Sludge suction system

The ethereal blue vapor condensing on the dungeon walls trickled down the stalactite peaks, winding into spiderweb-like patterns on the blue bricks. The light from Qian Wanguan's gilded seal at his waist was sliced ​​into fragments of silver, falling onto Sang Xuan's wounds, which were oozing spiritual fluid, making the blood groove on his collarbone appear like cracks embedded in amber. His black robe, torn into strips, hung between the blood-jade chains, revealing skin covered in purplish-black scabs. The patterns on those scabs corresponded perfectly to the Taotie patterns on the stone walls, as if his body had long been a living vessel of the ancient formation.

“Three hundred years ago, the firelight on the altar illuminated your face,” Qian Wanguan’s knuckles ground against the wound on Sang Xuan’s collarbone. The bluish spots, like greedy leeches, climbed up the blade, making a soft “crackling” sound with each movement. “Back then, you said, ‘The dragon turtle swallows the bone, the jade beauty offers her soul.’ Now it’s your turn to taste the backlash from your own flesh and blood.” The silver hairpin spun halfway in his palm, then suddenly spun hard into Sang Xuan’s temple. Inside the skull exposed at the break, countless blood jade worms were wriggling along the bone seams. Their bodies reflected a ghostly light, forming a dense “Xuan” character incantation.

Sang Xuan looked down at the bluish spots that had crept up Qian Wanguan's wrist to his elbow, and suddenly laughed. Spiritual liquid welled up between his teeth, condensing into a transparent poisonous bead on his chin. "Does Your Excellency know that these insects have gnawed on the spiritual bones of sixteen generations of jade immortals?" As he tilted his head, the blood jade chains made a heavy grinding sound. "What flows in your veins now is the Gu poison I brewed over three hundred years—every 'Xuan' character pattern is alive, gnawing at your soul."

Qian Wanguan suddenly swung his sword and severed a lock of Sang Xuan's white hair. The severed hair instantly transformed into a blood jade insect upon hitting the ground, flapping its wings and rising into the air. The sound of its wings flapping gathered into a roar like a torrential downpour hitting a window. The seal at his waist suddenly burst forth with a blinding red light, illuminating the old wound on Sang Xuan's collarbone from three hundred years ago—the wound was already covered by blood jade scales, the patterns on each scale perfectly matching the dragon-turtle relief on the dome, as if they were fragments peeled from the same skeleton.

"Stop trying to fool me with poison!" The back of the blade struck Sang Xuan's forehead, and fragments of the blood jade fell off, revealing the metallic skull beneath. "Sang Yu's tortoise shell is in my hands, and Tian Xue'er's blood is activating the mine. Do you think you can break this deadlock with just the two of them?" He ripped open Sang Xuan's collar, revealing the intricate blood jade veins in his chest, which emitted a faint glow with each breath. "Tell me! Just how many generations of jade people's spiritual liquid have you used to sustain this half-dead breath?"

Sang Xuan was pulled forward by the chains, his neck scales cracking and seeping spiritual liquid, which pooled on the ground into tiny pools of poison. He looked at the gray mist churning in Qian Wanguan's pupils, his smile deepening, "Immortality? It's nothing more than cutting your soul into sixteen pieces and sealing them into the bones and blood of sixteen generations of jade beauties." The blood jade chains suddenly buzzed, and his skull began to disintegrate, revealing a semi-transparent soul curled up like a cocoon inside. "Look at every pattern on this stone wall, carved by the sinews and blood of the jade beauties. When the seventeenth generation blood sacrifice is completed, the dragon turtle will use Tian Xue'er's body as a new shell and your soul as bait—" The cocoon exploded with a bang, and thousands of blood jade insects swarmed towards Qian Wanguan's face, "And I, am already the hardest scale of the old bones."

As he swung his sword, Qian Wanguan was horrified to realize that every insect he struck transformed into the "Xuan" character incantation on his sleeve. The moment the seal at his waist shattered, half a tortoise shell fell away—the inner side of the shell was engraved with the same dragon-tortoise scales as Sang Xuan's collarbone, and between the patterns, faint traces of the "Jie" character carved by the sword could be seen. From the depths of the dungeon came the rumble of gears turning backwards. Sang Xuan's remains transformed into spiritual liquid, seeping into the cracks in the stone. Each drop of this liquid reflected Qian Wanguan's terrified face, like countless shattered mirrors.

