CH 60

Chapter 60: Mutant demon tree

As it gets deeper and deeper into the night, when the moon reaches its zenith and silver moonlight shines down on the earth below, a layer of faint violet demonic energy sluggishly rises. The large, ancient banyan tree planted in the middle of the small town, surrounded by houses, slowly begins to shed its leaves. One leaf flutters down, then two, three…

Groan - crash — !

The large tree suddenly shudders, groaning and creaking as the remaining leaves shake, rustling in an invisible wind. Slow and steadily, the leaves move and shift, revealing a chillingly terrifying scene…

Upon numerous bare forked branches, a withered corpse is skewered on each tip. Under the dim moonlight, one can see the frozen expressions of the mummy-like bodies. Fright, fear, shock…a few corpses dangle from the tree, wrapped in hanging vines like a cocoon. As the wind breezes through that area, the bodies drained of all blood sways lightly back and forth like a bunch of figs on a fig tree.

Then, a soft sound breaks the tranquil silence once more as the deeply buried roots of the demonic tree slowly begin to move, emerging from the ground. One, then two, then three. The roots themselves look strange, resembling multiple rotten blood sausages wriggling around like worms. The sight of one alone is enough to make anyone feel nauseous. It takes a moment before all the roots break onto the surface, and the entire tree lifts upwards slightly before inching its way across the town towards a specific location.

The demonic tree's motions are extremely slow, but perhaps it feels rather impatient, for two tentacle-like vines shoots forth from its trunk, towards the courtyard of a small house.

Bang -

In the dead of the night, a silvery translucent barrier flashes into view before fading just as quickly. The demonic tree trembles, speedily drawing back the vines.

Due to the sudden loud bang that echoed through the town, Long Zhanye, who is on night watch, instantly open his eyes and grabs the gun next to him. At the same time, Huo Zaiyuan who was sleeping, leaning against him, also awakens immediately.

"There's something outside striking against the wards!"

"I'll go take a look."

One hand grasping the gun, he walks over to the window. Huo Zaiyuan also removes a pistol from his space and follows behind. The two arrives at the window and look out to see complete darkness. Sometime during the tree's awakening, dark clouds covered the moon, robbing the average person of their sight. However, one can still make out a large creature brandishing sort kind of whip at the barrier outside.

Suddenly, those tentacles lash out at high-speed, aiming for the window where the two men are located. Once again the attack is successfully blocked, causing another large boom to resonate, the shockwaves from the collision rocking the house to its foundations.

"Ahh!! Earthquake!" Li Qing's cry of surprise comes through the closed bedroom door.

"Stupid, it's not an earthquake. Let's go out to take a look." Qin Jun's voice drifts over. Mere seconds later, a bare-chested, rumpled shorts, bed-headed Qin Jun emerges from the room.

"Little Yuan, what's happening?"

Before Huo Zaiyuan could answer, a much more violent tremor cause the entire house to quake, nearly knocking him off his feet.

"I don't know, but apparently something's attacking the wards and trying to get in." Huo Zaiyuan says as he places a hand on the wall to stabilise himself.

"Little Yuan, we cannot remain in this house anymore. Even if you repair the wards, a few more knocks from that creature will bring this place down around us!" Machine gun clenched tightly in one hand, Long Zhanye grabs Huo Zaiyuan with the other and proceeds to drag him outside.

"What on earth is that thing? Why is it trying to attack us?" Li Qing accepts a pistol from Qin Jun and follows the first pair outside. At this time, the impacts from the collisions become increasingly intense with every strike.

"I couldn't see it very clearly, but it knows we are staying in this house." Huo Zaiyuan replies, his figure already disappearing out the front door.

When the party of four is out in the courtyard, they can finally see the entire demonic tree brandishing whips and bare branches, relentlessly attacking the barrier.

"F**k me! What the hell is that?! The Elder Demon of Black Mountain[1]?!" Li Qing utters faintly, hand gripping his pistol so tightly that the fingers turned white.

Staring up at that terrifying demonic tree and its grotesque adornments of mummified corpses, the reason this place is a ghost town becomes abruptly clear.

"Have you seen an Elder Demon of Black Mountain in the form of a tree with corpses hanging from its head?" Even confronted with this sort of otherworldly situation, Long Zhanye is not visibly shaken in the slightest or giving any signs of nervousness, still being able to make fun of Li Qing's exclamation. Bracing the butt of the AK at his shoulder, he takes aim and fires a burst of rounds at one of the striking tentacles.

The machine gun's muzzle flashes in the dark, bullets tearing into the incoming vine, splitting it down the middle.

Arrghh - !!

A howl of agony erupts from the demonic tree and another handful of tentacles replace the torn one, intending on flanking the group.

Bang! Bang! Bang!

Qin Jun's gun fires five consecutive rounds, with three missing their target while two grazes the vines in time to deter its attack. Flicking his wrist, five talismans appear in Huo Zaiyuan's left hand and streaks towards the tree. In the darkness of the moonless night, dazzling silver light trails from the wooden tiles, resembling a blade slicing through the air at high speeds. Cutting past the tentacles, the talismans pierce deep into the tree trunk.

There is another loud explosion as golden flames ignite from the tiles, slowly creeping higher and higher as it threatens to envelop the entire tree. The demonic lifeform draws back its tentacles abruptly, and as though fearful of the golden fire on its body, completely ignores the few puny humans in favour of trying to smothering the flames.

"Little Yuan, didn't you store away a few rocket launchers when we cleared out the armoury?" Long Zhanye asks as he slings the gun onto his back.

"There were, but they're all separated into parts."

"Take them out. This thing is too big. Ordinary guns and bullets wouldn't work."

