CH16: Cerberus

She was beset on all sides by screaming souls. The spirits of the dead and dying blew past her, reaching out to rip her away from her orbit. While they fell away, her nine fragments held her in place even as new fragments entered her as the inverse. Chi flowed into them along with the understanding of hundreds of thousands. Souls born of fragments she had only just grasped and died in a breath passed her by leaving their experiences. Only she remained in the orbit of a black hole.

No more significant than a pinprick the sum of all spirits that neared it were reduced to their base parts and picked through tossing the rest away. It ravaged the spiritual uncaring of any damage. It did a force of nature more than active personal destruction. For those too close, it was devastating, but for her, far enough away and hidden within a pocket dimension, she was safely locked in its orbit but not in any danger.

Then she felt her body again as power, and a sage-created artifact was laid upon her body. Severing realm chi passed into her, and she used it to evolve her 9 inverse fragments into 3 spirit arts. She was a Dao seed among Dao seeds, and she was more than willing to prove it.

With the spirit arts at her disposal, there was no time for soul searching or being choosy. She needed a sage art to counter the controls the artifact was doing to her. She almost had a spirit art with the hidden realm before. Fusing ice and fire or yin and yang was possible, but it was only a lot to ask for in her current state. She had hoped to do so much during the new moon.

The black hole returned to reality, and only a single barrier divided them. It was beautiful the way souls swirled around it, ripped apart, and fell to the point of no escape. There was power to be a gaping maw that knew only how to devour it, and it was inspiring, but not the right kind of inspiring.

She was a genius among geniuses, so she knew not to be overly ambitious, work hard, or overcomplicate things. Only she was Gou Fen, and this was worse than getting her period during a spirit art formation.

That happened, and it was the worst. She took pills to prevent it, and that wasn’t important. Gou needed a set of spirit arts that would become a sage art that would empower and be empowered by her eventual true sage art.

“I don’t understand. I’ve pumped so much yin and ice chi into her. She should have at least mutated into a monster by now. The souls should have done something. My sage art seed gave her all the direction she could need to grow like a vine up a tree.” So some pervert has her corpse in his clutches and is trying to make her into a Jiangshi.

“Why don’t I suck your dick, and you can relax and give your work some time.” A feminine voice said.

She needed to get far away from these perverts.

…

After only a few hours of looking over the formations and figuring out what was actually going on, I found two options that wouldn’t lead to our deaths. One was to walk in and stop the elevator at a certain point. The formation didn’t have notes, so I couldn’t find the right time to go through. Fortunately, there was another way.

I tapped a point on the formation and activated it. A panel slid open in the cave, revealing a tunnel.

“So the elevator was a trap.” Li Mei asked.

I smirked up at her. “Yea. That’s how these things go.”

No, the elevator wasn’t a trap. It just wasn’t the only way, either.

Light glimmered from within the tunnel, and the beak of a massive crawling bird covered in black feathers emerged. It opened its mouth, and the cries of the damned spewed forth.

The elders clutched their ears and fell to their knees as their nascent souls cried out in agony.

Li Mei clutched her ears. “That’s horrible. Someone make it stop.”

I raised my hand. “I’ll take care of it.” De Zimo said.

De Zimo raised his hand, and soul fire sprayed the creature, and its call of the damned turned into shrieks of pain. The air on the other side of the tunnel fed the flames, and they shot through the tunnel, filling it with screams of agony and then silence.

“That was terrible. Can we agree to kill them immediately when we see them from this point forward?” Elder Gou said.

We agreed and entered the tunnel. The panel closed behind us, revealing a seal. The image of an eagle covered in gold over the corpse of a crow demon was a bit tacky. The seal itself was a door control for not only our door but many others. I cracked the doors so my hair could peek under them.

“What’s the plan?” Li Mei asked while the elders recovered.

“I’m going to steal everything that isn’t nailed down. It seems all the good stuff is in these secret tunnels with Golden Eagle iconography.” I said.

“I thought your sect was the Thunder Eagle sect.” Li Mei said.

“They changed their name so the Camio wouldn’t take revenge on the immortals from the sect,” I said.

  “Oh, that might work if the demons are stupid.” Li Mei said.

I shrugged. Given the sheer number of sects in the world, a few might have similar enough names that a Thunder Eagle sect might squeak by. Who would know the difference between the Thunder Eagle, War Eagle, Rust Eagle, Bald Eagle, and Ghost Eagle? Then again, their demons are demons, so maybe they would simply kill everyone from those sects. Then again, it was also possible that the demons didn’t care that they lost their foothold in a mortal world. 

Right, power-hungry demons didn’t care about losing power.

“What are the odds the founder tore the demons apart and established another Golden Eagle sect?” I asked.

Li Mei shrugged.

…

Paintings covered in moth-eaten golden shrouds, books wrapped in golden chains, symbols held under lock and key, massive golems filled with souls, and so many corpses littered the rooms, and these were most likely the lesser treasures. The warehouse protected in my soul space would need to be expanded at this rate. I left every room empty, taking even the golem guards as we passed to ensure I took everything. If the stones on the floor were made of jade, gold, or precious jewels, I took them.

More Crow demons emerged, and we took turns annihilating them. They ranged from late foundation to late core, but none had been nascent soul rank so far. They allowed me to tighten my control over my growing fighting style. I was breaking away from Eagle Strike style and forming something of my own.

Crow demons rushed up the hill, and I formed a wall of black stone and attached one of the rings to it. In a fraction of a second, the stone extended into a wall of spikes, piercing the crow demons before dispersing.

“These numbers are a problem.” Elder Gou said.

I glanced back at him. “What do you mean?”

The other elder spoke up. “So many core and foundation realm monsters mean we will soon encounter a nascent soul realm monster. By their number, there could be severing realm monsters mixed in leading them or even a half-step immortal.”

