Fiction: Group 4
Then suddenly I felt a gust of wind roaring in my ear from the direction of the abandoned railway.
“But wait, how is this possible?” I thought. The broken train was in its full shape! Golden smoke was
swirling around the train. Out of curiosity, I boarded the train, and then it zipped me through the portal.
I woke up with a shock! Next to me stood a tall and slender man, wore a uniform. I looked out of
the window and recognized the place was Sanshui. However, there were neither any overwhelming
factories shooting out black smoke into the sky, overhead highways zipping through the air, nor even black,
mucky oil and chemicals in the water. This was my ideal Sanshui!
“May I help you, sir?” the man asked.
“Umm, can you tell me what today is and where I am?” I asked.
“Are you serious? You must have taken the ride too long!” he added, “here is Sanshui and today is
the 1
st
of January 1904, how could you forget such an important day to witness the holy dungeon arising?”
Now everything was jumbled up in my brain. “1904…Holy dungeon… What is happening?”
And then I remembered my grandfather once mentioned about a holy maze in the legend. There’s
a dungeon, facing the East Sea with the South Mountain behind, only appeared once in a year; in the
middle of the dungeon sat a pearl that could purify water, presided over aquatic life, and healed any illness.
If this was the legendary dungeon
−
a place for longevity, I had to get the pearl to Luo…
As I zipped past the crowd, I took a quick glance at the humongous granite walls with carving
details on pillars. Many guards were standing at the gate before the dungeon entrance. Judging by their
advanced weapons such as guns and cannons, they were obviously backed up by theWesterns.After our
severely weak Qing Dynasty government lost the warship, they demanded the grant over the extraction of
the railway.Then I understood the reason for building the railway; they wanted to mobilize their army in
order to loot the pearl from the Delta in the dungeon.
While scouting through the busy streets, still half believing what happened today, I saw a house
seemingly like mine but the lock on the door was identical and so I took my key out—“click”, and door
swung open. The house was pitch-black. As I tried to navigate through the darkness, I found a candle on
the table and lit it up, my eyes widened, as the interiors were exactly the same as mine except the
furniture… I turned back and suddenly saw a figure! My heart jumped and the next second I was pinned
down with a knife on my throat.
“Who are you? What are you doing in my house?” the man asked.
“I didn't m…mean it as I mistakenly thought this was my h…house!” I choked out the words.
Then he released me and said, “Fine, I trust your words, but don't come back again or I’ll kill
you.”
The light from the candle started to flicker over his face, then to my surprise it looked like my
grandfather but younger.
“Grandpa,” I muttered.
“Nobody here is your Grandpa!” he shouted with his eyes moving onto my arm, and then asked in
disbelief, “Impossible! How did you get this tattoo? “
We sat down and started exchanging our backgrounds. I told him about coming from 2014, my
career as a fishman, and how Luo was diagnosed with cancer. When it was his turn, he spoke directly and
confidently.
“The Draconis are the decedents of the Dragon King who takes charge of the sea. However one
day, an evil spirit tricked the Dragon King and transferred all his power into a pearl. The pearl, having a
mind of its own, sealed itself inside a dungeon and sank into the oceans where the evil spirits could never
reach; but at the first day of every year, the pearl will rise up and try calling her master. The evil spirits
couldn't find a way to conquer the dungeon, so they started capturing people from the Draconis tribe,
hoping to find a way to get through the last chamber and obtain the pearl. What they don’t know is that
only the blood of the 10
th
generation of the Draconis decedent will be able to open the last door leading to
the pearl, and the truth is I am the 10
th
decedent and my name is Jin,” he continued, “also the tattoo is only
belonged to the pure bloods of ancient Draconis, which means you are my great grandson!”
