Chapter 13: When Two Skies Answered
Dawn arrived without lifting the fog.
The mountains remained shrouded in gray mist, and moisture gathered along the walls of the abandoned observation post. Beneath the ruins, however, the installation was already awake.
Han Feng watched from a ridge overlooking the eastern slope.
He had spent the entire night observing the people entering and leaving the underground structure. They came in small groups, carrying instruments, formation components, sealed containers, and fragments of black stone. None stayed outside longer than necessary. The Regional Council's guards maintained a loose perimeter around the staircase, while members of the Threshold Society moved between the ruins with the confidence of people who believed they had authority over everyone present.
Their relationship was more complicated than it appeared.
The Council supplied personnel, records, and equipment. The Society provided knowledge of the anomalies and directed the experiments. Neither side seemed willing to surrender control to the other.
And neither seemed entirely certain what they were dealing with.
Han Feng lowered his gaze to the documents he had taken from Broken Bridge.
The earlier experiments had left behind a trail of omissions.
Three operators had disappeared during the first attempt. During the second, spiritual energy had ceased responding to the instruments for several seconds. The reports contained no reliable explanation for either incident. Some pages had been removed, while others had been rewritten in the language of administrative procedure, turning unexplained deaths into technical failures.
Yet one detail appeared in every surviving account.
The accidents had occurred when the researchers attempted to make the two cultivation systems interact directly with the structure.
Han Feng folded the documents.
The distinction mattered.
Primordial essence and spiritual energy could coexist in the world that had emerged after the Convergence. That much was undeniable. But coexistence did not mean the two systems obeyed identical laws, nor did it guarantee that combining them would produce a stable result.
A river and a road could cross at the same point without becoming the same thing.
The researchers appeared to have mistaken the intersection for compatibility.
And now they're preparing to make the same mistake again.
He looked toward the entrance.
Two workers carried a metal framework down the stairs. Behind them came several assistants transporting stone vessels containing black fragments. The materials were being arranged according to a precise sequence, and every movement seemed to have been rehearsed.
The experiment would begin soon.
Han Feng had no intention of interfering before he understood what they were attempting.
He had already seen what happened when people treated an unknown mechanism as a problem that could be solved by applying more force. If the installation contained a genuine boundary between different systems of existence, disrupting it without understanding its function might endanger everyone nearby.
Including him.
A single bell rang beneath the ruins.
The workers stopped.
A second tone followed from the underground chamber, and pale lights began appearing along the walls. The external containment formations were activating.
Han Feng shifted his attention toward the staircase.
The energy did not enter the structure all at once. Small quantities of spiritual energy flowed through the outer channels first, filling the engraved lines around the chamber. Only after those readings stabilized did the researchers introduce a separate current of primordial essence.
The two flows traveled in opposite directions.
They remained apart.
For several minutes, the arrangement held.
The outer formations illuminated the stonework in a dim, steady glow. The instruments registered no unusual fluctuations, and the pale door beneath the installation remained unchanged.
Then the gray-mantled man appeared beside the lead researcher.
He had not participated in the preparations. He had simply watched, occasionally exchanging a few words with the technicians responsible for the formation.
Now he stood directly before the door, his hands folded inside his sleeves.
"Begin the first cycle," the researcher ordered.
The spiritual current strengthened.
The primordial essence followed a moment later.
The two energies approached the inner boundary from opposite directions, separated by a narrow interval maintained by the rotating metal framework.
For a brief moment, Han Feng thought the researchers might have learned from their previous failures.
Then one of the instruments went blank.
Not dim.
Blank.
The researcher leaned toward the display.
"Stop the secondary circuit."
An assistant rushed to the control mechanism.
Before he could reach it, a second instrument lost its reading.
Then a third.
The spiritual current remained stable on either side of the affected section. The instruments registered energy entering the channel and leaving it, but nothing could be measured in between.
The energy had not been drained.
It had vanished from the measurement itself.
Han Feng's eyes narrowed.
The same phenomenon as the depot.
He remembered the black container beneath the Seven Lantern Depot. Three instruments had failed there, leaving an interval in which their readings showed nothing at all. The researchers had treated the event as a technical malfunction.
But the pattern was becoming difficult to dismiss.
The phenomenon was not limited to one object.
It could occur wherever certain artifacts and formations interacted.
Below the ruins, the lead researcher raised his voice.
