ShipTeaser

  I had felt almost ance as my bde had severed the head of the crazed ese didate, Cutting Twilight discharging a burst of spatial element, slig through the barrier of wind and his ne a surge of violet energies. For a brief moment I felt sick as I watched his head part ways with his body, the headless corpse standing there motionless before starting to colpse, red and silver spraying from his neck. Damn. I khis was going to happen, that there’d be no way to get through this without killing. Even so, I ’t say I like the feeling…

  My only pensation was the surge of aether that poured from his body, floodi was thick, dense, and noticeably greater than I expected, and when my body began abs it, a message scrolled ay vision.

  You have gained in strength. Your level has increased from One Hundred And Six to One Hundred A. All of your Material statistics have increased by twenty-two. Aether has increased by fifty-four.

  Two levels for another life, huh? Wait, I wonder what will happen to the Divine Favour… before I could activate my Eye, and before the aether was fully absorbed, the bone bde the corpse had dropped shuddered, as though it was alive, and the aether I ulling in started leaving my body, and the message became disarrayed, question marks overwriting a lot of the words.

  Is it… sug back the aether? As my Eye fred amber, glowing brilliantly, Daiyu was watg on, worried, the little masked creatures hiding behind her, peering through her legs.

  “I don’t think so…” I had the urge to destroy the bde, but sidering how greedily it was sug iher around us, I didn’t want to act recklessly. Besides, this is an opportunity. I owe it to the dead man, even if he was an enemy, to glean every st bit of knowledge from his death, give it meaning.

  My Eye could see the aether being pulled from me. Some had already ied within me, and as the mess of question marks vanished again, I had instead only gained a single level, ending up at one hundred and seven. The most startling thing was the Divine Favour that the corpse held. I could see it shining, looking a little like a turtle resting uhe chakra work in his left foot, but it was beginning to fade, sparks of powerful adherence drifting off it, vanishing into the upper Astral. No, it’s not managing to escape…

  My Eye could see adherenow, so I was able to dis the bde pulsing, as if it was alive, and sparks of the colpsing Favour were being absorbed. A shimmering ripple of violet energies coursed down the bde, and for a moment my Eye could see an overy of dozens of these bones, and something fleshy and disgusting, a blob with many mouths, tongues lig greedily at drained energies, before the image was gone.

  “Shit.” I didn’t like the implications of this, so I called on Foehn, and fmes coursed out, washing over the bde. It fought, the fme energy of the Foehn being leeched away, dimming it, but I fed in more fme energy to the greedy fires, as well as p in a verdant wind, boosting it further. The bone sword quivered and screamed, bing and charring, oozing a pestilent clear slime, which too sizzled and boiled, before the bone suddenly turo ash, vanishing in a scatter of purple mist.

  That was surprisingly difficult to destroy… As I did so, the su stopped, and I was able to reabsorb the remainiher, pushing me back to level One Hundred A, though I robably just barely at that level, rather than progressing well into it like I was before the bone bde had interfered.

  “Are you well?” Daiyu asked with some , having seen me unleash fmes against the fallen sword and burn it to ashes.

  “Yeah, just… well, whatever that on was, it was alive.” her came out of it when I destroyed it, but there were peared to be remnants of spatial element… I wonder if it was transported away somewhere…

  Behind us, a brilliant fre of red, green and gold exploded in the sky, and I smiled. “I guess that’s the fireworks to say Shiro’s arrived. I really want to link up with her, but…” I looked down at the corpse, Eye probing the deg Favour. It was rapidly vanishing, showing no indication of allowio take it, such as when I shattered Kondou Kazuo’s Anchor. “Whether that’s because it was damaged by the bde, or…” I muttered, making a decision. I don’t regret experimenting on him, but I wish I’d tried to remove his Favour via Chirurgery first. It should be possible, but… shit, there’s not much time.

  Gunfire, shouts and screams, explosions… all could be heard in the distance. Every minute of dey otentially a disaster, but allowing this ce to pass me by was equally foolish. “Daiyu, keep watch. I want to try something…”

  She nodded, and I accelerated my mind to its maximum, Split Thoughts enablio wield numerous bdes of aether to try and carve apart the work around the Divine Favour, lifting it free. I quickly discovered a problem. The work was rotten and tore easily, being as the holder was dead, and that caused further damage to the dissolving Favour, adherence leaking. “Yeah, this isn’t going to be enough. I don’t have a lot, but…” using my own stocks of adherence, my skills far inferior to my grasp oher, I started severing the es that held it, though my clumsy skills wreaked further damage.

