Chapter 64

Master Hong Feng jumped on board the skiff along with three of his men, Sumatra already at the controls.“Go, go!” he shouted. “We need to dump these bodies before the damn moon rises!”

The grey giant thrusted the craft forward with a touch of the rudder. The cultivators maintained their footing with martial stances as the skiff accelerated powerfully down the secondary tunnel, parallel to the one that was now blocked. The patchwork walls of the tunnel’s interior raced by at incredible speed, forming a mosaic of pipes, bricks, and cracked stone.

Hong Feng finally looked down into the belly of the craft with a scowl, viewing the corpse of the man who had played him for a fool; the man who had cheated him twice over in the wild, a man who had killed both Yin Chu and Shen Ju as well as over a dozen of his disciples.

Or at least, that was what I imagined he was thinking when he stared down at me.

I was still dead.

Yet somehow not.

My eyes were glazed open, but I could still see through them, the same for my hearing. I was a prisoner inside my own body, a soul trapped within a corpse. The loss of all my faculties while remaining conscious was horrifying.

Claustrophobic.

Events played out around me that I had no control over, and I became a spectator to my own demise. I watched helplessly as they tossed the bodies of the Fire Birds I’d killed into the skiff and then threw my body next to them. I could feel nothing, only see and hear.

What the hell was this?

I could still think though.

And I could still sense… something.

I willed myself to peer deeper inside my soul.

A flicker of Flame was still there.

Weak, feeble…but it was generating just enough Frenzy to keep me from [Death’s Door].

Holy shit, that was it…

I summoned the verse in my mind’s eye.

[Death’s Door] – (internal) should you suffer a fatal wound, use concentrated Frenzy to replace any bodily function that is lost.

I realized that this was what was happening to me now.

Except I’d never experienced it on this scale before.

I was clinically dead.

I had no heart.

Yet somehow my Frenzy—or what little I had left of it—was still keeping my brain alive.

But for how long I didn’t know.

I couldn’t use my Frenzy for anything else.

I couldn’t move.

Couldn’t heal.

Perhaps my true death was inevitable still.

Hong Feng kept glaring down at me, his thoughts unreadable except what was written on his face. Even in death the man still hated me and for all I’d done to screw him over, I probably couldn’t blame him.

After a couple minutes of traveling through the tunnel we broke out into the open air.

I couldn’t tell where we were. All I could see was a cloudless night sky above me. It was a beautiful sight. But danger would be coming with it soon.

And Hong Feng knew that.

The skiff stopped and the three cultivators that Hong Feng had brought with him jumped out.

“Get to the exit of the other tunnel and work your way back,” Hong Feng commanded. “Find that girl and kill her!”

“Yes, master!” they replied in unison with short bows.

“Make damn sure you get her!” Sumatra echoed him. “I don’t need any of this shit coming back to me.”

“Don’t be an idiot,” Hong Feng chastised him. “She’s a damn mortal and my men are already unblocking the other side. We’ll trap her in between. She’s as good as dead. We need to worry about ourselves now. So hurry up!”

Sumatra got back on the controls and the skiff sped away.

The bastards…

If I could summon the will of my Flame, my hatred would be boiling over, but somehow all I could feel right now was grief. It was as if the Demon’s heart had been ripped out along with my own and only the Struggler was left to console me.

Dammit, Mu Lin, I’m sorry…

I tried to think of if I could have done anything differently. Maybe I should have tried to get her up those stairs, instead of sealing her off inside that death trap of a tunnel. My mind reeled with the thoughts of what would eventually become of her when the Fire Birds finally found her inside.

Shit…

I wept with tears my body could no longer produce.

I had failed her.

Grim reality set in as I finally accepted the truth.

Mu Lin was already dead.

* * *

Mu Lin’s breath came out in short shallow gasps as she struggled through the darkness.

Her mind was reeling.

Her body wracked with pain.

Each step felt like her last.

She forcibly blocked her thoughts from reliving the nightmare she was still going through. Sumatra, the Fire Birds…Chun. She was beside herself with the horror from it all. The guilt. The pain.

“Chun why?” she whispered as tears rolled down her cheeks. “Why did this happen to us?”

