Kindling, page 38
part #6 of Painting the Mists Series
“I wasn’t bickering,” the hound said angrily. “And now I’m not in a good mood. Instead of letting a future enemy escape, I’ve decided to get rid of you once and for all.”
“I’m glad to hear it,” Huxian said. “Let me know when you decide to attack. Detonate.”
“What do you mean, detonate?” the hound said. Then his eyes narrowed as a whooshing sound came out from beneath his feet. He struggled to move but discovered that he couldn’t. Which wasn’t a surprise to Huxian—he’d already bound the hound’s shadow in an assortment of restraints.
“Despicable!” the hound yelled as a purple ball of lightning suddenly appeared beneath him. A concentrated field of electricity expanded from the ball, covering the many fiendish demons surrounding the hound with a paralyzing force field.
“Now!” Huxian yelled. He split into thousands of foxes as he dove toward the tens of thousands of fiends.
“Kill the elemental!” the hound yelled. It slammed its paws into the ground, sending fissures toward the lone mountain creature. They stopped right before it. Instead of propagating further, a puff of sand was released into the air. “Ignore the others, charge at the elemental!” the hound yelled once more.
The fiendish demons crushed against Huxian’s clones and resisted Lei Jiang’s force field. A tenth of them passed through. But to their dismay, the moment they entered within fifty feet of the elemental, sharp gusts of wind lacerated them and pushed them back toward Huxian’s clones. The clones perished in the collision but soon recombined in greater numbers with devoured energy. Meanwhile, some stragglers had managed to sneak past Silverwing. As they rushed to the elemental, Xiao Bai appeared and devoured any who approached. She was the gatekeeper, an invincible existence on the mountain.
“Change of plans, kill the fox,” the hound said angrily. The fiendish demons adjusted their trajectories and aimed for Huxian. His clones were killed, and when the next batch of clones reappeared, they’d reduced in numbers. Seeing that his tactic was ineffective, the clones recombined, and Huxian reappeared in their midst.
He ate a moon cake and projected his force fields. His size grew to 333 feet long and his three tails whipped wildly in the air. The Greater Friendship Circle expanded around him and became superimposed with a central domain of light and shadow. It linked together with a domain of swamp, wind, and lightning. His Devil-Sealing Intent and Demon-Subduing Intent combined with them.
As this happened, Gua’s, Silverwing’s, Lei Jiang’s, and Huxian’s auras surged as their powers reinforced each other. He lunged at the black hound, who lashed out with his paws and met force with force. The mountain trembled as they fought, and hundreds of lesser fiendish demons flew off it in the process. Their power level had greatly exceeded these mere mortals and crossed into half-step transcendence.
“It looks like I have no choice,” the black hound said. Its aura surged as several heads appeared on its fur and sprouted out. The gigantic hound now had five heads, each of them glowing with a different elemental color. Moreover, each element was laced with destructive black bolts of lightning.
“Be careful, Huxian,” Xiao Bai said. “He’s consuming his devil seed for a boost in power!”
“I’ll be fine,” Huxian said confidently. He moved to block the hound’s approach, but as he did, he noticed that his normally impregnable fur was beginning to disintegrate. And so were his domains, and his teeth and claws.
“This is bad,” Huxian said as he deflected a powerful blow from his superior opponent. He tried to recover from the ensuing numbness, but before he could, a paw coated in black qi slapped down on him. He quickly summoned his battle armor, which cracked under the pressure. It healed over slightly as he diverted energy from his companions and greedily absorbed the thick demonic energy on the mountain.
Chapter 37: Siege
Huxian continued his head-on collisions with the massive black hound. His armor of light and shadow was damaged in many places, and his domains weren’t as strong as they used to be. Still, he slugged it out with the massive fiend. He knew full well that, should he avoid its blows, it would sneak past him and interrupt the mountain elemental’s extraction.
How much longer? Xiao Bai sent to Huxian. A Grandmist Field, significantly smaller than when she’d started, sapped the life from a dozen fiends.
