The moment Ziqing closed that drawer, the entire cabinet suddenly moved on its own!
Yelu Qianqian and Ziqing both instinctively stepped back, watching as the massive cabinet slowly swung open like a door — revealing a hidden chamber concealed behind it.
The two exchanged a glance, then moved forward together, cautiously, one behind the other, in perfect silent understanding.
Yelu Qianqian led the way, the first to see what lay within, and immediately found it eerie and unsettling. But Ziqing, the moment she laid eyes on it, felt as though she’d been struck a sudden, brutal blow — she froze completely, utterly stunned.
The hidden chamber itself was entirely empty. But carved into the three white jade walls surrounding it were intricate illustrations, and under the glow of luminous night pearls embedded within, the images took on an uncanny sense of depth — every flower, every blade of grass, every tree, every figure, every insect, every beast, rendered with such vivid detail it seemed as if they might spring to life at any moment.
Every flower, every blade of grass, every tree depicted there was medicinal poison.
Every insect, every beast depicted was likewise a creature raised on medicinal poison, a gu-beast of medicinal poison.
And the human figure — a woman whose features were blurred beyond recognition, her entire body bound by twisting vines, standing there helplessly, facing an onslaught of venomous beasts.
This!
This was unmistakably a depiction of the process of cultivating a human gu!
Everything in that image was medicinal poison — whether plant or animal, everything depicted was precisely what she feared most, precisely what she had no resistance against at all.
Staring at that blurred, gaunt figure carved into the white jade wall, Ziqing couldn’t help but recall a hazy, yet terrifyingly vivid memory buried in her mind.
That scene aboard Xuanyuan Zhaoxi’s ship!
She’d been unconscious then, yet she’d distinctly felt herself enveloped in a thick miasma of corpse poison, heard the roars of venomous beasts, far away, yet seeming as though they might lunge at her at any moment.
And she, utterly drained of strength, had struggled desperately, desperately, to resist — yet couldn’t move at all, couldn’t do anything.
She hated that feeling of helplessness, hated it with every fiber of her being.
This hidden chamber, these three white jade walls — this, in truth, must be the real ruins of the isolated island beneath Mingsha Mountain.
This must be the very thing Yanzi had truly been guarding all along.
Ziqing could tell — these three white jade walls had been moved here from somewhere else entirely, deliberately hidden within this chamber.
Cultivating a human gu required more than ordinary poison — it required medicinal poison specifically.
So Yanzi had taken ordinary venomous creatures, raised them into medicinal-poison gu creatures using medicinal poison, and then used those medicinal-poison gu creatures to cultivate her.
Watching Ziqing’s face drain of color entirely, Yelu Qianqian seemed to sense something too, murmuring, “Han Ziqing, this… this wouldn’t be…”
“This belongs to Yanzi. If I’m not mistaken, all that medicinal poison outside was used to cultivate these medicinal-poison gu creatures,” Ziqing said coldly.
The name “Yanzi” alone explained everything.
Yelu Qianqian looked frightened. “Then… then… what do we do?”
If these murals were ever seen by someone knowledgeable in such matters, it would be tantamount to exposing the entire method of cultivating a human gu.
Ziqing was still deep in thought when Yelu Qianqian suddenly declared, “I’ll destroy them all!”
“This… I suppose this counts as your brother’s belongings too,” Ziqing said with a helpless smile.
“This belongs to Yanzi, not my brother!” Yelu Qianqian said, genuinely furious, immediately rushing out to fetch two torches. “Burn it all!”
As the saying went, “when jade and stone burn together, both are destroyed” — even the finest jade, once set aflame, would crack and shatter just like any common rock.
Seeing Ziqing hesitate, Yelu Qianqian urged her on anxiously, “Hurry, we don’t have much time — Father’s hosting a banquet tonight! If he can’t find me, he’ll notice something’s wrong!”
With that, she moved to set the fire — but Ziqing stopped her. Not for any other reason, but because she’d noticed something wasn’t right.
In the corner of the jade wall, there was a small line of finely inscribed text, written in characters she couldn’t read.
