[Ashborn-B1] 53. Pretenders (Patreon)

LIII

Pretenders

Breaking winds crashed over me. Sharp eyes pierced the horizon, where a great structure of ice jabbed into the atmosphere of the chamber like a pike, its sides spiked like teeth.

“It’s a mountain,” I called.

I half-expected another pass, but the entrance at the base was a tunnel.

“Can you see an exit on at the end?” Aurille said.

Our angle was off, so I lowered our elevation and brought us in line with the entrance.

“It’s pitch dark.” Too dark for it to be natural. Not even the walls offered light.

“Get us there,” Aurille said.

We reached the entrance and circled overhead. The ground was littered with rocks…and blood.

A gate opened beside my head. One of my chicks swooped out and dove inspect—

Shadows shifted and moved out of the way of long, slender limbs and a tail. Slanted eyes surveyed the land, then turned to a beacon in their palm. A second elite stepped out of the gate behind the first. Then a third.

My chick veered back up into the air, and I increased our elevation.

The trio of dragons animatedly conversed with each other before heading back inside.

“They must’ve been checking on their other members,” Aurille said.

“That was my guess too,” I said offhandedly.

‘Three elites.’ My gaze narrowed. That was some great sustenance. But while the thought of going after them right away almost made my shard flare, there could be more drakes inside. Moreover, if the elites were there, Erri may not be far.

‘We’ve also got the monks to search for.’

After a long moment, I steered us away from the mountain.

My gaze was glued to Ori’s beacon. The number of monks in this part of the shrine were low, giving me an exact idea of where her teammates were. Ashwing steered us north-east, towards a hill bare of any tree growth. I glanced through one of my chicks. There was an entrance in the earth with a staircase leading further down.

Two Black Fangs were standing guard.

“We’re diving,” I said.

Aurille wrapped her hands around my middle.

Winds whipped up my hair. I held my breath. ‘Do I kill them?’

The signature of the monks was definitely coming from below. Chance of those two standing guard to protect the Stillwater disciples? Zero. Which meant giving them an opportunity to react would only increase the odds of something happening to the monks.

I did say I would give everyone a chance before killing them…but that was only if I was after their tokens.

“How long do you think they’ll hold out for—” I caught one of the disciples saying.

Whatever else he wanted to say would be known only to the universe. Whiplash struck the top of his head, his skull rippling for an instant as it registered the titanic force smashing into it. Then his body whirled towards the floor and the rippling was no more. Blood, brain matter, and other bodily fluid coated the ice and Ashwing’s fur. Mainly, it coated the other Black Fang’s face like he was wearing a mask. His pupils froze then widened as his mind struggled to connect what happened with the situation of just one second prior.

“What—”

A whistle as the shard of ice shot forwards. Then a hole in the middle of the disciple’s forehead. He collapsed to the floor.

“Do we wait for them to rise?” Aurille asked.

“No. They’ve been adapting.”

“Adapting?”

I nodded. “I’m not sure yet if it’s on purpose, but the scorn are no longer rising.”

“That’s strange.”

“Indeed.” Which was why I dragged the corpses into the garden instead. I grimaced in advance, not looking forward to the assault on my taste buds that was going to come soon.

That said, I was beginning to think absorbing the corpses was better. In some cases. Perhaps it was a product of the necromantic magic that raised them or Skul feasting on their spirit, either way, the garden wouldn’t accept the bodies I killed a second time.

Gaining raw experience let me choose which tree to feed, but absorbing the bodies gave more total experience to the respective tree the corpse belonged to.

‘Well, there’s no choice right now, so it doesn’t matter.’

These two Black Fangs would nourish the cindertree to feed the still-growing fruit.

I turned towards the entrance. Calling one of my chicks from the air, I sent it to scout ahead.

Korin had to hand it to the Black Fangs: they were nothing if not persistent.

‘And obnoxious.’ The bangles threaded through the butt of his staff clanged as it spun behind him and left a trail in the air. The feline spirit beast trying to charge his rear slammed into the barrier of light. Korin whirled and planted the butt end of his staff in the creature’s face. It flew back over the moat separating their island from the rest of the cavern, landing in front of a dark-skinned man.

