第18章 十五号牢里少了尸!

"There is a lingering scent of corrosive medicine in the prison ventilation shaft."

Hearing this, Gu Qinghe immediately poured an antidote pill from her sleeve and handed it to Li Sanshun.

"Hold it under your tongue, but do not swallow it. Once Corpse-Bone Water mixes with corpse miasma, inhaling it into your lungs will damage your energy meridians. Your cultivation base is shallow; if you cannot hold on, retreat immediately. Do not force it."

Li Sanshun took the pill but did not rush to put it in his mouth.

The system within him relied on respiration to distinguish air quality and the components of a scent. If the medicinal aura of this antidote masked the original smell, it would prevent him from accurately identifying the odors inside.

"I will scout ahead first." Li Sanshun pinched the antidote in his palm, stooped down, and crawled into the ventilation shaft.

The shaft was extremely narrow, barely wide enough for an adult to crawl through while hunched over. The stone walls inside were cold and damp, and the air circulation was abysmal.

Gu Qinghe followed behind, holding a luminous pearl. Its dim light revealed several clear drag marks on the stone floor, with dark red medicinal stains extending deep into the passage.

Li Sanshun took a deep breath of the air inside.

A pungent, foul stench instantly rushed into his nasal cavity, churning his stomach so violently that he nearly vomited.

[You have ingested a mouthful of low-grade corpse rot.]
[Air quality: Malignant.]
[Life energy increased by 0.01 points.]
[Detected components: Corpse-Bone Water, Breath-Closing Powder, and traces of residual human aura.]

The system's notification chimed in his mind.

Li Sanshun's eyes flickered. Breath-Closing Powder? It was a potent drug that induced a state of suspended animation; once ingested, even the heartbeat and breathing would drop to near-zero. If Zhao Chong had truly taken it, his life tablet would have extinguished, and the guards would naturally have assumed he was dead.

He continued to crawl forward. As the distance increased, the system provided no further life energy gains, but its analysis of the scents became increasingly clear.

The corpse rot here was not of one kind, but a mixture of two. One was the old scent remaining on the corpse bags, and the other belonged to a body that had truly just died.

After crawling for about the time it takes to brew a cup of tea, a movable bluestone slab appeared at the end of the shaft.

Gu Qinghe stepped forward and pushed the slab open with force. A wind, colder and more sinister than the one in the passage, blew through. The two climbed out of the opening and dropped into a spacious underground stone chamber.

This was the underground morgue of the Law Enforcement Hall, where bodies awaiting processing were kept.

On three sides of the stone chamber, rows of massive wooden corpse cabinets were neatly arranged, each door hanging with a corresponding numbered wooden tag.

Gu Qinghe held the luminous pearl high and walked quickly to a corner.

"Cabinet number fifteen is not closed properly." She pointed, and beneath the cabinet door was half a footprint stained with dark red medicinal residue.

She drew the short sword at her waist and used the scabbard to pry open the door of cabinet fifteen.

Inside the cabinet sat a black corpse bag, its mouth wide open. Gu Qinghe poked at it with her scabbard, her brows locked in a tight frown. "The bag is empty."

Li Sanshun leaned in to take a look. The mouth of the bag was stained with the same blood Zhao Chong had vomited, but the bottom of the bag was clean, devoid of the oils and fluids that would seep from a truly decaying corpse.

"It seems Zhao Chong is not dead." Li Sanshun analyzed calmly. "Someone fed him Breath-Closing Powder to fake his death. Then, they used a forged Law Enforcement token to open the cell, stuffed him into a corpse bag, and dragged him here through the ventilation shaft as if he were a body."

"But the corpse transport carts must be filled to a certain quota before they are sent away." Gu Qinghe looked at the surrounding cabinets. "The number of deceased prisoners registered in the morgue last night was four."

"Check the other cabinets. Since Zhao Chong occupied one corpse bag, the body that was supposed to be transported must still be here," Li Sanshun said.

Gu Qinghe immediately walked to the record desk and flipped open the register of deceased prisoners from the previous night.

"Four people died last night, stored in cabinets two, six, nine, and twelve. At midday, the chore disciples are to load them onto the carts and send them to the cremation pit outside Medicine Peak."

She turned and walked toward these four cabinets.

Cabinet two was pulled open; an old man's body lay inside.

Cabinet six was pulled open; there was nothing unusual there either.

Cabinet twelve was also full.

When Gu Qinghe pulled open cabinet nine, both their gazes froze simultaneously.

