Gou Hui watched with lingering joy as he forced the miserable cockroach off the cobblestone walkway and into the ground far below. With the gravity from the mountain formation pressuring this spot enough to reinforce the ground below them into stone, the fall would be devastating, even to a Qi condensation expert like himself.

Yet, the joy in Gou Hui’s eyes faded a bit as a sense of déjà vu crept up on him.

The scene was faintly reminiscent: A young man falling into a pit of despair that by all means should leave him as bait for the beasts that lurked within. It was almost like this had happened before…

“There’s no chance. The fall alone would kill….” Gou Hui tried to reassure himself, but the feeling remained. After a few hesitating glances, Gou Hui glanced back at the dome.

“…kill…” The Matron’s voice lingered as a feeling of boundless Qi seeped into Gou Hui through the interweaving roots connecting to his left arm. Those roots connected him to The Matron, and they stretched as Gou Hui rode a gathered tendril of roots underneath the cobblestone arches. Along the way down, Gou Hui sprouted a series of seedlings along the arches. Within seconds, the seedlings grew into various blood-endowed plant traps that threatened any who came near.

“Rotten, lousy, no-good….” Gou Hui cursed as he descended.

If there was a slight, even a minuscule, chance that the fat cockroach had lived, then Gou Hui would finish him down here.

Finally, as he neared the bottom of the cobblestone arches, Gou Hui spotted a figure face first in the dirt. The way the cockroach had landed was entirely flat on his stomach, and despite the human-shaped indent in the ground from the fall, there was no blood.

Groan.

“Oh, for—”

“I’m fall-proof!” A muffled voice interrupted Gou Hui’s words.

*****

So, as it turns out, vibrations are very good at cancelling out the impact associated with falling. Of course, I had to learn that the hard way. Thankfully, the violet mist was very much present under the cobblestone arches. Or else, it would have been a different story.

I arose and brushed off the dirt from my robes, only to see an outraged Gou Hui staring at me. He was speechless as he looked at me until his face turned vicious, and the roots propelling him down pounced. They flooded towards me as an attack, but my hand was already grasping my trusty sword.

“…idiot…”

I retaliated with a vertical slash, cleaving through the roots and watching as more took their place.

An unending tide of roots.

“How do I deal with something like that?” I questioned aloud and was forced to quake the ground with a slam of my foot. The result was a wave of loose dirt folding up and momentarily obscuring me.

I could rush in. But at the cost of getting trapped by man-eating roots? No, thank you. And based on how the roots regenerated without an end in sight, I doubted I could outlast them, either.

An unwelcome voice sounded from the sword.

“…send…vibrations…” Gou Jia told me like it was the most obvious thing in the world.

“Where!?” I shouted as the first root found where I hid and attacked.

I had been sending vibrations into the sword this entire time, and it sang with a high pitch ring as it sliced apart the roots. Unfortunately, like battling a fabled hydra, more roots took their place in seconds. Sending more vibrations wouldn’t help; I was already putting the maximum strength vibrations into the sword.

“…simple…idiot…” Gou Jia reminded me.

“Listen, if you don’t want to tell me, then… Listen, I’m fully capable of figuring things out!”

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“…idiot…”

“Fine! If you want me to be an idiot, then at the very least, I’m doing this my way!”

The vibrations travelling through the sword stopped and crossed over into my fist as I drove it deep into the nearest attacking root. With a sudden pulse of infiltrating vibrations, the root burst apart and travelled towards the source: Gou Hui.

I watched as Gou Hui’s face shifted, and the attacked root twisted off the others, saving the remaining roots from being assaulted by destructive vibrations. Seeing this made a sparkle shine in my eyes, even as Gou Jia’s voice drifted out.

“…idiot…brute…”

*****

“You are nothing but a damned cockroach!” Gou Hui yelled at the hateful young man shredding his plants to pieces. Those preparations he had planted on his way down weren’t perfect, but they should have lasted longer. Or at least dealt some severe damage.

Ergh!

It was that strange power emanating from the cockroach’s body. The power shredded through his hardy roots and threatened to attack him as the host body. At first, the cockroach only used it with his fist, but then, it started to travel through his sword, too.

