Yu Li frowned quizzically at the envelope sitting on her doorstep.
It was still early morning, before even the sun was up. Su Ling had woken her much earlier, hungry as always. After feeding her, Yu Li had put her back down to sleep, and as she had committed herself to doing for the last few days, was about to head out onto the porch for morning exercise and cultivation.
After deciding to utilize the spirit stone Chun had given her, Yu Li was still working on cultivating the full concentration of Qi from it, and as he had hinted, she felt her inner strength growing steadily each day from it. Perhaps in ti, she would have enough Qi within her Dantian to attempt a breakthrough into the Foundation Realm.
So, like every morning for the past few days, she had risen early to practice cultivation while Su Ling slept. This morning however, it ca as a bit of a surprise to find an envelope at her door.
Especially so early.
Had soone delivered it late last night perhaps?
Curiosity piqued, Yu Li picked up the envelope and checked to make sure the address was correct and sure enough it was. Even more so, she recognized the handwriting. She’d know those sloppy characters anywhere.
“What the heck is this, Chun?” she muttered as she examined it further.
And why send sothing through the mail?
The envelope was stamped with an official imperial seal and no doubt that was the reason why it was left so plainly. Only a fool would risk the empire’s wrath by stealing an officially stamped docunt.
That only piqued her curiosity further.
Opening it, Yu Li found an identification card with Chun’s face on it and a half dozen other docunts written in fine imperial print.
What is all this?
After taking a mont to shuffle through them, Yu Li finally understood what she was looking at.
“By the heavens,” she whispered. “He actually did it…”
Peeking back into the house quickly for Su Ling, Yu Li made sure the infant was still asleep before heading quickly down the balcony to Chun’s apartnt. She rapped on the door and a few monts later, Gui Zu answered. His towering fra nearly blocked the entire doorway as he greeted her with a short bow and sleep-ridden eyes.
“Sister Yu Li?” he said. “You’re up so early.”
“Gui Zu, look!” she said excitedly.
He rubbed his eyes before squinted at the papers. “What is this?”
“Look and see,” she said. “And I told you to stop calling sister. I’m Chun’s sister, not yours.”
“Apologies,” he said and smiled at her with his crooked teeth. “Miss Yu Li.”
Yu Li grinned at her title. She had to admit, she found Gui Zu handso despite his teeth. The smile had grown on her just as Chun said it would.
“Su Ling is asleep, so I need to get back quickly. Tell what you think of this. Did Chun really beco a citizen and create a new sect?”
He looked over the papers, shuffling them in his hands. “Looks like it to .”
Yu Li was beside herself for a mont. Growing up with Chun, half the things he said and did bordered on idiocy most tis. And she had to admit, when he had first ntioned becoming a citizen and buying the entire housing block, she counted the endeavor as one of them. But now, here in her hands was proof. He’d done it. He’d actually gone and done it! But one serious question still remained.
“Why would he send this to ?” she said. “Plus, I haven’t even seen him in days.”
“I haven’t either,” Gui Zu said, scratching the back of his head. “Not since his last match at the tourna…”
His words trailed off and Yu Li squinted at him. Was he hiding sothing?
“The what?” she asked.
“Never mind,” he said. “He probably just sent it to you for safekeeping. Those are important docunts and he’s staying in a rough part of town. Probably doesn’t want them stolen.”
Yu Li twisted her lips to the side considering it. It sort of made sense, she supposed, but she still didn’t like it.
“Well, I don’t feel too comfortable holding them either.”
“We should probably tell Jian Yi about them.”
“What? Jian Yi?” Just the ntion of her na caused Yu Li’s stomach to sour. “Why her?”
Gui Zu laughed. “You should see your face. It’s turning red.”
Yu Li fud inwardly.
“Well, that bitch slapped . I don’t like her.”
Gui Zu smiled. “I get it, but she is trying to make ands you know?”
“I know, but still. I don’t have to like her. Why do we need to tell her about this?”
“She ntioned to that Chun was planning this,” Gui Zu said. “Starting a sect for Terrans.”
“What? She told you that?”
What the heck was going on here?
“Chun never even told about that,” she said. “And since when are you and Jian Yi friendly?”
Gui Zu laughed with his deep gentle laugh. “I’m friendly with everybody, Yu Li. You know that. And she’s not as bad as you think. She really does feel bad about what she did too.”
