A Pawn's Passage

As Chen Jianchou stepped out of the tunnel, he was stunned by what lay before him.

It was a vast underground hall, carved from a natural cavern and later refined into a circular floor, with seven separate tunnels leading into it, including the one he had just exited.

Chen Jianchou’s heart pulsed in alarm.

The case file had been explicit that the seven chief eunuchs had died suddenly. Now, there were seven tunnels. Thus, he had reason to believe that the other six tunnels must each lead to the tombs of the other six eunuchs.

Unlike the Great Xuan Court, the Yu Kingdom had inherited the old Wei Dynasty system in full, retaining the complete eunuch hierarchy of the inner court. The eunuchs were divided into 24 departments. Those who held the seals of these departments were known as chief eunuchs. Subordinate to them were their deputies, scribes, and those working in the Maritime Offices and Weaving Bureaus.

Within these departments, the chief eunuch of the Ceremonial Office held supreme authority. Though it was only an upper-fourth-rank position, the chief eunuch could wield considerable power, oftentimes balancing that of the Grand Chancellor. This earned him the informal title of Inner Chancellor. This chief eunuch also commanded the Green Phoenix Guard, earning him another name so he was known colloquially as the Eunuch Lord.

The Ceremonial Office handled all imperial decrees, matching the Cabinet’s seals. Thus, it truly served as the Inner Chancellor’s office. Meanwhile, the Imperial Stables Office shared military command with the Ministry of War and the Regional Governors, commanding the palace guards. Beyond that, it also managed pastures and royal estates, operated shops owned by the royal family, and shared fiscal duties with the Ministry of Revenue.

Typically, the hierarchy was clear. The chief eunuch of the Ceremonial Office ranked first, followed by its chief scribe. The chief eunuch of the Imperial Stables Office ranked third.

The seven dead eunuchs comprised two chief eunuchs, two chief scribes, and one scribe from the Ceremonial Office, as well as two chief eunuchs from the Imperial Stables Office.

The one Chen Jianchou had investigated was Wu Fu, the scribe of the Ceremonial Office. He was the last to die and the lowest-ranking among the seven.

It felt as though, after six powerful eunuchs had perished in succession, there was no one left, so they had included a lesser scribe merely to make up the numbers.

But why seven? Did the number hold some deeper meaning?

Chen Jianchou still had no clear lead for the moment, but he was certain that the deaths of the seven eunuchs had nothing to do with the Daoist order. At the very least, the theory that the Daoists had slaughtered these eunuchs as a warning to the Yu King did not hold up. If the Daoist Order wanted to issue a warning, there would be no reason to insist on killing a specific number of people.

Moreover, judging from the corpses of the grave-robbers in the tunnel, this tomb was not newly constructed but an ancient site that had been repurposed. The tunnels without brick lining were freshly dug and were likely created after the seven eunuchs had been buried.

What truly astonished Chen Jianchou was that at the very center of the underground hall lay a lake, and at the center of this lake stood a bodhisattva statue roughly 30 meters tall.

At first glance the bodhisattva resembled Guanyin. But instead of a white robe, this bodhisattva wore blood-red robes. It was the same one the king had dreamed of.

What was the connection between the king’s nightmares and this place?

A dotted line started to form in Chen Jianchou’s mind between the king’s dreams and the sudden deaths of the eunuchs.

But two questions still nagged at him. What was the Buddha depicted in the mural on the outer wall? Was there another blood-red Buddha besides this bodhisattva?

He also remembered clearly that Chen Jianqiu had said the king always dreamed of a vast red lake, a black mountain hanging inverted from the sky, and a huge bodhisattva in blood-red robes.

Now, the red Bodhisattva existed in real life, but the lake’s water had not turned red. The inverted black mountain in the sky was also nowhere to be seen.

If this were a cult ritual, did that imply the ritual was still unfinished?

Although Chen Jianchou was not a formally ordained Daoist, thanks to Xu Jiaorong, he knew almost as much as some Daoists. He instinctively associated the scene with the descent of an Ancient Immortal.

Rituals generally served one of two ends—ascending or descending. The atmosphere here did not look like preparations for an ascension. After all, an ascension was a public, glorious event that did not warrant such secrecy.

Thus, Chen Jianchou faced a dilemma. Should he report this place to the Daoist Order and have it destroyed at once or use this as an opportunity to continue investigating?

The first choice might make the mastermind cut its losses and vanish like a lizard losing its tail, while the second meant taking far greater risks.

But he knew that he could not linger here. Before the effect of the concealment talisman completely wore off, Chen Jianchou retraced his steps and withdrew the way he had entered.

