Chapter 201

Chapter 201: Yu-Style Fixed Gate Experiment

Talking things through at the Special Operations Bureau—and waiting for the lab to finish sampling the “umbilical cord”—took longer than Yu Sheng expected. By the time he got home, it was fully dark. The moment he pushed open the door, he saw a horrifying scene that nearly stopped his heart:

Foxy and Irene were huddled at the kitchen door, seriously debating what to make for dinner.

Irene suggested frying eggplant sandwiches and stewing the half chicken in the fridge.

Foxy suggested stewing everything left in the fridge, including two newly bought jars of chili sauce.

When Yu Sheng walked in, they were in the middle of a vote. Irene shamelessly raised six hands.

Foxy raised two hands plus nine tails.

Fortunately, Yu Sheng intervened in time and prevented another fox-destroys-the-kitchen incident. On this peaceful winter night, the Borderland did not explode with a bang.

“Didn’t I tell you not to go into the kitchen when I’m not home?” Yu Sheng said, tying on an apron. “Did you forget the iron-pot-stew-Irene incident? Or the ladle that got burned and warped last time?”

The fox and the doll sat side by side on the chairs near the kitchen door, heads lowered, enduring his lecture like punished children.

Then Irene lifted her head, eyes wide and sincere. “I-I wasn’t going to go in this time. I was just going to remote-command Foxy…”

“I can cook,” Foxy added quickly, raising a hand with careful confidence. “Benefactor, didn’t you say the stew I made last time was pretty good?”

Yu Sheng paused, remembering the mysterious pot of substance the young fox demon had produced. He gave her cooking a sliver of credit—then still shook his head. “Only when I’m home. You’re too easy for Irene to talk into things. The risk of her ‘remote-commanding’ you is too high.”

Foxy nodded immediately. “Oh.”

Irene’s head snapped up. “Hey! Why is my commanding too risky?!”

But Yu Sheng wasn’t listening anymore. He needed to hurry and get food on the table—Foxy had waited half the day on an empty stomach.

While he worked, Irene’s protests at the kitchen door gradually faded. A few seconds later, she strolled in as if nothing had happened. She climbed onto his shoulder and asked, in a tone meant to sound casual, “From the look on your face… did the Special Operations Bureau find something?”

Yu Sheng didn’t even look up. “We found Squirrel’s original name, and confirmed the exact time when the dark angel Anka Aila first descended. There’s a sheet of paper in my pocket. Take a look.”

So Irene climbed down at once, clinging to Yu Sheng’s leg as she rummaged through his pocket with nimble little hands.

Yu Sheng couldn’t help glancing down at her. [She looks more like a Squirrel.]

“…Eighty-six years ago. Zhao Le Le. Eight and a half when she went missing…” Irene unfolded the paper, scanned it, and muttered in a strange tone, “Tsk. You really can’t tell from the photo that she’s now out there twitching and swearing while smoking in the street.”

“It’s been eighty-six years,” Yu Sheng said softly. “She hasn’t been that eight-and-a-half-year-old child for a long time.”

“…Who knows what she’ll become in the end,” Irene muttered. She folded the sheet and stuffed it back into Yu Sheng’s pocket. Then, seeing he’d finished stir-frying the dish, she climbed back up onto his shoulder and reached over to turn off the range hood. “So what’s the plan after dinner? Go straight to the orphanage and tell Little Red Riding Hood and the other guardians what we know now? You’d better think carefully about how you say it. Dark angels are pretty scary…”

Yu Sheng thought for a moment as he plated the food, then shook his head. “No. Their lights-out is 10:30. I’m going to wait until they’re asleep, then enter the wasteland and tell them. That way, once we’ve confirmed the shelter mechanism works, everyone will have more confidence. Bringing up dark angels won’t make them panic too much.”

He carried the plates out. “Before that, you and Foxy are coming with me to the valley.”

“The valley?” Irene tilted her head. “What are we going there for?”

“To finish an experiment I put off earlier,” Yu Sheng said lightly. “There should be enough time. Foxy! Dinner’s ready!”

…

After dinner, Yu Sheng did a quick cleanup, then took Irene and Foxy down to the basement.

Wu Tong Road No. 66 had a surprisingly spacious basement. Like the oversized attic at the top of the building, the underground level took up nearly half the area of the first floor. A staircase in the living room led straight down. Aside from one wall piled with clutter, half the basement was empty.

