The speed of the Wind-Riding Skiff was astonishingly fast, so fast that the air on either side of the vessel was compressed into two white walls of vapor.
The hull was a thirty-meter-long, black leaf-shaped magical artifact inscribed with dense wind-traversing formation runes. With Yin Luo's spiritual energy fueling the runes, the entire leaf skiff shot forth like a catapulted dart, hurtling through the atmospheric currents weaving between the mountain peaks.
Jerry sat in the rear half of the skiff, his back resting against the upturned rim of the stern, his grey eyes watching the mountains rapidly receding on either side.
On the first day, he had still been using his Eye of Magic to map the topography and spiritual energy distribution along their path, but by noon of the second day, he had abandoned the effort.
This mountain range was simply too vast.
The regions they flew over on the first day consisted entirely of uninhabited, desolate wilderness. The peaks scaled in height from two thousand to five thousand meters, their surfaces blanketed in vibrant, alien vegetation. Halfway up some cliffs, waterfalls cascaded down sheer rock faces, the plunging water saturated with mountain spiritual Qi until it turned into shimmering ribbons of pale blue light.
Occasionally, colossal flying demonic beasts could be seen cutting through the distant cloud banks—massive grey birds with wingspans exceeding twenty meters gliding on thermal drafts, their tail feathers trailing streamers of pale golden spiritual particles.
By dawn of the second day, the terrain began to shift. Signs of human activity emerged amid the barren peaks. A small cultivators' marketplace built upon a mountain plateau swept past on the skiff's right flank. It was roughly the size of Diagon Alley in the wizarding world, with dozens of wooden pavilions lining a winding mountain path, open spaces packed with assorted stalls where cultivators paused to browse wares. The leaf skiff flew so fast that the market lingered in his sight for less than two seconds before dropping far behind.
Flying forward for another hour or so, a city suspended in mid-air materialized directly in his line of sight. The foundation of the city was a colossal boulder exceeding three kilometers in diameter, its underbelly sheared flat while its upper surface was packed with dense clusters of architecture. Hovering above a canyon between two mountain peaks at an altitude of roughly a thousand meters, the bedrock below the city was carved with hundreds of luminous formation runes whose emitted spiritual energy buoyed the entire citadel aloft.
Yin Luo piloted the leaf skiff directly beneath the floating city. The shadow cast by the bedrock engulfed the vessel for roughly ten seconds before the skiff broke free of the gloom, returning once more to the open sunlight.
"What place is that?" Jerry's voice carried from the rear of the skiff.
"Floating Cloud City. A gathering hub for rogue cultivators," Yin Luo's voice answered from ahead. She sat cross-legged at the bow, hands locked in piloting mudras, not bothering to turn around. "Roughly thirty thousand permanent residents. Mostly Foundation Establishment, with a handful of Golden Core."
Thirty thousand cultivators. In a single city.
Jerry's grey eyes watched the shrinking silhouette of Floating Cloud City behind them. Back in the wizarding world, the entire wizarding population of Great Britain was only around thirty thousand souls. Here, a single city for wandering rogues matched the population of Britain's entire magical society.
In the afternoon of the second day, the leaf skiff passed over a valley shrouded beneath a spiritual barrier.
The barrier was a translucent gold, stretching from the valley's mouth all the way to the horizon.
Gazing through the barrier, one could see neatly organized tiers of spiritual herb fields, their sheer expanse from above resembling a sprawling emerald carpet.
Hundreds of figures dressed in identical coarse grey tunics toiled among the fields, stooped low with tools in hand as they moved through the medicinal herbs.
"Who are those people?"
"Spirit slaves," Yin Luo replied dispassionately. "Mortals without spiritual roots, taken in by sects to cultivate spiritual herbs. Provided with food and lodging, but zero compensation."
Jerry's grey eyes lingered on the bent grey figures laboring behind the barrier.
"Slaves."
"Yes."
There wasn't a single ripple of emotion in Yin Luo's voice; she was merely stating a fact.
The leaf skiff continued hurtling forward. By evening of the second day, Jerry's eyelids grew heavy.
Two days of high-velocity flight, coupled with the mental drain of constantly observing his surroundings with the Eye of Magic, prompted his body to signal a need for rest.
Resting his back against the lip of the stern, his head tilted back slightly, his grey eyes blinking several times before gently shutting.
Within thirty seconds, his breathing settled into a smooth, rhythmic cadence.
