Chapter 39: Chapter 39 – The People’s Goddess (2)

Translator: Dragon Boat Translation Editor: Dragon Boat Translation

At 4 o’clock in the morning, on the 8th of April, Zhang Helai and his team set off from the fifth campsite. There were now only 12 people left in the entire mountaineering expedition group.

The three teams had a total of 20 people originally, but 8 of them were suffering from severe illnesses when they underwent health checks at the fourth campsite. They were not suffering from typical conditions like vomiting of blood but were instead showing psychotic behavior where they lay lazily on the ground as if they were drunk and were unconscious. Even when they tried to stand up, they were unable to differentiate between their shoes and their thermos flasks—yes, one of them even stuffed his boots into his mouth and wondered why there was no water coming out of them.

In their case, they could only remain at the fourth campsite and wait for the Kamiyan people to escort them down the mountain safely.

The low atmospheric pressure at a high altitude of more than 8,000 meters above sea level on the Hyjal mountain reduces the oxygen concentration within the human body to about one-third the level as compared to at sea level. Even when they were sleeping at night and the mountaineers kept their oxygen masks on, they could still feel physically uncomfortable due to the high altitude and thin air.

Compared with those people, Zhang Helai was considered lucky. He was still able to remain conscious and alert in his ascent up the mountain, but what was unfortunate was that his physical endurance had reached its limit, and his body had no choice but to use up more oxygen to function.

Although the group had already stopped at the fifth campsite, which was as large as a football field, for six hours to rest, Zhang Helai still felt a sunken feeling exerted on his body when he woke up.

When they set off from the fifth campsite, his other teammates could see that the amount of oxygen left in the oxygen tank Zhang Helai was carrying on his back was much lower than the others—it had dropped to a very dangerous level. Someone had given Zhang Helai a pat on his shoulder and pointed to his oxygen tank, but he shook his head and the others did not continue to coax him further.

All of them had to conserve their available oxygen by reducing the energy expended from talking, but they had also fulfilled basic human responsibilities—to advise Zhang Helai to treasure his life.

Anyone who dared to climb up and conquer the Hyjal mountain had to be responsible for themselves. Although the route to the peak had been planned out, such that it was the safest way possible, they still saw many dead bodies buried under the layers of snow during their climb. Whilst some of the dead bodies were found in locations that were extraordinarily hard to reach, the majority of corpses had been gathered together. They were mountaineers who had lost their lives for some reason or another during their journey on the mountain.

Without a doubt, Mount Hyjal was sufficiently cold to become a natural preservation ground for the corpses. The rate of decomposition of the body was extremely slow, and since the mountaineers would generally be wearing thick layers of protective equipment against the cold, the decomposing flesh and remaining bones of the corpses would be hidden from the view of other climbers. They would only be able to see layers of clothing over dead bodies serving as landmarks.

This is the sad truth of the Hyjal mountain route, 9,000 meters above sea level—every path was found at the expense of countless lives. Some of the paths could not even be considered a path as it required an almost 90° incline along the cliff, achieved by nailing down the rope securely with just one’s bare hands and climbing slowly onto it. There could even be cracked cliffs where one needed to secure the ropes and boards for the people behind to climb slowly across the precipice, 9,000 meters above the ground. If any one made a mistake and fell all the way to the bottom, there was not even a chance of recovering the dead body.

The team had initially felt a sense of fear when they first saw the many dead corpses along the way, but they soon felt more at ease and even nodded slightly at them in greeting when they walked past the bodies. After all, any of the team members could well become a part of them, so it was not a bad idea to exchange greetings with their potential neighbors beforehand.

You could either overcome all the obstacles nature presented in your way, or decide to become nature itself, or else you should just give up. If you dared to climb Mount Hyjal, then no one else should be responsible for your life.

