"Why?"
Li Sanshun held Li Jiu by the shoulder and first sprinkled Hemostatic Powder over his wound.
"Fourteen people were used as my doubles?"
"You've got it backward."
Li Jiu sucked in a sharp breath from the pain and pointed toward the iron cabinet beside the furnace.
"They weren't doubles. They were fourteen layers of skin hiding you."
An old wooden chest was concealed beneath the iron cabinet.
Li Sanshun lifted the lid. Inside was a heap of account papers from the foundry. They had gotten damp, and many of the words had blurred. Li Jiu pulled an oilcloth from the very bottom and spread it across the furnace platform.
The oilcloth showed an old map of the imperial capital.
Fifteen red lines ran through different streets before converging at an abandoned estate in the south of the city.
"Twenty-one years ago, the imperial capital was lashed by rain for seven straight days. Fifteen infants were sent one after another to that estate."
"Were they all of the Ji bloodline?"
"All close kin."
Li Jiu tapped the fifteen red circles on the oilcloth.
"Someone tested their blood, took impressions of their footprints, and recorded their birthmarks. Once that was done, the first fourteen children were sent back to their families through fourteen separate gates."
Li Sanshun's finger stopped over the last red circle.
"What about me?"
"You took the fifteenth route."
"Where did it lead?"
"The foundry."
Li Jiu pressed the Seal of Destiny mold onto the red line.
"That night, someone put you in a coal-delivery basket and smuggled you out of the imperial capital among a cartload of furnace materials. The fourteen samples of true blood stayed at the estate, and fourteen different sets of clothes the infants had worn were scattered along the way."
"No matter which way the investigators searched, they'd find imperial blood."
Li Sanshun understood.
The fourteen children were there to muddy the waters.
He was the only one who truly needed to escape the imperial capital.
"Who planned it?"
"Hell if I know."
Li Jiu turned back a corner of the oilcloth, revealing half of a Mystic Bird Seal.
"The contact was masked and carried a Gold Blade. She told me to remember one thing: 'Fifteen bloodlines form a screen; the blood of destiny leaves the capital.'"
"A woman?"
"Yeah."
"How old was she?"
"Couldn't tell. She was missing half her right little finger, and she had an old scar on her wrist."
Li Sanshun committed those two details to memory.
"Where did she go after handing me over to you?"
"Back to the imperial capital."
Li Jiu took a charred bronze fragment from a compartment in the wooden chest.
The character "Return" was engraved on it.
"She said that if she hadn't come back before dawn, I was to take you to Linshui Township. Change your name, keep your head down, and live as inconspicuously as possible."
"She didn't come back?"
"The next day, the estate in the south of the city burned to ashes. The imperial clan claimed a fire had killed fifteen children and sealed all the records."
Li Sanshun took out the fifteenth imprint of an infant's blood.
On its reverse was written: "Obeying Heaven and Following Fate, entrusted to Li Jiu."
"Why were these things left in the old vault?"
"Someone made a copy in advance."
Li Jiu rubbed the edge of the paper.
"The last two pages of the original fifteen records described how the fourteen children were sent back, and how you left the capital by the fifteenth route. Once those pages vanished, all fifteen became missing imperial infants."
"Xu Zhenchuan only got the incomplete records?"
"He got the blood records from the beginning, but never saw the return registry. That bastard spent twenty-one years looking, convinced that all fifteen children were hidden somewhere outside."
That also explained the fifteen unfinished blanks in the Ding-Character Furnace.
Six years ago, Xu Zhenchuan used the fifteen imperial blood records to forge orders, intending to create all fifteen identities.
The first fourteen had already been completed.
The fifteenth, however, had been left at the bottom of the furnace because its number and Blood Guide were wrong.
Xu Zhenchuan had no idea that Imperial Blood Fifteen wasn't the last of fifteen targets.
The number referred to the fifteenth route out of the capital.
Li Sanshun picked up the Seal of Destiny mold.
"Is this the only one?"
"The only one."
"What about the Seal of Destiny on the Gold Blade?"
"It was cast from this."
Li Jiu took the mold and tapped twice on the three red patterns.
"The Seal of Destiny recognizes three things: the Gold Blade, the mold, and the blood from your left foot. Miss one, and no one can open the final Blood Lock."
