Chapter 127: The Qi Vent

I hit the water at breakneck speed. My head nearly grazed the edge of the stone bridge as I went under, followed immediately by my ankles. It was completely unexpected. As soon as the water rushed over me, it began flooding into my windpipe. I choked and thrashed around in the water until my strength began to give out.

My blood dispersed into the water. Perhaps catching the scent of blood, an eight-legged infant corpse resting at the bottom suddenly opened its pupil-less eyes and lunged toward me from the depths.

Just then, a bullet sliced through the surface and plunged straight into the water. The trajectory seemed to slow down tenfold right before my eyes, striking the infant corpse squarely in the skull and knocking it back down to the bottom of the pool.

With my oxygen depleted, my body began to sink. Suddenly, someone leaped from the arched bridge into the water, splashing down right beside me. He grabbed my arm, hauled me by the waist, and pulled me up toward the surface.

He pulled me out of the water almost instantly. My vision was a blurry haze, and the suffocating feeling lingered. I tried desperately to cough up the water, but it was no use; I couldn’t summon an ounce of strength. First, I felt myself being dragged onto the bridge, and then I was laid face down across someone’s back.

Through the haze, I could hear He Yu shouting my name while someone pressed down on my body. The water in my windpipe was squeezed out, and I broke into violent coughing fits, feeling as if I’d cough my lungs right out. Slowly, sounds began reaching my ears again, and my vision gradually started to clear.

“Great, he’s awake! He’s awake!” someone exclaimed.

He Yu shined a flashlight over my head. The clothes at his neck and shoulders were completely soaked, his face dripping with sweat or water. The moment he saw me awake, he rushed forward and threw his arms around me: “Are you out of your damn mind?! If you died, who the hell was I supposed to take this up with?!”

Still coughing, I hastily patted his arm as his tight grip nearly choked me. He loosened up a little, but he stayed attached to me like a koala, refusing to let go.

“I’m fine, I’m fine… cough.”

I patted He Yu on the back and raised a hand to shield my eyes from the harsh lights around us. Squinting, I saw several grown men crouching on the ground, staring intently at me, staring so hard it actually made me nervous.

Lu Ayao was drenched from head to toe, water still dripping off him. Chen Canghai’s arms were covered in bullet grazes. It seemed I had missed one hell of a bloody battle.

“Don’t worry, he’s fine.” Chen Canghai stood up, made a hand sign to Han Jian, and went off to find a pack to dress his wounds.

Lu Ayao crouched beside me. He leaned in and patted He Yu’s back, gesturing for him to let go. He Yu got the message; he discreetly wiped away a tear and released me. Then Lu Ayao took one of my wrists and briefly checked my pulse.

“Does anywhere else on your body feel uncomfortable?” he asked calmly.

I checked how I felt and suddenly remembered that the bullet had hit me right in the left abdomen. I hurriedly pulled open my clothes to look. I had expected to see a bloody mess, but pulling open my clothes revealed only a minor graze. The blood I’d lost wasn’t even as much as when He Yu cut my hand earlier.

I reached into my pocket and realized the cloth amulet pouch He Yu had given me was gone.

“It fell into the water,” Lu Ayao told me. “The bullet was probably deflected by it, but where you fell in was pretty far from the bridge, and Qiao Sangui’s firepower was too intense, so I didn’t have time to fish it out.”

Aside from me, He Yu understood as well. “That doesn’t matter. Any amulet that saves Xiao Yao’s life is a good one. It’s a miracle from the Bodhisattva. Thank the Bodhisattva for the rescue. When I get back this time, I’m definitely going to a temple to fulfill my vow.”

He pointed at me. “You’re coming with me when the time comes. Not a single one of us can be left out.”

I hadn’t caught my breath yet, and my throat was extremely raspy. Amused by He Yu, I wanted to argue back, but as soon as I opened my mouth, a burst of coughing took over.

Han Jian walked over. “Alright, since he’s fine, follow the team and start climbing up slowly. Qiao Sangui and his men will likely reach this pagoda soon. The Stone Horseshoe Crab Insects outside have all woken up. We’re out of time.”

I froze, only then realizing I was already inside the first floor of the pagoda. The main hall was massive, supported by seven or eight gilded dragon pillars, with golden statues placed in the niches on all four walls. I was currently leaning against one of the gilded dragon pillars, while Han Jian’s men were already heading up the pagoda one after another.

Lu Ayao teamed up with He Yu to support me, pulling me up from the floor. Having just regained consciousness after choking on water, my entire body still felt somewhat numb.

He Yu commanded me sternly, “I’m grabbing something. You stand properly on your own, got it?”

