your trouser belt. This has been the case since ancient times. Tashi’s statement is always a bit alarmist. I heard people say that Tashi was very angry at his grandmother’s promise to lead us. He thought it was too dangerous, and Ah Ning and the others used money to convince him His grandmother is a kind of karma, we bring danger and sin to his grandmother.But the old lady Dingzhu Zhuolmana was very firm. The status of the grandmother in the Tibetan family was very high, and Tashi had no choice but to follow her to take care of her.So he basically didn't give us any good looks or say anything good along the way. Even so, in this village with only a few low adobe houses on the Gobi, blowing the cold wind of the Gobi at night, looking at the twitching bonfire, and thinking about the distance we are now from the civilized world, I still feel a shudder . After he finished speaking, we were not in the mood to talk any more. We sat by the campfire in silence for a long time, and then we went into our sleeping bags to rest.We are going to set off early tomorrow morning. Aning did not set up a tent, but only open-air sleeping bags. The temperature here sometimes drops below zero at night, so we all hide behind the raised ridges and stay close to the campfire to keep warm. Lying there, I felt that many people couldn't fall asleep, surrounded by whispers brought by the wind.No wonder, this may be the last place marked on the map before entering Qaidam. Veterans of this kind of activity naturally don't care, but a large part of the team are recruited locally, so of course they will be excited at this time a little. I don't know whether I am a veteran or a novice, but I just looked up at the sky and found that the sky here is much closer to the ground, and the stars are much clearer. I am in the south, and I haven't seen a sky full of stars for a long time since I was an adult.Seeing the bright Milky Way in the sky so clearly now, I can't help feeling sleepy. However, the long-distance running always worked. After a while of noise, the surrounding voices gradually quieted down. Aning and the others arranged a vigil. Because of the large number of people, these tiring tasks are mainly performed by local hired people, so they will not be rotated to us.But because this is still a village, there is no need to be too vigilant. Tashi also said that only near Hoh Xil may large-scale beasts appear. The grass here is so small that even mice do not come, let alone carnivorous beasts, so I also didn't hear the voice of the night watchman chatting, so I probably fell asleep.I vaguely heard a few animal calls in the wind, but I didn't pay much attention to it. We slept in the middle of the entire camp, and it was our turn to be eaten. I was thinking about things while looking at the night sky. I don’t know how long it took. Just when I was drowsy, I suddenly felt someone walking in front of me. I shivered and woke up. After taking a look, it turned out to be Tashi. I was taken aback by him, so I quickly sat up and wanted to talk, but he squatted down and pressed my mouth, and said softly: "Don't talk, come with me, my grandma wants to see you."