The instant Elder Guo finished speaking, the world around Jun Li seemed to fall away. In the blink of an eye, the scenery before her eyes shifted to a pale grey wall. Slightly alarmed by how fast the transition was, Jun Li quickly stood up and gathered her bearings.
In all eight directions, grey walls locked Jun Li inside a featureless room just barely large enough to maneuver around.
It felt a bit cramped to Jun Li, even though there was enough space to stretch her limbs; the lack of windows or doors made the space feel smaller than it was.
‘First to break free from the spell, huh…?’ Thinking about the Trial’s objective, Jun Li felt a bit uncertain.
She had hoped her advanced Cultivation would be able to help her guarantee a place in the top three, regardless of what the Trial involved, but this time… she simply had no idea what ‘breaking free of a spell’ entailed, just that she would need ‘spirit,’ whatever that meant.
In Jun Li’s mind, ‘spirit’ held the meaning of ‘grit’ or ‘mental strength,’ but she wasn’t sure how exactly she was supposed to manifest that to help her in this situation. “Well… here goes nothing, I suppose.”
Knowing time was of the essence, Jun Li cast aside her doubts and decided to rely on trial and error. Stepping forward deeply, Jun Li punched the wall in front of her with a probing strike.
‘Huh?’ As Jun Li’s fist soundlessly struck the wall, it felt as though all of the force in her punch had simply vanished into the wall without a trace, like a drop of rainwater down a chasm.
Again, Jun Li struck out, this time with a kick, only to receive the same lack of feedback. Almost bemused by the sensation, Jun Li circulated her Qi and executed a swift spear-hand strike, a Technique from the Sparking Thorn.
The instant her fingers touched the wall, they stopped, neither bending nor breaking. “I guess force is out of the picture then...” It was a bit reckless; Jun Li’s fingers were tempered, but not so durable as to remain undamaged when striking an immovable object.
Even so, she felt that she had to try her most powerful Technique, otherwise she wouldn’t be able to write off brute force as an option.
Feeling like she had wasted some valuable time, Jun Li stepped to the center of the room, sat down, and closed her eyes, ready to attempt a more mental approach.
But before she could clear her mind, a sound echoed out from the room, making her eyes shoot open. Jun Li was sure the room was entirely empty until a moment ago, but the faint ‘tap’ she heard was impossible to miss in such a quiet space.
And likewise, now that Jun Li had opened her eyes, the source of the sound was immediately apparent.
From a stain seeping through the roof, liquid was slowly dripping into the room. Frowning, Jun Li felt certain that her senses weren’t failing her and that the stain wasn’t there previously.
Looking to the floor beneath the stain, Jun Li saw what was dripping from the ceiling. Below, a vibrant, red puddle of blood was forming, drop by drop.
Suddenly on edge, Jun Li remembered a similar sight. When she first broke through to the Peak Qi Condensation stage and began to form an inner world in her Dantian, she found blood dripping down from a stone above.
At first, it unnerved her, feeling it was too dissonant to the surroundings, but in time, Jun Li acclimated to the strange sight.
Each time she found herself in that inner world when cultivating, she would inevitably find blood dripping from stones and leaking from cracks on the shoreline in the faintest traces.
At first, she assumed it was some intricacy of Cultivation that had yet to reveal itself to her, but now that it appeared inside what should be Elder Guo’s own spell… doubt had crept into Jun Li’s mind.
Kneeling, Jun Li reached out towards the blood-soaked floor. Touching the blood and feeling it coat her fingers, Jun Li felt the deeply 'real' sensation of blood.
It was thick, but thinly coated her hand. Touching her fingers together, the blood adhered between her fingers and turned into a thin, gummy string when she parted her fingers once more.
Rubbing the blood into her palms, Jun Li felt a sudden dissonance. Whereas in the real world, the blood would thin out and dry into flakes under friction, this blood seemed to have no such inclination.
For a moment, Jun Li thought to use this as a throughline to dismantle Elder Guo's spell. With such a glaring point of unreality, it should be easier to break free from this illusory prison.
Yet, within only a few seconds of Jun Li making this discovery, the ceiling began to flake away from above, long strips of something like wallpaper or canvas peeling down, the integrity of the room soiled by the blood.
For an instant, Jun Li thought the spell had begun to fail, and she looked up towards the peeled ceiling.
But the spell had failed from the moment it was cast.
Through the growing hole in the ceiling, Jun Li didn't see the fibers of the spell falling apart, nor did she see the freedom of the real world outside.
Above, beyond the peeling grey veneer, packed flesh and bone comprised the true ceiling. Woven muscle and sinew, darkened with dry age, wrapped around warped and discolored bones.
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Old eyes peered out from sunken sockets scattered across the leaky ceiling, alongside them, crushed and malformed jaws twisted as if to speak, only succeeding in sprinkling their shattered teeth down to the floor, like sesame seeds garnishing a grotesque feast.
Mind frozen in horror, Jun Li staggered back, her feet tearing the blood-soaked flooring open, revealing even more horribly unraveled bodies below.
Eyes and mouths both gaped upwards toward Jun Li with desperation. Jun Li knew, somehow, they did not wish for their own salvation. They were exactly where they wanted to be. Where they wanted Jun Li to be.
"Aah!" Jun Li fell, as a mouth, more intact than most that lined the room, bit into her foot with immense force. "Shit...!" Jun Li tried to pull free, staggering to the floor a half-step away, where the flooring had not entirely peeled away.
Only, much of Jun Li's foot did not follow her. Looking down at her foot, Jun Li saw that her shoe had been torn open and that little remained inside.
