Fengmori: A creature resembling a mix between bats, eagles, and devils straight from hell, these creatures are some of the most vicious predators of the Muinite Sea. These creatures are weak individually but are never in a group smaller than a thousand, so if one is sighted, it should be assumed a swarm is nearby. Fengmori are not a proper species, but rather the second lifestage of the Mantavari species that dominates the northern seas. Only a handful of Fengmori will survive to their next stage of development to become the apex predators the Night Fortress so hates. – Scholar Wen in “Species that Plague the East”

* * *

Tenri sliced at the Fengmori as it dove at Lang Tailyn’s head. His sword cut the bat-like creature cleanly in two and it screamed as it fell into the waves. The rest of the storm cackled with malicious glee, their voices coming together like dozens of tiny thundercracks that made Tenri’s ears ache.

The fishermen had been right to fear this storm. It wasn’t natural in the slightest. However, instead of an unbeatable Tide Serpent, it was a whole swarm of Fengmori, malevolent storm spirits. On their own, a single Fengmori was nothing to worry about. The tiny bat-like creatures were quick and liked to grab onto things with their dirty claws, or peck at things with their sharp beaks, but they lacked the power to do more than be an irritation.

However, the more of them that gathered, the more dangerous they became. A small swarm could summon a hurricane that would pelt the shores with wind, rain, and hail until buildings collapsed and farms were ruined. This, however, was not a small swarm.

Thousands of the wicked monsters swirled overhead, spinning wind and void qi into the air and whipping up a hurricane unlike any Tenri had ever seen. The waves soared overhead, thirty feet into the air. It was only because the Fengmori guided the taller waves away from the boat that they stood any sort of chance at all.

But, it was not goodwill that drove them. They wanted a meal, and the three humans in the boat were easy pickings so long as they remained above water. They dove headlong at the boat, only to be driven off by Tenri’s sword.

“How much longer?!” he shouted over the wind to Lang Tailyn.

The fisherman didn’t answer, his brow tight with focus, as he fought to keep the boat upright. He wrestled with the rudder and sail, letting out only a tiny bit of fabric to propel them away from the hunting swarm, but not enough to rip the sail clean off the mast.

Tenri was glad of his help. He wouldn’t have lasted ten minutes in this storm without the expert sailor. But even with that, he wasn’t sure they’d make it…

* * *

My feet pounded the ground, splashing through the mud with as much speed as I could muster. The dirt road was no more, and every footfall sank deep into the earth. I forged on, battling the rain and wind until the talismans on the lighthouse door finally came into sight.

I practically collapsed through the door, just keen on finally being back in shelter. The tower creaked as the howling winds battered its sides. Nothing about this storm was natural. It was too fierce and had too little warning. I would bet my weight in jade that this was the work of something wicked lurking offshore.

If that was truly the case, then my plan was likely doomed before it ever got off the ground. But…

My thoughts reached back to the docks of Saikan. Down there, a lonely little girl was crying, waiting for her father to return home. She’d probably already tried to slip away from Chiho by now, and though it was not in the little pin’s nature to keep Xinya prisoner, I had faith that it would keep her out of trouble. The poor girl had already shed too many tears over this storm.

I pushed myself back to my feet and began to climb the spiral stairs to the top of the spire. The decrepit building flew by, floor by floor until I shoved open the trap door above.

Relief filled me as I beheld the results of my blood and sweat. The two mirrors I’d painstakingly pieced back together as a temporary solution were still in place. If I could just get a proper light source, the tower might just fulfill its purpose once more.

“Leave it,” Sai Lyn warned.

“Am I going to have to beat some sense into you again?” I hissed, but the shade manifested behind me, hands raised in peace.

“I am still quite myself, friend.”

“Then why tell me to leave?”

He gestured to the wind around us. “This is a fool’s errand. It is too dangerous to be in the light room in a storm like this. One good gust and you’ll be sent plummeting to your death.”

“Your faith is encouraging.”

Ignoring his warnings, I crawled fully onto the rain battered platform. The railings were thin and broken, and Sai Lyn was not wrong about strength of the gusts. However, I had a job to do, and friends to save.