  Wait a minute… I’m doing it wrong, I think. If my skills with aether are better, why not use the adhereo fortify the aether? As soon as I had that thought, I acted on it, mergiher and adherence, and soon I had mao lift free the Favour, the shining turtle, now faded in pces and leaking a mist only visible to my Eye, sitting on my palm.

  Severely Damaged Xuanwu’s Turtle Blessing Of Might: Css: [???????] Type: [????????]. This Divine Favour was made of trated adherence, refiher and ??????????, though due to several sources of severe damage, it is barely funal, and strives to return to Xuanwu. The ability to wield strength far in excess of one’s limits o longer be used. As did all foes of Xuanwu perish uhe mighty blows of sword and fist, so shall the wielder find the strength to crush all they find unrighteous.

  Returning to Xuanwu? Does that mean that the Favours of the dead that aren’t taken via quero back to the God that grahem? That seems… wildly problematic. My gaze strayed to the silvery skies, lightning fshing and dark aurorae shimmering over Boundary Kyoto. I’d hope that doesn’t cause additional strain to the Boundary, but… “Well, looks like this was a failure, anyway…”

  I ched my fist, exerting all my energy, and the Divine Favour shattered. I felt strength enter me, and though I didn’t level again, I did feel strohe adherence from the destroyed turtle topped up my supplies, and in addition I had a couple more messages. Signifitly less potent than Kondou’s Favour, but sidering how much more of it was damaged and absorbed by that damn bone sword… I’ll take it.

  Yht has increased by fifty. Your Fortitude has increased by twenty.

  Your Skill, Might of the Furious Earth, has increased from Rank 1 to Rank 2. As long as you possess earth elemental energy, you further fortify either Might or Fortitude signifitly, based on a pertage of your base statistics, as well as the amount of earth elemental energy you currently tain. Your affinity for earth element has slightly increased, and your ability to recover earth elemental energies and their posites has also increased slightly.

  “Well, that wasn’t a plete waste of effort.” I muttered, feeling a noticeable increase in my strength provided by the skill. Turning to Daiyu, I gestured to the north. “It’s time to go. But first…” I looked at the little masked beings. “It isn’t safe here, you should seek shelter where the firework bloomed earlier. In the worst case sario, you flee to my Territory through the Gate. Though if you have the power to fight, I’d be happy if you joihe defences.”

  They shook their heads, and while they were speaking iremely archaic Japahe i came through.

  “No, we shall not abandon the sacred shrihey insisted, in a variety of ways that all meant the same thing. A refusal, huh?

  “Look. Shrines and temples be rebuilt. If you die, it’s over. Surely you see that? And I won’t be here to bail you out again. We have to press on.”

  Daiyu nodded, reag down to touch the little head of one of the childlike figures. “Indeed, he speaks the truth.” She could uand them as well, perhaps due to their diviure. “When this battle is over, rebuilding will surely e.” She paused. “Just like the Incorruptible jade. I long to throw myself into the jaws of death, defeating my enemies, not g whether I perish or not. But as, such is not merely folly, but a betrayal of the hopes and dreams of not only myself, but of those who perished before me.” She looked at me then, uanding. “While I live, their dreams live on, no?”

  “That’s right.” I approved. “And just like Koryu-ji, or any shrihat suffers destru, we rebuild it, bigger, better, nobler, just so long as we’re still alive to do it. Dying solves nothing.” My smile was sad. “We have to live, so that we ensure what we care about, who we care about, is safe.”

  At our words, the masked figures paused, looking at each other and chittering softly, before they all bowed once more and trooped off in a small n towards Haru-san’s Territory. Watg them go, I was reminded a little of the fairy tale my mom used to tell my sister and I as kids. Though there’s not seven of them… and dwarves do love mining, but they love making stuff more it seems…

  “e on. We have to go.”

  “I have been ready for some time.” Daiyu sniffed. “I am right behind you…”

  ********

  “This is madness.” The Major shook his head, and Lieutenant Nakano Banri had to agree. As gunfire was exged, the JSDF and Special Forces making great pains to keep things as quiet as possible, the invading ese forces seeming to delight in causing as muoisy chaos as possible, he spoke to his superior officer.

  “No damn kidding.” His Type-89 assault rifle was light as a feather in his hands, but simultaneously seemed to weigh him down like it was made out of lead. Squeezing the trigger, which almost seemed to burn his fihough he k was merely a psychological response, he unleashed a three-round burst, and the howling, wide-eyed ese soldier staggered and fell, bright spots of blood blooming on his dirty bat fatigues. Around them more were falling, but even as they were cut down, they were returning fire, a rocket-propelled grereaking towards a group of soldiers hiding in cover.

