We continued to move forward, searching for a way out in this snowy valley. Eventually, we discovered a place hidden beneath the snow that we could climb. I used my ice axe to scrape away the snow, gradually searching for footholds on the rocks, and climbed up step by step. That night, I rested against the rock face. It wasn’t until noon the next day that we finally climbed up the thirty-meter-high cliff.
We continued to struggle onward: I followed the muted oil bottle, and by dusk, the distance we had covered was probably no more than twenty kilometers. However, we discovered traces of melting snow all around us. The muted oil bottle listened carefully and felt around, finally locating a gap buried under the snow.
After dark, the temperature dropped much lower than expected. We entered the gap and arrived at the hot spring where we had rested earlier. We made a fire to warm ourselves and cooked some soup.
I had no appetite and didn’t eat much, but the muted oil bottle seemed to have no desire to eat at all. After resting for a while at the gap, we continued deeper inside. At this point, I had a clear understanding of where the muted oil bottle wanted to go. He wanted to go to the Bronze Gate. That place completely overturned my worldview; I truly did not want to see it again.
However, it was clear that the muted oil bottle’s destination was there. From this gap, we would reach that place quickly without needing to go around the entire Cloud Top Heavenly Palace.
I thought about those bird-faced humans and wondered what the situation was like now. That night, I had a dream in which the muted oil bottle and I arrived in front of the Bronze Gate. The muted oil bottle said goodbye to me and then entered, leaving me alone at the entrance. When I turned around, countless bird-faced humans were looking at me, which startled me awake. Upon waking up, I saw that the muted oil bottle was not sleeping but was sorting through all his belongings.
I asked him what he was doing, and he replied, “I’m checking which items you can use. I’ll leave them for you. You might need them on your way back.”
“What about you?” I asked in surprise.
“I’ll stay here. Even if I were a newborn baby, it wouldn’t matter; I’m already very close to my destination,” he said. “You don’t need to go in; it’s too dangerous inside.”
I was astonished to see that the muted oil bottle actually took out two ghost jade seals from his pack. He adjusted them a bit and handed one to me.
“Since you’ve made it this far, I think you should know some things,” he said. “Take this ghost jade seal back with you. I only need one.”
“Where did you get the other one?”
“Old Lady Huo gave it to me,” the muted oil bottle replied. “When you weren’t aware:”
“What is this thing used for?” I asked directly, no longer interested in the backstory.
The muted oil bottle said, “To open doors.”
I took the ghost jade seal, and he added, “If you bring this thing to the Bronze Gate, the door will open. Ten years from now, if you still remember me, you can use this thing to open that Bronze Gate. You might even see me inside.”
“What exactly is behind that door?” I asked the muted oil bottle. “Why do you want to go in?”
“I can’t tell you what kind of place that is,” said the man in the oil bottle. “I can only tell you one agreement. Many years ago, I found what you referred to as the Old Nine Gates with a secret. In the Zhang family’s ancestral teachings, preservation has always been the greatest goal. The entire development process of the Zhang family has been aimed at ensuring that the Zhang family can survive in any chaotic era, thereby preserving the collective burial of the ancient Zhang family buildings. From the information I have, only the clan leader can know a huge secret. The Zhang family acquired this immense secret from the very beginning, and this secret has been running through the long history of China; no one knows what it is. We only know of the existence of this secret itself, which has a critical time node. That node has now arrived. After the last hope of the Zhang family was extinguished, I found the Old Nine Gates at that time. I hoped to use the power of the Old Nine Gates to help the Zhang family and jointly bear this obligation, to ensure that this secret would not be discovered. However, among the Old Nine Gates, no one kept their promise.
“The core of the secret I must protect is behind this bronze door. Protecting this secret requires time; I will enter the bronze door and wait for the next successor for ten years.”
“Why do you say they didn’t keep their promises?”
“Because for nearly a hundred years prior, all the guardians of this secret were from the Zhang family, which weakened the power of the Zhang family. In our previous agreement, people from the Old Nine Gates must take turns guarding this secret.”
“Did none of them go?”
The man in the oil bottle nodded. “I am the last Zhang Qiling of the Zhang family. From now on, all the days must be guarded by me. However, since you have come here, I will still tell you that ten years later, if you still remember me, you can open this giant bronze door to take my place.”
“Wait.” I paused to digest this information and then asked, “Are you saying that the Old Nine Gates are supposed to take turns? The Zhang family has already taken turns for several generations?”
The man in the oil bottle nodded, and I asked him, “Then if that’s not the case, according to the promise, who should it be now?”
“You,” the man in the oil bottle said.
Me? I was taken aback. “Are you saying that it was originally supposed to be me who would go behind this bronze door and stay there for ten years?”
The man in the oil bottle nodded. Just as I was about to ask him to clarify, he suddenly reached out and pressed something against the back of my neck, and I lost consciousness immediately.
That was the last time I saw the man in the oil bottle. When I woke up, everything he had left for me, except for the ghostly jade seal, had disappeared.
I frantically searched for him, squeezing into the depths of the crevice, only to find that there was no way out. The path we had previously taken was inexplicably sealed.
I remembered how the man in the oil bottle had crawled inside and briefly disappeared before me. Did he activate something at that time that led to the path we later took?
I stayed in that place for three days. It wasn’t until the blizzard gradually subsided that I finally felt completely hopeless.
There was silence all the way.
In the end, I returned to Hangzhou. As I walked by the West Lake, a light drizzle began to fall. I recalled everything I had experienced, thought of everyone’s endings, and suddenly felt so tired, so very tired.
I don’t know why, but tears started to flow down my face. I returned to my shop, as if I had gone back to the years when nothing had happened yet. I used to think that after completing all of this, I would still have something left, but unexpectedly, there was nothing left at all. However, I realized that I couldn’t stop; I had to keep moving forward because there was still another decade ahead.
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