Border
Judging from the volume of the water splashing behind him, Mu Yu estimated the fiend beast surfacing was the agile type rather than the colossal type. He guessed it was another octopus when a tentacle circled him. As it closed in, however, he noticed something different – a sense of hope. Unexpectedly, it was seaweed. Mu Yu brought it under his control before it could harm him.
“Saved!” Xiaoshuai cheered.
Mu Yu dragged seaweed out of the river and discovered it was circular, had two thick arms around ten metres long and covered in thorns. It made the perfect shell for him to take over in.
“Argh! Hargh!” grunted Ol’ Tan, as a fought off hordes of fiend beasts.
Mu Yu wrapped the seaweed around him and vigilantly forged forth. It didn’t take long for him to see light. He stopped and looked back. The fire was behind him. He shuffled back and forth. To his delight, he had found the border.
Mu Yu crouched down. Still, he couldn’t see the ground, let alone anything else. He marked a cross in the ground using a chicken bone from one of Xiaoshuai’s meals and then brushed aside cobblestones to make it stand out. He searched for the wall and marked it, as well. Done, he ran back to Ol’ Tan.
“Mu Yu, if you manage to defuse the formation, take my remains out with you. I don’t want to stay here even in the afterlife!”
Mu Yu kept running and running. The flame flickered a few more times before it was extinguished, and Ol’ Tan’s voice was drowned in fiend beasts’ roars. With no light, there was nothing Mu Yu could do. If he was to survive, he needed to last until daybreak. To that end, he created a hammock off the wall next to him using the seaweed. As he listened to the sounds below, he prayed, “Please don’t let more beast fiends surface, and please bless Ol’ Tan.”
Mu Yu deliberately waited to hear Ol’ Tan’s voice. It was upsetting not to hear anything, but hearing him cry for help would be just as vexing as he had no means of helping Ol’ Tan.
“I’ve fixed your fracture. You’ll be fine tomorrow morning.”
“At least I won’t have to try wielding my sword with my weak side now.”
Mu Yu stayed up all night listening to the fiend beasts tear into something or each other. Once the golden medallion was back on the horizon, the fiend beasts were heard returning to the depths of the waters. He jumped off once there were no more sounds of them moving about. He kept the vine on him for emergencies; however, he soon realised it was averse to daylight.
“You mean there’s a toxin during the day that you can’t adapt to?” Mu Yu inquired with a nod.
The white mist was toxic to the fiend beasts during the day, but it didn’t seem to impact humans. Since the seaweed quivered as the white mist grew more prominent, Mu Yu was forced to return it to the river.
“Ol’ Tan!” Mu Yu hollered as he ran toward the spot Ol’ Tan was charged with defending.
Mu Yu stopped when he found blood splattered on the ground and walls. Severed limbs polluted the ground. He held his breath as he fumbled through the bits and pieces, praying there weren’t any human limbs amongst it. He wasn’t sure if he was supposed to celebrate not finding anything; there wouldn’t be anything left if they devoured Ol’ Tan bones and all, after all.
Mu Yu sat down with his back against the cliff face, guilt-ridden because he played a part in leading Ol’ Tan to his death. There wasn’t even a scrap of clothing left. Suddenly, a drop of blood landed on his arm. He instinctively jumped and looked up.
“Are you all right?” Mu Yu asked, seeing Ol’ Tan hanging from two short blades he stabbed into the cliff face.
Ol’ Tan struggled to open his eyes. Perhaps the adrenaline wore off. Perhaps it was fatigue. Ol’ Tan loosened his grip. Mu Yu’s right arm was still out of commission. As a result, Ol’ Tan hit the ground with a thud. He, nevertheless, didn’t feel a thing since his lights were already out beforehand. Seeing all the scratches from claws covering Ol’ Tan’s face and body, Mu Yu hurriedly transferred his spiritual qi over to treat the wounds. He used all of the seaweed’s vitality on Ol’ Tan.
“Xiaoshuai, spiritual qi.”
“The spiritual qi here is pretty much non-existent. I’ll give a try, anyway.”
Xiaoshuai swung his tail around. Mu Yu desperately absorbed the enhanced spiritual qi Xiaoshuai created.
Ol’ Tan was out for several hours. When he woke up, he helped himself up into a sitting posture: “Did you find it?”
Mu Yu’s nod put a forced smile on Ol’ Tan’s face. Mu Yu told Ol’ Tan to rest there while he went to search for the mark from last night and retrieve his pill flame stone. Mu Yu didn’t see any corpses of the fiend beasts he slew last night, therefore assuming the others fed off their corpses. He had wanted to know what the big-eyed eyes one was.
When Mu Yu located the mark, he noticed it was a mess because of the fiend beasts moving about. Fortunately, the mark he made on the wall was still intact. He drew a path from the cliff face to the riverbank. Ol’ Tan ended up following him to see where it was. There was nothing odd on either side.
“Is this the border we risked out lives to pinpoint?”
“Yes,” replied Mu Yu.
Mu Yu spotted a tiny carving next to the one he made on the cliff face. Because of its colour, the mark he didn’t make was almost camouflaged. The colour gave away the fact it was used specifically for formations.
It was common to draw formations using spiritual energy. The problem with it was the tremendous spiritual energy cost. Mu Yu recognised the colour because Elder Xun once grinded the material into powder to set a formation.
The two mirrors – as Xiaoshuai termed it – weren’t too far away, thankfully. Mu Yu intended to destroy the marking. But nonetheless, the difference in cultivation meant it was an impossible endeavour; not even Ol’ Tan could.
“Does that mean we’re still stuck despite coming this far?” lamented Ol’ Tan, gloomy.
Mu Yu took a few steps back and looked side to side. This time, he decided to look up for whatever reason. There, he found his inspiration. “We’re not cornered yet.”
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