“Qianqian, what language is this? Do you understand it?”
Yelu Qianqian leaned in to look, and her expression changed dramatically. She stared at it, murmuring the words under her breath, though it wasn’t clear what she was saying.
“You can read it?” Ziqing asked urgently.
Yelu Qianqian nodded at once, still nodding as she read the inscription over and over to herself.
“What does it say? What language is this?” Ziqing pressed, growing anxious. This concerned matters of grave importance regarding the human gu — even though destroying it all was the safest course, she still desperately wanted to know the truth.
As Yelu Qianqian continued reading, she grew more and more frightened, nearly on the verge of tears. “Waaah… Han Ziqing, this is horrifying!”
“What exactly does it say?”
“It’s absolutely terrifying!”
“Just tell me already!”
“It’s truly horrifying!”
“Are you going to tell me or not!”
Ziqing was ready to strangle Yelu Qianqian. After trembling several times, she finally spoke. “This is the ancient script of the Xijing people. It describes two methods of cultivating gu creatures. The first is using medicinal-poison herbs to raise medicinal-poison gu creatures, then using those gu creatures to cultivate a human gu. The second method is… is directly confining a medicinal-poison beast together with a person immune to all poisons, forcing them to tear each other apart, even… even…”
At this point, Yelu Qianqian faltered, unable to continue, tears welling in her frightened eyes.
“Even what?” It was Ziqing, strangely, who remained utterly calm.
Trembling with fear, Yelu Qianqian finally forced the words out. “Even… even… even human-beast mating, to produce a human gu…”
At these words, Ziqing’s legs gave out entirely, and she collapsed heavily to the ground.
In that instant, her mind went completely blank, and Yelu Qianqian immediately threw her arms around her. “Don’t be afraid, don’t be afraid, Han Ziqing, we’ll destroy all of this, and no one will ever know! No one will ever know, forever!”
Yelu Qianqian held her tight, so tight it nearly bruised her — if she hadn’t felt the full weight of this horror before, she understood it now, truly understood it.
Her brother — he couldn’t have done this!
It was too cruel!
Seeing Ziqing frozen in shock, Yelu Qianqian held her even tighter. “Han Ziqing, don’t be afraid! My brother is dead — besides Yanzi, only the two of us know about this. We’ll destroy every last piece of this filthy business, and no one will ever, ever know!”
With that, she rose abruptly, grabbed both torches, and set the white jade slabs ablaze one after another, until the entire wall turned black and cracked apart.
It took Ziqing a long moment to come back to herself. Just as she moved to stand, a sudden wave of nausea surged up within her. Without thinking, she braced herself against the wall and retched.
But no matter how hard she heaved, nothing came up — only a little water.
“What’s wrong!” Yelu Qianqian rushed over to support her.
“I’m fine…” Ziqing wiped the corner of her mouth, took the torch from Yelu Qianqian’s hand, and with calm, deliberate focus, burned through the blackened jade slabs once more, until every trace of the carved images had been utterly destroyed. Only then did she let out a breath of relief and withdraw with Yelu Qianqian.
Once the massive medicine cabinet had swung back into place, Yelu Qianqian and Ziqing exchanged a glance, a silent understanding passing between them.
“Don’t worry, I’ll take care of this! I’ll destroy every last bit of that medicine, and seal this place shut for good!” Yelu Qianqian said with utter sincerity, raising her hand as if to swear an oath to the heavens.
“Not even Haonan… don’t tell him either, alright?” Ziqing suddenly said. In her entire life, this was perhaps the only time she’d ever truly begged someone for anything.
She hadn’t actually said the word “beg,” but Yelu Qianqian clearly heard the pleading tone beneath her words.
Cultivating a human gu wasn’t merely a form of poisoning — it was a violation, a humiliation.
Even if it had never actually happened to her, simply seeing it, hearing those words — “human and beast” — was, without question, a profound humiliation to Ziqing.
“Mm-hm, I promise!” Yelu Qianqian agreed readily.
The two of them tidied up the scene, then hurried away.