Box of Ultimate Bliss

A long corridor stretched on without end, with countless rooms lining both sides.

No one knew what was inside the rooms. Their identical doors were all tightly shut.

Was this the inner space of the Box of Ultimate Bliss?

It was different from what Mo Jingxian had imagined. Even the lighting was a warm, milky white.

He lowered his guard and stood still, observing his surroundings.

He clearly remembered being sucked inside with the others, but now they were nowhere to be seen.

There had to be danger somewhere, perhaps behind one of the doors.

After several minutes, the surroundings remained just as quiet as before, to the point that even the passage of time seemed to fade.

Mo Jingxian raised his right foot and took a step forward.

The instant his foot touched the ground, he was ready to defend against an attack.

But nothing happened.

Then he moved his left foot.

The space was so quiet that he could clearly hear his own breathing.

Mo Jingxian explored cautiously, passing many doors without entering any of them.

He kept walking. He had no idea how much time passed, but the view ahead never changed.

It was just as it had been when he first arrived.

As if he had stepped into a street that looped forever.

The way out was probably hidden behind one of the doors.

What was behind them?

He would have to look to find out, but there was bound to be danger.

Mo Jingxian readied his defenses and randomly pushed open a door.

The scene inside made him pause. No attack came as he had expected; it was an ordinary home.

The house he had lived in for nine years, his former home.

He knew every inch of it.

His hand passed over the tables and chairs, the sideboard, and the flowers arranged on top.

It felt real.

But Mo Jingxian was certain he hadn't fallen under an illusion. The Chakra inside him remained sluggish and still.

The water element, however, was active. Within his range of perception, everything around him was real.

He was perplexed.

How had the Box of Ultimate Bliss managed this?

Had he fallen into an exceptionally sophisticated illusion without realizing it?

Or...

Did this space have its own unique rules?

It was too soon to draw a conclusion. He might as well try something.

Trapped inside the Box of Ultimate Bliss, Mo Jingxian had to find a way out. Taking some risks was unavoidable.

Sealing runes flowed with the water element, but the space didn't change at all.

Next, he began adjusting the runes' structure to produce different logical effects.

When he applied runes with the property of "aggregation," he sensed a subtle change in the room.

Hmm?

It worked!

If Mo Jingxian's senses hadn't been so sharp, he might have missed the subtle change.

If he remembered correctly—

When he first entered, there had been three purple flowers in the flower basket.

Now one of them had turned white. He was certain he hadn't misremembered.

A change was a good sign. He kept going.

The runes linked together one by one, forming the property of "aggregation," then layered atop one another.

When the third aggregation rune took effect, the room began to ripple like water.

Circular ripples spread through the space. Neither the walls nor the wooden doors could stop them; they vanished from sight.

The runes continued to stack until six aggregation runes linked into a six-pointed star.

The scene before him shattered like glass, and pieces of space fell away.

When Mo Jingxian came to, he was back in the original corridor.

It felt a little like experiencing the Flying Thunder God.

It made sense when he thought about it. The scene of the Box of Ultimate Bliss swallowing them had clearly contained spatial rules.

It was still the same door.

Mo Jingxian pushed hard against it, but this time it didn't budge.

It seemed he would have to try the next door.

As he walked forward, he checked his own condition.

His Chakra was a little more active.

When he came out, he had sensed a special rule descend upon his body.

It was faint, but definitely there.

Perhaps that was why his Chakra had become somewhat more active.

It was a little like a game where you cleared one stage at a time and received a reward each time.

To test his theory, he pushed open another door.

Mo Jingxian found himself back in the sacrificial hall, where the five bronze torches still blazed.

Another realistic illusion?

He was already prepared for this and had grown somewhat accustomed to the sudden shifts in space.

But—

The corpse at his feet looked like Mui.

His clothes were the same as when they had met earlier. Long Yunzhi had called him that.

So, was he really dead? Or was he just part of the realistic illusion?

"You killed Lord Mui?"

A furious roar interrupted Mo Jingxian's thoughts.

He looked up and saw an elite Grass Ninja not far ahead.

He wasn't sure if the man was part of the realistic illusion's trial, so he said nothing.

"Lord Mui!"

The man tried to wake the corpse lying facedown on the ground, but to no avail.

Mo Jingxian watched in silence. The grief and despair on the man's face didn't look fake.

If this was also part of the realistic illusion, then all he could say was... this was insanely good.

"Die!"

The Grass Ninja formed Hand Seals and unleashed a jutsu at once.

"Water Style: Thousand Senbon Rain Kill!"

And then... nothing happened.

Nothing at all. The Grass Ninja's hands were still locked in the seals, frozen in place.

From his observation, Mo Jingxian could tell the man's expression wasn't fake.

The confusion and panic on his face were perfectly convincing. There was even a hint of awkwardness.

The Grass Ninja recovered quickly. After a second, he drew a short blade and charged.

At least Taijutsu still worked.

The enemy attacked swiftly, as befitted an elite Grass Ninja.

He was hardly any worse than an elite Chunin from Konoha.

The two exchanged several blows, the sounds of their clash echoing through the empty hall.