Anyone who climbed Mount Hyjal would have had their own aspirations, or at the least, they would have wanted to gain some experience they could be proud of, to gain fame and recognition, or to fulfill their dreams. But at more than 9,000 meters above sea level, they were so close to the world’s highest peak, and they had only one thing in mind: to conquer it, and survive the journey back!

At about 8:50 in the morning, on the 9th of April, the group had already reached the checkpoint at 9,810 meters above sea level. They would only require at most two hours to reach the summit of the Hyjal mountain, and after taking photographs to remember the moment, they would be able to return safely to the fifth campsite before 1 o’clock that afternoon.

The latest time to descent from the Hyjal mountain was at 13:00 hours. Any delay would result in being unable to set up camp before sunset due to the unpredictable weather. They could even be trapped to death enroute. When Zhang Helai and the rest of the group saw the sign of the 9810-meter checkpoint, they saw yet another dead body buried in the snow, right beside the sign post. No one knew if he had been trapped there due to adverse weather conditions and froze to his death.

Now, Zhang Helai was manifesting severe conditions like nausea, paleness and cold sweats, and was slowly falling behind the group. With his oxygen tank almost depleted of oxygen, he was now showing signs of hypoxemia.

Even if Zhang Helai persevered and reached the peak, he would not be able to return to the bottom due to the lack of oxygen. He had overestimated his physical ability and had used up more oxygen than expected during his ascent. Regardless, he was now at a dead end.

Zhang Helai could not possibly turn back at this point now, and so he trudged on with all his energy. All he thought about was that if he were to die, he had to die at the peak of Mount Hyjal, 10,000 meters above the sea level. Prior to his expedition, he had already arranged for his family to receive his life insurance benefits should he meet with an unfortunate accident.

At this point in time, no one would be willing to help him. At the most, they would inform the Kamiyan people of the location of his dead body so that they could recover it and arrange for his family to retrieve his corpse for burial.

The lack of oxygen in his body made Zhang Helai extremely exhausted and feel heavy. The equipment he was carrying felt like he was being chained by the mountain as if attempting to make him stay on this natural cemetery forever.

At this juncture, Zhang Helai no longer had many thoughts in mind. Ordinary people who were about to die could, at the least, take a walk down memory lane, but for Zhang Helai who was about to die due to a lack of oxygen to the brain, he could not even afford to ‘recall’ and reminisce about his past memories as he slowly lost consciousness.

Just as he was about to shut his eyes and lose all of his consciousness, Zhang Helai heard a strange voice coming from below and behind him in the whistling of the bitterly cold wind.

It was the sound of rocks falling and hitting each other.

Did something drop? Or did a hailstorm form due to the wind?

Zhang Helai forced himself to open his eyes, and through his blurred vision, he saw what seemed like a human figure below him.

A human figure… below…?

Zhang Helai had been walking on the mountain route, and below him was a steep slope with an incline of almost 80°!

In his stupor, Zhang Helai thought that he must have been hallucinating in delirium. However, the figure went over to him very quickly, and took off his oxygen mask!

Instantly, he felt the bitter cold air assaulting his face like knives piercing through his skin. Just as he was about to shut both of his eyes and fall unconscious, another oxygen mask snapped onto his face and over his nose. Instinctively, he took large gulps of the oxygenated air and as the oxygen-rich air filled his lungs, he gradually regained consciousness.

“Who saved me?” Zhang Helai thought the moment he regained consciousness. “Who would be willing to sacrifice their oxygen tank to me?”

Everyone could, at most, carry one oxygen tank, otherwise, they would definitely not be able to move with the huge weight on their backs. But without any doubt, Zhang Helai was breathing someone else’s oxygen. He opened his eyes and turned his head to see an unfamiliar aface.

In the snow and wind, her golden hair was lined with frost, and her exposed skin was flushed red due to the extreme cold. Her thin set of clothes danced in the wind as if a useless armor in the assaulting cold wind and served merely as a cover for her. She had a relatively thin figure and yet her eyes shone with a comforting glow from her beautiful face, as if a warm beam of sunlight penetrated deep within Zhang Helai.

