The Tale Never Ends

I stood, a miserable soul alone in the dark. Gut-wrenching powerlessness and helplessness swelled in me as I felt a tingle in my nose and tears were threatening to burst. Ever since I became a man, this was the first time I had the urge to cry. The first time I felt so alone and forlorn, powerless and weak; and me alone in the shadowy passage with complete blackness around me merely reified this sensation.

I rubbed my nose and calmed myself. I have to think, and sniveling in tears would help me escape this accursed place not one bit. Wait, I thought suddenly. We took the leftmost path at the fork after leaving the main underground palace. That brought us here… I could go back and try the middle and the last path! There must surely be a way out!

With my mind made up, I whirled and retrace my steps back. There was no more need to mosey around.

But to my dismal astonishment, I turned back, I reached another three-way fork! The words from the graverobber’s journal rose in my mind again like a hidden horror, long-buried in my mind, stirring slowly from a dormant slumber, “There is no way out…” The way leading out of the treasure chamber earlier must have also been one of these three paths!

I almost collapsed at the staggering weight of defeat. There was no way I could call Father for help and my trusted companions, Chongxi and Lin Feng were no way near me. There’s just no way I could get out of here on my own! I could almost scream to myself. I chuckled with chagrin and chose a path with hardly a look, plunging into the dark, narrow walkway, dejected and morose like a broken man. For all I knew, I could be spending the rest of eternity here alone, drifting like a wandering soul, forsaken and desolated.

I dragged my wearied self through many a hall and so many more tunnels that I already lost count of. Not one of them I could recognize and none were as familiar to me than the previous ones before. Not even my Bee Scout could help me; it merely buzzed around aimlessly, failing to find me a vector that could lead to my salvation. Like a creature with no mind of its own, I walked towards every glimmer of light that drew my sight, my heart now filled with despair.

I lost all sense of time. Minutes, hours, days, or even weeks could have passed, until I finally came into a stone chamber which resembled in great detail to the first hall Father and I chanced upon when we first came. A mound of decaying bones, some white while some greyed and blackened, sat at the center of the hall. But this was not the same chamber, I was sure of it, for Father had incinerated the mound of bones to utterly nothing before we left. I smirked weakly and continued shuffling to the far end of the hall, my deadpan eyes set upon the passage ahead that snaked off into gloom and misery.

Just then, the cold, hard flagstones of the hall shook under my feet! Mistaking this as an earthquake, I crouched immediately. Before anything else, the roof of the hall cracked and crumbled. Broken debris and rock showered down like hailstones and my head jerked upwards. The roof was falling! Long cracks stretched quickly in every direction like a cobweb of ravines and canyons. Suddenly, they broke and a huge chunk of rock came down with fury! A shaft of sunlight spilled through the hole. Sunlight that gave me warmth and restored my hope! What providence! This infernal crypt is collapsing!

There was no time to lose. I have been here for far too long! I rose with a kick and flew upwards. Bits and pieces of the crumbling roof were raining down from above, falling down around me and rubbles peppered the floors of the hall below me. The hole was just enough for me to fly out and I darted through it and finally feel the heat of the sun upon the skin of my face.

I’m free! At last! That was the first notion that came to mind and I heaved a relieved mouthful of breath.

I looked around and the first thing I saw was Father, hovering in mid-air over the mountain! He stood in the air, borne by his flying sword and one of his hands was in the form of the Seal of the Sword. I immediately grasped what was happening: Father had returned to flatten this whole mountain! He wished to utterly lay waste to this infernal crypt and rid the lands of their evil and horrors! And by doing so, thus came the chance for me to escape!

I exhaled heavily. So much for Fate and Chance! I must really look into learning everything about the intricacies of the Windchaser magic after this, no matter how hard it is! Heaven forfend if I am to find myself in a similar predicament again with no ways to get out!

I looked up. But I was no longer at where I was. I had been transported away again before I even knew it. This time, I find myself standing right in the center of a busy marketplace. I shook myself free of all troubling doubts and thoughts. I’m here for answers, I told myself, And there’s no way I should be beaten back by these trials like waves on the shores! As if I even have the option of turning back…

From the hustle and bustle around me, I could detect no whiff of unrest or turmoil of war from the crowds of people passing around me. I must have been transported through time as well this time. From the clothing and the dressing of the common folk in the market, I surmised that I am in the Qing Dynasty now, although where, I still do not know. I began to walk around, a tourist in the noisy and boisterous village bazaar centuries from present, hoping to find from within the midst of this cacophony and clutter my purpose for being sent here.