“The source must be the Mountain Sealing Sword! If I can separate him from it, he'll be powerless!” Gou Hui formulated as he launched another tide of roots toward the cockroach.

Bloodthorne Sect Secret Art – Bloodvine Tide

The roots arched and weaved as they threatened the cockroach from multiple angles, never just launching toward him from the front. However, the roots served as pedestals for the cockroach as he inched closer to a retreating Gou Hui.

The battle started in Gou Hui’s favour, but now he was on the defensive. His connective roots to The Matron pulled him up the cobblestone arches, but the cockroach wouldn’t let him escape so easily.

“I can’t even drop him; he’ll just climb up again.” Gou Hui angrily spoke. A battle of attrition was something Gou Hui considered until he watched the violet mist soak into the cockroach’s wounds and heal them.

“He’s more like a fly than a cockroach now.” Gou Hui spat.

Instead, Gou Hui tried every means of plants, from trapping bellflowers filled with bloody acid to poisonous branches tearing through the cockroach’s defences. However, none worked with the Mountain Sealing Sword’s odd vibrational power and the ambient violet mist healing the cockroach.

In fact, things were starting to grow dangerous.

Gou Hui pulled on the roots and shifted his body aside as the cockroach tore the bits of earth stuck to the cobblestone and split it into shards that pierced toward Gou Hui. It didn’t seem dangerous, but based on how the rock shards hummed in the air, Gou Hui didn’t doubt they held a concealed power.

"He's infusing the power into objects now." Gou Hui hissed.

The cockroach was growing in real-time.

Gou Hui felt threatened as he glanced at the cockroach’s eyes. Those same fierce eyes that refused to back down before were back, but the helpless boy from before was now a cultivator. And against all odds, he had climbed through the Qi Condensation stages at a rapid rate. Even with The Matron empowering Gou Hui…

Suddenly, a whisper floated into Gou Hui’s doubtful ears.

“…more power..?” The Matron’s voice lingered, and a compelling sensation washed over him. A menacing grin crossed his face as he stared at the cockroach, still trying to cling to his feet. Suddenly, Gou Hui’s mouth opened wide, revealing razor-sharp teeth.

Chomp!

Gou Hui bit and chewed through the arm-turned roots in seconds. As soon as the origin was cut off, the attacking roots paused and began to fall. The resulting drop in weight made Gou Hui climb up the cobblestone at a pace far greater than the cockroach could jump along the root pedestals Gou Hui had unintentionally created.

Behind him, the chewed roots exploded with power, forcing the cockroach that clung to Gou Hui’s feet to evade. A choice that let Gou Hui rise back to the top of the cobblestone walkway and for him to arrive before The Matron inside the cobblestone dome.

Thud!

Gou Hui’s knees hit the floor as the blood from his chewed-off arm dripped onto the cobblestone.

“Matron, this one has failed you. Please bless me with more of your strength!”

“…strength…at a cost…” The Matron reminded Gou Hui. However, Gou Hui was already desperate.

“Please, Matron!”

At Gou Hui’s words, the red particles keeping the mist away paused its drifting state. Immediately, it rushed toward Gou Hui and invaded every corner of his body with a scorching sensation. The Qi within him surged as it was corrupted by the red particles, and with a screaming roar, Gou Hui felt another surge of power seep into his body.

“…KILL…”

*****

I threw off the plant remains that stuck to my blade and crawled onto the cobblestone walkway.

“Dumb plant boy, trying to keep me down there with acid bellflowers and trapping pompoms. Doesn’t he know that I’m a gardener? I know where to snip some little flowers.” I openly mocked and watched my surroundings.

That was enough to taunt Gou Hui, right? He should just appear before me any moment now—

Scream!

Another horrid scream escaped from inside the cobblestone dome, but I was close enough to hear the anguish deep within it this time.

My muscles tensed as I watched the roots along the platform die off and transform into red particles that funnelled inside the cobblestone dome. With terrible anticipation, I waited for whatever lurked within it. A solemn silence gripped me, making me pay special attention inside the cobblestone dome. It was my turn for my eyes to widen as the open doors revealed another bramble monstrosity that slowly walked towards me.

A bramble human.