Chapter 119: Stagnation of Heaven and Earth

Mengya’s sudden call caught us off guard. Ghost-Face Zhang turned his head. "What is it?"

Mengya ignored him and said, "Qiutong, come here for a second."

I had been engrossed in scraping away the rust, and hearing Mengya call me, I paused, worried that she was feeling unwell again. I handed the small knife to Ghost-Face Zhang. "Let me go check on her first."

Ghost-Face Zhang took the knife, let out a cold snort, lit a cigarette, and tucked the dagger back into his boot before following me over. "If this is a private matter, I’ll step aside."

Mengya sneered. "Do you think I have the time for private matters in a godforsaken place like this?" She pointed to the wall behind her. "Take a look at this."

I followed her finger. At first, the glare of the flashlight made it hard to focus, but when the beam hit the right spot, a chill shot down my spine, leaving me trembling.

Under the circle of light, a tiny crack had appeared in the wall. At the very bottom of the crack, there was a row of footprints on the ground. They were clearly fresh, identical to the ones we had seen under the massive stone behind the black stone Buddha in the Pala Dynasty ruins—they were the footprints of my master, the Fourth Master of the Nine Gates.

"Qiutong," Ghost-Face Zhang murmured. "Didn't your master tell you anything about this expedition?"

I frowned. "No. After I got this gold mask, I went straight to find him, and the next day I met you all at the Hongbin Restaurant."

I wasn't lying. Ever since that trip to Hong Kong with Mengya, Xiaoshao, Xiaoxia, and the Beijing shaman Yu Xianzhi, the bizarre events at the hotel, meeting the artist Xiao Wu, breaking the spell of the old cousin in the Yin-gathering ground to find that statue of Jebtsundamba Zanabazar, and discovering that eerie gold mask—everything that followed was beyond my control. Ghost-Face Zhang’s words clearly implied he suspected me and my master, thinking my master had intentionally lured the Nine Gates into this trap. But I was genuinely in the dark; it felt as if everyone was lying to me.

For once, Ghost-Face Zhang didn't show much suspicion; it seemed his trust in me had grown over the last little while.

I sighed deeply. "Third Master, I truly regret this. I really do! I just want to get out of here, live a quiet life with Mengya, and be a simple antique dealer." At the height of my emotion, tears welled up in my eyes. There is no medicine for regret in this world, and as they say, a man doesn't shed tears easily—only when he reaches the depths of despair.

Seeing me cry, Ghost-Face Zhang let out a long sigh; his own eyes grew teary, full of untold stories. Mengya reached out to wipe away my tears and smiled at me. "Don't worry, we’ll get out of here safely."

Ghost-Face Zhang was, after all, much tougher than the average person. He wiped his eyes discreetly, shone his flashlight on the wall crack again, and clicked his tongue. "There’s writing underneath!"

We were startled by his announcement. We squinted to see the markings, which were incredibly subtle. I looked closely; clearly, weathering here was rapid, but these characters had no oxidation layer—they were freshly written. The marker trace formed a character the size of a grain of rice that was impossible to decipher at first. It looked like a "square" inside the frame of the character for "wind," with the character for "heaven" written on top.

"What is that?" Ghost-Face Zhang asked in a low voice.

I shook my head, tracing the strange character with my finger and clicking my tongue repeatedly.

Mengya sighed. "Can't your master just speak plainly? Why write this cryptic nonsense? It’s just like that stuff on the back of the mask last time—it’s infuriating."

"Wait," Ghost-Face Zhang interrupted before she could finish. "Could this be another 'composite character' like the last one?"

I froze. If his theory was correct, breaking down the structure would give us "Heaven," "Wind," and "Mouth." Heaven was easy to understand—it meant above. But how to explain "Wind" and "Mouth"?

I shared my thoughts with Mengya and Ghost-Face Zhang. Ghost-Face Zhang immediately ran up a few steps, craned his neck to look upward for a long time, and shook his head. "There’s nothing there."

"Could it mean the wind blowing from below?" Mengya suggested.

I pondered this. We had indeed felt wind blowing several times while coming down, but that didn't provide any leads. I shook my head and fell back into deep thought.

Half an hour passed. Seeing I still hadn't found a lead, Ghost-Face Zhang, looking irritable, snuffed out his fourth cigarette. He tossed the butt toward my feet.

