The Forbidden Vault of the Myriad Beast Hall was less of a vault and more of a buried fortress. Located deep beneath the foundation of the main academy, it was rumored to hold the treasures of the First Sect Leader—weapons, manuals, and beast artifacts deemed too dangerous for the public eye. Legends said that a single step inside would trigger a thousand lethal arrays, turning intruders into a fine red mist.
Naturally, Su Ye was picking the lock with a pig.
"Master, this feels wrong," Lin Fan whispered, his voice trembling as he held a dim spirit lantern. The shadows of the mountain pass stretched long and distorted around them. "This isn't just against the rules. This is heresy. If the Grand Elders find us, we won't be expelled. We'll be composted."
"Relax, Lin Fan," Su Ye said, crouching before the massive, iron-bound stone doors that marked the entrance to the vault. "We aren't stealing. We are... performing an unscheduled inventory audit. Besides, we need an edge. The Royal Academy has resources we can't imagine. We need to level the playing field."
Su Ye looked at the door. Etched into the stone were glowing crimson runes, humming with a terrifying, lethal energy. It was a Blood-Lock Barrier, designed to incinerate anything that touched it without the Sect Leader's blood key.
"Zhu Zhu," Su Ye nudged the Void-Swallowing Pig, who was currently sniffing a patch of moss. "Dinner time."
Zhu Zhu looked up, his blue eyes locking onto the glowing red energy of the barrier. To a normal cultivator, the energy looked like death. To Zhu Zhu, it looked like spicy noodles.
Snort.
The pig trotted forward. Uncle Chen covered his eyes, expecting an explosion. Princess Luo Bing gripped her sleeves, holding her breath.
Zhu Zhu opened his mouth. The unhinging of his jaw was silent, a sudden expansion of void darkness. He clamped his teeth onto the intangible energy field.
SLURP.
It sounded like someone finishing a thick milkshake. The terrifying red glow of the runes warped, stretched, and was sucked violently into the piglet's mouth. The humming stopped. The lethal heat vanished. The intricate, thousand-year-old formation flickered once and then died, leaving the stone door cold and dark.
Zhu Zhu burped, a small puff of red smoke escaping his nostrils. He looked at Su Ye, wagging his curly tail.
"Good boy," Su Ye whispered, patting the pig. "Uncle Chen, get the crowbar."
With a groan of ancient hinges that echoed like thunder, the heavy doors swung open. A gust of stale, dry air rushed out, carrying the scent of old paper and decaying magic.
"Stay close," Su Ye commanded, stepping into the darkness. "And for the love of the Ancestors, don't touch anything unless I say so. Some of these artifacts are cursed."
The interior of the vault was vast, lined with towering stone shelves. It looked like a museum of nightmares. There were jars containing preserved beast eyes, skeletal remains of extinct leviathans, and rows of rusted weapons that pulsed with malice.
"It's... incredible," Gao Ming whispered, his theatrical soul awed by the atmosphere. "The aura of history! I feel the ghosts of the past watching us!"
"Those aren't ghosts, Gao Ming," Su Ye said, glancing at a row of skulls. "Those are security wards. Don't look them in the eye."
Su Ye closed his eyes for a moment, extending his senses. He wasn't looking for the most powerful items; he was waiting for the Ancestors in his disciples' beasts to speak up.
Zzzzt.
The connection opened. It was a cacophony.
"TRASH! IT'S ALL TRASH!" The Lion Emperor roared in Su Ye's head. "That sword is rusted! That shield is made of tin! This Sect Leader was a hoarder! Where is the gold? Where are the statues of ME?"
"Focus, you old rug," the Tortoise Ancestor grumbled. "Boy, look to the left. Fourth shelf. The blue box. It smells like the Deep Ocean."
"And the right!" The Stag Ancestor chimed in, sounding panicked as usual. "That grey cloak! It looks like a shroud! It's perfect for hiding! Grab it before it sees us!"
Su Ye opened his eyes. "Shopping time. Luo Bing, go left. Fourth shelf. Blue box. Gao Ming, the grey cloak on the mannequin. Lin Fan... wait."
Su Ye walked deeper into the vault, guided by the screeching of the Vampiric Bat Ancestor. He stopped before a glass case containing a strange, twisted piece of metal. It looked like a tuning fork that had been melted and refrozen.
"THE ECHO BONE!" The Bat Ancestor shrieked. "It is the rib of a Thunder-Wyrm! It amplifies sonic frequencies by ten thousand percent! If the boy attaches that to his armor, his Brown Note will become a Brown Symphony! He could make an entire army soil themselves from a mile away!"
"Grab that, Lin Fan," Su Ye pointed.
