CHAPTER 7 – Taipede
“How much longer will I have to carry you?”
Within the deep forest of the Northern Kratian Mountains, Yushia carried Suzaku on his back as they traversed through it. A Gelatin would occasionally cross their paths, and a swift cleave with Suzaku’s Ghost mansion would make quick work of it. It’d been roughly three days now since the fight with the lesser demon and the release of Yushia’s slave contract.
“Do you think my greatness is heavy?” Suzaku asked. She pulled on her wielder’s hair, offended by his words.
His head pulled back. “Don’t twist my words.”
Though it’d be easier to travel with Suzaku in her coined form, her constant complaints of an aching body and stiff joints caused her to become a sloth, unable to leave her wielder. In her greatness’ excuse, if a formidable foe appeared, she would be in her best condition.
They had pushed through heavy vegetation, slept under trees, foraged berries, and endured pestering insects as they slept. While Yushia was used to these conditions because of his background, Suzaku was not.
Suzaku groaned and buried her face into her wielder’s shoulder. “How much longer until we reach civilization?”
“We’re lost,” Yushia replied, struggling to break through the heavy stalks of a pink titanic hibiscus flower “And it’s been like that for the past seven days and six nights.”
Forests within the Northern Kratian Mountains were a claustrophobic combination of tall and thick hardwood trees, as well as beautifully diverse vegetation. Often, you’d find a pink titanic hibiscus plant filled with sweet nectar that lured and ate even the largest of beasts. No sane-minded person would dare try to traverse these parts alone. Stealthy critters lay dormant too.
“My greatness is so sick of these bugs!” Suzaku exclaimed as she swatted a mithril mosquito on her cheek. For whatever reason, her wielder was completely unaffected by such a little thing. In fact, they appeared to be avoiding him. Suddenly, she grabbed his hair again.
Yushia clicked his tongue and looked over his shoulder. “What is it now?”
Suzaku’s cheeks filled with air. “My greatness wishes to know your secret.”
“My secret? What are you talking about?”
“Do not play a fool with my greatness! Take a look at your arms! Where are your bug bites?”
“I don’t know,” Yushia replied. He caught a glimpse of Suzaku’s arms. “You don’t have any bug bites either. Anytime anything has a taste of your blood, they die a second later.”
“That’s because the blood of the great Vermillion Bird of the South has enough potency to kill several Mud Mammoths!” Suzaku exclaimed.
“That implies that we can use your blood to kill whatever comes our way then, right?” Yushia suggested.
“No way! Do not twist my greatness’ words!”
Yushia sighed.
Sunset neared. Traveling at night meant wishing for a death sentence. Yushia quickly scoured his surroundings and found a tree with enough space under it to clear out a flat surface for him and Suzaku to rest on. He tore branches off trees—firewood for the shivering nights. He bundled them together in the center of the cleared ground and watched as Suzaku shot a ball of fire from her finger to ignite it.
“Is the idiot feeling okay?” Suzaku asked, seated across the fire while hugging her knees. For a while now, she’d sensed uncertainty coming from her wielder.
“Yes, I’m fine,” he said. He slowly rose and patted his bottom. “I’m going to go relieve myself.”
“My greatness suppose you do need that,” Suzaku rose with her wielder, ready to accompany him. Being the mythical being she was, defecating was something she did not do, but it was her job to make sure her wielder was safe.
Along their travels when Yushia would need to relieve himself, Suzaku was often nearby keeping watch, but that was during the daytime. At night, it was possible to get lost even when you were within close proximity with a companion. “I can go by myself,” Yushia said. “We might get separated in the forests.”
“You serious...?” Suzaku asked.
“I’ll be back quick, I promise.” He tapped his feet into the soft ground and made sure the imprints of his feet were deep enough to guide him back.
“But what about my greatness!? You can not leave her here with all those critters roaming about!”
“You can handle yourself as well. I’ll be back. You won’t even realize I was gone.”
Suzaku’s last attempt to persuade her wielder was cut short as he vanished into the darkness, leaving her to herself. That idiot! she thought.
Shine did the moon. It was especially full tonight. Yushia pushed through a thick wild berry bush and searched for the proper spot to relieve himself but before he could step out, he heard the spine-tickling sounds of tapping. He looked down, and to his horror, the fresh corpse of a large feline beast lay dead. A Slikoko. Thousands of hundred-legged creatures crawled over and inside it feasting at its organs and orange flesh. Slikokos, being the avid hunters they are, could not have been killed this easily.
Yushia slowly brought his foot back into the bush and paced backward. Before he became a slave, the adults in his village always warned about the threat of Slikokos. He turned around and entered a full sprint, his long jet-black hair flying behind him. Thorns and sticks scraped his knees, but that didn’t matter. A dead Slikoko? There’s no way something exists out there that could do that!