"Disconnect the secondary circuit. Now!"
The assistant pulled the control lever.
The current of primordial essence stopped.
Spiritual energy continued circulating for another three seconds.
Then it disappeared.
A low sound emerged from the chamber.
It resembled the grinding of an enormous stone mechanism turning after centuries of immobility.
Everyone fell silent.
A vertical line appeared at the center of the pale door.
Han Feng felt the Celestial Diagram react.
The pulse struck his consciousness so suddenly that his breath caught in his throat.
He immediately strengthened the Art of the Celestial Veil, suppressing the fluctuations spreading through his body. He did not know whether the reaction could be detected by the people below, but he refused to give them the opportunity.
The Diagram offered no image.
No direction.
No explanation.
It simply responded, as though the appearance of that line had confirmed something it had been waiting to encounter.
Han Feng remained motionless.
Below him, the vertical line widened by a fraction.
Then the world seemed to lose its distance.
Han Feng's spiritual perception had been directed toward the underground chamber, but for one disorienting instant, the relationship between his position and the door ceased to make sense.
He could still identify the physical location of the installation. He knew where the ridge stood, where the staircase descended, and where the chamber lay beneath the stone.
Yet another part of his perception seemed to have been placed directly before a dark surface.
There was no depth beyond it.
No recognizable direction.
No meaningful measure of distance.
It was not darkness in the ordinary sense. Darkness implied a space in which light was absent.
This was different.
His perception had encountered something that did not provide the conditions necessary to understand space at all.
Han Feng severed the connection immediately.
His eyes opened.
A thin layer of sweat had formed along his forehead.
He took several slow breaths before attempting to extend his spiritual sense again.
This time, he observed only the outer formations.
He would not repeat the experiment merely to satisfy his curiosity.
The installation had already demonstrated that conventional perception could fail without warning. Testing that failure a second time would be foolish.
Below, the lead researcher ordered the complete shutdown of the formation.
The assistants complied.
The rotating framework slowed, and the outer channels gradually lost their glow. Yet the vertical line remained visible on the door.
The gray-mantled man approached, stopping several steps away from the surface.
"How long did the response last?"
The researcher consulted the instruments.
"A little over three seconds. We couldn't record what happened during the interval."
"And the containment system?"
"The channels appear intact, but three measurement points have stopped responding. I can't determine whether the instruments were damaged or whether the flow itself became unrecognizable."
The gray-mantled man studied the line.
"Do not repeat the procedure."
The researcher looked up sharply.
"But the response was stronger than any previous attempt. If we reinforce the secondary circuit and increase the interval between—"
"No."
The man's voice was quiet, but the discussion ended immediately.
The researcher hesitated.
"We are closer than ever to understanding the inner boundary."
"You don't even know what answered."
Silence settled over the chamber.
The gray-mantled man did not move closer to the door. He did not produce the black fragment Han Feng had seen during the previous night, nor did he attempt to use another artifact.
For several seconds, he simply watched the vertical line.
His caution was genuine.
That made him more difficult to understand, not less.
A reckless man could be predicted through his ambition. Someone who recognized danger but continued pursuing his objective required a different kind of calculation.
Han Feng withdrew from the ridge.
The experiment had confirmed three things.
The door responded to the interaction between the two cultivation systems, but not in a manner the researchers could control.
The disappearance of energy readings was part of the phenomenon itself, rather than merely an equipment failure.
And the gray-mantled man, despite possessing information unavailable to the other researchers, did not fully understand the mechanism he was trying to activate.
The third conclusion concerned Han Feng more than the others.
If the man was uncertain, then whatever lay beyond the door might be beyond the knowledge of every faction involved.
That meant the danger was not confined to a conflict between the Regional Council and the Threshold Society.
It was something neither organization could necessarily contain.
Han Feng moved along the ridge until he reached the narrow opening he had identified the previous night.
He had another objective.
The missing researchers.
If the reports were accurate, at least three people had disappeared during earlier attempts. Shen Rui's account had already established that the Council was willing to erase records rather than explain what had happened to its own personnel.
Han Feng needed to know whether the missing operators were dead, imprisoned, or somewhere else entirely.
He slipped through the opening and entered a narrow passage running parallel to the main staircase.
The walls were damp. Old maintenance markings covered the stone, most of them obscured by mineral deposits. Unlike the principal corridor, this passage contained no active formation lights.
