While other's eyes glead at the treasured cauldrons, Han Yu watched them differently, trying to analyze their placent and what was wrong about them all.
A delicate jade cauldron sat right next to a crude iron furnace. A bronze tripod that should have been suspended on a pedestal was instead shoved into a corner. It was haphazard, ssy… almost intentional.
Han Yu's eyes narrowed. 'Not storage. Not preservation. These cauldrons are not being kept... they're being used.'
Just as the realization crystallized, the excited Core Condensation disciple extended his finger and brushed the lip of the bronze snake cauldron.
Han Yu's heart lurched.
He shouted without thinking, his voice cutting across the chamber like a whip.
"It's a trap! Don't touch it!"
But the warning ca a second too late.
The mont the disciple's skin made contact, a sharp chi rang through the chamber, like a hundred bells struck at once. The cauldron pulsed, and then every single cauldron in the room lit up simultaneously.
Boom!
Streams of light erupted from their surfaces, weaving together into a blinding web. Symbols and lines flared across the walls, floors, and ceiling, forming a complex array that enclosed the chamber like a cage.
"Fall back!" Xuan Qing barked, pulling her junior away just as the bronze snake cauldron trembled and released a burst of searing fla.
Dozens of cauldrons followed suit. Get full chapters from novel⟡fire
So spat fire, others unleashed jets of freezing mist. A few pulsed waves of crushing spiritual pressure that made the very air heavy, while others released piercing shrieks that rattled the disciples' bones.
The chamber erupted into chaos.
"Protect the juniors!" Senior Brother Duan roared, his spear flashing as he cut down a stream of fire hurtling toward Fatty Kui.
Han Yu's heart raced, but he forced himself to think.
'They aren't placed randomly, they're arranged as nodes! Every cauldron is a keystone of the array. Destroying them one by one will only trigger backlash.'
Already, the disciple who had touched the bronze cauldron tried to strike it down, his blade crashing against the tal.
DENGGGG
The cauldron rang like a gong, and instead of shattering, it released a shockwave of force that hurled him across the hall. He slamd into a pillar, coughing blood.
Han Yu clenched his fists. 'Exactly as I thought. Hitting them directly only strengthens the trap.'
Xuan Qing's sword danced as she shielded her companions from streams of frost and fire. "Think! These are alchemical defenses! There must be a pattern!"
Han Yu's gaze swept the room again, this ti ignoring the chaos and focusing only on the positions.
The pedestals. The order. The flow of energy. His breath caught.
'That's it.'
"They're arranged by the Five Elents!" he shouted suddenly. "The jade cauldrons channel wood, the bronze channels fire, the iron channels tal, the black stone cauldrons release water, and the gold-rimd ones anchor earth! They're not random! They're a circuit!"
Xuan Qing's eyes flickered as she looked around. She saw it too, the cauldrons weren't scattered, they were aligned in a greater pattern that cycled qi endlessly through the chamber.
"So how do we break it?" Duan demanded, fending off another surge of frost.
"Not break, redirect!" Han Yu answered quickly. "You can't destroy the cauldrons, they're too reinforced. But if we disrupt the flow between them, the array will destabilize!"
"Which one first?"
Han Yu's mind raced. 'Wood feeds fire, fire feeds earth, earth feeds tal, tal feeds water, water feeds wood…' His eyes snapped to the jade cauldrons at the far wall, their soft green glow feeding streams of energy into the bronze ones nearby.
"Cut the wood nodes first!"
Xuan Qing didn't hesitate. "Everyone! Target the jade cauldrons!"
Her blade flashed, not at the cauldrons themselves but at the glowing inscriptions beneath their pedestals. Sparks flew as her sword severed the etched lines connecting one jade cauldron to its neighbors.
The mont the flow broke, that section of the array sputtered. The flas shooting from the bronze cauldrons dimd, their strength faltering.
"It works!" shouted Wu Shuan, exhilarated.
"Keep going!" Han Yu urged. "Don't touch the cauldrons themselves. Attack the connecting lines! Break the cycle!"
The chamber filled with the sound of blades striking stone, talismans flaring, and qi techniques blasting the etched symbols apart. One by one, the connections snapped.
The five-elent cycle began to collapse.
The array resisted.
The remaining cauldrons flared brighter, trying to compensate, and waves of pressure slamd down on the disciples, threatening to crush them. One of Xuan Qing's juniors staggered, nearly fainting, but Fatty Kui shoved him aside and took the brunt of a freezing mist, his arm frosting over.
"Kui!" Han Yu shouted, but his friend gritted his teeth and shouted back, "Don't mind , I can take it! Keep cutting!"
Finally, with a deafening crack, the last cauldron's connection was severed. The circuit collapsed. The cauldrons shuddered violently, their glow flickering erratically before going dark all at once.
Silence.
The oppressive pressure lifted. The chamber, once a storm of fire, ice, and qi, now stood still again, the cauldrons inert.
The disciples were battered and shaken, so bleeding, so burned, but all alive.
Senior Sister Xuan Qing sheathed her sword with a sharp motion, her face pale with strain. "That… was too close."
Senior Brother Duan exhaled heavily. "If not for the junior's quick eye, we would have been buried here."
Han Yu stayed quiet, lowering his gaze. He had no desire to draw too much praise, but inside, a small thrill ran through him. 'Another step forward. If this is the first chamber, what lies deeper inside?'
Fatty Kui groaned, clutching his frost covered arm. "I… hate cauldrons…"
Despite the tension, a few chuckled weakly.
But the mood was far from light. Everyone knew this was only the beginning.
If the first chamber of the repository was this deadly, what horrors waited in the inner sanctums?
Han Yu's expression hardened. 'Danger or not, I cannot retreat. The alchemist's legacy is here, and I will claim it.'
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