They burst out of the portal, into the cool darkness of the pine forest.

Tsaam Lei had been napping just in front of it; he leapt up with a yelp of shock as four people piled on top of him. “What the heck?”

Gong Lau Yan seized him by the scruff of his neck. “Siu Lei! Did any demons come through here?”

“Huh? Yeah, one or two… Or five…” Tsaam Lei dangled in her hand, his expression becoming thoughtful. “Come to think of it, a few came through here, huh? And I don’t think any came back…”

“Why didn’t you hinder them?” Chan Bik screamed.

“Hey, hey! My job is to look after this forest! I didn’t sense any ill intent from them towards this place so I let them be!”

“Which way did they go?” Gaam Yuk Ying interrupted.

“West, mostly. Some went north.”

“I’ll check to the north,” Gong Lau Yan said. “The three of you should stick together and head west. Keep our little Sage Star safe.”

“Grandmaster…”

“We can’t rely on A-po right now,” Gong Lau Yan ordered. “She’s… Something only she understands has her distracted right now.”

“Why now?” Chan Bik cried. “We need her!”

Gong Lau Yan laid firm hands on her trembling shoulders. “You’re a direct disciple of one of the Ng Dzeung, our Drifting Star. And the Jade Exorcist and Sage Star are with you. If all’s well in the north, I’ll join you soon. Don’t despair.”

Chan Bik gritted her teeth and steeled herself.

“Go.”

They scattered. Tsaam Lei, grumbling, picked himself up from where Gong Lau Yan had dropped him on his rear.

“Gong Dze really cares about this realm, doesn’t she? She could just look after her river but no, she’s got to get involved with these humans.” He sighed. “Should I have told them about that woman with the weird eyes, Old Man?”

There was a shiver amongst the pine trees, and a shape appeared from the shadows, a huge, deer-like form that surely could not fit between the trunks, with a mask-like face.

Lo Ma Luk made no sound.

“I suppose it’s a pity.” Tsaam Lei sighed again. “I did like those kids.”

---

The Cheon countryside spread out before them, verdant hills peaceful under the afternoon sky. There was no sign of any disturbance, no trace that a demon army might have passed by. Chan Bik ran steadily, Cheng Baak-hap on her back. Gaam Yuk Ying was a little behind, oblivious to the beautiful landscape they ran through, although his complexion had improved a little.

“Stop, Bik Bik, they obviously didn’t come this way.”

Chan Bik halted, turning right. “Then we should go north.”

“Not so much,” came Gaam Yuk Ying’s flat voice. “North-west.”

“North-west?”

“Mount Faa…” Cheng Baak-hap said. “Do you think…?”

“But why?” As she began to run again, Chan Bik frowned. “Don’t they need food? Why would they attack a place where there are cultivators?”

“Teem Djeung Baak.”

“You think so too?” Cheng Baak-hap said. “I hope we’re wrong…”

“What are you two going on about?”

“It just seems… Teem Djeung Baak has got an ability from a demon god. Why? Why would a god give her a power, and one like that?

“In addition, although Tsaam Lei saw demons travelling west and north, we haven’t seen any. Unless Lady Gong has come across them, it’s likely that they have regrouped somewhere in the north-west, unless they’ve looped back around south, but we’ve seen no evidence of that.

“Add her obsession with Gaam Si-hing, and how useful it would be for the starving demons if Mount Faa were out of the way… I know it’s all circumstantial, but we should go home. We need to check, just in case.”

Go home. It had been so long since they had left, and now they were headed back like this. Chan Bik increased her speed, desperately hoping that the worst-case scenario had not occurred.

Their path, coming in from the south, brought them enroute to the Mou Dang Sect. Like a pair of tigers, Gaam Yuk Ying and Chan Bik rushed up the long stairways, barely touching the stonework. Guards in a watchtower saw them approach.

“Mount Faa disciples!”

“Demons!” Chan Bik roared. “Have you seen demons?”

“Headed to Mount Faa!” came the response. “Half our cultivators have gone to fight them!”

No wonder the sect seemed somewhat empty.

But this was the worst news.

Gaam Yuk Ying flew away like he had wings. His Junior Sisters could barely keep up.

“Gaam Si-hing, don’t push yourself so much!”

“Gou Si-hing will be fine! Please calm down!”

“I can go ahead if you want!”

But they too fell silent when they saw the smoke rising from the mountains.

“Baak Gat…” Cheng Baak-hap whispered.

“He’ll be fine,” Chan Bik shouted hysterically, running faster. “They’ll all be fine!”

The mountains were distorted, and on fire.

Bodies lay from the foot of the first staircase up to the clearing where they had picnicked years ago, mostly demons, but with many young disciples amongst them.

The ground was upheaved, huge pits and enormous mounds pockmarking the area, and humans and demons alike struggled over this uneven terrain. The screams and clash of weapons were overwhelming.

“GOU DZING!” Gaam Yuk Ying roared through the smoke and noise. “GOU DZING!”

Cheng Baak-hap was screaming for her brother. Chan Bik added to the cacophony, “Master! MASTER LING GWONG, WHERE ARE YOU?”

Any demons desperate or foolish enough to attack them were dealt with instantly. Gaam Yuk Ying slashed and stabbed with Lo Fu Ngaa and Yiu Tsing without any regard, bellowing incessantly for Yuen Muk. He pulled paper talismans from his sleeves, slapping them on any demons who were not slashed by his blades, but they were only a temporary measure in a place in flames. Covering her nose and mouth with her sleeve, Cheng Baak-hap peered around with streaming eyes for her brother.

