Falling Star Lake—rather than calling it a lake, it would be more accurate to call it a massive, sunken, charred pit.
Legend has it that in ancient times, fragments of a star fell here, smashing out this unfathomably deep abyss.
The lake water is an eerie, dark purple, its surface utterly still, like congealed, viscous blood, emitting a nauseatingly sweet and foul stench along with a powerful, filthy energy.
Not a single blade of grass grows around the lake—only jagged, grotesque rocks and twisted spatial ripples, while the air is thick with destruction and deathly silence.
This is one of the most extreme and violently chaotic areas within the Mist Marsh, and it is also the place the Female Healer called the “ideal” location to carry out that forbidden technique.
Aoki stood at the edge of Falling Star Lake, his expressionless face reflected in the dark purple water.
According to the Female Healer’s instructions, he mixed his own blood with several materials collected from the depths of the marsh—materials imbued with poison and chaotic energy—then began to carve a massive, sinister formation along the lakeshore.
Every stroke brought a subtle pain from deep within his soul and sapped his life force, as the formation’s lines twisted and writhed like living things.
At the core, he left an open spot—the “sacrificial” seat, prepared just for him.
When he finished, he took out some pre-prepared, low-grade minerals and herbs with chilling, yin attributes and cast them into specific locations in the lake.
These were mere decoys, designed so that when Nongli arrived, she would think he was refining some artifact or elixir to oppose a certain entity here—rather than…turning himself into her “medicine primer.”
With everything ready, he sat cross-legged at the core of the formation, in the seat he had reserved for himself.
He closed his eyes and began to circulate the Soul Qi Technique—not to cultivate, but to forcibly and slowly strip away his own soul’s origin and vital essence.
This process was like death by a thousand cuts—far more excruciating than any external wound.
His face turned ashen at a visible rate, his breath withering, his body trembling as cold sweat instantly soaked his clothes.
Yet he clenched his teeth, uttered not a sound, and forced himself to guide the stripped, fundamental energy of his existence into the sinister formation beneath him.
The formation’s lines lit up one by one, emitting a foreboding dark red glow, which echoed the dark purple of Falling Star Lake, creating a strange resonance.
A powerful suction arose from the formation, greedily drawing in Aoki’s life and soul.
He felt his consciousness begin to blur, as though falling into an endless, icy abyss of darkness.
The shadow of death closed in all too tangibly.
*****
Outside the altar.
Nongli, relying on a faint sense of Aoki’s aura and the name “Falling Star Lake” mentioned in his letter, struggled through the thick fog.
Her heart was filled with urgency and hope; she only wanted to reach her Master quickly, to face him, and then to greet the “eternal companionship” spoken of in the letter.
She completely ignored how the environment around her was becoming ever more dangerous, how spatial rifts appeared with increasing frequency, how poisonous miasma had almost condensed into physical form.
She had only one thought in her mind: find Master!
At last, she broke through the last dense, corrosive fog barrier and saw the lifeless Falling Star Lake, the sinister formation on the shore glowing ominously red, and in the center of the array, the familiar, tiny figure sitting cross-legged, his aura so weak it was nearly gone.
Her heart nearly stopped.
“Master!!”
She let out a piercing, desperate cry and rushed forward without regard for anything else.
*****
At the altar.
Lin Qiyou’s despair and madness did not last long.
Extreme pain instead brought a strange clarity to her chaotic mind.
She suddenly looked up, a flash of determination glinting in her bloodshot eyes.
She could not give up! Even if she had to dig three feet into the earth, even if she had to search all three realms, she would find him!
Forcing herself to calm down, she carefully sensed the remaining auras within the altar once more.
Aside from Aoki’s and the fox demon’s, there seemed…to be a faint, hidden trace belonging to someone else? That energy carried a chilling, sinister flavor.
Suddenly, she remembered two people from her sealed-away memories—two she had not dared to face.
The two Female Healers who once transplanted spiritual veins!
Those Female Healers!
Nongli wanting to use Aoki as a medicine primer—it was so much like when she herself once devoured Aoki’s spiritual vein. If both Aoki and Nongli vanished together, could it be related to them?
Oh…so that’s it. Aoki wasn’t abandoning her of his own will, he was being abducted by that beast Nongli, right?
Of course! Of course! Of course!