As the disciples scattered to loot their designated items, Su Ye walked toward the center of the vault. There, sitting on a pedestal, was not a weapon, but a large, rough stone sphere. It looked unremarkable, like a cannonball made of granite.
But Zhu Zhu was staring at it. And the Crimson Maw Basilisk (who Su Ye had wisely left outside to guard the door) was pacing nervously.
Su Ye reached out and touched the sphere.
Zzzzt.
He wasn't pulled into a library or a void. He was pulled into... a nap.
The mental space was a cozy, dark burrow. Curling in the center was a creature Su Ye didn't recognize immediately. It looked like a badger, but its fur was made of diamonds and its claws were pure obsidian.
"Five more minutes..." the spirit mumbled, rolling over. "I'm not getting up. The floor is cold."
"Senior?" Su Ye projected. "Who are you?"
The spirit opened one sleepy, diamond eye. "I am the Stone-Eater. The Guardian of the Core. Why are you waking me? Did the Sect Leader finally bring the heating pad?"
"The Sect Leader has been dead for five hundred years," Su Ye said.
The badger sat up, blinking. "Dead? Really? Well, that explains why the room service stopped. Wait. If he's dead... why am I still guarding this rock?"
"What is the rock?"
"It's a Concentration Stone," the badger yawned, scratching its belly. "It condenses Earth Qi. Great for digestion. Also great for reinforcing barriers. If you take it, the vault might collapse in... oh, fifty years. I don't care. I'm bored. Take it. Just scratch behind my left ear first. It's been itching for centuries."
Su Ye pulled his hand back. A Concentration Stone. It was exactly what he needed to stabilize the chaotic energy in the Twilight Stable caused by the Basilisk.
He pocketed the heavy stone sphere.
Suddenly, a loud crash echoed from the back of the vault.
"Oops," Gao Ming's voice squeaked.
Su Ye spun around. Gao Ming, in his eagerness to grab the grey cloak, had knocked over a stand holding a rusty spear. The spear had fallen and shattered a ceramic jar on the floor.
From the shattered jar, a black mist began to rise. It swirled, coalescing into a vague, humanoid shape with burning red eyes.
"Intruders..." the mist hissed, the voice sounding like dry leaves skittering on stone. "Defilers of the vault... Die..."
"A Wraith!" Uncle Chen screamed, diving behind a shelf. "A Guardian Wraith! We're dead! Spirit attacks can't be blocked by physical armor!"
The Wraith lunged at Gao Ming. The drama king shrieked, throwing the grey cloak over his head and vanishing from sight. The Wraith looked confused, swiping through empty air.
"Luo Bing! Ice!" Su Ye shouted.
"Ice Phoenix! Frost Breath!" Luo Bing commanded. Her Phoenix, perched on her shoulder, unleashed a stream of cold air. The mist froze slightly, slowing down, but it didn't stop. Wraiths were incorporeal; physical attacks passed right through them.
"Lin Fan! Sonic attack!"
Lin Fan, clutching the twisted Echo Bone he had just looted, slammed it against his bronze gauntlet.
VRRRRRMMMMM.
The sonic wave hit the Wraith. The mist vibrated violently, disrupting its form, but it reformed seconds later, angrier than before.
"It has no biological body!" Lin Fan yelled. "I can't target its organs! It has no bowels to loosen!"
The Wraith expanded, filling the room with a suffocating chill. It raised a spectral hand, preparing a soul-flaying scream that would liquefy their brains.
Su Ye stood his ground. He looked at the terrifying ghost. He didn't have a weapon that could hurt a spirit.
But he had a phone line to the other side.
He sprinted forward, dodging a swipe of black mist that withered the stone shelf it touched. He lunged through the mist, his hand grabbing the center of the Wraith's form, where a faint, cold crystal pulsed.
Zzzzt.
Su Ye didn't see a monster. He saw an old man.
He saw the Ghost of the Vault Keeper, a hunched, elderly human spirit wearing dusty robes, holding a spectral feather duster. He looked incredibly annoyed.
"KIDS THESE DAYS!" the Ghost Keeper yelled in Su Ye's mind, brandishing the duster. "NO RESPECT! TOUCHING THE DISPLAYS! BREAKING THE JARS! DO YOU KNOW HOW LONG IT TOOK ME TO ORGANIZE THE SPEAR COLLECTION? ALPHABETICAL ORDER! BY LETHALITY!"
"Senior!" Su Ye shouted back mentally. "We're sorry! We're the cleaning crew!"
"CLEANING CREW?" The ghost paused. He looked around the dusty vault. "YOU CALL THIS CLEANING? THERE IS DUST ON THE LINTELS! THERE IS MOLD ON THE EAST WALL! AND SOMEONE LEFT A PIG IN THE FOYER!"
