Chapter 65: Chapter 63: Distorted Spaces and Faces

His fingers fiddled with a loose thread on his sleeve while he contented himself with thoughts of red hair and a smiling face while ignoring an insistent ache in his back and arm. Was it really her that he had seen or had he just imagined her in his despair? Liu Xie decided it did not matter. When he found Idony again, he would tell her about it. Maybe Eona had visited her too, in her dreams.

The idea made him smile.

“Ugh,” Ji Ying’s sound of disgust reminded him she was still there.

The door to Lady Gu’s room opened and Bo emerged as a pale shivering shadow of himself, taking a few steps out to immediately slump down into a sitting position, struggling to take deep breaths. Liu Xie gazed at the young man whose eyes stared in Rui Yifu’s direction and yet saw nothing. Rui Yifu for his part remained in a shadow clustered little corner where he was obscured from view. Liu Xie could not tell who seemed more distraught. Ji Ying was idly laying on her side while looking bored and irritated.

“Wow, you guys are really dramatic for men,” Ji Ying said. “Why don’t you all get some fresh air and get lost?”

Liu Xie looked over at the aggressive woman, “for one of Gu’s disciples you’re really badly mannered.” He wondered how Lady Gu could tolerate someone like that. Even he was not so outwardly rude while he dragged Gu around during his time teaching her so surely it was not because he had imparted some infinite patience upon her.

“Says you, you’ve got the worst manners of all,” Ji Ying was unperturbed but her words were full of almost casual venom. “By the way, I forgot to tell fatty but there’s some enchantments on the mountain. He might have gotten lost the moment he stepped out of here. Maybe you guys should go find him?”

There was a weird shuddering sucking sound of breath. “Y-yeah. Actually that’s a good idea,” Bo agreed shakily.

Rui Yifu was still quiet but got to his feet, standing in the light. Liu Xie raised his eyebrows a bit at the other man’s appearance. His eyes were large with reflective pupils, his flesh looked pale and almost wet, thin brows, and a mouth full of sharp strangely pointed backwards facing teeth as he spoke, “what? Why are you looking at me like that?” It took Liu Xie a moment to realize he was being spoken to.

“I’m just surprised to see a Fish Person’s real face.”

“...Is that… is this what all Fish People look like?” Bo whispered.

“Don’t be ridiculous,” Rui Yifu said. “I’m a decrepit creature in a dwindling body. If I was younger I’d be better looking.”

“What are you really then?” Liu Xie asked, curious. He had actually had very little personal experience with Fish People, at most going through their abandoned hidden cities or equally secretive surface facilities. It was just generally accepted among the heavens that it was better to ignore the things that so blatantly existed outside the gates of earth and heaven.

"Why does it matter to someone like you?" Rui Yifu's arms were crossed like he was trying to hold something tightly to himself.

Liu Xie took a step closer to him, "I'm curious. You've hidden so much from us you could at least answer a single question."

“...I’m a shark.”

“Hey!” Ji Ying called out from her spot, “can you turn into a shark right now? Can we make vinegar fish out of you? Or maybe fin soup?”

Rui Yifu made a noise between an exasperated laugh and a growl of annoyance before throwing up his hands and going down the stairs. Bo followed with a stiff and awkward gait and Liu Xie stood alone from the rest of his group as he stared down at Ji Ying. She had barely moved and fiddled with an amber charm tied to her waist by a red ribbon. Finally she rolled her eyes before looking up at him.

"Hey, look I'm flattered but I'm not into your kind."

Liu Xie couldn't help but snort at her statement and turned on his heel to go down the stairs as well. He really could not imagine how Lady Gu would have taken someone like that as a disciple. The other girls he had encountered so far were all relatively polite. The aggressive attitude vaguely reminded him of Idony in fact. As he went down the stairs he gradually caught up the the slowly descending forms of Rui and Bo, neither of whom were apt to talk much.

The strange manor felt like it was contracting around them, how a living being's lungs would shrivel on the exhale of a breath. A long passage down was suddenly shortened, disorienting Bo enough that Liu Xie lunged forward to grab him by the back of his collar so he would not break his neck tumbling forward.

"Argh! What!" Bo sputtered.

Rui Yifu was further down, covered in darkness, so that when he looked up at them only his reflective pupils seemed to pierce the gloom. "She's shortening our path, isn't she Liu?"

Liu nodded, "she's the mistress of the mountain and everything in it."

"She can do that?" Bo asked, having recovered some of himself from his earlier state of silence. His eyes were reddish and his voice hoarse.

"When you become some type of immortal, you can get abilities like that," Liu Xie said as he swiftly moved down the next few steps to walk beside Bo, placing a hand on his arm so he would remain steady. "This mountain was made by Hou, who gave it to her some time ago. Since she is its mistress though, it obeys her will. Nobody can come up the mountain unless she allows them. Not even if they're another immortal... like Song for example."