This thought flashed through her mind like lightning, fury and relief nearly making her lose control—but now was not the time to vent emotions.
She immediately steadied her mind, focusing all her spiritual sense, like the finest comb, combing through every inch of the altar again and again, tracking that nearly undetectable, unique energy trace belonging to the Female Healer.
At last, she caught a faint hint leading deeper into the marsh.
Without a moment’s hesitation, Lin Qiyou transformed into a sword beam and, following that barely perceptible trace, like a moth drawn to flame, once again charged fearlessly into the more dangerous, more unknown depths of the marsh.
*****
By Falling Star Lake.
Nongli dashed to the edge of the formation, but was thrown back by an invisible barrier. The formation had already been activated, creating a powerful energy field.
“Master! Master, what’s wrong?!” She stared at the ashen-faced, near-lifeless Aoki in the formation’s center, her heart torn to shreds, her vision instantly blurred by tears.
She pounded frantically at the invisible barrier, her seven fox tails whipping wildly as she unleashed immense demon power, trying to force her way through the formation.
“Don’t…come…over…” Aoki forced his eyes open, his voice so weak it was nearly inaudible.
According to the prearranged “script,” he managed to squeeze out a look that mixed pain and “deep affection.” “Go…quickly…the backlash…I’ll bear it alone…”
“No! I won’t!” Nongli screamed, unwilling to leave after seeing her Master like this, “Master, let me in! Let me help you! If we die, we die together!”
She attacked the formation’s barrier even more desperately, her dark red foxfire clashing fiercely with the array’s crimson light, producing a harsh, buzzing sound.
However, the formation was so bizarre—not only powerfully defensive, but it also seemed to absorb her attacks, turning the energy into an increased rate of extraction on Aoki’s life force!
Aoki felt the stripping of his soul suddenly accelerate, the pain nearly causing him to lose consciousness.
Looking at the frenzied Nongli outside the array, the last bit of hesitation in his heart vanished.
Now!
With the last of his strength, he formed a strange hand seal and slammed it onto his own chest!
Pu—!
A mouthful of fresh blood, dense with soul origin and vital essence, spurted out and landed precisely on several key runes at the core of the formation.
Buzz—!!!
The entire array erupted with an unprecedented, blinding red light! All the lines seemed to come alive, pulsing like veins, madly drawing in all that Aoki sacrificed.
His body withered visibly, his skin losing its luster, his eyes quickly dulling.
At the same time, a pure, vast, and strange energy—bearing Aoki’s unique aura and the bonds of a hundred years of karma—surged from the formation like a breached flood.
It did not attack Nongli, but, like a warm tide, enveloped and infused her completely!
“Master—!!!”
Nongli let out a soul-piercing wail. She watched, helpless, as Aoki was “utterly destroyed” before her eyes, while that surging energy poured into her body.
The energy was so familiar, so warm, carrying her Master’s very life, soul, and all his “affection.” It merged perfectly with her own demon power, without the slightest rejection!
Overwhelming grief, unspeakable gratitude, and a burning sensation deep in her bloodline all crashed over her in an instant!
She felt her seven fox tails wildly lashing, her demon power surging and swelling at an unprecedented speed!
A tearing, indescribably itchy pain shot up from the base of her spine!
A brilliant white light shot up from her body, piercing the marsh’s thick fog, even momentarily dispelling the strange purple glow over the area around Falling Star Lake!
Within that white light, the shadow of an eighth fox tail began to gather and grow—painfully yet resolutely!
With himself as the sacrifice, Aoki’s cruel trap was now, just as he had predicted, propelling Nongli toward the realm of eight tails in a mad, frenzied breakthrough!
And the price was his own fading life and soul.
In the instant before his consciousness fully sank into darkness, Aoki’s blurry vision seemed to catch another sword light—peerlessly fierce—tearing through the distant mist, bearing down on Falling Star Lake with a world-destroying momentum!
It was Lin Qiyou…
A faint, unreadable arc seemed to curve on his lips, and then he lost all awareness completely.
On the shore of Falling Star Lake, red, white, and purple lights clashed and intertwined. The fox demon howled in sorrow as she broke through, the sword immortal arrived in fury, and the one who set all this in motion was already like a candle in the wind—his life or death unknown.
The storm reached its peak in this moment.