That still didn’t make her feel any better.
“Anyway,” Gui Zu said. “Jian Yi said forming this sect would be important to standing up to Hein when he cos. She was waiting on Chun to create it. We should probably let her know that he has.”
Yu Li rolled her eyes. “Is it really necessary?”
“Well I don’t really know what else to do with these,” Gui Zu said, handing the docunts back to her. “Do you?”
Yu Li pouted.
She didn’t really have an answer.
“Fine… okay,” Yu Li said, resignedly. “We’ll go see her. But later. Right now, I need to get back to Su Ling.”
* * *
The endless ranks of demons and monsters surrounded on all sides.
My vision of them was but through a pinhole before, but now I was seeing them fully with my naked eyes. Mutated raplings, three tis their normal size, with red skin and spikes fought against the demons that herded them like cattle. The demons themselves were ard like warriors. Crude and rusted weapons in hand, bodies brimming with Demonic Qi and Dark Frenzy.
A shrill human cry rose above the din of chaos around .
I ran towards it, cutting my way through the hordes of demons with my axe.
The scream ca again.
Mu Lin!
Tearing through the demons I finally found her.
Standing atop a mound of corpses, she was being held captive by Sumatra and Hong Feng. The big, gray giant of a man was holding Mu Lin from behind, his thick forearm crushing her throat in a headlock. Hong Feng was transford. His head was as large as a person, his body a serpentine mass of writhing black limbs and tentacles. The other demons recoiled from him as dark energy pulsated from his rotten core.
He opened his mouth and like a snake, his jaw unhinged to create a monstrous maw filled with needle-like teeth. He swallowed Mu Lin’s legs like a belrug and bit her in half at the waist. She cried out sharply in terror and pain, but then her scream was cut short as he severed her spine.
Her insides spilled out as Sumatra cackled gleefully.
“My best damn handler!”
My stomach was sick. Abject horror filled my mind as Hong Feng continued to devour her whole.
I stood helpless to stop him.
She was gone.
Mu Lin was gone.
A cold emptiness filled .
I had wanted to save her, but I had no strength.
I wanted to feel hate and anger, but I had no Fla.
Darkness enshrouded as the Struggler took hold.
“Is this as far as you’ve managed to co, Max?”
The voice ca from behind and when I looked over my shoulder I had to crane my neck upwards to see who it was. There was Threja, even taller than I rembered her. Her blue skin had transford to red, her battle scars morphed into a suit of Frenzy-fueled, celestial armor that hovered inches above her skin.
“Big sister,” I said. “How are you here?”
“I’ll always be here for you, little brother. What ails you so?”
The demons around vanished into the backdrop as I found myself back outside the wall with Threja again. It was as if no ti had passed at all. The night before she headed off into oblivion.
“I’ve lost my Fla and I can’t protect the ones I love.”
I looked to the ground and saw Mu Lin’s body there—bitten in two by Hong Feng.
Bile rose up in my throat as I finally let out a sob.
It was the first ti I had truly grieved for her.
“I failed her,” I said. “I got her killed. And now so many more will follow.”
“Did you not think this could happen?” Threja said, kneeling down to look in the eye. “The path we tread will be filled with grief…not only for ourselves, but others.”
“I understand,” I said and faintly the anger began stirring in my heart. “I want to avenge her.”
Threja nodded. “And I’m sure you shall…in ti. But is that all you want? Retribution?”
The question stared at from the darkness and that sa sense of emptiness consud .
“I didn’t want her to die,” I said. “I don’t want to lose any of them.”
Threja was silent for a mont, studying and then finally she stood.
“You’ve chosen to add even more difficulty to your path, it seems,” she said. “Few Berserkers choose to protect as well as follow their rage. There may co a ti when you will have to choose between protecting those you love and fulfilling the vengeance in your heart. Are you prepared to make such a choice?”
“Am I making that choice now?” I asked. “Or has the choice already been made for ? If I can’t save Yu Li and Su Ling, will I be dood to only avenge them, the sa as for Mu Lin?”
Threja grimaced. “Only fate will tell.”
“Can’t I do both?” I asked.
But she was no longer listening to now. Turning, she slowly waded off into the darkness.
“Farewell, Brother Max.”