Soon, Huxian sent back. I just need to last a few more exchanges before he reaches us. At this moment, a few hundred fiendish demons emerged from the maze. Instead of joining their companions, they immediately disintegrated while channeling their strength into drops of black blood that shot over to the fiendish hound. Crap, he’s going all out.
A paw strike containing twice the strength it usually did came crushing down on him. Huxian drew from Gua, Lei Jiang, and Silverwing to counter it. Despite this, Huxian coughed up blood that rained down onto the slick mountain peak. The hound lunged at his throat and bit down on it, causing the large bones in Huxian’s neck to crack. Sensing a threat to his life, Huxian split into light and dark clones before recombining. The moment he reappeared, another paw came smashing down.
“You like this little disappearing act, don’t you?” the hound said. Its five heads began to glow brightly. Their energy channeled into a small black orb, which grew from the size of a pea to tens of feet wide in a few breaths. As he did so, thousands of fiendish demons disintegrated and merged with it, further fueling the black orb of destructive energy.
“But will you disappear again? If you do, your mountain elemental and its earth source are doomed.” Its five heads smiled wickedly as the black orb accumulated power.
He’s right, Huxian thought. If I can’t block this, we’re done. I need to bet it all on this one move.
Huxian’s fur drained to gray as he poured his light and dark energy into a black-and-white orb. The fiendish hound laughed as it saw Huxian resist. The black orb pulsed and launched forward simultaneously with Huxian’s black-and-white one. Both orbs traveled frighteningly fast.
Yet as they approached, time slowed to a crawl. The small black-and-white orb suddenly expanded into a bagua diagram. Space and time fluctuated as it appeared, projecting a small field around the destructive black orb. It didn’t stop it but slowed it significantly.
Xiao Bai! he sent, jumping backward. A trail of shadows followed him wherever he went. The trail curved off to the side of the mountain, where he promptly left it hanging.
Xiao Bai landed on Huxian’s shoulders and poured her powers into him. His fur regained a black-and-white hue, which he immediately poured into his shadowy road in the form of black and white strings. They then connected the makeshift road to the black orb and anchored the road to the mountain just before the bagua trap faded. The black sphere continued as before, but this time, its trajectory curved. Space shattered as the sphere struggled against the black and white tethers that forced it away from the mountain and toward a smaller one in the distance.
“No!” the devil sovereign yelled. He urged what devilish qi remained to try and correct its trajectory, but it was too late. The sphere rushed out toward the smaller mountain and exploded on contact, leaving a gaping hole where it had collided. Huxian walked up to him mockingly, licking his lips. “How dare you,” the devil sovereign said venomously.
Huxian, not wanting to bicker anymore, sent out clones of light and shadow to devour the remnant devil seed. It howled in indignation as it struggled to salvage the situation by absorbing fiendish blood from its nearby companions. Unfortunately for the hound, it was too late. The fiends turned to ashes, and so did the hound.
“The core is almost extracted,” Xiao Bai said as Huxian collapsed to the ground.
The mountain peak glowed with a dark-brown color. It surrounded the lone mountain elemental, who was seated at the core of a complex formation. The brown glow accumulated little by little. As it did, Huxian noticed a soft beating within the mass of energy. It continued to grow before finally solidifying and shooting out of the elemental’s body. A brown orb surrounded by a brown liquid wandered over to Xiao Bai, who collected the earth source and flicked the Earth Source Marrow and the Earth Essence Core to Huxian.
That was its heart! Huxian suddenly realized. A wave of sadness overcame him when he realized that the mountain had sacrificed itself for them. Did it have to be this way?
In answer, the mountain elemental’s face crumbled, revealing a small rocky egg. Seeing Xiao Bai shrug, Huxian received it inside his collar.
“Thank you for your sacrifice, Senior Mountain Elemental,” Huxian said gravely. “I don’t think it’s a coincidence that you left the egg there. In return for your favor, I’ll hatch that egg. I promise.” Exhausted, he munched on a dozen moon cakes. They melted in his mouth and replenished his energy stores. “How long did it take us to get here again?” he asked Xiao Bai, who was beside him.