Mo Jingxian seized an opening and used the Water Python Technique to great effect once more.

The Grass Ninja's expression grew even more varied. On top of everything else, it now showed bewilderment.

Mo Jingxian had no obligation to explain. He picked up the short blade the Grass Ninja had dropped and stabbed it through the enemy's heart.

Sparing his enemy a little suffering was the greatest kindness he could offer.

The moment the blade pierced the Grass Ninja's body, the scene began to collapse.

[Reputation from Grass Ninja Hongu Jiro +50]

That was good news. The Box of Ultimate Bliss couldn't block the rules of the Balance of Fate.

It was probably a collision between rule planes.

His Chakra became active again. By his estimate, about a third of the seal had been undone.

The scenery shifted, and he was back in the familiar corridor. That faint sense of a rule descended upon him once more.

Mo Jingxian didn't hurry to look for the next room. Instead, he sat down where he was.

He carefully sensed his body but found no lurking danger.

So far, the rule didn't seem to have harmed him. On the contrary... it had even given him something.

Still, he didn't think the Box of Ultimate Bliss would be so generous.

Unfortunately, once the rule entered his body, it vanished without a trace, leaving nothing behind.

He set aside the question he couldn't answer for now.

Mo Jingxian compared the two events in his mind.

The similarities were clear: spatial rules existed, the restrictions applied to everyone who entered, and the rules were the same.

The difference was that the Grass Ninja had used a jutsu right away, clearly unaware that his Chakra had been restricted.

Everyone had entered the box together, and he had already completed one room's task. The Grass Ninja had had plenty of time to notice something was wrong.

Yet he had acted as if he had only just arrived and hadn't had time to learn anything about the place.

That left only one possibility.

Time flowed at a different rate for each person.

His thoughts were becoming tangled. There was too much he didn't know.

He glanced up. There were still far too many rooms he hadn't entered.

Mo Jingxian stood and suddenly punched the wall.

Not a sound emerged. The silent corridor seemed to exist for eternity.

Outside, a punch like that would have shattered even stone.

But here, he couldn't even make a sound.

The wall remained as pristine as ever. It had absorbed the attack completely.

Mo Jingxian wasn't ready to give up.

He tried a jutsu instead.

As expected, it did no damage whatsoever.

"Ah, it seems my strength isn't enough to break the rules here."

He muttered quietly and opened the next door.

In the third room stood a mirror image of himself, which attacked as soon as he entered.

The mirror image was nearly as strong as a High Ninja. Mo Jingxian struggled mightily, and in the end only managed to win by using Sealing Jutsu to outmaneuver it and launch a surprise attack.

The mirror image vanished, leaving behind another mysterious rule, just as in the previous two rooms.

During the battle, he discovered that the mirror image was unaffected by illusions, which severely weakened his own methods.

Inside the fourth door was a sealing formula, "Fire Style: Heavenly Prison."

Mo Jingxian didn't have Fire Release Chakra, so in theory, he couldn't learn this Sealing Jutsu.

But he was well versed in the water element and the principles of Sealing Jutsu. It took him some time, but he managed to take the technique apart and understand it.

The technique in his sealing handcuffs was actually a simplified version of this one.

Of course, if he changed the underlying code of the Sealing Jutsu, the logic of its runes would change along with it.

After a long period of thought and experimentation, he actually managed to cobble together a new jutsu.

"Water Style: Fire-State Seal."

This jutsu restricted the flow of Fire Release Chakra, restored it to its original state, and disrupted Fire Release techniques after they had been unleashed.

Its effectiveness depended on how well he understood Sealing Jutsu and how much Chakra he put into it.

"Fire Style: Heavenly Prison" was a Fire Release sealing technique that sealed all Chakra.

With so little time, Mo Jingxian couldn't yet come up with an equivalent jutsu.

Instead, he took another approach. Using the principle that water and fire counteracted each other, he arranged the underlying runes of Fire Style: Heavenly Prison according to the opposite logic.

"Water" replaced "fire," and "dispersal" replaced "aggregation."

Then, with some of his own understanding added in, Mo Jingxian created a jutsu of his own in that room.

The moment the jutsu took shape, a familiar sensation washed over him.

He had cleared this stage.

Once people grew accustomed to an environment, they relaxed without realizing it.

After resting, Mo Jingxian easily pushed open the fifth door.

This time, his opponent was a half-human, half-beast monster.

It had human legs and a human torso.

Its arms were covered in feathers, like a pair of oversized wings.

Its claws gleamed coldly. Just from their appearance, he could tell they were razor-sharp.

There was nothing human about its head. Its face was covered in feathers like a bird's, each one swept back.

"What is that thing?"

The moment he saw it, Mo Jingxian was startled too and immediately retreated.

He didn't cautiously look toward it until his back hit the wall.

With the Ninja Blade in hand, he at least had the courage to face it.

At that moment, it was as if he'd encountered his natural enemy, yet an unrelenting urge to fight to the death rose in his heart.

Just as he was about to strike, the monster suddenly spoke in a human voice.

"I'm going to be devoured..."