Chills shot up from Marcus’ spine right to his head. He let the guard down and shot to Mick and Kevin’s side to protect them should anything happen. Gloria did the same and stood in front of Tae Kuo. Keryn caught the commotion and rushed to their position to help.
“What the fuck!?” Keryn opened her eyes wide and cursed as she fixed her sight on the small pool of dark liquid vomited by the guard, and his entire body.
The guard retched one more time, dark liquid seeped from the corners of his eyes, his nostrils and ears. And as the dark liquid pooled on the ground and on other guard’s bodies, more pieces of red flesh floated to the surface, revealing more and more deformed tiny faces.
“No - nonono - this is - this is not a safe house.” Tae Kuo looked around. They did not pay too much attention to the interior of this place at first, but right now they all noticed that the walls were becoming redder and more wrinkly by the moment. “This is an incubation house! We should get outta here!”
Before the last word from Tae Kuo dropped, more of the guards began retching and vomiting, the first ones to start doing so were the ones that had dark liquid spilled on them. Thus a series of chain reactions ensued, before long every one of them was vomiting black liquid.
“Now!” Tae Kuo yelled as he pulled Gloria’s arm. No one knew what he was afraid of, but everyone followed his lead and rushed towards the door.
The door was shut, but the bolt was not slided in. Kevin and Tae Kuo brought the lock in with them, so there should not be anything that would keep them from opening the door other than the weight. Yet when Tae Kuo pushed, the door would not budge.
“Something blocked the door.” Tae Kuo’s voice was trembling.
“Alright. Let us do it.” Marcus moved forward, giving Gloria and Keryn a look: “On three! One - two - THREE!”
All three mythic martial artists kicked the door at the same time, with their Qi infused into their legs. Dust and smoke burst from the frame, a faint tearing sound of cloth or flesh came as the door swung outward and the hinges whined.
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They rushed out of the room, just in time to see the change to the exterior of the “safe house” - a slowly moving, twitching dark flesh-like substance. It covered almost the entirety of the “safe house”, like a twisted cocoon.
“What is this?” Marcus narrowed his eyes at the sight he had never seen or even imagined before.
“Incubation room for the curse-ladened. ‘Spirit Gu’ I think they’re called. I don’t think they’re matured yet but - ” Tae Kuo pulled on the door and tried to shut it: “Shit, give me a hand! We must lock them in!”
Marcus and Keryn lent him their hands at the same time, while Gloria took the lock from Kevin and put it back in its previous place. Unfortunately, the lock could no longer work after Marcus had broken the talisman seal.
Cries and weepings from several child-like voices came from inside the “safe house”. And the dark flesh-like substance continued crawling. Before long, they drove every living human present away and covered up the entire door.
“We must go.” Tae Kuo’s voice was trembling: “GO! WE MUST GO!”
“Down.” Marucs nodded at Gloria and then everyone: “Master Liaoran said the cores of the array would be somewhere below us. We must go down.”
“In formation!” Gloria pulled Tae Kuo back, who just tried to rush past Marcus.
There was a staircase at the end of the open air hall to their left. The lights here were flickering, and some kind of dark mist roamed the air. But it seemed they had no better options right now.
“Hey, um - I have a question: why was I able to hear that stuff?” Mick asked Kevin through a whisper: “It’s creeping me out right now.”
“You remember getting hit in the arm by a bagua mirror?” Kevin responded.
“Well - yeah - I mean - I just remember my arm hurt for a few days but then it just went away.” Mick frowned: “But I don’t remember telling you - ”
“You were drunk. ” Kevin cut Mick off: “But - the thing is - I learned about this not long ago, that the energy from bagua mirrors could give you some kind of ‘wound’ on your soul, and when you heal from it, you might develop certain affinity to certain - certain signals in the environment.”
“But how did you tell - ”
“Mostly a lucky guess. I’ve memorized all of the gua symbols and it’s still fresh. ” Kevin sighed: “I’m just really glad it turned out to be correct.”
“Shhh!” Just this moment, Gloria, who was at the front of the team, raised her hand and shushed everyone: “Something’s ahead.”
Footsteps closed in as a long shadow was cast into the downward stairs in front of them. Two separate human-like shadows holding hands, one tall and one short. The taller one did not have a head and was holding what looked like a large cleaver, while the shorter one was missing one leg and one arm. The shadows seemed to be communicating and playing with each other, with the taller one walking slowly, the shorter one hopping as it walked and waving the only arm.
“Mother and Daughter Butchers.” Kevin whispered, his voice trembling.
Marcus and Gloria exchanged looks, then lowered their bodies ready to ambush.