  “Shit.” He cursed, but the Major was faster. Maing a spear, he hurled it, and it flew like a bullet, striking the ining projectile. It detonated, shattering the hastily created nce, but it was enough to knock the surge of debris off-target, merely setting alight several parked vehicles nearby.

  “Not bad,” Banri aimed and fired, and the shooter fell, bullets riddling his upper body and throat. “You’ve really got better at that, Sasaki-san.”

  “Call me Major. We are in the middle of a mission.” He sighed, firing his gun, which was actually another maion of his ability. “But of course I got stronger. You think I hear stories of little girls who fight better than us, proud soldiers of the JSDF…” he paused to duto cover, bullets spraying off the nearby vehicle, and Banri idly wondered how the citizens would expin the damage to their insuranpany. He doubted there would be a cuse for an invasion.

  “… and not be ashamed? I joihe army to protect people like them, not to cower behind their skirts! Didn’t you do the same, Lieutenant? Besides, I know you’ve been training hard too.”

  As several armoured vehicles rumbled into view, one exploded, a JSDF Type-10 Battle Tank, which had been hiding in a side street, opening up with its main armament, a fairly impressive 120mm on, and sg a direct hit. The other vehicles scattered, but one more was taken out, several anti-armour rockets fired by the Special Forces striking with unerring accuracy. Banri smiled at that, knowing that they had Chirurgery to thank for their impeccable accurad speed.

  “Though it’s still below ours!” Banri said.

  “What are you talking about?” the Major asked, puzzled, as the st Infantry Fighting vehicle opened up with it’s main 25mm assault on, as well as hosing down the area with its coaxial mae guns, bullets ricocheting off pavements and walls, some pierg windows and other points of vulnerability. “Damn those bastards.” The Major cursed, quite unlike him. “I hope we successfully evacuated everyone from the surrounding houses. They don’t care if they kill i civilians! Bastards!”

  “Time for the inferno…” Banri shouted, before realising they were supposed to be keeping quiet. Flushed, goldehat lit up the darkness exposing his shame, he unleashed the torrent of burning energy. The IFV tried to turn, but a well-pced shot from the Major blew oyre, and it skidded into the inferno.

  “Yeah, I have been training. You don’t remember the wisecracks from the girls before? My bro has fmes hotter than that.” He mimicked sarcastically. “Well, I joihe military to get chicks who liked guys in uniform, you know that. No entions here.” He ched his fist, fmes dying off. The IFV was rgely intact, though the armour had melted somewhat, but he khere would be no survivors, those withiher roasted or suffocated, if they were lucky. “Anyway, don’t be sexist. Girls fight just fine. Some of the broads in the Rangers are pretty bad bitches, right?”

  “I didn’t mean it like that, Lieutenant, and you know it. Shit, here es another wave…” he brought his gun up, only to pause. “What the hell?”

  Banri froze as well. “Uh… we’re definitely not in the Boundary right now, are we?” he said, likewise stunned.

  “No, we aren’t. Shit. How is this possible? You think even Akio-san do this?”

  “I wouldn’t put anything past him, but… I sure hope not. This is sick, man. These ese, how far are they going to go? I mean, it’s not like they win, they? We outnumber and outgun them dozens of times over.” His assault rifle fired, bullets pierg the oning ese troops, but after they stopped, blood bursting from new wounds, or fell to the floor, they quickly scrambled into motion again, surging in a tide that seemed unstoppable.

  “They aren’t trying to win. Their victory is when the m es and we have to try and expin all this. I pray no civilians are harmed, but…” the Major shuddered, gun sniping the zombie soldiers. One finally y still, head pletely destroyed, and with that, Banri hurled fmes, iing several more, though the effort of juring them here rather than the Boundary was making him sweat and tremble, his stocks of aether and elemental fire diminishing armingly fast.

  “… remember the rocket assault? Several buildings were hit before our air superiority could take them out.” He go the distance, where thick bck smoke into the sky, and military fire crews were on the se, civilians off limits. “And there could be anoal. Tsumura-sama says that they are aiming for powerful people like us. Shit…” he morphed his gun into a long spear, and carved apart several of the rushing corpses. “… it might be worth losing a few huroops just to take out one Chosen now.”

