Chapter 499

It was a space entirely cast of iron. No wonder this secret hold didn't affect the ship's posture even when empty.

The iron channeled all the chill of the winter lake into this space. Pei Ye looked ahead and saw the heavy, strange iron vats Zhang Er had described.

They were indeed cast of solid iron, with metal grids sealing the vat openings, the bars as thick as a person's finger. The bases were fixed tightly, arranged in a square formation in this space, as orderly as the cargo on the three levels above. There were about a hundred of them, extending into the depths of this hold and disappearing into the white mist.

A strange silence permeated this space. Pei Ye walked slowly to the vat and lowered his head—it was empty.

This was a device that made one's spine shudder. The cold iron bars were not cylindrical; the side facing downward had been ground into a sharp edge, and that chill could clearly cut a piece of skin-on meat into cubes with ease. Now, they were all in a state of sturdy locking.

Looking inside, three heavy, dark red shackles were cast into one with the vat wall—two smaller ones, just fitting a youth's wrists; one larger one, fitting a dancer's slender waist.

It was meant to be manufactured to restrain living beings with limbs. Behind the shackles were ropes that could be tightened. Pei Ye's gaze suddenly narrowed, and he used the tip of his sword to gently pick up an iron ring... Inside, two fine, sharp needles were extending inward.

He didn't know if this was some kind of cruel punishment, or if the things to be put inside truly needed this to be restrained. Pei Ye looked at them one by one, his footsteps echoing in the space. Every one of them was empty, but he could identify the dark blood deposited on the metal, which was hard to wear away even after many washings.

And even more shocking were the ferocious, deep claw marks left on the iron vat walls.

It was at this moment that Zhang Piaoxu beside him screamed, staring wide-eyed at the side wall.

Pei Ye turned his head to look and also narrowed his eyes. The iron cabin wall was dented, twisted, and cracked... It was an old mark left by a violent force.

The shape looked like it had been struck by a round iron hammer.

From here on, Pei Ye noticed various traces and deformations. The neatly arranged iron vats didn't look undisturbed, but had been rearranged after experiencing some kind of riot. Although they had tried their best to clean and repair, this space still left various deformations and carvings. This terrifying cage now actually gave people a sense of fragility.

"..."

Pei Ye moved his steps slowly again, and the further he went, the more obvious this feeling of patching up a broken mirror became—dents, tears, claw marks. Many of the outer walls of the vats began to have collision marks; one could imagine the madness of the things imprisoned within at that time.

And when he finally reached the last few rows, the thin mist in his field of vision dissipated, and Pei Ye narrowed his eyes and stopped his footsteps.

The source of all the riots was now gathered here.

If the hundred or so iron vats he had just seen were wooden boxes, then this large vat in the center was a square box cast of solid gold.

No matter from which angle one looked, it was several times sturdier than an ordinary iron vat—a gold-colored vat body, four layers of steel bars, iron chains as thick as a wrist, shackles with every joint locked tight... One could see the effort the creator had spent to imprison the things inside.

However, now, it had been destroyed from the inside.

The shackles were broken, the steel bars twisted like noodles, and a hole the size of a waist was broken in the vat body, with only the edge of the refined iron turned outward powerlessly.

Zhang Piaoxu pursed his lips and stared blankly at the terrifying traces, while Pei Ye slowly raised his head, only to see that the cabin wall in front had been torn open from the inside out to create an exit.

Pei Ye lowered his head again, his gaze lingering on this vat for a moment, and slowly extended his sword to pick out a remnant with a faint fluorescent glow from the inside of the shackles.

It was an irregular shape, damaged, with dark blood sunk into the texture, and a toughness and sharpness like bone... It was half a scale.

It was actually the size of a thumb.

The black cat stood up to look at it, but Pei Ye had already withdrawn his gaze from the scale and looked at the broken hole again, suddenly frowning slowly: "This secret hold... doesn't seem to be cast together with the ship's body."

"Hm?"

He stepped forward and poked his head out from this broken hole, only to see that between the cast-iron secret hold and the solid wood ship body, there were indeed only frames supporting it.

It was loaded on later, not designed as one piece from the beginning.

Zhang Piaoxu behind him didn't know what he was looking for, carefully looking at those large vats one by one. Pei Ye tilted his head to look at the black cat: "Since that's the case, they knew we were coming days ago... Why did they still leave this hold here?"

The black cat didn't look at him, but stared at the darkness outside this hold: "... What are those tied to the supports?"

"Changan Boat Department records: this ship entered the capital on October 6th; Taiping Boatmen's Guild account books: the commercial goods were unloaded by October 10th. The message you gave the boatmen was to board the ship on October 18th." Xie Chuantang looked at him earnestly, "However, this deadline was not met as scheduled."

"You stayed at the port for eight days with a ship full of cargo without doing anything, until October 26th, when you set sail and left the capital." Xie Chuantang looked at him, "Did some accident happen?"

"..." Chen Renzhong was rarely silent for a moment, his gaze withdrawing from the window and falling on the woman, "Inspector Xie is young and promising; I suppose you haven't botched an assignment from above yet."

Xie Chuantang frowned.

Chen Renzhong smiled slightly. This water-based tycoon lowered his gaze and sighed softly: "Sleeping peacefully with sails hoisted, not seeing stone shoals; relying on heaven for much luck, falling into a trap in broad daylight—how many times have I chatted with the Dock Master? For those of us making a living on the water, our eyes are only enough to see things on the water."

Xie Chuantang narrowed her eyes: "What assignment did the Feng River Dock Master give you?"

Chen Renzhong smiled and shook his head: "The first time I went out on a ship with the Dock Master was on the 'Nan Jin Feng.' At that time, we took all our money to save up for such a large north-south passage ship. Everyone had empty pockets, but we were so respectable on the entire Feng River."

Then he sighed lightly and long, and placed his hand on the sword handle beside him.

It was at this moment that Xie Chuantang clearly realized his determination to die. She gripped the sword handle fiercely, but the man's face had already returned to the cold hardness it should have. He gripped his heavy sword and spat out the last sigh: "This ship has been with me for sixteen years."

Xie Chuantang sprang up, but the man just stomped one leg, and the entire ship board broke with a roar, and he fell straight down.

Pei Ye was slightly stunned. At this moment, he also saw that on the sturdy supports connecting the hold to the ship's body, there were bulging cloth bags tied. Looking deeper, he saw four or five of them.

He wanted to flick a strand of true Qi, but at this moment, that smell had already penetrated the fishy smell of water and blood, drifting minutely into his nasal cavity.

With just a trace, he had identified it. He suddenly constricted his pupils and raised his hand toward Zhang Piaoxu behind him, but the next moment, the ear-shattering roar and the flames bursting from the crowd merged into the same hell, drowning out his roar.

"... Gunpowder!!"