Chapter 408

The corridor was much longer than Wang Ping had imagined.

He walked and walked, then suddenly realized something—he had been walking for a long time. Not the kind of "feeling like a long time" but an actual, tangible length you could hear in his breathing growing heavier. His footsteps on the stone tiles went tap, tap, tap, each sound as if something were knocking on the back of his head.

He began counting his steps, giving up at three hundred forty-seven, not because he lost count, but because he noticed the immortal markings on the stone pillars were repeating. Not an exact repeat, but like when you walk a night road and see a tree ahead, only to get closer and find it isn't that tree but another one that looks especially similar to the previous.

Those immortal markings were the same: you thought you had seen this pattern before, but a closer look showed the strokes going the opposite way, or the bend angle off by a little. It was like a person looking in a mirror—the person in the mirror makes the same motions as you, but you know it isn't you because his heart is on the right.

Cang Xuan's hand remained pressed on the sword hilt. His knuckles were white, not from exertion but because his hand had grown together with the hilt. In this world thirty thousand years later, everywhere are things that make him want to draw his sword, yet his sword won't come out. It's not that the scabbard is tight; the sword simply doesn't want to emerge. It is still asleep. It has slept a long sleep, had a long dream—in that dream are the people it has killed, the blood it has seen, the times it once, in someone's hand, split the sky. That person is dead, but the sword remains. The sword doesn't know that person is dead; it thinks he is merely asleep, waiting for when it awakens, that person will still grip it and bring it to kill, or be killed.

Yu Liuli's guitar strings kept sounding. Not the kind you can hear clearly if you deliberately listen, but the kind you hear in the deep night and mistake for tinnitus. Immortal spirit Qi surged from the depths of the corridor, like an invisible river; when the river flowed over the strings, they trembled. Each string vibrated at a different frequency—some high, some low, some fast, some slow. Together they sounded like a group of people speaking far away, in a language you cannot understand, yet you can tell they are discussing something. They have been discussing for a long time, thirty thousand years, and still have not reached a conclusion.

You Ying walked at the rear, her shadow stretched long. The immortal spirit Qi on either side of the corridor was uneven—thick in some places, thin in others—so her shadow was pulled and shortened between the dense and thin areas, like a person breathing. Her eyes kept scanning the gaps between the stone pillars, where the secrets of the Sea of Laws were hidden. She saw things wriggling in those gaps—not worms, not snakes, not any living thing—but "regulations" wriggling. After the immortal realm's regulations were shattered by the power of Order, the fragments scattered everywhere: some lodged in the stone pillars, some jammed in the tile seams, some drifting in the immortal spirit Qi like plankton in water. They still operate, still executing the commands they were given when created. Some regulations say, "No flying within three hundred steps east of this spot." For thirty thousand years no one has flown here, yet the regulation waits, waiting for some reckless fool to fly down this corridor so it can smack him down. No one comes, so it just keeps waiting.

At the end of the corridor, the collapsed gate was far larger than Wang Ping had imagined. He stood before it, lifted his head; the lintel was invisible in the darkness, but he knew it was there because when he tilted his neck to a certain angle, the back of his head would touch something—not an actual touch, but his divine sense contacting the lintel's edge. The lintel had broken into three sections; the middle one was missing, perhaps blown apart, perhaps buried under rubble somewhere, or perhaps turned to ash in some explosion thirty thousand years ago. The left and right sections still hung on the wall, but barely, like a person's arm broken with flesh still attached while the bone is shattered, the arm dangling, ready to fall at any moment.

The door panel leaned against the doorframe at a tricky angle, as if someone had deliberately placed it that way, or as if it had found the most comfortable pose while falling and then stayed like that for thirty thousand years. The copper nails on the door panel had rusted to green—not the bright green of fresh rust but the dark green of aged rust, green verging on black, green as if it would suck in all surrounding light. Wang Ping reached out and touched one of the nails; the instant his fingertip met the nail head, the nail shattered. Not cracked, not fallen off, but shattered—like a biscuit baked too long, crumbling to powder at the lightest touch. The powder clung to his fingertip, grayish-green, smelling of iron rust. He brought his finger to his nose and sniffed; the smell reminded him of the village blacksmith's shop from his childhood, where sparks from the hammer striking steel would hit the water basin with a hiss, sending up a wisp of white smoke, and that smoke smelled exactly like this.

