The day was warmer than a hot mom's buttocks. From the golden sand landscape, heat waves swam towards the bright blue sky as ethereal curtains. There were no clouds so the only moving things one could see were the dancing sand dunes.
It was the Comfur Desert, the longest and the biggest desert in the Western Continent. At times, the desert was referred to as the guardian of the west because it acted as a barrier preventing Eastern bumpkins from entering the city of opportunity and dreams.
Amidst the rolling sands, five humanoid figures stood, locked in a tense standoff.
On one side stood two men cad in t-shirts, accompanied by two camels. At their feet rested a coffin. Daniel's skin bore a steaming red hue, while Marquis's ant-human skin resembled a charred steak.
On their opposite side was a horseless (or camel-less) carriage. It was called a car; more and more of these were emerging recently. This model was a 2-year-old Fort T. It looked exactly like a black carriage but with a nose that contained a device called an engine.
Two of the three men in front of the car looked like bodybuilders escaped from prison. It wasn't sure if they went to school but their thick black ties resting on their neat white shirts with folded sleeves said otherwise. To complete the attire, a pair of suspenders stretched over their shoulders attaching to their narrow pinstripe pants that were hugging their legs with tailored precision.
Both of them had deep black eyes like the person standing in between them: Marcello Riina, the loan shark. His frame, smaller than the bodyguards, was packed in a black vest on top of a white shirt and tie. To complete the attire, he was wearing a black long coat, which trailed below his knees and billowed in the wind.
Marquis and Daniel gulped, forgetting about the heat for a second. Probably it was just the heat but Marcello's aura felt different, as if this guy was solo sitting under the shade of the only tree in this wide desert.
For three decades, Marcello had been a part of the mafia world. He was a powerful man, calm as a cucumber. He raised his hand slowly towards his head. He wanted to slick back his hair but his black round hat thwarted the move. This made him stare intently at the t-shirt fools. 'Who the heck wears t-shirts in the desert?'
He cleared his throat and wiped his mouth multiple times. The debt of these idiots was huge, but he was willing to let go if the 'step-brother' was really as Marquis had described.
Heat waves surge inside his pants.
His eyes also welled up with emotions as memories of the past flooded back. Many of his underlings walked out on him when they discovered he possessed a DualMax68. Since then he could only feel the rough grind of his hand to combat the stress from the decline of his gang.
Despite his lust demons, he looked like a gentleman because of his suit and beardless face. But, to be real, all rat-human clean-shaved to hide their sideways growing beard.
"It's a-me Marcello. Sho' me the merchandise."
A few nails scattered away as Marquis tore the casket cover.
Fang Fang embraced the comfy sun drape over his face. He felt as if someone rubbed a smoothing balm on his skin. A warm vibration resonated through his every cell which was exposed to the radiant desert light.
'It never occurred to me that the sun could be so rejuvenating.'
But suddenly, Marcello's shadow fell on him, eclipsing a part of the sun.
As the loan shark peeked inside the casket he saw a boy dressed in a noble black shirt tucked neatly inside black pants. Just one look made his pants bulge. One night, he was one night away from fulfilling his dream. He could already envision himself replaying that dream in an unending loop.
"Ahh, such sweet-a boy! You jokers, you consider your debt-a paid.." Marcello said, his eyes glued at Fang Fang. "Put-a him in the car."
The bodyguards had just taken a step forward when Marcello's hand signaled them to halt. His smile momentarily froze as he noticed the gradual shift in Fang Fang's skin tone. The white complexion seemed to undergo a subtle transformation, as if drying under the sun into a faint pinkish hue.
"Mammamia!" Marcello exclaimed.
Curiosity widened Lil Marquis's eyes as he peered inside the casket. So far, everything had been proceeding according to plan. The deal with Marcello could liberate him from the threat of being pursued and auctioned off in the black market.
He stood on the brink of a fresh beginning, a clean state with 0 debt in the city. But the sigh of relief that was building within him got trapped in his throat.
Fang Fang's crystal green eyes were starting back at him from the casket, and they blinked! A shiver surged from his toes and rose towards his head.
There were tons of rumors about his allegedly dead step-brother. Some of his siblings said that their queen mother was able to preserve the body of her firstborn and she took good care of the corpse until she died two years ago.
Was the step-brother alive all along?
Marcello Riina cleared his throat audibly, still not looking up from the casket. He missed Fang Fang's eyelid that had blinked only once.
"It's-a fine, the skin color doesn't matter and I like it better with open-a eyes."
"Nah, fuck you man. I ain't givin' away no alive brother."
Daniel's brows knitted in response to Lil Marquis's words. Alive? He had been leaning on the camel until now, silently celebrating Marcello's interest. However, this unexpected twist left him momentarily speechless. Standing up, he attempted to swallow the dryness that had settled in his throat, but his efforts were in vain as no saliva came to his aid.
"Yu-yu-you sure?"
"We are so fucked!" Lil Marquis said in a grave tone.
Daniel's lips twitched, as if restraining a scream. But it was the sand beneath his feet which silently shouted as dust blasted from the place where his feet had been seconds ago. The bodyguards were caught off guard, unable to react as his figure with the fluttering t-shirt, lunged toward the casket.
Fang Fang's eyes widened in astonishment as he witnessed Daniel's wind aided movement.
'Did he use Qi?'
However, the answer appeared no. The glow from under Daniel's shirt confused him. Daniel's power screamed instability whereas Qi energy was tranquil even when used to generate a tornado.
He followed the path of the wind currents, tracing their source to somewhere within Daniel's shirt. Their origin seemed to be the heart.
'It seems that people here imitate cultivation practices. However, I can't sense any Qi, nor do I resonate with the wind.
'After my death, I lost my comprehension of nature and all my Qi. I, a grand scholar, once capable of calling forth rainstorms with a snap of my fingers, someone on the brink of immortality, lost all my cultivation progress!
'Doesn't this make me a weak mortal? It would have been acceptable if I had no memory of my past, but I remember. Thus, eliminating the possibility of my rebirth.
'Hence, my only conclusion is that I've transmigrated to a different universe.
Daniel put Fang Fang down on the scorching sand before the latter could study his power more.
"Fu-fu-fuck, your sat-sat-step brother is staring at me-me-me."
Loan shark Marcello observed with a calm face. He was a patient man. He had been in the crime business since his uncle played doctor-doctor with him and tricked him into dual cultivation. Three nights after that incident, he smashed his uncle's head with a baseball bat gaining attention from the local mafias.
"Whatta are you doing? It seems, you do not understand your-a position here. I am in a good-a mood so I will give-a you another chance. Hand-a over the boy."
He thought the t-shirt boys were growing nervous, the heat of the desolate desert wasn't a help either. Nevertheless, the specifics didn't concern him; he was fine with a corpse or a paralyzed body. Worst case, he would have to kill five people and bury four.
Marquis stepped away from the crazy loan rat Marcello. He cast a complex gaze towards Fang Fang, a myriad of emotions playing across his face, before finally nodding in Daniel's direction.
"We ain't sellin' our homie!"