Chapter 108: The Underground Palace

The second before I lost consciousness, in addition to the sight of Tian Xiaoqi moving as if in slow motion, there was an incredibly crisp sound. It was the noise of stone colliding with stone, accompanied by the heavy rumble of a mechanism being triggered. The entire mountain began to vibrate.

A piece of rubble struck me squarely, and with a sharp pain in my shoulder, I quickly drifted into oblivion.

However, I woke up soon after. Unlike previous times, I was jolted awake by a splash of water. The water used to wake me was filthy, emitting a foul stench of rotting fish that shocked me into full alertness instantly.

I found that I was no longer in the same spot, though the surroundings were similar. I was likely still within the stone passages of the mountain, but the air here was stagnant, lacking the breeze from before. The person who had splashed me moved over to He Yu and emptied another canteen over him.

We were sitting together, propped against a wall with our hands tied behind our backs. My lower body remained completely numb, my legs devoid of any sensation. I had no idea what kind of dosage Tian Xiaoqi had used to poison us.

He Yu was still groggy, so I quickly craned my neck to survey the area. I scanned the surroundings, but Lu Ayao was nowhere to be seen.

“Stop looking, he’s not dead.” Tian Xiaoqi strode out from the distant stone passage, holding a flickering fire-starter. She had discarded her outer jacket and wore only a practical camisole. Several others followed behind her with fire-starters of their own, but they were far enough away that I couldn’t make out their identities.

Tian Xiaoqi looked quite disheveled, her hair loose and messy. Holding a Cold Steel knife in a reverse grip, she walked over and heartlessly propped her foot up on a shrine opposite me. She slowly tightened her shoelaces, then lowered her leg, switched the knife to her other hand, and approached me with a smile.

She crouched down in front of me and continued, “As you wished, the man named Lu isn’t dead. It’s thanks to him that we’re stuck here. The second before you lost consciousness, he took it upon himself to trigger a mechanism hidden beneath the shrine. He rolled into the groove that opened up, leading into a craftsman’s emergency refuge.”

I didn’t respond, but my mind was racing. The mechanism Tian Xiaoqi described must have been right next to the stone slab where Lu Ayao had collapsed.

Looking at it this way, Lu Ayao’s persistence in dragging himself along the wall even after realizing he was poisoned was likely because he had anticipated everything that might happen after he passed out.

“But his mistake was not taking you down with him. He’s riddled with corpse poison, and without a conscious person to assist him or any countermeasures, it won’t be long before the poison spreads through his entire body. He’ll just wither away in that refuge.” Tian Xiaoqi twirled her knife.

I keenly picked up a wealth of information from her words. Based on her description, Lu Ayao had used a mechanism to drop into a small niche similar to a refuge. However, in a typical underground palace, the mechanisms were interconnected. Activating one to open a floor groove would almost certainly trigger other systems simultaneously.

In my estimation, the most likely outcome was that the entire defense mechanism of the underground palace had been engaged. We hadn’t accidentally tripped any traps before, so aside from the self-propagating mycelium, everything had been peaceful.

But things were different now. The interior of this underground palace was now fully “alive.”

And the “awakening” of the underground palace directly resulted in Tian Xiaoqi and her group being completely trapped in the stone passages beneath our feet. Unable to find a way out, they hadn’t immediately gotten rid of He Yu and me.

While my mind was still racing for a way out, Tian Xiaoqi grabbed my chin and forced me to look up.

“I know what’s going on in that little head of yours,” Tian Xiaoqi laughed. “Do you know why Tian Yuqing can take so many people into the tombs all by himself, while you let a young girl like me lead you around in circles?”

Without waiting for me to speak, Tian Xiaoqi continued, “Because you haven’t seen enough of the world. You haven’t been trained, so you don’t know how to actually use your intelligence. You don’t know whose words to trust and whose to doubt. That’s why you’re always getting fooled. Even this time, that Lu guy chose to abandon you.”

As she spoke, she glanced at He Yu, who was still choking on water beside me.

At the same time, I fell into deep self-reproach. If I had been even slightly more cautious earlier, I wouldn’t have accepted that bottle of water from Tian Xiaoqi, much less passed it to He Yu to drink. Then he wouldn’t be tied up here with me like a couple of Zongzi^[1].

I was the one who brought He Yu to Yunnan. He trusted me so much, yet I had acted entirely on instinct, never considering the chain of consequences that coming in here would cause. It was my fault He Yu was in this mess.

