Hui peered ahead, searching. I’m almost there. Just a little further. A little further!

“Get back here!” Han Qin snarled. He thrust his hand out, blasting a ray of fire at Hui.

Hui dodged out of the way of the heat. The fiery ray turned around and looped him in, forming a U shape. Slashing with the beating stick, Hui broke the U in its loop, making sure to shake the bell a few times to be sure Han Qin heard it.

Han Qin clapped his hands over his ears and scowled. The second his hands were occupied with his ears, Hui grinned. He tossed a handful of talismans behind him. Ice burst out at Han Qin. Han Qin lifted his hands off his ears to counter, and Hui shook his bell again. Han Qin hesitated, caught between reaching for his ears and counterattacking, and both the ice and the reverberations struck him.

Hui hurried away. He glanced over his shoulder. It looks like Ying Lin is far enough away. He isn’t going to attack her. Good.

Beneath them, the plains rolled by. Here… it’s almost here. Right here!

He darted upward. Sword and man soared into the sky. Almost invisible, a faint spatial distortion wobbled in the sky. Compared to the gash that Han Qin had torn to step into the world, this one had a softness to it, almost like water.

Hui flew into it unhesitatingly and came out before the false town inside the small world Li Xiang lived in. He took a moment to reorient himself, then shot off toward the infinite space in its center.

Time to find out who has a better grasp on spatial magic, between the mysterious senior who lives in this world and Han Qin!

Or… between Han Qin and whoever made this world, depending on who made the infinite space.

If this world is anything like the one where Chen Wuya was locked away, there’s got to be something strange about this plain. Maybe it really is an infinite space… but maybe there’s something more. Even if it isn’t anything more than an infinite space, I can always lock Han Qin inside and permanently deny him the usage of one of his clones. Actually, I could even try to figure out the secrets to his clones! If I know how many he can make, or what the upper limit of their power is, or anything like that, I’ll be better equipped to fight them in the future!

At the same time, I’m really curious if this world really was created by Fen Long. Not to mention, I have a lot of questions for the mysterious senior! I’m not going to let her get away from me so easily. Two birds, one stone! Deal with Han Qin and find out more about the mysterious senior at the same time!

Even as he thought it, Han Qin appeared in the world behind him. “You can’t escape me!”

Hui sped on, jingling the bell a few more times as he did so. He waved jauntily at Han Qin.

Han Qin grit his teeth and sped up. What happened to the quavering coward I was dealing with? Shouldn’t he have dropped dead by now? He threw a few fireballs at Hui, but Hui spun around in midair and deflected them with a few precise swings of his stick. Han Qin’s nose wrinkled. And what’s with that hideous weapon? It’s not even a proper club!

I’ve played long enough. It’s time to teach this child who he’s dealing with. Han Qin sped up, suddenly doubling his speed. Hui’s eyed widened, and he jumped back, but too slow. Han Qin’s hand closed around his neck.

Hui’s head popped off, and a realistic spray of blood blasted at Han Qin. Unimpressed, Han Qin changed the direction of his hand, striking toward the center of Hui’s headless corpse.

Hui jumped back. The blood stopped abruptly, and a new head bloomed through the empty hole of his neck. He cracked his neck, rubbed his throat where it had been cut, then cocked his head at Han Qin and gestured him on.

The sound-suppression talisman burned out. Sound returned to Hui’s world. He reached for another, then paused. Actually… I might need to hear Han Qin right now. I’m going to need to stall him from using his full power for a bit.

Besides, I can’t always rely on sound-suppression to use this technique. I’ll have to try and shape the attack so it doesn’t strike me, rather than simply deafening myself!

“You’re acting strange,” Han Qin remarked.

“I’ve surmised that I have a heart demon,” Hui replied.

“Is that so?” Han Qin asked. He gestured subtly, starting the first few motions for a powerful fire attack.

“Mmm. Well, not everyone thinks it’s a heart demon.” Hui continued to fall back, watching warily as magic gathered around Han Qin. He surged qi into the bell and rang it again, using the qi to force the attack into a cone that flew outward rather than an area centered on himself. Han Qin’s expression flickered, and the spell, too, wavered, on the verge of falling apart.

Ha! Try your powerful spells. I’ll make them backlash! Hui thought, triumphant. He rang the bell again.

Han Qin scowled. “That attack won’t work on me forever.”

“I don’t need eternity, Senior. I just need a few moments,” Hui replied. He turned and fled, racing into the empty field.

Chasing after him, Han Qin finished the hand signs and threw out his hands. A wall of fire surged toward Hui. “I won’t give you that. It’s time for you to die, like all the rest.”

“Do you really have the time to waste? Don’t you need to bring back your precious wife?” Hui mocked, taking a wild guess as to the soul’s identity.

“Wife? Ha. You truly know nothing,” Han Qin scoffed.

Hui shrugged. It’s not as if every shot in the dark is a bullseye. “Sister? Daughter?”

“In any case, it will be a hundred years before I can make another attempt. There’s no harm in a little pest control before she returns,” Han Qin said, shrugging.

“Pest control? Am I a bug in your eyes, Senior? I’m honored to rank so high as to be included among the invertebrates,” Hui replied, bowing. I would’ve expected a microbe, or maybe a virus’ status, from how this man looks down on me!

Han Qin grimaced. “You disgust me.”

“Ah! My apologies, Senior. I’ll try to be less disgusting,” Hui pledged earnestly, cupping his hands to Han Qin.

“Truly, it boggles the mind that you continue to survive from one day to the next.” Han Qin threw his hands out, and a wall of fire flew at Hui. It stretched to the heavens and spread to the horizon, an inescapable wall with the heat of a thousand furnaces. Crackling and snapping, the fire rushed toward Hui with a fierce intensity. The air itself blackened around the fire, as if the flames charred them with their approach.

Hui darted back, eyes wide. Shit! If that hits me, I’m dead! Or, at least, this body becomes charcoal. Think, think…

That’s right! Yes! Hui dropped to the ground and slapped down an earth talisman, burrowing directly down into the earth. Fire rises. I should be safe underground!

Han Qin let out a derisive laugh. He gestured, and the fire chased after Hui, blasting through the narrow passage he’d carved.

Ah, dammit! It’s magical fire, it does whatever Han Qin wants it to do! Hui threw his hand out and quickly drew a talisman on the air. The earth reshaped itself to block off the passage behind him. He retreated deeper into the passage while the earth closed off behind him. Fire cracked and sizzled as it burned the earth away against all probability. Hui grit his teeth and retreated faster.

Abruptly, he froze. Wait. How could I have forgotten my own favorite trick? He let out a horrifying scream and dug his hand into his own chest, ripping out his core. Simultaneously, he coiled all the qi he’d gathered with him except for some of the death qi, which he left behind in the body. He threw his core upward along with an earth talisman. The earth talisman cut a path through the ceiling, and the core soared up through it. The second the core lost contact with his body, his body collapsed. The death qi quickly filled his ‘corpse.’

Quickly sprouting from the seed-core into a tiny Hui, Hui hurried through the earth. I already know that won’t work, but if I didn’t try, he’d get suspicious! No, no. This is necessary for my plan!

He gazed upward. We’re almost at the edge of the infinite space. Now is the time to act!