I was right. Before long, I saw the glittering sheen bouncing off the rippling waves of a large river like silk. Dozens of ships and merchant barges and as many boats and ferries filed up and down the river and the piers were crammed with mobs of people. The sights and scenes around me made me thought of the tales that my Forest Sprite and Godmother shared with me: the tales about how Godmother’s sister met her end! I leaped into the sky and flew into the sky overhead the people, wishing to see if it was really so.

A woman with immense beauty but pale of complexion was raising a dagger when I looked down. Her hand fell as she was about the sink the blade of her knife into her own chest! I could hardly believe my eyes; the surrealistic feeling of witnessing history with my own eyes assailed me again. Then I remembered how sad and mournful Godmother always was whenever she thought of her sister. A streak of insanity took me; I swooped down from her and grabbed at the woman’s wrist just in time to stop her from killing herself! She froze, aghast with shock at being clutched by an invisible hand. Then she tried to shake herself loose of my hold when she realized that only her wrist was being held but to no avail. My hold was as firm as a vice. She stiffly shoved the dagger to her other hand and tried again to stab herself!

With a loud crack, my other hand closed in tightly on the other wrist. With a bit of strength, I forced both of her arms down! As if injected with a sudden resolve or fervor, Godmother’s sister began threshing and floundering wildly like a fish on land, struggling to free herself! The sobbing woman began howling with tears and this earned a peal of murmurings and whispers from the crowds watching her. But there was no time for any of their gossips; I reached for her blade immediately, trying to wrestle it out of her grasp for good measure.

But just when I thought it’s over, a shrill whistle screamed through the air and I was startled beyond any reaction! My gaze slowly lowered, as did Godmother’s sister, and our eyes closed in on the very same item: a dagger jutting out of her chest. Blood was gushing out from where the dagger’s blade had plunged into her, soaking her robes into a blossoming scarlet red as it tumbled down. I tore my eyes away and looking towards where the dagger could have come from. But there was use. There was hardly a face that stood out from the midst of shocked and bewildered looks. The surprise attack had caught everyone unawares that hardly anyone could scarcely react!

But something else demanded my attention. Godmother’s sister’s dying body shuddered and I looked down. Her cadaver jolted and rocked unnaturally towards the direction the dagger flew from and that left me confused. What’s going on with her?! Suddenly, before I knew it, the dagger dislodged itself from the corpse with the sickening tear of her flesh, spattering blood all everywhere, and it flew away! Heavens!? The murderer is capable of some sort of telekinesis magic similar to how I control my sword! This is how he assassinated her and how he was withdrawing the murder weapon!

I took into the air. A higher vantage point might allow me to see where the dagger was traveling to. I might be able to catch a glimpse of whoever this murderer could be. But as soon as I reach sufficient height to look around, I saw an arm, extending out from the window of a boat cabin, catching the hilt of the dagger as it flew to him. I thought of pursuing him, but a strange feeling burgeoning from under me. I looked down and saw wisps of green fumes leaking out of the knife wound on the cadaver of Godmother’s sister. What else could it be if not her soul!

The spirit rose quickly into the air, which hardly boded well. Spirits of recently-deceased people normally find themselves still disoriented and their minds dulled. But the soul of Godmother’s sister was rather the contrary! She looked resolutely stern, positively wide awake and alert!

With hardly any hint of hesitation, the soul drifted along the banks of the Huan Xiang river at once and I recovered from my surprise and caught up. I had to see where she was heading to.

The ghost flew quick and far until we reached a residence bedecked with thin, pearly sheets of white shroud. It was a funeral. But goosebumps began sprouting on my skin as a deep, dreadful foreboding began to fill me. Dogging at her heels, I followed the ghost inside.

A group of people was kneeling in the courtyard of the house, all of them in mourning garb. Some were wailing in tears, while the rest sobbing quietly as they were on their knees in front of a wooden casket. At its head was a table filled with incense burners, candles, and other offerings and worshipping instruments. I drew closer to have a look at the table and to my unspeakable and indescribable horror, I saw the words inscribed upon the memorial tablet, saying, “Deceased Forebear of the Bian Family, Bian Dashou!”