After the tea and a small set of neat mooncake desserts, Jekyll left ten spirit stones behind.

He had enjoyed the quiet here, enough to pay for it five times over. Then his feet carried him higher.

At the closed third level, guards stopped him. They did not frown, and they did not posture.

"Halt there, state your business," said the white-robed guardsman.

Jekyll offered his prepared mask, co-founder of the Groundshrank Armadillo Intelligence Agency.

The two white-robed ghosts shared a look and nodded. They let him pass.

Not long after, Jekyll met an old man. Regal nobility hung on him, but without the usual high-handed stink.

With a casual nod, a chair and table appeared to the side, materializing out of thin air.

"Visitor, you have journeyed from afar," Eldric said. "Be seated. A long road deserves a quiet moment."

Jekyll's eyes scanned for blood. The man in front of him was alive. He could hear the heart.

Still, the beat came slow, too slow for an ordinary man. Too calm.

Jekyll could not read the man's age at all, but letting him see even this much felt like a courtesy.

"Visitor, your face is troubled," Eldric observed, his voice mild. "What weighs upon you?"

"Indeed, I am in distress." Jekyll's tone stayed cordial, yet his gaze did not soften. "Tell me, when you raised this place, what purpose did you intend it to serve?"

"I've no lofty ambition, fellow Daoist," Eldric said evenly. "Only the plain need of resources, no different from any other soul."

Jekyll knew the mountain had been cursed. The old stories claimed only those tied to the Ossuary Necropolis court could clear such a thing.

Yet that court had closed its doors more than half a millennium ago.

In his lifetime, plenty had claimed the name. The name itself brought a curse down on those who dared utter it.

After the first few decades, no one used it anymore. Too many who faked the affiliation died strange, leaving behind only mindless husks.

Still, Jekyll was not young. If there was a curse, there was a cure.

Maybe they held a counter spell. Maybe the hand behind this was bigger than that.

Celes Imperium. The ruler of the very continent beneath their feet.

In a dozen heartbeats, the possibilities flashed through him and burned away.

There was only one choice. Ask.

"Fellow Daoist, Eldric, is it?" he said with quiet courtesy. "I do carry certain worries, and I would exchange them with you for information, if you judge it proper. Would that suit?"

If anyone else heard words that direct, Jekyll might have been slapped for them. Eldric did not even blink. He read the intent behind the phrasing and reached into his sleeve, then paused.

"If I grant you the face you ask for," Eldric said, "what, in turn, will you promise me?"

Jekyll knew he was at a disadvantage. Still, he had enough weight to bargain.

He leaned back, elbows on the armrest, fingers tapping while his mind worked. Before he made an offer, he spoke again.

"You are aware that Goldkeep Crownmarkets is a principal source of wealth for the leading sects of the Emperia continent, are you not?"

Eldric nodded. His heartbeat did not rise. If anything, it calmed, as if they had stepped onto the same track of conversation.

Jekyll felt half certain Eldric was not bluffing, and half unsettled by how much control the man had over his own body.

Still, the place did not feel like a trap built by amateurs. He gave Eldric the benefit of the doubt.

He drew out a scroll with gold rollers, ancient runes inscribed along the ends.

When he opened it, the stench of blood surged out, and a shout of frenzy seemed to roar from the parchment.

Jekyll grinned wildly and pushed it toward Eldric.

"This, then, is the measure of my sincerity."

Eldric did not flinch at the blood stink. He studied the flickering runes first.

The karmic lines were genuine. Five seals sat within. A grand elder seal, three inner elder seals, and Jekyll's own.

A few lines followed. Land reclamation and seizure warrant, granted to the receiver. The recipient line was blank.

Radeon, watching from his pavilion, did not expect Jekyll to carry such an item.

Eldric responded without delay. He produced his own scroll, gold as well, but the runes were skeletal, familiar to Jekyll, and yet more regal than anything he had seen before.

Eldric opened it and passed it across. The moment Jekyll took the scroll in his hand, clanging rang through his senses.

Artifacts inside him shook like bells. Several cracked at once. He dropped to the floor, panting, breath tearing at his throat, his true face showing through as the pressure stripped his concealment bare.

Eldric lifted a hand and screened him from divination like drawing a curtain.

He rose, then bent down and brushed Jekyll off himself, eyes tracking the harm that had bitten into the soul.

Another casual wave followed, and the ache eased, the damage mended.

