100: Chapter 101 Half Anchor

When the ancient gate closed to just a person's width, the grey wind behind the gate suddenly burst outward.

There was no heat.

The cold ash struck Qiao Ye's shield, and a layer of white frost instantly formed over the old crack.

Qiao Ye looked down and his face turned green.

"Does this gate... know how to breathe?"

Wen Zhao gripped the Line-Marking Nail he had just switched to his left hand; the end of the spike was scalding hot.

Blown by the cold wind, the heat didn't dissipate; instead, it felt as if it were wrapped in a layer of grey skin, drilling straight into the crevices of his bones.

"It doesn't look like breathing." Wen Zhao stared at the grey-red wide steps inside the gate, his voice extremely low. "It's more like the wind from the Fire Well is looking for an opening."

Instructor Han Tiecheng's projection stood on one side of the fire platform, the iron fire order suspended in mid-air, the gate authority record on its surface not yet dimmed.

"All teams, retreat behind the fire line in front of the gate."

His voice rolled across the western front field of the Main Stele, carrying an unquestionable sense of oppression.

"Lu Jin's vanguard group, conduct the initial survey behind the gate."

"Only survey from one inch to thirty paces behind the gate. Do not seize materials, do not dismantle steles, and do not cross the outer ring of the Fire Well."

Instructor Han Tiecheng paused, and the fire patterns on the iron fire order suddenly sharpened. "Whoever reaches out to grab things, I will chop off their vanguard qualifications."

As the words fell, the few teams that had been peeking and poking around outside the gate all stepped back in unison.

No one dared to gamble.

The inner ring gate of the No. 7 Rift Zone had just opened, and everyone wanted to go in and make a profit.

But if they were kicked out of the vanguard sequence, they wouldn't even have the status to queue up later.

The Temple Inspector stood at the verification position, the platinum booklet opened, their tone stiff. "The temple requires the sample-sealing grey box to accompany the survey."

Instructor Han Tiecheng turned his head. "The grey box does not enter the gate."

"The Outer God's fine bone reacts to the residual fire behind the gate; it must be recorded during the survey."

"That's exactly why it can't enter." Instructor Han Tiecheng said coldly. "That thing just tried to pass the gate sequence. You take it through the gate—are you afraid the Outer God won't see clearly enough?"

The Inspector's face tightened, unable to speak.

Lu Jin glanced at the sample-sealing grey box on the outer layer of the fire platform.

The black gold fine bone inside the box was quiet, but Lu Jin could feel that the quietness was like a worm lurking in a shell—just waiting for the next scent of fire to drift by.

Grey Pupil stood at the Priest Layer, his staff pressing against the bottom of the Frontline Fire Hall, and he suddenly spoke. "Leave the grey box on the outer layer."

The Sacrificial Fire at the head of the staff pressed out a thin circle of grey-red lines.

"I will seal the box's scent. If it responds to the gate again, I will cut off the scent first."

The Inspector looked at him. "Can you guarantee that?"

Grey Pupil raised his eyes, his grey-white pupils devoid of emotion. "I don't guarantee whether the Outer God understands the rules. I only guarantee that the first scent it sends out will be burned clean by the Sacrificial Fire first."

Wu Fu hugged the Night Wing rack and squeezed out from the crowd of Work Rats; the three Night Wings were not in good condition.

The first one's wingtip was wrapped in a grey shell, the second one's dorsal bone was covered with cleaning ash, and the third one was the quietest, the half-piece of fire-stealing flake on its wingtip already burned black.

Wu Fu stared at the gate crack, gritting her teeth. "I'm only letting two in to check the wind."

"None of the three," Lu Jin said.

Wu Fu's eyes widened instantly. "If you don't release the Night Wings, are you going to crawl on the ground with your own eyes?!"

"Old wounds haven't healed."

"That's what they are for!"

Lu Jin looked at her. "That's why we can't lose them all in there right now."

Wu Fu's mouth twitched, clearly unhappy.

But when she looked down and saw the third Night Wing's wing bone still trembling slightly, she swallowed her words and held out a claw finger. "One. Only release this short-winged one; it can't fly high, it will hug the ground to probe the wind."

"It won't go in thirty paces."

"Twenty paces!"

Wu Fu gritted her teeth. "You are even better at saving than Grey Pupil."

Grey Pupil said indifferently. "Saving lives is nothing to be ashamed of."

Wu Fu snorted and didn't argue further.

Lu Jin withdrew his gaze.

The grey wind behind the gate kept puffing outward. Every time it puffed, the newly formed gate tendon at the bottom of the Frontline Fire Hall tightened once.