Feeling the full force of the greatest pain in her life, Jun Li's head pressed down into the floor, and her body retracted inward with force, the only sound escaping her mouth being a quiet, breathless wheezing.
And yet, she did not wake from this illusion, if it even was one anymore.
From the center of the room, where Jun Li wished least to look, many thin strands of blood, distinct in their coherency, joined Jun Li's mutilated foot to the malformed mouth that had bitten into her.
Those strands traveled down, into the mouth, and below the room where Jun Li could not see.
But she could feel it. "Ha... haha!" Jun Li could feel the other half of her severed foot and the strings of blood that fed into the mouth.
Tearing the remains of her shoe from her mangled foot, Jun Li saw thin strands hanging from her foot, tumbling through the air towards the mouth.
At first, it was just blood, but the threads continued to unravel Jun Li, thin sections of skin, muscle, and nerve falling toward the center of the room as if compelled by some great force.
Within seconds, Jun Li had lost much of her leg, and her mind had lost coherence.
The unraveling didn't hurt, but the sensation of raw flesh and nerve sailing through the air, running through teeth and coiling together in a lump beneath the floor... it was too much to bear.
Within a length of time Jun Li could not measure, her body, still living, was dragged beneath the floor of this room, formed into a woven sphere, delirious with the intensity of sensation.
A thought ran through her distorted mind. 'I hope... at the banquet... I can be devoured... and live forever...'
… … … …
Opening her real eyes with a shock, Jun Li collapsed forward on all fours, feeling the rawness of her flesh, as if she had truly been peeled apart into thread, only to be shunted back together all at once.
Drenched with sweat and gasping for shallow breaths, Jun Li’s fingers harshly scraped across the tiles of the Glass Cloud Sect’s Plaza, as if to reassure herself that the ground beneath her was real.
Looking down at the floor, Little Yun slithered into Jun Li’s line of sight. ‘Ah…’ Under Little Yun’s curious and concerned gaze, Jun Li found panic slip away.
Taking her companion into her hands, she felt far more stable. No longer alone, Jun Li was able to calm herself and breathe more solidly, her lungs no longer clogged by a haze of blood and the fear of death.
Pushing herself to her feet, Jun Li realized some of her nails now hung painfully from her fingers, partially shredded from how harshly she had grasped at the ground beneath her feet.
Trembling from residual dread more than pain, Jun Li slowly took stock of her surroundings. ‘Everyone’s still under the spell, and Elder Guo…’
To the side of the stage, Elder Guo was looking towards Jun Li with a deeply concerned expression.
Seeing how intensely distraught Jun Li appeared, he deigned not to interact with her until she calmed down, hoping not to agitate her condition further.
In truth, he was rather befuddled by Jun Li’s state. ‘Could she have had an intense moment of claustrophobia? Even so…’
In time, Jun Li made her way off the stage and towards Elder Guo. “Umm…” Jun Li looked much more meek than normal, staring off into space as she struggled to get her words out.
“Is the Trial over?” Perturbed by Jun Li’s manner, Elder Guo spoke softly. “The Outer Sect Trial will continue until all disciples have escaped the spell, which should be in another half hour, but…”
He looked to Jun Li with a soft expression. “If you wish to go home ahead of time, you may take your reward with you.”
Clutching tightly onto her own arms to stymie the trembling, Jun Li bowed deeply. “Thank you, Elder Guo…”
Pulling out a box, Elder Guo gently handed it over. “Here, the second-place prize, a bundle of Icefeather Ivy.”
Eager for a distraction, Jun Li let her curiosity guide her. “Second?” Looking to the stage, Jun Li couldn’t see anyone missing, not that she would know who to look for. “Who was ahead of me?”
Noticing Jun Li latch onto a subject, Elder Guo was sympathetic enough to speak with her for a while. “Ahh, that’s right, it was a disciple named Sun Huan, he entered the Sect a year before you, but he’s been making some impressive progress recently.”
“Sun Huan?” The name rang a bell to Jun Li, just barely.
“Indeed.” Elder Guo continued. “I believe he’s made it into the top 3 of the previous two Outer Sect Trials alongside you, first in third place, then in second, and now in first.” Elder Guo stroked his chin. “Quite a good seedling that one.”
Thinking back, Jun Li did remember a disciple with a saber slung over his back during the race trial, and again when she received her rewards at the end of the hunt trial. “That guy…”
Feeling better after small talk, Jun Li finally felt the pain of her broken nails. Hissing through her teeth, Jun Li gathered herself and clutched her reward close to her chest. “Thanks for everything, Elder Guo.”
“I’ll be retiring for the afternoon…” Bowing deeply, Jun Li turned away in the hopes of going home.
Only after a few steps, she couldn’t help but turn around. “Elder Guo…” Seeing Jun Li gaze back at him, Elder Guo felt some lingering concern. “Your spell…” Jun Li continued. “What exactly does it do?”
Seeing Jun Li steady herself to ask that question, Elder Guo felt a pang of guilt; he realized that Jun Li had somehow suffered from his Technique, despite how mild it was supposed to be.
Though he wanted to reassure Jun Li somehow, he realized he had no better option than to tell the truth.
“…The spell inscribed on the talisman I gave you is designed to trap one’s spirit in a simple and illusory grey room. Upon exerting sufficient spiritual strength, the individual under the effect of the spell should be able to break out of the room and return to the real world. If one lacks the strength, however, they will need to wait an uneventful hour for the spell to naturally wear off.”
Her gaze sinking to the floor as she listened to the description, Jun Li lightly nodded, her expression stiffening as the blood drained from her face. “…I see, thank you, Elder Guo…”
Walk unsteadily to her home in the Outer Sect, Jun Li desperately tried to stop thinking.
