Master, This Poor Disciple Died Again Today

Chapter 567: Phoenix Burning on the Underworld Floor

“Elder Sister… er, Your Majesty,” Hui tried.

Qian Liqiu appeared. She looked at him expectantly.

“Small cultivator has a plan. If everything goes well, I should be able to provide you and your people with… if nothing else, temporary bodies by the end. Will Senior cooperate?”

“You’re able to carry all of us, without flinching?” she asked, surprised.

Hui scratched the back of his head. Cries and conversation echoed in his mind, and the flames burned at his spectral body. It hurts, and it’s distracting, but… for the pain, it’s not worse than that time I had both legs broken and had to crawl across a burning hot parking lot in the middle of summer. As for the distractions… well, I did grow up in a different era, where it’s completely normal to walk through a store and have a dozen televisions playing different videos all at once. My attention span might be short, but in return, I’m easily able to block out extraneous sound! “Er, well, small cultivator is used to a great deal of distractions, and the pain… I can’t bear it forever, but I don’t plan to.”

A strange expression passed over her face, somewhere between concern and curiosity. After a moment, it resolved to impressed. Qian Liqiu nodded. “Then what is your plan?”

“Let me out! Give them back!” Huo Fenghuang shouted, banging on the barrier.

Hui looked her up and down, then sighed. “Elder Sister, please put some clothes on. You aren’t even on fire anymore!” Honestly. Even this small cultivator has the awareness to wear clothes!

Huo Fenghuang scowled. Robes materialized around her as she continued to beat at the barrier. “Let me out!”

Ignoring her, Hui sat down on the air and closed his eyes, beginning to meditate. He pushed the phoenixes outward, circulating them in a ring around his dantian. Taking a deep breath, he let it out, and as he let it out, two rings separated from the first ring. Inward, a ring of life qi spun, songbirds darting within it. Outward, a ring of death ducks swam on a river of death qi.

Life qi. Fire qi. Death qi. Fire qi. This is the fundamental cycle the phoenixes follow. Fire transmutes life to death and death to life. It is the intermediary step. The missing phase from one to the other. Where ordinary qi decays or transforms at a loss, fire qi allows an equal cycling through the phases of qi. josei

Ultimately, there is only one type of qi. All qi is one qi. However, that one qi… Hui’s brows furrowed. He shook his head. No, that’s still beyond me.

But this is already more than enough.

“Xiao Hui, I’ve gathered up everyone in the Night Market,” Black Dragon said, her voice echoing directly inside Hui’s head.

“Thank you. Qian Liqiu, are you ready?” Hui asked.

“We are ready,” she replied.

Another deep breath. A pulse beat through the rings, all of them swirling faster for a moment.

“Please, Elder Sister, phoenixes. Loan me your strength,” Hui said quietly. I said it I said it I said it…!

“Yes,” Qian Liqiu said.

Hui threw his hands out. The rings expanded. One after another, pounding through the Night Market. Everywhere the death qi touched, the land rotted away. The fire burned up what remained. Through the empty space that the first two rings left behind, the life qi surged, leaving sparks in the ashes.

The death qi passed over Black Dragon. As the fire qi approached, she opened her eyes for the first time since Hui had met her. Bare white orbs reflected the approaching ring of fire.

The fire, the world, everything froze. Black Dragon stepped casually over the flame ring and the life qi ring, then closed her eyes again.

Unaware of this, Hui continued to press the rings outward. The rings surged on.

The rings reached the limits of the Night Market and pressed against the edges. The edges of the Night Market trembled, shaking like the skin of a bubble.

Now. Now is the time to use Zhu Diyu’s secret attack!

He drew the void talisman on the air in front of him, then pushed a hand into it. At the very limits of the rings, the void talisman appeared. Voids opened in the surface of the world, and the rings rushed inside.

“Black Dragon, follow me,” Hui said.

“Understood,” she replied.

Hui stood and stepped into a void as it opened before him. Across the world, Black Dragon stepped into a void as well, bringing the Night Market with her.

Left all alone, Huo Fenghuang beat at the barrier. The Night Market grew unstable around her. “Let me out! Don’t leave me like this!”

In the collapsing world, reality trembled. A hole opened up in the sky, and a man sitting in a throne appeared. He stood. “Huo Fenghuang?”

“Ah? My disciple?” Huo Fenghuang asked.

Han Qin darted forward, personally leaving the throne and entering the world. He pressed his forehead against the barrier, his palms pushed up toward it. On the far side, Huo Fenghuang put her hands to hers.

“I finally found you,” Han Qin whispered.

“Get me out of here!” Huo Fenghuang shouted.

Han Qin gestured. The barrier floated away from its tether at the bottom of what little remained of the Night Market. He stepped back into his throne room, bringing Huo Fenghuang along with him. “However long it takes… I’ll free you, Master.”

“Hmph. Naturally,” Huo Fenghuang said haughtily. After a moment, her gaze softened. She put a hand on the border of the barrier. “Disciple…”

“Master?”

Huo Fenghuang ducked her head. “I… I’m sorry. For failing to guide you. For getting caught up in my own Dao and forgetting to nurture yours.”

Han Qin smiled, slow and warm. “There’s still plenty of time, Master. We can learn together.”

“Of course,” she replied, settling by the barrier’s edge.

Though neither of them noticed it, the barrier weakened by a tiny degree.

The gap in the world closed.

In the Night Market, nothing remained. Nothing but ash and a few flickering embers of life qi, floating in the empty space where the Night Market had once been.