146: Chapter 146 The Reclining Ox Stone

Hu Tian looked up and indeed saw a not-so-large white yacht, with a man wearing a windbreaker standing at the bow, waving at him.

Hu Tian hung up the phone, picked up his backpack, walked over, and stepped onto the boat.

The man was in his early thirties, his skin tanned very dark, and his facial features were rugged. He looked like someone who had spent years at sea. He reached out and shook hands with Hu Tian, "Mr. Hu?"

"Yes," Hu Tian nodded, "You must be Old Lin?"

"That's me," the man smiled, revealing a mouthful of white teeth, "A friend introduced you, saying you wanted to go diving near the Min River Estuary and needed to rent a boat."

"Yes," Hu Tian said, "Can this boat of yours go out to sea?"

"Yes," Old Lin patted the gunwale, "I've been sailing this boat for five years; no problem."

Hu Tian took the boat keys from Old Lin. It was a keychain with a rubber float attached; it felt heavy in his hand and carried a salty, fishy scent of the sea.

He counted the cash in his hand, pulled out a stack, and handed it to Old Lin, "This is the deposit for now; I'll pay the balance when I return."

Old Lin took the money, gave it a squeeze, didn't count it on the spot, and stuffed it into his windbreaker pocket. He patted Hu Tian on the shoulder, "You're going by yourself? Don't you want a guide?"

"No need," Hu Tian said, "I can manage on my own."

Old Lin took a look at him and didn't say anything more, just pointed to an iron box next to the cockpit, "There are spare fuel canisters, a set of simple tools, and life jackets inside. Once you're out of the estuary, the wind and waves get rough, so be careful."

Hu Tian nodded, threw his backpack into the cockpit, skillfully untied the mooring ropes, and started the engine.

The yacht's engine let out a low roar, the hull vibrated slightly, and the propeller stirred up a circle of murky water. The bow slowly turned, moving out from the dock and heading in the direction of the Min River Estuary.

Not long after leaving Mawei Dock, the water surface widened.

When the Min River reached the estuary, the river surface spread out like a giant fan. The water color gradually lightened from the deep brown of the inland areas, finally merging with the seawater to become a murky grey-green.

There were many boats in this area; fishing boats, cargo ships, and yachts of all sizes wove through the water. Some were going downstream, others upstream. With masts standing like a forest, it looked like a moving forest.

Hu Tian gripped the steering wheel, weaving through the fleet. His gaze swept across the sea from time to time, and he had already gone over the coordinates provided by the Treasure Hunting Radar in his mind.

The Treasure Hunting Radar was quietly suspended in the depths of his consciousness at this moment. That coordinate point was like a nail, firmly pinned to the sea chart in his mind. The location was on the west side of Beigan Island in the Matsu Islands, about 1,200 meters from the coastline, at a depth of about 14 meters.

A shipwreck from the late Qing Dynasty lay there. The hold was packed with a batch of copper coins and porcelain that had been secretly transported to Taiwan at the time. Due to historical turmoil, no one ever knew the whereabouts of this cargo, and it had been quietly sleeping on the seabed for over a hundred years.

Hu Tian increased the speed of the boat. The yacht broke through the waves, the bow spraying up a mist of white water. It quickly passed through the dense fleet and sailed toward the open sea.

Once out of the Min River Estuary, the sea became completely wide. The wind also picked up, and waves pushed forward one after another, causing the boat to pitch and roll with significantly increased amplitude. Hu Tian stood with his feet slightly apart to stabilize his center of gravity, gripping the steering wheel and keeping the bow pointed steadily toward the southeast.

On the distant horizon, a rolling outline could be vaguely seen—that was the Matsu Islands.

As the distance closed in, the outline gradually became clearer. Hu Tian stood in the cockpit, his gaze looking over the bow, watching the islands slowly reveal their true appearance.

The Matsu Islands were an archipelago composed of thirty-six islands and reefs of various sizes, scattered on the sea outside the Min River Estuary. At their closest point, they were only a dozen nautical miles from the Fujian Province mainland. In terms of geographical location, they were almost like a string of broken jade embedded along the continental coastline.

The terrain of these islands was extremely steep. The mountain ridges rose directly from the sea with almost no gentle slopes. The granite cliffs, having been washed by waves for thousands of years, had been eroded into countless jagged edges and gullies of varying depths. The color was a deep grey with rust-like stains, shimmering with a rough luster under the sunlight.

In the crevices of the cliffs grew clusters of tenacious shrubs and wild grasses. Their leaves were blown by the sea breeze to bend in the same direction, as if they were forever bowing toward the mainland.

The waterways between the islands were narrow and rapid. Sea currents squeezed and wove between the reefs and islands, forming hidden currents. Whirlpools and wave crests could be seen appearing alternately on the water surface, and foam piled up into a snow-white mass by the reefs. The sound of waves crashing against the cliffs could be heard from afar—low and powerful, as if something huge were pulsing within the rocks.

In the shallow sea area near the islands, the water color changed from grey-green to a transparent blue-green. The outlines of the reefs on the seabed were vaguely visible through the water surface. The reefs were covered with large patches of algae that swayed gently with the movement of the water, like a dark carpet covering the seabed.

Occasionally, a school of fish would flash past the reefs, sparking a silver-white light that vanished in an instant.

