Chapter 43: Chapter 41: A Denied Request

The air felt heavy. Not on his skin, but on his spirit. Like some sort of sap outside of his own was being laid over him. He blinked his eyes in mild confusion. Where was he now? The dark halls all looked similar. Metal piping laid on the ground like the spine of a snake, ‘ribs’ made of smaller red-lettered pipes that came out from the numerous rooms. But he could not make sense of which part of the strange place he was in. It twisted and turned in its darkness, the doors shut firmly in some cases or left open to expose half-built massive urns and tools.

It was a twisted place, the negative ambient energy was thick like wool. But it was a different kind of twistedness from the demonic altars, yet the coagulation of white flame was exactly the same.

Was this where it was all being funneled to?

He was vaguely reminded of the few times he had gotten into Fish People fortresses. They had the same kind of odd maze-like building practices and also enjoyed bizarre experiments. But without the underground river systems or twitching fetal-things in crystal vases.

Liu Xie stopped finally in one mostly empty room save for some pieces of wood and cracked pieces of pottery that spilled withered white flowers all over the ground. The air seemed a little cleaner.

He took a deep breath to prepare himself and then sat down. Then he took another deep breath just to make sure his nerves were ready. He, on some level, found it funny that he needed to do something to steady his nerves. Usually he was the one making others nervous. Liu Xie reached into his sleeve to pull out two small mirrors. They were both the size of his palm, one was wrapped in a frame of amber and gold with red painted upon it, while the other was framed with old bone and brittle wood that smelled like petrichor.

He didn’t bother getting out the third mirror.

He whispered words quietly. Words that had not been spoken in hundreds of years. Nobody would dare bother them like this.

Luckily, he was a ‘nobody’.

Both mirrors gradually floated upwards. Their shiny surfaces spun, growing bigger and bigger. They blossomed outwards and curled at their ends. In the wood and bone mirror was a stern faced elegantly horned woman with her hair pulled back and long nailed fingers clutching an ink brush. Behind her were scholars running around grabbing falling papers and tablets or chasing dog-sized inkstones with legs. The amber mirror revealed a friendly warm faced older bearded man with stubbier horns. He was relaxing in a garden with flashes of beautiful women at the edges of the mirror chattering with him in musical voices while two severe faced men in armor stood to either side of him.

“What. Is. It.” The woman asked tersely, turning her gaze to Liu Xie. “You’re bothering me.”

“Mother.” He bowed his head respectfully and felt a cup bounce off him. He winced as he picked the cup up and tried to push it back through the mirror. She grabbed it and threw it again, this time it shattered against the wall with enough force that a few pieces bounced back to hit him in the back of the head.

“You need something,” the Empress of Hell sniffed derisively.

The Emperor of Heaven blinked and gave a hesitant smile. “Nephew! It has been some time! You look like you’re in some sort of… I don’t know. Box?”

“It’s a room without a window, idiot,” the Empress of Hell went back to her paperwork.

He still smiled, “well, regardless. What brings you to contact us?”

Liu Xie straightened up but did not look either of them in the eyes. “I… I want your seals undone. At least some of them.”

His mother set down her brush and then placed a slender long nailed hand on the jar of alcohol, pouring its contents into the cup. “Where is Idony?” She asked as she brought the cup up to her red lips. “Is she safe?”

Liu Xie felt his throat and mouth grow dry. He bowed his head to avoid her gaze in the floating mirror.

“Ah, yes! The child,” the Emperor nodded. “How is she? Did she like the gift?”

Lying to his family was not one of Liu Xie’s greater skills. The thought of lying to his mother and uncle he had difficulty even thinking about but he feared speaking the truth of the matter. He gritted his teeth, “Idony is… not… here.”

“Oh? Then where is she?” His mother poured another cupful.

There was a rustling noise from the Emperor’s mirror as the Ruler of the Heavens shifted uncomfortably.

Liu Xie pressed his fingers into his thighs. “Idony is… not in this place.”

“I’m not asking where she is not, my son, I am asking where she is. Did you hit your head recently and lose what little intelligence you have?”

Red stains formed around his fingers in the fabric of his clothes as his nails buried themselves through the flesh and into the wood beneath. “I…” He swallowed and suddenly felt both very cold and hot. “I… I…” the words were refusing to come out. They wrapped themselves around his tongue and held tight.

“Do you fear you’re being watched?” The Emperor suddenly asked. “If you do not want to reveal her location so openly, I understand.” He nodded and stroked his beard. “Sister, we should address his request.”

“I don’t know,” Liu Xie whispered.

The Emperor shrank back a little and shook his head. “Excuse me?”

“You heard him, brother,” The Empress of Hell said cooly as she set her cup down and rested a hand on the jug. “He does not know where his own daughter is.”

“Sister, I think we misunderstood him.”

“We did not, right? You, who swore to us that you would bring that child here, somehow lost her,” the Empress of Hell snorted. “Did you not promise to protect her? To bring her to the First Palace?” She began pouring a third cup of alcohol. “You insulted one of your uncles, and then you lost your own child.”

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“Mother,” Liu Xie forced himself to meet her eyes. She stared at him with a pitiless glare and he instantly regretted his decision. “I did not mean to lose her I-”

“Nobody means to lose their child, you idiot boy!” She snapped. “Has your bloodlust finally poisoned you? You come asking for us to undo the seals you voluntarily took on, and you did not even think to tell us Idony had been lost!” The Empress of Hell downed her cup in a single gulp and set it down as she shook her head. “How can you look at us with such a face? How could you look at Eona? Eona, who loved you so much she gave you the daughter you desired! The one you broke mountains for! If I was her, I would spit in your face and throw myself to oblivion rather than share a bed with you. I’m ashamed to even call myself your mother.”