Cang Xuan crouched before the door panel, his fingers tracing the edges of the cracks slowly, as if afraid to disturb something. There was no blood on his fingertips; the crack edges were not sharp, they were blunt, worn smooth by repeated scouring of the power of Order. Yet Cang Xuan's fingers trembled slightly, not from cold but because he felt something within those cracks. The scars left by the power of Order were etched into the door panel like knife wounds. Thirty thousand years later, the scars remain, but the flesh that once bore them is dead. The door panel no longer feels pain, yet it remembers it. Cang Xuan's sword hummed faintly in its sheath, a sound so soft it would be inaudible unless pressed against the sheath—but Cang Xuan heard it. His sword was saying—I don't like this.

As Wang Ping went around the door panel, his shoulder brushed its edge, the panel shuddered and let out a creak. The sound was sharp and thin, like an old man groaning in his dream. The panel's movement was slight—about the width of a finger—but once it moved it never stopped, continuing to tremble minutely, as if nodding or shaking its head. Wang Ping did not look back; he walked into the space beyond the door.

Then he stopped.

It wasn't that he wanted to stop; his foot stopped on its own. His body still wanted to move forward, but his foot was nailed to the ground, as if grabbed by something. He lowered his gaze—nothing on the ground, no hand, no vines, no formation. It was his body feeling fear. His body had seen this immortal palace sooner than he had, seen the once-glorious place now reduced to ruins, and then it judged: do not go further, this is not where you ought to be.

But Wang Ping still walked on.

The immortal palace was larger than any ruin he had ever seen. He had seen ruins, many ruins. The Spirit Realm has ruins, the Demon Realm has ruins, and the Returning Ruins itself is the greatest ruin. But those ruins have boundaries—you know where they start and end. This immortal palace has no boundary; it stretches in all directions, to where your eyes cannot see, where your divine sense cannot reach, where your imagination cannot grasp. It isn't that it truly lacks a boundary; it's that your perception is insufficient. Like an ant crawling on a corpse of an elephant, the ant doesn't know it's an elephant; it only knows there is flesh, bone, and skin it can crawl over forever.

The stone pillars on either side of the great gate resembled two people who had stood too long; their poses were unnatural. The left pillar tilted slightly to the right, the angle so small you wouldn't notice unless you stared. But after a while you'd see it was leaning. Thirty thousand years ago it might have been straight, but thirty thousand years of gravity have pulled it askew. The right pillar is still upright, but its uprightness is abnormal, like a person straining not to fall, gritting teeth, tensing muscles, veins bulging on the face. The pillar cannot clench its teeth, but it can crack. Wang Ping saw a crack running from the base to the top of the pillar, as fine as a hair, yet it pierced the whole pillar. The pillar still stands, not because it can still support itself, but because it hasn't found a reason to fall.

The characters on the pillars were glowing—not a bright, dazzling light, but the kind that appears in your eyes after you stare into darkness for a long time. You can't tell whether the characters themselves are emitting light or your eyes are deceiving you. When You Ying approached the pillar, the light of the characters changed, becoming slightly brighter, as if someone in the darkness had opened their eyes and seen the arrival. You Ying lifted her head; her neck emitted a faint crack, not from age but because her cervical spine hadn't made that motion in a long time. In the Sea of Laws, she needs not lift her head, for there is no up or down—looking any direction is the same. But here it is different: here there is sky, ground, and a vertical distinction. Her body must readjust to these.

"Immortal Dao…" her lips moved, voice squeezed from her throat, rasping like sandpaper on wood, "Eternal… Chaos…"

When those three words lit up before her eyes, she felt something drill into her sight. Not light, not text, not any tangible thing—it was a kind of "knowing." Like when you don't know what an apple tastes like, someone puts an apple in your mouth, you bite, and suddenly you know. No one needs to tell you, no thinking, no reasoning required—you just know. Those characters transported her to a moment thirty thousand years ago, when the person who carved them stood before the pillar, holding something in hand—not a brush, not a sword, but some object she could no longer name. That person etched these characters onto the pillar, each stroke as if bidding farewell to something. To whom? To the world. Knowing he was about to die, he wanted to leave something behind to tell those who came after—I was here, I wrote these words here, and what I wrote is true.

