Not all stone tank cesspools were in use. Some had been built thousands of years ago, long discarded into mere remnants of their slimy past.

There were many a reason for this. Changing layout of the Outer Sect Centrum, internal politics, purposeful subterfuge, disasters. Most were retaken by nature, turning into burrows for beasts such as bats and rabbits. A significant many turned into the playgrounds for the Gorge-Crawling Earthworm tribe.

They were in one such abandoned cesspool. It was only an empty pool now. No drainage system dumping sewage, they'd all been collapsed and filled.

Feral Spot had guided them here, after Huang Niuniu had bargained for his services. She paid in emergency headpats after the worm had been bested by a peer of the Dawn Mist Crane Tribe.

It was an underground space like any of the others. On one end, the stairs led down. Not from a stone tank, but from in between a grove of giant trees twisting into a basket-like shape. From afar, the grove would look like one strange tree, perhaps mutated, nested between a forest of normal ones. On the other end of the underground space was a semi-collapsed pool.

Fang Zhao waved his hand. A large, tub-shaped cauldron appeared. Made of metal, with etchings of forests, lakes, and mountains. It stood one and a half meters tall and four times that wide. It wasn't an alchemy cauldron, however. They'd purchased it cheap from one of the outer sect's many cafeterias. It was meant for mass producing soups, stews, and occasionally, brews.

Today, they'd cook Yu Han.

"Are you sure we should do this before I level up?" Yu Han said. Uncertain.

Li Yao mimed a chicken, then dodged Yu Han's pathetic punch.

「Yu Han, no one is here. I told mister frog to go away.」 Fei Rui said from the top of the stairwell. He was on guard duty. What a dutiful crab.

Mistress Miao was at the base of the stairs. She licked a paw, then stretched. "I'm sure."

Yu Han waited a bit. No elaboration came.

"Why?"

"Why not?"

Yu Han was starting to feel, viscerally, Fang Zhao's problem with the cat.

Is it an autist?

"I'll be two origin points stronger," Yu Han said. One from Primordial Qi, and the other from the Heavenly Qi Allocation.

He wouldn't be exactly two points stronger though, with the weights being a thing.

"But then the level up won't benefit your second bloodline art," Mistress Miao said. "This way Fang Zhao's debt will be repaid more completely."

Right, debt.

The cat only cared about taking Fang Zhao away from the sect and playing pranks on the red-eyed boy.

The boy in question had healed up significantly in the previous days. He was now filling the cauldron with the marrow wine thing.

Li Yao took out a paper sheet and placed it under the cauldron according to Mistress Miao's guidance. It would generate constant heat. The array paper was a consumable. It would last five or six hours, enough for both Huang Niuniu and Yu Han's second bloodline awakenings, if Mistress Miao were to be trusted.

"Are you sure it won't hurt?" Yu Han remembered Fang Zhao's experience in the blood pool. How his skin had cracked and flesh had mutated, only to stitch back together time and again.

He would rather pass.

"I'm sure," Mistress Miao said.

"I had expected an elaboration when I asked that question," Yu Han said. "The awkward silence signifies that."

"Hmm. Troublesome. Why didn't you say so?" The cat corrected the array paper placements. She then activated them.

The array lines on the paper glowed, and Yu Han felt the heat radiating out. They would wait until the Corroding Corpse Stone Marrow Wine was simmering.

"His awakening was unguided," Mistress Miao said. "Yours is guided. Only writhers, and none but."

"That's enough for it to be painless?"

"Your potential is weaker," Mistress Miao said. "Needs less to awaken more. But you'll achieve less too. Not too painful. Needleprick. Afraid?"

「My Yu Han isn't.」 Fei Rui answered in his stead.

"Thanks, budd—"

「Look how big he is. He is round, and not less, but actually more.」

Someone's teaching my cute Fei Rui to be mean!

Second bloodline awakening. Fang Zhao had explained the concept to him after returning from the hidden realm. That's why he was there. He'd gathered a ring full of writher- and wisp-type monsters.