  “No shit.” Banri jured more fmes, only to let them die down as a volley of rounds from Special Forces snipers, more suited to taking out vehicles than people, smmed into the corpses, pletely demolishing their torsos. Giving a thumbs up to the hidden allies, he sighed, reloading his rifle. “Though if that’s their pn, I wonder how they’ll fare again Akio-san? Poor bastards…”

  “I’d like to see that.” Major Sasaki agreed. “But not everyone is as bat-capable. We should be all right, but there are a lot of key figures in Kyoto. National power is going to be determined not just by money and military might, but by people like us. We ’t let fn powers deplete ours!”

  The Type-10 fired again, and while several parked vehicles were destroyed, the tide of the fallen that were rising again were sughtered with them, uo g to their false sembnce of life as their bodies were obliterated.

  “Hey, aren’t the Type-10’s made by Ichijou Heavy Industries?” Banri said suddenly. “Wasn’t the head of that pany and his granddaughter at that big meeting? Isn’t Akio-san going into business with them?”

  “If you have time to talk, you have time to fight.” The Majhed. “e on, we have to this up before the dawn, otherwise there’s no way the top brass spin this…”

  Banri sighed. “Got it. I’ll keep quiet. Shit, who’d be a soldier? I know that there was always the possibility of flict, of having to fight and kill other people, but…” he let out a bitter sigh, sighting on one of the few remaining walking corpses, before squeezing off another well-aimed three rounds. “… I hought I’d be fighting on home soil. Even though we are the Self-Defence Force…”

  As the remaining zombies fell, Banri breathed a sigh of relief, until a gunshot cracked, and blood spttered, the Major staggering. Turning around, Banri noticed that a fog was rising, starting to obscure everything, the lights on their vehicles and even his night-vision goggles suddenly useless. “What now? Major, you okay?”

  “Shit, I got careless. My shoulder is wrecked. Lucky my instincts made me move my head.” Major Sasaki called back, though his voice was shrinking, as if the fog was abs it. “Guess we… might … targets… as…”

  “Shit, shit, shit!” Banri ignited his fmes, the light it cast pale and wan, the fog almost seeming to be stealing it away. “This is bad, really bad!” Readying himself, he charged into the fog, from the dire he thought he heard the shot ing from…

  ********

  tinuing north, we were heading towards the old Tsukuyomi-aligned shrines and temples. Ahead and beyond that was Saionji-san’s Territory at Kinkaku-ji, where we were going to link up with him, as judging by the sounds of explosions and the fshes of baleful lightning in the dista was a major focus of the fighting.

  First though was the impressive edifice that was Myoshin-ji, the temple grounds here in the Boundary a resple series of gold, ruby and silver buildings, t tates of scarlet and bck everywhere, twenty metre-high cherry trees casting a storm of blossoms into the air, a wonderful sight in happier times.

  Now though, such things were a mere distra, as when roached we immediately came under fire from a group of PLA troops armed with rifles, and several had set up mae guns. A storm of bullets was raining down, as well as some grenades, so I drew on my retly fortified earth energies, and a wall of mud and stone rippled ieopping the onsught.

  “My thanks. Qi ot stop steel. Not yet.” She muttered, looking at me inquisitively. “Though when you were shot earlier, I noticed that you barely reacted. Is that part of the Spiritually Pure Physique?”

  “Not really.” I shrugged. “It’s simply a matter of numbers.” Vaulting up onto the mud wall I hurled bsts of wind outwards, breaking bones. A hidden sniper fired, and I staggered, blood blooming, but the heavy round had deformed and bounced off, gouging flesh but not breaking my bohere. “This ability to move items to the Boundary and have them work is such a dam.” I muttered. “Ixitt would kill for it, I’m sure.” I quickly spotted the sniper, who erched in a tree, and hardening my heart, I swept him with bdes of wind, the body sliced apart, branches and blossoms falling severed. g my hands together to pray for fiveness for defiling shrine grounds, I turned my attention back to the soldiers I had attempted to incapacitate, but they were shambling to their feet, eyes and skin pale.

  “When will you learn?” Daiyu criticised me mildly, reag out to touch my shoulder. “Huh, this does not look so bad.” She sniffed, relieved. “Every group we have engaged has risen from their deaths. Why would this be any different?”

  “You’re right.” I sighed. “Even so, I don’t want to casually massacre them if I help it. Though that seems a forlorn hope about now.” Fmes fred, and the zombies burhe quickest way I had found to deal with them. As they perished, only a few dull moans heard over the sizzling of the yellow fmes, I noticed that the temperature was dropping, an icy mist f up.