Cang Xuan stood long before another stone pillar. He did not look at the characters; he gazed at the blank spaces between them. In those blanks lay sword intent—not a complete sword intent, but fragments of it, like a mirror shattered, shards scattered on the ground, each reflecting a different scene. Cang Xuan closed his eyes; the shards reassembled in his consciousness into a blurry image—a person standing here, gripping a heavy sword that required both hands to hold. The person raised the sword overhead and then brought it down, not cutting at anything but at emptiness. As the blade sliced the air, the air was torn, emitting a low sound like the earth sighing. That stroke had no target, no enemy, no meaning. Yet the person swung it, because he needed to prove he was still alive this way. After finishing the strike, he sheathed the sword, turned, and walked away—never to return.

Yu Liuli did not look at the pillars or the door panel. She crouched beside the deep trench, placed the zither on her lap, and rested her hands on the strings without playing. She listened. Wind blew inside the trench, racing along the smooth walls like a lost child—hitting the east wall then running west, hitting the west wall then running east, back and forth, unable to escape the trench. As the wind ran, it made noises—chaotic, without tune, without rhythm, lacking anything music should have. Yet when they combined, Yu Liuli heard a song. Not the wind singing, but the trench itself singing. Thirty thousand years ago, something sliced through here, from the depths of the immortal palace to the gate, leaving this groove on the ground. The sound it made while cutting was recorded in the stone walls, like a phonograph needle etching grooves into a vinyl record. Thirty thousand years later, wind blowing over those grooves released the ancient sound. The sound is vague, indistinct as to its source. But Yu Liuli knows it is the voice of something dying—not a wail, not a moan, but the sound you make when you see your chest opened, know you are about to die, and utter an "oh"—not surprise, not fear, not pain, just confirmation. Oh, I am going to die.

Wang Ping stood between two stone pillars, his gaze sweeping past rubble and debris, over the area burned black, over the area crushed to powder, over the region eaten away by the power of Order until riddled with holes, toward the depths of the immortal palace. That darkness was like a wall blocking him. Yet he could sense something beyond it—not with his eyes, not with his divine sense, but with his Chaos Primordial Spirit. His Chaos Primordial Spirit throbbed in his dantian, strong as a heartbeat. But this was not his own heartbeat; his own heart beat in his chest at about seventy steady thumps per minute. The Chaos Primordial Spirit's throb had no rhythm—sometimes fast, sometimes slow, sometimes double-tapping, sometimes pausing long before a beat. It was not pumping blood; it was conversing with something. Over there, something emitted a signal, his Chaos Primordial Spirit received it, the message simple—You have come; I have waited for you a long time.

When Wang Ping took his first step, the glazed surface under his foot gave a crack. That sound was crisp and loud, echoing for a long time in the vast immortal palace. He lowered his head and saw a crack on the glazed surface, spreading from the sole of his foot outward like a spiderweb. The edges of the crack were jagged, not straight; the glaze had developed internal stress when it cooled, and for thirty thousand years that internal stress had been bottled up inside with no outlet. Wang Ping's foot gave them an outlet, and they released along the crack. The crack was not the sound of stone breaking, but the sound of internal stress being released. Like someone who had held their breath for too long, finally exhaling.

When they walked over that rubble area, dust rose up, forming a gray mist in the immortal spirit qi. The mist was very fine, so fine that you could breathe it directly without choking or coughing, and you might not even feel its presence. But you could taste it. On Wang Ping's tongue there was a faint salty taste, not the saltiness of salt but that of rust. The dust contained metal, those metals being the framework of the immortal palace; when the palace collapsed, the bones shattered, turned to dust, floated in the air, and landed on your tongue, telling you—this is the grave of the immortal palace.