“Wait!” I shouted. “Please tell ! Can’t I do––”
“Seek not an answer for what you know is true,” she said, glancing back over her shoulder at . “Only you can control the Fla—”
I awoke with a sudden jolt, pain instantly filling .
“Ah---!”
A hand covered my mouth as I released a cry and in the semi-darkness, I saw Kelsey’s face staring back into my own.
“Don’t scream,” she whispered and slowly I began to regain my composure, the remnants of the twisted nightmare receding from my mind. It had felt so real, yet now in the waking world, I could see that all it was, was a dark reflection of my own traumas tornting from within my own mind. I vaguely beca aware that Kelsey was speaking to again.
“I’m going to remove my hand now, okay?” she said and paused for so kind of confirmation of understanding.
When I finally nodded, she did so.
“What ti is––?”
“I only have one question,” she said, cutting off. “If I help you to get back to that place out in the forest, to regain your powers, will you promise to take to the city?”
I searched her eyes. She was determined, convicted.
But I couldn’t lie to her either.
“I won’t promise you when,” I told her truthfully. “But when the ti is right. I will.”
It clearly wasn’t the answer she was looking for, but wobbling her head to the side, she resignedly accepted with a shrug.
“Fine,” she said. “Now you can scream, okay?”
“Wha––?”
Before I could comprehend what she was saying, Kelsey jabbed both her hands into the side of my ribcage.
“AHHHHHH!”
“Doug!” she yelled. “Doug, co quick!”
The infirmary door flew open and the guard ca in from outside. His eyes were wide with panic as his hand reached for the gun at his side.
“Kelsey, get back! Get away from him!”
“He’s having a seizure!” Kelsey said. “Go run and get my mom! Quick!”
The guard hesitated for a mont confused, his mind caught between indecision.
“Go! He’s going to die!”
“Alright, alright!” he said and promptly left the room.
As soon as his footfalls retreated down the hallway, Kelsey stopped pressing into my side and then produced a small key from her pocket.
“I stole this from my mom,” she said as she undid my handcuffs from the railing on the side of the bed. “Now we have to move fast, okay?”
Holy shit… I thought. This girl was pretty hardcore.
I nodded. “I’m right behind you.”
Getting up off a bed I hadn’t left in two days was murder. I felt unbalanced and I could barely feel my legs. Kelsey steadied like a crutch as she threw my arm over her shoulders.
“Damn you’re heavy,” she said. “Co on, we have to get to the outer hatch before he reaches my mom.”
I looked around, bewildered. “How did you even get past him to see ?”
“I told him my mom sent to give you an early breakfast,” Kelsey said. “Once he wakes her up though, all hell’s going to break loose. So we need to be out of here by then.”
I nodded and redoubled my efforts to hobble down the corridor with her. The dim lighting played tricks on my eyes, caught in that state between being too bright for night vision and too dark to actually see. It seed to have no effect on Kelsey however, who navigated as if not relying on sight at all.
“How much ti do we have?” I asked.
“The habitat floors are on the bottom level, four floors down,” she said. “It’ll take him maybe ten minutes to climb down there to get to her. A minute or two for panic and confusion and then they’ll sound the alarm. We need to be good and gone by then.”
“What ti is it now? Is it day?”
“It’s right before dawn,” she said. “Co on. We’re on the top floor. The hatch isn’t too far.”
I endured the bite of pain with each step, shuffling down the seemingly endless maze of darkened corridors. Whoever built the place must have designed it for hundreds of personnel, each corridor wide enough for a forklift to drive down. Finally, we ca to a room that resembled an airlock. A hefty door with a wheel, like sothing you’d see on a submarine was on both sides.
“Put one of these on,” Kelsey said and threw a green robe.
I looked at it more closely and realized it was the sa robes that I saw she and her mother wearing when they found . Except they weren’t exactly robes, they were camouflage ponchos made of plastic or nylon.
The thing was too small, but I made it work, stretching it over my bruised body.
I helped Kelsey close the inner hatch and then she barricaded it further from the inside, jamming a mop handle through the wheel.
“That’ll buy us a bit more ti,” she said. “Are you ready?”
I nodded. “Thank you for doing this.”
“Don’t thank yet,” Kelsey said as she worked the wheel and opened the hatch to the outside world. “You still have to prove to that you have magic.”
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