She had not looked up or back towards the First Palace.

Her face had remained buried into the moldy decayed shroud that wrapped around the thing that was called a 'horse'. Idony did not think it was an actual horse with its strange skin, the constant stream of reddish drool and snot that came out from with obscured face, or the way its limbs moved with a strange creaking in its joints like old leather straps struggling to hold something together.

But looking at the rotting grey shroud was better than looking anywhere else at the moment.

On either side she could also see the grey-water colored sleeves of Rui Yifu, who was holding the crumbling reins in hand.

The ground below was a rush of grass, tall reeds, occasionally broken up by patches of sparse strange vegetation and rusted weapons and armor that were half buried in the earth. The hooves of the 'horse' beat steadily, kicking up clods of grass or dust.

"Rui, what happened?" Bo asked. He was clinging to Rui Yifu's waist. Idony could feel the top of his hands against her back.

"What do you think happened?" Rui Yifu answered softly. "Lets not talk about it."

Bo was quiet for a while again. Idony was also quiet. Her face hurt. Like both of her cheeks were swelling up. Her eyes also stung and she felt that her tongue had dried up into a withered piece of jerky. She held onto the cloth around the almost-horse, her small fingers tightening around it and threatening to tear the frail material that continued to hold its own against her grip. The sky was slowly changing to a dull purple, lengthening the shadows on the ground until they distorted into strange stick-figures that were barely recognizable.

There was a smell of stew in the air. Not good stew but the sort of meaty stew made of whatever bits and chunks could be scrounged up, singed by crackling fires. She felt the horse's gallop slowing down into a jaunty trot. Voices floated in the twilight with the sound of crackling fire.

"Hello there!" An unfamiliar man's voice called out.

The horse came to a complete stop and Idony finally looked away from the neck of the horse to a group of men who were standing around... a large strange metal pot that had three legs. It was not in the best of shape from what she could tell, its long legs and its underside were blackened from the fire that cheerily crackled, and if there was paint on it it had long scratched off. Stew-scented steam billowed from it. Her mouth watered and she unconsciously licked her lips as her stomach growled. Then she remembered there were people standing around it. All of them looked like rough men, all twelve of them, with badly patched armor and chipped weapons and her hunger instantly disappeared.

Another of the men spoke, "where are you two riding off too?"

"The Jade Corpses place," Bo answered.

In the firelight, some of the men's eyes widened.

"Now? Son, did you not see the red moon that's been popping up these past few nights?"

"We've heard about it," Rui Yifu replied stiffly.

"It's bad stuff, I'm telling you. You can't even say it's just an ill omen," the man nodded. "We're finishing up dinner here and then we're going back to our shelter."

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Another younger looking man, with a raspy voice, added, "you can come with us if you want."

Idony could feel Rui Yifu's body tense, "that's nice but we need to hurry."

Some of the men further in the back were talking to each other, whispering quietly while pointing towards her. Idony shrank down, trying to press herself close to the horse.

"Is that a child?" One of the men in the back asked with mild alarm in his voice. "I've done a lot of stuff in my time, but by the Empress of Hell herself, I'm not bringing a poor kid with me into this place!"

Bo snorted with disgust, "that's high talk from a bunch of guys with a human head in a pot!"

Idony felt nauseous.

"Don't judge us, son. A lot of the stuff that looks like it's safe to eat can be really poisonous. We had a friend who ate something and was in such pain he died, but when he came back to life he still was in agony! We tried removing his stomach-"

"Yeah I heard enough," Bo replied. "I don't need to hear all the blood and guts."

The man who spoke first earlier sighed and shook his head, "the man in the pot was a terrible leader, and a cowardly friend. I know we've become monsters ourselves, but he was the worst of all of us." Then he raised a hand to point forward. "If you keep heading straight towards the Jade Corpses, you're going to come across these two fallen titanic steles," he held up his hands to make a triangle shape. "They fell like this. I don't know how long they've been like that, but it's very safe to shelter under them. You can get five men and their horses under there. We were there during the first red moon and no beast came for us. They all remained a safe distance away, it was a relief that night since we had been fleeing blind from one of the lakes. Speaking of which, no matter how beautiful the women seem, none of them are human," he chuckled dimly. Some of the other men around nodded. "At least, not anymore. But who is here?"

"Thank you," Rui Yifu said quietly.

"Are we leaving?" Bo asked.

"Yes."

"Safe travels!" Another man called out.

Idony was joustled slightly as the horse began to trot, then gallop again. The bumpiness and blur of darkening ground made her turn her gaze back down to the neck of the horse as she gripped its rotten shroud. The hooves beat against a ground that became increasingly more muddy, splashing up small amounts of mud as it struck. She looked back up and saw in the far distance a odd large structure and beyond that came slowly rising hills, all in strange shapes. One looked more like a giant had hacked off the top of a mountain peak.

They were approaching the structure quickly. It was two very large dark flat stones leaned on each other, joined together by a thick crusting of moss and dirt that swallowed up the faint imagery carved onto it. Beneath was another fire, tended to by two lone people whose heads turned upwards towards them. To Idony's surprise, she could see another horse also under the two big stones. It actually looked like a horse as well!

Rui Yifu pulled the reins and directed the 'horse' towards the small shelter, and one of the other people obligingly moved backwards to allow more room for the new party and its almost-horse.

"Argh!" Bo groaned, flopping inelegantly off the horse and laying on the ground. "I can't feel my hips."

Rui Yifu snorted and slid off the horse more gracefully, then Idony felt his arms gently wrap around her to pull her down as well. "Do you feel okay, Zhu'er?"

She stared blankly into the small fire close by as her mind numbly picked away at the last few hours. Her cheeks still hurt, and her eyes still burned. There were no real words in her mouth. The images of an angry face full of tears and frustration were things beyond her grasp of either language. A hole in her chest was forming, its raw edges scraped by something itchy that made her cough.

"Lets rest," Bo begged. "My ass hurts."

"Hello travelers," one person, a ragged looking young woman with tattered clothing and arms covered by thick scarring that looked more like stripes in the firelight, said. "What in the name of all six mountains makes you bring a child to this hell?"

"Tiger Hunter, be more polite," another person, a man with a scratchy looking beard and slightly more well tended to clothes, replied. "You all came right on time. It's about to begin."

The sound of the sky splitting rattled the world around them, dislodging dust from the makeshift ceiling above. Idony turned back around to see the moon that hung heavy in the sky shift into a dark red color that oozed past its form and into the very sky itself. It bled outwards, trickling down towards the horizon as terrifying howls and roars echoed across the land. The horse and the horse things reared up, neighing loudly and stamping their hooves.

Idony gripped Rui Yifu, watching as the ground was illuminated by the eerie glow of the Red Moon.