Chapter Sixteen: The Altar Mechanism

On my way back, I kept replaying the words Gu Anqi said before leaving. Her appearance was unexpected, a sign that knowledge of the ancient tomb was not exclusive to Yue Leiting. Yet Gu Anqi’s words were loaded with meaning; she repeatedly warned me not to enter, and seemed quite versed in feng shui. Clearly, she knew things I didn’t.

Now I understood that what lay beneath wasn’t a tomb, but an altar. Judging from Gu Anqi’s reaction, she had no idea—so what could be inside to make her so nervous?

According to Yue Leiting, the wealthy Mr. Huang, who spared no expense to hire him to dig here, was after a book. What kind of book could matter so much to this man?

These questions swirled in my mind, keeping me silent throughout the journey, but no matter how I tried, I couldn’t make sense of it all.

“Yan Hui? How… how are you?” I raised my head, finally noticing Yue Leiting standing before me. Perhaps curiosity had gotten the better of me; now even I wanted to see what was inside.

Huo Qian told me that Yue Leiting had stood downstairs almost the entire night. He stayed by his side, sleepless and haggard; I saw Yue Leiting’s hands tremble.

“Ting-ge, I found the entrance,” I said.

Yue Leiting exhaled deeply, folding his hands, muttering, “Thank heavens, thank heavens.”

A smile broke through Huo Qian’s weary face as he approached. “Yan Hui, you and Lian Shan should rest. I’ll have Liu Hao handle the rest.”

I shook my head, anxious. “Ting-ge, I’d rather go with you. We’ve found the entrance, but getting in won’t be so simple.”

Yue Leiting’s expression made his hope clear. After all he'd been through—his grand birthday, the incident with Zhong Weiguo—it seemed having me by his side gave him confidence.

“Huo Qian, tell Liu Hao to get the men ready. We can’t dig during the day, it’s too conspicuous. We’ll wait for nightfall, and tonight, we’ll break through. I want to see what’s buried in the tomb that nearly cost us our lives.”

When night came, Yue Leiting and I set out. On the way, I explained my investigation to him and Huo Qian.

“An altar?!” Huo Qian was surprised. “If it’s an altar, that makes sense. No wonder the entrance was so hard to find—it was hidden on purpose.”

Yue Leiting frowned at the word. “Why would Mr. Huang want me to dig up an altar? What could be so valuable inside? All this trouble for nothing—I wonder what he’s really after.”

When the car stopped, Liu Hao was already waiting with his men. Yue Leiting looked back at me.

“Yan Hui, where’s the entrance?”

I walked to the edge of the pond, tilting my head with certainty. “This is the entrance.”

“The pond… the pond is the entrance?” Liu Hao stroked his chin, hesitant.

Yue Leiting sliced the air with his hand, resolute. “If Yan Hui says it’s here, then it’s here. Send someone down for a look.”

Huo Qian, puzzled, came over to ask how I knew the pond was the entrance.

I explained that the feng shui layout here was “The Cuckoo Weeps Blood,” energized by the altar below. But the feng shui pattern carried too much hostility; surrounded by mountains, the negative energy was trapped and couldn’t disperse. Behind the altar, the mountain pointed to the Martial Star, which governs warfare, symbolizing armies in the hundreds of thousands. Facing Lone Cliff, the spear dyed in blood pierces the Emperor Star—meaning to strike at the heart. Yet the hostility pooled beneath the mountain, unable to rise and swirl around the spear, so the pattern’s meaning was lost.

“You mean the hostile energy must rise for it to be truly ‘The Cuckoo Weeps Blood’?” Huo Qian nodded in sudden understanding.

I nodded, pointing confidently at the pond. “This pond, embedded like a bronze mirror between three mountains, reflects the sky. The moonlight casts its image here—this is ‘Flowers in the Mirror, Moon in the Water!’”

Huo Qian’s eyes brightened as he nodded slowly. “I see. If the hostility can’t rise, then reverse the process—reflect the stars in the pond, so the gathered hostility covers the water. That completes the feng shui arrangement.”

“Mountains are yin, light is yang. Everywhere else is a dead end; only this pond, reflecting moonlight, is the sole living gate in the pattern. Water is the chief of all forms—it holds everything, yet separates everything. The pond’s water can block the hostility from seeping into the altar below,” I concluded.

The men who went down emerged, excited. “Boss, the pond is deep—no bottom in sight. At about ten meters, there’s an iron door locked tight, can’t open it.”

Yue Leiting grinned at the clue, nodding to Liu Hao. “Get a few more pumps—drain the pond dry!”

Liu Hao quickly arranged for pumps. After an hour, the water level hadn’t dropped. Yue Leiting paced anxiously.

I picked up a few pebbles from the drained water, examined them, and told them to stop. No matter how much they pumped, the water wouldn’t run out.

“Yan Hui… what’s going on?” Yue Leiting grew frantic.

I handed him a pebble. “These have been polished by years of water flow. There shouldn’t be so many smooth stones in a pond like this. It means the pond connects to an underground river. The pebbles are brought in by the current—there’s no way you could drain it dry.”

