Chapter 21: Locked in the Cavern

The dimly lit cavern trapped Moon’s breath in a suffocating, burning smell of ozone and dried herbs mixed with damp earth and sulfur.

Small, unglazed arched windows in the stone wall overlooked the vast dark sky, declaring the absolute dead of night outside.

Moon lifted his arm to cover his eyes to adapt to the cave’s air.

The floor underneath him slowly crept out with another set of array lines, lighting up with a purple shine.

"Spit it out," the crisp voice echoed from the cavern wall, sending an eerie feeling through Moon.

He looked around, finding himself without any silver shackles or chains. But still, he could not move his knees from the ground.

’A locking array,’ Moon observed as he looked up at the Witch. He didn’t answer her, but his eyes searched around the room.

A witch was more similar to mages than wolves, and they shared common interests—like the cauldron hanging on the wall and the glowing green moss. Moon had been searching for them for a while with his divine sense without any success.

But here, she had almost everything, even more than he needed right now. He squinted his eyes at the cauldron’s dark body. There was no engraving from any formation master or weapon refiner, but there was a simple array of distillation.

’This world’s hierarchy is either incomplete or they never knew the use of inscription for a spiritual cauldron.’

"Don’t look at what is not yours. It will only hurt your pathetic, poor self." The crisp voice rang again with a mocking sneer.

"Why don’t you give me one?" Moon asked, as if asking for a wild hibiscus flower.

The witch’s face became taut as her eyes narrowed. "Give you one? You have to spit out the array scripture you have stolen first."

"It’s mine."

"Hah! How can a mere rogue human like you have a summoning array?" She paced leisurely. "Don’t be delusional, boy. Give it back to the witch community. We will forgive your presumptuous act."

"Presumptuous act? You’re the one robbing me."

The Grand Witch’s pace halted. In a flash, she was in front of Moon. Her halberd came down on Moon’s neck even faster than he could blink. A sharp pain chilled his skin as the blood trickled down from his neck. His eyes widened.

"Last warning, lad. Don’t try to be smart. We know how a rogue like you gets his hands on an array." She stepped back, looking down at Moon as if he were a crawling little insect.

"Steal but will not admit... the fact that we haven’t ground you into the mud is only by our good grace. Take it out, or the next slash will go straight through your flesh."

Moon raised his brows.

He didn’t know his mere adapted array could attract such a grand witch. Was this world’s witch community that useless? He wondered.

"I don’t have any scroll. It’s in my mind."

"Draw it."

A brown, jagged paper flew in front of him along with a bark-like brush, its tip oozing out a black substance that gave a ghastly feel.

Moon figured it was something made by the witch to make the lines permanent and indestructible.

He lifted his wrist and could not help but praise the witch’s intelligence; she only trapped his lower half while giving freedom to his upper body.

He lifted his wrist but halted.

"Will you let me go if I give it to you?"

The witch sneered. "I will not hold you accountable only for the stolen array."

"Give me that cauldron." Moon pointed to the black cauldron hanging from the stone wall beside the roots of the ancient tree that gripped the entire cavern like a guardian of the mountain.

The witch’s halberd hit the floor, forcing Moon to prostrate heavily on the ground.

A dark, ominous pressure weighed down on Moon’s back.

After a moment, the pressure lifted, and a small cauldron flew into his face as soon as he lifted his head. It hit his nose squarely.

Moon heard the breaking sound of the soft bone of his nose.

"Damn it, do you have to be so mean?" he cursed, holding his nose.

’They are just jealous of my beauty,’ he comforted himself, looking at the cauldron in front of him.

The witch scoffed in contempt. This boy is clearly going to die; what’s the difference between having a cheap, defective cauldron and not?

Moon hurriedly drew the array in a few strokes.

The paper flew to the witch, but in the next few seconds, the temperature in the cavern surged with the witch’s flaring fury. She flashed in front of him and shoved the paper into Moon’s face hard. The force pushed Moon backward. His knees cracked sharply against the array’s hold as his torso bent in an arch.

The witch loomed over his face.

"You think you can fool me? What I want is not the broken array you drew at the Last Hole, but the full one."

Moon’s eyes dilated.

’Fuck! This old witch is more observant than I thought.’

Her long nails dug into his head suddenly.

The witch’s eyes narrowed dangerously and glowed purple as she sent her spell inside Moon, trying to force out his hidden secrets.

Moon convulsed.

’No, no, no, Moon. Don’t use your power yet. Calm down. You need it on the day of execution.’

He desperately tried not to use his Qi and forced his mind not to waver. He thought of his mother, thought of the bizarre intimacy of his fated mates, and he forced himself to think of Leo and curse him to death.

After what felt like eternity, he broke out in a cold sweat and shouted in agony, "I will tell, I will tell... let me go."

The pressure lifted immediately.

The nails shrank back.

The witch hid her fierce, confused, and fearful look while Moon was gasping. She hadn’t succeeded in entering Moon’s consciousness at all; it was blocked out by something she couldn’t fathom.

"You should have been obedient from the beginning." She hissed through her teeth.

Moon pulled himself back onto his knees.

His spine was aching.

He shivered on the floor for a moment, then confessed with sincerity, "I really don’t have the full array. That fragment was all I had."

The witch did not force him further but went to a stone wall packed with jars of glowing moss, preserved animal organs, wolfsbane tincture, and ancient grimoires bound in leather.

She rummaged through them and took out a tiny potion bottle. She fed it to Moon.

"Say it again."

Moon savored the bitter taste; his mind was racing.

His very instinct told him to speak the truth.

’Truth-revealing poison? Not that bad,’ he thought, as he said the same thing again.

The Grand Witch swept her cape as she disappeared through the cavern’s door, leaving Moon behind.

Moon clutched the cauldron to his chest, sitting on the floor. His eyes darted around the room, an evil glint flashing on his lips.

Deep beneath the palace, built into the very bedrock of the mountain, a figure was almost crawling in neck-level water. He took a dip and swam another thirty meters in a flash before popping up to breathe. His usual slicked-back silver hair was now sliding over his ears, dripping clean water, and his grey eyes were flickering with excitement.