“Years?” she replied.
“Right,” Huxian said. “I think I’ve figured out a way to get back faster.”
“How much faster?” Xiao Bai said.
“With any luck, it should only take three months,” Huxian said. As he looked toward Jade Moon Garden, multiple black and white threads appeared before him. He searched for a while before finding a convenient path through them. Xiao Bai hopped on his back while the others retreated to his tails.
“Full speed ahead,” he said, pushing off. The air warped as they passed through it.
Huxian will be here in three months? Cha Ming thought as he walked through the Sacred Jade Library. He summoned his core-transmission jade and sent a message to Yu Wen before proceeding to the next book on the jade shelf. Like the one before it, it was old and dusty. Its vivid handwriting contained a mystical charm that conveyed far more than words but were especially taxing on Cha Ming’s soul.
Like before, he read the book from start to finish, etching a portion of the contents into his spiritual sea. The writing in the book dimmed as he read it before eventually fading to near transparency. Once he could no longer read it, he replaced it on the shelf, which locked it in, and retrieved the previous book he’d read. The writing within it looked fresh and filled with life, much different than the previous time he’d looked at it. A single readthrough of the book retrieved the knowledge he’d missed the first time around.
Was it necessary to go into so much detail on even the most mundane topics? Cha Ming thought as he retrieved his core-transmission jade. He saw three new messages from Yu Wen indicating that everything should be fine with Huxian and the rest, and that she and the wood elemental would take care of receiving them in Jade Moon Garden.
Sighing in relief, he moved on to the next bookshelf, which contained more advanced knowledge. He pulled a book from the bottom shelf entitled Cures to Cultivation Problems, A Primer. It was a core-grade alchemy book, and the first time he’d tried to read it, he’d been knocked unconscious for a full three days.
Cha Ming took in a deep breath before flipping open the cover. Powerful handwritten runes came to life as he began reading the text one word at a time. He felt nauseous as he read, and a strong headache swiftly crept up on him the more time he spent on it. By the time he managed to read a few sentences, the world started spinning. He closed the book and returned it to the shelf before breathing deeply and allowing his body and soul to recover.
Although the books here are far more accurate and deliver much more content than Jade Moon Library, they’re much more difficult to memorize, Cha Ming thought. Further, memorizing advanced content is much too taxing on the soul without learning basic content. I can only take this one step at a time and learn as quickly as possible before my time is up. To be safe, I should try to learn everything I need within three months, in case Huxian needs help.
Once he had sufficiently rested, Cha Ming picked up the second book on the first shelf. The writing faded as he read like before, but this time the knowledge was much easier to retrieve.
An hour later, he’d fully memorized the contents of this second book, bringing his total study time to a full day. Although the first shelf only contained twenty books, he was apprehensive about the second shelf, whose contents were overwhelmingly advanced.
If only I had a camera, he thought, as he began reading a third book. Unfortunately, it would be useless even if he did. A camera simply couldn’t copy the charm present in the exquisite handwriting. He could only study in silence like a lone monk in a monastery, slowly accumulating the knowledge of his predecessors as the world around him crumbled into chaos.
Han Jiling passed many desperate cultivators spasming on the forest floor. Although he preferred not to see these men and women who suffered their punishment from the first trial, it was necessary to retrieve as many mid-grade herbs as possible before returning to the Ling Nan Plane. Dryads and wood spirits mocked the opportunists as he passed, gleefully making use of his presence to amplify their suffering. They only stopped once he reached a formation surrounded by nine cultivators, where he took out an herb-gathering quota to remove the mystical obstruction.
When did I become so useless that I need to use someone else’s herb-gathering quotas while he goes to collect a reward? Han Jiling thought.
He activated a movement technique to zip through the woods toward yet another protected herb. “A Blood Ring Lotus!” he exclaimed when he saw a much larger formation surrounding a three-foot wide flower. It was a high-grade herb, and a rare one at that. While the flower couldn’t be used to craft rune-carving pills, it could be used to create pills that simulated rune carving through the power of illusions. Its value far exceeded the ten points required to gather it.
