On the throne coiled a crimson jade dragon. With a single glare from its wolf-like eyes, the dragon’s body immediately erupted in a cascade of strange, flowing light, with rolling crimson radiance surging forth—it was entirely filled with quicksilver. However, this hollow quicksilver dragon was not the most peculiar thing; what truly captured our attention was its forward half.

Only a small section of the dragon’s body, including its tail, rested upon the throne, its head plunged into the wall. The tail and the two claws rested upon the back of the seat, projecting an air of languid indolence. The majority of the dragon’s body was embedded in the rear wall of the throne, undulating in relief and merging seamlessly with the painted murals on the hall walls, lending the entire fresco a powerful sense of depth without any jarring incongruity. Its conception was bizarre, and its craftsmanship was exquisite, reaching a state of perfection. The adage goes, "A divine dragon shows its head but hides its tail," yet this dragon on the throne and wall showed its tail but hid its head, as if this hollow jade dragon of quicksilver was coming to life, flying into the painting.

The grand mural integrated with the dragon’s body depicted the scene of King Xian ascending to immortality in heaven. In the painting, immortal clouds billowed like a sea, fragrant smoke curled and swirled, and distant peaks and palaces emerged faintly from the mist, the clouds, mists, and mountains brimming with vital spirit. The most prominent feature, the crimson jade dragon, reared its head upward toward the sea of clouds, where the sky split open with a crimson rift, half of the dragon's head already piercing through. The dragon’s body connected to the throne in the hall of the "Lingyun Heavenly Palace," and a crown prince, surrounded by his court officials, was stepping upon the dragon’s body, slowly ascending into the heavens.

This monarch was likely King Xian. He was significantly taller than ordinary men, clad in a wide-sleeved, round-collared mangpao robe, cinched at the waist with a jade belt, and topped with a golden crown. Embedded in the crown was a bead that resembled a human eye—it was unmistakably the appearance of the Muchen Pearl.

The king sported three strands of long beard; it was difficult to discern his exact age, nor was his countenance overly fierce, differing from our prior assumptions. I had always imagined a tyrant to have a face full of coarse flesh and a beard bristling aggressively, yet the depiction of King Xian showed a demeanor solemn and serene. I surmised that it had likely been deliberately beautified.

At the highest point of the mural, an old man rode a celestial crane. With snowy white hair and beard and a gentle smile, he bowed his head, looking down. Behind him were countless ethereal immortals, all possessing otherworldly grace. Though their postures varied, their expressions were uniformly deferential, awaiting King Xian as he trod the dragon’s body towards the Celestial Court.

I was stunned speechless. It turned out that the so-called "Heaven’s Collapse" referred to the scene of the Immortal King achieving true immortality, rather than any question of whether outsiders could enter the profound palace and underworld hall. This matter must have been extremely confidential, known only to King Xian’s most trusted confidantes.

In the corner of the main central mural, there were two smaller paintings, both depicting the offering of sacrifices during King Xian’s ascent to heaven: bodies burned in bronze tripods, a sight so gruesome we did not linger for a closer look.

Fatty remarked, "According to this mural, King Xian must have already flown to heaven to become an immortal and roam freely. It seems we’ve come on a wild goose chase. The earth-palace beneath the king’s tomb is probably empty by now. I say we might as well chisel out this dragon, burn this Heavenly Palace to the ground, and hurry back to find a buyer for this jade dragon to make a fortune, then eat and drink to our hearts' content."

Shirley Yang countered, "No, this is just King Xian’s persistent, self-willed delusion during his lifetime. How could such a mortal ever achieve immortality in this world?"

I agreed with Shirley Yang’s assessment and said to the two of them, "We’ve reached the summit of the royal tomb; there’s no reason to turn back now without entering the earth-palace to raid the treasures. Besides, haven't you noticed what’s set into the golden crown worn by King Xian in the painting? That is precisely the Phoenix Gall that can save our lives."

After a brief discussion, the three of us decided to first search this entire "Lingyun Palace," then ascertain if the breach in the pool was indeed the passage to the earth-palace. After that, we would begin the operation overnight. Regardless, seeing is believing. We would only give up once we had turned over every artifact in that underworld palace and still hadn't found the Muchen Pearl—that would be fate’s decree. This is what is meant by exhausting human effort and accepting destiny.

Before the Qin Dynasty, palaces served as the core facilities integrating large-scale sacrificial rites and political rule, possessing diverse functions. It wasn't until the Qin era that they were established separately purely as the emperor's residence, situated behind the administrative front court.

As for the Minglou (Spirit Tower) atop an emperor's tomb, its rear hall should have been a Hall of Sacrifice, not a sleeping quarter. It should contain numerous inscriptions and murals extolling virtues, for later generations to worship and behold.

None of us had ever seen what a Qin palace looked like, but the "Lingyun Heavenly Palace" should resemble the "Epang Palace" of the Qin era. While it certainly couldn't match the scale of the Epang Palace, said to take three months to burn down, it might surpass it in conceptual ambition. After all, Qin Shi Huang was the most fervent emperor of antiquity obsessed with alchemy and immortal cultivation, yet the First Emperor likely never dreamed that one of his subordinates would construct a Heavenly Palace as a tomb, far more magnificent than his own Qin Mausoleum.

Having reached an understanding, we turned towards the rear hall. I lingered at the back, unable to resist glancing back one last time at the bronze figures and beasts in the center of the grand hall. A profound sense of doubt still gnawed at me; I felt something was off, an indefinable sense of disharmony.