When the gate was opened just now, the Multi-Nest Layer Divine Domain only extended the fire line to one inch outside the edge of the Grey Fire Well. That inch was now like a thin needle, stuck in the grey-red fire mist behind the gate—he could feel the inside, but he couldn't stand in there.

Lu Jin raised his hand and pressed the gate seal beneath his feet.

The black-red gate seal sank in front of the fire platform, and the three old lock marks on the edge shone very faintly. The fire lock, mirror lock, and bone lock all looked as if they had just been opened and hadn't cooled down yet.

Instructor Han Tiecheng looked at him. "How do you want to survey?"

"Drop the anchor first."

Qiao Ye was stunned. "Not check the path first?"

Wen Zhao stared inside the gate. "Without an anchor, seeing the path is useless. Once the gate breathes, the line will break."

Lu Jin nodded. "The gate authority is currently only in front of the gate. I want to nail an anchor of the Multi-Nest Layer Divine Domain to the outer edge behind the gate."

"If we can't nail it in, everyone can only stand outside the gate and watch the show."

Wu Fu immediately asked. "How much fire to use?"

"One percent of the Outer Fire Well."

"One percent?" She first breathed a sigh of relief, then immediately became vigilant. "One percent is just the opening offer, right?"

"At most one and a half percent."

Wu Fu nodded then. "We can survive that."

Grey Pupil said. "The Priest Layer will provide half a strand to press the anchor, without entering the well."

Wen Zhao picked out three darker old spikes from the very bottom of his pouch. The spike bodies were short, the tails thin, as if they had been ground down many times.

Qiao Ye's eyes widened. "You still have hidden stock?"

"Old spikes, one less for every one that breaks."

"Then why didn't you use them before?"

Wen Zhao didn't even raise his head. "Before, you didn't take me behind the Wangting gate."

Qiao Ye was choked up. "You can blame me for this too?"

Ning Yanqiu stood on Lu Jin's left, the Cold Mirror Auxiliary Seal on her cuff glowing faintly. As soon as the grey wind behind the gate emerged, that auxiliary seal seemed to hear something, and fine, workshop-made gear marks emerged on the edge.

Master Crow crouched behind her shoulder, not spreading its wings, just looking up at the extremely low-hanging grey-red mist above inside the gate.

"It's not clean up there," Ning Yanqiu suddenly said.

Qiao Ye looked up immediately; the top could not be seen inside the gate, only the grey-red fire mist flowing downward along the wide steps.

"Where is it not clean?"

"There are broken gears in the wind."

Ning Yanqiu raised her hand, and the Cold Mirror Auxiliary Seal emitted a wisp of cold light, shining only above the threshold without crossing the gate.

The grey-red fire mist was illuminated to reveal a row of extremely faint gear shadows, like workshop gears burned and broken by fire, slowly rotating while suspended in the wind. If anyone rashly passed under the gate, their divine fire would be scraped off a layer first.

Qiao Ye watched, his teeth aching. "Does this place have knives even in the wind?"

"It looks like the fire-splitting gears of the old workshop." Lu Jin also saw it. At the first glance behind the gate just now, there were collapsed Wangting workshop steles on both sides of the wide steps, and these gear shadows were seeping out from behind the steles.

Instructor Han Tiecheng said in a deep voice. "Record it."

The Black-Armored Recorder immediately began to write.

Ning Yanqiu suddenly added. "There are also Cold Mirror gear marks."

She pressed the cold light of the auxiliary seal even thinner, shining it along the edge of the collapsed stele on the right side inside the gate. The grey-red fire mist dispersed by an inch, revealing several gear marks on the surface of the collapsed stele that had been burned white—they were very small, not as regular as the mirror patterns currently used by the Ning Family, but the angle of arrangement was exactly the same as the workshop-made gear marks on the edge of the Cold Mirror Auxiliary Seal on Ning Yanqiu's cuff.

Master Crow let out a low cry.

The frosty light in Ning Yanqiu's eyes was suppressed, but her voice was steady. "Only saw the gear marks. No attribution determined."

Wen Zhao recorded this sentence on the side. "Good, this sentence can prevent people from making a fuss."

Qiao Ye glanced at him. "You sound like a filing cabinet now too."

"Having just burned three spikes, one learns to leave half a step in every sentence."

Lu Jin did not interject.

His black fire had already descended along the gate seal. The seven layers of fire patterns of the Multi-Nest Layer Divine Domain lit up in sequence behind him—the Main Nest layer stabilized the central axis, the Priest Layer pressed half a strand of fire sequence, the Work Nest layer sent three fine work threads, the Sky-Sweep layer opened a low-wind perception point, the Grey Stele Post war map layer adhered to Wen Zhao's old spikes, the Outer Fire Well layer pressed into a beam of fine supply fire, and the Frontline Sub-Nest layer pushed the gate tendon one inch into the gate.

