“Guan Yo Shen is basically a ghost. We’re just as likely to have gone the opposite direction from him, right?” Hyun Soon was acting as something of a mediator right now, and doing a fantastic job as far as Dan was concerned. If Dan himself had voiced this issue, he expected that Fa Lian would have bitten his head off and spewed dragon fire into his neck.
“Yes. Without a map, a plan or any idea what he was looking for, we’re out of luck.” Fa Lian’s answer was calm, reasonable. Dan pursed his lips and made no comment about the difference in treatment between himself and Hyun Soon.
“Is there any way to find out where he is..? Do you think maybe he’s already home?” There was a lot of hope in Hyun’s questions, especially when they all knew the answers she would give.
“Until we find a true safe haven and people we can actually trust,” Fa Lian replied, glaring at Dan as she stressed the words before turning back to Hyun Soon, “not really.”
“Allusia.” Dan said, immediately wishing he’d never learned to speak as Fa Lian turned towards him, a hungry look in her eye. Dan had tried to argue that their path should take them to the previously mentioned city in the labyrinth, but as an idea it had been met with mostly disdain.
“A city of killers and you want us to walk right in?” Dan couldn’t expect Xiaomei or Hyun Soon to stand up for his idea, and he had rightly expected Fa Lian to rebuff it.
“What’s the alternative? Wander in these tunnels until we either bump into your brother or some monster that we won’t be able to handle this time? And will you please-” Dan reached towards Fa Lian, already cycling his mana and preparing to heal her still ragged hands. She had wrapped them in now dirty scraps of clothing. She pulled away, tightening her grip around the dragon bo. “I’m sorry for the Ashes.”
“It’s not just the Ashes though, is it?” They had been walking through a particularly long hallway without much change for a while until the temperature suddenly jumped. Fa Lian had stalked away after pulling away from Dan. Now, it was as though a furnace had appeared before them and was belching out heat with aplomb. “Aren’t you our leader? Don’t you have a powerful soul stone just dying to tell you where to go?”
Dan once again cursed Raffyal for saying something so impactful in such a casual way. Even Hyun Soon and Xiaomei had made jokes about it until Fa Lian had taken the fun out of the banter with her genuine anger. At the same time, though Dan wouldn’t admit it, nor did he agree with their actions, but the Ashes had a leader. It served them well enough to become as powerful as they were.
“If I were your leader I wouldn’t be asking, I’d be telling you where we’re going.” Dan had put up with Fa Lian’s misaimed anger and frustration long enough. The comment about his soul stone hurt too, given its recent silence. “Instead, I’ve tried to make everyone happy, and look where it’s gotten us. I don’t remember the last time I chose what to do, instead of just reacting to everyone else’s poor choices.”
Dan could feel the pain inflicted to Xiaomei and Hyun Soon at these words, but couldn’t find it within himself to pull back. A landslide had trickled into pure unstoppable force and now he could no longer bite his tongue.
“No one asked you to follow me around like a puppy.” Again the temperature flared, Fa Lian’s anger fueling the flames within herself and causing the others to take a cautionary step back from her position. She stamped and the sound was much louder than it should have been, as though her foot was that of something much larger.
“Actually, your grandmother did ask me. She knew you’d need the help, even if you don’t.”
“What help?” Both Fa Lian and Dan himself were positively shouting now. Dan began to cycle his mana in response to the outpouring of heat from the dragon bo. He was worried that it would start burning her again, despite his anger at her he didn’t want to see her in pain.
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“Stop,” Xiaomei pleaded from behind, “why are we even fighting?”
Dan spun around as Xiaomei spoke, but not at her words. His mana, left behind as it always was, had begun to ignite. Not in any way that Fa Lian could manage, but the reaction to a shell. While his mana burned away, the hairs on his body stood on end and a shiver crawled over his spine. It was them.
“Why indeed?” With a voice like silk being pulled over mud, Shazaar’s presence interrupted the argument. The sound of their rising tension must have summoned their almost-lost pursuers. Flanking the blue skinned majaal were Grier and Endun, the disparity in their height making it obvious who they were despite the general gloom and their distance from the group. “If you’d just given us what we want, we wouldn’t have to fight at all.”
“Thought they could get away, didn’t they, Shaz?” Endun’s teeth connected together as he spoke, adding an eerie click to his voice that wasn’t there before. The left side of his face was torn up and the red skin around where Fa Lian had his him was now a strange, vomit yellow colour. “Without revenge, they thought?”
