Hui cast around, glancing all around for a hint, anything. Water didn’t work… Ice didn’t either… what else, what else?

Death qi…?

Can’t hurt!

Hui gathered his qi, then sent it outward in a fierce pulse. The flames around him died for a moment, only to surge back a second later.

Catching his breath, Hui nodded. That’s not a solution, but it is a chance! I can use the death qi to suppress the flames, then escape during that momentary reprieve.

Here we go!

He gathered his death qi again, circulating it inside the lotus seed, gathering more and more just under the surface. The lotus seed began to emanate a dark aura, and the flames around it grew lower, suppressed by the death qi. More and more, until the seed trembled with it. Desperately, it desired to sprout, but Hui suppressed it just as desperately. No! Don’t sprout now. This qi isn’t for sprouting, it’s for suppressing the flames. Hold back, Hui! Hold back! Push it to the edge, but don’t push over! A little closer… a little closer. Right there… and now…!

Hui released his qi all at once. It burst out from the seed. All around it, the flames flattened, dying out. In the same moment, Hui grew from the seed and leaped off the blazing-hot pill furnace, flying for the gap at the very top. Come on! Let me out!

As he zoomed upward, the gap slowly closed. Hui’s eyes widened. He pushed himself faster. His limbs withered, and flames licked at the edges of his clothes. The gap grew smaller and smaller. By the time he reached it, it was barely the width of a hand.

That’s enough for me! Hui shed his body and threw his lotus seed core through the gap. Hurtling out, he bounced down to the floor and skidded away, tumbling into a corner. Smoke gently curled from his charred seed casing.

From his seed, he once again surveyed the area. Pill furnaces stretched to the ceiling all around him, each one as large as a room. Their bronze sides glistened in the light of the flames that burned beneath each of them, though many also glowed from flames within. A thick medicinal scent hung over the room. One or two of the pill furnaces belched dark fog. In the corner, one of the furnaces let out a delicate, sparkling medicinal mist that beckoned anyone nearby to come over and try its pill. The pale pinkish-purplish mist wafted on a wind of its own, circling slowly around the furnace.

Hui scanned the room again, but again found no one. Is no one watching the furnaces? Is there no pill master here? What’s happening? Usually, pill furnaces can’t be left unwatched like this! In the worst case, they’ll explode, but even putting that aside…

Across the room, the delicate medicinal mist darkened, then blackened. From the heavenly pinks and purples, it quickly deteriorated into the same dark fumes that clouded the tops of several of the other pill furnaces. Bits of dark ash rained down on the bronze furnace. Underneath it, the flames belched, as if protesting the pill’s failure.

…in the novels I read, pill manufacturing is always a delicate process that requires precise timing and constant attention. Even a moment’s worth of inattention can mean a perfect pill turns into poison… like what just happened over there!

I don’t know anything about making pills. My only real try ended in a roast duck, a lot of anger from everyone, and most dangerously, heaps of debt! But even I know that leaving the furnaces on to infinitely burn with no supervision like this is a bad idea!

Peering around one last time to ensure no one was watching him, Hui once again circulated his death qi and grew himself a body. Even full-sized, he barely reached a quarter of the way up the pill furnace’s sloped sides. He crossed his arms and looked up at them, shaking his head. What kind of pill needs a furnace that large, anyways? You could fit people in there!

Fit… people…

Er, aren’t there demonic techniques that involve cultivating souls or humans into pills? Don’t tell me, are these furnaces the kind built for that? But then… why are they in the Underworld?

Why are they in the Underworld? The Underworld, domain of the dead and counterpoint to the Heavens? Hmm, I wonder why. There’s no way a dark, dangerous place like this would ever be ruled by a demonic cultivator! Hui nodded to himself, smiling along at his own sarcasm. Obviously, if anyone’s going to conquer the Underworld, it’s a demonic cultivator! Perhaps even, the kind of cultivator who was rejected by Heavens but still reached the Immortal or near-Immortal realm anyways!

Don’t tell me, did I just accidentally enter Senior Zhu Diyu’s forging space? Senior, please accept my apologies! Small cultivator didn’t mean to!

No, no. Deep breath, Hui. Zhu Diyu specifically told me to use the talisman as a key to enter… something. He wouldn’t have told me to do that if he didn’t want me to see whatever was on the other side. But… surely he didn’t mean just this…?

He wandered toward the flames, crouching down to get a closer look. There was a familiar flicker to the flames, a strange shape in their lick. He peered closer, squinting.

Tiny little phoenixes made of fire fluttered in the very edges of the flames, flapping up out of the fire for mere seconds before they fell back into the heart of the flames.

“Phoenix fire?” Hui murmured aloud. A second later, he frowned. Is that what the fire in my gut looks like? How have I never noticed?

Well… maybe it’s a purer form of phoenix fire, or higher-realm. Sometimes objects don’t show their true properties until they reach a certain level of purity or a certain realm. It’s especially common in pill forging!

Higher-realm…

Who would have a higher-realm version of phoenix fire than Han Qin, the lover-slash-disciple-slash—I’m actually not sure what his relationship is, come to think of it. Anyways. The point is, who would have a higher-realm version of phoenix fire than Han Qin, the associate of unknown description of the phoenix-fire female cultivator? Obviously—that female cultivator!

So what are these furnaces using this fire for? I was inside one of them, but I didn’t see anything in particular… certainly not a furnace-sized pill. There were some ashes and charcoal, but… nothing that looked like pill-making materials, demonic, humanoid, or otherwise.

Curious, Hui flew up toward the top of the nearest furnace. He peeked inside.

Nothing. Bits of glowing charcoal and overbearing heat. He reeled back instinctively, wiping his face. Phew. Okay, but there’s no smoke on this one. Maybe I should check one of the ones with smoke? And definitely the one with the medicinal mist that just turned into smoke!

He flew over to one of the smoky ones. Before he could peer into it, the thick smoke assaulted his face. His eyes stung, and his nose and lungs burned. Waving his hand in front of his face, he coughed and backed up.

Whew. That is fierce!

Taking a deep breath of the clear air, Hui held his breath and plunged his face toward the crack.

Black gunk clung to the walls of the furnace and coated the furnace’s bottom, inches thick. Dried and sticky, it had burned into the furnace to the point of becoming flaky. Hui backed up and grit his teeth, taking a breath of the fresh air again. I would hate to clean that. That’s a multi-day soak with some dish soap in the sink if I’ve ever seen one! Hell, that might be the kind of burned-in filth where you just throw away the whole damn dish!

I mean, ahem. Truly, this furnace is ruined. A pill will never be made in this furnace again.

But… how about the one that just burned? Surely that one won’t be as disgustingly charred in like this one is.

Hui flew over to the furnace that had just burned. With a deep breath, he plunged his head into the smoke.