Chapter 44: Chapter 42: Ruination of a Questionable City

He laid face down on the ground, head spinning. He was aware of people running around him. Furious angry people who shouted slogans and demands. He forced himself onto his knees to watch the crowd move past him towards a large warehouse. He had been at the head of the mob at some point, then…

Li Baobao reached to the back of his head and winced as his fingers moved through bloody hair to a small gash on the back of his skull. He stood back up and realized his shoes were missing.

“Who steals someone’s shoes?” He mumbled to himself.

“Move!” A man shouted, shoving Li Baobao back onto the ground.

Li Baobao remained on the ground for another long moment. There were still people running past him. He was trying to remember what had happened but whenever he tried to think his head started to spin. It began to feel like a giant had picked up the ground and was shaking it violently beneath him. He gritted his teeth and braced himself, but the shaking did not stop. The blurry shape of people in his vision stumbled and turned backwards.

His eyes caught the ground suddenly erupting a few paces across from him and he got back to his feet with a mighty heave of all his strength, the ground buckling as something large and sinuous bolted free from the earth right where his body used to be.

He turned his head to look up at what looked like a strange mix of a meaty centipede with a corpse-like visage of a woman’s face atop a muscular torso with two long arms that ended in bony blades. The face screeched in agony, an eye erupting as the creature leapt for him. Li Baobao stared at it in shock and fear, feeling as though his blood was escaping through his chest. He was imaging those blades sinking into his chest when the monster’s charge was suddenly stopped by a blade cleaving through its neck. Thick syrupy blood that smelled like flowers and iron splattered over the dust. The head bounced to the ground with wet thumps, its mouth still ajar as the body toppled over in an undignified manner.

“Hello there young man!” A smooth voice said. A hand rested comfortably on his shoulder and he turned to see a well groomed handsome man standing beside him with an easy smile on his face. “No need to worry.”

“Thank you?” Li Baobao said before he managed to grab a hold of his scattered thoughts. People were still running past them, screaming about monsters. The smell of blood, not his own, sank into his nose.

“It was my pleasure,” the man looked down at the body which began to convulse. Slimy tendrils of sinew were beginning to extend from the head towards the body. He rammed his sword through the skull and the tendrils flailed wildly before flopping on the ground. “...Damn.”

“Can… you can help us!” Li Baobao put his hands together.

“Well yes, that’s why I was called,” the man nodded with raised eyebrows. “The Emperor of the Heavens himself called upon me, Lord Song of the Five Thousand Flowers, to come to this den of iniquity’s aid.” His words were grandiose and he lifted his chin a little as he spoke.

“L-listen! My… my friends and I. We’re looking for a girl and we thought she was being sacrificed, but then it turns out theres… this other stuff… going on…?” His head began to hurt as the memories scratched around in his brain. “I can pay you!”

The man, Lord Song, laughed. “I don’t need to be paid… wait actually you said a girl. Is she pretty?” The man looked at him with interest. “Unmarried? Untouched?”

Li Baobao, for the first time in his life, felt like punching someone in the face. Repeatedly. It was an uncomfortable feeling.

There was a loud plopping noise and both men looked down at the large puddle of blood from the monster. A hand had emerged, then another one.

Suddenly Bo was thrown out from the puddle, shrieking in shock as he flipped in the air and right afterwards Rui Yifu hauled himself out of the blood puddle too.

Lord Song stood there in silence for a moment, stepping out of the way of another man who ran by with a broken arm, to stare at the new arrivals. “...That was the strangest use of a Jade Gate I have ever seen.”

“More of a Scarlet Gate, really,” Rui Yifu spat out some blood.

“I never want to deal with any sort of weird magic stuff again!” Bo cried, shaking as he got back to his feet and looked at Li and Song. “...Li who’s the new guy?”

“This is Lord Song of the Five Thousand Flowers,” Li Baobao introduced politely, manners overtaking him for a moment.

“More like Lord Song of the Five Thousand Pretentious Names,” Rui Yifu coughed, sitting on the ground. His shoulders were slack and his head was bowed. “I’m spent.”

“Where’s Liu Xie?” Li Baobao asked, looking back at the puddle, expecting the white clad man to emerge next.

