Chapter 259

Chapter 260: The Second Door

So that settled it.

Soon the staff found the “vessel” Yu Sheng had asked for: a door salvaged from the Orphanage ruins. It was iron, double leaf, an inch and a half thick, with a frame three and a half meters wide. It was so heavy an average adult could not push it; they used a crane to set it up, and it stood there like a wall.

Yu Sheng stared, then hurried to explain to Li Lin that he wanted a plain, normal door, the kind a small student could push: “Not this heavy security door that looks like the entrance to some big boss’s secret base. Sure, it looks cool, but without a power assist the Cursed Children won’t be able to budge it.”

“Ah, I misunderstood,” Li Lin said, rubbing his nose in embarrassment: “When I heard it was a portal connecting the Valley and reality, I pictured the bureau’s customs gates. I even thought, if this door wasn’t big enough, I’d call a leader and get Engineer Sun over.”

Yu Sheng and Irene spoke in unison: “Spare Engineer Sun!”

Laughing awkwardly, Li Lin waved it off. He had the crane return the heavy triple-proof door that used to sit under the Orphanage, then after a short wait a normal door was delivered to the Open Ground.

It was an old iron door, black-red, with ironwork decorations that screamed twenty years out of date and some colorful stickers. They brought it with the frame and leaned it against a surviving brick wall on the Open Ground.

“Hey, that’s the old door from the big office in the east building,” Rapunzel said at once: “I even put that sticker on it!”

Yu Sheng nodded, satisfied: “This will do. Next comes the alchemy setup. Irene, watch me and correct me. I’ll try drawing the one you taught me, the kind with the Augmentation Node Technique.”

He took a piece of chalk, set Irene down to the side, and began drawing a complex alchemy formation with amplified nodes in front of the door. The chalk, by the way, came from Foxy. Her tail really had everything. [Why does she keep a box of chalk in there? Surely not for snacking, right?]

Li Lin stood nearby, eyes wide with curiosity. With permission, he pulled out his phone and started recording video. He knew this footage might land straight on the Director’s desk. Yu Sheng himself might not realize it, but this material could keep the Technical Department working overtime for a week.

It was the Special Affairs Bureau’s first close, direct record of “Entity Yu Sheng” opening a portal and fixing it to a real-world vessel.

Out of the corner of his eye, he saw agents who had patrolled the perimeter now gathering nearby. Big and small detectors were already on, logging every tiny change happening on the Open Ground.

Li Lin felt a little guilty. Even though Yu Sheng had said it was fine to watch and even film, a whole team crowding around with scanners did feel a bit rude. He worried Yu Sheng might get annoyed. But after watching for a while, he saw why Yu Sheng didn’t mind at all.

Yu Sheng was drawing the most basic soul imbuement rite, even a simplified version.

Li Lin could do this too. They taught it in the basic classes. Not only field agents but even folks in the office like Ren Wen Wen knew it.

The “auxiliary materials” from the bureau arrived. Li Lin watched Yu Sheng pick a little for the formation and then stuff the rest straight into the fox tail.

He lit candles at the formation’s basic nodes. The flames wavered in the open air, but with crystal dust, essential oils, and tea powder sprinkled in, the flames steadied at once.

Foxy crouched outside the formation, watching her benefactor draw while munching a skewer of grilled mushrooms. The smell was so good that Rapunzel walked over and asked, smiling: “Give me a bite?”

Foxy hugged the mushrooms to her chest, bared her teeth, and let out a warning growl.

Rapunzel didn’t mind. She had teased Foxy the same way at the barbecue before, so she just grinned and backed off: “Fine, keep it.”

“Back up a bit, both of you, especially you, silly fox, and don’t drip oil on the lines,” Irene said as she paced inside the formation, checking and occasionally pointing things out to Yu Sheng: “Hey, you missed a stroke here. Add it. Usually this part can’t be added later, but since you never explain your reason when you do alchemy, you can add it now.”

