Chapter 267: You Also Have a Name |
Lu Yuan did not answer. He drove the copper needle down hard.
The instant the needle tip sank into the crack between the bricks, a muffled thud came from beneath the ground, as if something had been impaled and its ley lines pierced by the needle.
"I see now."
Cold intent deepened in Lu Yuan’s eyes.
"The altar doesn't stand alone. It's feeding off the Earth Veins' eye."
"You've placed its offering here, using the whole cellar as an eyeball."
Iron Abacus's lips went pale. After a long moment he squeezed out, "I didn't set this up."
"I only guarded the altar."
Lu Yuan raised his eyes to him. "A guardian?"
Iron Abacus was momentarily struck speechless by the question.
At that moment, laughter from inside the black altar rose again, this time nearer than before, as if it were coming out from between the folds of the yellow cloth and pressing up against a human ear.
The laugh rolled softly, and the round mirrors in the four corners of the empty room simultaneously reflected the same image.
Not a person.
A huge eye.
The sclera was a grayish yellow, the iris black, and within the pupil layered after layer of countless tiny human silhouettes pressed together as if looking down into a deep pit where someone stood at the edge peering down—and the bottom of the well was looking back at him.
Zhou Heng, who was the closest, sucked in a cold breath and nearly lost his footing.
"Don't look at the mirror!" Lu Yuan barked, cutting him off.
But it was already half too late.
Zhou Heng had still managed a glance in that instant. His whole body froze, his gaze went blank, as if his soul had been lightly hooked by something.
Song Qinghe, seeing this, panicked and reached out to steady him.
Lu Yuan immediately shouted, "Don't touch him!"
"He's being borrowed by the mirror's eye. Whoever touches him gets taken!"
Wang Cheng'an reacted fastest. He fished a sheet of red paper from his chest, crumpled it into a ball, stuffed it into Zhou Heng's mouth, and whispered urgently, "Bite down, don't let out a sound!"
Xu Erxiao also moved, drawing a length of thin hemp rope from his waist and quickly looping it around Zhou Heng's wrist, tying a sliding knot.
"Brother Lu, will this work?" Xu Erxiao asked.
Lu Yuan glanced and replied at once, "It will buy a breath."
"Don't let him look back for now."
Wang Cheng'an and Xu Erxiao's actions were swift and steady.
Lu Yuan no longer allowed himself to be distracted. He tugged the tail of the copper needle's cord, driving the needle another half inch downward.
At that plunge, the commotion inside the black altar increased suddenly.
The yellow cloth covering the altar mouth bulged sharply, then slowly caved inward, as if something inside were pushing its face against the cloth from the inside.
Lu Yuan grit his teeth and looked up at Iron Abacus. "Speak clearly. If you don't, the first thing to come out of this altar won't be a deity—it will be the thing you raised yourselves."
Iron Abacus went white. Forced to a corner, his throat bobbed and his voice came out dry as sandpaper. "We didn't raise it."
"It chose this place."
"There was an eye first, then the offerings."
"At first it just watched the mountain, watched the road, watched whether people walked the proper path."
"Later it wanted to eat eyes."
"Later still, it wanted to borrow people's eyes to see farther roads."
Lu Yuan's brow tightened. "Borrow eyes to watch roads?"
Iron Abacus nodded with difficulty. "Yes."
"The more it sees, the faster the thing below wakes."
"When it finally opens its door, anyone in the mountain whose name it marked will have to guide its road for it."
Lu Yuan's gaze hardened. "Marked names?"
"Who marked the names?"
Iron Abacus was about to answer when the thin face within the altar bulged again, and then a hand suddenly shoved out from under the yellow cloth at the altar mouth.
This time it was not pale, fingerlike tips, but a full palm.
The hand was long and narrow, its knuckles slightly bent. The palm was split down the center as if a half-open mouth had been carved there.
It seized the rim of the altar.
Then the "eye seeds" within the altar fully lit up.
When those eye seeds brightened, Lu Yuan felt as if some invisible thing had suddenly lifted the edge of everything around him.
Not wind, not qi—something that looked.
It was looking at people.
And not from the altar itself, but from a layer deeper, emptier, and colder.
It swept over the room like a living thing, treating everyone there as living specimens arranged on a table, scanning inch by inch.
Wang Cheng'an felt it first. His body jolted as if someone had pricked him at the back of the neck with a fine needle, his spine instantly taut.
