CHAPTER 10: MASK AND MASK

The occupants of the carriage heard Yin shouting loudly before the carriage was rocked and plunged into darkness. The rocking continued for a while until the rocking came to a stop. There was silence, no longer could they hear Yin shouting or the outside world moving.

“What… What is going on?” Wang Zen was the first to speak.

Jun Nee and Don Fat looked around them, feeling worry creep in like the brown dust that had invaded the small carriage.

“Stay away from the walls,” a voice came from the shadowy figure at the back of the carriage. “We’re being attacked.”

“By-By who?” Don Fat asked, obviously worried.

“Bandits. Assassins. Mercenaries. It could be anyone.” The figure came out but still could not be seen as everything was darkness. He opened the window and was surprised when rocks and soil flowed into the carriage. “Earth? Are we trapped inside some kind of Earth Incantation? Everyone, hang on to something, I’m going to try and break us out.”

Everyone nodded in the darkness, although they could not be seen.

The man who was giving orders activated a qi technique. White energy erupted from his hand, disrupting the darkness in the carriage with a dull flash of white. He leapt up and thrust his palm into the roof of the carriage while shouting, “Savage Strike!”

There was an explosion from the earth and the man leapt up into the air before landing on the ruined roof of the carriage and the earth. The man had on a mask, with one half painted black and the other red with a single eye shaped slit for his eye.

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He expected to be higher in the air but the masked man realised that he was at ground level and that the carriage had been buried. “What kind of powerful cultivator are we dealing with that he can bury a whole carriage? He must be as strong as Zhing Yin.”

“Well, I do not know who this Zhing Yin is,” a woman wearing jade pants and a kimono like shirt said while walking closer to him, “but I can assure you, my lover is very strong.” The woman also wore a mask, albeit, it had no wards like the one the masked man of the carriage wore. Hers was white with simple black markings and two slits for her eyes.

Wang Zen climbed out of the carriage to join the masked man on the roof and above ground. “What is going on?”

“Young lord, be careful.” The masked man said as he drew a knife.

“I can help,” Wang Zen pointed to the tanto sheathed behind his back.

“Its too dangerous,” the man said.

The masked woman laughed lightly at this. “I really have to thank you to. The incantation was meant to actually deposit the carriage above ground but it was disturbed before that could be done. By breaking out of the carriage and the ground, you’ve made my job easier.” She opened her palm and qi, in the form of short thin strings appeared over it, orbiting some invisible centre while taking the form of a sphere.

“Your job? What is your job?” The masked man asked.

“Isn’t it simple? To kill the brat beside you!” The woman pointed at Wang Zen with one hand while the other continued making qi, adding thickness to the strings and giving them more of a needle shape.

“Me?” Wang Zen pointed at himself in disbelief.

“Hmpf, well that won’t happen.” The masked man reached up to his face. his hand grabbed the mask and he began taking it off, “if you know what is good for you, you will runaway, woman.” The mask began lifting from his face and allowing some of his power to show…