His right foot caught itself in the overgrown roots of a tree. He braced himself, arms tucked into his body as his body tumbled down a small hill. Dirt filled his mouth as he landed face-first into the ground, making him choke and gag. He stood up but found his balance unsteady. Confused, he tried curling his right foot’s toes. They were there, but they were unusually numb.
Another revelation struck Yushia when he realized he’d lost his footprints back.
Hissss...
Thousands of small legs began brushing against the soles of his feet. Yushia squinted his eyes: a long, thick, purple plate armored insect had touched him. It crawled in the darkness of the night, concealing its gargantuan body. Dozens of smaller purple hundred-legged beasts—children of the much larger one—crawled from the openings in the plate armor.
Yushia heard another hissing under his numb foot. A smaller purple centipede had released its bite, crawling back into its mother’s body.
A Taipede and its broodlings, he thought, gulping as he pushed his back against the hill behind him. That creature killed the Slikoko!
Climbing up the hill wasn’t possible any longer with Yushia’s condition. He began hopping away, opposite of the Taipede’s path as it slithered.
The Taipede broodlings hissed, prompting more of its brothers and sisters to join in on the hunt.
Yushia tripped numerous times, his heart beating as he stood, again and again, hopping. Their cries grew louder and louder, that is, until he heard what sounded like a gift sent from Inanis.
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Whiiiiiiish...
Water! He used the sounds as guidance, careful not to trip again. If he remembered correctly, they weren’t beasts capable of swimming.
WHIIIIIIISH...
The loud currents became more noticeable. Pushing through a bush, a river came into view, reflecting the moon’s light as it ran violently, splashing against rocks and boulders. Yushia stepped on the sharp river bed and cringed at the sharp depressions in his feet. He looked over his shoulder: the Taipede’s brood had grown tenfold, and they quickly closed their distance on him. In a moment of desperation, he jumped into the water.
***
“AAAAAHHHHHHH!!!”
Suzaku’s flames weren’t enough to burn the armored Taipede. She sprinted through the forest with her finger pointed up, her flame lighting only her close surroundings. While it’s true her greatness couldn’t defeat the Taipede, she didn’t run because of that fact. Rather, it was her fuel that drove her legs into a sprint. “Inanis damn you, that idiot! My greatness knew she should have gone with him! Kyaaaah!”
The Taipede was fast, smashing against trees, knocking them down, but the Vermillion Bird was just barely faster than it.
The broodlings made disgusting squishing noises as Suzaku stepped on them, causing her greatness to scream even louder into the night. Her voice alone made her seem like the biggest threat in the forest.
“Help my greatness, someone!” she exclaimed, tears running down her face. Her long, red, twin tails caught on a branch yanking her back. She pulled on it with all her might but fell on her butt as she set herself free. She quickly recovered, but then her flame blew out.
A loud hiss came out of the Taipede as it made its long body tall, towering over the Vermillion Bird. Its large mandibles opened, revealing its mouth dripping with saliva that smelled of rotten flesh. The broodlings that had chased after her crawled back into their mother.
Suzaku stumbled backward. She was so afraid that she fell back on her butt again. So disgusting! This is no way my greatness shall die!
Lava boiled inside her core. She felt unusually hot even by her standards. A slimy liquid oozed out of her body like sweat; leaves and branches that touched her ankles set alight. Her eyes drooped, and they shut.
The Taipede dove itself at the Vermillion Bird.
Ether from all the Shijin orbs her greatness had eaten released all at once as she screamed at the top of her lungs, leading to her body combusting. Heat burst through every pore in her body, turning the ground black and incinerating anything near her, the Taipede included. It hissed in anguish as it caught on fire, collapsing on its side.
Suzaku opened her tired eyes, panting. Such a phenomenon had occurred once before when her wielder had released her greatness.
“Oh, Inanis...” Suzaku moaned, an evil smile on her face as she stared at the gentle-red Shijin Orb before her, surrounded by hundreds of other dark-red ones. She was moments away from passing out but began feasting on every Orb she could to prevent that.
***
Yushia managed to cling back onto the river shore as it nearly swept him into a lake. He climbed back onto land with haste, resting on his back on the homely ground.
“I beseech you...”
A voice unfamiliar to him chanted from across the lake. It was still too dark out, too dark to see the person who spoke.
The lake shined a brilliant yellow, its light waking the night sky. It was so bright that anyone could have mistaken the time of day. Bubbles of ether rose from the water, flying into the air before carelessly into each other, exploding into dust that fell into the water again, repeating itself.
There was a cliff on the other side of the lake. A robed figure stood at its edge, and their wooden staff pointed at the body of water beneath them.
Yushia’s eyes briefly met theirs. The person’s eyes were gray, almost lifeless.
“Where are you?!” cried another voice.
His body jerked in its direction. The lights in the water vanished, and when he looked back up at the cliff, the robed figure had already left.
“Where are you?! My greatness can not do this anymore!”