Just then, a fit of coughing caught Tian Xiaoqi’s attention. She let go of me and turned her gaze toward the people approaching with lit fire-starters.

It seemed her real boss had arrived.

Qiao Sangui walked over with his hands behind his back. He coughed a few times, spared a cold glance for Tian Xiaoqi, and said in a snide tone, “Didn’t Tian Yuqing teach you? All you need to do is watch over them and don’t hurt them. I still need to ask these two for a favor.”

To be honest, seeing Qiao Sangui didn’t surprise me much. If Tian Xiaoqi had really been working on her own from the start, her style wasn’t like Liu Wan’s; she wouldn’t have been able to plan so thoroughly. There had to be someone assisting her from behind the scenes. Now I realized she was merely a trailblazer for Qiao Sangui.

As for why a member of the Tian family would sincerely serve under Qiao Sangui, that was something I had no way of knowing.

Several thugs hovered around Qiao Sangui. They either had Mauser pistols tucked into their waistbands or held Hanyang 88^[2] rifles. They seemed quite accustomed to this dim, lightless environment, a far cry from Hou Jinshan’s brainless lackeys.

Qiao Sangui’s men cleared a space for him and helped him sit down. That Brother Guangtou from before was there too; his status seemed relatively high, as he was allowed to sit next to Qiao Sangui and fan him.

After a moment, Qiao Sangui acted as though he had only just noticed me, offering a sly smile. “Pardon my poor eyesight, it seems one of you is already awake. Which one are you? Ah, I remember now. Your grandfather is Eight-Foot Dragon. You’re that ‘Little White Horse’ who suddenly popped up on the scene recently, aren’t you?”

My back teeth itched with rage. This man was taking a roundabout way to insult my entire family. Right then, I wanted nothing more than to lunge forward and bite this wretched old man to death.

Qiao Sangui seemed to read my mind and chuckled raspily. “You ran quite fast earlier, so we didn’t get a chance to get properly acquainted. Well, now look where we are—you have no choice but to help me get out of this stone passage.”

Sitting on the ground, he flicked his fingers. A lackey pulled a crumpled piece of paper from his pocket and spread it out before me. It was a complete structural diagram of the underground palace’s interior. The flaw, however, was that the paper was too small for everything that needed to be drawn. The whole thing was a chaotic tangle of crisscrossing lines, completely unintelligible to an ordinary person.

The old man wanted me to lead them out of this stone passage.

I turned my face away, refusing to look at the dense cluster of lines.

Seeing my attitude, Qiao Sangui was not annoyed in the slightest. “It’s fine. You’ll agree to it.”

Just then, I saw a burly man stride toward He Yu. He raised the muzzle of his Hanyang 88 and pressed it right against He Yu’s forehead, his finger resting on the trigger, ready to fire at Qiao Sangui’s command.

I panicked instantly. “Wait! We can talk! What do you want me to do?”

“Show him the map.” Qiao Sangui smiled again, gesturing to the lackey beside me. He continued, “The man in our group who drew this map died, so we need someone in the trade to help me decipher it. We’re taking a twenty-minute break. During this time, I want you to sear every detail of this map into your memory. Not a single line can be wrong. Got it?”

I looked up, sweat beginning to bead at my temples.

Qiao Sangui checked his watch and gave me a smile. “Five minutes have already ticked by, which leaves you with fifteen. Gan Ji, if you fail to memorize it, I’ll have my man blow your companion’s head off. If you don’t believe me, we can place a bet.”

I feel it is necessary to mention something in the author’s note. As the protagonist of Nine Rings, I, as the author, hold very high expectations and affection for Gan Ji. Starting from this arc, his highlight moments will gradually be revealed to the readers. Of course, Nine Rings is written in the first person, and Gan Ji is a bit too humble early on, which might give some readers the false impression that he is weak. If this were written in the third person, I can guarantee you would realize that what you have seen of Gan Ji is only the tip of the iceberg. His supposed weakness is merely his own self-assessment, not a label given to him by others.

This might be the most I have ever written in an author’s note. Since I have already fully mapped out Gan Ji’s character arc as the protagonist, I truly hope readers will cherish the current Xiao Yao^[3], who still treats everyone with complete goodwill, free of scheming or hidden agendas. Additionally, I want to thank all the readers who have accompanied Xiao Yao as he grows. Your support is my greatest motivation.