Han Feng advanced without releasing unnecessary energy.
After several dozen meters, he heard a cough.
He stopped.
The sound came from behind a reinforced wooden door.
"Who's there?" he asked quietly.
Silence followed.
Then a man's voice answered.
"If you're here to interrogate us, come back later. We've already answered the same questions more times than I can count."
Han Feng examined the doorframe.
A small alert formation had been carved into the wood. It was crude compared with the mechanisms protecting the main chamber, but activating it would immediately announce his presence.
He traced the formation's circulation with his spiritual sense, found the narrowest point in the circuit, and interrupted it with a controlled thread of primordial essence.
The mark faded.
Han Feng opened the door.
Three people sat against the far wall. Two men and a woman. Their clothes were dirty, and exhaustion had hollowed their faces, but none appeared to have suffered a serious physical injury.
A fourth person lay on a blanket near the corner.
His breathing was shallow and irregular.
Han Feng's gaze settled on the dark markings running along the man's neck.
He had seen something similar on Shen Rui.
That did not mean the cause was identical, but the resemblance was enough to make him cautious.
The woman stood.
"Who are you?"
"Someone who isn't working for the people who brought you here."
"That doesn't tell me much."
"It tells you what you need to know for the next few minutes."
Her expression hardened, but the older man beside her raised a hand.
"Let him speak."
Han Feng closed the door behind him.
"I need to know what happened during the experiments. Keep it brief."
The older man looked at him for a moment before answering.
"They tried to activate the door with spiritual energy and primordial essence at the same time. The first attempt destroyed part of the formation. Three operators disappeared. During the second attempt, the instruments stopped detecting energy throughout the chamber."
"Did you see what happened to the missing operators?"
The woman answered.
"I saw two of them standing near the door when the readings disappeared. One was checking the inner circuit. The other was holding a measuring rod."
She swallowed.
"When the instruments began working again, neither of them was there."
"Did the door open?"
"No."
"Did they fall? Were they pulled toward it?"
"There was nowhere for them to fall. The chamber was sealed, and no one saw them leave."
Han Feng studied her expression.
She was frightened, but she was not improvising an explanation. Her account matched the strange interval he had felt from the ridge.
The older man continued.
"After the second attempt, they brought us here to interpret the inscriptions. The door doesn't appear to be an ordinary transport mechanism. There are no coordinates to enter, no destination to select."
"What does it respond to?"
"We don't know."
"Then what have you learned?"
The man hesitated before answering.
"The inscriptions describe an external boundary and an internal boundary. The external one can be approached using the registration token distributed to the researchers. The inner boundary responds to something else. We tried to activate it using both cultivation systems, but every attempt produced an incomplete reaction."
Han Feng's attention sharpened.
"An incomplete reaction?"
"The outer formation registers a response. The inner mechanism begins to move. Then the measurements disappear before we can determine what has changed."
He glanced toward the unconscious man.
"We were supposed to stabilize the formation during the last attempt. He tried to compensate when the secondary circuit failed. The energy stopped circulating correctly through his body."
"What happened afterward?"
"He collapsed. He hasn't awakened since."
Han Feng did not approach the injured man.
The markings might indicate an alteration in his energy circulation, but that was not enough to determine the cause. Treating him with an ordinary healing technique could make matters worse if the problem involved the same phenomenon that had disrupted the instruments.
"Is there another exit?"
The woman pointed toward a narrow opening behind a wooden shelf.
"A maintenance tunnel. It leads to the other side of the slope. The guards believe it collapsed years ago."
"Can you walk?"
"Both of us can," the older man replied. "She's injured, but she can manage. He cannot."
Han Feng looked at the unconscious researcher.
He could free the two who were able to walk and leave before anyone noticed. It would be the safest option. He had already risked enough by entering the installation, and carrying an unconscious man through an unknown tunnel would slow him considerably.
But the man's condition was deteriorating. Leaving him here meant returning him to the people who had continued experimenting despite their inability to explain what had happened to their colleagues.
Han Feng had no interest in becoming a savior.
He simply disliked leaving an unresolved danger behind when he had a reasonable chance to limit it.
"Prepare to move," he said. "No cultivation techniques until we're clear of the installation. If you feel anything unusual, tell me immediately."
The older man stared at him.
"You're actually helping us?"
"I'm opening a route. What you do afterward is your responsibility."
