The Tale Never Ends

Jin Qichen turned a hair, shifting from terror into anger and slammed his fist into Na San’s face. Only what bothered me was, Na San was allowing himself to be beaten; the poor servant even tilted his face so that his master could get a better angle. But I could not stomach such abuse. So I got up, raised a foot, and shoved it at Jin Qichen’s waist, causing him to lose balance and fall.

Edelweiss looked equally perturbed herself. She drew nearer to Jin Qichen and was about to reciprocate the abuse he had inflicted on Na San, but Na San loped forward and wrapped his arms around her ankles, begging between chokes and sobs, “Please, My Lady! Mercy, please! His Highness has endured a terrible ordeal! Please, no more!” “All right, all right. Let go. It’s unsightly for you to be hugging my wife’s legs,” I muttered smilingly with a hand on his shoulder to calm him and Na San quickly released his hold.

I bent down and stared at Jin Qichen, whose eyes were filled with fright as he looked at us, “So, what’s wrong with you? Have you gone off the rails because of the shock?”

Prior to coming here, I had already wondered if Jin Qichen was being held here after he was taken, although I hardly expected him to make such an entrance. Between the Real and the Fog World, it was clear he had been kept here in the Real World but he had suffered a terrible shock. Something must have terrified him so greatly to cause him such psychological injury. And since we had encountered nothing, I could only surmise that the Fog World abounded with horrors that the Real World was devoid of and that could be the reason why Big Sister’s and the others’ climb to the top had to be a gritting struggle. This could also mean that Jin Qichen was held in the Fog World for some time before he came here.

Then I asked, “You said just now that you’ve been here for a night?” Jin Qichen bobbed his head furiously. “Then where were you before that?” I asked again, “Here too? You’ve been missing for a week.” The pretender prince shook his head in a bewildered manner, clearly oblivious of the facts. “I don’t know,” he sputtered, “It was nighttime when they brought me here. And it has been until you appear! So it’s a night, but a really long one!” And he succumbed to more tears.

Na San busied himself with consoling his lord and prince while I got up and discussed with Edelweiss, “So, there’re still things here that we’ve yet to understand. As far as Jin Qichen is concerned, he’s been here for barely one night. And it could be, otherwise he would have died after lasting for a week without food.” “But it has really been a week.” Edelweiss pointed out skeptically. I shook my head. That was all I could respond with until I make out everything.

But there was no point dwelling on that question. At least not now. I asked Jin Qichen again, “So what have these people done to you after you were taken?” Jin Qichen’s head sank, refusing to answer.

I crouched and looked deeply into his eye and I hissed, “You either tell me now, or you can stay here for as long as I like it!” That seemed to do the trick, Jin Qichen jerked and flinched and he grunted before he wailed, “All right, all right! I’ll speak! They know about me supplying information to you that they deemed it as a breach of our agreement and they sentenced me to die here! I’ve not seen them anymore since they threw me here! I’ve seen you, and Na San, and my parents too! But all of you wanted to kill me!”

“Ah, so it’s hallucinations?” I uttered under my breath, rubbing my chin. Edelweiss looked at me, nodding her head imperceptibly in agreement. “Help your prince to get up,” I instructed Na San, saying, “It’s time we rejoin Lin Feng and the others.” Na San nodded, lifted Jin Qichen to his feet, and put his arm over his shoulder and they began limping towards the elevator.

Behind them, I uttered hesitantly, “Urm… Na San. Actually, there’s no need for you to come with us now. You’ve found your prince. So you can keep yourself out of more trouble now.” I felt that Na San needed to risk his safety any more with us and I believed that he should be given the right to choose for himself.

Unexpectedly, Na San looked back, his misshapen face grinning at us. “I’d do nothing of the kind, Young Lordling. We Shamans owed greatly to the Wudaxians. The Wudaxians did not abandon us even after the fall of the Qing Dynasty and its emperors, continuing to shower us with their grace until now. And as the Young Lordling of one of the Wudaxian species, you are our benefactor and anyone of us owe you our implacable loyalty and steadfastness! I might only be useless and hardly consequential, even so, I only hope to be of service!”

The sudden outburst of gratitude left me stunned and speechless. It took me seconds before I could break into a gladden smile as I nodded. It seemed that I had underestimated Na San after all.