The first mission would be to remove the old stones. They were blackened and drained after years of use, and that meant they were only in the way. I shoved the boulders aside. They were heavy, but nothing in the face of a cultivator. One by one, the three spent boulders tumbled over the side of the lighthouse to crash to the rocky cliffs below.

Now, with the deadened stones gone, I ducked back through the trap door. The storage room held a few scraps of moon tears, but nothing larger than my fist.

“You won’t have enough,” Sai Lyn said. “You need at least three times that amount to create the light.”

“I won’t know until I try.”

The Keeper of the Lighthouse rushed forward, blowing straight through me in order to stand before my eyes. I shuddered as his chilling qi froze me down to my bones. His hands gripped my shoulders, forcing my teeth to chatter some from the cold.

“You are throwing your life away for a fool’s errand! Don’t repeat my mistakes!”

A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.

“Stand aside, Sai Lyn,” I whispered. “There are people in the storm. They won’t make it home without the light.” After a long, painful moment, he released my arms and stepped back. I scrambled to the floor, gathering every single scrap of silver stone I could find and throwing it into the last empty crate remaining. Only after I’d double checked that there was nothing more to find did I drag the crate to the trapdoor and push it upward.

The moment I reached the light room, an enormous gust slammed into me, knocking me clean off my feet. My hands scrambled at the tower stones, trying to gain purchase before I was pushed off the side.

* * *

Tenri’s sword was gone. A cluster of three fengmori had taken him by surprise, latching onto his sword and wrenching it from his grasp. He’d barely managed to keep his footing to avoid careening over the side and into the dark waters. Now, he was weaponless.

Xi Qian clung to Tenri’s foot, frozen in fright at every bump of the waves and shriek of the swarm above their heads. Through it all, Lang navigated with expert precision, dodging wave after wave, weaving their tiny boat through the waters.

“How far from shore are we?” Tenri shouted. He’d asked several times and received no answer. The fisherman’s concentration was razor sharp, but, this time, he glanced up to meet Tenri’s gaze.

“I don’t know,” he answered, almost too softly to hear. “The current is strong! We’ve drifted north, but I don’t know how far!”

A cold fear settled into Tenri’s stomach. Had he been a fool to try and rescue Xi from the storm? Had he doomed both himself and Lang to a watery grave? Without knowing where they were, how would they make it back to shore? They could hardly see a few yards from the edge of the boat, let alone all the way to shore.

The boat suddenly lurched to the side, and a wave crashed over them, soaking Tenri to the bone. Something dark clung to his head, and he flinched before flinging it to the bottom of the boat. It sat there, still, and he squinted at it through the rain. It was so hard to see anything at all with his glasses covered in rain, but he thought it might be a strip of seaweed.

He reached for it with his qi. Seaweed was a plant, and plants were natural vessels of wood aura. It wouldn’t be much, but maybe…just maybe…

The next wave of fengmori dove at Tenri’s head. He struck back, whipping the length of seaweed towards them. It lengthened and stretched under his command, snapping at the vile monsters and driving them off.

Another wave struck, and he lashed them away. Again…and again…and again they came. Tenri fought with all he had, burning through his qi at an alarming rate as he battled the fengmori. If they were going to die, better it be by drowning or crashing against the rocks than eaten alive by the bat-like monsters.

* * *

My fingertips grasped a sliver of raised stone before I tumbled off the edge of the lighthouse. Sai Lyn stood nearby, watching intently as I struggled. He was unaffected by the winds, but not unmoved by my plight. I knew that if he could help from beyond the grave, he would have done so in a heartbeat. However, his time was over, and, without Chiho to catch me, I was only inches away from sharing in his tragic fate.

Gritting my teeth, I hauled myself back to safety. The wind howled, dragging at my limbs, my clothes, and my hair like a jealous lover, but I crawled back to the center of the lantern room regardless.

I carefully pulled the crate of stones closer to the bowl. It was grueling work to shift them from the crate, but with each stone added, the bowl glowed brighter. I was halfway through the scraps I had, but it still shone weakly.