Sensing the magical fluctuations behind her stabilize into stillness, Yin Luo released her hand seals.
She turned her head, her dark red slit pupils fixing onto Jerry asleep at the stern.
His head was tilted to the right, his cheek resting against the curved edge of the boat's tail, his lips slightly parted as calm breaths seeped between them.
His grey inner robe was bunched and wrinkled from his posture, the collar tie loosened to expose his collarbones and a sliver of skin above his chest. His legs were stretched out with ankles crossed, the hem of the robe draping tightly over the contours of his lower body.
Yin Luo's slit pupils drifted downward from Jerry's face—skimming past his neck, past his chest, past his abdomen, finally landing on his crotch beneath the draped fabric.
The inner robe was woven from thin silk. With Jerry lying back, the fabric draped naturally over the contours of his frame, revealing a prominent bulge at his groin. That bulge extended from his waistband down toward his inner thigh; even in a completely flaccid state, its sheer mass tented the silk into a distinct, pronounced arch.
Yin Luo stared at that bulge for five straight seconds.
Her right hand lifted from her knee, her five black-nailed fingers hovering in mid-air for two seconds, before resting back down.
She turned her face forward, her slit pupils gazing at the mountains ahead.
Three seconds later, she turned her head back around, her pupils locking onto the bulge once again.
Her throat bobbed with a dry swallow.
Her right hand lifted from her knee again. This time it did not hesitate, reaching straight toward Jerry. Shifting out of her cross-legged posture, her knees slid along the deck as her upper body leaned in his direction. Bracing her left hand on the skiff's floor for balance, the fingertips of her right hand made contact with the thin silk covering that prominent bulge.
The moment her fingertips brushed the fabric, her hand flinched back slightly.
Jerry's breathing remained unchanged—even, steady, deep.
Yin Luo extended her hand once more. This time, she pressed her index and middle fingers together, resting the pads against the highest peak of the bulge. Through the sheer silk fabric, she could feel the heat and substance of the cock beneath. Even in a completely flaccid state, the girth of the shaft was so massive that her two pressed fingers couldn't even cover the width of the head.
Her fingers stroked slowly downward along the contour of the bulge—from the tip down to the midsection, and from the midsection to the base. By her fingers' measurement, the length exceeded fifteen centimeters. Fifteen centimeters while completely flaccid.
Her slit pupils blinked twice upon completing this measurement.
In her mind flashed the image of that jade dildo in her low cabinet's drawer. That jade rod was twelve centimeters long and about two centimeters thick; it had taken her nearly half a year just to get used to that size. Yet the thick cock before her already exceeded the jade rod's length while totally limp, and its girth was nearly twice as thick. If it were fully engorged and erect...
The tips of her ears flushed crimson.
Her right fingers pulled back two centimeters, hovering in the air. Then she pressed them back down.
This time, her entire palm flattened against the bulge. Her five fingers closed over the middle of the shaft from outside the fabric, her palm soaking in the heat radiating through the thin silk. Her fingers gently tightened, trying to encircle its full circumference.
She couldn't close her grip around it.
Even when flexing her hand to its absolute limit, there remained a gap of about two centimeters between her thumb and middle finger. She couldn't even encircle it flaccid.
Yin Luo's breathing rate nearly doubled over the past thirty seconds. Her chest heaved with rapid breaths, the neckline of her sheer outer robe parting and closing slightly with the motion. Her thighs clamped tightly together beneath her robes, the skin of her inner knees pressing flush against each other.
Her hand lingered on his shaft for about ten seconds. Within those ten seconds, she felt the dick begin to react under the stimulation of her palm's warmth. The previously limp shaft gave a slight twitch within her grasp, its firmness stepping up a grade from totally flaccid, its diameter swelling roughly half a centimeter with that throb.
Yin Luo snatched her hand back as if stung.
Her body scrambled back to the bow of the skiff, settling cross-legged once more, her hands quickly reforming the steering mudras. Her spine was ramrod straight, her slit pupils glaring fixedly at the mountains ahead, her lips pressed into a tight line.
The tips of her ears burned so crimson they seemed ready to bleed.
The sound of Jerry rolling over drifted from behind. The silk of his robe made a soft rustle as he shifted. Yin Luo's shoulders locked tight at the sound, her fingers freezing mid-seal.
Three seconds later, Jerry's breathing resumed its steady rhythm.
He hadn't woken up.