When I turned around, I saw Shirley Yang standing still, waiting for me. Her expression suggested she had arrived at the same thought but hadn't pinpointed exactly what was wrong. I shook my head at her; no need to dwell on it for now. Things would sort themselves out when the time came. We then walked side-by-side toward the rear hall.

Passing through a short corridor, we entered a hall in the rear palace that was even gloomier and darker. Inscriptions along the corridor indicated this latter section was called the "Shangzhen Hall." The hall was lined with numerous steles, featuring eight separate walls of murals. Although the hall was deep, the density of the stone steles and mural walls made it feel slightly cramped—a passage, perhaps, that was necessarily compact. The eight mural walls were arranged in a nine-palace Bagua formation. Each wall was constructed of large bricks, all white-based with three-color paintings.

With the exception of some murals depicting battle scenes, nearly every brick held a single image, perhaps one or two figures, or two or three animals, structures, or implements, covering the political, economic, cultural, diplomatic, military, sacrificial, and ethnic domains of the Dian Kingdom during King Xian's reign.

For scholars studying segmented history, these might be priceless treasures. But for tomb raiders like myself, they offered little immediate use. I only hoped to find information regarding the subterranean palace of the royal tomb within them, yet the sheer volume made my eyes swim, far too much to process at once.

The murals on these eight walls numbered in the thousands. Combined with the stele inscriptions in the hall, the entire space was a comprehensive historical archive of the Dian Kingdom. Shining my 'Wolf Eye' flashlight, I skimmed through a few of the larger murals, with Shirley Yang offering a brief explanation, allowing me to grasp about eighty or ninety percent of the content.

The large murals were epic chronicles of warfare, recording two major campaigns led by King Xian during his lifetime. The first was against the "Yelang Kingdom"—both 'Yelang' and 'Dian' were regarded as southwestern barbarians during the Han Dynasty. The second war occurred after King Xian broke away from the ruling structure of the "Ancient Dian Kingdom," where he massacred the local indigenous people at the foot of "Zhelong Mountain."

Both wars were overwhelming victories, resulting in heavy enemy casualties and the capture of numerous prisoners and spoils. The social structures of their two opponents at the time were still in the late stages of slavery, and their means of production were extremely backward and primitive. Their bronze smelting technology was far inferior to that of the Dian people, who inherited Qin techniques. Consequently, they collapsed upon first contact; they were no match for the Dian forces.

These captives, including a large number of slaves, became the primary labor force for constructing the royal tomb later on. Naturally, the murals and inscriptions highly publicized these achievements.

However, the murals provided no description of the royal tomb's earth-palace. One wall featured murals of sacrificial rituals, including inviting celestial omens, divination, and shamanic rites. The scenes were bizarre beyond measure. Shirley Yang photographed all these murals with her camera, remarking that they might prove useful later when deciphering the secret of the Muchen Pearl.

Fatty, finding the rear hall filled with such material utterly uninteresting, wandered around inside, shining his flashlight while carrying his submachine gun. Suddenly, in the center surrounded by the mural walls, he discovered something and hurriedly called for Shirley Yang and me to come and look.

On the floor in the very center of the hall stood a massive, six-legged bronze ding (tripod cauldron). It was covered with a bronze lid, and on either side was a huge bronze ring. The six legs of the ding were shaped like six half-kneeling divine beasts. Their forms were vigorous and ancient, their musculature knotted beneath scaly skin, all frozen in a roaring posture. In terms of design, they bore a strong resemblance to creatures like the Qilin.

This ding was extraordinarily large, and for some unknown reason, it had been painted entirely black, devoid of any decorative patterns. In the dark palace, we had only noticed the inscriptions and murals. It was only when Fatty wandered to the center and called us over that we finally saw it; otherwise, this colossal cauldron, blended into the darkness, would have been difficult to spot.

Fatty tapped the body of the vessel with the butt of his IAI gun. A dull echo resonated immediately. He asked Shirley Yang and me, "Could it be that there were too many funerary artifacts, and the earth-palace couldn't hold them all, so they were temporarily stored here? It might be worth opening it up to check."

Shirley Yang said, "This must be the massive cauldron prepared for boiling corpses during the sacrificial rites. The mouth of the ding is still sealed. This suggests King Xian did not achieve 'corpse dissolution and immortal ascension.' His remains must still be in the sarcophagus within the earth-palace; otherwise, there would be no need to seal this giant cauldron."

I told Shirley Yang and Fatty, "Heaven knows what this thing was used for. If it were a ritual vessel for cooking humans, cattle, or sheep as sacrifices, it should be a fu (cooking vessel), not a ding. Furthermore, this probably isn't a weng or ding at all—how could a ding have six legs?"

Each of us held stubbornly to our own theory, unable to convince the others. We decided to see the truth for ourselves. This time, we had a purpose: to find the Muchen Pearl, and we wouldn't overlook any suspicious object. The black bronze ding was within easy reach. I took out the Underworld Probing Claw, used for opening coffins, from Fatty’s backpack and scraped away the sealing wax on the cauldron's mouth. I saw an impression on the wax: a criminal whose collarbone was pierced by chains. Since there was an imprint, it meant it had never been opened.

After scraping away the sealing wax, I tested the opening with the fine needle on the tip of the probing claw. There were no further interlocking obstructions; the lid could simply be lifted off. I called Fatty over to help. As the two of us gripped the bronze rings and strained, we heard a sound echoing from the depths of the deathly silent palace: a series of "Heh, heh, heh, heh" laughter. It sounded like a woman, but her laughter was cunning and cold, undeniably malicious. The sound was like ice and frost, capable, it seemed, of freezing the heart.