“Sorry kids,” Shazaar was close enough now that he didn’t have to project his voice, “but when Endun gets mad I try to just let him get it out of his system. It was going to be a bit of fun, but whether you survive is no longer up to me. Whenever you’re ready.”
His last words were to the red demon at his side. Setting off a chain of events, with the first being Endun removing his large hooded cloak for the first time. The brown, rough fabric fell away and he rose to the fullest height he could. The fact that he was still stooped despite the fairly high ceiling here bode well, but it was the silver lining on an immense stormcloud.
Nervous energy filled the air, despite the bravado. Grier had yet to speak, and it seemed that Calliope was not with the group at all. Fractures, despite the “leadership” Dan had used as a defence.
“Lost a member and half a face already, are you sure you want more?” Dan nearly got sick in his mouth as Fa Lian shouted down the hall from behind him. He could feel rancid mana leaking past Endun’s shell and it was dense. Some of the strongest mana Dan had ever felt, easily rivalling Guan Po Shang.
“Wait, Fa Li-”
“No.”
Like a blast of magma, Fa Lian blistered past Dan at incredible speed. Her ferocity was terrifying and the Ashes were not immune to surprise. She reached their position in a heartbeat, Dan unable to grasp her as she past him in one bound. The air around Fa Lian was igniting, wisps of blood red flame shooting into the air around where she held her staff.
No. The bile that threatened to rise found its way to Dan’s mouth and he couldn’t swallow it back. The licks of red flame were cinders of Fa Lian’s skin burning away to nothing, her palms once again boiling under the heat of her weapon. Dan spat to the side before blasting all of the force he could muster into his mana and cycling it at an uncomfortable rate. He was smashing into his mana channels and would hurt for weeks… if they survived.
Throwing caution to the wind like himself, he felt Xiaomei and Hyun Soon prepare too. Both had their artefacts at the ready, their mana catching up to the situation. Dan was thankful that Hyun Soon had reached the star stage, and that their practice had become fruitful.
Starting from behind the dark metal of Rise and Ruin, a thick plate of mana appeared on Hyun Soon’s arm. Within seconds, dozens of other plates fell into place around him, the orange mana climbed up his arms like a wildfire on dry kindling. It knitted around his back, solid armour with no restriction to his movement. The breastplate that formed was not the only upgrade Hyun Soon had managed. With a satisfying clink, very like a clear bell, the metal mana collided with itself as the helmet of Hyun Soon’s armour formed.
Xiaomei had not progressed to such a degree, but her own mana unravelled wonderfully in Dan’s vision, a scattered star of blue light. She unravelled the cord of her weapon from around her shoulders, slowly twirling the yellow crystal around like the head of a flail.
Dan took a step towards the chaos. Fa Lian had moved passed everyone, so his stride brought him closer to Xiaomei and Hyun Soon. Placing a hand on each of their shoulders, he pulsed his mana outwards, leaving space for their mana to flood into him. A swell of power mingled into Dan’s own. A heavy colouring of orange and blue tinted the clear river within. They had practised this, but the efficacy still surprised all three of them.
As Dan’s own armour formed, he wondered how the collection of techniques would look with her mana added to the mix. Knitting together quickly, the combination of Hyun Soon’s technique and Xiaomei’s together gave Dan’s armour a different look. While Hyun Soon’s was heavy looking, and reinforced his already intense strength, Dan’s mana armour was more akin to that of a hunter. Like hundreds and thousands of tiny threads were wrapping around his skin, Dan felt the mana embrace him.
“They’re too strong.” Dan said, falling into the formation of three which he, Hyun Soon and Xiaomei had become most familiar with. “Even if we do have a dragon on our side.”
Due to the strange shell of mana that surrounded each of the Ashes, Dan’s ambient mana was all but destroyed. He gathered some on each of his allies, Fa Lian included, and frantically tried to think of a way out of this fight. Fa Lian clearly had no such thoughts, her staff connecting heavily with the rock of the labyrinth wall.
Shazaar and the other Ashes had been pushed back by the surprise of her assault and the intensity of her follow up, but Fa Lian was not able to reach them with her attacks. To Dan, it was obvious that she was just wildly swinging the dragon bo, lashing out aimlessly and hoping to hit them with the incinerating heat.
Fa Lian herself was shivering, and the ground she had gained was quickly being lost. Endun had drawn two daggers from the belt around his chest, and his long arms stabbed forward like a viper’s strike. The air itself was cut, screaming as his blade sliced along it.
Conversation was no longer possible. Dan readied himself, and leapt into the fray.