Chapter 53: Golden Crow

Scales and claws churned the dark waters below the cliff into a surging black tide, jagged rocks protruding like the spines of savage beasts. Long Li tumbled sideways from several meters in the air, her tiny figure no larger than a blade of autumn grass.

Gu Xianwang watched the scene unfold, the space around her warping as if time itself had slowed to stuttering frames. She parted her lips, but no sound escaped.

The Submerged Jiao reared up its scaled body. Long Li slid from the crease beside its eye, grasping futilely several times mid-descent, but the slick scales offered no purchase. Wind whistled past her ears. With one final chance, she twisted in midair, flipping onto her side and thrusting her arm out as far as it would go. Her shoulder and arm muscles wrenched in protest as she dangled from the creature’s foreclaw.

It was far too close for comfort. The moment her fall halted, Long Li vaulted from between the Jiao’s talons and onto its back. She had barely steadied herself when a pair of golden slit pupils—like the high beams of an oncoming truck—loomed over her, staring down.

Gu Xianwang’s mind raced at full speed, every rescue idea surfacing only to be shot down. She couldn’t reach them; her only option was to draw the Jiao’s attention. What had lured it up from the depths in the first place? Long Li’s descent to help? If this black water was its moat, why had Sara floated in it unscathed? Had it mistaken her for a corpse?

Her thoughts flashed like lightning when a sudden weight settled on her shoulder. Gu Xianwang whipped her head around to see a golden furball launch itself into the air, wings flapping as it glided several meters out—dropping lower, lower still…

On the verge of plummeting, the Fat Bird beat its wings furiously, buoying itself upward just enough to land with awkward grace on the back of the Submerged Jiao’s claw.

Gu Xianwang: …

Long Li never could have anticipated that Gu Xianwang’s reinforcements—beyond the waist knife—would include this Fat Bird.

In that instant, humans and Jiao alike fell silent.

The Fat Bird hopped twice, waddling up to Long Li before spitting out a small mole rat with a wet “pthoo.” It then tilted its head and flapped its wings at her.

The gesture seemed to say: This lord just went hunting. Here’s one for you—to settle the score.

When Long Li didn’t react, the Fat Bird launched itself again, burrowing headfirst into her chest. It still preferred this position above all; being cradled was the comfiest.

Long Li had witnessed countless bizarre sights in her life, but nothing quite like this: the golden Fat Bird nestled in her arms, her gaze locked in mutual silence with the Submerged Jiao’s truck-sized head. Absurdity defined the moment.

Only two words filled Gu Xianwang’s mind: We’re screwed.

After a long pause, the Fat Bird let out a chirp, shattering the tension.

The Submerged Jiao’s eyes narrowed at the sound, steam puffing from its nostrils as it leaned in closer… almost affectionately.

As the massive blue-scaled head drew near, the Fat Bird began gesturing frantically at Long Li.

“You want me to climb on?” Long Li asked.

“Chirp!”

The sight was comical, but it sparked a realization in Gu Xianwang: mutual generation and restraint. She had never given much thought to why this golden-feathered exotic bird had appeared so suddenly in the cavern forest at the bottom. Fat as it was, its looks were anything but ordinary—three fiery plumes crowning its head, its tail resembling a phoenix’s after flames had licked it clean. If this Submerged Jiao was an ancient beast the Witch Clan had imprisoned here a millennium ago, could the bird be…?

She froze. A phrase surfaced unbidden. Where had she heard it? From where?

“Sunken Abyss locks the Scaled Serpent; Golden Crow suppresses the Submerged Jiao.”

Even as the thought formed, the Jiao’s head swung close. Its enormous snout nudged the cliff edge before Gu Xianwang, its blue scales forming a makeshift staircase. Long Li stepped down from its forehead and pulled her aboard.

She planted her feet, and the world lurched beneath her, her viewpoint sinking. The black tide rushed perilously near, but the Jiao swam with remarkable steadiness—far smoother than any speedboat off the coast.

They repeated the process at the cliffside, picking up Senior Brother, Ye Chan, and Sara. Perched atop the Jiao’s forehead, the group exchanged awkward glances. Aside from the still-unconscious Sara, every face betrayed that familiar “I have something to say, but maybe I shouldn’t” hesitation.

Only when they finally touched solid ground on the far shore did the sensation of firm earth unshackle Chatterbox Ye Chan. She exhaled sharply. “Holy hell, that scared the life out of me. I’d never have imagined stepping on the head of a divine beast from the Classic of Mountains and Seas in my lifetime.”

Yao Cuo eased Sara to the ground and murmured, “We were all stunned watching from over here. What the heck happened? Why did this big fella suddenly play along?”

Because this big fellow’s massive head was still propped against the cliff edge, peering down at them, everyone instinctively kept their voices low. Ye Chan had been holding back for ages and finally couldn’t contain herself. “Yeah, exactly. So the real passage to the altar runs through this submerged jiao. What a brilliant design—if someone shows up without passing the jiao’s ‘inspection,’ they won’t just fail to cross; they might end up dead right here.”

But had they actually passed that inspection?

Gu Xianwang didn’t think so. What had truly pulled them through the crisis was something else entirely. “It was the Golden Crow.”

She explained, “I’m guessing the strange bird we ran into is the legendary Golden Crow—the Sun Bird. That submerged jiao is the Witch Clan’s tamed beast, and the Golden Crow is the Witch Clan’s totem. That’s why it stopped its attack the moment it spotted the Golden Crow.”