Yushia turned back and got up but struggled with his paralyzed foot. He saw Suzaku with a small fire hovering above her fingertip and waved his hands. “Over here!”
A wave of relief washed over Suzaku when she squinted and spotted her wielder. She ran toward him in a hurry and took his hand, entering her Ghost Mansion to become a blade. “Big, big, big, big, big, bugs! They almost got my greatness! They were so icky and yucky but then my greatness—boom! Fire!”
“Did you see them?” Yushia interrupted.
“Those Taipedes?” Suzaku replied. “How could my greatness not!”
Was she crying so hard that she missed what happened? “No, I mean those lights and the person on the cliff! Didn’t you see them?”
“Heartless! Heartless! Heartless!” She would punch her wielder if she could, but she was too afraid to leave her Ghost Mansion. “How dare you disregard my greatness’ feelings! My greatness does not care if she must sleep in this form tonight! It is better than seeing those beasts again preying on a maiden!”
Yushia could hardly hear Suzaku’s shouting words. He was sure of it—sure that he saw someone and that they had seen him. “There are people nearby...”
It was a strange feeling. Never in his life did he expect to be excited to meet people. Too many times had he been called a monster, and he became fearful of new faces. But now, that fear became drive. With Suzaku beside him, he felt braver than before. Taking a step no longer shared the same risk as walking off a plank.
***
Morning arrived as the two awoke under a tree near the lake. The paralysis in Yushia's foot disappeared when he awoke, and again, he carried Suzaku on his back. They sought after the person spotted last night, but with no obvious trails to follow, their search seemed hopeless. Suzaku grew tired as well despite all the Shijin Orbs she’d eaten, and by the grace of Inanis, they spotted a cave in the distance and sat inside.
“We’ll rest here,” Yushia said, sliding Suzaku off his back.
“My greatness agrees,” she said as she sat against the wall hugging her knees. “It is getting too tiring to bear any longer.”
Yushia sat beside her. The air had gone silent, a sense of awkwardness taking its place. The two had only recently gotten to know each other, after all.
“Which continent are you from?” Suzaku asked her wielder suddenly.
He looked at her in confusion. “Continent?”
“Well, where in Owanai did your people come from? My greatness has never heard of a Cerulean in all her years of living, so your kind must be foreigners to her land.”
Her words only made him more confused. “Sorry, what’s a continent and Owanai?”
Suzaku turned her head slowly at her wielder. “You jest.”
Having been raised secluded from the rest of the world for most of his life, he had never learned the same knowledge others deemed common sense. Even back at CM-22, he never had the opportunity to learn because he was shunned for who he was. In a way, he was still an infant to the world before him.
Suzaku searched around the cave and picked up a stick across from her squatted in front of her wielder, drawing a circle on the ground. As her greatness spoke, she drew to the best of her abilities a rough sketch of Owanai: a large circle. “Owanai. that is the realm we stand on today. It has been over a millennium, so even my greatness is unsure if this information retains its validity.” She drew four landmasses, one north, one east, one south, and one west. She began with the north. “Within Owanai, these are the four continents. In the north is Lyrock, A vast flatland of deserts. There, the Black Tortoise of the North reigns. He and my greatness never spoke much.”
“There’s more of you?” Yushia asked, his eyes showing intrigue.
“One of us for each continent,” Suzaku explained. “We are formerly known as the Four Guardians.” She pointed to the continent eastward. “In the land of the East, there lies Zyleth, a mountainous region littered with jungles. There, the Azure Dragon of the East resides. He and my greatness quarreled often, but we remained on good terms.” She then moved to the south.
“This is where you rule, right?” Yushia asked.
“Where my greatness once ruled,” Suzaku corrected. “That demon bastard Laplace stripped my greatness of her powers over Kratia, the land of the South.” She sighed. “Just like Zyleth, we too have plenty of mountains, but we remain a land dominated by its warm weather.”
Suzaku paused at the Land of the West. Her head ached just thinking about it as she poked its land several times before continuing. “This is Yukito, home of the White Tiger of the West.”
Yushia was hesitant to ask when he saw Suzaku’s expression. “Is there something wrong with them?”
“Very much so. My greatness asked for the White Tiger’s help when facing Laplace. The White Tiger, too full of herself, ignored the request and shamed my greatness. What she did is unforgivable.”
She bit her lower lip in response to her frustration. Had the White Tiger helped, her greatness would have never been sealed. She rubbed her temples before starting again and placed her stick outside of Owanai’s circle. “This is the Land of Demons.”
“There’s nothing there,” Yushia said.
“Nobody knew where they came from. Not even my greatness.”
The accuracy of her statement had likely changed after a thousand years, and she hoped some information regarding their origins had been found. Like her wielder, she too was an infant to the world that continued without her.
Suddenly, Yushia traced his fingers over the empty space inside Owanai that wasn’t inhabited by the four continents. “All this is...”
“Saltwater,” Suzaku answered.