She kept the oxygen mask over Zhang Helai’s face with her right hand and held onto the oxygen tank with her left. A length of rope was wrapped around her waist, but she carried nothing else.

A…young girl who had golden hair.

A…mountaineer who did not use an oxygen tank.

A…mountaineer who did not use the conventional mountain routes but instead climbed directly onto the cliffs.

A…mountaineer who did not wear any protective clothing, who did not wear gloves or boots, who was still able to continue her ascent as per normal at 9,000 meters above sea level!

Without any warm clothing, without any oxygen tank, what was this sorcery?

Based on the general guideline of a six centigrade drop in temperature for every 1000-meter increment above sea level, since it was spring on the ground in the Tedamia region with a temperature of about 20°C, then it would be at least -34°C at the current elevation of more than 9,000 meters. And in fact, when they set out from the fifth campsite at an elevation of 9,600 meters, the measured temperature was -40°C.

How cold was it at -40°C? Saliva would turn into ice even before reaching the ground; a normal person without any warm clothing and protective equipment would lose all body heat in under an hour, and the body temperature would drop below -25°C. The temperature regulatory center of the brain would cease to function, and one would quickly stop breathing, the heart would stop beating, and the blood pressure would drop rapidly. All reflexes would disappear and there would be no response to external stimuli. Eventually, the vasomotor center and the respiratory center would stop functioning and result in death.

In other words, the young golden-haired girl should have been frozen into an ice sculpture by now, and her limbs should be weak and stiff. There was no way she could still be moving and functioning normally!

Furthermore, she did not use an oxygen tank?!

Some people amongst extreme groups of mountaineering hobbyists believed that the potential of the human body was limitless, and indeed there had been many mountaineers who had acclimatized to the thinner air at higher altitudes by training at an elevation of 6,000 meters above sea level. The partial pressure of oxygen in alveolar air and the partial pressure of oxygenated pulmonary venous blood was about 100 mmHg in people living at lower altitudes, and that of the Kamiyan people who lived at higher altitudes was only 10 mmHg. The less oxygen required, the higher one could climb.

As such, some people believe that as long as one lived sufficiently long at a certain altitude, it was possible for one to climb the Hyjal mountain, which, at its peak, had an atmospheric pressure at less than a third of that at sea level, without bringing any oxygen tanks!

However, this was not possible. Even at the third campsite, 8,400 meters above sea level, there had yet to be any instances of anyone being able to continue the ascent without using an oxygen tank. Even the Kamiyan people who lived their lives at higher altitudes than most people could not do so!

Furthermore, the young golden-haired girl did not walk the usual paths but instead chose to climb the cliffs which stood at an incline of 70°~90°, using just her bare hands…

Countless complicated thoughts and questions formed in Zhang Helai’s head as he finally managed a short mutter, “Thanks.”

He did not think that he had such charisma that the golden-haired girl would sacrifice her life to save him, and it naturally followed that the girl merely wanted to help him when she saw that he was about to die.

The young girl with golden-colored hair smiled as she helped him remove the oxygen tank on his back, and replace it with the one she had been holding on her hand.

Zhang Helai did not stop her, and neither was he in the position to stop her—should he be worried about the golden-haired girl who would die from a lack of oxygen after giving him her oxygen tank?

That would have been nonsense, for Zhang Helai could tell with just his eyes that the young girl with golden hair was in a much better physical condition than him!

“At that point in time, I’m sure you would have known that the person in front of you…is not an ordinary person,” said the official in the black vest.

“I wouldn’t be exaggerating if I called her a superwoman,” said Zhang Helai. He smiled and continued, “She’s simply…the goddess of Mount Hyjal. Ordinary people like me can only hope for her existence.”

Source: Webnovel.com, updated by NovelKeep