The demons were better equipped than ever before. They swung their new weapons with desperation, not skill, but there were so many of them, and the smoke was so thick, that only the most skilled cultivators were able to manage. Protection arrays had activated all around; deep pits were filled with the bodies of invading demons, such that any who fell in now could climb right back out, and those arrays that used illusions did not seem to affect the demons.

“Bik! My brother!”

“Where?”

“I thought… Let me down!”

“No! It’s too dangerous!”

“How can you fight with me on your back like a turtle shell? I’m a cultivator too, I’m not completely helpless! Help Gaam Si-hing!”

“Stay right next to me!” Chan Bik let Cheng Baak-hap down but kept one hand clutched on her girlfriend’s sleeve. She kicked a demon directly in the face as it rushed up. “Where the hell is Ling Gwong?”

A huge rumble rent the air, and a building collapsed, shrieking demons falling with the foundations into a deep pit. A man emerged from the dust and smoke, panting and swaying.

“Gou Si-hing!” the two women yelled, forgetting his change in title.

Gaam Yuk Ying took a single leap and threw his arms around Yuen Muk, who staggered and laughed weakly.

“Yuk Ying. There you are.”

Chan Bik was close behind. She seized Yuen Muk’s tattered sleeves, crying. “Si-hing, you’re here! Where’s Master- Where’s Lady Ling Gwong?”

“She’s-”

The words stuck in his throat.

Gaam Yuk Ying and Chan Bik turned to follow his gaze.

The buildings of Mount Faa were unrecognisable, collapsed and burning, filled with screaming and crying. The dead lay in undignified positions, blood drying in the heat of the fires.

Teem Djeung Baak stood in the middle of it all.

She looked dead. At any moment, she might keel over. Her skin was sickly and green, her huge eyes so darkly ringed that she looked like she had been punched. The stump of her sliced-off hand was so many colours that it was clear that infection had set in.

Her other hand had formed a fist in the robes of an unconscious Cheng Baak-hap.

She smiled.

Unconsciously, Chan Bik’s irises turned pink.

She opened her mouth to scream.

Teem Djeung Baak was an imposter, not the true direct disciple of the Vermilion Bird of the South. Chan Bik could have made it to her in less than a second.

And then what?

Could she have got away in time?

In any case, she never even took a single step.

Yuen Muk flung himself bodily over her. An unearthly howl came from Gaam Yuk Ying as he suddenly flung his arms up, and with a tearing scream, metal rose from the ground before anyone could even blink. As the metal rose, Chan Bik, her vision sharpened beyond anything she had experienced before, saw a sharp, red light erupt in Teem Djeung Baak’s hand.

As if in slow motion, a wall of earth followed the wall of metal, wrapping the three of them in a dark embrace.

There was a flash of light, that pierced through even their double barrier, a light that seared their skin and burnt their eardrums, a light that lasted less than a heartbeat and left behind a hideous fuzzy ringing in their ears.

She felt the reverberations through the ground, through Yuen Muk’s body, inside her own skull, even as she screamed unconsciously, unable to hear herself.

The tremors seemed to go on forever.

The barriers collapsed.

And then, at last, there was complete and utter silence.

---

Chan Bik recovered first.

Everything hurt. Her ears rang. Her skin felt like she had been rolled in a fire.

She blindly pushed at the thing covering her, unsteadily rolling to the side as she tried to stand, before realising that the ‘thing’ was Yuen Muk.

He lay where he fell, raw red patches on his back showing through his tattered robes.

Gaam Yuk Ying lay nearby, unmoving. Fragments of the metal and earthen walls lay around them, melted into eerie shapes.

She couldn’t understand it. Why was everything faintly red? Why couldn’t she hear or feel properly? Bringing her hands to her ears, they came away wet with her own blood.

Where was Sing Sing?

She raised her eyes to where Cheng Baak-hap and Teem Djeung Baak had been.

There was nothing there.

Well, there was a deep crater. There were some sooty patches.

There were no people.

In fact, all the humans and demons nearby were gone. Along with the buildings, the paths, the plum trees. Dazed, she turned to look behind her. For a space of a lei, there was nothing, except for her, her two unconscious Senior Brothers, and the remains of the two barriers they had thrown up.

And beyond that?

Something was crawling away.

Her eyes hurt. She had to squint hard to see what it was.

It looked vaguely humanoid, but it was bright red, and black, and green. Tattered strips hung from it like… torn clothing. Or flesh.

And there was another. And another. And another.

Some lay still. Some twitched or rolled.

Some stood upright, stumbling like restless ghosts.

If they were making a noise, Chan Bik couldn’t hear them.

I’m in hell, she thought dimly. She turned back to the deep crater. This is hell, right?

In the centre of the crater were two patches of soot.

She looked from one to the other.

Two patches.

It seemed significant, somehow.

Where was Cheng Baak-hap?

Something moved at the edge of her vision, and it took her a moment to realise that it was Ling Gwong, walking slowly towards her.

“There you are,” she said, or she tried to say. Who knew what actually came out of her mouth? Her tongue felt strange, and she couldn’t hear properly. “Where’s Sing Sing?”

Why was she asking Ling Gwong that? What was happening?

There was more movement now. She could see Lord Gaam Bing, and there was Gong Lau Yan, looking like she had just arrived, and some disciples, looking shellshocked.

Ling Gwong stopped on the other side of the crater, staring down at the two patches of soot. Then she looked up at Chan Bik. Her mouth trembled, then moved.

What? What’s she saying? I can’t hear her.

Chan Bik swayed, squinting at Ling Gwong’s mouth. It was hard to tell what the Vermilion Bird was saying – her lips trembled. But the longer Chan Bik stared, the clearer the words became, until they were pounding in her brain.

“I’m sorry.”

She looked at the soot patches.

“I’m sorry.”

Two patches.

“I’m sorry.”

Chan Bik screamed.