He intended to erase his traces, but the living corpse he had slain was hard to conceal, and Chen Jianchou had no better solution at hand.

When Chen Jianchou retraced his way through the tunnel back to Wu Fu’s burial chamber, he froze in disbelief. The corpse fragments and the spilled green fluid were gone, and the coffin had been restored to its original, untouched state.

Chen Jianchou’s pupils contracted sharply. Has my presence been discovered?

On reflection, it made sense. Since the deaths of the seven eunuchs hid deeper secrets, and their tombs connected directly to the underground hall, the mastermind would have posted guards around the clock to patrol the place.

He had been too careless.

At that moment, the side doors linking the main chamber to its side chambers suddenly swung open. A horde of living corpses surged out, moving with unnatural speed and sinister agility, almost humanlike. They closed in around Chen Jianchou in a tight encirclement.

Chen Jianchou drew his saber in one smooth motion. With a single swing, he beheaded the leading corpse, its skull rolling across the stone floor.

He darted forward immediately, dodging the attacks of two more corpses.

One corpse lunged forward, brushing past him. With another flash of steel, an arm flew high, severed cleanly off the shoulder.

Without breaking stride, Chen Jianchou twisted mid-motion, slipping past two clawing corpses. His blade flashed upward, severing their forearms in a single arc.

Then, with a palm strike, he knocked back a third corpse. As a fourth lunged from behind, he caught its wrist, yanked it forward, and drove his elbow brutally into its chest. The impact collapsed its ribcage, leaving the corpse lifeless and still.

He paused for only a heartbeat, gripping his saber in one hand with its edge angled downward, nearly brushing his leg. The previously repelled corpse let out a guttural howl and charged again.

Chen Jianchou remained unmoving. His blade rose swiftly, deflecting the charge before cutting downward.

Before the corpse could react, the saber sliced from right to left, splitting it clean in two.

Finally, Chen Jianchou spun around and kicked the next corpse barreling in from behind, sending it crashing into another until both tumbled across the floor like rolling gourds.

These corpses were driven only by instinct and their master’s will, so they were fearless. Though they were no match for Chen Jianchou, they still hurled themselves at him relentlessly.

Chen Jianchou moved in measured steps, his saber flashing ceaselessly. At the same time, a multi-shot gun appeared in his left hand. He fired in quick succession, each round striking the corpse’s skull and killing them instantly.

But as more and more living corpses flooded in, even he began to feel the strain.

When he ran out of bullets, Chen Jianchou swiftly holstered his gun. With a turn of his hand, he produced a dark orb. Its surface was dark, yet its center glimmered a faint ember-red hue, like an eyeball.

This was the Grade-B Series One Phoenix Eye Bomb.

Chen Jianchou hurled it forward.

A deafening boom followed as the orb burst into a rain of fire. A towering wall of flame surged several meters high, and the horde of corpses dropped like flies.

In mere moments, the blaze spread wildly, turning the chamber into a sea of flames. Firelight surged toward the sky. The pus within the corpses even fed the inferno.

One corpse ignited and collided with others, setting them all alight. Soon, the entire floor was a writhing mass of burning bodies, rolling and screaming in hoarse agony as the stench of charred flesh filled the air. The scene was horrific beyond words.

Seizing the moment, Chen Jianchou leapt upward, slipping back through the thief’s tunnel he had dug and emerging above ground.

But the instant he surfaced, a blade pressed coldly against his throat.

The blade was about a meter long with a 15-centimeter hilt. Its spine was straight, and its edge was faintly curved. It was a Phoenix Saber.

Ironically, Chen Jianchou himself carried the same blade.

His assailants were, of course, members of the Green Phoenix Guard.

These Green Phoenix Guards were the Yu Kingdom’s, not the Great Xuan Dynasty’s.

In other words, they were his colleagues.

Two elite guards seized him by the arms and escorted him toward a gravekeeper’s hut nearby.

A man in plain clothes whom Chen Jianchou recognized sat inside.

It was his direct superior, the new chief scribe of the Ceremonial Office, who had been recently promoted after the seven chief eunuchs’ mysterious deaths. He was the new Eunuch Lord named Sikong Guang.

A chill ran down Chen Jianchou’s spine as a million questions raced through his mind. What did this mean? Was Sikong Guang the mastermind or merely the mastermind’s pawn? Had the mastermind seized the Inner Court while the King lay ill? Were the seven dead eunuchs who were loyal to the King killed to cripple his influence? That way, the mastermind could replace them with their own spies in the vital offices? Who possessed such power? Could it be Deputy Chief Chen, who was also of royal blood? What about Chen Jianqiu? Was she now in danger as well?