Demonic Tribulations - Chapter 85 preview (Patreon)

Chapter 85 – Yang Mu

“Ah Ying, you idiot!” Yang Mu cried, watching as the bundles of trade goods – all of which they had been contracted to bring at speed – plummeted to the earth. The man-child had unleashed his sword, cutting through the ropes that had bound the boxes and chests to the peng’s upper body, letting them tumble end over end in the air as the creature tilted its form.

Now, goods, in such quantity that they would be hard pressed to replace in value, fell. A wind vortex had risen up, keeping them chained together and she had unleashed her own aura as she had thrown herself off the bird, dragging Yu Ag behind her.

The woman was screaming, loud and profanely, as she plummeted to her death. The demon had no method of flying, no way to control her descent. Falling from this great height meant that she had a lot of time to consider her death.

However, Yang Mu, unlike her idiot lover was not about to scare Yu Ag for no reason.

“I have you. Relax. Enjoy the flight.” A small movement, and she extracted and tossed a yellow talisman at the other. It struck her in the chest, sticking to the robes even when Yu Ag, reactively, pawed at the paper. “And that will protect you too, even if I get too distracted.”

“Distracted? Distracted by what?” She screamed the words, forgetting to use spirit speech in her fear. Only Yang Mu’s heightened senses allowed her to pick the words as they emerged from her mouth. But she had no further time to explain, nor reason to – not when she could so easily showcase it.

A flicker of movement brought her right next to the boxes, her aura slammed forwards. Connections. That was what her dao was about. She utilized it now, pulling the disparate pieces of merchandise together, connecting them by their places of origin, the ownership of those who had purchased the items within. Connected the shipment to herself, tethering her existence to it.

Then, flicking her fan out, she straddled the immortal weapon and began the process of slowing down the descent of the entire cargo. At first, it was easy, but she quickly realised she would need to exert ever more energy if she was to stop the destruction of the cargo.

As she readied herself to do so, Wu Ying floated over to her, hands behind his back. “There’s no need.”

“What?” She snapped. “This is our responsibility!”

“And I have it well in-hand.” Wu Ying tilted his head ot the side, ducked it as though receiving an admonishment. “Or, well, the wind does.”

“You’re trusting them to control the descent? WHEN?” She snarled, as they plunged on and on. The ground, so far away at first, was fast growing in size. Humanity that had been no more than specs to even immortal eyes were beginning to take shape and form, buildings and the hard earth coming sooner.

“Yes! When?” Yu Ag shouted as well.

“Soon. Near the bottom.” Wu Ying shook his head. “Falling is always easy. It’s climbing that is hard.”

“I hate you. I hate my life.”

Yang Mu glared at her companion, but reduced the pull on the boxes and the energy she flooded into her newly created fans. They were immortal make and much better crafted than anything she had ever owned, a restructuring of her old weapons; but they were not meant to hold aloft thousands of jin[1] of weights as well as her own.

“Could you not have warned us?” Yang Mu growled. The impish grin shot her way had her roll her eyes, but now that she had been assured their goods would not be so randomly destroyed, she relaxed into the experience and enjoyed the fall.

The world around them grew in size, the demonic plains they were watching different from their own but also familiar. More strange demonic beasts roamed this land than in the Middle Kingdom, for the mixture of demonic chi, immortal chi and mortal chi within led to surprising combinations.

It was perhaps the biggest difference amongst the demonic realms and the others. The Middle Kingdom was meant for mortals. It was filled with mortal chi for the most part, with only small amounts of demonic and immortal chi. The heavens were a mirror of the Middle Kingdom, with much heavenly, immortal chi but little mortal or demonic energies.

While mortal and immortal chi might be like the yin and yang of the universe, not able to exist without the other, and dependent upon the interactions to form; demonic chi in itself was strange, mixing with both energies and subsuming it into itself, while not being of either. Where mortals had to replace their mortal chi with immortal energy, rebuilding their entire forms to achieve the next state; demons seemed to progress like spirit beasts.

They grew, forming a core within them, that core altering and strengthening their bodies. Over time, the demonic chi would interweave with immortal chi, concentrate and strengthen and improve the individual till they achieved the next stage. Discreet stages like with mortals were superfluous and only rough generalizations could be made.

