The Emperor’s Daily Nitpicking - CH 23.3

The eyes of those who had felt like they were about to die suddenly came to life, and they picked up speed like the final radiance of the sun, urging the people in front of them. “Quick, quick!”

Kevin reached out and touched the stone platform at the top of the hill. Then, he flipped up to the peak with the force of his short sword and turned around to pass his hand to Ben, who was following closely behind.

One by one, the group climbed up and then fell to the ground with their arms and legs spread out like dead dogs, panting rapidly.

Kevin sat down too, bending one leg and resting his elbow loosely on his knee while he fanned himself with the other hand.

The ground was wrapped in a layer of snow that wasn’t too thick or too thin. It had been trampled on so much by something that it was on the verge of being pressed into ice. The group lazily cooled off on the ice for a while, not wanting to move a single finger.

After almost freezing into a human stick, they finally sat up successfully, asking, “Where do we walk next?”

The young lion, Ben, was still young and energetic. Soon, he became lively again and strolled around the surrounding.

Because it was high and straight, the mountain looked a little thin on the outside, as if it was only the size of the tip of a pin when you reached the top. But after climbing up, they realised that the mountain was quite vast.

The summit was much larger than they had expected, and it was not flat but somewhat rocky and rugged with layer upon layer, making it easy to get dizzy and confused after a couple of turns.

Ben didn’t dare run far and returned to Kevin’s side after a quick glance around. “I’ve taken a look around, but I didn’t see anything like the Eternal Waterfall.”

Kevin waved his hand at him, saying, “Don’t be anxious. You guys can take a break first. You can take out those carried rations to eat for a while. I’m not sure when we will have the time to eat again later.”

Everyone was frightened by his words. “What did you men not sure when there is a chance to eat again?! Could it be that we’re entering the god’s tomb soon? But there wasn’t even a ghost of a shadow of the god’s tomb?!”

Kevin also didn’t bother to explain. He was afraid that they would get a stomach ache and not be able to eat afterwards.

He took some eagle’s food out of his leather bag and sprinkled it around the ground in a thin circle. And then, he slapped the officer who liked to ask questions on the back, saying, “Nick? Take out the dried meat in your bag. I’m almost dying from hunger.”

Nick let out an “oh” and simply flipped his rucksack upside down. The dried meat wrapped in a greaseproof paper bag rolled to the floor. Kevin nonchalantly peeled away the greaseproof paper, picked up a strip of meat strips and swallowed it in three bites.

It had taken them most of the day to climb the Whitehead Hill. They had set out at dawn, and by the time they reached the top, it was well past midday. With the amount of physical exertion, the men were already famished.

The sun was half blocked by greenish-black clouds so that only a faint glimmer of light could be seen. The sky was dark and looked as if it might rain.

The wind was dry and strong at the top of the mountain. The only good thing was that flying insects seemed to vanish, so they didn’t worry about getting bites. Kevin ate three strips of meat in a row before slowing down and chewing on the fourth one.

Just as he had the last bite left, an eagle’s cry came from a cloud off to the side and caught Kevin’s attention.

He had just turned his head when he saw the white eagle, which had been sent to deliver the message earlier, follow the eagle’s food smeared all the way up to the top of the hill and swooped into his arms with a flap of its wings.

Kevin: “…..”

He wasn’t quite sure how the palace had been raising eagles these past few years. Somehow, they were cute and silly, swooping down on people until they got feathers all over their mouths.

The white eagle seemed very humane and stretched out a small leg, shaking the small metal cylinder tied to it.

Kevin straightly shoved the last bit of dried meat into its mouth and pulled a rolled-up piece of parchment out of the cylinder.

Before setting off for the journey, he had agreed with Oswald that he would report back every process he took to make it easier for the palace to have a long-distance control, preferably with a location, a route and the method into the tomb.

Being a lazy man, Kevin felt it would take too much time to explain everything, so he came up with the “picture method,” thinking it would be simple and easy to understand at a glance.

Oswald’s reply was even more obvious. It didn’t even have a picture, just two lines of scribbled text: What a filthy eyesore you drew. If you keep scrawling bullshit, I’ll break your limbs when you return.

Kevin: “…..”

No, what was the filthy thing? Even an eyesore?

He stared at the emperor’s overly arrogant little note for a while before sneering: Is he itching because he’s too far away and I couldn’t beat him up? After all, who will break whose limbs?”