“No clue, we split up inside the… place,” Bo shrugged with worry on his face. “We got attacked by the cutsleeve’s old mentor, and…” he paused for a strangely long time before he continued. “...Things… other things started attacking us. Like that thing,” he pointed at the corpse.

Rui Yifu turned his face towards Song. Even in the poor light of the night, Li Baobao could see the exhaustion on his features. His face looked slightly different although Li Baobao could not tell how. Maybe it was the moon’s light making his nose look slightly smaller than before. “You’re the Immortal Song, right?”

“Yes,” Lord Song sniffed a bit, sounding slightly offended by Rui Yifu speaking to him but he stood up straight anyway.

“Someone was manufacturing flesh puppets with corpse syrup,” Rui Yifu was looking back at the warehouse. People were racing away from it, towards it, across it. A massive confused mob. Lumbering shapes broke walls behind where fires danced.

“Manufacturing?” Lord Song’s eyes narrowed and his face grew thoughtful.

“I found large containers there. Full of corpses. Corpses and some sort of floral liquid. There was piping. It looked like a brewery from the North.”

Lord Song’s face twisted into one of stunned shock. “Waxy moon flowers,” he whispered softly in horror. “...Gods in their heavens.”

Someone was walking towards them, slowly on tottering legs. Thick blood seeped over the partially exposed torso. Liu Xie made his way over to them, dark eyes wide as he sank down to his knees, his blood drenched sword resting on the ground. Bo instantly moved to Liu Xie’s side and Li Baobao stepped in front of him to fret over his wounds. It looked like someone had tried hacking him apart, or pulling him apart with their teeth. “They knew… they knew…” Liu Xie muttered to himself. “They had been waiting with this…”

“Who knew?” Bo asked.

“Master Liu I think you’re delirious from blood loss.”

Liu Xie shook his head. “No, no… Eona…”

Lord Song made a slight noise of recognition, taking a step back from Liu Xie, before he looked past the group. “Fellows, I think moving would be an excellent idea at the moment. I don’t have any seals on me, so the moment I take my sword out of that thing’s skull it’ll start regenerating, and I believe its friends are coming to join us.” He gestured out at the crumbling warehouse. More forms, all in varying shapes, were spilling out from the fire-engulfed interior.

“I’m in no state to fight,” Rui Yifu got to his feet. “Liu Xie’s not either,” he tucked his arms under Liu Xie’s, “Bo, grab his legs.”

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“I can walk!” Liu Xie hissed, wiggling out of Rui Yifu’s grip, taking several steps, and falling.

“No you can’t,” Rui Yifu said. “Bo, grab his legs.”

Bo grunted in strain as he grabbed Liu Xie’s legs, and Rui Yifu wheezed as they pulled him up. Li Baobao and Song walked on either side. In the dark, Song’s blade seemed like a sliver of light when it would lick outwards towards the creeping monsters. They would howl in voices like people, running, slithering, galloping away before they would circle back towards them.

“Why do they keep coming?” Li Baobao asked.

Rui Yifu grunted, shifting Liu Xie’s arms slightly. “They’re probably hungry. There’s two immortals right here for them to eat.”

“Excuse me? Are you blaming my kindly self for these things?” Song asked. Li Baobao realized he was not even holding his sword. He was gesturing with one of his hands, the sword gliding through the air like a bird with a wounded wing.

“Yes, you’re truly a sage for the ages!” Rui Yifu replied. “I’m not knowledgeable on flesh puppets but I do know they need frequent sustenance of Flames or qi, like many types of demons. Immortals have huge reservoirs of such.”

“They were concentrating White Flame to feed them,” Liu Xie spoke. Li Baobao looked down at him to see he was scowling up at them all.

“I don’t touch White Flame. I’m very old, but not senile enough to think I could do anything with it,” Song protested. “Lady Gu or maybe even Hou might know, but not I. I’m an expert in the Amber Flame.”

“This willow is full of it though,” Rui Yifu ‘gestured’ at Liu Xie by kicking him in the back as he supported his arms. Liu Xie suddenly twisted his body, freeing himself from Bo and Rui’s grip. “Crawl then.”