Yu Sheng came down here even less than he went up to the attic.

He flipped on the light and started digging through the dusty mountain of junk by the wall. Irene watched with wide-eyed curiosity. “Hey, didn’t you say we were going to the valley?”

“Just doing some prep,” Yu Sheng said, not looking up. “I remember seeing it here… ah, found it.”

Under Irene’s shocked stare, he bent down with a grin and hauled up something large.

An old wooden door, with its frame still attached.

Irene gaped. “What do you want that thing for?!”

“Seeing if I can set up a fixed gate,” Yu Sheng said as he carried it out of the pile. “Didn’t I say it last time? Right now, going in and out of the valley depends on me opening a door. It’s inconvenient. I’ve got time, so I want to test whether my idea works.”

He propped the door against the blank wall at the end of the basement, wiped off the dust with a rag, then pulled out a pen and began sketching lines on the floor nearby.

Irene recognized it at a glance: a simple spirit-infusion alchemy formation—also the only kind of alchemy Yu Sheng knew.

She immediately understood what he was trying to do.

“You’re planning to use a physical door as a medium,” she said, voice sharp with disbelief, “and treat the teleportation door you open as an alchemy effect to… solidify it?!”

Yu Sheng nodded. “That’s the plan.”

Irene opened her mouth, then shut it again. Instinctively, she glanced at Foxy, as if looking for backup.

Foxy did not disappoint. Her eyes lit up the moment she heard Yu Sheng’s idea, and she clapped. “Benefactor’s way of crafting follows the heart, taking the path of simplifying the complex to chase the source…”

“Are you serious?” Irene stared at her. “You don’t even understand alchemy.”

Foxy shot back, “Do you understand Benefactor’s netherworld passage?”

Irene choked on her own breath. “…You—”

Yu Sheng didn’t bother stepping in. He kept drawing.

In the end, Irene huffed and marched over. “Fine. I’ll help. You can’t just draw like that—an array this size is already mid-scale. You can’t just enlarge the small one I taught you. Every node needs extra amplification. I’ll show you.”

Yu Sheng hesitated, then handed her the pen. He watched as she added to the rough formation, muttering under her breath while she drew.

“Just drawing isn’t enough. Proper alchemy needs special ink for bigger arrays, but using your blood as the material, that missing step shouldn’t matter much. Watch these runes—these are amplification nodes. Every time the array’s complexity doubles, you add a pattern like this at every intersection…”

Yu Sheng listened, stunned, as Irene struggled to hold a pen that was almost too thick for her small hands.

Then rapid footsteps clattered on the stairs. Two more Irene came down from upstairs—each carrying a pen—and immediately joined in.

Three little dolls darted across the floor, and the large, delicate alchemy array took shape at an alarming speed.

Somehow… Irene looked genuinely happy.

When the base formation was complete, she extended several runes onto the doorframe itself. Only then did she finally straighten up.

“All done!”

With her picture frame slung over her shoulder, Irene turned and said smugly, “That’s the base array. Remember it? Anything with a radius over one meter needs amplification like this. Why are you staring at me?”

“…You suddenly look pretty reliable,” Yu Sheng said honestly. “Like an alchemy expert.”

“I am an alchemy expert!” Irene’s red eyes flared. “And when have I ever been unreliable?! Anyway, I drew your array, but I’m not guaranteeing it’ll work. Nobody’s tried your idea before, and I don’t even know what your teleportation doors really are. Just don’t blow this place up…”

Yu Sheng waved quickly. “Relax. I know what I’m doing. I can sense the entire door-opening process precisely. If it feels wrong, I can stop at any time.”

As he spoke, he pulled out his phone.

At the top of his frequent contacts: Bai Li Qing.

He stared at the name for two seconds, tugged at the corner of his mouth, then hit call.

She picked up quickly.

“Ahem.” Yu Sheng cleared his throat. “Director Bai Li…”

The moment the honorific left his mouth, her cool, calm voice came through the receiver. “Experiment?”

Yu Sheng: “…Yeah.”

“How long?”

“About two or three hours…”

“Fine. I’ve arranged it. Tell me when you’re done.”

Yu Sheng blinked. “Oh, th—wait. How did you know I was going to—”

“Ahem,” Bai Li Qing said. “Honorifics. You’re not usually that polite when you do door opening.”

Yu Sheng: “…Right.”