Unsealing
When we returned to the stone house, it was just getting dark.
Long Tian didn't go inside. He first squatted down by the well, scooped up water to wash his face, took off his coat, and hung it on a low branch of the pomegranate tree to dry before entering the house. Long Tieshan was sitting by the stove. When he saw Long Tian come in, he moved aside to make room for him in front of the stove, just as he did every evening when he returned. Long Tian squatted down by the stove, warmed his hands over the fire for a while until his fingers regained their warmth, and then began to recount his discovery of the air chamber at the base of the underwater space.
After listening, Long Tieshan remained silent, squatting by the stove and repeatedly bending a piece of dry firewood in his hands before finally placing it into the furnace. Only when the flames flickered around the tip of the firewood did he speak, "The line of characters on the side of the base—when you saw it, did you read the stroke order with the direction it was carved, or against it?"
Long Tian thought back for a moment. When he saw the text, it was written from left to right, the same direction as the common language of the continent. He told Long Tieshan this information, Long Tieshan nodded after listening. He didn't ask any more questions, stood up, walked to the corner of the wall, turned over an old stone slab, drew a few symbols on the bottom, and then asked Long Tian to come and take a look. The shape of the symbols was consistent with the stroke order of the ancient characters on the side of the base, as if someone had memorized them and then copied them.
If the inscription on the side of the base is read from left to right, then the opening direction of the air chamber should correspond to the side where the inscription begins. If you go back to that spot, you don't need to pry open the base. Just place your palm on the edge of the base on the side where the inscription begins, and let the energy from the Origin Return Pearl Bead travel along the texture of the base surface. Find the point where the feedback is weakest—that's where the opening is.
Long Tian mentally compared the symbols Long Tieshan had drawn with the inscriptions on the side of the base, memorizing the starting position of each stroke. Before resting that night, he went through the stroke order of the characters again, confirming that his memory of the starting position matched the order of the symbols Long Tieshan had marked. The next morning, he put the stone slab drawn by Long Tieshan into his leather pouch and went out again with Yu Jin.
Upon arriving at Longfish Bay, the people at the stern were washing the planks at the dock. Seeing them approach, they put down their brushes, washed their hands, untied the mooring ropes, and waited for them to board before poling away from the shore without saying a word. The boat took slightly longer to navigate the inky waters than before, and the current seemed to have shifted slightly, but the people at the stern adjusted the rudder a few times and regained the course. Long Tian squatted at the bow, placing the silk map and the stone slab drawn by Long Tieshan side by side on his knees, confirming that the orientation of the marking plate corresponded correctly to the opening direction of the base.
As dusk fell, the ship approached the waters directly above the marker disc. Long Tian plunged into the water, following the light path of the marker disc through the keel base and the slanted passage, re-entering the underwater space. The light layer of the Dragon Shadow spread outwards after he entered. He swam to the base, stopping at the starting point, and placed his palm on it. The aura of the Origin Return Pearl traveled along the texture of the base's surface. When it reached a point near the bottom of the base, the feedback intensity of the aura was significantly lower than in other areas—as if there was a thinner stone wall there, weakening the signal strength during continuous transmission.
He pressed his palm against that area, continuously channeling the energy from the Origin Return Pearl into it. As his energy continued to flow in, the stone wall in that area began to slowly warm up, as if the continuous conduction had activated certain internal structures. Then, it slid along the edge of the opening to both sides, revealing a narrow crevice. No water flowed into the crevice—an extremely thin, transparent layer blocked the gap between the crevice and the water, separating the water from the air. He pressed the layer with his fingertip; it was thin yet resilient, like a membrane stretched to its limit, which, under pressure, dented slightly inward before returning to its original shape.
He withdrew his hand, hovering in front of the crevice, peering through the thin membrane into its interior. The inside was dry, containing a stable, dark space that maintained its own state behind the membrane, neither pushing outwards nor allowing anything to seep in.
He turned and floated back to the surface along the passage, then climbed onto the boat and wiped the water droplets from his face. The stone wall on the starting side of the base had slid along the edge of the opening to both sides, revealing a gap. Inside the gap was a waterproof membrane, completely separating the space inside the air chamber from the seawater. The membrane was still intact. The air chamber was dry, without any water ingress, and the seal was good.
After he finished speaking, he squatted on the deck for a moment, letting his breathing gradually calm down. The person at the stern waited until he had caught his breath before asking, "What do you plan to do with that thin film?"
"Let's not deal with it for now." Long Tian stood up and tightened the belt of his coat. "I need to confirm how the material and structure of the membrane remain stable under continuous support. I'll record what I observe when I get back, and then determine how to get past that barrier and into the air chamber." The ship turned back into the night. The Dragon Shadow continued to shine above the bow, and the vertical line on its forehead still retained a faint afterglow after passing through that area for a while, like an iron piece just taken out of the furnace retaining its heat in the early stages of cooling, gradually returning to normal temperature during the return voyage.