3 Plans

Zhang Jue had been walking in the cave for a few hours, and so far, he hadn't encountered any danger, but the things he had encountered were quite bizarre and simply couldn't be explained by common sense. Of course, the cave itself was not a thing that could be explained.

Zhang Jue did not intend to stay too much here, nor did he regret leaving his food for Alice. He organized the exploration squad's bones side by side, bowed to them, and then continued on his way alone.

Normal people would usually feel their heart will inevitably drum or feel a little goosebumps when it comes to this situation—scared because of this bizarre cave full of unknown threats. But that has been said countless times, and Zhang Jue grew up as a brave person.

After encountering all sorts of things that defied common sense, instead of flinching, he gradually became excited. The mysterious cave, the odd corpse, the Foundation's various failed operations, and even the Black Queen had come to intervene.

Everything was telling him that there must be a huge secret hidden inside. Zhang Jue is the kind of person that's hard to describe. Like a soft and hard object, an oil and a salt that acts the opposite most of the time completely.

If I had to say he had any weakness, it would be his curiosity. The more complex the puzzle is, the more bizarre the event is, the more he wants to get involved. Knowing that it is very dangerous, he is also willing to accept the risk. At this point, I'm afraid that things might have been too late. This is also the reason why he tried every possible way to trick Zhang Jue into coming here.

He only needs to hold a thread to build a bridge, push the boat. Zhang Jue himself will solve all the mysteries. But there's one thing he's afraid that he thought wrong. Once something falls into Zhang Jue's hands, he has to be ready in terms of power if he wants to snatch it from him.

Zhang Jue whistled and continued his sightseeing tour. He didn't have to go far this time before he heard footsteps coming from ahead. There were quite a few people, and the footsteps were very regular and disciplined, a footstep that sounds like someone who had trained in the military.

Just as he heard the other side's voice, the other side seemed to have noticed him as well. Both sides all stopped in place. There was darkness ahead, and no one was willing to take another step.

However, this time was different. Zhang Jue already had an initial guess in his heart who was on the other side. Although he didn't make a sound, he knocked on the wall with his flashlight.

"... -. --... --." (SCP)

He guessed that there would be someone who knew about his message, and a few seconds after he tapped on the wall, a voice came from the darkness not far away.

"SCP Mobile Task Force "Birds of Prey" Squad 1 Leader Klein, Number MTF-111631."

The other person heard him, and Zhang Jue responded, "SCP Foundation's Special Advisor Zhang Jue, Number SCP-X-0001."

After exchanging numbers, a figure appeared in the darkness, holding a flashlight and holding his hands high as he marched over to Zhang Jue.

Zhang Jue also slowly walked out. The two exchanged the documents in their hands, and after confirming that they were correct, the team member shouted backward, "All clear, Captain!"

The sound of a click came. Only then did the team members put away their guns and relax. The Captain of the first Birds of prey Squad was a tall white man with mustaches, and he looked very shrewd.

He had never heard of Zhang Jue's number prefix before, so he took Zhang Jue's ID and looked at it several more times carefully. Only after confirming that he was indeed given an SCP Identification, he gave it back to Zhang Jue but with a look of doubt on his face.

"Advisor Zhang, when did you come down here? Why didn't I see you just now, and why are you ahead of us?" Clearly, even if the documents were correct. He didn't trust Zhang Jue fully.

Zhang Jue shrugged, "I've been down here for hours. Of course, you don't see me. What squad are you guys on? the first one or the second one?"

"What first squad?" Klein looked at Zhang Jue, "We've only been here for less than an hour after we dispatched from the Foundation. We're the first squad down."

"An hour?" Seeing that this squad leader's expression didn't seem fake, Zhang Jue pinched his chin, thinking that things were getting more and more interesting.

Out of the two squads that had come down to explore the cave, the second squad had already spent their time for ten years. While the first team claimed to have just come down less than an hour, this cave was truly magical.

Seeing Zhang Jue's expression change, Klein looked at him critically, "What's going on?"

"I'm not too sure." Zhang Jue turned around, "I'll show you something, and you'll see what I meant."

Fortunately, Zhang Jue wasn't far from the place he'd just been. Ten minutes later, Klein saw the remains of the second exploration squad Zhang Jue had spoken of.

A squad member carefully examined the eight corpses, then whispered in Kline's ear, "Captain, it's indeed Ford's corpse, except for the ID nameplate. I know his tooth that was broken a long time ago, and the bone fracture was the same as I remembered." Klein nodded slowly but still couldn't accept it.

They had only just come down an hour ago, but their comrades had already turned into dead bones.

He looked at Zhang Jue: "Advisor Zhang. According to you, the Foundation sent people to continue the exploration mission because both of our squads had all lost contact. But why are you the only one, and where are the others?"

Zhang Jue didn't want to go into detail about his battle of wits with Lei Shui, so he could only shake his head, "Hey, it's a long story."

Klein could see that Zhang Jue was hiding something from him, but we were all from the Foundation. He didn't want to escalate the situation so quickly and asked again, "Advisor Zhang, you've been in this cave longer than we have. Have you found anything else?"

Zhang Jue nodded and stated his deduction, "Here, time and space seem to be distorted. Their direction is not always forward, and the flow rate is not fixed. You are clearly the first squad to depart and arrive here in less than an hour. On the other hand, the second squad has been dead for more than ten years."

Speaking of this, Zhang Jue gave a slight beat as the puzzle pieces in his mind integrated, and he seemed to know what SCP is this cave was. Time and space were all distorted. If he was right, they should be within the interior of The Moebius Cave or SCP-1351.

----

To explain what kind of SCP-1351 (Moebius Cave) is, the first thing to know is that you should understand what a Moebius strip is.

Imagine we have a strip of paper of unlimited width and length of one centimeter. If we do not consider its thickness, then it has only two sides: the top and the bottom.

We put an ant on the strip of paper, and under normal circumstances, it can only walk on the "top". Imagine that we rotate one end of the strip 180 degrees and stick it together with the other end. Thus, we have a Moebius strip.

At this point, we then put the ant on the strip of paper. You can see that as long as the ant has been walking forward, it will be able to walk across the edge of the strip of paper without crossing the surface of the entire paper.

This is a fundamental characteristic of the Moebius strip. There is only one surface, but you can never go to the end. You can only go inside it. It will be an endless cycle.

A Moebius cave is similar in structure to a Moebius ring, except that the paper strip is two-dimensional (approximate), while the hole is three-dimensional. If the "two-dimensional" Moebius strip only distorts space, then both time and space are distorted in this "three-dimensional" Moebius cave.

In such a place, any kind of weird thing can happen. But Zhang Jue wasn't worried. Knowing where he was, he now had only three things to do.

The first was to extract the Foundation's information from Klein's mouth.

Second, according to the clues, decipher the secrets that existed in this hole.

Third, get out of this damn place.

Zhang Jue gave a heated smile. It was as easy as putting an elephant in a refrigerator.