  “Careful. This could well be one of the ones on our list.” I warned, and moments ter a hail of icicles started raining down from the silvery skies, each a cold blueish-white and hard as steel, the trees around us colpsing, the nces of frost pierg deep into the ground. More and more were falling down, and I grabbed the protesting Daiyu under my arm, making a break for it.

  As she squawked indignantly I apologised. “Sorry Daiyu’er, but if those hit us, we’re in for a lot of pain.” The ground suddenly froze, flowers and trees instantly frosty, and I stumbled, befaining my band rag clear, only to run into a group of figures wearing simir robes to Daiyu, apanied by a woman carrying a strange mirror as if it was a shield, her expression cold. There’s one of those bdes hanging at her side. Some of those robed people have them too.

  Daiyu squirmed out of my grip, nding on her feet. Brushing herself down, her skin mottled with frost, she looked at the oning troops, her expression tense. “Unquered Heights and Brilliant Dawn Shield.” She decred, softly, but loud enough for everyoo hear. “What madness is this? Why are you here?”

  The woman with the shield snorted, and looking at the strange refle in the polished, gssy surface, I had a bad feeling. If she’s the power of refles on the list, that’s probably the most troublesome power of all… “You want to speak?” she asked the Cultivators she was apanying. “If so, make it quick. These two… the bde hungers.” She caressed the hilt of her bone sword with her free hand, her expression both tender aed.

  “I will speak. I reise you, Bck Jade the Ever Beautiful.” One older man said, his age perhaps in his forties, his robes ahy brown, with gold highlights on his sleeves and shoulders. He gazed at her with his cold brown eyes, his face covered in fading scars, and her lip curled in disdain, possibly at the niame she had told me she hated.

  “Why are we here? Because of your failures! How could you let yourself be caught out by the Sects who betrayed us! Thanks to you, the Party has gone mad, rooting out any and all who refuse to bow to them. No, not merely bow.” He spat, insed. “Unless we kiss their feet, give away all our treasured secrets, bour as sves, we are cast out, exiled. And then… worse…”

  He paused, his gaze flickering up for a moment before he opened his mouth, and I saw a brief fsh of glee. Immediately, I grabbed Daiyu a, as more icicles hammered down where we were standing, these exploding into glittering, diamond dust shrapnel. Landing a few dozeres away, I spun, Daiyu still in my arms, to see the figure of a man ing, bone bde in hand, his white beard and moustaot the sign of age, but an affectation, as he was quite youthful.

  “You dodged that huh? Such a pain.” The young man, his hair dyed a pale white, grinned. His body was covered in blue ice, like armour, and I once more wondered why all of the didates here seemed to be s. It doesn’t make sense. And these are the losers of a struggle as well…

  “Careful, they seem powerful.” The mirror-carrying woman said, her expression bored. “The bde is craving them.” She looked down at the slimy stain spreading on her clothes, tutting. “But more importantly… here we have one of the main reasons we ended up trapped in this misery.” She fixed her sight on Daiyu. “You shouldn’t have disturbed the hunger of that thing. It was sleeping off a feast, the dogs of the Ministry, and your antics, you foolish Cultivators…” she snorted ptuously. “You woke it up!”

  Daiyu looked at her, clearly not uanding what she was talking about. “Woke what? All I did was discover that the target we were after, for the good of us all, was already dead, along with its guards, their spirits drained dry of Qi…” she trailed off, her expression suddenly horrified, and I winced. I see. Yeah, I’m starting to get the picture now…

  As the ist rose around us, Cultivators fanning out to cut off any escape, clearly unwilling to eain more dialogue, I put down Daiyu. “Damn, I wish Shaeu or Hyath was here now, even Shiro. Well, I suppose I should be gd that the mirror-wielder ran into us. Yasaka-san freaked out when he heard just what she could do…”

  “Heard of me? I won’t ask how. I don’t care.” She grihough her eyes were still sullen and bored. “Well, by this shard of the Mirror of Retribution, face your sins!” With that, she angled her shield, until Daiyu and I were reflected in it, and the strange, repulsive refles we cast were as disturbing as they were ugly…

  Behind us, the temperature was dropping further, and with that I drew Cutting Twilight once more. “Daiyu’er, we have to fight. Whatever they say, whatever you did… right now, we have to fight!”

  With that she nodded, and together, we faced off against two other didates, the scattered Sect remnants with them taking up fighting stances arieving what treasured talismans and ons they had escaped with, ready to crush us…