He clenched and refrained from turning, grumbling low, "This eye is truly malevolent."
Xu Erxiao's scalp tingled under that gaze; his right hand could hardly keep the ceramic basin pressed down.
Thankfully, Lu Yuan had ordered strict caution earlier. He gritted his teeth and held the basin's rim down so the volatile qi within didn't surge out.
Song Qinghe's face was the palest, but she did not falter.
She understood that if she panicked now and the lamp shifted, the whole formation could be probed by that eye along the flickering flame.
She resolutely nudged the oil lamp forward half a finger more; the flame trembled violently but did not go out.
Lin Zhaoxuan stared coldly at the hand at the altar side. "It wants to come out of the altar."
Lu Yuan said, "Half a step short."
As he spoke, the black cord tied to the copper coin in his hand had already gone taut. The other end of the black cord was pinned into the ground crevice, pressing down on the Earth Veins' eye.
As long as that breath wasn't broken, even if the thing in the altar stretched a hand out, it had not truly stepped over the threshold.
But Lu Yuan knew that these wicked things excelled at forcing people into mistakes when they were "half a step" away.
So he decided to strike first.
"Cheng'an, pinch the left red cord's tail."
"Erxiao, cast salt—trace a circle along the altar's base."
"Zhou Heng, wake up. Lower your head for me and bite your tongue—don't make a sound!"
Zhou Heng, still dizzy from the red paper in his mouth, heard Lu Yuan's shout and bit his tongue hard. The metallic taste of blood hit him and his gaze finally came back a bit.
Wang Cheng'an moved lightning-fast. He rose and tore at the remaining red cord on the left, twisting his wrist until he snapped the tail clean.
Xu Erxiao took advantage of the gap and poured handfuls of coarse salt from his bosom, tracing a ring along the altar's base.
Once the salt touched the ground, fine white smoke immediately rose from beneath the black altar as if something had been scalded.
The hand within recoiled sharply, and a dark-red, almost black fluid seeped from the split in its palm.
Iron Abacus's face changed drastically. He cried out, "Bad—if the eye seed sees blood, it will claim a living person!"
Lu Yuan's eyes chilled. "Claim who?"
Iron Abacus spat the words through clenched teeth. "Whoever is nearest the eye."
Lu Yuan instantly understood. If the black altar’s eye seed saw blood, it would pick the first living person who made eye contact in the field and use that person's eyes to complete its final opening.
And the one closest now was Iron Abacus himself.
Iron Abacus realized it too. He staggered back as if doused in ice water.
But no matter how fast he retreated, the eye that had grown from the altar slowly turned toward him.
His voice changed pitch. "Don't look at me!"
"Don't look at me!"
"I'm not a donor of eyes!"
"I'm not!"
But the black pinprick of an eye was fixed.
Lu Yuan immediately perceived the danger and roared, "Lin Zhaoxuan, pin his shoulders!"
Without hesitation Lin Zhaoxuan stepped forward, seized Iron Abacus's shoulders, and forced him down, breaking that thin line of eye contact.
Almost at that same moment, the altar emitted an extremely high, shrill screech.
It was no longer human—more like the tearing shriek of a membrane being ripped.
The yellow cloth on the altar's surface snapped into a curved bulge, and then an entire gray-white human face slowly pushed its way out from under the cloth.
Its features were blurred but emaciated; where its eyes should have been were two deep hollows.
Within those hollows light rolled, as if any moment a living thing might flip itself out.
"Press down the lamp!" Lu Yuan shouted.
Song Qinghe bit down and shoved the oil lamp down half a finger; the flame tilted and shone directly on that face.
Under the light, the face seemed to come alive—the corners of the mouth twitched upward into a grin.
Then the altar's mouth-hand, whose palm was slit like a torn mouth, seized fiercely and ripped the yellow cloth open.
A wave of foul, almost black qi burst out of the altar.
As the qi rushed out, all the round mirrors in the empty room gave a metallic chime and their thin glass panes cracked on the spot.
Zhou Heng shuddered at the sound and finally regained much more of his wits.
He saw the altar mouth gape and blurted, "It's come out!"
No sooner had he said that than the thin face within the altar slowly turned its direction.
Not toward Iron Abacus—
But toward Lu Yuan.
In that instant, Lu Yuan felt as if a thin layer of paper in front of his eyes had been gently lifted. Behind it was neither dark nor light.