That was the limit of his promise.
Han Feng examined the maintenance tunnel. Several stones blocked the entrance, but there was no active containment formation. He removed the smaller pieces one by one, careful not to strike the surrounding structure hard enough to trigger a collapse.
The work took longer than he wanted.
Voices drifted from the main corridor.
"The report must reach the Council before nightfall."
"The Council doesn't care why the readings changed. It wants to know whether we can open the door."
The footsteps moved away.
Han Feng increased his pace.
When the opening was wide enough, he helped the two mobile prisoners through. Then he returned for the unconscious man.
The woman supported the researcher's head while Han Feng lifted him onto his back. The man's body was unnaturally cold, and the dark markings along his neck seemed more pronounced than they had a few minutes earlier.
Han Feng adjusted his grip.
"Keep his head steady."
The woman nodded.
They entered the tunnel.
The passage twisted through the rock, forcing them to walk bent over. Roots had penetrated the walls in several places, and moisture made the floor treacherous. Han Feng moved ahead, checking each turn for guards or signs of an active formation.
After several minutes, the tunnel opened into a natural chamber.
Two passages led away from it.
The woman pointed to the left.
"The exit is down there."
Han Feng stopped before taking another step.
Something was wrong with the air.
It was not spiritual energy.
It was not primordial essence.
It was an absence.
The sensation reminded him of the black container at the Seven Lantern Depot, where the readings had vanished for three seconds. Here, however, the effect was weaker but persistent, concentrated along the left-hand passage.
Han Feng lowered the unconscious man carefully to the ground.
He picked up a pebble and threw it down the left corridor.
The pebble vanished.
There was no flash, no sound, no movement of air.
One moment it was traveling through the passage.
The next, it was no longer observable.
The woman covered her mouth.
"That wasn't happening before."
Han Feng studied the corridor.
The path remained physically intact as far as he could see, but the disappearance of the pebble meant that he could not safely assume the passage still led somewhere accessible.
He examined the right-hand corridor.
It was narrower and partly obstructed by roots, but the stone remained coherent. His spiritual sense could follow it for several dozen meters without encountering the same interruption.
"The right passage," he said.
The older man frowned.
"But the left one is shorter."
"And now we don't know whether it leads anywhere we can reach."
No one argued.
Han Feng took the lead, checking every turn before allowing the others to follow. The tunnel gradually rose, and the strange sensation faded behind them.
At last, they reached a natural fissure in the mountainside, concealed by dry vegetation.
Daylight entered through the opening.
For a moment, none of them moved.
The air outside felt ordinary—cold, damp, and entirely unremarkable. After what they had experienced underground, that ordinariness was almost reassuring.
Han Feng emerged first.
The slope was empty. No guards stood nearby, and the sounds from the main installation remained distant. The experiment team was still occupied with the damaged formation.
Their escape had not been discovered.
Not yet.
Han Feng led the group to a sheltered hollow between two large rocks and examined the prisoners.
The older man could walk, though he was exhausted. The woman had only minor injuries. The unconscious researcher remained unresponsive.
"We need a healer," she said.
"Not just any healer," Han Feng replied. "The marks on his body may be related to the loss of energy you described. A conventional treatment could make his condition worse."
"I know someone west of here. They studied the effects of the Convergence."
"Then take him there. Avoid Broken Bridge, and don't contact the Regional Council."
The older man nodded slowly.
"And you?"
Han Feng looked toward the ruins.
"I have something to verify before I leave."
He did not explain that he intended to observe the installation from a distance. The prisoners already possessed enough information to attract several factions. Associating his name with their escape would only create another trail for his enemies to follow.
Before they separated, the woman took a folded sheet from inside her clothing.
"I copied this from the inscription beside the inner boundary before they brought us here."
Han Feng accepted it.
Three lines of ancient characters had been written on the paper. The first described a passage without coordinates. The second referred to a condition of recognition. The third contained a short sentence:
What lies beyond does not belong to the path that brought you here.
Han Feng read it twice.
The inscription did not prove that the door led to another universe, nor did it establish that the mechanism was a passage in the conventional sense. But it reinforced the possibility that the researchers were dealing with something more fundamental than a spatial fissure.
Perhaps the structure did not lead to a destination.
Perhaps it established a relationship between two things that ordinarily could not meet.
That remained a hypothesis.
Han Feng folded the paper and put it away.
