Sludge suction system

Snowflakes pelted the jade wall of the insect-rearing room. Sang Xuan stared at the shattered jade in his palm and sneered. The curse-breaking patterns gleamed with an eerie red light under the moonlight, just like the insect core in his heart, which had devoured the souls of sixteen Sang family women over three hundred years and was now staring hungrily at the celadon medicine bottle at Tan Ge's waist.

"Master is still as greedy as ever." Tan Ge tossed the medicine bottle onto the stone platform, the three characters "Eternal Life Gu" engraved on the bottle oozing blood. Sang Xuan looked at the teeth marks on his sleeve—the marks left when he bit Tian Xue'er last night—and felt a surge of pleasure, just like when he personally pushed Sang Li into the blood jade coffin three hundred years ago.

“Tian Xue’er’s Yuan family bloodline is top-grade material for refining Gu.” Sang Xuan’s fingertips traced the insect-shaped runes, and the golden swarm of insects beneath the scales, smelling the blood, began to wriggle under the skin. Tan Ge clenched his fist, his knuckles turning white from the force. He knew that the master before him was no longer human, but a living dead hollowed out by the swarm of insects. “Bring her here, and I will give you half an insect core, allowing you to coexist with her.”

“Symbiosis?” Tang Ge suddenly laughed, his laughter mixed with sobs. “You lied to Sang Li like this back then, didn’t you? Saying that ‘the Twin Curse is destiny’, but she became your first jade corpse, and her soul was devoured by the swarm of insects until there was not even a trace left.”

Sang Xuan's insect core suddenly throbbed with pain, and the shattered jade glowed crimson, illuminating a bone bottle hidden in the secret compartment of the insect-rearing room—containing Sang Li's fragmented bones, each piece engraved with the character "Xuan" incantation. The insect swarm stirred at this moment, and he saw in the shadows behind Tan Ge that Tian Xue'er was suspended by iron chains, the silver bell on her wrist engraved with the character "Tan," a gift he himself had bestowed upon her.

"You won't listen to reason, so you'll have to suffer the consequences." Sang Xuan raised his hand and swung it towards the stone wall, whereupon chains formed by the swarm of insects suddenly wrapped around Tan Ge's throat. "You think Qian Wanguan will really give you the antidote? He just wants to use you to send the Yuan family bloodline into my insect hive—"

Before she could finish speaking, Tian Xue'er suddenly opened her eyes, her pupils reflecting the cracks in Sang Xuan's shattered jade. Only then did Tan Ge realize that the silver bell on her wrist had cracked at some point, revealing the fragments of jade hidden inside—the patterns were the same as Sang Xuan's, but with an additional shocking knife mark.

“Sang Xuan, look what this is!” Tian Xue’er held up the broken jade, the blood beads seeping from the cracks were actually blue. “The Yuan family bloodline can break the insect Gu, and your broken jade…” She pressed the fragment onto Sang Xuan’s insect core, and the incantation suddenly reversed, “It’s actually the soul bone nail that the abbot used to control you three hundred years ago!”

Sang Xuan's scales began to crack, revealing the festering skin beneath. He saw that what emerged from the shattered jade was not the incantation-breaking runes, but the consciousness of the Abbot—the parasite hidden deep within his insect core, emitting a chilling laugh through his mouth: "Tang Ge, why don't you offer up the Yuan family girl? Don't you want to save her?"

"I never wanted to save her from being controlled by the Gu poison." Tan Ge gripped the bone knife tightly, the blade slicing open Tian Xue'er's wrist. Blue blood dripped onto Sang Xuan's insect core, causing all the insects to shriek. "Tian Xue'er, use your blood to awaken the real me—"

Amidst the excruciating pain, Sang Xuan's mind suddenly cleared. He saw himself three hundred years ago, kneeling by the Blood Jade Pool, his mother stuffing fragments of jade into his collar. The edge of the jade was engraved with the character "解" (jie, meaning "to resolve"), but it was devoured by the abbot's swarm of insects, turning into the character "玄" (xuan, meaning "mysterious"). It turned out that from beginning to end, he had been the abbot's puppet, and the so-called immortality was nothing but a lie built with the bloodline of the Sang family.

"Tan'er..." His voice was mixed with the chirping of insects, "Kill me, destroy the insect core..."

“Master, you should have done this long ago.” Tan Ge’s bone knife pierced Sang Xuan’s heart, and blue blood and black insect blood exploded simultaneously, piecing together a complete dragon turtle totem on the wall. Sang Xuan’s body began to disintegrate, and as the swarm of insects poured out of his seven orifices, he finally saw Tian Xue’er’s face clearly—it was exactly the same as his mother’s when she was young. The purity of the Yuan family bloodline was enough to purify all curses.

"So... I was the biggest joke..." Sang Xuan's shattered jade fell to the ground, revealing the abbot's soul bone nail in the cracks. "Three hundred years of immortality, nothing more than making a wedding dress for someone else..."

