Chapter 404 - The Heist

The emerald-green flint gleamed in Xiao Chen’s grasp as he twirled it between his fingers. There was something else in his finger. A map that contained perfunctory information about the Ridge of the Fallen Drake. He had no idea how Su Lianyue managed to procure this vital piece of information. Only that she had left him this during the night they hatched the plan for this heist.

She had said little during then, but Xiao Chen knew enough to guess that there was more to this than just a simple flint for starting a fire. He studied it that night and found the map embedded inside.

But the map was hardly the only thing hidden in the flint when Xiao Chen pried it open; there was also a tiny little pill. Xiao Chen made himself a small light with the flint and studied the map, following it as he made his way to the Chamber of Teeming Woes, the abode of Elder Long, the guardian of this waycastle. On his way, he managed to slip by unnoticed by a few patrolling squads without raising any alarm.

It took hardly long for Xiao Chen to find himself facing a great cave yawning at him. Four concave vessels were blazing with fire, lighting up the entrance of the cave that led to the Chamber of Teeming Woes inside, and there were each two sentries standing just below the hanging vessels of flame. The positioning of the guards allowed for no opening that Xiao Chen could exploit and a stealthy infiltration seemed impossible.

Realizing that he has only three-quarters of an hour left, he decided that he had to act fast. With the brushes and thickets to mask his foray, he pressed on as quietly as possible until he was about several dozens of yards away from the gaping mouth of the cave and he picked up a little pebble and shot it like an arrow at a large tree standing almost a hundred yards just opposite the cave.

The pebble struck on the tree with so great a force that it shook so violently as if a storm had rattled it and that was enough to distract the eight guards at the entrance. Just as soon as their heads turned, Xiao Chen put his mastery of the Immortal-override Steps to the test and zipped like a shadow before he faded into the entrance with no one noticing.

Once inside, he found himself traveling down a winding passage that occurred to him as if he was walking inside a snake. Flaming brands lighted every twenty yards of the passage, preventing him from succumbing to the staggering presence of darkness looming all around him as he held his breath and suppressed his aura to prevent detection. He had to be extremely careful; there were not only guards in the Chamber that towered just ahead, but also a powerful foe with powers of the Nirvana Realm.

Xiao Chen was wary not to step out of the passage immediately when he realized that he was nearing its end. The stone tunnel opened up to a huge empty and barren expanse, save for a large building, a hall that stood lonesomely forlorn. Two disinterested sentries stood at the ashen stone doors, yawning and muttering to themselves. An oculus opened at the top of the hall, just under a hole at the top of the ceiling where a shaft of moonlight would pour into the hall at midnight.

It would be the time when Elder Long emerges from the inner cloisters to bath himself in the pale glow to hone his magic using the moonlight. It would be a process that would take tens of minutes.

Xiao Chen needed only a moment’s patience and Elder Long would appear. The granite doors of the hall, a portcullis slab, would be raised to open like a monster opening its mouth and the distraction would prompt the guards to divert their attention inwards to receive their superior. This would provide Xiao Chen with the diversion he needs to slip into the hall and remain hidden in the shadowed corners inside or fly to the ceiling so long as he remained unnoticed.

It was a risky plan and everything must be clockwork for this plan to succeed. He could not summon Guifeng in here and any alarm raised would rattle the entire beehive. Every enemy from top to bottom would be swarming for him, chasing after him like hounds on a scent and not even Su Lianyue who was moving towards the Rock would be spared.

She entrusted to him the task of stealing the pass to deactivate the traps of the Rock of the Fallen Drake, which, in one way or another, she was also entrusting her life to him.

Xiao Chen waited with bated breath for the stone portcullis to open. He rubbed his sleeve against his forehead now glistening with sweat. His patience bore fruit at last when he saw a ray of moonlight slanting down the hole, the oculus and on the polished floors of the hall where an old man, dressed fully in black, was sitting cross-legged.

