"Yu Zitong, I would remind you but one last time — if any mishap befall me, you shall fare no better for it."
"Know this: your primordial spirit, in its present shape, cannot endure for long. If there be none to seek out a fitting body for you, I fear you shall indeed dissolve into nothing. And so, if in the arts you have taught me there be any flaw or falsehood left, now is the time to speak and set it right, and it is not yet too late."
Doctor Mo would not yet let the matter rest; still he laboured, with sore and patient coaxing, upon the young man.
Han Li at last understood a part of it. All these vain words that Doctor Mo had painstakingly addressed to this man — they were but because he feared that this one, called Yu Zitong, had wrought some trick into the arts he taught, so that the spell should go amiss and turn the harm upon himself.
"The art of body seizure I taught you — there is not a whit of tampering in it. If I deceive you, let the heaven's wrath fall upon my whole clan, let them die unburied, and from this day let my line be utterly extinguished." Yu Zitong paused not for a moment, but with resolute speech swore yet another solemn oath.
"Moreover," he went on, "though by the Seven-Ghost Soul-Stealing Art you may, for a short space, command a measure of magical power, this is after all a feeding of your own body to the ghosts, a thing paid for in essential yuan. And will the essential yuan yet remaining within you suffer you to work the art a second time?" And with this, Yu Zitong went on to cut off Doctor Mo's retreat.
When these words were spoken, the stone chamber fell once more into silence, and only the sound of Doctor Mo's restless pacing broke the stillness.
Han Li prayed within his heart; he who had never believed in gods, for the first time made a wish to some passing immortal, that this man might take fright and abandon his ill intent — even though he knew it was absurd, it was the only thing he could do in that hour.
"Very well," said Doctor Mo at last, his resolve hardened at once. "He who employs a man should not doubt him; he who doubts a man should not employ him. If I would seek so great a prize, it is but fitting that I hazard a little risk."
At these words Han Li fell to despair. Were his face yet his own to feel, it must surely have turned white, and borne all the dejection in the world. Yu Zitong, by contrast, showed himself well pleased; a lively excitement ran through his words.
"It should have been so from the first," said he. "Consider, you were a base and vulgar man without a spiritual root, one who could never by any means set foot upon the path of cultivation. But once the art is done it shall be otherwise. Possessed of this body that carries a spiritual root, you may seek out some cultivation clan or sect, throw in your lot with them, and free yourself, it may be, from age and sickness and death, from the revolving wheel of the Five Phases; and at the very least you shall live far longer than any common mortal."
"Heh heh, then I shall take your kind words to heart," said Doctor Mo, his fancy set all aflame by Yu Zitong's speech. With the fair prospect after the working of the spell before his eyes, his heart grew warm; he treated Yu Zitong with greater courtesy, and there crept into his words a coaxing, a drawing of one to nearer fellowship.
"Then I thank you, Elder Brother Mo," said Yu Zitong, craft beyond his years. He drew himself the closer, knitting a bond between them.
Han Li, listening from the side, was so enraged his very pores seemed to belch smoke. Verily these two, wolves in league, treated his body as a prize within their own keeping, and never once heeded the will of its owner. Yet he was now utterly without resource.
Doctor Mo cast aside the last of his misgivings, and having fixed upon his purpose, resolved to delay no longer.
He drew forth a few slender golden needles, and swiftly thrust them into the hidden acupoints at the back of his head, so that his face shone red with vigour and his spirit waxed great, that he might have strength enough to work the spell and not err.
Then he came to Han Li's side, lifted up his body, and set it in proper posture, cross-legged upon the ground. He himself sat down opposite, folding his two arms upon his shoulders.
Doctor Mo shaped a hand seal within his palm; he cast forth his hand, and a ray of red light shot from it and smote the pattern beneath Han Li, whereupon the jades around at once blazed bright.
Then, low and deep and heavy, the words of the incantation flowed from Doctor Mo's lips, like some sorcerous charm that cast its hearers into drowsiness and a great longing for sleep. Han Li's awareness faded by degrees into vacancy, till he grew heavy with slumber.
"Ill it bodes," thought Han Li, knowing well this was no accident, but the very prelude to the seizing of his body. Loath to wait upon death with folded hands, he struggled with all his might against that sound, yet to no avail. Had he still commanded his body, he might have bitten his tongue or pinched his own flesh to keep his senses sharp; but as matters stood he could only bear it passively.
Under the great drowsing power of the incantation, Han Li was soon unaware of all things; and before he slipped into that swoon, he dimly made out the face of Doctor Mo, once so handsome beyond compare, grown savage and dreadful in the guttering lamplight — all the grace of the fair-complexioned man quite gone.
"How ugly you have grown!" Such was the last thought Han Li shaped before he slept — the one curse, foul in no word, that he could bring himself to utter.
In the endless dark, Han Li dreamed a strange and wondrous dream.
In that dream he was a ball of green light the size of a fist, dwelling in his own little world of sky, drifting and roaming at liberty, and glad beyond measure.
But ere long there burst in upon him another ball of yellow light, no bigger than a thumb, a full several times smaller than Han Li's own green orb. Yet it came on fierce and menacing, with no kindly intent; the moment it spied Han Li it charged toward him savagely, gaping open a great mouth to bite at him. Han Li, not to be bested, summoned a mouth of his own and fell upon the other in bitter return. In but a few exchanges, profiting by his greater bulk, he had swallowed the yellow orb whole, and ended the fray with all ease.
Filled high with elation at his victory, Han Li savoured the sweetness of his prize. Just then, another intruder came in from without — this one a ball of green light, even as himself, yet larger by a full round, though its glow was dim and faint, without the radiance of Han Li's own. At sight of the green orb that was Han Li, it gave a clear start, paused a moment, and seemed to waver in doubt.
But Han Li, who had but now tasted the rare delight of devouring other orbs, would not by any means let this one pass. Without so much as weighing the difference in their strength, he hurled himself straight at it. Seeing this, the other had no choice but to meet him, and so they fell to rending each other.
The stranger's bulk was greater than Han Li's, but it was weak and listless, plainly nothing but a hollow shell; it held out but a little longer than the yellow orb had done, and then, failing, turned and fled. Han Li gave chase at once. But the other was cunning beyond measure; whenever it was caught, it shed the bitten portion of itself and went on fleeing with what remained, and so contrived, in truth, to escape — though its bulk was shorn away by a full third.
After these two battles, this realm remained Han Li's alone; and the orb into which he was changed went on hoping that other strangers might yet come to him of their own accord. But none ever came after that.
As time wore on he ceased to mind it, and drifted on alone and in high spirits, an age upon an age. It seemed he should go on thus forever.