"Oh, him." Bo made a somewhat sour expression, like he had just tasted something that had gone wrong. Light abruptly flooded the stairs and Bo again staggered, Liu Xie tightening his grip on him to keep him from toppling.

The front doors of the manor were open and displayed the verdant greenery of a healthy forest. Rui Yifu stepped out into it first and Liu Xie helped Bo down the last few steps. There was a light breeze at his back, and turning around Liu Xie found only more trees. "Ah," he sighed. If this was what Li Baobao dealt with he felt the poor merchant's son was probably going to be in a confused state with all the spatial displacement he had likely experienced. Two young women emerged from the tree line, one carrying a yoke over her shoulder while the other gasped loudly. The one holding the yoke whipped it around like a staff pointed directly at Rui Yifu's face, moving in front of the other girl. "What are you doing here, soul stealer!?" She demanded sharply.

"I'm here with your teacher's own teacher," Rui Yifu held up his hands, where dry flesh was beginning to peel back, creating cracked red lines. Liu Xie remembered Rui Yifu's earlier statement of being a decrepit creature in a dwindling body. Liu Xie looked at his own arms, giving 'tea' of his own sap had worked with Idony, he thought, so surely it could work with a Fish Person as well?

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"Huh?" The yoke-wielding girl looked over at Bo. "You?"

"N-no!" Bo shook his head, "with Boss." He pointed at Liu Xie.

Liu Xie waved at the two girls, "we're looking for another young man."

"And is that thing with you?" She gestured at Rui Yifu.

"We call it Rui Yifu, and yes," Liu Xie replied.

The girl who was hiding behind her more assertive friend peeked over her shoulder, "we saw a young man up here earlier. We thought he was a refugee! So we brought him down to the camp," she pointed northwards. "I... I don't think he left. He didn't seem in the right state to go wandering off."

Liu Xie smiled at the two girls, both of whom turned a light shade of pink in their faces. "Thank you! We'll be going now and we'll take the fish with us and keep him under watch, so there's nothing to worry about."

"O-oh, alright then," the yoke-staff wielding girl said although she seemed distracted.

Taking the lead, Liu Xie swiftly began walking in the direction pointed at, descending down an increasingly steep path that split through the dense trees like a snake through sand. Gradually the trees thinned away and opened up to a small lake of various colored and shaped tents, people busying themselves with their various chores and fluttering through the winding pathways of the tents like fish. The people were all somewhat wan and quite a few looked like they had been on the road for some time before they had finally found shelter. Li Baobao would not look out of place.

"Hey! I think I see him!" Bo pointed towards a young man walking towards them with a stooped old woman following behind him, her face and head all wrapped up as she, in turn, gestured towards them. Li Baobao's own face looked pale and he continued glancing at the woman behind him.

"Everyone! You found me!" Li Baobao said in relief.

"I told you they would find you, yet you doubted me," the old woman sighed dramatically.

Li Baobao wrung his hands, "n-no! Never! I would never think to doubt an elder!" He said. "I was just still worried!"

Liu Xie looked at the woman and found cloudy eyes staring back at him. She was aged and yet he could feel a thrum of strength within her. Similar to Bo's, yet far more matured. "Thank you for watching over our friend."

"Of course," she said. "I take responsibility for everyone in this camp!" She looked at the group. "Would any of you like your fortunes told?"

"No thank you," Liu Xie said politely. "I like surprises."

"Can you do palmistry?" Rui Yifu asked.

The woman turned her concealed face to him, "palmistry? I can, but I've never done it on a Fish Person before." She spoke without judgement. Rui Yifu held his hand out for her and she took it in her own brittle fingers. "You... could really use some lotion. Or water," she observed flatly, running a thin finger over the peeling skin. "Hmm... a good foundation, but a lot of misfortune. Not of your own fault. A bitter star, I think." She had not once closed her eyes but seemed to be furrowing her brow as she studied his hand.

"Very good, you guessed correctly," Rui Yifu sneered.

"...Someone you loved betrayed you. You should be dead. Your lines are terminated."

Liu Xie glanced at the Fish Person, who was staring at the elderly woman.

"Eh, Rui Yifu? Your face..." Li Baobao placed his hands onto his own face. "It's different."

The woman let go of his hand, "ah. Do not feel so sad, I was just saying what I saw. I've dealt with the same you see-" Liu Xie noticed Li Baobao seemed to be struggling to not show exasperation on his face. "When I was a young woman, I fell in love with a man named Wang Huaqing-"

Rui Yifu suddenly gripped the woman by her shoulders, putting his face close to hers. "You know Wang Huaqing!?"

"Wang..." Bo repeated the name, frowning. "...Is that the guy we met in the Free City, the one who attacked us Rui?"

Liu Xie looked at Bo in confusion, "what?"

The wrappings around the woman's face fell away, revealing a scarred faceless mass beneath, where teeth stuck out from a lipless mouth. It was hard to tell what she was thinking, but Liu Xie felt he could see the sympathy in her eyes. "We're sister and brother then in our grudge."

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