Strands of beards and hairs of white flowed down his gnarly and wrinkled face to his shoulders. His eyes were tightly shut but the eight little balls of ghostly-green flames hovering and circling around him like bees indicated that he was neither sleeping nor resting. Suddenly, the orbs of ghost fire puffed into eight wispy fumes that intertwined together and entered his brain. The old man’s eyes blink opened at once as if he was feeling invigorated and thrilled. Slowly he got up and he began sneaking towards the doors.

A cascade of rock grounding against rock groaned as the granite hatch climbed up slowly. The two guards swiveled immediately to greet the Elder and Xiao Chen sped as quickly and covertness as he could muster into the shadows on the left side of the hall and quickly suppressed his aura.

The stone portcullis completely yawned open and Elder Long strolled out quietly, heading straight towards the passageway leading out of this expansive cavern. Xiao Chen waited until the Elder was far and his aura no longer lingered and he leaped up to the roof of the hall without hardly a squeak coming from him.

Xiao Chen crept to the top of the roof and found the oculus no more larger than a dinner plate. Xiao Chen looked down at it and then at the little green pill he found hidden in the flint. It was a pill to magically reduce his size, a concoction of the apothecaries of Fort Raksasa, no doubt and its effects would last for a quarter of an hour.

There was scarcely any need to guess why had Su Lianyue left him this pill; it was intended for him to shrink himself so that he could pass through the oculus. He peered at the little green pill rolling harmlessly in his palm, wondering with the faintest trepidation if it could be poisonous as his brows creased into a frown. Still, he swallowed it readily with a gulp.

Mages of Fort Raksasa were known to be immensely skilled in employing poison and voodoo curses which could not only be potentially destructive, but also terribly untraceable that they would escape even the notice of Xiao Chen’s Divine Sense. But Xiao Chen knew better than to doubt Su Lianyue; the latter had entrusted her life to him and there was no reason he should suspect her.

With magical bounded fields holding up the defenses of this hall, shrinking himself was the only way Xiao Chen could go in. The effect of the pill was almost instantaneous; he felt himself constricting and he allowed himself to fall through the hole. Once he felt the hard floors of the hall under his feet, he turned himself back to his original size and projected his Divine Sense to search for the pass.

Dangers abounded every inch of the floor and walls of this hall, Xiao Chen knew. Any ordinary person sneaking in could have just as easily triggered one of the hundreds of traps lurking about and die a most terrible death. But with the Divine Sense, Xiao Chen was no ordinary man.

It did not take long for Xiao Chen to find where the pass was hidden. He expertly avoided the tiles that could trigger anything untoward and slowly made his way to his quarry. He needed to be calm and precise; the loose tile that housed the hiding spot of the pass was also guarded by a flurry of trap mechanisms. One wrong move and the alarm would be raised. The entire stronghold would be completely locked down and not even a formidable mage with powers of the Nirvana Realm could extricate himself in one piece then.

He had never known anyone else other than this infernal Sect who would guard their valuables and secrets with so much jealousy and mystery. But Xiao Chen was skilled in using the Divine Sense, the one skill that all thieves and graverobbers would have died to learn. With it, Xiao Chen carefully examined every crevice, every chink, and every slit in the loose tile to make sure he was doing it right. But time was of the essence; he has less than 10 minutes left and Elder Long could be returning any moment.

But the structure and design of the devices now putting his patience and deftness to the test was beyond his expectation. Not even his Divine Sense could prevent him from breaking cold sweat. Time inched closely by, further draining his confidence and composure. Yet still, Xiao Chen remained as careful as ever, examining and removing every bit meticulously.

Just then, the patters of footfalls echoed off the stone walls of the cavern outside. Elder Long is returning, a voice screamed within him. But he was only half-way. The panic nearly robbed his breath and cold sweat began pouring down his back so profusely that his shirt was clinging to his skin.