She still couldn’t understand it all, but he’d just sacrificed himself for her.

All because she couldn’t keep her big mouth shut.

A sob escaped her lips as she briefly gave into her grief and despair.

Chun...I’m so sorry.

Pain struck her again, both within and without.

So much pain.

No, she thought, steeling herself. Not now.

If Chun had sacrificed himself for her, then the least she could do was try to survive.

Mu Lin once again blocked out the trauma, her mind compartmentalizing itself.

She pressed on, step by step through the darkness, then sensed something ahead.

Strong auras.

Three or four of them.

Mid-Level Foundation practitioners at least.

The Fire Birds were trapping her inside the tunnel from both sides!

Her heart raced.

They were stronger than her. Faster than her.

And as savage as any creature she’d faced out in the wild.

Panic flooded her mind as she felt along the tunnel, seeking someplace to hide.

Nothing!

She kept pawing at the tunnel surface, looking for an opening as the Qi auras grew closer, the sounds of hurried footfalls coming with them. Fear gripped her heart in a vice. She’d be as good as dead when they found her. Mu Lin inhaled sharply as the light of flames emerged at the far end of the tunnel, shadows jumping like demons in the darkness.

There was nowhere left to run now.

Mu Lin froze in terror as the cultivators closed in.

She prayed to the heavens, holding her breath as to not make a sound.

But inside…she screamed.

* * *

The skiff slowed and eventually came to a stop. We didn’t land though. The skiff instead kept hovering at some unknown height in the air. Sumatra left the rudder and grabbed one of the charred and blistered bodies next to me and dumped it over the side.

The snapping of tree branches preceded a loud thud a few seconds later.

From the timing of the sounds, I figured we had to be high above a forest canopy, perhaps a good hundred feet or more in the air.

“Hurry it up,” Hong Feng said, grabbing a body of his own to toss over. “The Bloodmoon will rise soon.”

More snapping tree branches and thuds followed as they dumped the other bodies.

Hong Feng finally got to me and then paused before spitting in my face. “Burn in the depths of hell, you worthless piece of shit!”

He hauled me up to toss me over the side when Sumatra suddenly stopped him.

“Wait,” he said. “We might as well take back what the bastard stole.” He drew his knife and ripped open the bottom of my shirt, exposing the location of my Dantian. “At least we can salvage something from him, yeah?”

“Just make it quick,” Hong Feng said, looking warily at the night sky. “I can’t come under the effect of the Bloodmoon.”

“I know, I know,” Sumatra said, positioning himself over me.

I couldn’t feel what he was doing exactly, but I could see his bulky shoulders moving back and forth as he sliced into my stomach. Reaching inside, Sumatra pulled out the lightning core and then suddenly my Flame roared to life inside of me.

It was as if a cork had been unstuck.

A valve opened.

As my Flame burned bright and blue, fresh liquid Frenzy flowed from it to my Dantian and began feeding the rest of my oxygen-starved body through [Death’s Door]. Pinprick tingles of sensation came to my extremities, steadily building.

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But then I remembered.

The dampening effect of the core!

The full effect of my Dantian had been dampened by the lightning core once I placed the full thing inside of me. But now that it was removed, the full strength of my Flame had returned.

But now probably wasn’t the best time for it.

Pain was returning as well.

I channeled some of my precious Frenzy towards [Indifference] to maintain my corpse-like composure despite the growing pain. But for all the strength that was returning, I still had no heart, and perhaps no more blood to pump either.

How long could I keep this up?

“Will you look at this thing?” Sumatra said, brows furrowed as he rolled the bloodied chunk of lightning core between his fingers. “It’s all pitted, like something’s been gnawing at it. And it looks like part of it’s been sliced clean off too.”

“Let me see that,” Hong Feng said, grabbing it from him. He stared examining it closely. “What in the hells? This core looks like it’s been [Absorbed].” He then looked down at me, the cogwheels turning behind his scowl again. “I think this bastard has indeed been lying to us. But not about what we think.”

“What do you mean?”

“Cut into him again!” Hong Feng shouted. “Look for a second core! Only demonic cultivation can achieve this!”

Oh shit…!

My Dantian was now the only thing still keeping me alive.