“This thing?” Ye Chan stared at the fat bird, dumbfounded. “Golden Crow? Sun Bird? It? It’s the Nine Li Tribe’s totem?”

Where was the sanctity? The radiance? Just how luxurious must the Nine Li people’s lives have been back then? Why did the carvings and the real thing not match up at all?

Ye Chan wiped her face and paced in a couple of circles on the ground. Speaking those words was borderline blasphemous, but keeping them bottled up left her chest tight and her whole body restless.

“True or not,” Long Li said as she set the Golden Crow down and turned to face the stone door of the altar, “there’s no doubt we’ve ridden its coattails to get here.”

The stone door’s cracks had been eaten away by moisture over time, leaving them blurred and indistinct—not the look of something that had ever been opened. It felt just like being back in the abandoned village, standing before a dilapidated brick house thick with decades of dust. Human presence had faded so long ago that a hollow, deathly silence pressed in on them.

Before them loomed another disk, but this one lacked the elaborate engravings of the last. It bore only three holes, clearly meant for fingers to probe inside and twist, unlocking the massive stone door.

Gu Xianwang sized it up discreetly. She could handle the mechanism herself without issue. Long Li had just fought a brutal battle; her stamina had to be waning. If the disk required a specific sequence and they botched it, at least she’d have reserves left to deal with the consequences.

She had barely taken a step forward when the Golden Crow, freshly deposited by Long Li, bounded after her and burrowed straight into her arms to snuggle.

Gu Xianwang: …

“Everyone, fall back a bit.”

Long Li didn’t wait for discussion. She strode forward, reached out, and slid three fingers into the holes. Her knuckles whitened as the disk spun with her wrist. A deep rumbling echoed from within the stone door, like massive millstones grinding. The disk rotated a full one hundred eighty degrees before clicking to a halt.

The moment it stopped, the mechanical whirring fell silent. Long Li withdrew her hand and stepped back. The instant her long fingers cleared the holes, the disk retracted into the door, then slid sideways into a recess, revealing the chamber beyond.

The inner chamber was roughly the size of half an altar table. At its front sat a stone platform with a recessed slot in the center—perfectly sized for one jug and one cup.

Ye Chan’s eyes bulged as she gaped at the ancient clay jug and cup nestled inside the mechanism’s stone box. “That clay body, that shape…”

Before she could finish, Long Li had already lifted out the narrow-necked clay jug. In the instant she raised it, she felt a faint rebound between the base and the slot. She shot a glance at the round pedestal beneath; something more lurked below.

Even after the jug was fully removed, no traps sprang to life around them. Gu Xianwang let out a quiet breath of relief. Long Li gave the jug a couple of light shakes, and to their surprise, liquid sloshed against the sides from within.

Gu Xianwang blinked. “Is there… water in there?”

Ye Chan let out a whoop. “Entirely possible! Archaeologists have pulled wine jars from tombs before, still holding onto scraps of thousand-year-old booze. This one’s preserved beautifully too. By the style, it’s got to predate the Two Han Dynasties at least. If whatever’s inside held up, a lab test outside could pinpoint its exact age.”

“We’ll soon find out.” Long Li twisted open the sealed lid with care. Sealed away for who knew how long, the jug gave a soft ‘pop’ as the cover came free.

She tilted the mouth toward the sunlight and peered inside. Good lord—half a jug of black liquid, yet it carried the distinct scent of alcohol.

“A jug of wine?” Gu Xianwang said, baffled. “What’s that doing here?”

“It’s genuine thousand-year-old liquor.” Ye Chan made a face. “They don’t seriously expect us to drink it, do they?”

Her words hung in the air, plunging them all into an awkward silence.

Ye Chan blinked rapidly, forcing a dry laugh. “What’re those faces for? I was joking! Look at how black that stuff is—one gulp and you’d be off to your next life, right? Ha, haha.”

Yao Cuo half-squatted down and peered thoroughly into the Stone Box. “There’s nothing else inside besides these two.”

Nothing?

After battling the Submerged Jiao and arduously crossing the Black Abyss to finally reach the Altar’s entrance—twisting the mechanism only to obtain half a jug of millennium-old wine smoother and blacker than ink?

Gu Xianwang said in disappointment, “Could this really be a dead end?”

Long Li mused thoughtfully, “Not necessarily. When I took the wine jug earlier, there must have been another mechanism hidden beneath its slot. I suspect it’s related to gravity.”

“You mean putting the jug back in its original position might trigger a new mechanism?”

“Mm.” Long Li stared at the wine liquid inside the jug. “But it definitely won’t be as simple as putting it back exactly as before.”

Yao Cuo said, “Then just pour out the wine inside. This mechanism only recognizes weight, doesn’t it?”

Ye Chan coughed softly and nodded her mouth toward the Jiao head behind them, which had been staring at them with wide eyes, utterly motionless. In a hushed voice, she asked, “This big fellow has been holding its head up watching us for half the day now. I’ve got a bit of an immature guess—could it be that this Submerged Jiao isn’t just responsible for ferrying people over, but also for… supervising us to open the door by the rules?”

In other words, with this jug of wine sitting right here, anyone wanting to open the door had no choice but to drink it. Skip that, and who knew what mechanisms might lurk inside the door—at the very least, the one before their eyes might not give the Golden Crow any more face.

Gu Xianwang had to concede, “That’s a real possibility.”

Ye Chan carefully retrieved the ceramic cup as well and shook it toward the Submerged Jiao with an awkward grin. “This… does it have to be one cup per person?”

The Jiao head stared straight at her, its slit pupils contracting slightly. Then, it gave a nod.