Weight blanketed my body as I dodged the older woman. I moved across the flattened surface, predicting and responding to each punch, slam, and kick aimed at me.
By the second she was going faster, and I increased my speed as well. Her fists were swinging like ones I often see in professional boxing matches and her kicks were being thrown as if we were in a martial arts movie.
Sweat was entering my eyes but seeing my hair getting blasted when I barely was able to dodge a punch made wiping away the salty water the least of my priorities. Suddenly the invisible weight on me grew and my one foot that was carrying most of my weight as I was dodging backwards almost gave out.
Next thing I knew a fist was about to break my face by how fast it was going but at the last second it stopped, causing only the punches wind to grace my face. Panting I looked at the fist that was lightly touching my nose before looking at my opponent who was looking at the sky.
Slowly she pulled her fist away and stood up straight.
"We will stop here for today."
I was panting as Alene's voice sounded out. I looked up at her in confusion as our session wasn't over yet. Doubtfully I recounted the days I've been here but after many equations I still end up with the same answer if being here for only 15 days meaning it was only 6 hours in the real world.
The woman in question was still looking up at the ever-changing sky. Her face fixed in an odd blank look.
"Why? Did something happen?" I questioned looking up to the sky before looking back at her. She didn't answer me right away as she continued looking up at the sky before finally she breathed out and shook her head.
She then looked at me with a look before smiling brightly. "The world out there is chaotic." The sentence was random but ominous. My confusion was slowly turning into worry but as if she didn't just say something alarming she laughed freely.
"Well good luck." She said cheerfully.
"What?" I asked before everything became dark.
I woke up in a gasp. I looked around the familiar room and noticed, strangely, no one was there. Wang Nuo, Chen Liang, or Zhou Li would stay by my side to make sure I was alright and that I wouldn't drown in the water, but now I was the only one here.
Getting out of the warm water, I was going to see if there was any food on the table as my stomach growled but commotion sounded out from outside the door. Without much thought, I quickly examined myself, making sure every feature of my body was covered.
I ignored how my wet clothing clung onto me, as I made way to the center room before the door slammed open. I didn't take a good look at the person before they reached to grab me and my body responded instinctively, avoiding the hands as I pushed myself backward behind the couches, so there was something between me and the person.
Me and the now-visual older teen stayed in confrontation. Me feeling tight and the older teen breathing rapidly as his eyes looked furiously at me. The teen looked to be around 19, a foot shorter than the mammoth of a man, Zhou Jian. His face looked very similar to Wang Nuo showcasing the family bond between them. However, what my eyes gravitated to was his tan uniform robe, which oddly looked familiar.
"So this is the kid you all are protecting while my little sister is out in the unknown with a dangerous individual?!" The man shouted, turning around to look at a calm Wang Nuo and a pinch-faced Zhou Jian, who stood at the door, while a worried Chen Liang and Zhou Li were behind them.
Chen Liang pushed herself inside as she immediately came to me to pick me up in her arms. Quietly, she asked if I was okay, to which I nodded as I watched and tried to understand the situation at hand right now.
Zhou Jian was going to say something but Wang Nuo walked into the front and up to the teen boy. She didn't wear her usual makeup today, nor did she dress elegantly like she always did whenever she exited the room. Instead, her face was bare, her hair was high up in a bun, and her Hanfu was dark and overly simple.
Her gentle face was now stone cold and she was staring down at the taller young man in front of her. The young man didn't step down and stare at her back but I could see his hands trembling by his side.
The word "Spiritual Pressure" sounded in my head as I watched the ordeal. The more time went by, the more the teen shook and his face became contorted. However, despite this, he still looked at Wang Nuo dead in the eyes.
"Zhou Shen, I did not send you to the High Mountain Water Sect for you to come back and lose your rationality." Her voice was stern and her eyes practically had flames in them. She stepped closer to the teen. They stared at each other before the teen grunted as his body bent more under pressure and eventually he looked down with a conflicted face but nevertheless he said a quiet apology.
Hearing it, Wang Nuo's face finally relaxed as she sighed while placing her hand on the teen's cheek, her face returning to its familiar gentleness. "You're not the only one who's worried, Zhou Shen. Everyone is worried. Zhou Mei is not the only one who's been taken; so has Jiang Wu. Jiang Wu's family is also worried sick but everyone understands that rushing in and not making a plan is not the best idea."
Her eyes looked over his shoulder to look at me before looking back at the young man in front of her. "Especially the plan you're thinking of, Zhou Shen. You think he will give them back because we gave him what he wants? From all the time you spent in that sect, they didn't teach you this? Well, I for one, have taught you this. Maybe it's time you come home for a bit to clear your mind." Her face hardened the more she spoke.
