Xiao Su attempts to seal

Xiao Su sat tensely in her training room, her mind rehearsing the sealing technique. It was past midday, and He Lan had yet to return. She knew this was good news, since it most likely meant Xiao Da was making a pill that could help her, but she grew anxious as time passed. Her doubts and fears kept surfacing in her mind, making her wonder if she could really do this.

Her attempts at image training were barely keeping her from succumbing to fear. 'It's scary, I don't want to face that pain again, I'm tired of always suffering, I don't want to die, I don't want to die, I don't want to die.' Her fears kept running through her head in waves, attempting to force her under.

As she struggled to breathe normally, He Lan arrived. "Ah, were you able to get anything?" Xiao Su immediately asked calmly.

He Lan easily saw through her poor attempts to feign calmness but didn't comment on it. "He couldn't make anything that'd directly makes qi more distinct," He Lan stated, "but he did make a focusing pill that should increase your spiritual sense." She finished while taking out a pill.

Xiao Su smiled as she held out her hand to accept the pill. "Thanks He Lan, you really-", her words stopped as the pill fell out of her hand. She looked at her hand in shock and found it trembling violently. She grabbed it with her other hand but even that couldn't completely stop the shaking as she kept breathing heavily and rapidly.

He Lan looked at that fragile, shaking form and felt as though her heart was breaking. Finally, she said "Su, you don't hav-"

"Don't say it!" Xiao Su yelled desperately, halting He Lan's words. "Please don't say it." She repeated in a feeble voice, tears in her eyes as she looked down on that trembling hand. She was near her breaking point, if He Lan finished that sentence then her resolve would shatter and she might never be able to put it back together, she had to do it now.

She grabbed her wrist with her other hand and reached down to pick up the pill before grasping it tightly in her still trembling hand. She wiped the tears from her eyes and then looked He Lan in the eyes and said, "I have to do this," firmly.

He Lan tightly gripped her palm before forcing herself to nod silently.

Xiao Su closed her eyes and took several deep breathes to calm herself. "I'm starting." She said as she popped the pill into her mouth. "You know what to do if It ends poorly" She murmured gently before closing her eyes and focusing on her dantian.

He Lan stared at her and said, "If you want me to have them, you need to give them to me yourself." With a fiery resolve.

Xiao Su's vision entered her own dantian. It wasn't seeing in the normal sense, it was more like feeling so vividly, the sensations make an image. Inside, there was a wide variety of colorful qi floating and tangled everywhere, it looked like a beautiful, exotic land. Xiao Su observed the strange, yet pretty, sight with sadness. This was the source of her misery, her pain and her frustrations for the last six years. A wide assortment of qi from combat skills, techniques and body cultivating haphazardly thrown into a small space.

She'd tried various methods to overcome this, numerous pills and techniques were applied, but nothing worked. She'd once tried to combine the different qi and skills to make stronger skills and reduce the overall quantity in her dantian, however, the qi of the stronger skills caused a stronger backlash when disturbed and, since then, whenever she used her qi she'd be reduced to a coughing mess in a few minutes.

Another time, she'd tried sealing some of the qi to reduce the amount active within her at one time. Though this seemed to work at first, it caused major instability and ruined the odd, yet existing, order within her dantian, causing a catastrophic backlash that broke all the seals and nearly killed her. She'd barely survived back then, and she even fell from the third stage to the second stage of the human path for over a year.

Though those two attempts had the worst results, many other failures left repercussions and hidden dangers in Xiao Su's body. If it weren't for the overwhelming vitality held in her body due to the [Limitless] ancient ability, she'd be a cripple already, if not dead, but even that has limits. She was in so much pain daily, she doubted her body could bear much more. there was a very real chance of her dying this time.

The speed at which the strands of qi moved around steadily began to slow as the medicine enhanced her mental capabilities. 'It's now!' Xiao Su thought as she began to unwind the qi. What she planned was a special type of seal, it would sedate the qi and make it less reactive, but it'd still be felt by the rest of her qi and, hopefully, maintain the balance.