First would be Yu Han's turn. Then Huang Niuniu, though the girl wasn't with them now. She said she would bring one more wisp-type creature. It wouldn't be a monster, but Mistress Miao said the ritual had enough flexibility as long as Huang Niuniu didn't regret it later. Her Bioluminescence allowed her to somehow, at an exceedingly primal level, communicate with mortal-grade wisps likes bioluminous algae, phytoplankton, jellyfish, and fireflies. For some reason, she was adamant about including this one.

A case of theft: this story is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

Yu Han cast another sceptical glance at the cat. She was an ancient being. Fang Zhao's hidden grandma.

Of course she would know a trick or two that weren't included in her sect's NDA.

Yu Han's bloodline was the Deep Writhing Clam. Most of its kind were normal animals or primals.

It was a clam.

With a near-translucent octopus squid cuttlefish thing inside. Imagine a nautilus but instead of an ammonite-like shell, it was a clam. It spent most of its life inside the clamshell, while opening up only when it needed to relocate. It could filter feed, and also hunt. The clam's inside was attached to the cephalopod where the head would have been. It could grow a big pearl inside the brain area. If it did, the pearl could be seen through the translucent skin and flesh. Deep Writhing Clams were hunted for their medicinal properties. Yu Han's family were in the business of cooking a wicked soup.

There were regional variations, and more so if they were monsters or primals. Apparently, one type could grow pearls all throughout the inside of its body. It would look like a blob of swimming stars while moving.

Their abilities included sleeping for years at a time, spraying ink, camouflage, creating pearls, poison, and a few more molluscan skills. Yu Han guessed his Deep Sleep was related to the first ability.

Come to think of it, some mollusks have jet propulsion, right?

That would be weird.

There was also filter feeding, burrowing. And retraction into the shell? Wait, if Yu Han got shell-retraction, where would he retract into?

He shook his head to get the gruesome image out.

His second bloodline awakening would tend towards the writher portion, rather than the clam. So creating pearls and super durable skin was out.

He brought up his Dao Record.

Yu Han (Johan) | Lvl.2 | Accords: 1

Qi:

[True: 300/300]

[Pure: 149/300]

[Primordial: 0]

[Lifeforce: 879/912]

He'd reached the True Qi cap. The Trial text had appeared.

Trial: [Create an Outerplanar Outpost 0/1.]

"Shapes unite, leaves enlarged,

Parasol stops, arrays converge.

An eye encircled, an ear of sphere,

A nose kited, and mouth of square.

Green flames lurk hidden, drawing close,

Lanterns touch and flicker golden, the ghost's encroachment slows."

Outerplanar Outpost. Does the Dao want me to create a building on that… Mirror Earth?

Yu Han was pretty convinced the Trial had something to do with shape-based formation arrays too. It was literally there. The words, shape and array.

He didn't have the Qi Awareness trait yet. He had gone through the notes Elder Chang had given Huang Niuniu and had his own plans. If things went well, he would get at least 3 major power-ups in the next couple of days. This included the second bloodline awakening, but not the realm level up, which might take longer. He wasn't even a novice in arrays. How long would it take for him to get proficient enough to create an outerplanar outpost? Years? Decades?

Is the dao fucking me over?

Yu Han chose not to stress over it.

When the Corroding Corpse Stone Marrow Wine started to simmer, Fang Zhao took out a writher corpse. It was clean without anything non-writher attached to it like dirt and sand. He threw it in, followed by a spirit stone.

"Writhers have beaks you know," Yu Han said to Mistress Miao. There was also the cuttlebone and the gladius. "The marrow wine only dissolves the blood. Do we have to remove the flesh goo and the hard bits? It's going to be a pain in the ass sitting there otherwise."

"Why?" The cat stared at him.

"Don't make me explain my jokes. Please."

"Why?"

Yu Han explained what pain in the ass meant, and how sitting on pointy beaks and bones would literally cause his hindside pain.