Zhou Shen didn't say a rebuttal; instead, he huffed while exiting the room, and right as he was leaving from view, his eyes locked onto me. It was filled with pure hatred before he finally disappeared. My grip on Chen Liang strengthened as a bad promotion spread throughout me.
I reached down to Chen Liang's hands that held me and wrote on one of them, "Bad mental states cause irrational decisions." I felt Chen Liang's grip on me further strengthen before she said something out loud.
"Sister Nuo, are you sure it's okay for him to walk out like that? Zhou Shen doesn't seem like he's feeling well." Chen Liang didn't let out a shimmer of doubt in her words and sounded like a worried aunt. Maybe she was worried but her tense body told a different story.
Wang Nuo, who was looking at the floor in deep thought, looked up to Chen Liang and said, "Zhou Shen is a hot head but once given a clear view of a plan, he will calm down. I will go to his room after he calms down a bit to tell them of our plan for rescuing the children."
I could tell Chen Liang wanted to say more but she held her breath. Wang Nuo saw it anyway and gave us a weak smile as she comforted, "Though I might say this, however, it seems like my son has changed a bit so I have sent people to follow him just in case." With that, Chen Liang finally calmed down but I didn't.
Alene's words echoed in my ears and my doubts spread like a plague throughout my nervous system. An episode that I haven't felt for a long time was acting up but now that I am familiar with the feeling of pain, it felt more like a hum but it was an annoying hum that is reminding me that relaxing was not my best choice of action. I placed the feeling in the back of my head to remind myself to always be on guard as I asked Wang Nuo a question.
Getting her attention by waving my hand I asked, "Zhou Mei and Jiang Wu are missing? The Ringleader kidnapped them? Since when? How?" I was truly confused because the lockdown wasn't only for me but also for the two children.
Jiang Wu has been staying with us the whole time during the lockdown. Everyone recognized Wang Nuo's strength and recognized among all the parents involved that the Zhou Household was the safest under Wang Nuo's talismans. During time's when I wasn't in Alene's Spirit Realm, I was mostly hanging out with the two of them. Either talking or sharing experiences that will benefit them in the long run. The last time I saw them was right before I went to practice. Zhou Mei was saying the two of them were going to learn things with Zhou Jian.
Wang Nuo sighed before rubbing her forehead. "That you just met is my first son, Zhou Shen. He just came to visit from being away in his sect but it was a surprise visit and without letting me or Zhou Jian know, he took both the kids out." I felt my eye twitch.
"No one stopped them?" I signed in bewilderment. Practically everyone here knew we were in a lockdown and had a general idea why we were. It made no sense that no one tried to stop them, whether or not Zhou Shen was the young master. The young master shouldn't be able to override the head master and madam's words.
Wang Nuo's face hardened as she turned to look at a quiet Lou, who stood there like a shadow in the corner. "You gather those were guarding the children and entrance during the time they left?" She asked the quiet woman.
Lou didn't look at Wang Nuo as she answered, "They disappeared, Madam Wang Nuo. Me, Gong, and Dong looked everywhere, but they are no longer in the household. We asked around and people are saying that they were acting abnormally." Wang Nuo questioned what she meant, which Lou further explained: "They said their movement was wobbly and their behavior was stiff, when they asked what was wrong with them, they said it was sickness."
"Sickness?" Wang Nuo repeated. "Sickness," she said again with a disbelief laugh. I watched as Lou's head bowed further down, the more the laugh turned to anger.
"Well, someone is in trouble." I thought, watching as Wang Nuo lost her previous cool as she walked side to side in the room. While Zhou Jian was comforting her, I turned to Chen Liang to further explain how the two children were taken.
"Zhou Shen said they were out eating and Zhou Mei needed to go to see the special lanterns they have there, so they went to look at them while Zhou Shen was talking to his friends from the sect that came with him." Chen Liang spoke while looking at a calm Wang Nuo as she spoke softly to Lou and Zhou Jian.
"They got taken during that time?" She nodded. I hummed before asking, "And Zhou Shen didn't meet the man?" Once again, Chen Liang nodded in affirmation. "So how does he know that I was the reason why it happened?" I could tell she wanted to disagree with what I just said but she stopped. I watched as she was thinking and even looked at Zhou Ji, who shook his head.
"Sister Nuo." Chen Liang called out, causing the woman to stop her conversation as she looked over. "How did Zhou Shen know the man was looking for Ignis?"
Wang Nuo turned blank before slowly turning to Zhou Jian, who also wore a blank face. Before I could even comprehend, both woman and man disappeared from the space, leaving behind a quiet atmosphere that soon became ominous.
