That night, Yu Sui tried to fall asleep. The burning pain eased somewhat, but it hadn't disappeared completely. It seemed to depend, at least in part, on her state of mind.
For Yu Sui, the searing pain of the strange fire over all these years had been both a torment and an unusual kind of trial for her resolve.
Even so, she slept for a little over an hour, then woke just as the sky began to lighten.
Once daylight came, the night's trial was over. Yu Sui removed the Extreme Sea Cold Jade and put it away; she wouldn't wear it during the day. If anyone came near her, they would feel its bone-deep chill.
Yu Sui put the Extreme Sea Cold Jade into the Mechanism Box.
She gazed at the Red Jade Snowflake in the box's little compartment, pleased, and reached out to touch it before closing the box.
Yu Sui continued tinkering with the Listening Wind Ruler in her room, finishing the Secret Text she hadn't completed before. She called this Secret Text Mountain Spirit.
She had once thought of creating an intelligent being with "consciousness" inside the Number Mountains, one that could invade other Number Mountain Clusters without connecting through the Listening Wind Ruler.
But it seemed she would need the power of the School of Names, School of Law, and Yin-Yang School to have any chance of succeeding.
With only her Heavenly Eye to analyze the Number Mountains, Yu Sui could create only a rough framework: shaped, but without awareness. It couldn't achieve the effect she wanted.
Back then, Yu Sui had thought she couldn't cultivate or become a Nine Schools Practitioner. She'd regretted it, believing she had no chance of realizing this idea.
But things were different now.
At Chen hour, someone from the