Yin Luo's shoulders finally relaxed. Slipping her right hand from the seal, she slapped her own burning cheek. The coolness of her palm pressed against her feverish skin, her black nails grazing her cheekbone.
"...It's way bigger than the jade rod."
The murmur slipped past her lips, so soft she could barely hear it herself.
In the afternoon of the third day, the leaf skiff pierced through a sea of clouds.
The cloud bank was roughly two hundred meters thick. The skiff burrowed into the white mist from below, flew blind for about ten seconds, and then burst out above the sea of clouds.
Above the clouds was blinding sunlight and a pristine azure sky, alongside a massive white flying barge hovering in mid-air.
The white barge was more than twenty times larger than Yin Luo's leaf skiff. Its hull was immaculate white, carved with golden lotus patterns along its gunwales. At the top of the main mast hung a white banner embroidered with gold characters reading "Qingxu." On the deck stood seven or eight cultivators clad in white Daoist robes, their collars and cuffs edged with golden lotus trim.
When Yin Luo's leaf skiff burst from the clouds, every cultivator on the deck of the white barge turned to look.
Yin Luo's hand seals didn't waver, nor did the leaf skiff decelerate. She steered the skiff straight past the starboard side of the white vessel, the distance between them shrinking to less than fifty meters.
"Blood Butterfly."
A woman's voice carried from the deck of the white barge.
The voice was clear and melodious, somewhat high-pitched, laced with a deliberately cultivated dignified poise.
Yin Luo's fingers relaxed slightly. The leaf skiff's speed dropped sharply from a frantic dash to a slow glide, coming to a halt fifty meters to the right of the white vessel.
"Who is it?"
Yin Luo's voice projected across the open air, drawling and languid, as though she had just been roused from a midday nap.
At the edge of the white barge's deck, a female cultivator in white robes stepped up to the railing. Her robes were far more ornate than those of her companions, the golden lotus motifs extending over her shoulders. Around her waist was a gold sash hanging three jade medallion tokens. Her black hair was coiled into an intricate bun fastened with two golden hairpins.
"Three years since we last met, and Senior Blood Butterfly's temper remains as fierce as ever."
A textbook smile graced the woman's lips, the curve so mathematically precise it looked measured with a ruler.
Yin Luo's slit pupils narrowed. She rose smoothly from her cross-legged seat, her sheer outer robe swirling around her legs. Standing at the prow of the leaf skiff, her dark red slit pupils locked onto the female cultivator across the fifty-meter void.
"Qingxu Palace. Liu Qingluo."
When Yin Luo uttered the name, her lazy tone flattened into an icy, deadpan edge.
"Senior has a fine memory," Liu Qingluo maintained her immaculate smile, hands folded neatly before her, her posture as stiffly poised as a porcelain idol enshrined on an altar. "Is Senior returning to the Myriad Demons Palace? And this young man beside you is..."
Her eyes shifted from Yin Luo to Jerry sitting in the stern. Beneath Yin Luo's spiritual camouflage membrane, he appeared as an ordinary young cultivator in a grey inner robe, with black hair, plain features, and the aura of a mid-stage Foundation Establishment disciple.
"He's mine. None of your business."
Yin Luo's six words slammed the door on all of Liu Qingluo's inquiries.
"My, Senior is actually traveling with company now. At the Myriad Spirits Auction three years ago, Senior wouldn't even spare a glance at your own junior brothers and sisters."
Yin Luo's right hand slipped from the sleeve of her sheer robe, her black-nailed finger flicking casually through the air. A streak of dark purple spiritual energy shot from her fingertip, crossing fifty meters of open sky to strike the banner atop the white ship's mast. The flagpole snapped at the point of impact; the white-and-gold "Qingxu" flag fluttered downward, tumbling twice in the wind before disappearing into the sea of clouds below.
The cultivators on the white barge instinctively stumbled backward a step. Two Foundation Establishment disciples ducked down completely, clutching their heads.
Liu Qingluo's painted smile vanished. Her face paled a shade the instant the banner fell, her lips pressing thin as her jawline clenched tight. Her right hand twitched within her sleeve as if reaching for an artifact, but she ultimately refrained.
"Senior, that was the official sect banner of the Qingxu Palace."
"I know."
Yin Luo's voice was flat.
"It was an eyesore."
A single word.
Liu Qingluo's lips parted and closed, parted and closed again. Her chest heaved with suppressed rage twice before her hands refolded neatly before her, resuming her rigid, immaculate posture.
