109: Chapter 109 Mechanism

"It's been half a day already. Have you found the exit or not?"

Ye watched Qin Mo tapping here and there, and finally couldn't help but speak up.

Qin Mo immediately replied crossly, "If you're so capable, why don't you try?"

"I will then!"

Ye snatched the blueprint from Qin Mo's hand and began to study it.

Qin Mo, meanwhile, sat to the side with a lazy expression.

After a long while, Ye followed the sequence on the map to a certain bookshelf and began to inspect it.

Qin Mo glanced over and said indifferently, "I've already checked there. There's no exit."

Seeing this, Ye went to another bookshelf.

"Not there either. It's solid."

Qin Mo continued to speak while picking at his fingernails.

...

At those words, Ye fell silent...

"You do it, you do it!"

Ye stuffed the blueprint back into Qin Mo's hands, his face looking a bit embarrassed...

Qin Mo looked at him with an amused expression.

"I told you already. I know you're anxious, but don't be. You can't rush things; the more you rush, the easier it is to make mistakes."

With a forehead full of black lines, Ye moved away from Qin Mo, not wanting to deal with him...

"Besides... I've already found the exit, but I'm not sure if it actually is the exit."

"What did you say?"

Ye, who had just turned away, immediately whipped his head back upon hearing Qin Mo's words.

"Why didn't you say so earlier?"

"You didn't ask?"

Qin Mo spread his hands, looking completely innocent.

"You..."

Ye was so angry he was speechless.

You already found it, yet you still let me try? What was I even doing?

Qin Mo paused and said seriously, "First of all, I'm not certain if this is the exit, but as things stand, this is the only way."

"Do you think we should do it?"

Hearing this, Ye gritted his teeth. "Do it! We're trapped here anyway. Let's go for it!"

"Very well!"

Qin Mo stood up from the ground.

"Listen! The positions of the Gates of Life and Death are relative. Having both life and death constitutes the Bagua."

"It's currently November. The positions of dead qi are Chen and Xun, so the relative positions are Dui and Qian."

"Therefore, we need to find the Dui Gate and the Qian Gate, which are the Gates of Life."

Ye looked around at his surroundings.

"How do we find them? These eight bookshelves all look identical. We don't even know north, south, east, or west right now. How are we supposed to find these two gates?"

Qin Mo said indifferently, "Sense them!"

"Sense?"

"Sense what? Can the Gate of Life be sensed?"

Qin Mo suddenly covered his face.

"I'm not telling you to sense the Gate of Life; I'm telling you to sense the Gate of Death!"

"I told you before, dead qi starts in the first month of the ten-month cycle and moves clockwise from due south. But we don't have a compass, so we can't determine where the Gate of Death is."

"dead qi is also called cold qi, chilly qi, and so on. Basically, if you stay in it for too long, your body will feel uncomfortable. Life Qi, on the other hand, is as warm as the beginning; the longer you stay, the better your body will feel."

Ye suddenly realized. "So we just need to find the coldest spot, and the opposite of that will be the Gate of Life?"

"Smart!"

Qin Mo cast an appreciative glance at him.

"Let's move!"

Immediately, the two of them began to sense their surroundings in detail at different positions.

...

At this time, Li Ming had led a group of Officers to turn the entire castle upside down, but they still hadn't found any trace of Qin Mo and his companion.

Everyone was currently baffled.

The Operator holding those sensors had a face full of confusion.

"It shouldn't be? The last signal from the connector was lost right here. How can we not find them?"

Li Ming, standing nearby, said crossly, "Could it be a malfunction? What a piece of junk. We've never successfully tracked Qin Mo with this thing even once!"

"That's impossible! Captain Li, you don't understand. This sensor is waterproof and fireproof; the internals won't break. We haven't dropped it or anything, so how could it just break for no reason..."

"Then what do we do? Where do we look now?"

"Captain Li! I'm so sleepy... When can we sleep?"

One of the Officers spoke up with a face full of exhaustion.

Li Ming's face immediately darkened upon hearing this.

"Sleep, sleep, sleep! All you know is sleep. It's been this long and we still haven't caught Qin Mo, yet you have the face to ask for sleep?"

"Gentlemen, what's the reason for such a big temper?"

Aisinuo spoke up from the side with a smile.

Li Ming glanced at him and didn't say anything, instead standing to the side with his head down, deep in thought.

Seeing that they weren't paying him any attention, Aisinuo wasn't discouraged. He turned and walked toward the kitchen.

After a short while, he came back with several cups and West Lake water.

"You all must be thirsty, right? Have some water."

As he spoke, Aisinuo handed the water cups to everyone.

Li Ming and the others didn't think much of it.

"Thanks!"

With that, everyone took the water and began to drink.

Seeing this, a cold, sinister smile suddenly surfaced on Aisinuo's face.

Just after finishing the water, one Officer yawned. "Li... Captain Li... I'm so sleepy. I'm going to sleep first..."

As he spoke, the Officer lay directly on the ground, unconscious.

Before Li Ming could react, the surrounding Officers fell one by one.

At this point, Li Ming finally realized something was wrong and pointed at Aisinuo with a face full of rage.

"You... You..."

However, before he could finish a single sentence, he followed the others and collapsed.

"Hehe... Sleep! Sleep!"

Aisinuo looked at the Officers sprawled all over the ground, forcing a smile onto his expressionless face.

He then took a remote control out of his pocket and lightly pressed a button.

Boom!

A loud noise rang out as the wide stone slabs on the floor immediately moved to the sides, and a short while later, a massive hole appeared.

Aisinuo looked down, then proceeded to put the Officers down into it one by one.

He pressed the remote again, and the wide stone slabs instantly returned to their original state, as if nothing had ever happened.

He himself then reverted to a harmless expression and walked to the door.

...

"Hey? Does this method of yours actually work? I've been sensing for ages, and everything around here feels the same?"

The two had been sensing for a long time without discovering anything, and Ye finally couldn't help but speak up.

Hearing this, Qin Mo snapped angrily, "Shut up! If feng shui were that simple, it would be great."

"Sense carefully—the air, the environment, and the humidity!"

Hearing this, Ye suddenly turned back to look at a bookshelf he had just inspected.

"Huh? Now that you mention it, this bookshelf seems a bit more damp than the others."

Qin Mo was immediately overjoyed.

"Then that's it! This is the Gate of Death. The first one counter-clockwise, the one next to it, is the other Gate of Death!"

As he spoke, Qin Mo fixed his gaze on the opposite side of these two bookshelves.

"If nothing goes wrong, these two bookshelves are the Gates of Life!"

The two looked at each other and began searching around these two bookshelves separately.

"I found a Mechanism!"

Just then, Ye suddenly cried out in surprise.

Qin Mo nodded. "I found one too! Let's press them together!"

The two then exchanged a glance and pressed the Mechanisms simultaneously.

Boom!

A loud noise rang out, startling both of them.

In the next moment, a stone slab on the ground was quickly moved aside, revealing a flight of stairs. The bottom was bottomless and pitch black...