What year was it? It didn’t matter.
The sky was blue, the dirt was alive, and Jiang was no longer dead. There was nothing more to be said. He blinked, sat down, and began collecting the ambient qi around him.
I will revive them.
He had killed so many people. Two more didn’t matter.
I must.
Countless worlds had been burned in his name. Countless armies had fallen to conquer the burning ashes of things he later realized were useless. Two dead cultivators were as useless as tears falling into a palace of ashes. They would not bring back what once was there, and they wouldn’t make him feel better. It was meaningless.
But I will do it anyway.
Jiang reached deep within himself and allowed his eyes to open, tears falling out. The earth sank down below as his tears penetrated it deeply. His body slowly began to fall as the dirt receded beneath him. He would sit here and fall until a chasm formed and the sun penetrated the earth all the way to its molten stone.
All around him the qi flowed inward as all things did towards the cosmic drain now formed on this corner of the world now turned the center of all things in the cosmos. His body was awake and hungry and Jiang did not feel like restraining it anymore. Azafir demanded the world would burn and Ding Yi had signed its death-warrant. Even the very stars cried out for his death but Jiang refused to die.
The earth continued to dissolve into its barest essence, the first layer of bedrock appearing before him as his body sank faster and faster down. All things in the world flowed towards him as his body sank deeper into the fabric of gravity, pulling everything on the sheet of space-time into its drain.
The chasm grew and Jiang could sense the first cultivators making their way towards him. They were weak and flew slowly, peering from just above the trees down at the hole in the soil where Jiang resided. Quickly they realized that they could not fly backward, panicking and shooting bolts of fire and lighting down at the lone body that had apparently caused them this illness of only moving forward.
What happened to courage in the modern age? Whatever happened to “never a step back?” Jiang sought to teach them this lesson.
They screamed as they fell continuously towards the qi-drain, one growing wings that beat frantically at nothing, meaningless as tears falling into fire. As they approached him Jiang did not look into their wide eyes and screaming lips. He stared blankly at the soil flowing into him and the stone falling down as he sank still-deeper into the world.
Phase one: qi refinement. This phase of cultivation involved consuming qi from the world and beginning to refine it within yourself, forming the barest glimpse of a spirit inside the body. Jiang was long-since past this point.
Phase two: foundation building, was when a cultivator began creating or following a path and creating their bodily and/or spiritual foundation. Jiang had, likewise, long-since achieved this.
Phase three: golden core. Jiang’s had been in his brain. His spiritual center was still there.
Phase four: nascent soul; the sprouting of a spirit out of the golden core strong enough to leave the shell of the body behind. Jiang’s was far more than strong enough to do this.
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Phase five: self-forming, the point at which qi could regenerate your self and began being produced passively inside you. Jiang was not currently producing qi, meaning he was pushing from nascent-soul to self-forming. He needed more qi to begin generating his own.
Violet woke up to a fountain of bones overflowing with blood and she screamed. Luo jolted, already standing with his hands clasped behind his back, looking away at the mansion whose fountain she had just awoken next to.
“Violet! You’re finally awake!”
“What is this!?”
“Hell.”
Her eyes grew wide with shock and terror.
“It’s real?!”
“It is. The stories were true….”
“How do we get out!!!!?” The words were practically a scream.
“....”
He knew.
“Tell me!”
Violet stood up shakily.
“Tell me!”
The words grew louder. Luo didn’t want to answer her.
“TELL ME!”
She had moved to stand an inch from his ear and the shouted words made him physically recoil in pain.
He sighed loudly, perhaps enhanced by temporary deafness.
“I don’t know for certain if what I’m about to say is true..”
“Get on with it!”
“But, there are three ways to escape according to the legends.”
- Kill hell from inside
- Kill hell from outside
- Die
“What does that even mean? Kill hell? Is it even possible?” Violet practically shrieked.
“Hell isn’t a place… It’s a person.” Luo responded calmly.
“What?”
“Qi is a product of life.”
And?
He let the words sit in the air for a long moment.
Terror grew on Violet’s face.
Hell was a person. She quickly and finally put the pieces together.
They were dead and inside a person— it was them, the dead, that formed the qi inside self-forming cultivators! Did that mean every single sequence-5 cultivator held perhaps dozens of departed souls?!
Luo’s eyes told her a secret:
That she understood the truth.
“Who is hell?!”
“I don’t know. It could be Ding Yi, it could be Master Jiang, or it could be someone else. These are all just legends and whispers I’ve only barely heard.”
“Can we escape?!” The terror had eased on Violet’s eyes, replaced with a look of contemplation.
“It depends on how strong the inner manifestation of hell turns out to be. We must find it and determine if we have the strength to kill it.”
She knew they didn’t, but her words still echoed throughout damned-creation.
「I swear on my soul and on my dao that I will kill Hell」
It wouldn’t matter if she was wrong, she would already be dead, but in the meantime Violet was filled with power and determination from the strength of an oath. Her foundation, while cracked, could hold long enough to be given the chance to shatter, she was certain.
“It’s no good to win if you die, you know.” Luo said in a gruff voice.
She did know.
“It’s no good to hold back if you die. We need to be all-in on survival if we expect to have any chance at all.” Her voice was firm with determination.
“Fine.”
「I swear on my soul and on my dao that I will kill Hell」followed Luo.
They were bound on the same path together, wherever it may lead. Given they were already in Hell it couldn’t get much worse, surely?