The constant pressure made my irritation flare up. I lowered my head, ready to lash out, but when I saw the four cigarette butts on the ground, I gasped, a flash of realization striking my brain. I turned back. "Mengya, give me the paper!"

Mengya quickly handed me the paper and pen. I wrote out the small character from the wall and drew six horizontal lines beneath it, furrowing my brow.

"Is this the Eight Trigrams again?" Mengya whispered, her face grim.

"How did you deduce that?" Ghost-Face Zhang asked, looking at me skeptically.

"The way you threw your cigarette butts so neatly reminded me of the Eight Trigrams. The 'Heaven' character on top corresponds to the Qian trigram, taking the two upper Yang lines. The 'Wind' frame with the hook trailing from top to bottom takes the first and second lines of the Xun trigram—one Yang line and two Yin lines. The square inside the wind frame represents 'the sky is round and the earth is square,' taking the square to represent the Kun trigram, or Earth. Put it all together, and you get this hexagram."

Ghost-Face Zhang cursed when he heard it was the Eight Trigrams. "Damn it, I don't know where that brat Kaleidoscope went." He looked at me. "Don't you know a thing or two about this?"

"I can't compare to him. I just read books out of boredom; I wouldn't even say I’ve caught a glimpse of the basics. It’s just for passing the time."

"I don't understand it at all, so I'm leaving it to you." He snatched the notebook, said, "Don't get it," and threw it back to me.

I looked down at the six lines: Yin, Yin, Yin, Yang, Yang, Yang. Arranged this way, this hexagram is called "Pí" (Stagnation). The "Pí" means "not" or "no." The upper three lines form the Qian trigram, and the lower three form the Kun trigram. Usually, the earth is nourished by the sky and the sun, which is not a bad thing. However, when the earth is influenced by the sky, everything on earth must be subject to the heavens, and the inherent nature of the earth is denied. In terms of relationships, the earth symbolizes the host, and the sky symbolizes the guest; the host must adapt to the guest. In my heart, this hexagram felt extremely ominous. I always felt it meant much effort for little return, which is why I was frowning so hard.

"What's the point of deducing this hexagram?" Mengya asked, whispering for fear that Ghost-Face Zhang would start complaining again.

I shook my head. "Who knows? I've always found this hexagram troublesome."

"Could it be a clue for the keyhole?"

I shook my head. "If it were, would my master have needed to be so cryptic? Besides, even if we know the trigram on the door, what do we use to open it?"

She remained silent for a long time, suddenly lost in thought.

"What's wrong? Are you feeling unwell again?" I asked.

She shook her head. "Do you remember the 'Quicksand Tomb' we raided on the mountaintop halfway here?"

I gasped. "I remember. I still have that box with me." I took it out.

Mengya looked at the small gold box in my hand and smiled triumphantly. "It really is that."

I frowned, wondering what she was getting at. "Tell me, don't keep me in suspense."

Mengya reached out, took the exquisite gold-inlaid silver box from my hand, and began twisting it. The box clicked as if a mechanism had been triggered, and six horizontal pins emerged from the seams of the square box. She twisted it again, and the box made another sound as the six pins shifted suddenly.

Mengya was a master at solving puzzles. After five minutes of twisting, she wiped her forehead. "Here."

I slapped my thigh. "Big sister, you're amazing." I gave her a thumbs-up and looked back at Ghost-Face Zhang, who was smoking. "Third Master, it's done."

Ghost-Face Zhang walked over with a cigarette in his mouth and looked at the gold box in my hand. "How did you get this thing to open?"

"This is the key to the door."

"Huh?" Ghost-Face Zhang frowned. "Are you saying if we hadn't raided that Quicksand Tomb, we wouldn't have been able to get out of here?"

I nodded, thinking, *Thank goodness, thank goodness.* It was a stroke of luck that we had obtained the gold box that night, or we would have been doomed. But it all felt too coincidental, as if an invisible hand were arranging us like pieces on a board. I mused that once I got out, I would never deal with these people again; I would just be a simple antique dealer and live a stable, peaceful life with Mengya.

Ghost-Face Zhang took the gold box, inserted the pins into the keyhole, and gave it a twist. With a loud *creak*, the door swung open. At the same moment, the rhythmic sound of water began again, and the scene inside the door was so terrifying it nearly took our breath away.