It didn't take long before the three of us—me, Chen Liang, and Zhou Li—entered our bedroom. After setting me down on the bed, the two adults started placing talismans and runes everywhere in the room. The bad feeling I was getting was becoming stronger by the second and it came to a head when a tiny white stone glowed on the nightstand by the bed.
Zhou Li picked it up and placed it on his head. Whatever he was hearing was obviously bad news, as his brows furrowed. Zhou Li took the stone down the moment it turned dark and faced me and Chen Liang, who was sitting by me.
"Zhou Shen can't be found. No one knows where he went and even his friends are gone." He said quietly.
"Taken or possessed?" Chen Liang asked at an equal volume as she picked me up and had me sit on her lap. Her hand was rubbing my back while I looked up at her. It was scary how a couple of hours have passed since I last saw it here in reality and the once beautiful face now looks to have aged. Her body was slouched, her hair was messy from her fingers constantly running them through, and her eyes looked blown out as they unintentionally flickered at anything that made a sound.
It reminded me of the first time I met her.
"Jian said it might be the later; however, Sister Nuo didn't feel anything." Zhou Li answered. He looked at his wife in concern, probably already noticing how her mental state was degrading, before his eyes looked over to me.
"Do you think he's infected by a Gu?" I signed out.
Zhou Ji didn't say anything for a moment while I thought back at Alene's explanation of what a Gu does to a person with a fully healed soul.
"While you have a buffer since your soul is broken, if someone who has a fully healed soul got it then influencing the person's thoughts will be easy. Especially if they are mentally weak. Mentally weak people are easy to control. It's the strong willed ones that are able to overrule."
Alene's words left a bitter taste in my mouth as the memory of how I wanted to end it all was still fresh in my head. My hands tightened as Zhou Li finally nodded his head to my question.
"Yes, we believe he has it but there's one question we need to know." He wondered out loud.
"When he got it." Chen Liang finished his words. Zhou Li wanted to say something but Chen Liang stood up before looking at me. "I think someone is in desperate need of a change of clothes. You will catch a cold if you stay in these wet clothes even further."
Her words shocked me and Zhou Li but I didn't question it and Zhou Li closed his mouth as he watched us pick out an outfit for me to wear. She chose one that was fully black with black stitching of vines and leaves. I was going to put it on but she stopped me as she helped me take off my wet clothes and put on the new dry ones after drying me off.
I looked up at her and saw tears in her brown eyes. Her mouth was sucked into her mouth and her brows furrowed as she was trying not to let the tears fall down. When I was fully dressed, she leaned back and said gently, "Handsome."
I smiled under the mask that I still had on. Lot of thoughts were going in my head. Weaving and spinning. It was like watching the final countdown of the dungeon boss coming onto screen blinding everyone with their intricate design and enchanting voice track before finally zooming out to show the little hero that you play who was barely leveled up and only had cloth on their back and a club in their hands.
I looked at my hands that showed hard work from these many days of training but nevertheless the tininess of them as they were still the size of a toddlers kept my mood low. I looked at Chen Liang 's face and saw dismay that I was stifling inside.
Both of us shouldn't be feeling like this.
Sighing, I rejuvenated myself as I pulled on her sleeve. When I got her attention I thought of many ways to communicate myself to her but at the end I decided to just go straight to the point as I signed, "I might not make this out alive." Her face froze, probably not expecting me to say that but before she could say anything, I continued, "I just want you to know that if I don't, I don't want you to go into a spiral like the first time I met you."
Her body started shaking while her tears finally escaped her eyes and slid down her face. However, I ignored the visual expression of her telling me to stop: "Believe me when I say that no child who truly loves their parents wants to see their parents go into a depressive disintegration because of them."
I wiped her tears with my sleeve before taking my hands back as I said, "I only saw a fake visual of my family becoming like that and it made me feel like I was dying all over again." I shifted so I could look at the quiet cabinet. "So imagine how it feels for your son?" She closed her eyes tightly; however, I tapped her so she could see what I was about to say. "I am not saying you can't feel pain." I looked over to her, whose tears stopped as she looked at my hands with baited breath.
"I'm just saying, Chen Liang, I want you to be happy. I want you to heal. If I don't make it out alive, just know that it was never your fault. In fact, being here was so bearable because of you and all those I met who gave me nothing but warmth." I signed before I was pulled into a hug.
I felt another pair of arms wrapped around me and my masked forehead tapped against Zhou Li's. I pushed the discomfort down but nevertheless, my body was shaking, not ready for what I wanted to do.
Before either one of them asked me what was wrong, I crooked out with my voice, which I haven't used in a long time: "You guys are amazing and your son was so lucky to have parents like you." My pronunciation was horrible and my voice faded near the end as bile was coming up my throat and my body was shaking heavily. I feel like a night out gone wrong in the worst way possible but it was worth it to hear the laughter of both of them.