Each word hammered another painful nail into Liu Xie’s spirit and he found himself wishing that he could crawl into a hole where his mother would not find him. The Emperor’s hands were raised appeasingly in the mirror, “sister please calm down! Accidents happen! Please don’t yell at your son like this! He’s clearly in distress and he’s trying to tell us something important I’m sure, why else would he ask for the seals to be broken?”

“An accident? Listen to yourself! Always willing to think the best of and defend others while leaving me to handle everything too hard for your gentle heart! Do you want your future niece-in-law to see her daughter’s corpse on her wedding day?” The Empress of Hell paused in her ranting to take a swing from the jug itself.

“Please calm down! Stop drinking so much!” The Emperor pleaded on the verge of tears.

“The poor girl is probably dead!”

“SHE’S NOT DEAD!” Liu Xie shrieked, balling his hand into a fist and smashing it on his thigh. He refused to believe Idony had been killed or died. There were no fragments of her spirit to be found, no body. “Idony is… she’s not going to die so easily. She’s a stubborn girl. I found her staring down wolves-”

“How do you know she’s not dead, hm? Gut instinct?” His mother took a deep breath and then she pointed at him, “you’re lower than trash. I don’t want to see your face and I refuse to undo my seal from you. Fight with your own pathetic strength. Can’t even protect your own child, I can’t believe this…” she muttered.

“Sister you are being extremely unreasonable-”

“And you!” She snarled at the Emperor of Heaven. “If you bother me with my paperwork again, I’ll open up the faces of your pretty courtesans. I have a six hundred year backlog and this little conversation is just adding to my work pile!”

Her mirror suddenly fell to the ground, back to its original shape. The Emperor gave him a shake of his head. “Unless I have her agreement, I cannot undo my seal, White Flame. But… what else is it? Why do you need the seals undone?”

“There’s something very wrong. There’s large vessels here full of corpse syrup.”

“Sounds like some sort of dark craft,” the Emperor spoke thoughtfully. “Not something that should trouble you.”

“The corpse syrup isn’t anything I’ve seen before. It’s not with demon blood or bone paste, it’s with some sort of… sweet floral liquid. There’s more as well. This city’s been tormented by some sort of murderer who has been hunting down women, so the mortals are sacrificing people at demonic altars and they’ve dug channels for-”

“Sweet floral liquid?” The Emperor’s warm face suddenly turned very grave. “...I understand. I cannot help you immediately, but rest assured I am going to send the message out for an investigation at once. First I will need to speak to my advisors.”

Liu Xie was about to open his mouth but his uncle’s mirror fell to the ground. For a moment he considered smashing both of them into tiny pieces in frustration but instead, with trembling hands, picked both up to slip back into his sleeve. He stood up and walked over to a wall and with a wail of anger he slammed his fist into it. The wood splintered and cracked, a chunk falling out. There was a shout behind it.

Liu Xie yanked his hand free and saw someone’s shadow on the other side of the wall. He ran out of the room he stood in himself, just in time to see a well dressed man stumble out the door of the next room over. Liu Xie bolted after the man, grabbing him by the collar and tossing him back into the room he just ran from in one swift move. He stalked inside after the man.

The room had more pipes on the floor that lead to six massive wooden containers covered in odd seals with iron bolts holding them together. The man himself lay partially dazed on the ground and Liu Xie crouched down beside him. “And who are you?”

The man blinked at him, “I could ask the same!” He laughed. It was a strange laugh.

“I’m a man with a sword,” Liu Xie answered.

The man’s eyes drifted to the weapon at his side. “...So you are!”

“So who are you?”

“The workers call me Boss Lu,” he gave Liu Xie a wide smile. “And these are some of my brothers,” he gestured at the boxes.

Liu Xie felt something tick in his head. The name was familiar. “So you are the one behind all the dead women.”

“And the dead men,” he nodded. “But that was long ago enough that nobody cares to remember. She told me to do it this way to avoid too much attention.”

“Who?”

“The fortune teller,” then Lu laughed, his eyes rolling in his head. They were glassy eyes. Sanity had long ago fled them for better places. He slapped the ground, puncturing his hand on a small raised spike on one of the pipes. Blood flowed and yet he still laughed. He laughed and laughed before he suddenly got up far quicker than Liu Xie expected. “They’re coming back, you see. She told me how! They’ll all come back, they’ll come back to me and finally this entire city will burn like they did.” He dashed out once again, his giggles reverberating down the hall.

Liu Xie stood back up and as he did so he heard a set of long low rumbling. The wooden containers shook and rocked. Roars bellowed out from the cracks forming on the wood panels as the iron bolts screeched in agony as they were impossibly stretched. The writing on the seals turned a vivid white as the containers were torn open from the inside out.

Standing there, Liu Xie stared in horror as monstrous things stumbled out. They were massive creatures, wrapped in raw-red musculature with their heads twisted upside down. They had the faces of young men, full of terror and pain.

“What have they done?” Liu Xie whispered, more agonized roaring echoing down the halls. Suddenly he felt a terrifyingly sharp pain in his shoulder, wet floral saliva pooling down his head.

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