“So what now? If we can’t drain the pond, how do we get inside?” Liu Hao wiped his sweaty brow.

“If there’s a door below, it must open. Send someone back down to see if there’s anything near the iron door,” I said.

“No need for all that—just an iron door.” Liu Hao turned to his men. “Ten of you, take tools, pry it open.”

I tried to stop them, but a dozen men had already jumped in. Yue Leiting saw my worry, laughed lightly. “Sometimes brute force is all you need. There’s no door that can’t be opened.”

I felt uneasy. The altar’s design was so intricate—the builders must have anticipated someone might stumble upon the entrance by accident. What if…

Just as I thought this, someone shouted from the pond. “Blood! There’s blood!”

I rushed over. Under the moonlight, patches of blood blossomed across the pond, slowly spreading. Several men surfaced, dragging unconscious comrades to shore.

“There’s a trap below. The moment we tried to pry the door, something shot out—several brothers are hurt.”

Xiao Lianshan helped haul the wounded out. One man’s back was studded with rusty short arrows; Lianshan pulled one out and examined it under his flashlight.

“They’re from a heavy crossbow—close range, strong penetration. The blood is bright red, luckily not poisoned, perhaps because the mechanism has aged. If it were at full power, none of them would have survived.”

“Damn it, who installs traps underwater? Must’ve been bored to death,” Yue Leiting grumbled, pacing irritably.

“It’s a door, so it must open. If there’s a trap, there must be a switch,” I urged him not to panic.

“Send a few more down, see if there’s anything else near the iron door,” Yue Leiting called out, anxious.

Seeing the wounded writhing on shore, Liu Hao’s men exchanged fearful glances—no one dared move.

“Brother, I’ll go,” Xiao Lianshan said, stripping his shirt.

I hurriedly warned him to only look, not touch anything.

Lianshan nodded carelessly and dove in. I wrung my hands, watching anxiously.

Soon, Lianshan surfaced, wiping water from his face, shouting, “Brother, there are lots of characters next to the iron door—they look like you can press them.”

“We saw them, too—thought it was fine, pressed at random, and arrows flew out,” a wounded man groaned from the ground.

I asked Lianshan how the characters were arranged.

“Arranged?” Lianshan spat out water. “I don’t know—just a square iron frame, packed with characters.”

“A square frame?” I repeated, then asked, “What color are the characters?”

Lianshan furrowed his brow, recalling, “Some black, some white. Arranged in rings—a ring of white, then black. Made my eyes spin.”

By now, I understood. It was a common mechanism, used in tombs and secret passages. I told Lianshan it was derived from the Nine Palaces Grid of the River Luo numerology.

“Nine Palaces Grid!” Huo Qian came over. “But isn’t it just nine numbers? Lianshan says there are more than nine characters.”

“Of course, not just nine. ‘The Cuckoo Weeps Blood’ is a Qimen Dunjia pattern—the mechanism follows Qimen numbers. Qimen Dunjia combines the celestial and terrestrial plates, humans, eight trigrams, eight gates, eight deities, nine palaces, nine stars, heavenly stems, earthly branches, and twenty-four solar terms—making 1,080 possible arrangements. So there are 1,080 characters,” I explained.

“So many?!” Yue Leiting was bewildered and anxious. “Out of all these, which ones open the door?”

“Not several—just one!” I said firmly. “In Qimen Dunjia, only one is the living gate. If the mechanism follows Qimen numbers, the switch is just one among the 1,080 characters.”

“Only one!” Yue Leiting’s eyes widened—one character among 1,080. Even if he summoned all his men, they’d be skewered by the crossbows before finding it. Having found the entrance but unable to enter, he grew more agitated.

I smiled faintly, turned to Lianshan in the water. “Lianshan, do you trust me?”

“Brother, what kind of question is that? Tell me—which one?” Lianshan grinned.

“Count nine rows from the top, then five characters from the left. Don’t press it, but use it as a base point. Then count three characters upward—don’t press. Then seven downward—don’t press. Finally, one upward—and press that one!”

Before I finished, Lianshan dove without hesitation.

Watching the ripples left by his dive, I felt a cold sweat. To find the right character among 1,080 was no easy feat.

“I know something of the Nine Palaces, but how are you so sure your calculation is right?” Huo Qian asked.

“The River Luo numerology: wear nine, tread one, left three, right seven, two-four as shoulders, six-eight as feet, five at the center. The mechanism below combines River Luo numbers with Qimen Dunjia. Lianshan said the characters are black and white—just as I expected,” I replied.

“Even so, you need a base point. How did you calculate that?” Huo Qian pressed.

“‘The Cuckoo Weeps Blood’ is a pattern of regicide and dethronement. The emperor is honored as nine-five—the base is the ninth row from the top and the fifth character from the left. The five central white rings are yang, four corners are black and yin. Then, three back, seven forward, one up—these are advanced Qimen formulas.”

Huo Qian was muddled; he’d never heard such esoteric Qimen techniques. As I finished, the surface of the pond suddenly began to swirl, then gradually calmed.

Lianshan surfaced, water streaming from his face in a goofy smile.

“The door’s open!”