"Senior's temperament is duly noted by Qingluo. Farewell."
The formation runes across the white vessel flared brilliantly, and the hull accelerated to tremendous speed within three seconds, soaring off in the opposite direction. As the ship pulled away, every white-robed disciple on deck bowed low in Yin Luo's direction.
The leaf skiff resumed its forward speed.
Jerry stood up from the stern and walked up beside Yin Luo.
"What is the Qingxu Palace?"
"One of the six great righteous sects," Yin Luo sat back down cross-legged, reforming her steering hand seals. "Exclusively accepts female cultivators. Extremely strict sect rules—disciples are forbidden from any personal relations with men. Liu Qingluo is the head disciple of their current generation, late Golden Core."
"Do you have history with her?"
"No history," Yin Luo half-hooded her slit pupils, her tone returning to its usual languid detachment. "Every time she sees me, she insists on greeting me, and every greeting is dripping with passive-aggressive snide remarks. Annoying."
"So you shot down their sect banner."
"If it's an eyesore, it gets shot down."
The corner of Jerry's mouth lifted. He returned to his seat at the stern, resting his back against the rim. Reaching into the pocket of the hoodie beneath his inner robe, he pulled out a palm-sized cloth pouch—one of the personal packs he had brought from the wizarding world, containing a few spare items.
He opened the pouch and pulled out a pair of black stockings.
Catherine had shoved them into his pocket before he left, claiming they were "to keep your legs warm if it gets chilly," but the sheer nylon was thin enough that you could see finger outlines through it in the sunlight—its thermal value was effectively zero.
"Yin Luo."
"Hm?"
"A gift for you."
Yin Luo turned around, her slit pupils settling on the black stockings in Jerry's hand. Her gaze lingered on them for two seconds, her brows furrowing slightly.
"What is this?"
"Stockings. Worn on the legs. Something from our wizarding world."
Yin Luo pulled her right hand from the seal and took the stockings. Pinching the waistband with her black nails, she lifted them up and unfurled them in the breeze. The ultra-thin, semi-transparent black fabric shimmered with a silky sheen in the evening light, its weave so gossamer-fine that from afar it looked like dark smoke condensed into cloth.
"Worn on the legs?"
"Yes. All the way from toes to hips."
Yin Luo stared at the stockings for five seconds. Her fingers rubbed the fabric edge, testing its texture.
"Why wear something like this?"
"It looks sexy."
Yin Luo's pupils shifted from the stockings to Jerry's face, then back down to the stockings. She flipped them around, locating the waistband, and glanced down at her legs.
"Right now?"
"Whenever you want."
Yin Luo switched her flight seal to a one-handed mudra, maintaining the skiff's trajectory with her left hand while spreading the stocking waistband with her right.
Extending her right foot from her cross-legged seat, her toes slipped into the toe of the stocking. Starting from her toes, the black fabric stretched over her instep as her fingers drew it upward inch by inch, sliding over her ankle, then smoothing up her calf.
The sheer black nylon clung flush against her pale skin as it climbed. The semi-transparent weave allowed her flesh to show through the dark mesh, turning her alabaster tone into a cool, dusky cream, while the taut fabric traced the elegant, slender curves of her calf with breathtaking definition.
The stocking reached her knee. Yin Luo's fingers paused at the hem just above the joint, her slit pupils admiring the snug nylon hugging her calf, her toes flexing twice inside the sheer toe.
"It feels remarkably smooth."
"Keep pulling it up."
Yin Luo's fingers resumed drawing the sheer stocking upward. The fabric slid past her knee, up her mid-thigh, all the way to the apex of her thigh. The hem of her sheer robe was shoved up to her hips by the movement, fully exposing the gorgeous length of her bare leg to the open air. The black stocking hugged the soft, pale skin of her inner thigh, the top band pressing a subtle, tantalizing indentation into the flesh at the root of her leg.
Her right leg was done. Retracting it, Yin Luo extended her left foot and repeated the process for her left leg. Step by step—from toes to ankle, from ankle to calf, from knee to thigh. The black sheer fabric climbed inch by inch over her pale flesh, forming slight wrinkles over her joints that smoothed out as she pulled the nylon taut.
Both legs were sheathed. Yin Luo hitched the waistband up around her hips, letting the sheer robe fall back down to cover the upper portions of her thighs. But her calves and knees remained exposed, the black stockings shimmering with a silky luster in the twilight.
