In front of her was still a room with the same decorations as the ones above and below. The ceiling creaked above her head, and the wooden boards above the hole she had just fallen through quickly slid over, once again forming a seamless ceiling.
Tie Ci stood in place and waited for a while, but the second floor here didn’t seem to have the magnificent full-floor mechanisms like the one above. The doors and windows opened and closed normally, and there were doors connecting each room.
Tie Ci opened a door to the left. A man was secretly groping for wine jars under his wife’s bed, sticking up his big butt. Tie Ci took one glance and knew it wasn’t him.
She opened another door. Two people were rolling in passionate waves. The man who was interrupted wasn’t angry but delighted, waving his hand and smiling at her: “Come join us, sister.”
Tie Ci turned around, grabbed the man who had been stealing wine, and threw him onto their bed, laughing: “Good. No need to thank me.”
She opened another door. Water sounds were loud, and steam filled the air. A robust man washing jumped up in alarm from the steam, shouting “Someone’s peeping, come quickly!” while covering nothing that should or shouldn’t be covered.
Tie Ci slammed the door shut, thinking this lewdness could compete with Murong Yi’s.
She opened another door. This time it was women bathing. Five or six people sat in a huge bathtub, and water splashed to reveal the girls’ wheat-colored lustrous skin. Tie Ci didn’t spare an extra glance before closing the door. Murong Yi wouldn’t be here—it wasn’t him bathing.
Doors opened one by one. Tie Ci calculated that she had already gone around in a circle, but still hadn’t seen Murong Yi.
Playing games wasn’t done this way. Tie Ci stood still and looked down at her feet, shutting out all the surrounding noisy human voices. Only then did she hear the same familiar but obviously more subtle sliding sounds as before.
So this place was still rotating, just extremely slowly—so slowly that people couldn’t detect it.
So after rotating one full circle, would it open a passage downward?
She stopped moving and calculated the time needed for one full rotation. When she heard a slight “click,” she suddenly stomped down hard.
The floor beneath her collapsed, and she fell to the next level. In the pitch-black room, someone said: “Madam said that if you can find where she is within half an incense stick’s time, she’ll have a proper talk with you.”
Tie Ci strode out the door and stood in the center. Only now could she clearly see the ingenious mechanisms of the entire circular building. Under each floor of wooden houses was a layer of tracks, and all the houses were built on these tracks. Above the third floor, the houses were divided into two sections—one wider, one narrower. Now the narrow houses were slowly withdrawing from the wide houses. The two ends of the houses gradually closed together, returning to their original appearance. Without careful observation, one couldn’t tell that part of the houses could be nested into another part.
In other words, after entering the third floor, the tracks would rotate. Not finding the original house position was a small matter, but once the mechanisms activated and the houses nested together, people would either be trapped to death or crushed to death. Because of the nesting, people also couldn’t find where the windows and doors were. Under such a strange design, they would only be confused and lose their bearings, or be lured into a trap.
The second floor wasn’t as complex as the third—it just rotated extremely slowly. In the dark night, it looked almost unchanged, but the room one stood in would never be the same room as when one started.
The bottom floor was currently rotating in the opposite direction from the second floor. Because both upper and lower floors were rotating, every room entered or exited was necessarily fluid. So unless one could determine which room A’dan was in, the identical rooms spinning up and down would make one dizzy just from looking.
Someone lit half an incense stick and placed it in the center of the open space. This incense burned even faster than ordinary incense—with one gust of wind, only a finger’s length remained.
Tie Ci suddenly crouched down, grabbed a handful of sand and dirt, and threw it up.
The sand and stones spread out like a large splash of water in the moonlight, forming a smooth ring in mid-air. The ring whistled out and struck every door.
The doors opened heavily, slamming against the walls behind them.
At a glance, all were pitch-black interiors with identical decorations.
But Tie Ci’s gaze had already fallen on a certain spot, then she swept straight toward the opposite side of that location.
In the next instant, she kicked open the closed door again. Someone in the darkness inside rose to avoid her, but Tie Ci’s blade was already lightly pressed against their neck.
Firelight came on, and A’dan slightly raised her eyebrows in the gradually hazy brightness.
Tie Ci’s gaze swept around—indeed, this was her own room.
“How did you guess I was here? And how did you determine this room’s position?” A’dan still seemed somewhat incredulous.
“I suppose I can read the mindset of people like you. Making me unable to find you in my own room would make me more frustrated? As for determining the position, after I entered this room, I saw the man from the opposite room come out. He had driven a wooden nail into the wall to hang his whip. No matter how your circular house rotates, it’s just an illusion to confuse people. The order of the rooms actually can’t be disrupted. As long as there’s one reference point, one needn’t worry about not finding it.”
A’dan lightly clapped her hands.
“However, your circular house design is truly marvelous—definitely not the work of an ordinary person.”
“You flatter me.” A’dan’s enthusiasm seemed fake, and her modesty also seemed fake.
Tie Ci hadn’t expected that she had actually designed it herself. She was somewhat surprised, but pressed down a doubt in her heart for now.
