Fei Tang picked a handbag of Gobi jade. At first, he carefully examined each piece—its color, its luster, its cracks. But then he suddenly realized: Changdong and Ye Liuxi weren’t picking anything either, and it was only he who was. He couldn’t afford to become overconfident, especially when everyone else was moving so slowly, treating politeness as a blessing. So he quickly grabbed everything—whether it was perfect or not—anything that looked good and had a pleasing color, no matter what, and bundled it all into his bag, rather than risk missing out. When he returned to the car, he had already roughly guessed that their partnership was coming to an end: they’d made it through the uninhabited region, saved their lives, and even earned a modest profit—far from a wasted trip. Yet he hadn’t expected Changdong and Ye Liuxi to return to Baidongdui. Fei Tang felt a cold rush of anxiety: “Dongguang, don’t you worry? This time, we’re lucky—what if…?” He couldn’t even form the words; he was trembling. Yet he knew these two had strong intentions, and his own voice carried little weight. He watched them drive away with longing, wondering whether it was easier to form feelings when going through hardships—yet felt oddly uneasy in his heart. After the car had driven about ten to fifteen meters, it suddenly stopped again. Ye Liuxi reached out from the window and waved at him. Fei Tang dropped his bag and hurried over. Ye Liuxi handed him a satellite phone: "There's a channel in the Gobi region, near Yuhem, to sell off the goods. I've been thinking about this—should you find success from this, you won't leave soon. You'll come back again." Fei Tang's cheeks warmed up. Indeed, he had memorized the milestone number of the nearby provincial highway, specifically to come back again someday. "Stay in touch," she said with a half-smile, "and one day I'll ask you to help me deliver some supplies—will you come then?" Fei Tang clutched the satellite phone tightly: "I won't. As long as I'm here, I'll definitely come back." Ye Liuxi smiled: "Don't worry. If I really need your help, I'll just ask you to deliver the supplies to the entrance — Around dusk, the two returned to Bai Long Dui. No one, no wind, quiet and still as the lunar surface. Meng Jin Gu’s camp was neat—no plastic bags left behind—but this sense of environmental awareness didn’t extend to others. The ground where the team had set up camp looked like a landfill, piled high with leftover waste. Chang Dong gathered the trash and burned it; black smoke rose steadily into the sky, a decent effort in the remote area where, if waste couldn’t be removed, it was hard to do better. For dinner, they simply ate what was available, gathered the fire, pitched the tent. Though the ground stakes still wouldn’t drive in, the lack of wind meant they wouldn’t be blown away—either the weight of the tent itself could hold it down, or they could prop it with stones at the corners. Sleeping in the vehicle had been unbearable; every morning, Chang Dong woke up with stiff back and sore shoulders, as if he’d been beaten. In the evening, Chang Dong pulled out the shadow puppets for some entertainment. Ye Liuxi had no intention of pushing him anymore, just as she had advised Chang Dong: "If you can't drive out Fei Tang, then try to fall in love with him." Since Chang Dong remained unyielding and didn't flinch under her sharp remarks, she adjusted her approach and began to explore the unique qualities of the shadow puppetry. Perhaps, when the time came to reopen her stall and sell melons while also performing shadow plays, her income could double. She carefully went through every item in Chang Dong's puppet stage. Chang Dong meticulously carved the puppets, occasionally glancing aside when he saw her examining the materials, and would then explain to her. "These are the leather sheets—the world has no two exactly alike. Some are clean and pale, others gray and coarse. We use the finer leather for scholars and beauties; the coarser for generals and comic characters; the poorest for background props." Ye Liuxi scoffed, "Even carving a shadow puppet, you treat the material like a person—so very self-serving." "You carve a delicate, well-built laborer, and still don't manage it well," she added. Ye Liuxi huffed, then picked up a volume whose pages had turned yellow "That was the initial sketching phase—you had to think carefully about how the figures or animals could move, and wherever they could move, those were the points where the joints would be formed. So the head, limbs, and other parts all needed to be sketched separately. For instance, if you wanted to carve a scorpion, you couldn't draw it all at once; you'd have to break it down into parts first, then assemble them. "Ye Luoxi found fault: "It's like having to disassemble it into eight pieces—really harsh, isn't it?" Eventually, with no more points of criticism left, he could only rest his chin and watch Chang Dong carve the shadow figure. "If you've gone through extremely painful experiences and no one has saved you, you won't want to collapse on your own—you'll have to find something to distract yourself, to fill the void, to shift your focus. Anything will do: wine, passion, shadow plays, even." "Why can't you