"You stay outside. If the water rises too quickly, you'll be responsible for digging the diversion channel and directing the leyline water towards the Blind Zone." Snow Empress took out the Earth Vein Compass from her bosom and handed it to Yin Wujou. "The compass is useless in the Blind Zone, but it's useful outside. Use it to keep an eye on the location of the leyline water."
Yin Wujou took the compass. The copper disc was slightly warm in his palm, and the indicator steadily pointed to the bottom of the third ditch. He was silent for a moment, then nodded.
"Three days," Snow Empress said to Deacon Sun. "If they don't come out within three days, you take men and dig up the entire diversion channel, letting the ley line water fill the Blind Zone. It doesn't matter whether we're inside or not."
Deacon Sun opened his mouth, but ultimately only managed to say, "Be careful."
Snow Empress turned and walked towards the bottom of the third ravine. A Yao followed behind, carrying a pottery jar and a bamboo staff. When the two reached the bottom of the ravine, the red patterns on the ravine wall pulsated even more violently. A Yao held the bamboo staff upright in front of her, the bluish luster of the middle section of the staff standing out against the red patterns. She closed her eyes, placed her hand on the bamboo staff, and felt the faint vibrations coming from the staff.
"This way." She opened her eyes and pointed to the inside of a depression in the ditch wall. There was an extremely narrow crack there, which had been filled with silt before, but now the silt had been stretched open by red veins, revealing the deep blackness below. A wind carrying the smell of sulfur surged out of the crack, making A Yao's hair fly wildly.
Snow Empress drew her sword, its cold, eerie blue light illuminating the inner wall of the crack. The earth vein patterns on the inner wall were clearly visible, but they were broken and chaotic, like a spider web torn apart and haphazardly pieced together. And among these chaotic patterns, there was an extremely thin, almost transparent streak of light, winding its way into the depths of darkness.
Those are traces of the earth's vein water.
"Let's go." Snow Empress stepped into the crevice. A Yao followed closely behind.
Beyond the crack was a narrow, downward-sloping path. The vein patterns on the rock walls on both sides constantly changed, sometimes crimson, sometimes dark purple, and sometimes pitch black. A Yao held her bamboo staff in front of her, its bluish sheen illuminating the path three feet ahead. The light trail appeared and disappeared beneath her feet, like a faint thread, guiding them deeper into the path.
After walking for about the time it takes for an incense stick to burn, the narrow path suddenly widened, leading into a natural stone chamber. The chamber wasn't large, but the ceiling was extremely high. Looking up, faint reddish lights flickered in the darkness, like a group of silent fireflies. The floor of the chamber was covered with cracks, and dark red mist seeped from each crack. In the very center of the chamber, a huge black stone pillar rose from the ground, its surface engraved with the ancient symbols found on Meng Qi's bamboo staff.
The bamboo staff trembled violently in A Yao's hand. The staff's bluish-green luster shone brightly, illuminating the " Vein Eye " symbols that had been repeatedly carved three times on the stone pillar.
"The first Vein Eye," A Yao said.
At the base of the stone pillar, a piece of timber was buried horizontally in a crevice. Most of the timber had rotted away, but a few pieces of pottery were still embedded in the remaining wood. The patterns on the pottery pieces were exactly the same as the ones that A Yao had buried near the spring.
"The culprit blocked the canal here, cutting off the Vein Eye." A Yao squatted down to examine it. "But as long as we remove the rotten wood and replace it with new canal wood and pottery shards, it can be reconnected."
Snow Empress stood guard at the edge of the stone chamber. The dark red mist around the chamber was slowly gathering towards the center, as if drawn by the Vein Eye symbols on the stone pillars. She noticed tiny shadows occasionally flashing through the mist, about a foot long, with five toe claw prints and forked tails. The small beasts lurked in the shadows but did not approach. They seemed wary of the bluish light emitted by the bamboo staff.
"Quickly," Snow Empress said.
A Yao took out spare timber and pottery shards from her backpack. Following the " Three Eyes Return to One " formation diagram in her father's notes, she first embedded the timber into the groove at the base of the stone pillar. The moment the timber entered the groove, the Vein Eye symbol on the stone pillar lit up, and a blue light spread outward from the center of the symbol, pushing back the gathered dark red mist. A Yao then embedded the pottery shards into the sides of the timber according to the angle of the formation diagram. As soon as the first pottery shard was in place, the dark red mist seeping from the cracks in the stone chamber floor immediately weakened. As the second shard was in place, the red light spot at the top dimmed. When the third shard was in place, a stream of clear earth vein water suddenly gushed out from the base of the stone pillar, rising along the grain of the timber and washing away the rotten wood fragments.
The dark red mist in the stone chamber was forced into a corner by the earth vein water. The small beasts let out soft hisses and scurried into the cracks in the corner. A Yao stood up and patted the mud off her hands.
"The first spot is open. The water will flow in a loop along the Vein Eye to the second spot. Let's go to the second spot."
The two left the stone chamber and returned along the narrow passage. On the rock walls on both sides of the passage, the previously almost invisible water vein mark had thickened and become a clear water line, winding upwards along the rock wall. A Yao used her bamboo staff to sense the direction of the water line, leading Snow Empress through the narrow passage, turning left and right, and finally entering the second stone chamber through another fork in the road.
This stone chamber was smaller than the first one, but the stone pillars were thicker. The Vein Eye symbols on the stone pillars were also blocked by the canal wood, but the canal wood here was not rotten; it was still new. A Yao took a closer look, and her face darkened.
"This Vein Eye was only recently blocked," she said, pointing to the cross-section of the canal log. "The cut is very clean, like it was made with a knife. Someone was here before us."
Snow Empress crouched down to examine the cut on the canal wood. The cut was indeed very new, and the wood chips had not completely changed color. In the crevices of the rocks around the canal wood, she found several blurry footprints. The footprints were small, with five toes, but they were not animal claws; they were bare human feet.
" The Resentment Beast doesn't use a knife." Snow Empress stood up. "Someone's here."
A Yao gripped her bamboo cane tightly. She remembered what Meng Qi had said: he wasn't the only one who had sabotaged things back then. Some of them were dead, and some had gone into hiding. But if anyone knew that the Spirit Vein Bureau was repairing the Vein Eye, they might come to stop it.
"Could it be one of the people Meng Qi mentioned?"
"I don't know. But whoever it is, this Vein Eye must be opened." Snow Empress drew her sword. "You switch to Qu Mu, I'll guard it."
A Yao nodded and quickly took out spare canal wood and pottery shards. Just as she cleared away the rotten wood, a series of light footsteps came from the narrow passage outside the stone chamber. The sound was very soft, like bare feet stepping on gravel, but extremely fast. Snow Empress drew her sword horizontally, and the cold blue light illuminated three short figures at the entrance of the narrow passage.
They were people, but not entirely human. They were only three feet tall, with grayish-white faces, no hair, long and thin limbs, and webbed membranes between their fingers and toes. Their eyes were large, without pupils, and the entire eyeballs were dark red. Each of them held a sharpened piece of wood in their hand, like a crude spear.
With a flash of her blade, Snow Empress severed the first spear thrusting at her. The dwarf let out a sharp screech, and two other dwarves pounced simultaneously. Their movements were incredibly fast; they used the rock walls on either side of the narrow passage as leverage to leap and thrust at Snow Empress from both sides. Snow Empress spun around, her blade tracing a circle, severing both spears cleanly. With a sweeping motion of the back of her blade, she sent the three dwarves flying. They crashed into the rock walls with dull thuds, then quickly scrambled to their feet and disappeared into the cracks on either side of the passage.