They say it never rains but it pours. Just ask Qie Xieling right now and he would tell you in detail. While he was dealing with a queasy stomach with a face as pale as a sheet of paper, the ground suddenly shook making them lose their footing.
He had just been splashed in the face with rotten blood and now he was been shaken like he was in a tumble drier. Better yet he was shaken like a cocktail in a cocktail shaker.
The earthquake-like tremors came to a sudden stop allowing Shao Lan to finish up the rest of the undead.
If Qie Xieling was dry heaving before now he was throwing up for real. Dai Yu pat his back as Machu brought over some medicine. They tended to the poor bunny till some colour returned to his face. It was only after they were certain that his condition had improved did they finally address the elephant in the room.
There was nothing natural about the earth tremors just now but they still couldn't figure out the source. Shao Lan crouched down and placed his palm on the ground. With his eyes closed, he sent his Qi in the ground connecting with the complicated network of nature's spiritual veins.
His Qi acted like an endoscope projecting images from wherever it travelled underground. This method was a whole lot different from empathy but it was similarly taxing. His forehead was already laced with a layer of cold sweat and his strength diminishing but he had to find out what was coming so they could prepare for it.
Dai Yu was starting to worry about him and didn't hesitate advising him to stop. Just as she convinced him to stop his Qi finally found something.
The dark energy coming from this place was suffocating strangling his Qi that he wanted to retreat. That is when he saw it. The image was fuzzy but it frightened him so much that he abruptly withdrew falling flat on his back.
"Lan-ge!" yelled Dai Yu in a panic as she ran to his side. She was the very definition of the word distraught as she helped him up.
Shao Lan could care less about his image right now hesitantly saying, "We have to go. It's, it's..." Even he couldn't be too sure of what he saw under Mount Lese a few kilometres away from them. This dark and sinister mountain was rumoured to have housed a formidable creature known by the common folk as Qian heti (Chimera) the most vicious creature in history.
Rumour had it that it was a three-headed fire breathing hybrid with the head of a lion, a goat on its back and the head of a serpent extending from its tail. From what Shao Lan saw it wasn't just a rumour. That beast looked exactly as described just more appalling in person.
"What, what is it?" asked Machu feeling rather anxious. If it was something they couldn't handle by themselves then they would need to gather troops and judging from Shao Lan's reaction it either had to be Godzilla or King Kong for him to be this shaken.
"It's Qian heti and it just broke its bounds underneath mount Lese," he explained with a slight tremble in his hand. This kind of creature was hard to kill and someone had just freed it resigning the entire world to a fatal ending.
"Hahaha.... no that haha, that can't be," said Machu chuckling in disbelief but the blank look on Shao Lan's face spoke volumes. "Ha ha..... wait are you fuckin serious?" asked Machu as his laughter died down.
"We have two options. Do you want to hear them," said Dai Yu with her hand on Shao Lan's back.
"Go on let's hear it," said Machu supporting Qie Xieling who looked half dead.
Dai Yu took out a piece of paper and said seriously, "Option one we write our wills and resign to our fate or... or we go to the Zhao sect and convince those righteous sects to gather manpower so we can fight it together. Maybe will stand a chance but that means we have to sacrifice our pride," with a sullen look.
Machu was about to say, "Does anyone has an ink brush?" so he could start writing when another earth tremor shook the ground followed by a loud roar permeating the air.
"Screw pride. Let's get the fuck out of here," replied Machu as Qie Xieling took out a teleportation talisman.
"I know where to go," said Qie Xieling as he opened up a portal. The four figures disappeared from the bamboo forest just in time for the ground to collapse where they had been standing.
The four of them reappeared in a strange house making the other three look at Qie Xieling strangely. Qie Xieling stared back at them asking, "What?" while shrugging his shoulders.
"Whose house is this?" asked Machu while touching stuff that he shouldn't be touching.
Qie Xieling sprawled on the bed and said, "It's Shixiong's place.... I am just going to lie down for a minute and you three can go and convince the old farts that the world as they know is about to end," finding a cosy spot.
Dai Yu placed her hand on her waist and asked, "How are you feeling now?" in a gentle tone.
"I am, ah.... be-better," he hesitantly replied with a little suspicion.
His suspicion was warranted because Dai Yu smiled in the next instant and dragged him off the bed by the ear. "Good, then you come with us. We need your aggressive charisma to appeal to those long bearded freaks."
With that said Qie Xieling was dragged along to see the sect leaders who were still gathered at the main hall.
In a distant realm, King Yama was having his afternoon tea after a busy morning of sorting out aggrieved souls. Just when he had put his legs up about to take a nice long sip, there was a disturbance in the atmosphere that had him pause. The surroundings were so silent that one could hear the sound of a pin dropping.
King Yama furrowed his brows with a thoughtful expression. Thinking he was overthinking things he resumed drinking his tea. Just when he was about to take a sip a loud roar shook the entire realm causing him to spill his tea staining his favourite robe.
He shook his sleeve as he put the teacup down. Who else could have the balls to stir up trouble across three realms except, "MIYU REN!!!!!!!!"
While King Yama was looking through his contacts for the best bounty hunter to bring that demon back to the underworld, the culprit was elated with his new pet he had just freed. He was so overjoyed ignoring the people around him.
"Oh god, why do I always have to deal with the crazy ones?" whispered Wen Qinxi thinking if Qie Ranzhe was really surrounded by such crazy people in the real world then the CEO might as well forget his number and pretend they don't know each other.