It was a maze of fine lines crossing horizontally and vertically, stretching into the far distance.
They were roads.
Offering roads, borrowed roads, return roads, roads of the dead, roads of the living—all tangled together in a dense web that led deep into the mountain’s belly.
And at the end of those countless fine lines, an even larger eye was slowly opening.
Lu Yuan's heart skipped. He knew he had been singled out by it.
But he did not step back.
He lifted his gaze coldly to meet it and spoke, his voice low and ground as if coming through clenched teeth, "You see me?"
"Then stop pretending and come out."
The thin face moved, and Lu Yuan understood that the true opponent was no longer Iron Abacus, nor merely this black altar.
The thing in the altar had begun to pick people.
The tinkling of shattered mirror glass around them had not yet ceased, but Lu Yuan steadied.
He was not afraid of being seen. He feared it would not see him.
If the wicked thing truly fulfilled its sight and made its move to borrow a body, it would be one step away from possession. That was the moment one must never act rashly.
His left hand kept pressure on the copper needle lodged in the ground crevice. His right hand rose slowly, fingertips tracing two invisible lines in the air as he murmured, "If you've chosen eyes, don't hide inside the altar playing dead."
"If you want to look at me, I'll let you see clearly."
As he finished speaking, he suddenly stepped forward half a pace.
Iron Abacus's face changed dramatically. "Are you insane?!"
Lu Yuan did not look back. He said in a low voice, "It dares not truly come out because the altar hasn't been fully broken."
"If I retreat, it will take the chance to borrow your eyes and move in."
"If I press it, it can only show its true form inside the altar first."
He said it and flicked his fingers. From his sleeve a yellow talisman folded into the size of a coin fluttered out. With the back of his hand he pressed it to his own brow.
The talisman touching his forehead made his aura suddenly condense and drop. His eyes, however, grew brighter—like his spirit was being temporarily bound into a single line, preventing the altar's eye from finding a gap.
"Cheng'an!" Lu Yuan shouted.
Wang Cheng'an answered tautly, "Here, Brother Lu!"
Lu Yuan barked orders again. "Dump all the rice left in that basin in front of the altar!"
"Erxiao, get the salt bowl and lay a line by my foot—don't let it break!"
"Zhou Heng, kick every shard of mirror to the east wall. Don't leave a single piece in the center!"
"Song Qinghe, keep the lamp lit. Shine it onto that face!"
Their responses were immediate.
Wang Cheng'an, not caring for his hands getting dirty, grabbed the remaining rice and flung it forward with a rustling scatter into the altar's front.
The rice grains hitting the floor made a tight, continuous patter, as if landing on an invisible living shell.
Xu Erxiao, holding the basin down, poured salt at Lu Yuan's feet. This time he moved without hesitation, steady and quiet, murmuring, "Brother Lu, the line's all laid for you."
Lu Yuan acknowledged tersely and shifted his stance—they were inside the salt line, his weight squarely on the inner side.
Zhou Heng had recovered further. Hearing Lu Yuan's command, he bent and kicked the scattered mirror shards aside.
The motion disrupted the lingering mist inside them; the leftover eye-lines were torn apart as if by someone snapping threads.
Song Qinghe gripped the oil lamp with both hands; though her wrist shook, the flame remained trained on the altar mouth.
Under the flame the face that had pushed out from the yellow cloth was now clearer, no longer an indistinct human shape but a more defined outline.
The browbone was exaggerated, the cheekbones sunken, and the mouth slit as if pulled open by thread.
Yet both eye sockets still flickered with black light, one brighter than the other—like two unformed eyeballs frantic to pry themselves out.
Iron Abacus stared at that face, almost unable to stand, and choked out, "It's half-awake..."
Lu Yuan stared at the altar mouth, his gaze like steel. "It finally decided to peel off a borrowed skin."
The face within seemed to understand; its mouth's corner slowly lifted.
Then a very thin voice rose from the altar's base, as if someone were breathing under thick earth: "Road..."
Just that one word, and Lu Yuan felt his chest fall cold.
It wasn't the sound that frightened him, but the strange, uncanny familiarity contained in that single syllable.
As if every road in the mountain that had been suppressed, borrowed, or offered suddenly turned their heads and aimed themselves at him.
Wang Cheng'an's face drained of color. He almost blurted, "Brother Lu, it's calling you?"