Song’s head suddenly turned and he yelled. Li Baobao felt Rui Yifu grab him and watched as he and Bo were both yanked down. A thick pink thing swept through the air, catching Song by the head and throwing him into a nearby building with such force that the wooden walls collapsed and people shrieked as the immortal crashed over furniture and cowering civilians hiding from the monsters outside.

Laying again on the ground, Li Baobao wondered how his life had gone so terribly astray. Bo grabbed his arm and pulled him back up, patting his arm. “Are you alright?” he asked.

“Someone stole my shoes,” Li Baobao replied. “I am not alright.”

“You know, I haven’t been alright in a very long time either,” Bo agreed.

A hoarse roar rattled through their bones and a skinless monster moved towards them, a long tongue dragging across the ground as it ambled on uneven limbs, the ground shaking beneath their feet. “Rui!” Li Baobao called out, stepping back. Bo shifted in front of him, lifting his fists as though he were about to brawl the monster.

Rui Yifu was laid out on the ground, blood pouring from his nose and mouth. Li Baobao took a step towards him and Bo grabbed his arm and pulled him back behind him. “Don’t move stupid!”

Li Baobao doubted Bo could fight the monster, and immediately clasped his hands together in desperate prayer. He started with the Four Houses in quick whispers to the Amber Emperor, the Jade Prince, the Empress of Hell, and even the Headless God.

A streak of bright white lit up his eyes as Liu Xie rose to his feet and threw his sword like a javelin at the monster, spearing it through the head. It let out a pained cry like a tortured man before it loudly sighed and slid down as smoke rose from its flensed muscle, little sparks of white bleeding from it.

The ground then exploded beneath his feet. Li Baobao and Bo screamed together as a sinuous creature lunged out from the ground with jaws wide open. Liu Xie swore briefly before its maw closed around his head and upraised arm. The sound of wood splintered followed as the decapitated one armed body was violently thrown a few feet away. The creature made noisy chomping sounds, black hair smeared in wood pulp and sap thick blood winding in its teeth as it swallowed. More abominable shapes lurched forward, hurtling towards the ruined body.

“BOSS!” Bo yelled in distress.

Li Baobao kept his hands together and began listing off the names of gods beneath the Empress and Emperor in terror, fumbling through the names and his pleas.

“What are you doing!?” Bo asked, grabbing Li Baobao’s arm.

“Praying!”

“To who?!”

“I don’t know, any option seems good right now!!”

“I don’t think anyone is listening!”

The ground rumbled lightly again. Li Baobao was yanked almost off his feet as Bo moved to grab the unconscious Rui’s arm and start dragging them both.

But the entire world seemed to grow quiet abruptly. Li Baobao could still hear screaming and roars, the crackle of fires. But they also seemed so far away, as if on the other side of a mountain. The monsters turned their heads to Li Baobao and Bo, jaws smeared with red.

An elegant woman leapt over a toppled wagon nearby them, whipping a long white pine staff to create a delicate arc of bright flames that lashed out at the monsters. Her long blonde hair fluttered in the flames as she turned to look at them with wide purple eyes, firelight catching on the amethysts in her pointed ears. “You two!” Her voice was heavily accented and sounded hoarse. “Start running! I can distract them!”

“Y-you,” Bo blinked. “The lady who gave me food!”

“Go! Run!” She demanded, the monsters now turning their attention to her. She raised her staff upwards and glinting glyphs of silver hovered above, as the monsters came close the glyphs shattered into massive shards of ice, crushing some of the creatures and slicing through others.

But they just kept coming.

She turned around, running to the distance as the monsters chased after her. Li Baobao watched her vanish past the smoke, barely registering Bo leaving his side to grab Liu Xie’s mutilated body. Then a hand rested on his shoulder. He turned, somehow expecting to see Rui Yifu conscious and grumbling but instead saw a young woman gazing down at him. She wore traveling clothes with thick boots, and in her hand was a long blood stained sword. Beside her were two other girls, similarly dressed with weapons of their own.

“Sir, are you and your friends in need?” She asked softly. “We’re here to help, Lady Gu sent us.”

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