A’dan spoke to her sincerely: “Actually, I can roughly guess your purpose. You came for the old prince’s private army, didn’t you? The private army was entrusted to Nanyan by the old prince, so returning it is only proper. But the old prince once said that the private army shouldn’t be used unless it was a matter of life and death. Obviously, Kun Prefecture is about to fall into chaos now, and these private troops have lived and eaten with us in Nanyan these years, close as family—they’re our own brothers. Having our own brothers wade into muddy waters makes me uneasy. I’m afraid they’ll encounter misfortune, and I’m also afraid this army will end up in a miserable state under incompetent leadership. So I used our circular house mechanisms to test you. Please forgive any discourtesy.” She stood up and bowed.
Tie Ci’s smile deepened. “Just a test?”
A’dan said without evasion: “If possible, I was also thinking of asking you to hand over the military talisman.”
“You don’t want to return it?”
“Who would want their brothers to go die?” A’dan said with a pleasant smile. “But now I’ve thought it through. Since you can see through even my circular house mechanisms and can come to see me with the talisman, you’re obviously someone trusted by the prince’s mansion siblings. Since the former master is reclaiming former property, I have no reason not to return it. I only hope that after you take these people away, you’ll treat them well and try to preserve their lives.”
“That’s natural.” Tie Ci looked around. “Where are my maidservants and your A’kou?”
“When I came, I drugged them unconscious. They’re in the room next door now.” A’dan clapped her hands. “Don’t you want to see the Yannan Prince’s mansion’s hidden troops?”
Tie Ci turned back and saw a spiral staircase appearing in the center of the huge open space. Soldiers in full vine armor continuously walked up from below the staircase.
“Ten thousand elite troops divided into three places—we have three thousand here.” A’dan said. “They’re proficient in various battle tactics, good at mountain climbing and charging on flat roads. Their vine armor is woven from special materials and doesn’t fear water or fire. Each person has one or two special skills. Moreover, having stayed in Nanyan for so long, they’re very good at rock climbing and mountain traversing. They can take you through a path that crosses through the mountain’s belly, using the fastest speed to strike directly at Kun Prefecture.”
“Excellent.” Tie Ci praised.
“It’s good to return them to you—I can also settle one matter on my mind.” A’dan said frankly. “Take them and leave now. I’ll have someone send your two maidservants over. As for A’kou, let her stay in Nanyan. I haven’t seen her for several years.”
She whistled once, and several women accompanied two females out. Looking at their figures, they were indeed Chi Xue and Dan Shuang.
The vine-armored soldiers also formed orderly ranks in the open space, ready to travel mountain paths.
A’dan covered her mouth with her hand and yawned. “Go on, go on. I can also catch up on some sleep.”
Tie Ci made an “mm” sound and was about to turn around when she suddenly smiled: “Eh, how come it seems you haven’t looked at my talisman yet, but you’ve already handed the private army over to me?”
A’dan paused, blinked, and smiled: “Didn’t I look?”
Tie Ci pulled out the jade tablet from her sleeve and waved it.
A’dan smiled bashfully: “Look at me, confused from being tired. Come, let me take a careful look.”
She reached out to lean on the table and stretched her neck to look at the jade tablet. Tie Ci’s wrist didn’t move as she squinted and smiled: “Your posture looks quite far and awkward. Better come closer for a good look. What if this is fake?”
A’dan didn’t move and smiled: “Since you say so, then it definitely won’t be fake.”
“But when you say that, I feel everything from inside to outside is quite fake.”
A’dan’s smile didn’t change, but her whole person smoothly slipped back, shrinking behind the table and chairs, tilting her head to look at Tie Ci and sighing.
“Really hard to fool.”
Tie Ci turned around and pointed at the solemnly waiting army and the maidservants walking toward her.
“Whether I approach my ‘maidservants’ or think I’ve completed the mission and joyfully take these soldiers away, my fate would probably be to become fertilizer under your circular house’s underground caves, right?”
“How did you see through it?”
“Does this need seeing through? Your flaws are as numerous as a sieve. You said you were uneasy about the private army’s fate so you tested me—is there such a grand-scale test? Choosing such a ‘test’ shows unwillingness to hand over the private army. Then why did you easily agree afterward? Verbally reluctant to part with them, but agreeing so readily, calling people as if everything was already prepared—completely giving the feeling of wishing you could immediately pack people up and send them away. This creates a very contradictory feeling, dear.”
A’dan blinked and said apologetically: “Not good at acting. How embarrassing.”
“Most importantly, you said you designed the mechanisms yourself—I believe that. But if you say you built the entire mechanism, I don’t believe it. The entire circular building, using a massive structure as a mechanism, requires skilled craftsmen, enormous manpower, and expensive rare materials—an incalculable amount. To transport these people and materials into the mountains would also require full cooperation from government offices, post stations, and water and land routes. To say something you might find unpleasant—with your capabilities, with Nanyan’s capabilities, it can’t be done.”
“Then who do you think could do it?”
“Naturally, whoever controls Yannan could do it.”
A’dan clapped again, her eyes lighting up. “What a clever woman. Since things here didn’t work out, why don’t you try Chou Li or Mu Bang?”
“Deliver myself to their doorstep again?” Tie Ci smiled. “Among the three major Pacification Offices, it would be the same whichever I choose to attack. Since Nanyan here was already waiting for me, the private armies of Chou Li and Mu Bang have probably long since taken the surname of Commandant You.”
“Since you know, why are you still here talking nonsense with me? Do you really think the circular building can’t handle you?” A’dan said. “For A’kou’s sake since she likes you, I’ll give you a quarter hour to escape first. The countdown starts now—”