"We can fix it!" Su Ye negotiated frantically. "We have a technique! We can remove the dust!"
"PROVE IT!" The ghost crossed his spectral arms. "THAT CORNER. THE COBWEB. IT HAS BEEN THERE SINCE THE MING DYNASTY. REMOVE IT, OR I FLAY YOUR SOULS."
Su Ye snapped back to reality. The Wraith was hovering inches from his face, its hand raised to strike.
"Zhu Zhu!" Su Ye screamed. "The corner! Top shelf! Eat the cobweb!"
The Void Pig, sensing the urgency (and the delicious ancient spiritual energy of the cobweb), launched himself into the air. He bounced off Lin Fan's head, rebounded off a shelf, and unhinged his jaw.
SLURP.
The ancient, magically reinforced cobweb vanished into the pig.
The Wraith froze. It looked at the clean corner. It looked at the pig.
The red eyes faded, replaced by the tired, human eyes of the old keeper.
"Hmph," the Wraith grunted audibly. "Acceptable. Finally, someone who knows how to dust."
The mist began to dissipate, retreating back into the floorboards. "Don't touch the vases on the way out. They are Ming. And wipe your feet."
Silence descended on the vault. The disciples slowly poked their heads out from their hiding spots.
"Did..." Luo Bing whispered, pale as a sheet. "Did you just exorcise a Guardian Wraith by... dusting?"
"I appealed to his professional pride," Su Ye wiped sweat from his brow. "He wasn't a monster. He was a disgruntled janitor. Never underestimate the rage of a man who just wants a clean floor."
"Grab your loot," Su Ye ordered, his heart still hammering. "We're leaving before he finds a smudge on the window."
They scrambled out of the vault, clutching their treasures.
Gao Ming wore the Shroud of the Phantom Stag (which made him semi-transparent).
Luo Bing carried the Heart of the Frozen North (a blue box that radiated intense cold).
Lin Fan held the Echo Bone of the Thunder-Wyrm.
And Su Ye pocketed the Concentration Stone.
As they reached the surface, the fresh night air felt like a blessing. Uncle Chen kissed the ground.
"We survived," Chen wept. "We robbed the Forbidden Vault and we survived."
"We didn't rob it," Su Ye corrected, looking at the stone door as Zhu Zhu burped, releasing a final wisp of red barrier energy. "We just... permanently borrowed some cleaning supplies."
"Master," Lin Fan asked, looking at the strange bone in his hand. "With these items... can we beat the Royal Academy?"
Su Ye looked at his team. They were ragged, terrified, and holding artifacts of immense power that they barely understood.
"The Royal Academy has Golden Rocs and Purebred Lions," Su Ye grinned, the moonlight catching his eyes. "They fight with honor and power. You guys?"
He pointed at Gao Ming, who was flickering in and out of visibility. He pointed at Lin Fan, whose bone was vibrating. He pointed at Luo Bing, whose ice box was freezing the grass around her feet.
"You guys are going to be a nightmare. A confusing, terrifying nightmare."
"Let's go home," Su Ye turned toward the stable. "We have two days to figure out how to use these things without killing ourselves."
As they walked away, deep beneath the earth, the Ghost of the Vault Keeper reappeared. He looked at the empty shelf where the Concentration Stone used to be. He looked at the clean corner.
He sighed contentedly, dusted the empty spot, and faded away. At least the room was tidy.
While Su Ye was robbing graves, the Royal Academy Team was arriving at the VIP Guest Quarters of the Beast Hall.
Their leader, Prince Zhao, stepped out of a golden carriage. He was tall, handsome, and radiated an aura of effortless superiority. On his shoulder perched a Tier-5 Golden Roc, its feathers shining like polished metal.
"Prince Zhao," a servant bowed low. "The bracket has been finalized. Your opponent in the finals will be... The Twilight Stable."
"The Twilight Stable?" Prince Zhao frowned, accepting a towel to wipe his hands. "The comedy act? The ones with the cockroach?"
"Yes, your Highness. They defeated the Liu Family today."
Prince Zhao laughed. It was a pleasant, melodic laugh, devoid of malice but full of dismissal.
"Entertaining," the Prince said. "My cousin, Luo Bing, has fallen far. To associate with clowns..."
He stroked the Golden Roc's beak.
"Prepare the Sky-Dominance Formation. I do not wish to play games with insects. We will crush them in the first minute and end this farce."
The Golden Roc shrieked, a sound that pierced the night sky, promising death from above.
Far away, at the Twilight Stable, Zhu Zhu paused in his eating. He looked up at the sky, ears twitching.
"Hungry," the pig whispered.