"Go. If you find the healer, don't tell them where you were held unless you have to."
The woman gave him a guarded nod.
Then the three prisoners carried their unconscious companion down the western slope and disappeared among the trees.
Han Feng waited until they were out of sight.
Only then did he return to his observation point.
The installation remained active until late afternoon.
Han Feng watched from the ridge as technicians dismantled part of the external circuit. Several guards carried damaged instruments outside, while others searched the surrounding ruins.
The gray-mantled man listened to the lead researcher's report without interruption.
Then he asked a question.
"Where are the prisoners?"
The researcher stiffened.
"We haven't confirmed their location."
"Confirm it."
Minutes later, an assistant returned with the answer.
The holding room was empty.
The gray-mantled man closed his eyes for a brief moment.
When he opened them, his expression had changed.
"From this moment on, nobody attempts to activate the door without my authorization. Collect the fragments, suspend the experiments, and find the fugitives."
The researcher looked uneasy.
"What if the Council demands another attempt?"
"Tell them the installation has been compromised."
"They won't accept that indefinitely."
"I don't need them to accept it. I need to prevent anyone from opening that thing before we understand what answered."
The researcher fell silent.
Han Feng watched the gray-mantled man return underground.
The man's caution had become more pronounced. Perhaps the morning's experiment had finally convinced him that the mechanism was beyond their control. Perhaps he had realized that unauthorized people were moving through the installation.
Or perhaps he knew something that he had not yet revealed.
Han Feng had no reliable way to distinguish among those possibilities.
He was preparing to leave the ridge when the sky changed.
There was no storm.
No lightning.
A narrow band of pale light appeared among the clouds, forming an almost vertical line above the mountains.
It remained visible for only a few seconds.
The light had no familiar spiritual coloration. It was nearly colorless, and it seemed to divide the sky without casting a shadow.
Then the spiritual energy across the region receded.
Han Feng froze.
The Celestial Diagram vibrated inside his consciousness with an intensity he had never experienced since the Convergence.
This time, the reaction did not produce a symbol or a clear image.
Instead, he sensed two presences at an immeasurable distance.
They were separated by something he could neither see nor measure.
The first presence felt ancient.
Silent.
Indifferent to the world around it.
The second carried a different pressure—a will that seemed unwilling to accept any limit imposed by its circumstances.
Han Feng could not identify either presence.
He saw no faces.
He heard no names.
The impression lasted less than a heartbeat, leaving him with nothing he could reliably use as evidence.
Then the light disappeared.
Spiritual energy flowed back into the mountains, and the sky returned to its ordinary appearance.
Han Feng remained motionless.
He refused to invent an explanation simply because the event had frightened him.
The two presences might have been connected to the universes that collided ten years earlier. They might have been related to the door, or they might have been responding to a larger disturbance beyond the region.
He did not know.
What he did know was that the Celestial Diagram had reacted to something far more distant than the underground installation.
The experiment might not have caused the phenomenon.
It might merely have coincided with it.
Or perhaps the door had become a point of contact through which something elsewhere could be sensed.
All three possibilities were dangerous.
Han Feng put the copied inscription away and began descending the ridge.
He would not return to the installation that night. He had freed the prisoners, obtained a partial description of the inner boundary, and confirmed that the researchers did not control the mechanism.
His next task was to discover where the fugitives were going and whether the healer they trusted could interpret the records without attempting to activate the door.
As for the gray-mantled man, Han Feng would continue observing him from a distance.
The man possessed too much information to ignore. Yet he had not directly attacked Han Feng, and his actions suggested that he was not entirely confident in the outcome of his own experiments.
Turning him into an enemy before understanding his motives would be a waste of an advantage.
Han Feng reached the valley as night settled over the mountains.
The Celestial Diagram's vibration faded.
This time, he did not stop to investigate.
He continued along the narrow trail, leaving the observation post behind.
Far beneath the ruins, the second door remained closed.
But the vertical line that had appeared during the experiment had not disappeared completely. A faint mark remained on the surface, almost invisible, like the trace of pressure applied from the other side.
The mechanism was not open.
It was not even clear that it could be opened in the way the researchers imagined.
Yet it was no longer entirely dormant.
And somewhere beyond the boundaries the researchers were trying to understand, something had noticed that the path between two distant realities was becoming more distinct.
It did not cross.
It did not answer.
It simply recognized the change—and waited.