Then he bent down to pick up the scattered backpacks and gear from the floor, slinging them onto himself one by one. Seeing all the gear hanging off him left and right, almost turning him into a display rack, I tried to help, but before I could even reach out, He Yu shoved my hand back.

Han Jian began climbing the pagoda. Halfway up, he called out for Lu Ayao again.

To be honest, I was getting annoyed. He was really pulling wool off the same sheep until it was bald^[1]. Was Lu Ayao his mother or his guardian? Why did he have to call him for every little thing? Could he not function without him?

I turned around, about to curse, but Lu Ayao pressed a hand onto my shoulder. He pulled a pack of gauze from his waist utility pouch and handed it to me. I seemed to read something in his eyes. On second thought, he was right—we were at the very end, and starting a fight now wouldn’t help anyone. His look meant I should just endure this stretch and talk after we got out.

I took the gauze and reminded him, “Stay safe, then.”

He paused for a moment, then nodded at me. “You too.”

With that, he turned and climbed the pagoda stairs in a few quick steps. I used the gauze to wipe the blood from the scrape on my head. By now, my legs were starting to warm up again. I shook out my hands and feet, stepped forward to grab one of the backpacks off He Yu’s shoulder to carry, and called for Chen Canghai to head up the pagoda.

“What are you doing? Trying to steal my job?”

I waved him off and stepped forward to snatch a flashlight from He Yu. “I’m a perfectly fine living person with hands and feet. Why do you have to do everything yourself? Stop dawdling and get up the pagoda!”

Chen Canghai climbed ahead of me, and the three of us pulled ourselves up the ladder by the handrails. None of us dared to stop, lit only by the flashlights in our hands. As we reached the second floor, my ears suddenly rang, followed immediately by that strange chanting again, accompanied by whispering.

But this time was different. The sound was exceptionally grating, so loud and irritating that I had to grab the ladder and pause for a moment.

He Yu quickly asked me, “What’s wrong? What happened?”

Chen Canghai also stopped to look at me.

I tried my best to adjust, taking a deep breath before continuing to climb. “The higher we go, the louder the chanting gets. I’m fine, I can push through. Move fast!”

For the next fifteen minutes, I just followed Chen Canghai. Just as I expected, the higher we went, the louder the chanting grew, until it completely filled my ears and drowned out all other sounds for a time.

The noisy chanting made me incredibly irritable, as if some ghostly Buddha hidden within the pagoda was trying to provoke me. Suppressing the fire inside me, I climbed all eighteen floors in one go.

Near the top, the flashlight beams grew more concentrated, all gathering on the platform of the eighteenth floor. As the three of us hauled ourselves up, the chanting was so grating I thought I was going deaf. The sound made me feel like I was about to explode, so I went over to a pillar by myself, leaned my head against it, and covered my ears.

Just as I was considering banging my head against the pillar to see if it would help, I felt something cold slip over my head and slide down to my neck. In an instant, the world went silent.

Then I heard He Yu’s voice: “How is it? Feeling any better?”

I turned around and blinked. The Jade Disc was so cold it sent a shiver through my whole body.

“I told you this damn thing would work. Well? Does it? Can you still hear that chanting?” He Yu thumped his chest proudly at Chen Canghai, who knowingly gave him a thumbs-up.

I scratched my head, picked up the Jade Disc around my neck to examine it, and listened closely. Sure enough, I couldn’t hear that chanting anymore. Was this thing some kind of jammer or what?

“Don’t worry, I borrowed it from Old Lu. Just gotta give it back to him when we’re done,” He Yu said, patting my shoulder.

I glanced over at Lu Ayao. He seemed to still be discussing how to secure the explosives with Han Jian, so I gave He Yu a push and shot him a look. Catching my drift, the two of us edged over to listen.

“The stone ceiling isn’t high. We’ll just blow it open and seize our chance to escape,” Han Jian said.

Lu Ayao shook his head. “Escape how? We still don’t know the situation outside. If we blow the ceiling, someone has to stay behind to hold the explosives in place. The collapse would happen too fast. If the river water rushes straight in and blocks the passage, flooding the underground palace, there won’t be enough time to get out.”

“Then what do you suggest we do?”

“Find an air vent,” Lu Ayao said.

Han Jian chuckled. “An air vent? Easier said than done. Everything we’ve seen so far is either stagnant water, black water, or flooded burial pits like this. Where are we going to find an air vent?”

Lu Ayao said, “The Burial Classics^[2] state that the land has four forms and Qi flows from eight directions. Even an ominous tomb retains a sliver of an air vent. Only with wind and water can a complete Feng Shui layout be formed. The pillars in this pagoda are carved with crouching dragons and tigers, proving the builder understood at least a bit of Feng Shui. So I suspect there really is an air vent here, but it might have been blocked by something later. Without air circulating, this place turned into a true body of dead water.”