"The skeletons in the mass grave have the character '解' (jie, meaning 'to resolve') etched on their palms," Sang Xuan's voice surged from all directions, mingling with the tolling of bells from the altar three hundred years ago. "That was a trap I set for the old bones. Tian Xue'er's lotus birthmark? It was a deadly move laid by Sang Yu's mother using the blood of a spirit deer. Your blood has long since merged with the spirit bones of the sixteenth generation jade maiden—" Qian Wanguan's jade-like hand gripped his throat, blue spots already spreading across his chest. "Now I must ask you, when the old bones devoured souls, did they first chew up your ambition, or your regret?"

Deep within the dungeon, the candlelight flickered eerily in the draft, casting Yuan Xiangya's long shadow across the stone wall etched with taotie patterns. Her embroidered shoes crushed the fragments of Qian Wanguan's decaying jade body, the hem of her gold-threaded skirt brushed against Sang Xuan's blood-jade chain, which was soaked with spiritual liquid, and the blood-jade peace lock around her neck suddenly buzzed, resonating with the runes on the stone wall to emit fragments of golden light.

"Elder Sang Xuan, how have you been?" Her voice was sweet with a bitter undertone as her fingertips traced the bloodstain on his collarbone. "My father swept the lotus pond for you for twenty years, yet you let Qian Wanguan kill him with a rusty knife—" Suddenly, she grabbed his broken silver hairpin and stabbed it into the wound. "Now you're clinging to life by absorbing the Jade Man's spiritual elixir, while his bones are infested with maggots in the mass grave. Have you ever felt a shred of remorse?"

A strange, gurgling laugh escaped Sang Xuan's throat, as spiritual liquid mixed with fragments of a silver hairpin slid from between his teeth, etching spiderweb-like cracks into the blue bricks. His pupils constricted as he stared at the "Xuan" character pattern on Yuan Xiangya's peace lock—the pattern was identical to the curse mark within Qian Wanguan's body, yet a yellowed corner of paper peeked out from the lock's clasp, clearly a soul-suppressing talisman soaked in lotus dew.

"Xiangya!" Qian Wanguan's remaining jade-like hand suddenly grabbed her ankle, his right cheek now covered in bruises. "Don't believe his nonsense! This peace lock is to suppress the evil within you..."

"Suppress?" Yuan Xiangya ripped off the safety lock and threw it to the ground. The lock shattered, and half a finger bone, mixed with dried lotus petals, rolled away. She stared at the bluish bone, suddenly remembering the murmur that always floated up from the well in the back courtyard on rainy nights: "Ya'er, Mo Jinyu..."

As Sang Xuan gazed at the severed finger bone, his memory was suddenly pulled back to the altar three hundred years ago. The mute servant who always hummed Wu songs by the pond, before his death, didn't give him a letter pleading for help, but a handkerchief soaked in lotus dew for twenty years, with the tiny character "解" (jie, meaning "relief") embroidered on the corner.

“He begged me to protect you,” Sang Xuan’s spiritual liquid dripped onto his finger bone, condensing into a transparent dewdrop. “The peace lock contains thirty years of his lifespan, not a curse mark. The skeletal hand you dream of every night… is the old bone coveting the Yuan family’s bloodline.”

Yuan Xiangya suddenly let out a shrill laugh, pulling a blood-stained silver hairpin from her sleeve—the lotus pattern on the hairpin head fit perfectly with Sang Xuan's broken hairpin. "So you're going to refine me into a blood catalyst?" She ripped open her collar, revealing a dark lotus birthmark on her chest. "Tian Xue'er's blood can activate old bones, and my blood can grant you immortality, right?"

Qian Wanguan's jade-like fingers dug deep into the blue bricks as he gazed at the gray mist swirling in his wife's eyes. He finally recalled the lotus flower adorning her hair on their wedding night. At that time, he had not yet received the seal of the prefect. In the "betrothal gift" box that Sang Xuan handed him, besides a peace lock, there was also a lotus flower sealed in wax.

"Xiangya, listen to me..." His voice was mixed with the sound of jade shattering, "Sang Xuan used sixteen generations of jade figures to nourish the soul, wanting to use your blood to make the old bones recognize their master..."

"Enough!" Yuan Xiangya plunged the silver hairpin fiercely into Sang Xuan's blood jade chain. The chain suddenly trembled like a dragon's roar, and thousands of "Xuan" character runes climbed up her arm. Sang Xuan's skull began to disintegrate, revealing a coiled, translucent soul inside, which bore a striking resemblance to Yuan Xiangya's father.

"Back then, your father took a knife for me," the spirit spoke, and Yuan Xiangya smelled the familiar fragrance of lotus flowers. "His blood seeped into the old bones of the dragon turtle, and from then on, the Yuan family bloodline became the key to breaking the deadlock..."