The vegetation on the islands was not lush. Most of what grew on the hillsides were salt-tolerant dwarf trees and wild grasses. Occasionally, a few taller casuarina trees stood slanted on the cliff edges; their trunks were blown into peculiar arcs by the year-round sea breeze, and their branches and leaves were sparse, yet they displayed a stubborn vitality.

Scattered on the hillsides were some old-style stone houses, built with local granite. The roofs were weighed down with stones, and the walls were thick and low—an architectural style formed by the local residents to withstand typhoons. They looked simple and sturdy. Many had been abandoned, and only in a few places could one see traces of rising cooking smoke.

Inside the bays, the wind and waves were slightly smaller, and the water surface was relatively calm. There were several naturally formed rocky beaches along the shore. As waves washed up, they made a delicate splashing sound in the crevices of the rocks. After the tide receded, large areas of dark rock surfaces were exposed on the rocky beaches, covered with dense clusters of barnacles and sea snails. A few white seagulls perched on the tops of the protruding rocks, necks tucked in, staring blankly at the sea.

The clouds in the sky were very low, pushed quickly by the sea breeze. Sunlight appeared and disappeared, casting light onto the sea surface, transforming the water color into layers of overlapping shades—sometimes a quiet ink-blue, sometimes revealing a light, airy cyan. The distant reefs and island silhouettes appeared and disappeared in the light and shadow, giving the entire sea area a vast and primitive atmosphere.

Hu Tian slowed the boat, bypassed a reef area, and steered the yacht into the sea area on the west side of Beigan Island. The water here was relatively open, with no other boats nearby. The sea breeze in this area carried a stronger, fishy, salty scent, and the waves were slightly gentler than in the open sea, but they still rose and fell with a steady rhythm.

The yacht gradually decelerated, and the white foam stirred up by the propeller slowly dispersed at the stern. Hu Tian stood in the cockpit, one hand holding the steering wheel and the other holding his phone, carefully comparing the photograph of the silk map on the screen again and again.

The map had turned yellow and brittle, with some damage at the edges. However, the island outline drawn in ink, with its concise lines and simple annotations, revealed an aura that the person who drew it back then must have been extremely familiar with this sea area.

Hao Yulin's handwritten note was written on the lower left side of the map. The handwriting was neat, a typical "official" style. The general meaning was that the entrance was located on the western cliff facing the sea of a certain island, where there was a giant rock shaped like a crouching ox. Behind the rock were piles of loose stones and rubble; one must push aside the rubble to reveal a cliff crevice, which was only wide enough for one person to enter.

Hu Tian flipped the phone over and checked the coordinates on the navigation system again. Comparing the two, his gaze fell on the island ahead.

This island was smaller than the surrounding ones, but its terrain was exceptionally steep. It was almost like a single block of granite protruding from the sea. The cliffs on all four sides were nearly vertical, with no gentle slopes. The waves struck directly at the base of the rock, and years of erosion had hollowed out a jagged indentation at the bottom of the cliff. From a distance, it looked as if the rock had been bitten by something from below the water surface.

There was very little vegetation on the island. At the top, there were a few casuarina trees blown askew by the wind, their branches growing almost against the rock surface, their roots firmly gripped in the crevices of the rock.

There were no buildings, nor any traces of boats having approached. The entire island displayed a desolate, remote air of being completely forgotten.

Hu Tian lowered the speed of the boat, steered the yacht around the east side of the island, and slowly moved westward along the outer edge of the cliff.

This water area was dense with reefs, and the outlines of the reefs could be vaguely seen below the water surface. As he steered, he checked the depth gauge reading from time to time, proceeding with extreme caution.

After rounding the east cliff, the western cliff appeared in his field of vision. The light was dimmer on this side than on the east, and the sea breeze was partially blocked by the island itself, making the waves relatively calmer.

The cliff was made of dark grey granite, its surface uneven and pitted, covered with large patches of seaweed and barnacles. The rock surface above the waterline was repeatedly wetted by waves and dried by the sun, forming a distinct water-mark line, like a scale left by time.

Hu Tian slowed the boat and moved it slowly along a position a dozen meters outside the cliff, his gaze carefully scanning along the rock wall.

He remembered the crouching ox rock noted on the map. It was said to be shaped like a crouching ox, so it must be quite large and shouldn't be hard to identify.

But now, the cliff in front of him was filled with large rocks of various shapes. It was hard to distinguish details from a distance, so he decided to bring the boat a bit closer.

The yacht slowly approached the cliff. The propeller speed was reduced to the minimum, and the sound of the engine was suppressed into a low hum, which was drowned out by the sound of waves hitting the rocks, making it almost inaudible.

About six or seven meters from the cliff, Hu Tian saw it.

The rock was right at the base of the cliff, about 1.5 to 1.6 meters high and nearly two meters wide. Its overall outline was low and broad, its surface rounded, and its sides extended slightly downward.

Hu Tian checked from several angles, and finally discovered it from a very narrow angle.

The rock did indeed look somewhat like it was crouching. To say it resembled an ox was not unreasonable; it was more like a large beast with its head bowed, quietly leaning against the base of the cliff. Half of its body was submerged in the range where the waves could reach, its surface covered with a thick layer of green-brown algae, blending into the surrounding rocks. If one didn't look carefully, one wouldn't notice any difference between it and the other reefs.

Hu Tian stopped the boat and dropped the anchor.

The sound of the anchor chain entering the water seemed exceptionally crisp by the side of these relatively quiet cliffs. The anchor bit into the reef on the seabed, and the yacht swayed slightly on the water surface twice before stabilizing.