Lu Yuan replied slowly, "It's testing whether I'll acknowledge the road."
Xu Erxiao felt a chill run down his spine and ground his teeth. "What if you acknowledge it?"
Lu Yuan did not answer immediately. Instead he fixed his gaze on Iron Abacus.
Under Lu Yuan's scrutiny Iron Abacus stiffened all over. The earlier brittle composure had almost vanished. His lips quivered as he stammered, "Don't look at me, I really am not an eye-donor."
"I'm only guarding... guarding it for someone."
Lu Yuan asked, "For whom?"
Iron Abacus's expression flickered. He involuntarily looked to the shadow behind the altar.
Lu Yuan followed his gaze and immediately saw that the shadow was not empty.
There, half a human height tall, stood a black wooden tablet.
The tablet's surface had been pressed under yellow cloth and shadow so its inscriptions were not clear. Now, under the lamplight its edges revealed dense carvings—not scriptures, but names.
Row after row, like an offering list, carved full of human names.
Lu Yuan's eyes went ice-cold. "I see."
"So it's not feeding a god. It's feeding roads with human names."
Iron Abacus truly panicked this time. His voice went hoarse. "Don't touch that tablet!"
"That's the Borrowed-Name Tablet. Move it and the whole path beneath will flip!"
Lu Yuan pretended not to hear. "If I don't touch it, it won't spare us."
He reached slowly for the short blade at his waist.
Just then the thin face in the altar moved again—not laughing, not staring, but lifting a hand with extreme slowness.
It was that split-palmed hand.
It stretched beyond the yellow cloth, fingers slightly open, as if feeling for an invisible threshold.
Then the hand's finger very, very slowly turned in the direction of the black wooden tablet.
Zhou Heng sucked in a breath. "It's naming people!"
No sooner had he spoken than the topmost column of characters on the wooden tablet clicked—lighted—like something gently tapped it.
The first name lit up.
When that name flared, Lu Yuan's chest tightened as if a thin thread had been pulled across the air toward him.
He realized then this tablet was not a ledger of the dead nor a mere offering list. It was the register that marked borrowed roads.
Whoever's name it highlighted would be the first to be "seen" by it.
And after being "seen" came borrowing a body, borrowing eyes, borrowing life.
Wang Cheng'an had clearly realized this as well. He went pale and hurried to gauge Lu Yuan's reaction. "Brother Lu, what do we do?"
Lu Yuan did not back away. He ordered in a deep voice, "Erxiao, reinforce the salt line."
"Cheng'an, take out the cinnabar from your pouch."
"Zhou Heng, stop staring at the names. Dig up the earth in front of that black tablet and see what is buried beneath it."
Zhou Heng hesitated. "Me?"
Lu Yuan's tone was calm but decisive. "If it's naming, there's a root beneath. Dig it out and it won't be so easy for it to find people by the names."
Zhou Heng clenched his teeth and immediately knelt, using a length of broken wood at hand to dig in the soil before the black tablet.
Under the soil, they unearthed a length of blackened hemp rope.
The rope was extremely thin, tightly wound, coiling down from the tablet's root like a buried vein.
"This is... a binding-name rope?" Zhou Heng exclaimed.
Iron Abacus's face turned completely gray as if exposed. "Don't cut it!"
"That's the root that locks the altar. If it's severed, the Eye Bed underneath will truly open!"
Lu Yuan shot him a look, his eyes sharp as knives. "You say that now? Too late."
With that he flicked out his short blade. The blade sliced down onto the exposed hemp.
There was a twang—yet the rope did not immediately snap. Instead, it quivered under the blade as if pressed.
At the same time, the face inside the altar flinched. A low, mournful murmur issued from under the yellow cloth, like some colossal thing turning over beneath the earth.
The whole underground chamber trembled slightly.
Song Qinghe nearly lost grip of her lamp; she steadied it, her voice tight, "It's moving!"
Lu Yuan kept his eyes on the hemp rope. Even colder now, "It's panicking."
He increased the pressure in his hand. The short blade spun and the rope finally went "snap."
The moment it broke, every name carved on the black tablet dimmed almost simultaneously.
At once the split-palm at the altar mouth pushed outward as if trying to use that shock to climb out.
The black light in the thin face erupted to full brightness.
And at that instant, Lu Yuan heard an extremely soft, extremely near voice, dropping right by his ear: