The night deepened, and fog once again enveloped the town. The electric lights at the gate tower illuminated an inconspicuous small box truck parked at the entrance of the mansion. An advertisement was painted on its side: “Fresh Vegetables, Delivered Fresh to Your Home.”
The driver, dressed in a logistics worker’s uniform and wearing a brimmed hat, stood by the rear compartment. Seeing Leopard bringing Mu Dai out, he immediately opened the compartment door.
A damp, stale odor of vegetables stored too long wafted out. Leopard pushed Mu Dai, whose hands were bound with plastic handcuffs, into the truck and gave her an injection.
As the cold liquid entered her bloodstream, Mu Dai opened her eyes wide to look at Leopard.
She was a beautiful, sinister woman dressed all in black, with long hair and a black leather eye patch covering one eye. Then, right in front of Mu Dai, she slowly put on sunglasses.
The drug gradually took effect. Mu Dai’s mind began to blur, and she strangely thought: This woman’s appearance was like her own dream.
When learning martial arts, she had always fantasized. She had gestured to Meihua Jiuniang: “Master, in the future, I want to be that kind of cool female knight.”
“I’ll wear all black, with stylish boots, and cover my face with a mask. In the dead of night, I’ll appear in the dark corners of the city, and if anyone is doing bad things, I’ll beat them up.”
Meihua Jiuniang lowered her head to sip her tea: “Look at the clothes you’re wearing—kittens and puppies. Do you look like a cool female knight?”
She had smiled smugly: “Master, you just don’t understand. This is called contrast. The greater the contrast, the less likely people will suspect me. Everyone around thinks I’m silly and childish, but I’m incredibly smart!”
Meihua Jiuniang had choked on her tea.
…
The compartment door slowly closed, light being driven out inch by inch. At this moment, Mu Dai, drawing strength from somewhere unknown, suddenly struggled forward and forcefully blocked the nearly closed door.
Through that narrow gap, she looked into Leopard’s eyes.
She asked: “Where is my Master?”
“Dead.”
Mu Dai’s eyelids suddenly became too heavy to keep open. She collapsed softly onto the compartment floor, hearing the heavy sound of the lock engaging and the driver’s eager voice.
“That’s enough to make her sleep for 24 hours.”
The truck started moving, jolting and bumping along the town’s distinctive cobblestone road. Mu Dai lay there, her back pressed against something cold through the thin layer of her clothes.
With her eyes closed, her curled fingers twitched unconsciously at intervals as she thought: I don’t want to sleep for 24 hours.
The heavy drowsiness was like a hand, pulling Mu Dai down, back to the previous night—the vast white fog, the impenetrable darkness, the silver-eyed bat flying up and down, and Master’s voice, faint as if coming from all directions.
—Mu Dai, the silver-eyed bat, only finds its way on invisible nights. You’ll go in one night and come out the next.
—Only the silver-eyed bat can find this path. Some say that years ago, a master created a formation among these mountains and waters, forming an enormous maze. Perhaps it’s true. Your Senior Brother and I have tried—even in broad daylight, when visibility should be better, we suddenly lose our bearings and can never find our way out.
—This Mist Town is in the Cloud Ridge mountain range, foggy year-round. Master’s mansion is called The Four Archways. Together, it’s “beneath Cloud Ridge, at the Four Archways.” Perhaps one day, someone will find this place and bring seven keys.
—What these seven keys look like, Master has never seen, nor has your Grand Master. If you don’t see them in your lifetime, remember to take on a reliable disciple and pass down this task.
—This silver-eyed bat will lead you to the true Four Archways. Do you know what an archway looks like?
Mu Dai knew what archways looked like. Out of curiosity, she had once searched for images. The archways in the pictures were all tall, grand, and flat, classified by the number of sections: one section with two pillars, three sections with four pillars, and five sections with six pillars.
The path continued to stretch before her. Her breathing grew rapid, branches rustling underfoot. Her gaze followed the fleeting shadow in the fog, fearing that one moment of carelessness would lose it.
After an unknown length of time, she stepped into knee-deep flowing water. As she waded through, the flow gradually diminished, revealing smooth, shiny stones at the bottom, polished by the long-term flow.
This was the small river Meihua Jiuniang had mentioned, which would stop flowing at a certain time before dawn and resume its flow after daybreak.
The silver-eyed bat stopped, perching on a high rock, its wings fluttering slightly as if waiting for her.
Mu Dai looked at the silver-eyed bat. Just then, it suddenly flew up, circled once in mid-air, and unexpectedly crashed down into the riverbed.
What was it doing? Mu Dai quickly took out the pocket flashlight she carried, crouched down, and turned it on to illuminate the riverbed. Such a weak light had little effect on the dense fog, but it was still enough to see nearby objects.
The bat had spread its wings and embedded itself into a slippery blue stone at the river bottom, fitting perfectly.
What did this mean? Did the surface of this stone just happen to have a bat-shaped depression?
A faint tremor suddenly came from beneath her feet. Mu Dai stepped back, suddenly understanding.
This was a mechanism. The silver-eyed bat was the first key to open it.
With a thunderous sound, the riverbed split open on both sides. Two rectangular stone slabs beneath slowly moved outward, revealing a space about two meters deep. In the center of this space was a miniature building, approximately one cubic meter in size.