After one inch, the gate tendon immediately made a harsh tightening sound, like a wet bone being twisted by someone.

Wu Fu's expression changed. "The Fire Well wind is biting the nest tendon!"

Grey Pupil's staff immediately pressed down. "Sacrificial Fire as a base."

The grey-red Sacrificial Fire spread a thin layer of fire ash along the bottom of the gate tendon; the Fire Well wind hit the fire ash, and its speed slowed by half a beat.

Lu Jin seized this half-beat. "Wen Zhao!"

Wen Zhao's first old spike was launched.

The spike didn't fly too fast, sliding inside along the ground of the threshold, scraping out tiny sparks all the way. At the first step past the gate, the spike tail dimmed; at the second step, a circle of grey-white wind marks emerged on the spike body; at the third step, the entire spike sank downward, as if the ground inside the gate did not want it to remain.

Wen Zhao's face turned pale, and he slammed his left hand downward. "Qiao Ye, press the threshold!"

Qiao Ye didn't ask, shouldering his shield and stepping right to the front of the gate. He didn't cross the line, but the shield crossed by half an inch.

The grey wind immediately pounced on the shield surface, and the outer edge of the cracked shield clicked. Qiao Ye's shoulder sank, and he suppressed it by force. "Heavy!"

"Only press for three breaths."

"Then hurry up!"

Wen Zhao's second old spike followed, avoiding the ground, and nailed it next to the shadow of the first spike. The two spikes, one real and one shadow, finally pressed down on the position of the third step inside the gate.

The gate tendon probed forward along the spike shadow, and the three fine work threads of the Work Nest layer immediately wrapped around it—one connected to the ground, one to the fire, and one to the war map account of the Grey Stele Post.

The gate seal beneath Lu Jin's feet vibrated slightly.

At the bottom of the Frontline Fire Hall, a tiny inner ring echo appeared.

It couldn't be traversed yet, it could only count as a landing point.

Wu Fu's eyes lit up. "Is it nailed?"

"Not yet," Grey Pupil looked inside the gate. "It just hasn't been spat out."

The third breath arrived.

Qiao Ye's shield was suddenly pushed back half a step by the grey wind, and two cracks appeared in the stone surface under his feet. He cursed, tilted the shield corner by half an inch, and the grey wind scraped past the side of the shield, sweeping exactly over the first old spike.

Wen Zhao's third old spike landed.

The spike tip took advantage of the gap left by the sweeping wind and pierced into that little grey crack behind the third step inside the gate.

Thud.

The sound was very light.

But the Frontline Fire Hall, the Grey Stele Post, and the Outer Fire Well all responded at the same time.

Lu Jin pressed his black-fire-covered palm downward. "Half-Door Anchor, set!"

The gate tendon no longer sprang outward; like a fine bone that had been nailed down, it finally lay flat on the ground behind the gate.

The war map layer of the Grey Stele Post of the Multi-Nest Layer Divine Domain lit up with a black-red dot so small it was almost invisible—the dot was behind the Wangting Ancient Gate, three steps away from the threshold.

Three steps.

Very short.

But these three steps were the first segment from the main control in front of the gate to the landing point behind the gate.

The Black-Armored Recorder's pen sound stopped for a moment.

Instructor Han Tiecheng looked at the small dot, his eyes darkening. "Write."

The Recorder immediately lowered his head. "Lu Jin's vanguard line used the Multi-Nest Layer Divine Domain to nail down the first inner ring outer-edge anchor under the half-door state of the Wangting Ancient Gate. Anchor position, three steps behind the gate. Nature, temporary. Passage, insufficient. Can be used as a return line for subsequent initial surveys."

Qiao Ye heard "three steps behind the gate" and was a bit unconvinced. "Went through all that trouble for just three steps?"

Wu Fu immediately glared at him. "What's wrong with three steps? Do you know how much material three steps require?"

Qiao Ye felt inexplicably guilty under her glare and muttered. "I was just asking..."

Grey Pupil said. "Three steps are enough to pull a life back."

Lu Jin nodded. "When we enter later, we will start from these three steps."

Instructor Han Tiecheng looked inside the gate. "Continue the initial survey."

Lu Jin did not let anyone enter immediately.

He first stabilized the newly set Half-Door Anchor for three breaths, confirming that the gate tendon had not been gouged out by the grey wind, and then raised his hand—

"Night Wing, hug the ground."