Kneeling before the mountain of discarded spirit stones and mining slag, Yue Qingqian maintained an outward appearance of serene concentration. Her eyes were half-closed, her breathing slow and even, as if listening intently to the silent stories held within the ancient debris.
Internally, however, her senses were stretched to their absolute limit. The faint, cold yin aura she had detected was like a single, almost silent note in a cacophony of residual energies. Pinpointing its exact location within the towering pile required immense focus.
She began her "excavation," moving with a deliberate, almost ritualistic slowness. She didn't use any spiritual energy that might seem out of place for someone merely "communing." Instead, she used her bare hands, carefully shifting aside dusty, low-quality spirit stones and chunks of petrified rock. It was slow, tedious work. Dust coated her simple outer robes (worn over her protective purple ones) and smudged her face, but her expression remained one of profound, otherworldly focus.
To any hypothetical observer, she would appear to be engaged in a deeply spiritual act – perhaps seeking a specific resonance, or tracing the flow of forgotten qi lines within the debris. In reality, she was performing manual labor under extreme psychological pressure.
Her fingers brushed against something small, smooth, and unnaturally cold. The yin aura spiked slightly, confirming her target. It was buried about two feet deep.
With painstaking care, she cleared the surrounding debris. Finally, she unearthed it.
It was an orb, roughly the size of a large bird's egg, and appeared to be made of polished black stone. It wasn't perfectly spherical, bearing the subtle irregularities of something once organic. It felt cold to the touch, a deep, penetrating cold that seemed to absorb warmth rather than radiate chill. Held up to the dim light filtering into the cavern, it revealed no luster, only a dead, matte blackness. Yet, deep within its core, her spiritual sense could detect that faint, ancient, serpentine yin signature – the fossilized echo of a long-extinct Shadowscale Viper's eye.
Success!
A wave of relief washed over Yue Qingqian, so potent it almost broke her composure. She quickly suppressed it, channeling the emotion into her performance.
Her eyes slowly opened wide, filled not with the excitement of finding a target, but with the awe of artistic revelation.
"Ah..." she breathed, her voice filled with wonder. She gently cradled the stone orb in her palm. "The whisper... takes form. So cold... so quiet... the memory of shadow..."
She held it up, seemingly examining its non-existent patterns in the dim light, projecting an image of profound discovery.
Now, where were the others? The record mentioned three. Lin Fan had stressed the importance of finding all of them if possible, as duplicating this risky infiltration would be extremely difficult.
Maintaining her meditative air, she allowed her spiritual sense to gently probe the immediate vicinity of where she had found the first eye. If they were confiscated together, they were likely stored together.
Her sense quickly latched onto two more identical, faint auras, buried slightly deeper and a few feet apart within the same debris pile. It seemed luck was truly on their side – the items hadn't been scattered.
With the same deliberate, ritualistic slowness, she carefully excavated the remaining two Serpent's Eyes. They were identical to the first – cold, black, stone-like orbs radiating that faint, specific yin signature.
She now held all three keys to the Ghost Market.
Knowing she couldn't linger – even "meditation" had its limits before arousing suspicion – she prepared to leave. She took out a simple, dark cloth pouch (provided by Lin Fan, naturally lined with basic insulation runes). With a reverence usually reserved for sacred relics, she carefully placed the three Serpent's Eyes inside, handling them as if they were fragile fragments of solidified silence.
She stood up, brushing the worst of the dust from her robes. She took one last, long look around the chaotic cavern, her expression one of peaceful, fulfilled contemplation, as if she had found exactly the "whisper" she was seeking.
Then, with the same unhurried, drifting gait, she exited Sector Gamma-9, the heavy stone door groaning shut behind her, sealing the forgotten things back into their dusty slumber.
She navigated the silent corridors back towards the entrance. The two guards were still there, looking bored. When they saw her emerge, looking dusty but serene, they straightened up respectfully.
Yue Qingqian presented Elder Liu's token once more. As the guard keyed open the energy barrier, he couldn't resist a hesitant question.
"Sage Yue... did you... find the balance you sought?"
Yue Qingqian paused at the threshold, turning back slightly. She looked not at the guard, but through him, her eyes focused on some distant, inner landscape.
"The whispers were quiet," she said softly, her voice carrying that now-familiar enigmatic quality. "But they sang a necessary song. The harmony... is closer now."
With that cryptic pronouncement, she stepped out into the cool evening air of the valley, leaving the bewildered guards behind.
She didn't waste a moment. As soon as she was out of sight of the entrance, she leaped onto her sword, activating a low-level speed talisman Lin Fan had given her. She flew like a shadow back towards the Ninth Peak, the small, heavy pouch containing the Serpent's Eyes clutched tightly in her hand.
The components were almost gathered. The construction could soon begin in earnest. But first, she had to deliver the keys to her waiting Senior Brother.