The Four Archways—this was the true Four Archways.
Mu Dai held her breath and lightly jumped down, walking around the Four Archways, observing as she went.
This was not an ordinary archway. This archway had five sections and five pillars.
It might seem difficult to understand literally, but it wasn’t mysterious. Ordinary archways are flat, planar structures, but this archway had five pillars arranged in a pentagonal pattern. Thus, the five sides formed by the five pillars created five sections.
In the center of the archway, suspended in an irregular position, was a… wooden box. At the bottom surface of the archway was a recessed yin-yang bagua double fish symbol. The bagua plate seemed to contain a small amount of water, giving off a faint gleam.
When she reached out to take it, she was suddenly stopped, as if blocked by transparent glass. She tapped it with her finger, producing a muffled sound.
She understood now. The inside of the archway was a solid transparent material, like crystal or glass. The wooden box was embedded in the center of this solid. How could she take it out?
She looked carefully and finally discovered that each of the five sides had small holes, unevenly distributed, positioned at varying heights. From specific angles, one could vaguely see the depths of the holes, which were also all different.
She counted them—seven in total.
A thought suddenly struck her: Master had mentioned seven keys. Perhaps the seven keys were not the ancient style she had imagined, but round, wedge-shaped objects like this?
Like the silver-eyed bat, the seven keys would also activate a mechanism. Only when someone brought those seven keys would the archway open, allowing the box to be retrieved.
Master had said that inside that box was… an enormous secret.
Mu Dai’s gaze fell on the entablature of the archway, which bore a character—the seal script for “wood.”
…
The truck suddenly lurched, as if avoiding something. Mu Dai’s body rolled inside the compartment, her nails digging deep into her palms.
She thought: Don’t sleep for 24 hours. Wake up. Wake up.
From outside the compartment came the driver’s angry shout: “Can’t you watch where you’re going? Are you blind?”
…
The truck sped away in a cloud of dust.
Left standing on the dirt road was a person with semi-curly hair and black-framed glasses on the bridge of his nose. Traveling at night, he carried only a non-woven fabric bag, the outward-facing side printed with “More Leisurely than Lijiang, More Pleasant than Dali.”
Being scolded by the driver for no reason made him unhappy. He had been walking properly when the truck suddenly darted out, hadn’t he? Was there no reason anymore? Did remote areas not follow traffic rules?
He bent down to pick up a small pebble, took out a slingshot from his non-woven bag, placed the pebble in the middle of the slingshot’s rubber band, and viciously shot it in the direction the truck had gone.
The pebble, accompanied by a slight sound of wind, disappeared into the gradually brightening darkness.
He continued to gesture threateningly: “Just wait until we meet again! You’ll be sorry!”
Dawn was approaching. Luo Ren walked to a water tap outside an inn, turning it on full blast, creating a loud rush of water.
He put his head under the stream, a powerful jet directly hitting the top of his skull. Small sprays and streams of water covered his face and seeped into his collar down his back.
His head ached, the effects of alcohol not yet dissipated. He remembered fighting with Qing Mu, drinking a lot, and after a disagreement, getting up and leaving. During this night, he had probably walked through the entire ancient city.
He turned off the tap and sat down on the steps, water dripping beside him, dampening the cement platform.
Qing Mu’s words still echoed in his ears.
—She’s only important to you, not to me. You want me to arrange everything. If she dies in the process, will you blame me?
—Luo, the Leopard has already crushed your spirit. She hasn’t even made a move yet, and you’re already afraid of her.
—Leopard would have had nothing, but you gave her the biggest bargaining chip.
Finally, Qing Mu had asked him: “Why did you fall in love with her? If you didn’t love her, you wouldn’t have these troubles now.”
Luo Ren had laughed heartily, even to the point of tears.
Yes, no one could take care of everyone else. Qing Mu truly had no obligation to share his worries. The girl he had fallen in love with was his responsibility.
The sun was rising.
The inn was opening, and gradually there were human voices around him, and the sound of a phone ringing, one call after another.
After a long while, Luo Ren realized it was his phone.
He took out his phone and answered.
The call was from Wan Fenghuo.
This was Wan Fenghuo’s style—regardless of day or night, information was always delivered immediately, piping hot, fearing to fall behind others.
On the phone, he informed Luo Ren: “Found something, not a big discovery. Take a look, I’ve sent it to you. Leopard’s ancestral home—the old house was demolished long ago, took a few photos of the scenery.”
Leopard’s ancestral home was near the sea, but unlike most people who went to Southeast Asia from Fujian or Guangdong, her ancestral home was in a small town in Zhejiang.
Wan Fenghuo’s “photos of the scenery” referred to the town’s appearance.
After hanging up, Luo Ren opened the photos.
An ancient town amid development—cramped, chaotic, with low buildings, rows of parked bicycles, a stone bridge over the river…
A stone bridge over the river?
Luo Ren’s heart jolted. Very slowly, he swiped back to the previous photo, then zoomed in, and zoomed in again.
If he wasn’t mistaken, this should be the third time he had seen photos of the stone bridge.
A small town in Zhejiang, a stone slab bridge. The stone slab patterns under the feet were identical to the content of the giant underwater painting in Five Pearl Village, and even more complete.
This was… Leopard’s ancestral home?