The Legend of Zanghai: Reborn

In the twelfth month of the sixth year of the Zhenshun era, snow still lay thick atop Mount Dancui. Kuai Duo, Chief Astronomer of the Imperial Observatory, walked over the ice to inspect the Fengshan ritual site. The royal project, which had consumed the labor of a hundred thousand commoners, was nearly complete, yet he could not shake the feeling that a pair of eyes was watching him from deep within the mountain.

“My lord, water is seeping into the mine on the southwest side!” Li Zheng, the foreman, came running over, drenched in sweat.

Kuai Duo frowned and followed him. The moment he stepped into the tunnel, a bone-chilling cold seized him. Torchlight revealed winding, dark red patterns on the rock walls. On closer inspection, they looked like overlapping scales. He reached out to touch them. The wall suddenly rang like metal against stone, and a deep blue liquid seeped from the cracks, gleaming eerily in the firelight.

“Get out, now!” Kuai Duo shouted. Before the words had left his mouth, a dull rumble rose from beneath the earth. Dozens of boulders crashed down from overhead, sealing their way out completely. Li Zheng screamed as rubble buried him, while the shock wave hurled Kuai Duo into a hidden cavern.

The cave reeked of rotting corpses. Dozens of bodies clad in bronze scale armor knelt in a circle around a stone platform. Three bronze fish engraved with snake patterns rested upon it, their eyes set with luminous pearls that glowed coldly in the darkness. More disturbing still, each corpse had been carved with densely packed incantations. The lines, traced in cinnabar, were still as bright as blood.

“Tianshu, Tianxuan, Tianji…” Kuai Duo recognized the arrangement of the Big Dipper. As soon as he touched the bronze fish, the stone platform split open, revealing a bottomless pit beneath. A foul wind rushed up, carrying the faint sound of chains dragging across the ground.