At this moment, the subterranean fire burst through the rock strata, and Tian Xue'er's shattered jade and Tan Ge's silver bell resonated, weaving a net of light to kill the insects. Before dissipating, Sang Xuan saw Sang Yu rush into the insect-rearing room. On her wrist was the silver bell her mother had worn before her death. The clear sound of the bell drowned out all the chirping of the insects; it was the lullaby of his mother that he hadn't dared to finish listening to three hundred years ago.

"Yu'er...I'm sorry..."

The moment the subterranean fire burst forth from the cracks in the rocks, Sang Yu, carrying Xiao Zha's blue light, burst through the window. The silver bell on her wrist shattered the blood web woven by the swarm of insects, and fragments of jade gathered in her palm to form a shield, forcefully blocking Tan Ge's bone knife aimed at Sang Xuan.

"Stop! His insect core contains the Abbot's Soul-Devouring Insect!" Xiao Zha's mechanical voice pierced through the rock strata, and a holographic projection unfolded on Sang Xuan's chest—where the insect core had split into three parts, each part containing the Abbot's golden larva, which was spreading along Sang Xuan's blood vessels toward Tan Ge.

Tan Ge's blade stopped three inches from Sang Xuan's throat, the edge reflecting the bloodshot veins in Sang Yu's eyes: "He just tried to kill Tian Xue'er! He's not human!"

Suddenly, Sang Yu's shattered jade adhered to Sang Xuan's insect core. The black blood and the cursed patterns on the surface of the insect core resonated, revealing layers upon layers of memory fragments—Sang Xuan carved a silver bell for her in front of the blood jade coffin, secretly used his own blood to nurture her shattered jade in the insect-raising room, and even led the insect swarm towards his own heart when the abbot forced him to make a sacrifice.

"He was cursed with a 'Parricide Gu' by the Abbot, and his actions just now were against his will!" Xiao Zha's blue light enveloped Sang Xuan's festering skin. "Host, quickly use your blood to activate the mother Gu mark in the broken jade! That's the key to breaking the curse left by Sang Xuan's mother!"

Sang Yu bit her tongue, dripping her blood onto the crack in the broken jade. Miraculously, the golden swarm of insects beneath Sang Xuan's scales began to wriggle backward, burrowing into the abbot's soul bone nail along the patterns on the broken jade. Tan Ge's eyes widened as he saw the red light in Sang Xuan's eyes fade, replaced by a pain unseen for three hundred years, a pain belonging to a human.

“Yu’er… go…” Sang Xuan’s fingertips trembled as he touched her cheek. The blood seeping from the worm core was no longer black, but warm, bright red blood. “The abbot is deep in the mine… he wants Tian Xue’er’s blood…”

“We’re not going anywhere.” Sang Yu squeezed his hand and placed the silver bell in his palm. “Xiao Zha said your insect core is the key to opening the abbot’s secret chamber, and Tian Xue’er’s Yuan family bloodline…” She looked at Tian Xue’er, who was being lifted up by the swarm of insects. The birthmark on the latter’s wrist was resonating with the broken jade, “which would prevent the dragon turtle totem from possessing her after it manifested.”

Tan Ge suddenly staggered and knelt down, pulling out the medicine bottle Qian Wanguan had given him from his pocket: "There were insect eggs in this medicine... I almost..."

"Shh—" Tian Xue'er woke up at some point and gently pressed her hand to his lips. Her fingertips traced the insect-shaped curse mark on Sang Xuan's body, and the blue blood actually condensed into ice crystals on the surface of the mark. "Yuan family blood can freeze insect worms, Sang Yu's blood can guide the swarm of insects, and the three of us..." She looked at the snow light outside the rock crevice, "are the ones destined to break the curse three hundred years ago."

Xiao Zha's gears suddenly spun rapidly above his head: "Host! The Abbot's soul bone is nailed to the deepest part of the mine. Now, Sang Xuan's insect core is resonating with your shattered jade, which can interfere with his spacetime anchor point!"

Sang Yu helped Sang Xuan up, feeling his body temperature through her palms. The excruciating pain from the insect core had turned into warmth, like the warmth her father used to warm her hands when she was a child. She pressed the broken jade against his chest, and heard her mother from three hundred years ago whisper in the bell's core: Blood ties are not shackles, love can break through eternal night.

"Tang Ge, take Tian Xue'er to the Jade Corpse Array and use the silver bell to awaken the souls of our aunts." Sang Yu drew his bone knife, the blade reflecting the overlapping shadows of the four people in the firelight. "Father, this time it's my turn to take you home—back to the home without the Gu worms and the Blood Jade."

Looking at the determination in his daughter's eyes, Sang Xuan suddenly remembered his wife's dying words: "Yu'er's name is Yu, the 'feather,' not Yu, the 'jade' in 'jade coffin.'" He gripped the silver bell tightly, and for the first time, its sound no longer carried a curse, but was clear and melodious like snowmelt from Kunlun, causing all the insects to scatter.

“Okay, let’s go home.” He said softly, letting Sang Yu help him walk into the depths of the mine, leaving behind a trail of true survival woven from the light of shattered jade and the clear sound of silver bells.