Kevin didn’t even think twice before pulling another small piece of parchment from his leather bag and quickly scribbling on it – didn’t let me draw? Who cares about you…..

He still didn’t feel like explaining the process in little scribbles and long paragraphs. Instead, he drew an even cruder Whitehead Hill, blotted a black dot on the peak, drew an arrowhead, and concisely marked it with a word: “hole.” He wrote a line with a flourish underneath it: Arrived at the peak. Enter from the hole.

This bastard had no self-awareness and no objective knowledge of his literary skills. After a brief examination and feeling no problem, he rolled it up and put it back into the small cylinder tube, letting the white eagle continue to send the message.

The white eagle ate enough food before drinking a little water. After enough resting, it left like a lord.

Only Ben, with a strip of dried meat dangling in his mouth, blankly asked Kevin. “What is the thing you drew just now?”

“Whitehead Hill,” Kevin said without blushing. “Can’t you tell it?”

Ignoring that bullshit for a moment, Ben tilted his head and said, “Why did you draw a dot on the peak, saying it’s a hole? Is there a hole in this summit? Why didn’t I see it just now?”

Kevin waved his hand, saying, “Behind that rock. Don’t be anxious. Anyway, we have to go in from there later.”

Ben didn’t realise what he meant by that and said “oh” with a regular expression.

It was only twenty minutes or so later that Ben fully comprehended the meaning of “we have to go in from there” as the group stood around the large hole.

They had heard countless legends about Whitehead Hill and the Eternal Waterfall in all their years of life. Every time they imagined it in their minds, they had subconsciously put it on top of the mountain or halfway up the hill. It never occurred to them that the waterfall could actually be embedded in the mountain.

Whitehead Hill looked marvelling tall on the outside, but it was also admiring on the inside – because it was hollow in the middle.

There was a huge hole at the top of the mountain, and you could see to the bottom when you looked over the edge of it, like a deep natural well growing in the ground. The so-called Eternal Waterfall was located at the “bottom of the well.”

As to why the stream at the bottom of the well could be called a waterfall…..

That was because there was a giant pit at the bottom of the well. That pit didn’t look quite natural since there was a flight of steps at its edge that spiralled down towards the cave. If not because of the looming danger, it looked a little like the circular fountain with steps around its borderline in the square of the central temple of St. Andis at first glance.

Only, it was not as gentle and quiet as the fountain. A massive stream of water rushed from all sides of the steps and poured straight into the black hole in the middle, forming a huge whirlpool in the centre because of the turbulence.

Ben and Nick listened for a moment as they lay dumbfounded by the tunnel entrance.

The sound of rushing water inside, pounding back and forth through the mountain walls, became especially loud like a whizzing gale going full speed, shaking one’s heart to the core.

“What method did you mean to go in from here?” When Nike asked, his lips were slightly trembling.

Kevin – beast – Fassbinder boldly pointed at that whirlpool. “Jumping in.”

Ben was stunned on the spot.

***

As they stood with two trembling legs at a thousand metres high place and got ready to kill themselves, Oswald was made slight progress at the northern end of the Wujinxuan Palace after he finished running through the Medical Institution, Priest Institution, and the three legion camps. He had managed to get some time off in the afternoon and planned to take a short break to refresh himself.

In the end, he dreamed up some bloody scenes in a short period. To sum it up, it could be brief in one sentence – several ways in which Kevin died.

Either he was shot by a sharp arrow from the mechanism in the god’s tomb and nailed to a tall stone statue, or lost his footing from a high place ……he was stabbed through the heart without exception.

Each dream ended with Kevin’s blank expression; the corners of his mouth overflowed with flowing blood. The blood seeped out from beneath him slowly to quickly, dripping everywhere in a shallow pool of crimson in the blink of an eye.

And then, the black pupils in those beautiful eyes dilated slowly and clearly……

Oswald’s fingers twitched, and he jerked awake again. A cold sweat had steamed out of his body at some point, and it felt cold, sticky, and uncomfortable when blown by the wind brought in from the window.

He lay for a few moments due to low blood pressure before finally wiping his face and rolling over to sit up. He then pulled open the bedside cabinet door with a depressed look and fished out the crumpled parchment with the Whitehead Hill picture, squinting at it for a moment.

Or else…..

An idea flashed in his heart, but his shaking head soon dismissed it.

When he just decided to get down from the bed, the commander of the patrolling guard, Peter, knocked on the door. “Your Majesty, there’s an urgent report.”