Jin Qichen had been keeping unusually mum. I knew he could hear us and I knew full well that he was nowhere near unconscious. In fact, he had never been so alert in his life. At long last, Jin Qichen could fully appreciate his inability and powerlessness to steer the situation. He might as well just join in our party for now and bade for another chance. Redeeming himself into our good graces could score him some points that could prove vital in persuading me again in the future.

Then, of course, this was hardly the right time for us to travel down that road yet. We walked into the elevator and I tapped on the other “2” button.

The elevator groaned as it began its downward motion. I kept my eyes peeled on the LED display overhead, watching the number change from “9” to “8”, then to “7” and so on until we reached “2”. Then I felt it. The elevator did not stop on the second floor but instead, it went further down to the first floor. It went down, not stopping, and immediately rose back to the second floor and the “2” button on the right side flared to life. Edelweiss and I swallowed hard as the bell chimed again and the doors opened. Everything outside looked just as dark as the corridor of the second floor of the Real World.

With a final look at Na San and Edelweiss, we nodded and Na San carried Jin Qichen out of the elevator. Once outside, he looked back at me, his expression grave but calm, to indicate that all was fine for now and we got out. The elevator doors slid to a close behind us and suddenly, the dark corridor began to brighten dimly with a shade of red as deep as blood, shedding everything around us in a gloomy, macabre hue of horror as if someone had spattered a huge amount of blood everywhere. The red light shot through every glass pane and cubicle and just then, loud noises like falling rocks and bricks began cascading around us and the glass pane window opposite us turned into a tiny dot!

No, the window did not shrink, I realized, It’s the corridor! The corridor had extended in length! What was more, the long corridor stretching from under our feet began to wiggle like a snake as if it has just come alive! Jin Qichen yelped a terrified howl then he wailed with panicking dread, “Coming! It’s coming! It’s coming!” His hands flailed violently as if he was trying to get free of Na San’s hold and Na San released him. Jin Qichen crashed to the floor and he crawled desperately backward to the elevator doors, his arms clawing at the air futilely.

But just when he crawled barely a foot away from us, the short length of the corridor to the elevator doors behind us grew instantly with a horrid swoosh and now it looked as if the elevator was at least a hundred meters away from us! Jin Qichen howled, kneeling on the floor at his chance to escape being thwarted. I could see that from his screams and mortified expression, he must have had endured this before.

Then I felt something pulling my sleeve and I looked. “What is it?” I asked Edelweiss and she said nothing, merely pointing a finger at the far end of the corridor opposite the elevator. And what I saw made me drew a deep breath. Not far away, a ghoulish creature in the shape of a man, with blood dripping off its torso like water falling off stalactites, rose from the ground! I peered more closely and spied its Raiments—the Taoist cap and the priestly robes—wrapping around its hideously scrawny body. Despite looking like a Taoist priest who should be veritable vanquishers of evil, the presence of this creature looked hardly reassuring. Yet something about the behavior and disposition of this Taoist priest looked strangely familiar.

I risked a call at the figure, yelling, “Hey?!” It stood there, not moving as if it barely heard me. Edelweiss’s dagger emitted a golden sheen beside me as she raised it and I freed my sword from its scabbard. Out of nowhere, Na Sa appeared, hurling himself forward with his shamanic drum raised high, charging at the blood-drenched Taoist priest!

I would have called for Na San to stop. There was no need for the hastiness to shove himself into the face of Death. But the Taoist priest began bellowing with laughter and looked up. “Heh heh heh heh… AHAHAHAHA…” His laughter bounced off the walls of the office corridor, spreading across the cubicles of offices around us, sounding no less ghastly than how he looked. Between that and the red morbid shine around us, nothing we encountered could have been any more horrifying.

But Na San charged on like a fearless knight, undaunted by the unknown terrors that awaited with his drum held at the ready. I had to run after him before he got himself killed and grabbed at his shoulder. He screeched to a stop and looked at me, puzzled, but I ignored him, keeping my gaze fixed on that bloody creature not far away before us.

The creases lining across his gaunt and bony face and his hollow cheeks only accentuated his thin mouth. Nothing about him—the deathly-pale color of his face and the dry wrinkles under his sunken eyes—looked alive and his eyes were completely white with only the sclera visible. As he giggled vilely, his mouth gaped with blood drooling out, blending with bubbly froth as it dribbled down its body. His arms sagged limply by his sides as if swaying to a lurid song accompanied by the sinister laughter.

Then, I recognized that look. Is this not the old weasel demon of the Creed of the Eight Trigrams?!