Fourth Prince - Renjie Was Delighted

Ganimedzu-no-kami Renjie was delighted by the progress made on Garrett's upper chest. Bon Bao had been a push-up fanatic at least as long as Renjie knew him – and probably a lot longer by the look and feel of his body. The Gargogryeon muscle hunk liked dropping to the floor and doing twenty push-ups at weird angles (sometimes straight up and down, sometimes with only one hand) as much as he liked flexing. Now Garrett was a push-up fanatic too. In addition, both he and Bon Bao helped the Ministry of Works lift heavy objects.

Overly engineered puzzle box mechanisms took shape.

In addition to the frame inside the entrance corridor, anchored by Rangiku's flared stone corners, the engineers constructed a weird steeple-like mechanism against the pit's stone lip. The top of the steeple was held in place by cables anchored to the frame at the entrance. The base of the steeple included supports which ran through grooves in the wall fashioned by more of Rangiku's magic. The long-term intention was to build several frames and steeples all around the room. That would allow for the construction of elaborate lift mechanisms.

Presently, however, the plan was to allow one person to descend on a primary line with two backups. There were mhoddim practitioners who could fly on billowing wings of silk, like the Empress, or transform their bodies into drifting snow, like Snowblind Tigress, or otherwise descend bottomless pits in complete safety. They were rare. Parsifal came close. All he required was a rough surface. The pit's walls might have qualified, but the Third Prince hadn't returned from whatever side-quest his mother had given him.

No one else on the expedition could fly or transform.

As far as Renjie was concerned, flying or transforming was super cool – but climbers should climb. He wasn't about to say no to backup lines, however.

"What if there's a giant snake monster?" asked Rangiku.

"There aren't any giant snake monsters in Jade Palace Mound," said Renjie.

"You've never been this far in," countered his sister.

"Iba Algi would have warned me if there was a giant snake monster."

"You're putting a lot of pressure on a ten year old girl."

"She's almost eleven."

"Do arguments like this happen a lot?" Bon Bao asked Garrett.

"Every day," replied Garrett.

"Your chest does look good," said Bon Bao.

"Thank you…."

"I'm going down now!" said Renjie.

"Say hello to the giant snake monster!" said Rangiku.

"There is no giant snake monster!"

"I can't hear you!"

"I said there is no giant snake monster!"

Before Renjie encountered a giant snake monster or a bottom, he encountered another big round chamber. It was several hundred feet down. It took a long time to reach it. Then it took a long time to get back up to tell everyone what he'd found. After staring at the pit's featureless stone wall for that long, he felt certain the walls were staring back at him. 

The second time down went more quickly.

Rather than bring everyone, the away team consisted of Renjie, Garrett, Bon Bao, the Minister of Antiquities, and Whisps. When they reached the lower chamber, they swung into it, disengaged from the lines, and left the lines coiled against the lower chamber's inner lip.

The lower chamber differed from the one above in that it wasn't domed, there was only one exit – and that exit was blocked by a door. The door was thirty feet tall and covered with geometric reliefs. The chamber's floor had no obelisks, but was inlaid with geometric reliefs similar to (though less dense than) those in the door. According to Bon Bao, the door was to the west – in the direction of Hell King Hades' Cut. The position of the cables down supported that conclusion.

Renjie stood in front of the door and put his tiny hands on his sharp hips.

"It's too short for giants," he said.

"Giants don't use doors anyway," said Bon Bao. "They just walk through the rock."

"If hobgoblins aren't any bigger than us," said Renjie, "why have such a big door?"

"Maybe it's a service entrance," suggested Garrett.

"A what?" asked Renjie.

"A door the servants use in order to bring boxes of candied apples and bath toys into a palace," said Garrett. "Such doors are usually hidden in the back so people living in the palace who aren't servants don't have to see them. They tend to be large and sturdy in order to accommodate a lot of traffic and diverse package sizes."

"Such things exist?" asked Renjie.

"They do," said Garrett.

"Are you telling me we have a giant door in the back of Plum Terrace Palace?" asked Renjie.

"I am," said Garrett.

"I like the suggestion," said the Minister of Antiquities. "I wouldn't call it a service entrance, however. If this were a storage or staging area, I would expect corridors leading off to storerooms. Also, the inlay work on the floor is exquisite."

"I was thinking we entered this structure up above," said Garrett. "But we didn't enter. We crawled in through a hole in a wall. Maybe this is the entrance."

The Minister put one big hand on a collection of circular reliefs in the door.

"There may be more than one entrance," he said, "but I think you're onto something."

"Can you open it?" asked Renjie.

The Minister's hand flared with force energy. He pushed against the stone, then moved his hand in a slow circle. The rock moved with him. Geometric patterns in the door shifted to accommodate the motion. When he was satisfied with how far he had moved one element, the Minister pulled his hand back and pressed against a larger circle in the center. Once again his hand flared with energy.

A moment passed.