Learning from her research and past failures, this was the method that Xiao Su was most confident would work, she felt more certain than she'd ever felt that this was the right path, the only question was whether she was up to the task. The difficulty in this sealing technique was its specificity, it could only seal one kind of qi in it; meaning, she needed to separate all of a singular kind of qi from this chaotic sea before she could even start sealing it.

The qi she'd chosen was a particularly bright-orange that managed to have a presence even in this chaotic mess. This was a qi that came from a skill she'd crafted from origin rank skills. it was a skill that'd surpassed the origin rank, the rank of the majority of the qi here, so it was easier to focus on. Slowly, she shifted her focus around her dantian and unraveled the orange qi thread by thread while gathering them in a spot she'd cleared.

Intense pain slowly began to build within Xiao Su's body. Though she was as careful as possible, she was untangling a lot of qi, which was beginning to react. When she finally finished collecting all the qi, she clenched her teeth to endure the pain instead of enjoying her success. The critical part started here, if she messed up, she'd die.

She focused on the gathered orange qi with all her being and began to make the seal. Translucent-blue symbols took form in her dantian and gather around the collected qi. The symbols grew in numbers and slowly started to weave a net around the orange qi.

Outside, Xiao Su's body was trembling in intense pain. Her skin and internals were breaking and bleeding in several locations. He Lan watched the process in worry and regret. She was a veteran at watching Xiao Su in pain and, while she didn't like it, she was used to it. Yet the knowledge that she could die this time had her scared all the same. When Xiao Su suddenly coughed out blood violently, He Lan's cold face finally broke down and showed her genuine frustration and helplessness, she had to physically stop herself from going near Xiao Su. Thoughts like, 'If only I could've convinced her to stop,' or, 'I should have done more,' and, 'I should have encouraged her more' were contradicting each other in her head as she coped with how little she could do in this situation.

Xiao Su was in an immense amount of pain as she worked on the seal. The seal was almost complete, but her speed was slowing as the qi within her body ran wild. She realized she wouldn't be able to finish if she continued to restrain the rampaging qi, her only chance was to focus entirely on completing the seal.

She stopped paying attention to her body and dedicated herself entirely to completing the seal, forming symbols with a manic intensity. At some point, the pain started to feel disconnected and removed, despite its potency. Slowly, time continued to move onwards, one minute, five minutes, fifteen minutes, thirty minutes… almost an hour had passed since Xiao Su began sealing and she was now sitting in a pool of her own blood, unable to dry as it kept flowing.

Finally, Xiao Su let out a huge breath and opened her eyes. She looked exhausted and pain was clearly etched all over her face, but even then, she looked at He Lan and smiled, a clear indicator of success.

He Lan, who'd regained her cold mask, walked over and kneeled next to her, not minding the blood. Xiao Su collapsed into He Lan's waiting arms as her face twisted in pain as she groaned in agony. The sealing was done successfully, but her qi hadn't calmed down at all. "Swallow." He Lan said urgently as she put two pills into Xiao Su's mouth. One was her usual qi suppressing pill while the other was a healing pill. The Xiao clan's ancient ability, [Vigor], didn't improve their natural healing ability much. They wouldn't be hindered as much by injuries and could survive wounds that'd be fatal to others thanks to their overflowing vitality, but it'd take around the same time to heal, Xiao Su [Limitless], which was an enhanced [Vigor], was no exception.

He Lan rubbed the groaning and thrashing Xiao Su's head gently. Even when Xiao Su gripped her painfully hard, she continued to rub her head and comfort her. After a few minutes, Xiao Su passed out as the pain lessened enough for her to slip into blissful unconsciousness. He Lan looked at the sleeping face still twisted in pain and made a tender smile, "You did well, my foolish master," she said gently before mercilessly stripping her for cleaning.