If they cut that out…

Sumatra grabbed his knife again, but I refused to let it happen.

Summoning the full strength of my Flame, I fed concentrated Frenzy to my limbs and lungs. White-hot pain surged throughout my entire body as I sat upright and sucked in a huge gulp of air.

“Huuuuuurrrkkk!”

The sound I made was frightening, like something out of a horror film.

Hong Feng and Sumatra both screamed at the top of their lungs, their eyes wide with terror. They threw themselves against the far side of the skiff to get away from me, oozing with fear. My movements were so sudden and violent that they kept screaming as I flopped like a fish until finally I managed to throw myself over the side of the craft.

Tree branches and shrubbery broke my fall as I tumbled end over end and then finally, I landed flat on my back with a resounding thud!

Air jetted from my lungs with another nasty sound, but it didn’t matter. My body was running mostly on Frenzy now anyway. But I could do little more than be still now––my reserves running low again from the sudden movement.

Above me the screams of panic continued, until Hong Feng finally seemed to come to his senses.

“Shut up!” he bellowed at Sumatra who was still wailing. “Stop screaming, man! Calm yourself!”

“Did you not see that?” Sumatra yelled back at him. “Nine saints in hell! That bastard just came back to life with no damn heart!”

“Shut up!” Hong Feng said. “That’d be nothing if he is what I think he is.”

“Then what the hells is he then? A damn demon?”

Hong Feng didn’t respond right away. “I wonder….”

Shit, these guys were giving me more credit than I deserved.

But I’d take it.

And the Demon would return for them indeed.

Just the thought stoked my Flame, but there was little extra Frenzy to do anything besides keep my body alive. I still couldn’t move. Couldn’t heal. Even the fear I’d generated was hard to cultivate now. Hong Feng’s initial shock had worn off completely, replaced now with the faintest hint of lemonade. Sumatra thankfully was still pissing himself though.

“I don’t hear anything,” the big grey giant said from above. “Do you think that fall killed him? Can he even be killed?”

Hong Feng harrumphed. “Anything can be killed out here in the wild, but that’s not the point. The fool wasted a perfectly good opportunity. He could have made a powerful ally for our cause. But he has chosen death it seems.”

“You sure he’ll be killed?”

“Do you wish to stay here to find out?”

“To hell with that shit,” Sumatra said, and I heard him stomping back towards the controls. “Let’s get the hell out of here.”

“I am curious about something though,” Hong Feng said.

“What?” Sumatra asked.

“I know what this moon would do to me…but I wonder what it would do to someone like him.”

* * *

Hong Feng’s words haunted me long after I heard the skiff depart.

Tense minutes passed as the cries of wild beasts and monsters began to fill the night. I was transported right back to being eight years old again, as if hearing them for the first time. The trauma that had caused was still at the spiritual root of my Dao and I felt every bit of it as the darkened forest began to fill with the eerie red glow of moonlight.

Overhead I finally saw it, the Bloodmoon in all its unmitigated glory.

Instantly, a huge pressure fell on top of me, crushing me further into the ground.

Or that’s what it felt like anyway.

The pungent aroma of something odd yet familiar filled the air.

Dark Frenzy...

But this was nothing like what Hong Feng and his ilk produced before. It was raw and concentrated. Filled with chaos. I cried out as it fought against the burning of my Flame, trying to force itself into my already weakened Dantian.

Hong Feng’s words returned to me.

He no doubt feared the moon for what it might do the demon core growing inside of him.

But what would indeed happen if I let this dark energy inside my Flame?

Growls and horrid shrieks of beasts I couldn’t recognize grew closer, twigs and branches snapping under heavy footfalls as they closed in. Not more than a dozen feet from me, the grisly sounds of fangs ripping apart flesh chilled my skin as whatever it was began feasting on one of the bodies.

I would soon be next, I realized.

Yet strangely, the thought didn’t bother me.

My death was now certain.

But I had no fear.

Holy shit… I thought. I’d done it.

I’d reached the next level of the [Death Mastery] technique.

I no longer feared certain death.

Something opened up inside of me and my Flame flared into the most brilliant of blue hues.

I expected to feel my strength return, to suddenly be able to rejuvenate myself and rebuild my body anew of a true Core Realm cultivator. But strangely I felt nothing.