In mortal terms, demons undertook both soul and body cultivation at the same time. At each level, they were stronger than mortal cultivators, but their progress took longer by nature. On the other hand, because they progressed both sides, they were also often longer lived.

Where the heavens might be order, the demonic plains were chaos. You never knew where a hidden expert might live, and towering immortal creatures altered the very geography of the land they existed upon, undertaking battles that might warp geography and lay low entire civilisations at a moment’s notice.

The peng they had flown upon was but one example.

The fast rising demon, wreathed in flames like a fireball flying upwards to meet them another. He blasted through the sky so fast that Yang Mu had time enough only to extract her other fan before he arrived, his burning presence hovering beside them as they fell.

“What are you doing?” he snapped.

“Falling,” was Ah Ying’s blithe reply.

“If you do not slow down now, I will be forced to destroy your goods and fine you for endgangering the citizens of my town,” he snarled, raising one flaming fist. It went from red to white, radiating heat as they closed.

“Of course…” A slight whisper, and she felt the winds pick up. It blew in from below, pushing against the falling boxes. At first, the slowdown was infinitisemal, but with each moment, the pressure exerted increased.

“Is this how you intend to land? Using wind?” the flame demon snarled.

“Yes. Is there a problem?” Wu Ying cocked his head to the side, guilelessly.

“Are you an idiot? Do you not see what it’s doing below?” One hand swung down, pointing. A small tornado had formed beneath the group, reaching down to the earth and causing merchants and pedestrians at the center of the square they had aimed for to flee.

“Is there a better place to land?” Wu Ying said, calmly. “It seems to me that is where we are to go. Or so I was informed when I researched this.”

“It is the location for aerial descents, but most take their time. They don’t cause this much of a fuss.” Hand clenched. “Can you not do something?’

“No. My other strengths are not sufficient.” Ah Ying shrugged. “My spatial dao is poor, and the winds are my greatest resource.”

“Then I’ll-”

“Before that… maybe I can help.” Yang Mu edged down with her fan, bringing herself into the conversation. Ah Ying’s words had sparked a thought in her mind, one that was eager to test.

“Be quick about it. And you will be fined for the disruption you’ve caused.”

“That’s unfair. What rules have we broken?”

Ignoring the two bickering men, Yang Mu reached within herself. The talk of spatial dao and the sight of the earth beneath them, now connected to the spinning tornado that was slowing the drop had given her an idea. The connections were all there, after all. The existence of the boxes above, and their eventual placement was but a matter of time. All space was connected to one another, in the end.

All she had to do was extend her aura down, all the way to the ground. Connect it with her dao, utilize the enlightenment and understanding of space and time that she had gained transporting herself across dimensions. She pushed with her immortal energies, connecting the two spaces more immediately. There was a barrier, one made of the greater dao of time that blocked her way, of costs and consequences but that was what immortal chi was for. It broke through the barrier, made what was impossible possible. Made the future the present.

Just faster, yet with the same degree of finality. Bled the momentum of the boxes off into the compression of the space, utilizing the forces generated and dispersed to help guide the funnel. To Yang Mu, the boxes descended, slowing and spinning down through the tornado, bleeding off momentum and force before it touched down to the ground with a gentle thump.

To others, on the outside of her dao; the boxes and other storage devices shuddered and then disappeared, reappearing at the bottom of the still swirling tornado. Ying – or perhaps the winds themselves – were quick to react, dying almost immediately, though their initial momentum still swirled around the boxes that she protected with her aura.

“There. Happy?” she smiled at the pair, proud of her achievement.

“That…” The demon’s eyes widened, then he coughed, dispersing the flames around his hand as he did so. “You’re bleeding.”

“Hmmm?” Yang Mu blinked, then touched the wetness around her lip. She took her fingers away, to find them bright red. It was then that the tumultuous drop in her chi, the exertion caught up with her. Her body went limp and she plunged, plunging to the earth on her fan accompanied by a screaming demon.

“I HATE YOU ALL!!!!!!”

[1] Jin – roughly a half pound, depending on the time period. Modern day, its standardized to half pound.