Yan Minxue sat alone in the dim light of the ancient ruins. The air outside the invisible barrier was still thick with the bright green toxic gas, but inside the small circle created by the gray bead, the air was fresh and cool. She held the mysterious object in her palm, staring at it with intense focus.
It was heavy, much heavier than a normal stone of its size should be. The surface was not smooth like a polished gem. It was rough and uneven, like a piece of dried clay that had been baked in the sun for a thousand years. It looked like trash. If she had seen it lying on the side of the road, she would have kicked it away without a second thought.
But she had seen what it could do. It held back the deadly swamp gas without any effort. It was a treasure.
She needed to understand it. She needed to know what it was and how to use it. If she just carried it in her pocket, it might fall out. If she encountered another beast or a cultivator from a rival sect, they might sense the energy and kill her to take it. She had to make sure this bead belonged to her completely.
She placed the bead on a flat stone in front of her. She reached into her boot and pulled out her dagger. It was a simple iron weapon, the metal dark and stained with rust near the handle. The edge was chipped from hitting rocks and bones, but it was still sharp enough to cut skin.
She gripped the handle of the dagger tightly. Her knuckles turned white. She raised the blade and brought it down hard on the gray bead.
Clink.
The sound was sharp and high, like metal hitting a diamond. Yan Minxue's hand went numb from the impact. The dagger bounced off the bead. She leaned forward to look at the bead. There was not even a white scratch on its gray surface. It was perfectly unharmed.
She looked at her dagger. The tip of the iron blade was bent.
She frowned. This bead was harder than iron. It was harder than any rock she had ever seen.
"Physical force is useless," she said softly to herself. Her voice sounded small in the empty stone room.
She sheathed the dagger and closed her eyes. She took a deep breath, trying to calm her racing heart. She focused on the energy inside her body. She was only at Qi Accumulation Level 3. Her energy was a small, thin stream flowing through her meridians. It was weak, but it was all she had.
She guided her qi to her right hand. A very faint, white light appeared around her fingers. It was not bright. It looked like the light of a dying firefly. She pressed her glowing fingers against the gray bead. She tried to push her energy into it, to make a connection, to leave her mark on it.
Nothing happened.
It was like trying to pour a cup of water into a solid mountain. Her qi hit the surface of the bead and vanished. The bead did not glow. It did not get warm. It did not react at all. It just sat there, cold and indifferent. It rejected her.
It was too high of a level for her weak cultivation. A feeling of frustration rose in her chest. She had found a great opportunity, a chance to change her fate, but she was too weak to use it. It was like a starving beggar finding a golden box that was locked tight.
She pulled her hand back. She bit her lip until she tasted iron.
"I cannot give up," she thought. "The heavens gave this to me. I will not let it stay a useless stone."
She sat there for a long time, thinking. The green gas outside swirled against the barrier, looking like hungry ghosts trying to get in. She remembered a story she had heard when she was a child in the Yan Clan. Her grandfather had told her about ancient artifacts that had their own will. These treasures would not accept a master unless they were bound by a blood oath. It was called Blood Refinement. It was a dangerous, forbidden method. It did not require high cultivation. It required life essence. You had to feed the artifact your own blood to force a connection.
It was risky. If the artifact was too strong, it could drink all the blood in a person's body, turning them into a dry husk. Yan Minxue looked at her thin arms. She did not have much blood to spare. She was malnourished and tired. But what choice did she have? If she walked out of here with the bead in her pocket, the swamp gas might return. Or the Scarlet Hawk Sect might find her. Without power, she was dead anyway.
"Better to die trying to rise than to live as a dog," she said. Her eyes were hard and cold. She had made her decision.
She picked up the bead again. It felt cold against her skin. She took her dagger back out. She did not hesitate this time. She pressed the sharp edge of the blade against the palm of her left hand. She gritted her teeth and sliced.
A line of red appeared on her skin. The pain was sharp and hot. Blood began to well up, dark red and thick. She made a fist, squeezing the wound to make the blood flow faster.
She held her bleeding hand over the gray bead. A large drop of blood formed on the side of her hand. It grew heavy, then fell.
Plop.
The drop of blood hit the gray surface. It did not splash. It did not roll off. It sank into the stone. The gray surface drank the blood like dry sand drinking rain. For a second, nothing else happened.
Then, a faint red light appeared deep inside the bead. It was working.
Yan Minxue felt a rush of hope. She squeezed her hand again. More blood dripped down. One drop. Two drops. Three drops. Each one vanished into the bead. The red light inside grew stronger. It began to look like a red eye opening in the darkness.
But then, the situation changed.
The bead moved. It did not roll. It jumped. It flew up from the stone floor and stuck to her bleeding palm. It was like a magnet snapping onto iron.
Yan Minxue gasped and tried to shake her hand, but the bead was stuck fast. It covered the wound she had made.
A terrible sensation washed over her. It was not pain, exactly. It was a pulling feeling. A violent, hungry suction. The bead was not just drinking the drops that fell. It was actively sucking the blood out of her veins. She could feel it pulling the blood from her wrist, from her arm, from her shoulder.
"Stop!" she cried out. She grabbed the bead with her right hand and tried to pull it off. It was impossible. It was welded to her skin. Her right hand slipped because of the sweat on her skin.
The suction got stronger. The red light inside the bead became bright and angry. It was vibrant and terrifying. Yan Minxue's face went pale. The color drained from her lips. She felt a coldness spreading from her left arm to the rest of her body. Her heart began to beat wildly, trying to pump blood that was being stolen.