The door split along an irregular line roughly down its center. The two halves rotated into the floor. The walls which had appeared to be adjacent to the door were in fact part of it. Renjie rushed to one side to look at the seam between the actual wall and the rotating door. It was invisible. When the door's reliefs came into contact with the floor, the floor absorbed them as if made of liquid.

"That's amazing!" he said.

"I've opened doors like this," said Bon Bao. "But I just pushed on the middle."

"That works?" asked the Minister of Antiquities.

"I pushed really hard. I don't think they're intended to be locked."

"The main purpose may be to control the flow of air," agreed the Minister.

"The doors I've seen didn't rotate into the floor like that, either," said Bon Bao. "They broke into pieces and scurried back along the walls like bugs. Now that you've opened this door, how would you close it?"

The Minister gestured to a circular pattern in the floor.

"Do you mind if I give it a try?" asked Bon Bao.

Nobody minded. Bon Bao put a foot on the circle and manifested a disk of his own force energy. The door rotated back into place. Renjie crouched down to watch the reliefs emerge from the floor. The effect was indistinguishable from rock rising out of rock-colored liquid. The floor even pulled up slightly as the door emerged. Rather than forcing the door to open again, Bon Bao tried the Minister's approach of moving one of the circular patterns around first.

Beyond the door was a long, straight corridor matching the door's width and height. It ended in a "T" intersection. A door to match the previous one sat across from the straight hall. The perpendicular corridor was less tall and wide. Its far wall contained two smaller doors in each segment.

"I know this!" said Renjie. "On the other side is the Little Queen's Balcony!"

Bon Bao opened the central door. Beyond was a balcony set into the wall of Hell King Hades' Cut. Columns of swirling rock appeared to support the overhanging cliff. An elegant balustrade separated the balcony from the chasm. Though everything was grandiose, it conformed to human or hobgoblin proportions – not those of giants. Carved into the cliff beneath the balcony's center was the head of a beautiful young woman with fairy features.

High up and to the left, Old Keep Bridge spanned the Cut. Many smaller bridges spanned the cut above and below the balcony. Some bridges connected to well-known tunnels. Some connected to tunnels Renjie had explored. Many connected to tunnels that had been sealed from the inside. Renjie had never known how to open giant doors. Even if he knew, he could not have opened the doors on the Little Queen's Balcony. There were no mechanisms to open them from the outside.

"Not exactly an entrance," said Bon Bao. "More of an exit."

"Yes," agreed the Minister. "I'm now thinking this floor served ritual purposes."

"Ah!" said Renjie.

"Ah!" mimicked the Minister.

"Ah, ah, ah!"

"Out with it," said Bon Bao.

"There's another door at the bottom!" said Renjie.

"The bottom of the pit?" asked Bon Bao.

"The bottom of the Cut," said Renjie. "Straight down from here! And half buried in rubble. Well, maybe a little more than half."

He stuck a perfect arm through the balustrade and pointed down.

"It's not exactly straight down," said Bon Bao, looking over the balcony edge. "But it is six or seven hundred feet."

"We don't have to climb," said Renjie.

"Are you suggesting we jump?" asked Bon Bao.

"No, you big silly," said Renjie. "It's on ground level."

"Yes," agreed Bon Bao. "Ground level six or seven hundred feet down."

"I think he's saying we can use the existing roads and lifts to get down from Jade Palace Mound," said Whisps, "then walk along the bottom of Hell King Hades' Cut."

"Can we walk along the bottom?" asked Bon Bao.

"There are paths," said Garrett. "They aren't good paths, and it isn't considered safe…."

"Why not?" asked Bon Bao.

"Falling rocks," said Garrett.

"But if there were an entrance down there," said the Minister of Antiquities, "that would allow us to explore the interior from the top and bottom."

"It won't do us any good if it's another ceremonial exit," said Bon Bao.

"Ground level isn't very ceremonial," said Garrett. "Why didn't you mention this before?"

"I didn't know giant doors could be opened!" said Renjie. "We were looking for ways relics came out so we could go in through something already open!"

"We could keep going down the pit," said Whisps, "and open the door from inside. Then the Ministry of Works would be able to bring in supplies."

"I have to admit," said Bon Bao, "I'd rather walk on the ground than ride a rope down another six or seven hundred feet."

"Some of us will do what Whisps suggests," said the Minister of Antiquities, "in order to explore the interior. There's probably one more level in between here and the ground. However, the Fourth Prince and Bon Bao could go up and out, then down to the door. Bon Bao should be able to open it if it isn't one sided."

"There's a ramp down under Watchtower Thirty Eight," said Garrett. "And a bridge not far from both the tower and Plum Terrace Palace."

He pointed to the relevant locations.

"The three of you can take a couple of engineers from the Ministry of Works," said the Minister of Antiquities. "I agree that ground level isn't ceremonial."

"So you expect the door to be openable?" asked Bon Bao.

"I do," said the Minister. "The engineers can start planning how to make the route safer."