Chapter 1 The Reason Behind Everything

"Mr. Zhao, now, I can tell you the reason behind all this."

I was dizzy from all this sudden upheaval and nodded helplessly.

"Those two groups of people just now were from the Z Organization. The Z Organization has grown to a massive scale, reaching into every country and region in the world. If my calculations are correct, the core members of this organization already number more than twenty thousand, scattered in every corner of the world. They are after you."

"Me?" I looked at her in confusion.

Zoe gestured for me to continue listening.

"...I only learned about all this six months ago. I think you've already seen the information about your father, your second uncle, and the cause and effect of all this. Let's start with the 1984 expedition."

In 1984, the Molman expedition team chose to climb the mountain from the position where the Senna brothers descended that year. They advanced along the established route towards Devil's Col and set up camp on a flat ground four or five hundred meters away from Devil's Col. This place was hidden among the mountains, a raised flat ground that was not afraid of blizzards and could stay away from avalanche disasters. Most importantly, supplies were very convenient here, and there were no obstacles to communication with the outside world.

The expedition cycle was initially set for three months, the three months with the most suitable weather of the year. In the first two months, the expedition team only studied and explored the periphery of Devil's Col and did not venture inside.

On a certain day at the beginning of the last month, something strange happened. Four of the five people in a group collecting samples on the periphery of Devil's Col suddenly disappeared. The missing people were the two British men, a Chinese man, and a South Asian man who were missing from the second photo. The person who returned was another Chinese man named He Rui.

The group's task today, like usual, was to collect soil and plant samples around Devil's Col. This task had been going on for more than a month and had been going smoothly until now. He Rui initially followed behind the four people. He was suddenly attracted by a strange stone on the mountain. The stone's shape was a bit strange, curved like a crescent moon. He was so engrossed in watching it that he stopped for less than a minute. When he came back to his senses and wanted to catch up with the team, he found that the four people had suddenly disappeared. Because the surrounding area was almost completely open, and the edge of the mountain col was high, there was no place to hide. Could it be a prank by the four? But he believed that Li Bo, as a fellow Chinese, would not collude with people from other countries to tease him.

He Rui dared not run around. He stood where he was and turned on the radio: "Li Bo, are you there? Frank, Rick, Shakya, where are you?" Only static came from the radio. The camp also heard He Rui's call for help. After understanding the situation, Cole Molman immediately warned He Rui not to run around and to return to the camp quickly. This matter was too bizarre and too strange. He Rui immediately returned to the camp.

This was the first time that team members had gone missing, completely unexpectedly. Cole panicked all of a sudden. He originally planned to do some more research on Devil's Col before considering going deeper, but he didn't expect an accident to happen.

He Rui flatly denied that they had set foot in the "restricted area" that Cole had initially set. Obviously, Cole had not told them the secret of Devil's Col. He Rui explained, "We were still a distance away from the designated restricted area at the time and did not trespass into that restricted area. Moreover, Li Bo would not leave me to take risks without saying a word. After all, we have a good relationship..."

Cole asked everyone for their opinions. The other four Chinese people and Kately, the Nepalese (who was married to Shakya), advocated for rescue. The nine Americans were willing to cooperate. Except for the Sherpa guides who kept repeating, "There are devils there, don't go, don't go." However, when the Americans were willing to add double the guide fee, the Sherpa guides reluctantly agreed.

Zoe then explained to me, "Actually, my father was also considered a member of the Z Organization. In the 1960s, my father's research institute was doing some research on rock formations, and the research funds encountered difficulties. Later, the Z Organization fully funded it. At that time, he didn't know what the Z Organization was doing. The Z Organization told my father that they were just an academic alliance, and the Z Organization's performance was really like a non-governmental academic institution. Besides periodically giving my father some soil and stone samples for research and analysis, they never interfered with anything in the research institute. Later, my father founded a company based on the research institute and started doing business. However, scientific research was still my father's soul-stirring life pursuit. Until the Z Organization handed the Himalayan expedition project to my father, he took on the task without hesitation."

Of course, the Z Organization concealed the descriptions of certain mysterious supernatural events in the project they gave to Cole. It only mentioned that there were some natural dangers that could lead to disappearance and distress.

In the end, the remaining sixteen members of the expedition team decided to head towards Devil's Col to find the four missing people. Before setting off, everyone discussed detailed and thorough exploration and emergency plans and took the last group photo.

Among the sixteen people in this photo, there was a true core member of the Z Organization, whose identity even Cole did not know. He knew all the bizarre events and the terror of Devil's Col, so when participating in the formulation of the action plan, he left himself a backup plan, which was to walk behind the team and run away immediately in case of danger.

After replenishing supplies, some team members sent the last letter down the mountain. That was the last time the expedition team communicated with the outside world.

The plan was for everyone to first come to the periphery of Devil's Col, near the Crescent Stone (the strange stone that He Rui discovered), to set up climbing steel nails and connect everyone with a climbing rope, with the other end tied to the nails to fix it. The team members re-set a climbing steel nail to fix the position every few meters they advanced. The core member of the Z Organization was the one who set the climbing steel nails. He made some alterations to his section of the climbing rope. Everyone else's rope was fixed and inseparable, while his was fixed with a movable buckle. In case of danger, he could escape by pressing the movable buckle to detach from the climbing rope.

No one knows what happened after that. From the day the sixteen people entered Devil's Col, no one ever came out again. This included that core member of the Z Organization. The entire expedition team seemed to have evaporated from the face of the earth.

...

From the time I met Zoe until now, we haven't even spent half a day together, and she suddenly tells me these sensational so-called secrets. I don't know what to do for a while, but my subconscious tells me to trust this foreign woman in front of me.