“It’s not enough,” Sai Lyn said. I ignored him, tipping over the crate. The rest of the moon tears fell to the bottom of the bowl just before the crate was ripped from my grasp. My breath caught as it narrowly missed hitting one of my carefully reconstructed mirrors before careening off the side. I didn’t hear the crash below.

Sai Lyn was right, though. The moon tears shone brightly, but I wasn’t sure it would even be seen from the ground, let alone out at sea in this storm.

“Are there any more stored in the tower?” I shouted, clinging to one of the pillars supporting the roof. Sai Lyn shook his head.

“If I knew of any, I’d have already told you.”

I couldn’t argue with that. Time was short. Originally, I’d planned to order brand new moon tears from Saikan, but that wasn’t an option. There might not be time to run all the way back to town, and even if I did manage to get there and back, what would I do if my mirrors were shattered again in the meantime? I had to come up with a solution here and now.

If there were no moon tears left, then what could I use? Fire? There wasn’t enough fuel. I was no lightning artist, so I couldn’t harness the power of the storm to do it but…

I burst out laughing. Had I really been pretending so long that I’d forgotten who and what I am? Two thousand years learning the arts of cultivation, ascending to godhood, followed by six hundred years as an avatar of the natural world, and I’d forgotten it all after a week of pretending.

I had everything I needed right here. The light source I needed was me.

I climbed into the bowl, spreading the stones so that I could sit comfortably. Settled between the mirrors and the great lens, I sat cross-legged and focused inward. Tenri would no doubt be upset with me, but, if it meant saving his life, then so be it.

I circulated my qi, sending it out to my fingertips, then back to my core. Several times, I let the qi flow, agitating it and letting it flow freely. Once it was ready, I let it flow into my skin. Only one thought was in my mind, and I focused on it. It became the totality of my existence, and I let it fill me entirely.

SHINE!

* * *

The fengmori were unending. Tenri knew he couldn’t keep this up much longer. His qi was running dangerously low. Any strike he made could exhaust his reserves at any moment, leaving him helpless and unable to defend any of the men in the tiny boat.

They weren’t going to make it. All three men knew it. They would die long before they reached town. If they managed to keep the boat upright, then the fengmori would get them. If the fengmori didn’t rip their flesh from their bones, then they’d crash against the cliffs and be dragged down in the undertow. If they were lucky, the impact would kill them swiftly, but Tenri didn’t believe in luck anymore, not after this storm. They’d almost certainly drown, and there was nothing any of them could do about it but cling to life with everything they had.

Another wave of fengmori were cut from the air by his seaweed whip. His core throbbed as he called upon reserves he didn’t have. He was forced to his knees. The monsters above circled, sensing the weakness in their prey. It was over. Tenri was out.

“Wait, what’s that?” Xi Qian pointed over the right side of the boat. Tenri squinted, trying to see what he was pointing at, and his heart froze.

Illuminated in the storm was the shadow of a ship. Tattered sails were lit with a thousand ghost wisps. Its bell rang loud and clear over the waters, and, for a brief instant, Tenri saw a figure at the ship’s rail. It was a girl. Ragged green hair fell beneath a tricorne hat. Her shining silver eyes were definitely those of a ghost, and they met Tenri’s for a flash second before she raised her head to look beyond their tiny boat.

Tenri turned. Behind them, a single star pierced the darkness with its light. It cut through the storm, a shining beacon on the horizon. Where its light touched them, the fengmori shrieked and howled before fleeing higher into the storm above. For a moment, he was confused, unsure of what he was looking at, but then it dawned on him.

“Lang! Look over there!” he shouted, pointing to the star. “Tsuyuki lit the lighthouse!” It was brighter than it had ever been. Even in the storm, it would be seen for miles in every direction.

Lang looked up. “We’ve drifted north, but not as far as I’d thought!” he shouted back.

“Can we make it back?!”

“I’ll be damned if I don’t try!” He whipped the sail around, cutting against the wind and sending the boat lurching forward. Tenri turned, hoping that the Ghost Ship wasn’t watching them, but the ship had vanished completely into the storm. It was as if it had never been there at all.

Tenri clung to the mast, his energy all but spent. Maybe they’d make it after all…