He was seated in the lotus, resting one arm on his knee and lazily supporting his chin. His glance shifted to the beast still sliding to a halt beside him. “I don’t understand it.”

“Understand what, Sir Zev?” Korin smirked.

He took the offered respite to check on his party members. Zuhan was cradling his abdomen. Despite the high-tier healing pill he’d taken, blood still leaked from between his fingers. That didn’t keep him from protectively crouching in front of the unconscious Lima, though. There were more in their party, but those had joined yesterday and were injured beforehand. Apparently, they’d lost members to a Black Fang ambush similar to this one.

Korin grimaced. ‘We shouldn’t have entered without a plan.’ He’d tried to convince Elder Gyatso of the need, but the older monk wasn’t convinced.

“There’s no need to start a war over one loss, child.” So went the Elder’s words.

‘I should’ve forced the issue.’ Now look at them: on the brink of death simply because they preferred entering danger with their eyes closed.

“You’re strong,” Zev continued. “Every single one of you. Yet you refuse to exercise your strength and live passively. Why?”

Korin regarded the other Black Fangs surrounding their island. They numbered fifteen. Many of them were meditating or swallowing pills, preparing for when it was their turn to tire Korin out.

The monk huffed. “The explanation would be lost on a ruffian.”

Deep inside, he knew that the mentally of their temples wasn’t to blame—it’s the Black Fangs who had to look inward and change their ways. However, if the price for good karma was the blood of his friends on his hands, how could being the bigger person be worth it?

Zev shook his head and rose to his feet. He waved the Black Fang supporting her spirit beasts with some kind of art away, and the girl plopped down with a sigh.

Korin exhaled his doubt and recentred his mind. The zeroth circle wasn’t one you could enter or uphold when your inner world was in turmoil. He couldn’t, at least.

‘Rowan could’ve done it.’ Korin’s brows knit together. ‘He was ever the best of us.’

His sect brother’s voice still followed him. “Oy, Korin! You skipped out on cleaning the statues again, didn’t you!” And then Korin would scurry off with haste, dropping whatever he was doing in the process like it was a hot stove.

Palms tightened around his staff. With a flex of will, the golden, three-tiered pagoda fell over him. He didn’t need to image the screams of the damned. They rattled in his ear, sent the blood pumping through his veins.

Had Rowan or any elder been here, they would’ve scolded him. “Too much anger and the spirits won’t listen, Korin.” But anger was all he had.

“Hhm, so you do have it in you: hate.” Zev’s nails extended, growing into talons that could carve through rock with a glancing swipe. Bones snapped as they thickened and lengthened, and tuffs of fur grew from his skin. “That makes me glad. I was beginning to think you weren’t human.”

“What would you know about being human?” Korin snarled, his voice a mix of different tones and inflections as if multiple people were speaking at once.

Zev’s lips curved upwards. “You don’t think I’m human? That’s not very kind of you.”

The metamorphed Black Fang blurred as the air exploded behind him.

Souls burst out of the lowest floor of the pagoda. Korin called them towards him, intent on strengthening his body, but most of the spirits disregarded him and rushed forwards. Zev’s talon ripped through the uncontrolled cloud of spirits like they were flies and crashed into Rowan, locking the two of them in a brief power struggle.

The monk gritted his teeth. ‘It’s heavier than before.’ Which went to show how much strength he’d lost in the hours fighting these people. He wouldn’t be able to hold him the next time…if he even made it through the gauntlet again.

‘I’ll end this quickly.’

Iron rings jangled as Rowan forced the small number of spirits he’d managed to gather into his staff. The chimes were deep and rumbling. Shook its listeners to the bones.

Shifting his weight, Korin threw the Black Fang to the side, then used the butt of his staff to come back around and slam into Zev’s midriff. It wasn’t a powerful strike, but it served to get the man off-balance and create some space.

Korin gripped his staff near the bottom and grunted. ‘Hell Swipe!’

