A master of both medicine and martial arts, he picked up a beautiful CEO as his wife.

Three days later, Ye Feng went up Heqi Cliff again. This time there were only four people: Ye Feng, Lin Yuqing, Shen Yu, and Qi Zhao.

The stone platform at the bottom of the cliff is still there. The crack is still there, and the stones pressing against the crack were placed there half a year ago and no one has touched them.

They went down through that opening. The nail was still in the hole, and no one touched it.

Nine hundred and eighty-seven steps. This time we walked quickly, taking a little over two hours.

The words on the steps were still there. When Lin Yuqing reached the eighth pair, where Chen Jiu was, she paused, pressed her hand on the words, and then walked on.

The narrow crevice from the landslide was still there. As Ye Feng squeezed through, he touched the rounded stone at the crevice's edge.

A wooden plank had been placed between the two broken steps. The plank was new, nailed to the stones at both ends, and had been erected over the past six months by people coming down from the mountain to deliver supplies.

The delivery was done on the third day of each month. After the twenty-six people went up the mountain, the delivery never stopped—a monthly trip was made to send down rice, oil, salt, and a new quilt.

The old man downstairs never accepted them. The person who gave them the gifts piled them up outside the doorway for seven months, until they formed a small heap.

Ye Feng glanced at the pile of things as he walked past. The rice sacks were covered in a layer of dust.

Down below, the doorway was still there. Ye Feng extinguished the torch.

After three breaths of darkness, my eyes adjusted—the room was still the same, without any light source, yet I could see everything.

The house is empty.

Six months ago, there were twenty-seven people standing here, forming a circle around the hole in the middle. Now that circle is gone, and only twenty-seven shallow marks remain on the ground.

Ye Feng stood at the doorway for a while.

In the past six months, he had seen many houses in Dongyang, Luoxia, and Shapu. But every time he entered this house, the first place he looked at was the same—the ninth spot.

That spot is empty now. The old lady now grows vegetables in a small house with a yard in Tingxue Town.

Only one person remained standing. He stood in his original spot, facing the hole.

The hole is no longer empty. Less than an inch of the nail tip protrudes, and the twenty-seven palm prints around it are still there, though a little darker in color than the surrounding area.

The old man turned around. "You've come."

"Old man."

"You were twenty days slower than I calculated."

Ye Feng stopped. "You've calculated it?"

"I wonder when you'll finally understand," the old man said.

His accent was still so strange, with an upward slant. He'd been standing here alone for the past six months, and his speech had become a little smoother than before.

"I'll give you a six-month timeframe. You used seven months and twenty days."

How did you know I was coming?

"Because when you left last time, I asked you a question."

Ye Feng remembers.

—Do you think you've subdued its entirety?

"I've been thinking about that sentence for the past six months," Ye Feng said.

"What have you come up with?"

"I've come up with two things."

Ye Feng took two steps forward. "First thing: There are many outside. Forty-three wells, nine sea eyes, two thousand years, one gourd per generation."

"The second item—"

He looked up at the hole. "I don't know how much is left down there now."

The old man smiled.

That was the first time Ye Feng had ever seen him smile.

"Sit down," the old man said. "There are no chairs here, so sit on the floor."

Ye Feng sat down. Lin Yuqing sat down next to him. Shen Yu and Qi Zhao stood in the doorway and did not come over.

The old man didn't sit down. He had been standing for two thousand years; he couldn't bear to sit.

"The year I came down here," the old man said, "it was full."

"How do you make it full?"

"It's so full that even if I stand here and raise my hand, I can't reach the lid."

Ye Feng was stunned. "How tall is this house?"

"A little taller than a person. You can reach it by stretching your arm."

"I'm talking about back then," the old man said. "Back then, this house wasn't empty."

"That thing down there is pushing upwards. It pushes up to here—"

The old man raised his hand and placed it on his chest.

"There were 27 of us standing inside it at that time."

"Like a person standing in water, with the water reaching their chest."

The room remained silent for a long time. "And then?"

"It declined year after year after that."

"Slide down to my waist."

"Get down to my knees."

"Back down to my ankles."

The old man lowered his hand. "I counted my steps for the first hundred years of my life. I stopped counting after that."

Why?

"Because the regression is too slow, only one inch every hundred years, it's painful to count."

"Old man."

"Um."

"How did you feel when it retreated?"

The old man thought for a moment. "Lightly."

"light?"

"When it was pressing down, all twenty-seven of us were submerged inside," the old man said. "When you're submerged, you don't have to exert much effort—it supports you up by half."

"For every inch it retreats, our burden increases."

"Later on, it shrunk down to our ankles, and the weight of that cap pressed down on all twenty-seven of our hands."

Ye Feng clenched his fists at his sides. "In other words," he said, "the further you go, the more strenuous it will be for you."

"right."

"The most difficult period was the last few hundred years."

"right."

The old man's tone remained unchanged when he said those two words.

"So the most difficult part was when the nineteenth pair of girls came down."

"The three hundred years she bore for Qi Zhao were heavier than the first thousand years."

Ye Feng slowly stood up. He looked around.

The room was forty-six steps wide and had the same length on all four sides. The ceiling was low, within arm's reach. The ground was stone, dry, and bare.

Empty. "Old man."

"Um."

"Now down here—"

The old man raised his hand and swept it around. The movement was slow, as if he were giving directions.

"See for yourself."

"Look how empty this room is."

Ye Feng stood in the empty room for a long time without speaking. Later, Lin Yuqing spoke.

"Old man."

"Girl."

"Since it's already so empty," she said, "what's the point of hammering that nail in?"

The old man turned to look at her. "It's useful."

"What's it for?"

"It can't get out of the remaining part."

"But what about those outside?"

The old man didn't answer immediately. He looked up at the cover above him for a long time.

"Those outside are scattered."

"One ladleful at a time, scattered in forty-three pits, scattered in nine sea eyes, scattered everywhere in the human world."

"A scattered approach won't get anything done."

The old man's voice trailed off. "But what if it gathers together—"

Before coming up, Ye Feng asked the old man one last question.

Why don't you go up?

The old man answered quickly. "I was the one who sent those twenty-six people up there," he said.

"They should leave. They've been here for two thousand years, enough is enough."

"I'm different."

"What makes you different?"

The old man raised his hand and drew a circle around the empty room.

"I've been standing here for two thousand years."

"When is it full down there, when does it drop to my waist, and when does it drop to my ankles—only I know."

"Those people outside don't know, and neither do you."

He lowered his hand. "So I still have to stand here."

"I'll keep an eye on things for you."

"What are you looking at?"

The old man looked up at the hole. He stared at it for a long time.

"Let's see when it happens."

"From the outside."

"return."