Yin Luo gazed down at her legs sheathed in sheer black stockings. She wiggled her toes inside the nylon, the delicate tendons of her instep flexing visibly beneath the translucent mesh.
"It truly does look enticing."
Her voice was soft, her slit pupils admiring her shapely calves, a subtle smirk gracing her lips.
Jerry's grey eyes drank in the sight of her legs in black stockings. Her pale skin showed through the sheer black nylon, catching the refracted sunset to give off a cool, dusky-violet sheen. Drawn taut by her cross-legged posture, the fabric clung even tighter along her inner thighs, delineating the firm, succulent curves of her flesh.
"Do all women in your wizarding world wear this?"
"Depends on the occasion."
Yin Luo flexed her toes again. Her slit pupils shifted from her legs to Jerry's face.
"You've been staring at my legs for a while."
"Because they look breathtaking."
The tips of Yin Luo's ears flushed. She tugged the hem of her robe down two centimeters, covering the stocking band above her knees.
"...Pervert."
"You take the gift and still insult me?"
"Shut up."
The stench of blood began penetrating their nostrils from three hundred kilometers away.
When the leaf skiff broke through the final layer of clouds, the concentration of the odor exploded tenfold.
Jerry clamped his right hand over his mouth and nose, pressing hard against his nostrils in an effort to block out the foul stench of rusted iron and rotting meat. Useless.
The scent molecules seemed to possess sheer penetrating power, burrowing between his fingers and seeping through the pores of his palm to saturate his entire respiratory tract. His stomach convulsed under the revolting assault, gastric acid surging halfway up his esophagus before he forced it back down.
Yin Luo sat cross-legged at the bow, her mudras rock-steady, her breathing calm and smooth. The blood stench seemed entirely nonexistent to her.
"You'll get used to it. The Myriad Demons Palace is built beside the Blood Sea; it smells like this year-round."
"Your sect has unique taste in real estate."
"Good Feng Shui."
The skiff flew on. As the distance closed, the stench intensified relentlessly until Jerry's nasal passages went numb under the chemical onslaught, eventually dulling entirely, as if his olfactory nerves had been forcibly shut off.
The silhouette of the Myriad Demons Palace loomed on the horizon.
It was a colossal architectural complex built directly against the face of a sheer precipice. Black palaces stacked in jagged layers climbing up the cliffside, the lowest structures clinging to the roots of the abyss while the highest spires vanished into the clouds.
The architecture bore no resemblance to any cultivator structures Jerry had seen before—no soaring eaves, no carved beams, only brutalist, square monoliths piled from coarse black stone. Seeping from the seams between the massive blocks was a viscous dark-red fluid, making the entire palace complex look as though it were slowly bleeding.
The skiff landed on a terrace jutting from the midway point of the cliff. The stone platform was roughly fifty square meters, paved with black flagstones whose mortar lines also wept dark crimson fluid. At the edge stood two guards clad in black plate armor, their faces obscured beneath full visors, showing only their chins and lips.
Yin Luo stepped off the vessel, her boots splashing softly onto the damp stone. Both guards bowed deeply in unison.
"Elder."
Yin Luo walked between them without so much as turning her head. Jerry followed behind her, the spiritual camouflage membrane masking his true aura completely; the guards swept their eyes over him without the slightest reaction. An Elder bringing along a Foundation Establishment attendant was likely the most mundane sight in the Myriad Demons Palace.
The corridors inside were expansive, wide enough for six people to walk abreast. Every five meters, a dim red lamp was embedded into the stone walls, bathing the surroundings in a morbid, bloody glow. Occasional cultivators passed by in robes of black, deep violet, or dark crimson. Whenever they neared Yin Luo, each halted, bowed respectfully, and hurried along their way.
Not a single soul spared Jerry a second glance.
At the end of the passage stood a colossal stone portal. Yin Luo stopped, turned around, and looked at Jerry.
"I must report to the Palace Master. Wait for me in my quarters. Head back down this corridor, take a left at the third intersection, and follow it to the end. My ward is on the door, but your magic can bypass it directly. Just push it open and step inside."
"Understood."
Yin Luo turned, pushed open the massive door, and walked in. The stone slab ground shut behind her with a heavy rumble, the displacement of air sending a subtle shudder down the corridor.