"I would say that someone needs to take a lesson on pronunciation, however," Zhou Li said, lifting his forehead from mine and taking my mask away a little bit to look at my face. "I would rather you just sign." Zhou Li joked and Chen Liang laughed a bit while rubbing my shaking body. I rolled my eyes playfully but stopped as the urge to throw up came up again.
Placing my mask back on my face, Zhou Li whispered seriously. "Your voice is very nice, Ignis. Thank you for having us listen to it." He spoke quietly. Feeling my body gradually ease, I was able to hum.
We separated, and when Zhou Li was about to say anything, a loud explosion sounds from outside, causing the whole place to shake. Zhou Li quickly covered me, Chen Liang, as things came crashing down from the shelves. The scent of medicine spread out and screams and footsteps sounded from outside.
Zhou Li looked down at us and asked if we had any injuries and after telling him we were fine, he got up and quickly got his spear. He went to get the stone that was now glowing but instead of white, it was glowing red. Facing the door, he placed it on his head.
"People in black are attacking us and the area around us." He spoke, turning to me and Chen Liang. "The city guards are demanding you and I heal people." He said grimly to Chen Liang. She looked down at me, then back at him, her face evident of her unsaid question.
Zhou Li sighed before saying, "If the situation is under the influence of who we think it is, the safest place for him will be in this room filled with talismans and runes. Out there in a space of chaos, it will only lead to him being an open target, no matter how much we guard him."
"One of us can stay with him and the other goes to help people. Once we tell them the situation, they should understand-."
"However, it will bring more eyes to Ignis." Zhou Li interrupted Chen Liang. Her body shook, probably in a dilemma. If both of them stayed, they would get in trouble, and of course the reason why they stayed would link to me. The same would happen if one of them left and the other stayed. Eyes have mouths. Mouths talk to other ears. And curiosity is the doom for the hidden.
Patting her, I signed, "The best is to give me anything that can help me through the situation." She looked at me for a bit. We stared at each other before I patted her again. Breathing out, her face became stern as she moved around the room, placing things in my storage bag. Whistling, Po came trotting to me as he was pointed to and laid by my side.
"Guard him." She said to him and Po let out a soft bark before placing his head onto my lap as his body wrapped around me. Then she looked over at me. "Be safe, Ignis. Please." Her voice carried a begging tone, making my heart burn. I nodded as she gave me my storage bag, which quickly became tightly attached to myself.
She stood up, looking down at me and Po, before she and Zhou Li left the room after placing more talismans down and telling me instructions for a couple things she placed in my bag.
Po and I stayed in the spot for a while before moving to the back of the room after hearing people yelling and banging on the wall and doors of the room. Neither of us relaxed or moved after hiding in the space between the bed and the wall.
Po's body was frozen like a statue, besides the occasional breathing. His ears were perked, twitching whenever he heard something. I rubbed his body, hoping to relieve some stress his body was probably feeling after being in the same position for so long.
The sounds of explosions and screaming didn't stop even when night came and the moon hung high in the sky. The darkness made my heart uneasy, like something was stalking in it. Getting up, I went to grab the hand-held lantern and quickly lit up with the matches that were found after searching through the mess on the ground.
I set the lantern to light a blaze, one that made the space no longer dark but not bright enough to be seen through the window. Suddenly, slamming was heard from the door. Po got into an attack posture and started growling softly. While I faced the door and slowly backed up.
"I know you're there! Open the door! It's not fair my sister got taken when it was supposed to be you! Let him get you! Let him have you!" I heard the voice of Zhou Shen as yelled. It sounded maniacal and crazed.
I took the stone that Chen Liang left me in my bag and pressed on it like she instructed me to. The stone was an item similar to Earth's walkie-talkie. It went directly to the other twin stone. I was given it as an emergency dial, as it will glow and transmute any noise around me.
I heard Chen Liang on the other side asking what's wrong but hearing the commotion, she immediately told me not to hang up and that she and Zhou Li would come over now. I did as she said and continued pressing the bottom as Zhou Shen tried to break in but eventually he stopped.
However, me and Po didn't hear him leave, as he continued growling and I stood behind him holding the stone as Chen Liang comforted me through it. Suddenly, the door made a big bang and a white light flashed, causing me to get down. The door shook heavily but the damage wasn't the door but the talismans and runes.
One by one the talismans burned and the runes broke. I watched as they all destroyed like a wave went through it. My eyes moved along the wave destroying path before looking at the back of the space. Where I stood was at the perfect angle to see the bathtub. Except I wasn't looking at the bath tub.
I was looking at a pair of eyes.