“Is that really necessary?” Tian Zhi said. “He can technically request unlimited amounts for his experiments already.”
“Which you are responsible for controlling and requisitioning,” Wang Bo said coolly. “In this case, if he makes off with our family fortune, it will be your head on the line.”
“I thought you only cared about the vault’s safety,” Tian Zhi jibed.
“If you thought that also meant I wasn’t attached to my own life, you were mistaken,” Wang Bo said. “Well? Would you like to stay for tea and snacks? Or would you perhaps like a guided tour of this complex you’ve frequented so often?”
“We’ll pass,” Tian Zhi said. He looked at Cha Ming. “Follow me.”
They walked further down the hallway they’d come from, with Tian Zhi leading the way. His heavy footsteps echoed against the stone walls and only stopped once they reached a dull gray metal door. There was a hole in the center, barely wider than a fist.
“You’ll have to stick your arm in here,” Tian Zhi said, demonstrating for Cha Ming. He made a fist and inserted his left arm into the hole. The hole closed lightly around his arm, as though looking for something, then relaxed. Then the door opened. Cha Ming moved to walk in, but Tian Zhi stopped him. “You’ll need to do the same. Only one entry per identification. You do not want to see what happens to those who try otherwise.”
Cha Ming did as he was told. The doorway closed, its two diagonal parts forming a thin vertical line. The metal, he noticed, was several feet thick and made from a mixture of silbium, cold iron, and xanthium. It also bore traces of life-leaching gold. It would be difficult for even Cha Ming to cut through it, assuming he tried to do so wielding only a peak-core treasure.
He stuck his left arm into the hole, which closed around it. To his surprise, he felt a small stab against his skin and a slight numbing sensation. Simultaneously, light traveled the length of his arm until it found his mark. When it did, the prickling faded, and the door released him. He caught a glimpse of the retracting mechanism as the door opened.
There are needles of life-leaching iron worked into the door, he thought. If unauthorized personnel tried to do what I did, they would die before they knew what hit them. A body cultivator like him wouldn’t be so easy to dispatch, of course. He was sure he’d last at least ten seconds.
After passing through the first door, he saw a second one. This one opened automatically. It was as strong as the one before, and if the runic patterns running through the walls were any indication, it was linked to the other door. More likely than not, it had a fail-close mechanism. If the door before it was damaged, it would slam shut to buy time for the conglomerate’s security forces to arrive. It also served a good second layer of defense against explosions.
“Well?” Tian Zhi said, holding his hands up to the shelves around him. “What do you think?”
Cha Ming looked around the room, his mouth agape. It wasn’t the wealth contained within that amazed him but the sheer size of the place. The inside of the storage room was ten times larger than it seemed on the outside.
“A spatial expansion formation,” Cha Ming said, tracing the runic lines on the walls and floor of the chamber. “Displays like these make me wish my affinities were different.” His proficiency with five elements, though admirable, was still lacking in certain aspects. Illusions were one of those things. They came to him with great difficulty, despite his access to water qi and Huxian’s light and shadow qi. Time acceleration and freezing were nearly impossible for him, even with Huxian’s preliminary mastery over time essence.
Space was also difficult. Through light and shadow, he could imitate some things like linking points in space or bridging spatial tears. Things like spatial expansion and the crafting of spatial treasures were mostly left to people with a rare affinity to space. It was these people with mastery over spatial qi who could draw those esoteric formations that expanded and contracted reality. They were the ones who crafted storage treasures, big and small, and chambers such as these.
“It’s a work of art, that’s for certain,” Tian Zhi said. “Though I can’t say it’s the best vault I’ve seen. There’s a vault farther north at our main headquarters that’s much more impressive. It even has a custodian—a construct that obeys verbal commands and can even make decisions and keep track of the vault’s contents.”
“Farther north,” Cha Ming said, frowning. “I can’t recall any other major cities farther north. Unless you mean…” His eyes widened, and Tian Zhi grinned. “You’ve been north of the border? You’ve been to the place we’re trying to get to?”
“You were bound to find out sooner or later,” Tian Zhi said, picking up a small brick of red metal off one of the heavy metal shelves. It was purified flameweave steel, a great metal for forging thin swords. Though good for physical weapons, it was terrible for conducting flames. “Truth be told, I was born there. So was Director Yong and Wang Bo.”
Cha Ming gulped. His surprise was genuine—he’d expected only Wang Yong and Wang Bo to be from Gold Leaf City. “You mean you ran away from paradise? To join the South? Why?”
Tian Zhi shrugged. “What’s there to be surprised about? Life is hard, and it’s difficult to get ahead. Some things are just more profitable than others. And besides, the South’s going to win anyway. I’d rather be down here before the wall falls and even help push it down rather than try to hold it up. It’s an unfair world, lad, as I’m sure you know.”
“Yes, yes, I do,” Cha Ming said, his expression solemn. “And the others? He Yin? Pan Su? Shao Qiang?”
Tian Zhi laughed. “What, you think