With a wave of his hand, all the launcher parts appear in front of Long Zhanye. "This…what exactly should we do with them?" Huo Zaiyuan inquires as he doesn't know how to assemble it.

"Hand over a rifle to Qin Jun and little Qing. Keep that creature occupied for two minutes!" Long Zhanye instructs as his hands fly over the various parts, assembling it as fast as he can.

Taking two rifles out of his space, Huo Zaiyuan passes them over to Li Qing and Qin Jun before arming himself with more talismans to block the frantic strikes from the now berserk demonic tree. Very quickly, the first layer of protective arrays can no longer withstand the continuous bombardment from the plant's vines and shatters. However, the second layer - the Heaven Concealing Array - is evidently a lot stronger than the first barrier. Holding firmly against the tentacles, the impact from each strike is also a lot less intense. In addition, whenever the vines meet the invisible barrier, it ignites in golden flames, further burning the demonic creature. Being able to attack and defend, this array allows people to take a breather. Nevertheless, in this critical situation, Huo Zaiyuan doesn't take much notice of it.

"Ready!"

At Long Zhanye's one word, he leans the assembled rocket launcher on his shoulder, eyes looking down the scope. Locking onto the target, he pulls the trigger. Sparks fly as the rocket speeds forward, trailing smoke behind and heading unerringly for the huge tree.

Boom!

The force from the exploding rocket is tremendous, managing to send the demonic tree skidding backwards. A fierce, deep orange flame erupts, causing the giant mutant plant to emit ear-piercing screeches. However, it remains mostly unyielding, stretching forth more burning and blackened vines to assault the barrier. It is rather obvious that it intends to bring them down in a kamikaze blow.

Naturally, Huo Zaiyuan refuses to sit around and wait for death. Five coin talismans appear in his left hand, right hand coming up to draw runes in the air with his fingers as he chants a spell. Taking a step forward, the talismans fly from his hand. A faint dragon roar rings out and the five coins connect in a single line, forming a red fire dragon that slams against the tree trunk, winding its body around the large girth. Red flames gradually turn golden. Unable to endure it any longer, the demonic tree begins running around wildly, knocking over houses and slamming into various obstacles as it screeches and shrieks, attempting to put out the raging inferno most of its body has become.

The demonic tree burned the whole night, only dwindling down little by little when dawn breaks the horizon and the first rays of sunlight hit the ground. As spiritual fire will only burn demonic beings and evil spirits, ordinary objects and humans are left untouched. Else when the tree had run around frantically crashing here and there and rolling about, the entire town would have burned to the ground too.

The mutant tree itself wasn't the only thing that was subjected to the flames. The bodies drained of blood left dangling or skewered by its branches were not spared either. The golden fire left no traces of the corpses behind.

"That…I say, what was up with that tree? Don't tell me during the apocalypse, humans will turn into zombies and plants will become blood-sucking autotrophic leeches?" Li Qing murmurs. Although it is early in the morning, he is only wearing a thin, sleeveless vest, snuggling up to Qin Jun to keep warm.

Abruptly awakened by the demonic tree, he was unable to fall back asleep. On top of that, firing a heavy rifle last night as well as bearing the stronger than usual recoil of the firearm caused his arms to ache.

Looking down at the pile of charcoal that was formerly a large demonic tree, it is fairly obvious this thing cannot be any deader than it currently is. So Huo Zaiyuan walks out of the array and waves his left hand, materialising a sword and begins slicing open the charred remains, speaking as he does. "Not sure if it was "Liao Zhai" or "Shan Hai Jing"[2], they mention many kinds of Immortal Flowers and Demonic Trees or something like that…I reckon this tree can be considered as one of them."

"How's that possible? Those are simply myths and legends, something to trick little kids with." Li Qing says sceptically, not believing a word.

"Why are their existence impossible? This is a world where zombies run rampant, so how is a tree turning into a monster impossible?" Long Zhanye answers, pulling out his knife and poking the pile of charcoal with the tip, not quite knowing why Huo Zaiyuan seems to be so fascinated by it.

"Eh…that's true, I suppose." Convinced by Long Zhanye's words, Li Qing ponders for a moment, then nods his head. Suddenly, his expression changes again as he thinks of something else. "T - t - then…how many 'Elder Demon of Black Mountain' are there in this world?"

Aiya…goodness…if last night's situation wasn't so tense that it prevented him from thinking too much, just looking at that tree full of mummified corpses is enough to make one tremble in their shoes.

"During my summer vacation, I was helping my old man out in the hospital looking after patients and heard a few elderlies say evil spirits need to gather demonic energy for a thousand to ten thousand years before they can become sentinel beings. Therefore, these creatures can't possibly be everywhere." Qin Jun kisses his cheek comfortingly.

"That's great then. That's great." Patting his chest, Li Qing places his hands on Qin Jun's waist, plastering himself close to his lover.

"Hmm…looks like this tree is reduced to its essence." Using quite a bit of strength to stab his blade in and bring it firmly downwards. The charcoal split open and out rolls a sparkling and crystalline green pearl.

"What is that?" Long Zhanye steps up to Huo Zaiyuan's side, gaze locked on that green pearl. "A pearl? It can't be one of those so-called evil spirit inner core, right?"

"I think it is." Nodding his head, Huo Zaiyuan bends down to pick it up.

Just as his fingertips graze the clear surface, his vision blurs, and countless images flicker across his mind. His body stills for a second, then collapses like a doll with its strings severed.

"Little Yuan!!"

Footnotes:

[1] "黑山老妖", a demon king character that appears in the old "Journey to the West" movie.

[2] "聊斋" and "山海经" are two fairly popular books. They are some sort of encyclopaedia - if you would - about mythical spirits and such like.