"It may be that the old ghost of the Ossuary, the one who put that scroll into my hands, has made sport of this old man." Eldric inclined his head. "I beg your pardon."

Jekyll stared at Eldric for a few dozen breaths. Then he laughed, loud and heartily, tears even gathering at the corners of his eyes.

"I have lost." His mouth twitched, half wryness, half resignation, as he brought his hands together and bowed.

"It seems I've played the fool. This junior has made a buffoon of himself, Senior Eldric."

Eldric waved it away and patted his back.

"There is no elder or younger between us," Eldric said. "My Dao may walk with life and death, yet my heart only longed for carefreeness. Look about you."

For Jekyll, the words were worth chewing. If this old man was still polishing his Dao, then his realm was already past the mortal line, apotheosis or half-step, maybe the peak, maybe beyond.

Jekyll even felt a touch smug that such a monster had given him so much face.

He placed the blood scroll into Eldric's hands.

"A wager is a wager, Sir Eldric. I pride myself on my integrity, nor does the cult withdraw its word once it is given."

Eldric slid it into his sleeve.

"Very well. I've seen your sincerity," Eldric said. "I know you carry ill tidings, and would be off the sooner for telling them. Speak, then."

Jekyll pondered the words carefully. At first he thought of dragging Cairnlight Barterhold into the fray, but seeing the old man's attitude and the authenticity of the sect master's letter, he would be a fool to offend this senior.

That would only add to the list of enemies facing the cult and the secretive organization he represented.

"I would have you seal your mountain, if it can be done," Jekyll said, his voice even and without ornament.

Respect for Eldric gave him no appetite for riddles or games.

This time Eldric's hand paused on the armrest. Radeon, watching from the pavilion, knew it for what it was, a clear warning given with cordial dressing.

"I shall see to it," Eldric said, the smile never leaving him.

He stood. Jekyll should not leave empty-handed. Eldric drew out another technique and passed it over.

Liquid Orbital Bombardment Technique.

Radeon took it from a past lifetime, heavy drops of blood pulled from Giovanni's memory, and it suited Jekyll.

Simple in principle. A blood sphere held above, controlled and guided as it descended.

One could wield ten. Ten could become a flood in the sky. The limit was not in the art. It was in the wielder.

Jekyll was a martial genius. After reading the arts, he was astounded.

This was not simply an additional arsenal for him. It was akin to turning a crude knife into a well-forged sword.

It fit him so well that Jekyll felt a chill.

Looking at their exchange, the old man seemed to value the small peak he was running, hence the appreciation.

More than that, the old man knew they were about to start something big and was clearly looking out for him.

Eldric saw Jekyll's serious expression, so he tried to lighten his mood.

"Now, now," Eldric said gently. "Best keep those mountains whole." Eldric joked.

They both laughed, pleased with each other.

From the pavilion, Radeon watched Jekyll tamed like a child, and knew the man's suspicion of him had been cut clean.

In the next few days, Radeon rolled out maintenance claims. He closed the eight gates on the Wordsworth Shortspires, under the name of the Groundshrank Armadillo Intelligence Agency.

People saw white-robed cultivators hauling larger loads of construction materials through the lanes, making the maintenance look real because it was real enough.

Cairnlight Barterhold even issued a written notice, verbatim policy from the head himself, a ranking system for sellers based on how good their products were.

It came with stall discounts, priority placement, and even a chance to be featured in the luxury stalls on the third tier for those who performed well.

Mortals and cultivators would each get their fair share of chances. With that, most people saw no problem.

The closure was promised to last a few days, maybe up to two weeks.

Rumor said the ranking would be run by an artifact, and those rumors were the ones Radeon had quietly let loose.

As the last gate shut, the search began. Nooks and corners, crawl spaces, and false walls. Any place a body could hide was checked.

Some cultivators had tried to stay hidden. Some were stubborn and wanted to wait it out inside. In the end, all of them were pushed out.

Once that was done, the miners were told to eat a lot and drink what they could. They obeyed.

Then they were ordered to sleep. The four disciples were no exception.

The ghostly fog manifested again, now contained within the walls instead of leaking into the surroundings like before.

A large barrier dome formed over Cairnlight Barterhold, sealing it off from outside forces.

Radeon was on the mountain peak, on the very head of the statue of his soul.

Below, the ghosts and wraiths were in their true forms. It was a horror-inducing scene to any who looked.

"Are the tunnels ready?"

"It is done, Lord Radeon," Calyx said.

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