This couldn’t be right, I thought.

But then slowly the truth revealed itself to me.

I huffed out a scoff.

“Just my damn luck,” I managed to wheeze between my blood-encrusted lips.

My breakthrough had occurred, but I lacked the Frenzy within to complete my ascension to the next realm. What little Frenzy I had was still being deployed to maintain my broken body.

And my Flame wasn’t generating any more either.

My Flame seemed at a standstill––locked in combat with the Dark Frenzy trying to invade my soul. I glared up at the oppressive red sphere in the night sky. It was as much a symbol of control and oppression as anything else.

A curse placed here by the empire as an excuse to conquer us.

My ire stirred but it was barely enough to push back the dark energy, much less lead me to ascend.

I needed more power.

The Dark Frenzy of the Bloodmoon surrounded me like an ocean of chaos, a wealth of energy a hundred times greater than any my Flame had generated before.

What if I used it? I thought. But no…

The Bloodmoon turned normal spirit beasts into demons, but as Hong Feng had correctly mused, what the hell would it do to a man who already had a demon living inside of him, like me? The words of my mentor came to mind.

“Ensure the Struggler wrestles always with the Demon,” I whispered what Threja had said to me. “Without struggle there can be no true growth, only descension into madness.”

Would I lose myself if I did this?

Or had the Struggler suffered enough for me to retain some semblance of control?

I’d already lost my family.

My entire planet.

And now even Mu Lin.

Just the thought of it spiked my anger and the need for revenge.

But would it be enough?

And then a new thought occurred.

“What the hell am I thinking?” I said with a laugh.

If I no longer feared death, then why the hell should I fear this moon?

Without care I reversed the flow of my Flame, drawing the Dark Frenzy into me instead of pushing it back. The screams of a million demons filled my soul and I cried out in unison with them. The world turned a deeper shade of red as my consciousness shattered to pieces. The Dark Frenzy hit my Flame like crude oil being thrown into a jet engine, its color instantly shifting from brilliant blue to a deep red while belching thick volumes of black smoke.

But the power it gave was tremendous. It coursed through my meridians with such force, that it threatened to shatter them and when it finally hit my Dantian it immediately crystalized and formed a solid core.

I’d done it! I had created a solid core! I had ascended to the next Realm!

But the Demon within me didn’t care.

It raged. It craved vengeance.

It wanted blood!

Solid Dark Frenzy shot though my veins, filling them with new blood. It went to work, mending my broken flesh. Bone and sinew cracked as new veins and capillaries grew, new muscles and then finally, I felt the first beat of a brand-new heart within me.

I gasped with new life, blood finally circulating though my body once again.

I leapt from the ground with a howl, my bones and fingers lengthening.

Blood and fangs ripped against my lips.

Horns grew from my head as my skin turned as red as the sky.

I stood as a giant amongst the trees, towering higher than I ever had before.

My mind shrunk inversely and my view to the world became little more than a pinhole.

Savage snarls filled the air, but I couldn’t tell if they were from me or from the dark, fearsome creatures I tore into with my teeth and claws. I could barely make out what they were. Mutated forms of bears, demons with spider like bodies but a human face for a head. Winged creatures the size of men that resembled bats.

I tore through them all as they lashed at my skin with claws, whips, and chains.

The pain was delicious.

I reveled in it, cackling as I ripped some red-skinned demoness with bat wings in two.

The more sentient of the demons pointed at me as I absorbed their fear.

~Fiend of the Cursed Flame!~

The words more formed meaning in my mind than was spoken, all semblance of true intellect gone from me now. Blood and bone. Rip and tear. No sense of time remained. The pinprick view of the world grew yet smaller.

I willed for the Struggler to keep it open.

Don’t lose control, I told myself. Don’t let me have made this entire journey in vain.

I thought of my family.

Of Mu Lin…

But no.

I needed to struggle for the future as well.

Yu Li and Su Ling.

The people of my square.

Fia…

I gained a new sense of control as the Struggler returned and I could finally see my Flame again. It was an ugly smoldering mess. The Dark Frenzy covered it like tar, the Flame nearly extinguished by all the impurities that had run through it. Then faintly I sensed something new. Something pure.

