Yung decided to leave the wasp nest be. No need to disturb other people’s homes. He stretched, and gave the place one last once over.

The graves looked proper now.

Yung stared up at the sky. The sun was about to go beyond the horizon. He decided to head back. He’d done Su Nanya wrong and would need to correct his mistake.

“Grr.”

Suddenly, a strange rumble echoed from somewhere.

“What the?” Yung looked around.

"Kiiii!" Silky landed on his shoulder with a worried look. The wasps scattered in frenzied disarrays, like panicked peas fleeing a pod.

There, about fifteen feet away, the ground bulged up.

“Grrrr!”

More growls sounded. Yung was familiar with this noise.

A horn pierced upward from the heaving earth, long and curved, its colour a dull grey bordering on black rust. A mass of dirt rustled in its wake, shifting aside with a rumbling sound. And with it, the ground bulged and stirred as though a living creature was breaking free from within. More growls resounded, and the pungent smell of decay filled the air, thick as a dense fog, making Yung gag.

“Zombie rabbits…”

Yung muttered, covering his nose. But before the first of the beasts could fully reveal itself, he used total empathic isolation.

The wretched hornbeasts erupted from the burrows one after another, their rabbit-like forms with jug-like ears and pointed snouts screeching with bloodlust. They then looked around, sniffing the sulphur-tainted air, their glowing pink eyes squinting in confusion. A moment later, as if to protest their mark escaping, they bashed at the trees, emitting void-coloured qi as their black claws scraped against the ground.

I should’ve taken the spear, Yung lamented. Killing them isn’t a problem now, though. Can I bash their heads in with a rock?

One of the voidfiends rushed towards Yung’s mother’s grave with an unearthly sound and chipped a side of the tombstone, incidentally breaking the wasp nest. Silky cried out in rage, but the owners of the home had already made their hasty departure.

Fuck me, Yung cursed. He picked up the broom and snapped its thistled end, leaving a splintered tip. The voidfiends didn’t notice because, whilst in stealth, anything Yung picked up would also become isolated.

He warily approached the wretch that defiled his mother’s grave, aimed at its neck, and brought the broom-spear down.

Squelch!

Three wet splatters rang out along with dying voidfiend screeches. Yung turned around, dropping the spear with the struggling zombie rabbit attached.

“Youjin Chao.”

The taller boy couldn’t hear him. He appeared at the entrance of the graveyard.

At Youjin Chao’s feet lay two bisected wretched hornbeasts. More of the fiends noticed him and roared their rage.

Youjin Chao cut three in half mid-air and swivelled around before grabbing the fourth with his gauntleted arm. He squeezed. The fiend popped like a bubble.

But the fight was not over. More zombie rabbits had erupted from the earth, their maws revealing razor-sharp fangs, eyes aglow with fury.

Without a moment's hesitation, the battle resumed. The clash was a spectacle of motion and brutal strength, a scene punctuated by the slicing of air and the crushing of bone. Youjin Chao’s agile movements cut down the monstrous bunnies mid-leap, and his powerful punches splattered them into a pulpy mess.

“Brother Yung, are you there?” The taller boy called out, looking at the broken broom-spear skewering that one fiend.

Yung took hold of the empathic link coming from Youjin Chao and manually rejoined it.

Immediately, Youjin Chao’s red eyes snapped to Yung, then he nodded. He popped some qi boosting pills and brandished his sword towards the hopping horde in an arc.

The first row of fiends, mid-jump, were halved as though made of butter. Youjin Chao ducked, then kicked away, his sword dragging the dirt as he flew backwards right in time to avoid a dozen more hornbeasts coming from the sides.

What a monster, Yung thought to himself. He can’t cultivate, but lower-level mobs are nothing to him.

It was then that Yung noticed the anomaly.

An enormous zombie rabbit, almost the size of Yung himself, was trying to dig out of one of the burrows. It shook the earth free with every twist of its ghoulish body, the putrid qi stretching off its width like a miasma.

If you spot this tale on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.

“GRRRRRRRRRRRRRAAAAAA!!!!”

It let out a piercing screech, a ghastly sound that echoed through the graveyard. Its lifeless ruby eyes mirrored the macabre dance—Youjin Chao locked in a lethal tango with its swarm. It thrashed and writhed in desperation, attempting to free its gargantuan form from the imprisoning earth. Yet, by the looks of it, its path to the surface would still demand more time and struggle.

Yung swallowed, then stared at the pink heart ring on his left middle finger with apprehension.

Let’s see what this mystical artefact does.

Yung injected Heart qi into it. The ruby glowed. A haze of strange emotions waved out. The qi gathered in an orb of concentrated power, which pulsed with every elapsed second.

The zombie-rabbit boss finally hopped out of the hole like a torpedo. The fiend bent its hind legs, muscles taut for a bulldozing charge.

The pink heart ring seemed to screech, crying both in pleasure and pain. It was time. Yung aimed the ring at the giant fiend as though he was the green lantern, and a heart-shaped beam the same colour pallet as the Barbie movie zoomed out.

The voidfiend was mid-stance in its jump, wind gathering in a vortex around its rusted horns. It had but one target, kill Youjin Chao in a single strike. It couldn’t see Yung, nor sense the numinous art headed its way.

So the beam hit the fiend right in its midsection.

The big bunny screamed,

“GGRRRRRRRAAAAaaoooooongggg?”

And moaned, confused.

The voidfiend stumbled forward, its front legs buckling like sore knees. The muscles in its hindquarters shuddered in an unnatural rhythm as the beast collapsed to the ground, twitching and spasming, tendrils of purple-green slime oozing from its maw. It twitched again. Then it twitched some more.