The footsteps drew nearer and nearer before a silence came suddenly. The Elder must have reached the door, the voice in his mind warned again. As if on a cue, the portcullis slab rumbled as it was raised slowly. Xiao Chen’s consciousness was hanging on a bare thread as his fingers never stopped tinkering on the mechanisms. Finally, he managed it. The trap has been defeated!

Without so much as a look, Xiao Chen swiped at whatever it was lying inside and shut the tile. With a gentle kick with the front of his foot on the cold, solid floor of the hall, he took flight and shrink again, passing out of the oculus and made it to the roof.

But he did not dare move again. He stood at the edge of the hole, watching Elder Long drifting back to where he was sitting. Then the unexpected happened. A bead of sweat rolled off his chin and fell through the hole! And it was falling down right on the head of Elder Long below!

The staggering weight of dismay and despair made his face curdle with fear. There was only one thing to do: his telekinesis magic. With every fiber of his determination, he willed the bead of sweat to stop in mid-air. And there it hovered, just a few yards from Elder Long’s head.

“Ah?” Elder Long felt his spiritual senses tingled suddenly. He looked around and found nothing. Xiao Chen was holding his breath, desperately clinging to his magically-levitated bead of sweat now hovering in mid-air.

Elder Long turned on his heels and looked around strangely. But he quickly concluded that nothing was amiss and he walked to his place and sat down. The eight balls of green fire sprouted from him again and began floating lazily around him as soon as his eyes are shut and he resumed his meditating.

Inch by inch, the drop of sweat rose very slowly. Xiao Chen could not risk moving it too quickly lest he became discovered. Then he allowed it to drop outside before he leaped off the roof and slipped towards the passage of the cave. But he had to stop before he reached the tunnel; he had lost his chance to escape unnoticed when the guards’ attention was on the returning Elder Long. There was no way he would be able to make it out without alerting the guards now.

But he has barely a half hour’s time and he needed to rendezvous with Su Lianyue as soon as possible. He could not risk being discovered by any of the sentries lest he endangered both their lives.

With his mind set to regrouping with his companion, Xiao Chen crouched to the ground to pick up another pebble. He used it to create a diversion and he sped down the stone passage.

He repeated the same trick again on the eight guards watching the cave entrance and fled, melting into the darkness.

It was only when he reached the deep of the forest when Xiao Chen could finally breathe easy. He fished out the pass from his pocket and looked at the ebony-black medallion bedecked with engravings of dragon scale all around it. He flipped it over and saw the inscription detailing the spell used to activate the mechanisms of the Rock and its socket.

There should be no more delay, he realized and he sped past the Ridge to another area indicated on the map as the Lair of the Fallen Drake with his Immortal-override Steps.

He arrived at the mouth of the Lair before long. The Lair of the Fallen Drake was the final gauntlet leading to the upper levels of the Summit. The only way leading up, in fact, and it was guarded by a contrivance powered by both magic and mechanisms called the Rock of the Fallen Drake. No humans, not even a mage of the Apotheosis Realm, could destroy the Rock. Only the pass activates and deactivates the mechanism of the Rock that acted as a gateway. But that was also the reason that there were only a handful of guards here. Still, that did little to dissuade Xiao Chen from practicing extreme caution as he approached the Rock.

The air was cold with the night’s breeze whistling incessantly by Xiao Chen’s ears as he waited anxiously. There was no sign of Su Lianyue and he could feel nothing of her aura. They had promised to meet each other and no one was to proceed without the other. Had something gone wrong?

“My lady?” Xiao Chen waded through the thick undergrowth and squeaked softly, hoping to hear her voice but none came. He crawled through the thick jungle, looking for her but to no avail.

Trepidation and dread began churning in him. She was never known to be tardy nor reckless. And her absence now could only spell something was wrong. But why was the alarm not yet raised if something grave has happened to her?

“My lady?” Xiao Chen risked another soft cry. Even his Divine Sense could find nothing amidst the nocturnal chaos of the jungle.

Suddenly, the cool voice of a man intoned over his shoulders, “Are you looking for her?”