Thump-thump-thump.
It was beating too fast. It was struggling.
Her vision began to blur. The edges of the room started to turn black. She felt dizzy. Her knees gave out, and she fell sideways onto the hard stone floor. The cold of the stone seeped into her clothes, but she barely felt it. She was freezing from the inside.
"It's killing me," she thought. Panic flooded her mind. "It's going to drink me dry."
She was going to die here, alone in the dark, killed by the very thing she thought would save her. The irony was bitter. She thought of the Scarlet Hawk Sect. She thought of their laughter. If she died here, her bones would rot, and no one would ever know. No one would care.
"No," she growled. The sound was weak, barely a noise in her throat. "I will not die."
She needed energy. She needed to replenish the blood she was losing. Her mind raced. She thought of the herbs she had gathered today. She had a few low-grade roots, but they were not enough.
Then she remembered the prize. Earlier that day, before the crocodile attack, she had found a Silver-Leaf Herb. It was a mid-grade healing herb. It was rare. It was worth twenty spirit stones. She had planned to sell it to buy food for a month.
She reached into her sash with her free hand. Her fingers were clumsy and numb. She fumbled with the cloth. She could feel the texture of the leaves. She pulled it out. The herb had three broad leaves that shimmered with a silver color, even in the dim light. The roots were still covered in dirt.
She did not have time to clean it. She did not have time to boil it into a medicine. She shoved the entire herb—leaves, stem, dirt, and roots—into her mouth.
She chewed frantically. The taste was awful. It was bitter, metallic, and gritty with soil. She gagged, but she forced herself to swallow. She chewed and swallowed, chewed and swallowed.
As soon as the herb hit her stomach, a ball of heat exploded in her gut. The Silver-Leaf Herb was potent. Eaten raw, its energy was wild and violent. It burned her stomach like a hot coal. But Yan Minxue welcomed the pain. The heat rushed through her body. It entered her bloodstream. The medicinal energy began to produce new blood and vitality at a rapid speed.
The bead sensed the new energy. It sucked harder. The suction became a throbbing pain. The bead and the herb were fighting a war inside her body. The herb created life. The bead consumed it. Yan Minxue was the battlefield.
She convulsed on the floor, her body shaking uncontrollably. Her skin turned red from the heat of the herb, then white from the blood loss, flashing back and forth. Sweat poured down her face, mixing with the dirt on the floor.
She screamed, but her voice was raw and broken. The pain was unbearable. It felt like her veins were filled with fire and ice at the same time. She curled into a ball, clutching her left arm to her chest. The gray bead was now glowing with a blinding red light. It was vibrant and bloody. It looked like a small sun made of blood.
Minutes passed. Or maybe hours. Yan Minxue lost track of time. She focused only on breathing. In and out. In and out. Stay awake. Do not close your eyes. If she closed her eyes, she would never open them again.
Slowly, the violent suction began to slow down. The bead was getting full. The wild heat in her stomach from the Silver-Leaf Herb was fading, leaving a warm, soothing feeling behind. The herb had done its job. It had kept her alive just long enough.
The bead let go of her hand.
It fell off her palm and floated in the air. It did not fall to the ground. It hovered at eye level. The gray color was gone. The bead was now a deep, translucent crimson. It looked like a drop of solidified blood. It gave off a low, powerful sound that vibrated in Yan Minxue's teeth.
She lay on her back, panting. She watched the bead. She was too weak to move. She wondered if it was going to attack her again.
The red bead spun slowly. Then, without warning, it shot forward. It moved like a streak of red lightning. Yan Minxue did not even have time to blink.
It aimed straight for her face. Specifically, it aimed for the spot between her eyebrows—her Upper Dantian. This was the place where a cultivator's mind and soul resided.
She flinched, expecting her skull to crack. But there was no impact. There was no pain. When the bead hit her forehead, it did not hit bone. It felt like a drop of water falling into a calm lake. It passed right through her skin and bone. It dissolved into her.
She felt a strange, cool sensation slide into her brain. It moved to the center of her head and settled there. It felt heavy, but stable. It was like an anchor dropping into the deep sea of her consciousness. The bead had found its home. It had accepted her blood, and now it was part of her.
Yan Minxue lay still. The ruins were quiet again. The green gas outside continued to swirl. Her breathing slowly returned to normal. Her hand was still throbbing where she had cut it, but the wound was already closing, healed by the leftover energy of the Silver-Leaf Herb.
She felt different. The world seemed sharper. The shadows in the corners of the room seemed to have more depth. She could hear the wind outside more clearly.
Then, the pain returned, but not in her body. It was in her mind.
It started as a dull pressure, then expanded rapidly. It felt like someone was writing on the inside of her skull with a chisel. Information. Massive amounts of ancient, forgotten information flooded her brain. It was not words she heard with her ears. It was knowledge being stamped directly onto her soul.
She saw images of dark oceans, of mountains made of bones, of a sky that was purple and black. She saw figures standing tall, their bodies emitting a terrifying, dark power.
She grabbed her head with both hands. She gritted her teeth, trying to keep her sanity as the flood of information threatened to wash her away. It was a technique. A cultivation method. But it was not like the gentle breathing exercises of the Yan Clan. It was not like the righteous sword arts of the Scarlet Hawk Sect. This was something older. Something darker. Something that demanded pain and sacrifice to master.
The characters formed in her mind, burning with a cold, black fire. They arranged themselves into a title that carried an aura of death and absolute power.
The Abyssal Bone Forging Art.
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