Yung hit it again with a second pink heart beam after another long charge-up.

Yet the voidfiend continued to twitch, its movements pitiful and weak, too out of it to even dodge.

In a bizarre twist, its fur seemed to regain a peculiar sheen, a sharp contrast to its recent emergence from the dirt. Small, gruesome gashes that marred its purple-on-white coat —reminiscent of past battles— began to mend under the soft wash of the healing pink radiance.

Beneath its quivering form, the floor began to dampen with a noxious green liquid, a vile secretion from its healed lower body, thick like a sludge. The bunny wet the floor, Yung realized with horror, and the acidic substance hissed upon contact, sizzling against the cold stone, emanating a repugnant odour that filled the air.

Yung spotted tears in the voidfiend’s ruby eyes, and looked away. For some strange reason, he felt profoundly ashamed.

In the meantime, Youjin Chao took care of the smaller beasts. He gave Yung a strange glance. Yung squirmed, about to get defensive, but chose not to speak. Silky patted his head, which made Yung feel even worse.

Youjin Chao walked to the bigger wretched hornbeast and put it out of its misery. Yung swore he saw a nod of gratitude in the fiend’s ruby eyes as Youjin Chao plunged the sword into its neck.

“This one is at least a late stage Imperfect Heaven 1st order voidfiend.” Youjin Chao said, and didn’t ask for details; Yung was happy not to answer.

“Thanks,” Yung said from the bottom of his heart, “I was in a bit of a pickle.”

Youjin Chao gestured at the broom-spear and the dead fiend skewered on it. “You would’ve managed. Though it might have taken longer.”

Yung smiled, “Credits are due where credits are due. What were you doing here?”

“I followed you. Saw you running out of the hotel… after which Fairy Su, well.”

“Ah...ahaha. And then you waited here that long?” Yung hadn’t noticed at all. But good thing he had only monologued his Jung self-talk.

“It looked like you had things to sort out,” Youjin Chao said.

“That I did. Did Su Nanya do anything weird?”

“She, how should I say this….” Youjin Chao looked at him with a complicated gaze, “Rushed down to the restaurant floor and smashed every pot and pan. And chair… and table.”

Yung slapped his head, “By Gaia. Okay, let’s head back.” He was about to, but then stopped, looking at the voidfiend remains.

“This is twice now that the graveyard was attacked. And these hornbeasts, they dug their way up.” That might have been the case last time too.

“I fear there might be a voidrift below ground. We should notify the clan lest the underground farms suffer misfortune.” The taller boy said.

Yung nodded. Voidrift, huh? Haven't seen one before. And if they only spawn fiends this weak, I could take a look.

The two walked back. The silence, to Yung, was pleasing. He now knew what he wanted to do regarding Su Nanya. He quite looked forward to it.

“Brother Yung, if I may ask a presumptuous question?” Youjin Chao suddenly said, stilling.

“Go ahead.” Yung replied.

Youjin Chao looked him straight in the eye with his posture straight and chin pointed down,

“What have you done to make Fairy Su so distressed?”

Yung immediately went on guard. But he kept his face poker.

“Ugh, that’s what I’d like to know.”

“Does Brother Yung truly not know? I do remember you saying you were not emotionally interested in her. So I suppose you would not care.” Youjin Chao said as if to reassure himself of the fact.

Yung neither denied nor confirmed. He knew the proximal cause, of course. It was because he’d run out. But what was the ultimate root reason behind Su Nanya’s bizarre actions? He didn’t have the foggiest idea.

Having a second opinion might be good. After all, I did have a weird talk about love and relationships with him. Yung decided to take advantage of Youjin Chao’s probing questions. He read his Empathic link. Uncertainty. Envy?

Yung narrowed his eyes, asking his own leading question. “Then what does Brother Chao think of her?”

Youjin Chao, a main character he might be, shuffled uncomfortably in his steps, “Fairy Su is someone I look up to. There are tales about how she was born with a deficient physique yet crawled her way up the ranks. One step at a time, with cultivation far slower than her peers, she inherited the title of the Su princess. She showed the world that nothing is impossible!”

Yung didn’t think Youjin Chao lied. But there was obviously more to that.

“What about her looks?” Yung said with a grin. “She’s hella hot, right?”

Youjin Chao stammered, “I-It is not my place to comment on that, Brother Yung. Are you teasing me?”

Oops, Yung gave in. But he was pretty sure Youjin Chao might turn out to be a love rival. After all, he was the protagonist, and Su Nanya might be his primary love interest. Yung wondered if Youjin Chao's story was about a harem. There was Ziyou Ling, who had a crush on Youjin Chao. Not to mention the rumours about them around the slums. And Youjin Chun, the engagement annuler who regretted her actions dearly. If Youjin Chao was meant to regain his cultivation via Su Nanya's foxball, then it was almost a done deal that they'd be intimate somewhere down the line.

We can’t have that now, can we? Yung thought it might be a good chance to prove precisely how flexible fate was and if, in this world, the individual's choice could well and truly reign supreme. After all, that's what immortal cultivation promised in all the strange sutras.

“I’m just curious, heh.” Yung said, “Brother Chao looks so prim and proper. I wondered if even you have fallen to her charms. I mean, her attire screams seduction, if nothing else.”

“Harem clothes are meant to do that.” Youjin Chao said with slumped shoulders, “It has not done any good for her reputation. But only a fool would judge Fairy Su as lesser only based on her clothes.”