"Amusing," the cat laughed. "Wordplay. I can appreciate that. No, it won't be a 'pain in the ass.'" The cat winked at him. "The heat and spirit stones will empower the marrow wine."

About a thousand writher corpses, all monsters with monster cores. A thousand mortal grade spirit stones. The marrow wine had assimilated all that mass, but the volume seemed to not have changed.

They removed the array papers after deactivating them and waited for the cauldron to cool.

Fang Zhao checked everything one last time. He was bandaged up still. He wouldn't say who or what was responsible for his injuries. He had assured him his life was not, and had not been, in danger.

That deep fire in his eyes though. Yu Han knew it well.

It was naked resentment.

Not at him, of course, but the assailant. Although Huang Niuniu did whine at him for glaring too much.

The boy had been testy. His fists would clench randomly, and he'd suddenly go still as if caught in a violent dream. Yu Han didn't want to be insistent before being cooked. Mistress Miao assured them his life hadn't actually been in danger.

Just Fang Zhao's pride.

Despite that, whoever had gotten on Fang Zhao's bad list, got on his too. He had a guess. Only a guess. Fang Zhao was ganked. Pretty badly at that.

The red-eyed boy would share his woes soon enough, that much he trusted. What's the use of a courtyard if they didn't gang up on bullies together?

When the cauldron cooled enough to touch without skin being burnt, Fang Zhao placed the array papers under the cauldron again and restarted them.

"Brother Yu, best of luck," he said. "I'll be outside. Just call for me if anything goes wrong." He wiped his lip with the base of his thumb. It was cracked, red oozing. "I don't like her, but the cat won't wrong you."

They left, and Fei Rui came down.

「Yu Han, if you become soup, I won't eat you.」

"I'd rather have you eat me, bud. Don't let my body go to waste. Eat, and get the nutrition."

「Then, then. Then, if I die, will you eat me too?」

"That's a promise."

Fei Rui raised his claw. Yu Han fist-bumped it. The crab looked at the claw, the orange fire in his obsidian eyestalks flickering like fireworks.

「I think you are so kind. Meow Miao said you have to take off the clothes.」

Yu Han stripped. He touched the cauldron edge, it was at his chest level. He heaved himself up and got in without disturbing the contents. The metal was warm, but not hot enough to scorch. It would gradually heat up.

His body sank down into the marrow wine. It was thick, gelatinous, like sinking into glue. As his body lowered, it felt like needles were being pricked into his skin. It wasn't painful though, like acupuncture. He relaxed, his soles touched the floor of the cauldron.

Soon, the concoction started to bubble. Yu Han stood there, then closed his eyes. He was to cultivate.

His breathing shifted, rising and falling in rhythms. The thick goo of the marrow wine was like a weight atop his chest and belly. He had to exert to inhale fully. The wine was hot. It slowly turned scorching. His feet felt like they were melding into the cauldron floor.

But they didn't. Yu Han got used to the weight and the heat.

He let his sense of smell fall first. Then sight. Sound. Taste. Only touch remained as a nova. Above his skin. Under it. He felt, sensed, savoured the thin wisps of 'something' permeating into his body. Like osmosis.

He tasted spice. And ink. And seafood.

With his flesh.

What? He had let his sense of taste fall. But apparently not fully. Did the substance permeate his body and then rise up through his throat to some unknown taste glands? He didn't have trouble breathing though, as long as they were slow and methodical.

Yu Han kept his concentration.

Let's try it out.

He let his sense of touch fall too. In his mind, the pink and green blossoms closed, like a reverse timelapse of a blooming flower.

All that was left was darkness. In that state, Yu Han slowed his breath. He concentrated an inch behind his forehead, inside his brain.

The brain did not feel. He should not feel anything. But when he was Johan, it was a trick he did to help his restless mind relax. They said he had ADHD, he didn't really believe them though.

He should have—

Yu Han appeared in his Dreamscape. It didn't always work, but with the increased Thousand Petals Awareness mastery, he could now induce sleep manually.

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