Chapter 13 — Cave Encounter, Part Two

On the night of the full moon, the stone door opens of a sudden; only the fated may enter.

Before daybreak, remember to leave. Five years hence, the stone door opens again.

As a boy, Wei Zhao had learned seal script from Old Man Wei, so he had no trouble making out the eight lines carved on the stone tablet. Having read them through, he set to puzzling over their meaning.

On the night of the full moon — that was easy enough. Was tonight not the night of the full moon? And "the stone door opens of a sudden" must mean this vermilion stone door. But what did "only the fated" mean? Could he himself be that fated one, the reason he had been allowed inside?

It struck Wei Zhao as wondrous and baffling at once. There seemed nothing special about him. An orphan, taken in by Old Man Wei, he had drifted muddle-headed to the age of eight without ever noticing anything out of the ordinary in himself. Compared with Old Man Wei, at least, there was nothing in which he surpassed the old man.

Still, since he had gotten in, he might as well count himself the fated one.

"Before daybreak" was even simpler: it meant before the sun rose and the sky turned light. "Remember to leave" meant he must be gone before daybreak. Yes, taken literally, that was the meaning.

But what of the last part — "five years hence, the stone door opens again"? Could it mean that if he failed to leave before daybreak, the stone door would close of itself, and the next time it opened would be five years later?

At the thought, Wei Zhao could not help shuddering. Good heavens above — thank fortune he could read seal script. Otherwise he would have sat here like a fool the whole night, and when the door shut behind him, would that not be the end of him? Never mind five years; five days without food or water would be hard enough to survive.

Now that he knew the rules of this cave, so long as he made his way out before daybreak there should be no trouble. At this, Wei Zhao's heart eased a little.

Only then did Wei Zhao take a close look at the great hall. It turned out that all four walls were studded with luminous pearls, which was why the place was bright as day.

Anyone with the least eye for such things could tell that every pearl set in those four walls was priceless; take one out to the market and auction it, and it would fetch a fortune.

But Wei Zhao had grown up in the mountains, and had little taste for gold and jewels. Wondrous and lovely as he found them, he did not suppose they would fetch any great price outside.

The real question was: in these mountains, whom would he sell them to? The richest person around was Widow Wang at the head of the village, who ran a snack shop and a little store and managed to put by over a thousand yuan a year.

But rich as she was, who would spend money on such impractical things? To Wei Zhao's mind, money was better spent on two big slabs of fat pork — now that was fragrant. These luminous pearls were fine to look at but useless; you could not eat them.

So Wei Zhao did not let his eyes linger over the hall's lavish ornaments. Instead he began searching the place in every direction. From the Jin Yong novels he read, he knew that when a man stumbled by chance into some cave or valley, he was bound to come upon a stroke of fortune — a manual of peerless martial arts, say.

At the thought, a thrill ran through Wei Zhao. If he found a manual of peerless martial arts, he would no longer have to suffer the old man's bullying; once he had mastered it, the old man would not dare beat him.

The hall was vast but empty. Apart from the glittering decorations on all four sides, there were only two structures at its center. One was the stone tablet Wei Zhao had seen the moment he entered; behind the tablet stood a raised platform.

The platform much resembled the altar of ancient sacrifice, or the place in a sect where precious things were kept. In any case, it looked exceedingly old — no such structure would be built in modern times.

Wei Zhao gave it no more thought. Two or three strides carried him up onto the platform, and at its very top he saw a small wooden box of antique charm. His heart surged: could this be some sort of scripture casket?

Wei Zhao picked the box up with great care. The moment he had it in hand, he leaped down from the platform and hid himself, for he had heard that such ancient structures were often riddled with traps. He had touched someone's treasure; if a mechanism sprang, he would be in deep trouble.

Yet he waited a long while and nothing out of the ordinary happened, so he let out a quiet breath of relief. Wei Zhao was in no hurry to open the box — after all, the stone door would close before daybreak, and he could open it at home. For now, he decided to use what little time remained to search the cave further.

Skirting the platform, Wei Zhao was astonished to find another stone door behind it, and beside that door a smaller stone tablet, also carved in seal script with eight lines of four characters each, just like the tablet he had seen at the entrance.

Astonished, Wei Zhao hurried to read it closely:

Five years hence, when the divine art first comes to fruition, strike the door with your palm, and only then may you enter.

If your wish is not fulfilled and the divine skill is not yet mastered, wait another five years and come back to try again.

After reading these eight lines, Wei Zhao was utterly baffled. What did "five years from now, when the divine skill is first mastered" mean? Could it be that the box in his hands really contained some secret martial arts manual? And once he had trained in it, he would be able to strike the door with his palm and it would open?

At this thought, Wei Zhao casually pushed at the door, but alas, the stone door did not budge in the slightest. That being so, the last four lines were easy enough to understand as well: "If your wish is not fulfilled and the divine skill is not yet mastered, wait another five years and come back to try again" meant that if he failed to push the door open, it was because his own skills were not yet up to the mark, and he would have to wait another five years, until the stone door opened again, and then come back in and try once more.

Looking at the stone door before him that would not open, Wei Zhao felt a sudden itch of curiosity. By any reasonable reckoning, if the first great hall already held a secret manual of divine skill, then the great hall behind the stone door must surely conceal something even more precious.

It was just that Wei Zhao also understood that with his present abilities it was impossible for him to open the second door. At best he was merely a man of destiny; being able to open the first stone door and enter this great hall was already quite a coincidence.

That being the case, Wei Zhao stopped demanding anything more. Carrying the box he had taken earlier from the high platform, he walked out through the cave entrance. By now the sky was no longer so dark; in the east a faint fish-belly white was beginning to show, the harbinger of the sun rising and daybreak...

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