What a stroke of luck, he thought as he began deciphering the formation.
Time trickled by as the flower’s protection unraveled. When did the forest become so quiet? Han Jiling thought. The wood spirits no longer taunted the looters, and the looters no longer moaned. They shivered in unison, and Han Jiling soon joined them.
What’s happening? Why do I feel threatened all of a sudden? He looked up to the formation-covered sky, and as he did, he saw several gigantic spikes floating above. And in the middle of them was a large black pillar that looked much like a battering ram.
Did they finish it? he thought. As he did, the air around the black spikes shivered. Energy danced around them, causing the void to crackle. The nine massive spikes stabbed down into the shield simultaneously, and unlike the 1,080 before them, they managed to dig several feet into the thick green obstruction before stopping.
“Thank goodness they didn’t make it through,” Han Jiling muttered.
But he didn’t relax, as he noticed the pillar in the middle of the nine spikes pulsed and suddenly fell toward the shield. It accelerated for a moment before crashing into it. The collision caused the Jade Moon Garden to tremble. Tiny cracks appeared around the jade spikes but soon mended. Then the pillar rose once more. It wouldn’t be long before it fell yet again.
“Your attention, please,” the wood elemental’s voice suddenly boomed. “All cultivators previously disqualified may now participate in a fourth trial for access to the Sacred Jade Library. Those first offenders who are fertilizing the forest may choose to participate and end their punishment early.”
Cheers rose up in the forest when he said this.
“Merit will be based on contributions toward fighting the invasion.”
The cheers died down.
“There is currently a requirement for formation energy gathering,” the wood elemental continued. “Following this, we will organize a resistance force to fight against these invaders. Merits will depend on contributions. Deserters will get no rewards. Those who wish to participate, please announce your intent.”
“Participate!” Han Jiling said without any hesitation after retrieving the Blood Ring Lotus. He suddenly appeared beside a few hundred other cultivators who’d immediately volunteered. Then over a hundred thousand others appeared. They looked gaunt and sickly after having served as a fertilizer source for years. Some had hands covered in cuts and stains but looked otherwise healthy; these cultivators had fully embraced their punishment and had been rewarded with weed-picking duty as an alternative.
“Why are there so few of us?” Han Jiling said to Zhang Fei, who had just appeared.
“You’ll understand when you look up,” Zhang Fei said dryly. Fang Li and Mu Qianlin appeared soon after. Han Jiling looked up and sighed when he saw that there was a note addressed to the inhabitants of Jade Moon Garden beside the pillar’s imprint.
To those reading this message:
I don’t want you. I never did. I killed many cultivators, but only to strengthen my overall plan. Now that we’ve reached the end game, I’d like to make a deal with you. I swear on my devilish heart that those who don’t resist the invasion will not be harmed, not by me or my followers.
There are only three exceptions. First, the cultivator known as Yu Wen. Second, the demon rabbit known as Xiao Bai. Third, the wood elemental presiding over Jade Moon Garden. They are the reason I am here, and I will leave once they die.
Consider wisely. I don’t give second chances.
Han Jiling shook as he realized that the forces of good might be helpless in this struggle. Far too many of them had already opted for inaction, and likely many of those who’d been transported here would rather return to their punishment than risk their lives in a battle they couldn’t win. Doubt weighed down on his heart.
“Are you sure this will work?” the wood elemental asked as he watched Yu Wen turn a small knob. She was currently fiddling with an enormous tripod set in the middle of a giant formation. Energy-gathering runes pulsed as they greedily absorbed a pile of purple crystals at her feet.
“It’s better than doing nothing,” Yu Wen said. “It might not block him completely, but it will buy us some time.”
“What about his threat?” the elemental said.
“What can I do?” Yu Wen said, shrugging. “I already knew what kind of people they were. They’re humans without a backbone, cultivators without virtue. They pay lip service to good because it grants them luck, but they’ll turn on a dime as soon as something threatens their life. The truth is, I couldn’t be bothered with those people. They’re nothing more than trash.”