Jerry turned and retraced his steps. His boots tapped rhythmically against the stone, the floor feeling slick, as though coated in an ultra-thin film of liquid. Glancing down, a drop of the dark red fluid oozing from the cracks squeezed out under the weight of his step, splattering onto the stone.
At the third junction, he turned left.
This corridor was half the width of the main hall, the wall lanterns shifting from dark red to deep purple. At the end stood a wooden door inscribed with arrays in the same style as Yin Luo's mountain cavern. Jerry pressed his right hand to the wood, channeling a wisp of grey-black magic from his palm. The runes flared upon contact, and the door swung inward.
Behind it lay a room roughly thirty square meters in size. The decor was austere: a bed, a desk, a chair, a wardrobe. The bed was made with deep violet bedding, while the desk held several jade scrolls and a teapot. The window looked out across the cliff face, offering a panoramic view of the chasm below.
Jerry stepped up to the window.
The view outside froze him in his tracks for three full seconds.
Beneath the precipice, extending from the base of the rock wall to the absolute horizon, was an endless expanse of dark red liquid. The surface lay dead flat like an obsidian mirror, undisturbed by waves or ripples, save for the occasional gas bubble welling up from the unfathomable depths to pop and throw up a tiny crimson splash. The color was a deep, coagulated red, so dark that under shadows it appeared pitch-black. From Jerry's vantage point, it stretched out for dozens of kilometers, its distant shoreline melting into the sky, blurring where the sea ended and the heavens began.
Blood.
It was entirely blood.
Jerry rested his fingers against the windowsill, his skin registering a damp chill. The wood was weeping microscopic beads of dark red fluid; pressing down, they ruptured under his fingertips, smearing his skin red.
When Yin Luo returned, Jerry was still standing by the window.
The creak of the wooden door echoed behind him, followed by the soft clicks of her boots drawing near. Yin Luo walked to his side at the opposite edge of the window frame, her eyes settling on the dark red expanse below.
"What is this?"
"The Blood Sea. Can't tell?"
Jerry lifted his hand from the sill. The dark crimson residue on his fingertips evaporated sluggishly in the air, giving off a sharp stench of iron.
"Blood on this colossal scale—is it all human?"
Yin Luo rolled her eyes, her irises tucking up under her eyelids for a full second before settling back into view.
"You'd have to slaughter an entire world's worth of mortals to bleed this much. Do you think that's even plausible?"
"Then whose blood is it?"
Yin Luo rested her right hand on the window frame, her black nails tapping lightly against the wood.
"Ancient blood. A substance that has existed since the dawn of the realm. The first generation of cultivators who set foot here saw this reservoir and assumed it was an ocean made of blood, hence the name 'Blood Sea.' In truth, it's not quite an ocean—more like a vast inland lake."
She paused, her fingers tapping twice more.
"Scholars later investigated. This blood originated from a colossal primordial beast."
"How large?"
"Larger than this entire cluster of worlds."
Jerry's fingers froze on the sill.
"A demonic beast larger than an entire world cluster."
"Indeed. It was struck by something as it passed through this expanse, suffering grievous wounds that showered blood down here. Or perhaps it perished outright—no one knows where its corpse drifted, only that its blood remained."
Yin Luo pulled her hand back, wiping the crimson stain off her fingertips against the side of her robe.
"This blood does not evaporate, nor does it coagulate over ten thousand years. Regardless of how many eons slip by, its temperature, density, and viscosity remain identical to the moment it was shed. That is why it remains just as vast after countless millennia."
Jerry tore his gaze away from the dark red lake and turned to Yin Luo.
"The Myriad Demons Palace was established here specifically to harness this blood?"
"The spiritual Qi concentrated within the Blood Sea is unimaginably dense. Most cultivation techniques of our Myriad Demons Palace require blood essence as a catalytic medium. Building our seat beside it is no different than sitting atop an inexhaustible gold mine."
Yin Luo walked over to the desk, pulled out a chair, and sat down. Taking the teapot, she poured herself a cup of tea. The liquid was dark crimson, virtually indistinguishable from the Blood Sea outside.
Jerry stared at the crimson brew in her cup.
"That tea..."
"Blood tea. Spiritual tea brewed with water from the Blood Sea. Replenishes Qi and nourishes blood—superb for cultivation."
Yin Luo raised the cup and took a sip, lips pressed to the porcelain, letting the crimson brew flow past her lips. After swallowing, her tongue licked across the residual red sheen on her lips.
"Want some?"
"...I'll pass."
"Suit yourself."