Youying walked at the rear, her footprints deep in the dust because her body was much heavier than it looked. The beings in the sea of laws are like that; their density is great, great enough to survive in the fissures of the laws without being crushed. Beside her footprint was a fainter footprint, not made by her, but left by someone long ago. That person was lighter than her, or walked very carefully, trying to leave no trace. Yet the trace remained, half-buried in the dust like a half-buried face, only one eye visible, watching you. Youying crouched and gently brushed away the dust to reveal the full footprint. The footprint was not large, about two-thirds the size of her foot; the shape of the toes was clear, the big toe larger than the others by a ring, the second toe slightly longer than the big toe—this is an immortal's foot. An immortal's foot differs from a mortal's: a mortal's foot is flat, an immortal's foot is arched, the arch hollow, because immortals need not plant their feet on the ground; they can walk in the air. But this person walked on the ground, perhaps because he was tired, perhaps because he no longer wished to fly, perhaps because he wanted to feel the ground's temperature one last time. Youying placed her palm over the footprint; her palm was larger than the footprint, her fingers longer. Thirty thousand years have passed, the footprint's owner is gone, but the footprint remains, waiting for someone larger to cover it.

Wang Ping stopped his steps in the region eroded by the power of order. When his foot stepped on those stones riddled with holes, the stone emitted a sound—not a crack, not a creak, but the sound you make when stepping on snow, a squeak-squeak. But the stone was not snow; stone does not make that sound. He lowered his head and saw that many fine dust particles were squeezing out of the tiny holes, like the stone was sweating. The power of order had destroyed the stone's internal structure; it still looked and felt like stone, but its bones had turned brittle. Wang Ping's foot applied a little pressure, and it collapsed, like a sponge being compressed, the air in the holes squeezed out, producing a squeak-squeak sound. Wang Ping lifted his foot, leaving a deep footprint on the stone, the edges of the footprint smooth, not made by stepping, but the stone deformed under his foot, permanently deformed.

Cangxuan walked up beside Wang Ping, his sword in its sheath letting out a long cry. That sound did not come from the sheath; it came from the sword blade, which vibrated inside the sheath, the vibration transmitted through the sheath to the air, the air vibrated, and reached Cangxuan's ears. The sound was sharp and high, like someone whistling far away. Cangxuan understood the meaning of that sound—there is poison here. Not the poison that would poison you, but the poison that would transmute you. The power of order lingered here like a chronic poison; if you do not touch it, you are fine, but if you touch it, it will slowly change you, turning you into another person. Cangxuan's sword warned him not to stay here too long, not to touch anything, not to breathe the air here, and not to let his divine sense touch those remnants of the power of order. Cangxuan did not move; he stood there, the sword crying in its sheath, he did not draw it, because he knew his sword would not come out. The sword was saying 'There is poison here,' but it would not come out to help him, because it was still asleep. It was just talking in its sleep.

Yuliuli's zither was vibrating. It was not the strings vibrating, but the body. When immortal spirit qi flowed over the zither's body, the body vibrated like a piece of wood being struck, producing a low humming sound, like a cello's C string plucked. The sound lasted a long time—not a single note then silence, but continuous, like an endless note. Yuliuli pressed her ear to the body, listening to that hum; her eyes closed, her brows furrowed, her lips pressed into a line. In that hum she heard other sounds—many voices, chaotic, mixed, like several thousand people speaking at once. Some shouted for help, some shouted 'charge!', some shouted 'mother!', some shouted 'what is my name again?' I can't remember. Those voices overlapped, masking each other, drowning each other out, so no one could make out what anyone was saying. But when they combined, you would feel an emotion—not sorrow, not anger, not fear—but an emotion you had never felt before, with no name, no color, no shape. You only knew it was immense, too great for your body to contain, and it would spill from your eyes as tears. Yuliuli's tears streamed down; she didn't realize she was crying, she just felt her face wet.

Wang Ping's steps grew faster and faster. His body told him not to go on, while his chaotic primordial spirit urged him to hurry. He was pulled between the two voices, like a rope being tugged from both ends by two people, growing tighter and tighter, about to snap. His breathing became ragged, his chest heaving violently, air rushing in and out of his lungs, carrying a hint of iron rust, a hint of salt, and an indescribable taste. His eyes fixed ahead; the darkness before him, under his gaze, became less and less like darkness, turning transparent like a thin veil, behind which something glowed. It was not a bright, blinding light, but a soft, warm glow like a candle flame. The light pulsed, as if alive, breathing, growing, calling to him.