let go now? Still struggling?" "Because you've gotten used to it." Ye Liuxi sighed. "Then I guess I don't need to learn this. I don't have much to suffer through." "Never?" "Never really," Ye Liuxi said, looking at the fire slowly dimming. "Sometimes I feel like I've never even cried..." She suddenly stiffened, and sharply demanded, "Who is that!" — Chang Dong turned to look. With the camp's lights and the firelight, he could make out a figure hiding near the edge of the earthen platform—hiding rather awkwardly, constantly shifting and trembling. Ye Liuxi pulled a still-unburnt stick from the fire and threw it hard, shouting, "Get out!" The embers from the wood fire scattered around the man, glowing orange. He still hadn’t stepped out—his body swayed steadily, like a toy figure that wouldn’t fall. Chang Dong held her chisel tightly in her palm, gave a glance to Ye Liuxi, who nodded and picked up her knife, moving in tandem with Chang Dong, forming a flanking attack from left and right, advancing slowly toward him. The man didn’t flee or appear—seemingly aware of their approach, he paused for a brief moment, as if still listening. Ye Liuxi felt a bit tense… Indeed, the head chef from Gray Eight had been making pancakes on the first day, then serving carrot and lamb soup the next. Ye Liuxi realized: last night, Gray Eight's death had scared away two people, and this head chef was one of them. She had originally thought that those who had worked alongside Gray Eight and the coffin would have vanished as mysteriously as he and the coffin had—only to find they were still there. Her tone carried a touch of disdain: "I always assumed people who worked with Gray Eight must have some courage—yet here they are, completely stunned. Still, quite capable, to have managed to come back." Chang Dong paused and reflected: "Last night, when they were all rushing around so chaotically, it was easy to get lost. Perhaps when I was burning the trash earlier, he saw the black smoke and followed the trail back." He then pulled the head chef firmly to sit by the campfire. With two people now missing, and one more lost in the White Dragon Ridge, he would need to be especially vigilant tomorrow—starvation, temperature fluctuations, and dehydration could claim a life within just two or three days. The chef wasn't content. He clenched his left hand into a fist and slowly pushed his right hand upward until it reached a certain height, then made a crisp "click" sound with his mouth. After that, he kept his left hand in a fist and lifted it up, taking a long, deep breath. The head chef slightly shifted the umbrella, squinting at the sky, then quickly pulled it back over his head, murmuring softly about sand, opening the umbrella, and folding clothes. Chang Dong paused. The weight of the hundred or so pounds pressed heavily on his shoulders—now, with the pause, it felt even heavier. He shifted his shoulders and lifted his body slightly, as if adjusting his position at the stove. Ye Liuxi picked something up from the ground, tapped it firmly, and handed it to him. "His umbrella fell," he said. Chang Dong turned and walked off immediately. "The person in charge doesn't have to be the one who went crazy when Gray Eight died—he went back later, witnessed several things, perhaps even saw how those things vanished right before his eyes... yet he wasn't taken away." That is to say, the dead are erased, the living are left behind. "Not taking the living"—that phrase is so terrifying that Ye Liuxi's scalp tingled slightly. "What did you come up with?" Chang Dong said softly. "We've experienced strange occurrences over several consecutive nights, and these nights share a common feature: strong winds and sandstorms. In the heart of the desert, there's a saying: at night, during a major sandstorm, by chance, you'll see the ghosts of Yumen Pass." When the gray one died, the song echoed like waves on the horizon, layer upon layer, as countless wandering spirits hummed: "Yumen Pass, Ghost Pass, one step beyond, blood runs dry..." The elderly woman from "Jia Village," who spoke with a stammer and washed her clothes with brackish water, said: "That Yumen Pass—Yumen Pass—has already been alive for a long time. If you go out into the fields at night, don't wander too far, or you'll find yourself walking into the pass's hollows. Yumen Pass is also known as the Yin Pass." Ye Liuxi asked: "So you're saying all the strange things we've encountered along the way are due to this Yumen Pass, which has long since weathered and crumbled?" Chang Dong replied: "The green ghost flames, the camel caravans struck by the light, the strange hands in the sandstorms, the shadow coffins, and that very song—don't you think all these incidents are somehow connected to Yumen Pass?" Ye Liuxi remained silent. For a long time, Chang Dong only heard her soft, whispering voice: "Then, will I be someone from Perhaps she had mentioned it—she seemed to be someone who always drove large trucks, hauling various loads: shoes, clothes, books, even celebrity posters… Yet every time, once they entered the Gobi Desert, she would forget everything. … But everything about the Jade Gate Fort remained legend. And those goods—those were real. Who were they being delivered to?