NR | Chapter 4

In general, anything that was locked up belonged to the precious sort. At the time, I had several basic theories, and I’m writing them down here to help with understanding later.

The first possibility was that the owner of the jade box simply didn’t want anyone opening it a hundred years later, which was why he made these nine silver rings as the lock. The Nine-Ring Lock was jammed fast at both ends inside the box, forming a dead loop.

But there was one obvious problem with that idea. If this thing was really so precious that no one could even touch it, then why didn’t the owner just destroy it on the spot? Why go to all the trouble of sealing it inside a fragile jade box? Wasn’t that just asking for suffering?

Next was the second possibility. The owner of the jade box wanted someone to discover it a hundred years later and open it, but not everyone would be able to see what was inside. Only someone who could break the deadlock of these nine rings would be able to take the contents out.

But that brought up a new paradox. Why would this person choose jade, such a fragile material, as the vessel for a treasure? Was he not afraid that if it fell into some crude brute’s hands, the man wouldn’t be able to open it and would just smash the box instead?

If I had some earth-shattering secret that only one person in the whole world could discover, I would of course choose a much sturdier material. At the very least, it would have to be something that couldn’t be broken by a fall.

After thinking it over and over, these were basically the only two possibilities.

I touched the bottom of the jade box and began focusing my gaze on the groove underneath, while guessing at the purpose of the pale yellow liquid at the bottom. In ancient times, crafting such exquisite jadeware took time and labor, and the artisan couldn’t possibly have had so much spare time that he would deliberately carve such a groove into the bottom for no reason.

So the existence of this groove had to have some meaning. I didn’t think it was just for looks. I had seen powdered gold before, and compared with gold dust, the golden sediment in this pale yellow liquid seemed more like some kind of extracted metallic substance.

I tapped my temple with the pen, my brain overloaded and getting a little hot.

Wait, metallic substance?

Since the original owner of the jade box dared to use jade, such a fragile thing, as a container, he must have had absolute confidence that no one else would dare smash it. So why was he so certain that people centuries later, after getting the box, still wouldn’t dare to force it open?

I remembered a case. Back when I used to look through the ancient tomb diagrams my grandfather had collected, some tomb owners, in order to prevent grave robbers from violently tearing the mausoleum apart, would pour a layer of kerosene into the outermost tomb walls.

The craftsmen building the tomb would carve deep grooves into the walls, then press highly reactive metal into fire beads and store them in the oil. The air inside the burial chamber was thin, and once the chamber was damaged, outside air would rush in. That reactive metal would spontaneously combust and explode, and getting hit by it could strip off at least a layer of skin.

That was the most basic kind of mechanism. I lifted the jade box again and looked at it, thinking, Could this be something like kerosene? It wasn’t impossible. If the owner of the jade box was ruthless enough, and he didn’t want unnecessary people seeing the information inside, he could absolutely make a mechanism like that and blow the box apart.

I wasn’t going to keep guessing blindly. No matter what, this box definitely couldn’t be opened by brute force. I opened the flat iron case beside me. Inside, tools were lined up in neat rows: wires from thin to thick, curved wire picks of special shapes, small pliers, and screwdrivers far smaller than ordinary ones.

These were special tools I had summarized and refined over the years from all the mechanisms and locks I had encountered. In this world, basically no small mechanism that had ever appeared could resist these tools.

I slid the thinnest wire into the upper lock hole and pressed my ear against the box to listen for movement. The wire had gone in about a centimeter when it hit something. I lightly flicked the wire, closed my eyes, and listened to the sound coming from inside the lock.

After only half a minute, my heart sank.

I realized that in more than ten years of research, I had never heard the sound of this kind of mechanism before. I couldn’t even find anything in my memory that sounded similar. I might have to ask Fourth Brother and see whether he recognized this box.

No sooner thought than done, I stood up from the chair, took the jade box with me, and left the room. On the first floor, only Tian Yuqing and Yu Jingzi were sitting there. The two of them were chatting and drinking tea, while the fat guy had no idea where he had gone. Fourth Brother was still at the main seat, pouring tea over his tea pet.

I gripped the jade box and went downstairs, then hid behind the screen and waved at Fourth Brother. He set down his tea, and I dragged him behind the screen, taking the box out from behind my back.

“What era is this box from?” I asked.

The moment Fourth Brother saw it, he suddenly froze. He really did go completely still. Then his pupils widened several times over. He snatched the jade box from my hands and turned it over and over in his slightly trembling grip.

I looked at his reaction and found it even stranger. My grandfather had taken you to see who knew how many good things, and you’d closely examined artifacts ten times better than this. Just one broken box and you’re already drooling over it?

Fourth Brother grabbed me, his voice unexpectedly low. “Where did you get this?”

I was baffled. What, did he not know there was such a box in the cabinet?

I pointed upstairs, but before I could say anything, someone reached out and shoved me aside like I was a chick. I staggered from the push, and watched as the sly bastard Tan walked past me, reeking of smoke. He glanced at me and said, “Kid, stand aside. Let your Uncle take a look at what this is.”

Damn it, he wasn’t even ten years older than me. What was he putting on that big-shot act for?

The sly bastard Tan narrowed his eyes, took only one look at the box, then widened them again to confirm the imprint on the bottom. He cursed loudly, “Fuck, this is the real key. How the hell did this thing end up with you people?”

I realized I might have caused trouble. What kind of serious thing could make the heads of the geomancers from the southwest, north, middle, and east care this much? If I’d known this thing was the key they were talking about, they could have beaten me to death and I still wouldn’t have chosen to go downstairs and ask Fourth Brother at this moment.

Fourth Brother looked up and gave me a long, deep glance. His expression was very off. I was still too green then, in both thinking and scheming, so I only thought he was silently cursing me. It wasn’t until many years later that I understood that look, so pitiful it seemed to foresee everything I would go through in the future.

The sly bastard Tan seemed to know quite a bit about appraising antiques. He took the jade box from Fourth Brother and, for some reason, produced a magnifying glass from nowhere. Striding over to the lamp, he examined it under the light. Down below, Tian Yuqing and Yu Jingzi also set down their tea, and their faces began to look ugly.

Fourth Brother tugged me once and asked in a low voice, “Where did you get the thing?”

I was wronged to death and hurriedly explained, “That locked redwood cabinet in my room. I opened the cabinet and it was sitting inside. I can’t unlock it, and I was going to ask if my grandfather bought it.”

Fourth Brother waved a hand. Looking at the three people in the distance, he drew a breath and said in a deep voice by my ear, “You little troublemaker sure know how to make things difficult for me. Later, you won’t say a single word. No matter how they ask you afterward, you must say you found it.”

“Also, absolutely do not tell anyone that you studied mechanism craft.”