Long Ya nodded.
She jumped into the driver's seat. The Demoness Pickup Truck's engine growled twice, and a cloud of gray smoke puffed from its exhaust.
Liu San huddled in the back seat and waved at Yang Yong. "Mr. Yang, we're off."
Yang Yong ignored him.
He stood where he was, watching the Demoness Pickup Truck's blue taillights bob a few times in the Gray Mist before they were swallowed completely.
He stood alone at the edge of the quarry, the wind sweeping down from the north and filling his ears.
Yang Yong summoned the Heavenly Dragon Slash Flying Daggers and played with them in his hand as he set off toward Black Water Marsh.
After daybreak, the reed beds looked much more normal.
Broken glints of light shimmered on the gray-green water. A few waterbirds fluttered up from deep among the reeds, tracing black lines across the gray-white sky.
The fishy smell on the wind had faded, but Yang Yong knew that thing was still there.
He found the spot Yezi had marked last night.
Several reeds had been bent and broken, as though left as a marker.
Yang Yong crouched, first cutting a circle around the spot with a dagger, then brushing away the loose soil on top.
The earth was soft. As the throwing knife plunged down, the loose soil came away like tofu.
A little over two feet down, the throwing knife struck a stone slab with a clang.
Yang Yong kept going, clearing downward along the edge of the slab.
After clearing about another foot, he exposed an iron chain in the mud.
Thicker than his thumb and rusted blackish red, the chain wound around the slab's lower edge like a pinned snake.
There were patterns on the chain too, all spirals, winding round and