His fingertip hovered above the jade shard. The ink-black bead spun faster and faster, the thin thread drawn so taut it seemed ready to snap. Chen Wuya's pupils contracted slightly as the system prompt flashed repeatedly in his mind: "Fuse?" He did not move, only lowered his breathing even further.
At that very instant, the golden light seeping from the jade shard's cracks suddenly shuddered, as though something were tugging it inward. Then came a soft crack. Spiderweb fractures spread across the jade's surface, and the stone table and the wall behind it began to shake violently.
"Get back!" Chen Wuya seized Chen Xuan and Chen Yao by the shoulders and pulled them behind him. Bai Zhi turned her sword point, guarding the front of the three.
Boom—
Broken stones rained down as dust billowed up. The stone wall that had held the jade shard collapsed inward from its center, revealing a pitch-black opening. A staircase descending into the depths silently emerged, every step covered in fine grayish-white sand, its edges carved with faint, blurred patterns.
Wind surged up from below, carrying the mingled scent of old paper and dead grass. It was not cold, yet it made their backs tighten.
Bai Zhi frowned. "This doesn't look like a naturally formed passage."
"And it wasn't dug recently, either." Chen Wuya crouched and brushed aside the loose sand at the stair's edge, revealing crisscrossing metal threads beneath. "There are remnants of an array buried here, spread in all eight directions, controlling the flow of qi."
Chen Xuan rose onto his tiptoes and craned his head forward. "Then... can we still go down?"
"We can." Chen Wuya rose, his voice calm. "But we can't just wander in."
He turned to look at the two children, his expression darkening. "Those bones and chains