The scene had zero “professional” vibe.

Li Lin held it in for a long time and finally couldn’t: “So… that’s it? You fix a portal to reality like this?”

“This is only the first step,” Yu Sheng said.

Li Lin let out a breath: “I figured. Back when I learned-”

“The second step is to add the final ingredient,” Yu Sheng said.

He pulled out his treasured knife and started sawing at his own hand.

Li Lin blinked: “…?”

“Foxy, bite me,” Yu Sheng said, setting the knife down with a sigh as the fox maiden, finished with her mushrooms, looked over: “I really need a new blade.”

“Okay!” Foxy hurried over, opened wide, and bit down on his wrist. Her sharp teeth sank in with a wet sound. She was used to her benefactor’s strange traits now. Biting him no longer made her flinch.

Yu Sheng guided his blood into the door and performed the truly important last step.

[Think.]

[Think hard.]

[Picture the matching Door in the Valley slowly taking shape.]

He could have built the matching door in the Valley first and then opened this side. The result would be the same when they linked up. But he was lazy, and the Valley responded to his remote control anyway. [One less trip is one less trip.]

A faint scraping came from the plain iron door’s sides. The candle flames on the ground jerked as if tugged by something unseen and then shot up.

Still dazed a moment ago, Li Lin jolted as he saw the door grow and change.

From both sides of the door, structures like living tissue spread out and fused with the brick wall. The wall rippled and swelled, and as the door seated itself firmly, a hard rock-like skin formed on the surface.

Suddenly a thought, or rather a knowing, crashed into his mind: [This Door is alive.]

All that messy alchemy and those materials hadn’t mattered at all. The footage they had recorded and the data from the detectors meant nothing. Only the last step mattered, and no instrument could track or analyze it. Everything changed when Yu Sheng gave the door his blood and, with one hand on it, closed his eyes to think for a few seconds.

Yu Sheng turned the handle.

The newborn Door let out a silent cheer in the real world. The living, wall-fused structures throbbed and swelled in dimensions humans could not observe, and a first heartbeat sounded.

Then the Door offered its creator a view of a faraway place.

Snow White and her seven Thunder Titans stood on the other side. A girl with smooth Rapunzel-like hair in a light blue dress peeked curiously at the threshold. She was the Mermaid, with the proud King perched on her head.

“Sister Red Hood, and Brother Yu,” the Mermaid cried, waving to the people on this side: “Hey, the door really opened!”

“Human, you are impressive,” King said with polite reserve as he stretched his head forward: “Come, pet my head.”

Smiling, Yu Sheng reached out, lifted King over from the far side, and gave him a good pet. The kitty didn’t mind. After a satisfied cuddle, King leaped to the ground, looked around, and lifted his chin.

“Alas, ruins everywhere,” the tabby cat sighed, very human-like. He flicked a paw, and a bard in a short robe appeared beside him: “I should recite a poem for this scene. I can’t, so you do it.”

The bard pulled out a quill and parchment and began to write.

Yu Sheng, after confirming the Door could run on its own without his constant support, relaxed. He turned to the still-stunned Li Lin and said cheerfully: “All right, I’m done. Make sense now?”

“Even the Director wouldn’t ‘get’ this,” Li Lin said with a wry smile, taking it in stride: “No wonder you didn’t mind us watching.”

He glanced at the Door: “So from now on we can pass through this Door to enter the Valley? Do we need a guard post here? Besides the node, maybe assign guards in case someone slips past the node. With how special you and Fairy Tale are, the Director would approve the staffing.”

“No need for guards,” Yu Sheng said: “I’ll have Little Red Riding Hood arrange a Door watch here to keep the kids from sneaking out. Don’t worry about intruders. The Door needs permission. Even if it’s open, anyone without permission can’t enter that passage.”

“Like Wutong Road 66?” Li Lin asked.

Yu Sheng smiled: “Exactly like Wutong Road 66.”