"What Blood Lock?"
Li Jiu was about to answer when footsteps sounded outside the courtyard.
Zhao Rui led a group into the furnace room, escorting a captured Dark Patrol Guard.
The man had cloth stuffed in his mouth, and both arms were bound with Spirit-Locking Chains. Four disciples from the main peak stood guard nearby, leaving him no chance to struggle.
"We searched the bottom of his boot and found this."
Zhao Rui tossed over a Black Iron token.
The front bore the Law Enforcement Peak's Dark Patrol markings, but a blood groove had been cut into the back. A number was engraved beside it.
Seven.
Li Sanshun set the token on the furnace platform, then took out the tracing of the fifteenth unfinished blank.
The size, thickness, and position of the blood groove all matched.
"How did he end up with one of the fourteen imitation orders taken from the Ding-Character Furnace?"
The Dark Patrol Guard gripped the cloth in his teeth, a few muffled laughs rumbling in his throat.
Zhao Rui yanked the gag away.
"Talk."
"Fine, you caught me. Don't expect to pry anything out of me."
Li Sanshun picked up the No. 7 Imitation Order and brought it close to his nose.
Beneath the iron tang, he detected Green Pine Resin, the sealing powder used in the Armory, and a trace of royal formation energy that had only just dissipated.
[Imitation Sealing Order detected.] [The Law Enforcement Peak Armory was opened within the past three hours.] [The imperial formation was touched within the past two hours.]
Gu Qinghe's old sword fragment and the Mystic-15 Sealing Sword had both left the Armory within the past three hours.
"So you used an imitation order to open the Armory."
The Dark Patrol Guard clamped his mouth shut.
Zhao Rui fetched a sheet of white paper and pressed the No. 7 Imitation Order against it.
The wear along the token's edge matched the Black Iron marks left in the Armory's lock perfectly.
Gu Qinghe had never entered the Armory.
Nor had she needed to hand her Deacon Seal to Fang Shao herself.
If they followed the No. 7 Imitation Order, they could clear away most of the accusations against her.
Li Sanshun slipped the token into the Evidence Bag.
"This thing can open the sect's vaults and touch imperial formations. What were you planning to do with fourteen of these?"
The Dark Patrol Guard still said nothing.
But Li Jiu braced himself against the furnace platform and stood up.
He snatched the No. 7 Imitation Order, turned it over, and scraped at the black lacquer beside the blood groove with an iron nail.
Two small characters emerged beneath the lacquer.
Outer Lock.
Li Jiu dropped the token and turned to search the dead assassin's clothes.
Before long, he pulled a folded piece of black paper from the corpse's belt.
Fifteen gates were drawn on it.
The first fourteen had already been crossed out in red.
Beside the last gate were three characters.
Take left foot.
No one in the furnace room spoke again.
The two assassins had risked their lives trying to cut off Li Sanshun's left foot. They hadn't been after his birthmark.
They needed his blood to open the gate.
Zhao Rui grabbed the Dark Patrol Guard by the collar.
"What's behind the gate?"
The Dark Patrol Guard spat out a mouthful of blood.
"Ask his foster father."
Li Sanshun turned to Li Jiu.
Li Jiu gripped the Seal of Destiny mold, beads of sweat on his forehead.
"The fourteen imitation orders have already opened the Outer Lock. If they came for the mold tonight, that means they've found the last gate too."
"Where is it?"
"Beneath Tai Xuan Sect's Imperial Sealing Vault, there's another level."
A message talisman flew in through the courtyard gate.
Zhao Rui caught it, scanned one line, and passed it to Li Sanshun.
Earth Fire had appeared beneath the Imperial Sealing Vault.
Seven vault guards were missing.
Qi Shouxuan had already taken people there.
Li Sanshun grabbed the No. 7 Imitation Order and turned to leave.
The Dark Patrol Guard laughed behind him.
"You'll never make it in time."
Li Sanshun stopped.
"Has Xu Zhenchuan already gone inside?"
The Dark Patrol Guard licked the blood from between his teeth.
"Vice Hall Master Xu was only in charge of opening the gate."
"The one really waiting in the Chengyun Vault is the woman who personally sent you out of the imperial capital twenty-one years ago."
Before you continue