Jun Li felt a tugging sensation in her head, as if something inside was being affected by a gravitational pull unknown to the rest of her body.

  "You…!" Jun Li took a step forward towards Junzi, freezing halfway as she realized that, unlike last time, she was able to move.

  In fact, the entire scenario seemed different from Junzi's last manifestation. Not only was his appearance different, he hadn't formed a body 'out of' a mass of blood, and instead formed his body 'from' a single drop. 'A difference in the purity of the Earth Dragon Blood…?'

  With Jun Li having distracted herself for a moment, she failed to notice Junzi's expression change slightly as he turned to her. "Hm… I suppose I should set you aside for a moment, Jun Li…" When he raised his hand, Jun Li's heart sank, not from any fluctuation of emotion, but as a direct, very literal result of her blood shifting in her body.

  The frozen blood that sealed her slit throat shut burst away with a sound like a window shattering, the shards melting in the air and elongating into threads that stitched into the ground. "Shit…!" Jun Li could only curse for an instant, her throat filling with blood once more.

  The threads of blood that stitched her body to the floor began to contract, their lengths descending into the stone and forcing her down by her torn throat. Whether by design or coincidence, for Jun Li to prevent herself from lying face down in the dirt, she could only kowtow.

  Spreading his arms wide, Junzi took in a deep breath before letting out a satisfied sigh, a bright smile on his face. "Hahhh…! It feels good to be in the flesh for once!" He reached up to his neck and jaw, gently feeling the muscle, cartilage, and bone beneath his skin.

  "Now… young hero, Gao Feng…" He looked down at Gao Feng's limp body, still bleeding from his destroyed arm and struggling for breath. "Rejoice! For you will never die!" Making this absurd statement, Junzi flourished the sleeves of his robe proudly, as if presenting some great gift.

  Gao Feng offered little reaction, simply turning his neck slightly to watch the strangely vibrant outsider with bloodshot eyes.

  "Hmm…? Ah, yes, the poison." Junzi realized and sauntered over to Gao Feng's side. Kneeling down on the still-solid ice, Junzi reached out towards the pouring blood that leaked down Gao Feng's flank, and grasped it as simply as a length of fabric.

  As Junzi stood, the blood rose with him, flowing up and down through his grasp, as though his hands held more sway over the nature of blood than gravity or fluid dynamics. Peering deeply into the streaming blood, Junzi nodded his head. "Yes, I see… It's a wonder people can do anything with blood like this."

  With both hands, he began to brush his fingers through the blood, parting the stream into innumerable strands with each movement of his hands. As he agitated the blood in this way, iridescent flecks sprayed into the air before losing their luster and falling as dust.

  It was an impenetrably arcane act to any but Junzi. Even if the action and consequence could be understood, the process was irreplicable by any other, layered in the innumerable facets of inhuman logic and divine skill accumulated over tens of thousands of years.

  When the blood passed through Junzi's hands, it glowed with a luster unimaginable for any mundane substance. Although the nature of his technique was restricted to 'purification and refinement,' it was difficult to imagine that lustrous blood had been resting within as simple and mild a creature as Gao Feng.

  This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

  The blood descended from Junzi's hands, feeding back into Gao Feng's destroyed arm as if by its own will. As the last of the blood passed through Junzi's fingers and descended into Gao Feng's body, the ice was coated in an opaque ash of impurity. Both that of Jun Li's poison and that of Gao Feng's own natural, mortal impurity.

  Throughout this process, light and energy slowly returned to Gao Feng's eyes, until he was held in place not by physical weakness, but by lucid apprehension. Logically considering his situation was impossible. After all, the man standing over him shouldn't be able to be there.

  The Earth Dragon's Grave forbade those of higher Cultivation from entering, and this man seemed like anything but a low-level Cultivator. From his demeanor to his capabilities to the pressure that radiated from his presence, everything told Gao Feng this man was beyond even the Elders at the Emerald Blade Pavilion.

  For now, silence and acquiescence were his only options.

  "There, that should be better… I've stopped the bleeding as well." Junzi stepped back, brushing himself off, although no impurity had so much as touched his robe. "The bleeding served no danger to you, of course, but it's best to be clean and tidy in moments like these."

  "Ah, you can hear me, yes? Are you feeling better?" Faced with a direct question, Gao Feng let out a slow breath and remained calm, looking himself over. "...Yes, better than… ever, probably." It was no lie, certainly. His senses were clearer, his muscles lacked any aches, and his breath came easier than ever.

  It was hard to imagine that all that had been done was a cleaning of his blood. Even the faults in his rushed Cultivation seemed to bother him less, causing a thought to suddenly hit him. 'He spoke to her familiarly in that moment. Are they acquaintances? Master and disciple? Is her blood like this as well…?'

  "I am gladdened to hear it, young hero! Though it comes as no surprise." Junzi cleared his throat. "I apologize if my words come slowly; that young fiend over there has been compensating for her momentary inability to speak by screaming obscenities into my mind without pause…"

  He laughed slightly, scratching the back of his head as if embarrassed. "Now then! I have a proposition for you. Your eternal life is already guaranteed; you only need to decide how to spend it."

  "You may spend eternity in comfort, among countless peers, engaging in profound dialogues with great scholars, sparring against legendary warriors, enjoying leisure alongside saints and emperors!" He spread his arms wide, orating with gleeful pride.

  "Or, you can strive for greatness with your own two hands, clawing your way through the red dust of the mortal world as you seek the status of a living, martial god! A path of pain and prestige both, on which I may serve as your mentor and confidant, guiding you as closely or distantly as you please!"

  Junzi had leveled an intense 'one or the other' choice onto Gao Feng, the terrible lack of context available causing him to freeze, categorically incapable of making an educated choice, despite the eager incitations of the enigmatic being before him.

  Gao Feng, despite the genuine and growing fear of the man before him, was about to ask for further information, until Junzi suddenly spoke. "Oh, hold on a moment."

  Turning around, Junzi strode a few paces out, raising a hand so that his palm faced the ceiling of the Grave. The back and palm of his hand suddenly ruptured, sending sharp streams of blood in both directions, colliding with the air and splattering around as if filling an invisible vessel.

  Within a few seconds, a solid cylinder of blood had been formed, which Junzi then grasped with his other hand, pulling it from his palm. Now holding the long pole, he tapped it against the ground, agitating it and sending a ripple through its surface, causing sharp scales to billow out over its surface.

  Those scales flared and flattened in waves, becoming more defined with each moment, until finally, they stopped motionless, arrayed flatly like the scales of a snake, from one end to the other.

  "Right then…" Junzi raised the scaled spear in his hand, twirling it gently as he stared through the stone of the mountain. "...there you are."