Inside the large wooden cabinet lay only a set of prison robes stained with black blood. The bottom of the cabinet was covered in a thin layer of Corpse-Bone Water, and the body had vanished.

"Who was originally in cabinet nine?" Li Sanshun asked.

Gu Qinghe looked down at the register. "The prisoner was named Ma Quan, at the sixth level of Qi Refining. He had been imprisoned for two months for trafficking poisonous pills. The register records that he died of poison last night, his body covered in pustules, so the coroner specifically noted: 'Not suitable for opening the bag for re-examination'."

Li Sanshun understood everything.

"What a clever switch," Li Sanshun sneered.

"The person in charge of transporting the bodies stuffed Zhao Chong into Ma Quan's bag. Because of the 'not suitable for opening' note, as long as the bag wasn't unsealed, no one would know if it contained the pustule-covered Ma Quan or not. Then, they quietly hid Ma Quan's body in cabinet fifteen and poured Corpse-Bone Water over it to dissolve it."

Gu Qinghe picked up his train of thought:

"This way, the transport cart would carry away four 'bodies' as usual. Once the cart left the range of the Law Enforcement Peak's formation, Zhao Chong could crawl out of the bag and escape without anyone being the wiser."

"Who was driving the transport cart last night?"

"A chore disciple named Sun Erhe."

Gu Qinghe immediately checked the entry and exit logs of Law Enforcement Peak. "He has been at Law Enforcement Peak for nine years, specializing in this dirty work. After his shift ended last night, he drove the corpse cart off the peak and has not returned since."

"Where is the cart? Where is it now?"

"The record says it went to the Medicine Peak cremation pit. Let's go, we need to find the cart outside the cremation room!"

The two did not delay, immediately hurrying up the stairs of the stone chamber to the surface.

The night was deep, and several unused wooden carts were parked in the courtyard of the Law Enforcement Hall. Gu Qinghe summoned a duty disciple, and they quickly identified the corpse cart Sun Erhe had driven out the previous night.

The cart had clearly been washed with water, and the boards were clean.

But Li Sanshun crouched down directly and reached for the wooden wheel axle beneath the cart.

In the deepest crevice of the axle, a small pinch of dirt that had escaped the washing was wedged. This soil was an eerie, grayish-white color.

Li Sanshun pinched a bit and smelled it. It lacked the charred, ashy scent typical of the Medicine Peak cremation pit, instead carrying the sour stench of aged medicinal dregs.

"This is not soil from the cremation pit," Li Sanshun said with certainty.

Gu Qinghe leaned down and rubbed the grayish-white dirt between her fingertips. As the soil crumbled, several extremely fine, black, broken roots were revealed inside.

Gu Qinghe's expression changed.

"White sand soil, mixed with broken medicinal roots..." She stood up abruptly, her gaze fixed on the residue on her fingertips. "This is soil from the abandoned medicinal garden on North Mountain!"

"The abandoned medicinal garden?" Li Sanshun stood up.

"Yes. Fifteen years ago, the sect planted Corpse-Bone Vine on a large scale on North Mountain. Later, due to improper disposal of medicinal dregs, the soil became too toxic, and nothing would grow. The sect completely sealed off that garden; even the patrolling disciples never go there."

Li Sanshun's mind raced.

The Scripture Library incident occurred fifteen days ago; the number on the forged token was fifteen, and the portrait number was fifteen.

And there were only two days left until the next fifteenth day.

"They are hiding Zhao Chong in the abandoned medicinal garden?" A sharp light flashed in Li Sanshun's eyes. "It is rarely visited, and with the old formations providing cover, it is indeed a good place to hide someone. They must intend for Zhao Chong to hide there for two days, and once the second fifteenth day arrives, they will find a way to smuggle him out of the sect."

"Oh no!"

Gu Qinghe suddenly gasped. She did not respond to Li Sanshun, but instead whipped a thick volume of sect internal affairs bulletins from her storage bag and began flipping through it rapidly.

"What is it?" Li Sanshun noticed her expression was wrong.

Gu Qinghe's fingertips pressed heavily onto the latest page of the bulletin. Her face was pale, and her voice carried an unconcealable urgency:

"The main peak issued an order last month to prepare for the reopening of the North Mountain spirit fields. To clear the soil of toxins, the Medicine Peak has already issued a burning order."

She looked up toward the direction of North Mountain, clutching the bulletin tightly.

"Li Sanshun, the accumulated corrosive medicine and waste soil in the abandoned garden... they are scheduled to be burned tonight at the hour of the Rat!"