Pure Frenzy…

In my murderous haze I sought it out, running towards wherever and whatever it was. I fought through hordes of monsters and demons, now hundreds strong. My body was ripped and torn apart as they dug into my flesh, but my bloodlust wouldn’t allow me to fall.

I’d be dead as soon as my Flame burned out though.

The hatred surrounding me was immense, the demons crying for my demise.

~Foul Frenzied Flame…~

~Cursed Fiend of the Flame…~

I pushed in the direction of pure Frenzy to get away from them and the closer I got to it, the more it burned the tar from my soul. Stronger and stronger it got until suddenly, like breaking through a wall, I was free from all the demons.

My face hit the ground as I collapsed. My soul breathed deeply, the air now free of the Dark Frenzy and the influence of the Bloodmoon. My body then suddenly succumbed to its wounds as the Struggler finally took back control.

“Gods be damned,” I cursed.

Every piece of me hurt like hell.

Weakly, I turned about to see the army of demons had stopped dead in their tracks not more than a couple dozen feet from me. Red skinned, humanoid with fangs, claws and horns, eyes the color of midnight. They railed and hissed at me, cursing me in a guttural language that I could no longer comprehend.

They didn’t seem able to move beyond where they were though.

It was as if I had reached the barrier.

Had I? Did I make it all the way back to the city?

I turned from the army of demons and crawled on my belly towards the source of the Frenzy. Agony came with each pull across the ground, but the closer I got, the more it burned away the tar consuming my Flame. But there was far more tar than Flame now.

Slowly, the Flame flickered as my eyes grew heavy and then finally it went out.

* * *

I woke to the brilliant light of morning, sucking in a lungful of air.

A scream rang out and I jerked upright, startled.

I regretted it immediately, my body rebelling against the sudden movement with a fistful of pain. I winced and fell flat on my back again, not even able to muster the power of [Indifference] to keep my reaction in check.

I was still outside in the wilderness, an open space surrounded by spruce trees.

My head was foggy, nightmare images of the Bloodmoon’s influence still running through my mind. I wished it had indeed just been a nightmare, but the deep cuts and lacerations in my body said otherwise.

More memories resurfaced.

Hong Feng ripping out my heart.

Dying and then losing Mu Lin.

“A-are you okay?” a voice said. “How did you get here?”

I stirred at the unknown voice and then glanced to my side to find it.

Two women were standing there. Or a woman and a girl, perhaps. They were covered head to foot in what looked like deep green robes. I could barely make out their faces, but they appeared to be Terran. The girl looked close to Mu Lin’s age, with blond hair peeking beneath the hooded robe covering her head. The other woman resembled her, an older sister perhaps.

I glanced down at my body.

I couldn’t move.

Closing my eyes, I checked on my Flame.

There was nothing there save a heaping pile of black tar.

Shit...

I looked to the two women, who were still staring at me like I shouldn’t exist.

And for all I’d been through, I probably shouldn’t.

“Where am I?” I asked. I must have broken through the wall at some point and ended up in the farmlands. “Which gate is this?”

The two of them suddenly screamed and backed away from me.

“You stay away from us!” the older woman yelled and picked up a mean-looking stick from off the ground. “Stay away or I’ll bash your head in!”

“Damn, take it easy, lady,” I said with a glare. “I couldn’t if I wanted to. Do you see the state I’m in?”

The older woman pushed the younger one behind her. “Stay back, Kelsey.”

“K’el Xi?” I said. “That’s a weird name.”

“Mom!” the younger one cried. “Mom, he just said my name!”

What the hell…?

Something wasn’t right here.

In fact, something was off about the both of them.

“Wait a minute,” I said, struggling to sit back up and holding my palm towards them in surrender. “I just want to talk––”

“Mom!” the girl cried. “Mom, he’s doing something!”

“I said stay back!” the older woman screamed and then charged at me.

She swung with her makeshift club, and I was too spent to even move as she clapped me right across the temple. I saw stars as my head fell back to the ground and the lights began to dim again.

Damn it all to hell…

But then suddenly I figured it out—what wasn’t quite right about them.

Holy shit, I thought, as I drifted back off into unconsciousness.

They were both speaking English.