The sea trembled. It reached toward the gem, drawn by its immense powers of suction, but couldn’t break the seal.

Hui furrowed his brows. He grabbed the snake and pressed it against the gem, then fed his qi into the gem to strengthen its power of suction.

Still nothing.

No, no. This should work. This gem was created by the Sect Leader of the Black Asp Sect. There’s no way it doesn’t…

He blinked. He mumbled aloud, “The reversal spell!”

Hui probed into the gem until he found the reversal spell. He circulated his qi into it, forcibly activating it. The spell fought him, unwilling to activate without meeting all its conditions.

From within the gem, the red soul let out a sudden laugh and rushed at Hui. “I knew you couldn’t resist this treasure. This time, I’ll possess you directly!”

Hui narrowed his eyes and sent a ray of life qi into the gem, shooting it like a bullet at the red soul. The red soul screamed, dodging away. “Life and death qi? That isn’t fair!”

As the red soul darted back, it passed closer to the reversal spell. The restrictions on the reversal spell began to loosen as the conditions were met.

“Aha!” Hui’s eyes flashed. He prodded at the red soul with life qi, shepherding it toward the reversal spell.

The red soul flinched back. Aggravated, it howled, “You’re asking to die, child! When I find a body, I’ll—”

“This small cultivator never asks to die! Let this small cultivator teach you how to play dead instead. Cooperate peacefully, senior, and we can live peacefully!” Hui howled back.

Eh, I feel like that came out wrong, somehow? I didn’t sound nearly as domineering as the protagonists in my favorite novels.

Oh well! All I need is to get him a little closer… a little closer!

The red soul passed into the outer boundary of the reversal spell. Instantly, the spell rushed to light. The reversal activated, roiling uselessly in the air. At the same time, the authority of the Black Asp Sect’s Sect Master burst out of the gem. The seal on the sea weakened. A trickle of blood qi began to flow into the gem.

Hui grinned. “Yes!”

He caged the soul into the corner where the reversal spell existed with gold life qi. The cage became a fluttering songbird. It bounced around, pecking at the ground.

The red soul scoffed. “Can’t even control your life qi, and you want to cage me? I’ll…”

The songbird lunged at the red soul, suddenly surging with the full power of Hui’s cultivation base. Hidden deep beneath, a glimmer of his master’s cultivation burst through, like a knife within the bird.

“That… what is that? Are you masking your cultivation?” the red soul asked, terrified.

“Stay put,” Hui ordered. Internally, he cried with joy, surprised. Master! You do think about this poor disciple of yours! Thank you, Master!

The red soul cowered back, leaping away from the bird. “Stay back! Don’t come near me!”

That’s handled. Retreating from the red gem, Hui focused on where the red gem’s suction power and the force of the authority within the red gem pressed into the seal on the blood qi sea. He circled around that authority with his qi and fed power into it, building it up as he restrained it with his qi. More and more, until his qi flickered, trembling against the power of the energy within. All at once, he released the power of authority.

The authority slammed against the seal. The seal shuddered and weakened again. More blood qi rushed into the gem. Still, the gem drew at the sea, absorbing wildly. It formed a small dent in the sea around it, eating into the blood qi around it. Hui pushed it deeper, further against the red seal. Again!

He gathered up the authority and slammed it into the seal again. The seal shook. Cracks appeared in the red lines around the gem.

Glowing red lines appeared over the sea. They thrummed with power, and rapidly replenished the seal around the gem. The crack Hui had broken into the seal earlier almost closed over entirely as the seal fought back against the red gem’s authority.

Hui furrowed his brows. His eyes glowed. That isn’t enough? I won’t stop! Not now, not yet!

He threw more power into the gem, strengthening the reversal spell and the authority contained therein. At the same time, he captured that authority, building it up, up, up.

Stretching his other hand out, he touched it to the tail of the shadow snake and fed his death qi through the snake into the seal. The red lines began to shrivel. They glowed again, closing up the gap, but the glow around him grew slightly weaker.

It’s working. Again!

Hui circulated his death qi at full power. Stretching out his hand, he fed the death qi steadily through the snake to the seal. The red lines flickered, fighting back. The death qi surged through the red lines, infecting the red seal’s lines with pure black. Hui continued to feed it, but the death qi reached critical mass. It fought the seal’s regenerative power on its own. Every time the red light surged, the death qi fell back, momentarily losing ground. The second the light faded, however, the death qi bit deeper into the red light once more, crawling further away from Hui and the island.

The red lines around him shuddered, tainted with thick strings of black qi. Hui’s eyes lit up. He released the authority and slammed it directly into the weakened seal.

The seal shattered. For ten meters in every direction, the red lights shuddered, then flickered out. The death qi raced faster through the red lines, devouring them.

Without the seal, there was nothing to hold back the red gem’s absorption power. Blood qi poured into the red gem. Hui held it out, squinting against the blood qi rushing around him. The red gem shuddered in his hand, shaking with the force of the blood qi blasting into it.

Around him, the level of the sea began to lower. Not only did the sea hollow around him, a huge section scooped out from the force of the gem’s absorption, but the entire sea began to lower. Imperceptibly at first, but growing faster, the blood qi crawled lower down the island of bones, revealing more and more of the massive pile. Hui climbed down the bones and continued to press the gem into the blood qi.

He stared at the gem with a mixture of amazement and horror. How much can this gem absorb? What kind of heavenly treasure is this thing? He stared out over the blood qi sea and sucked in a breath, as a wild idea passed through his mind.

Could I… absorb the entire ocean, and simply walk to the exit?