The pit deep within the immortal palace was far larger than he had imagined. Standing at its edge, he felt as if he were on the brink of a cliff, with an abyss of ten thousand fathoms below and a starless night sky above. The rim of the pit was marked with radial cracks, like lightning spreading outward from the edge; some were wide enough for three people to walk abreast, others so narrow not even a finger could fit. Yet every crack was deep, bottomless. Wang Ping crouched, slipped his hand into a relatively wide fissure, his fingers probing inside, touching rough stone, cold metal, and fragments of something. He pulled out a shard: a piece of pottery, white with blue‑flower decoration, bearing a painted lotus. The lotus petals were shattered, only a single petal remained, lone and pitiful amidst the immortal aura. He turned the shard over; on its back was a character, not an immortal rune but ordinary mortal writing: "An". An — the character for peace, for safety, for rest. This fragment had once been a bowl belonging to an immortal, who had inscribed the "An" on its base, wishing himself safety. Thirty thousand years later the bowl broke, leaving only this shard bearing the character "An", lying in a crack, waiting for a mortal to pick it up.

Wang Ping slipped the fragment into his pocket, rose to his feet, and gazed down into the pit. He knew what lay below. His chaotic primordial spirit throbbed faster and faster in his dantian, like a frightened rabbit's heart racing wildly, making him feel as if his belly would be burst by its pounding. He drew a deep breath — the air tinged with powder, immortal aura, remnants of ordering power, and the summons of his chaotic spirit. He swallowed it, closed his eyes, and leapt.

The sensation of falling was strange. It was not the weightlessness of jumping from a height, nor the vertigo of a roller coaster, nor the fear of plummeting into an abyss in a dream. It was the feeling of "you are going home." You had been away from home for a long time, traveled far, endured many years, and almost forgotten what home looked like. Then one day you stood somewhere and caught a familiar scent — not the aroma of food, not the warmth of blankets, but the first breath of air you inhaled at birth. You could not name it, but your body knew. Your body told you — you had arrived, you were back.

Cangxuan followed, jumping down without ever releasing his sword hilt. Yuliuli clutched her ancient zither as she leapt; its strings wailed in the wind, like sobs. Finally Yingying jumped down, her shadow stretching long and long beneath her, trailing behind the pit wall like a black cloak. Four silhouettes fell in the darkness, surrounded by silence, light, or any reference point. You could not tell whether you were dropping, rising, or hovering motionless. Time itself warped — you felt you had fallen for a second, then for ten thousand years. You felt you were still airborne, yet also that you had already reached the pit's bottom.

When Wang Ping opened his eyes, his feet stood on solid ground. The floor was hard, cold, and level, as if polished by something. He crouched and touched it; the surface was smooth, glass‑smooth, yet far colder than glass — so cold that the moment his fingertips met it, the skin blanched. He rose and looked around; the pit floor was far larger than he had imagined, vast enough to seem another world. High above, a distant pinprick of light marked the mouth of the pit; the light filtering down was so faint it almost vanished, but if you stared long enough you would see it gradually dimming, as if something were obscuring it.

Wang Ping turned around and saw it.

It lay at the exact center of the pit floor, not large — not so large that you could lift it with both hands. Its shape was irregular, like a crumpled sheet of paper, like a lump of kneaded clay, like a piece of glass that had been melted and then cooled. Its surface was black, but not an ordinary black; it was the kind of black you stare into and cannot escape, like a bottomless pit, like a closed door, like a dream that never ends.

It was glowing — not the object itself, but its surroundings. Light seeped out from the folds and depressions on its surface, like water oozing from a crack. The light was white, yet not ordinary white; it was the kind of white that soothes the eyes upon seeing it, like spring sunshine on snow, like a mother's palm covering your eyes.

Wang Ping approached it, his steps light and slow, as if nearing a sleeping infant. His chaotic primordial spirit ceased its throbbing, growing still as dead water. It had found what it sought; it no longer needed to call or respond. It simply remained there, beside that thing, breathing the same air, pulsing with the same rhythm, sharing the same existence.

Wang Ping squatted before it, reached out, and slowly brought his fingers closer. When his fingertips were still an inch away, he stopped — not from fear, not from hesitation, but because he sensed the thing looking at him. Not with eyes, but with its very existence. It knew he was there, knew who he was, knew why he had come, knew what he intended to do. It waited for his choice.

Wang Ping's finger touched it.

The world fell silent.