Cyan light poured from his staff. Where its tip passed, the atmosphere distorted with the hunger of a hundred spirits.

“Dream Shield,” Zev grumbled, raising his elbow to hide his face. A purple ripple shuddered over his fur and formed a shell around him.

A crunch ripped through the growing screams of the departed. Zev’s shield kept the spirits from leeching onto him and damaging his spirit, but it didn’t stop the weight of the blow. Neither did it stop the island from cratering underneath him.

Korin leaned forwards, trying with all his might to press his staff into the Black Fang.

The purple shell around Zev’s skin dimmed. However, the boy was seemingly unbothered by this fact. His gaze was locked on Korin as he smiled. “That’s…a lot of hate for a monk.”

Boots dug into the sand. With them being this close, it didn’t matter whether Korin controlled the spirits or not, so he let his insides churn. The souls clawed and raked the barrier to pieces.

“You know,” Zev said. “You’re all pretentious to me. Silly cultivators who feign having morals…” Bent legs straightened and pushed Korin back. “Morals that make you better than everyone else…filthy hypocrites.”

With a shout, the hulking beast of a disciple threw Korin backwards. His shield flared back to life like a river breaking through a dam, and he smacked the rest of the spirits away with a backhand.

Korin ground to a halt. ‘Shit,’ his mind yelled. He pushed down on his panic. Everything was fine. He still had enough energy to—

“Lay down your weapon.”

His head whirled up. Zev had his foot planted on Zuhan’s chest, his soles digging into the blood leaking out.

‘That’s what I get.’

In his rage and urge to slay the beast, he’d forgotten the priority was to protect his friends and avoid a situation exactly like this.

Zev tilted his head, asking silently: ‘What will it be?’

With great reluctance, Korin threw his weapon to the side.

A snort escaped the Black Fang’s nostrils. “You see what I mean? Pretentious.”

“Go fuck yourself you mongrel,” Korin spit.

Zev shook his head. “You Orthodox clans are the true mongrels if you ask me.” He crouched and grabbed Zuhan by the hair.

“Oy!” Korin yelled, which drew a chuckle from Zev.

“That’s what I mean. You knew there was no chance I’d let him live, yet you threw away your weapon. Do you know why?” His talon came to rest against Zuhan’s neck so the boy could only lean back to try to save his skin. “Because you’re weak. You hide behind your morals like they’re walls. But you’ve never been saints and never will be.”

“It’s not about being,” Korin snarled. “It’s about trying.”

“So lauds that the old adage, doesn’t it?” Zev said. “However, what difference does it make? You try to be saints and fail. We don’t pretend and are true to ourselves. The end result is the same.”

And though Korin wanted to lord a philosophical quote over him, his days of skipping class had seen to it his mind was coming up blank in the moment.

The Black Fang smiled and looked off into the distance as if he was remembering something. “Did you know: our clan leader used to be a monk in the past.”

Korin’s face muscles contorted. “What?”

“I didn’t believe it at first either. But it’s the truth. His monk name was ‘Black Hand.’ He fled to the Redmaw Wastes after they expelled him from the clan.”

Korin frowned. “What’d he do?” he asked. Not because he was interested but because it gave his mind more time to solve his way out of this conundrum.

“Beat a disciple black and blue.”

“Expected nothing less.” Korin snorted.

“The disciple he beat was a new initiate,” Zev said unabated, “and the man who raped and murdered his wife before he became a monk. The temples allowed him in despite my master’s protests. Even forced the two of them to share a classroom as it would ‘make them understand each other.’”

Korin’s mouth went dry. “That’s—”

“—truly evil.” Zev’s hand sharpened into a point. “How could any among you think themselves good?”

Essence whirled inside Korin. It was now or never—

“You have a point.”

The third voice brought him up short. He and Zev both turned to the source.

A girl strode into the chamber whose robes could only identify her as a Dawnflame. Behind her, a disciple in nothing but a thin dress strolled forth, though it was hard to tell she was moving at all with how minimal sway there was in her gait.

“Perhaps,” the Dawnflame said, “we need to stop pretending.”