I shrugged at that. “We’ll fight whatever, whoever we must.”

“We could leave, find bodies that will accept our souls, and leave this place behind.” De Zimo said.

The elders stared at us uncomfortably. “You would take the body from someone so callously.”

I shrugged. “There are billions of mortals. I’m sure I can convince one to willingly give up their body. If not one of them, then I could always take over the body of a beast, though I’ve heard their rules for cultivation are a bit different.”

“Extrapolate on that, or we won’t feel easy letting you go if we must retreat.”

“I could find a town controlled by a demonic sect where the mortals live brutal, unfulfilling lives and find someone who wants revenge no matter the cost. I’ll agree to give it to them in exchange for their body. Of course, I’ll only accept payment up front.” I said.

“You’ve thought about how you would manipulate a poor child out of the only thing they have to offer. Why not rob some poor woman out of her unborn child and be done with it.” Elder Gou said.

I shrugged. “We are soul entities that want bodies of our own. What would you do? Do either of you have better ideas?” I asked.

Elder Gou nodded. “Master George Whiteman can give life to corpses and make them far more powerful than they were in life. Some have their own lives once again. By joining the sect, you can have one with enough contribution points.”

I met Li Mei and De Zimo’s eyes, and figuring out what each other was thinking wasn't hard. We might not have known each other long, but it was clear that this was a manipulation to control us.

“Beasts can gain human form given enough time. We’ll take our chances with them instead, but thanks. I’m rather partial to zebras. I’m sure there are some on the planes south of here.” That seemed to give the elders some pause.

“You would take an animal host instead of a human to ease our moral worries.” Elder Gou said.

“I’ve always been partial to cats. Maybe I could get a cute lioness cub body. That would be so sweet.”

This would have been the perfect time to kill the elders. I looked them over. They were tired and had a hard time recovering their chi. While they had the potential of nascent soul cultivators, they had major endurance problems, and this vault was a marathon, not a race.

“Hey, if you can use those jade slips to get us some animal bodies to hop into when we get out, that would be great. We need a pregnant lioness, zebra, and De Zimo. What did you want?”

“Oh, a freshly laid wyvern egg would be best. Plain wyverns are particularly sturdy creatures, from what I remember,” De Zimo said.

The elders smiled as if pleased. We seemed so trusting, but there was no way we would trust anything they gave us.

Something shook the tunnel. I turned to see a three-headed dog, each with a different elemental flame flashing between its teeth. How did I not sense it coming? It vanished, and the other elder walked into its mouth and vanished in a single bloody bite.

“It’s a Cerberus.” Elder Gou yelled.

My fist flew, and the beast was gone before my attack landed. Hot breath spewed flames on my back as my jaws clamped down. I raised a single hand, catching the jaw before it could kill Li Mei. The creature vanished in my grip. The Cerberus was on the other side of the tunnel and spewed ice out of its right mouth, blocking the cave.

“What is a Cerberus?” I asked.

  I kept my voice calm as the Elder hyperventilated. “They are the guardians of hell. Why are they here? We aren’t trying to reach the immortal realm.” I concluded they were far beyond what we would typically deal with.

De Zimo raised his hand, and I punched as Cerberus tried to bite his arm off. It was only a guess, but if I could teleport or whatever Cerberus was doing, that’s what I would do. Dogs liked their prey panicking. I extended my hair to fill the tunnel, and it didn’t matter where or when Cerberus was at any given time.

The monster took my next blow to the lightning snout, and it unleashed a howl. A devious plan came to mind.

Hellish lightning blasted my body, and I tried to run away. The beast howled louder as more lightning blasted my body. I held my hands to my neck and shrieked. It committed unleashing more power than before as its fire and ice snouts fizzled out from the power drain.

The hellish lightning touched my soul, splashing against it, and shards of it fell away, but they were only the weakest parts. I turned to run while shrieking, and the Cerberus increased the power even more until I started laughing.

It lunged to bite, and I ducked and weaved through its attacks. The monster’s claws raised up to slam down on me, and I leaped out of the way. My back remained to the creature as it attacked, swiping and biting. It vanished, appearing in front of me and lunging to similar results.

I punched it in the nose and felt my hand shatter against its body. There was no blood, and the pressure altered as a new hand grew, and the rest of my body changed. It wasn’t physically fast, but it could teleport. The monster was sturdier than anything I’ve ever encountered.

The world seemed to hold its breath as a massive ice sickle fired at hyper-sonic speeds and shattered against the beast’s hide.

“It's true their bodies are treasures that can withstand the attacks of half-step immortals.” The beast’s fur didn’t even move as ice shards tore through my body, shattering bones and throwing Li Mei across the room. De Zimo took it better, but his dragon scales were still ripped from the impact. “We need to retreat and find a way around the beast.” Elder Gou said.

Why could we go on another dive and get set upon by the Cerberus again? My body was still adapting and growing stronger from damaging my body the first time. I didn’t want to risk Li Mei and De Zimo’s lives but wanted revenge.

Which was more important in their lives or moving forward?

I wanted it. A piece of me soldered with in outrage. They used me, Lui Fang cheated on me, and I saved them from the Djinn.

But maybe this time, I’ve found people to rely on. What was the best choice?

A claw slashed through Li Mei’s pressure. I felt her energy drop like a stone. She barely clung to life.

I hated them for forcing me to make this choice.

“Zimo, melt that ice. I’ll distract it.” I said.

I punched it again with all my strength, and the monster twisted and bit my arm and half my body off.

I froze as the open air touched my soul. A small line covered the edge of my soul where a tooth scraped it.

My offhand punished the Cerberus with a blow to its eye. The monster didn’t move when my blow struck, and the bones in my arm exploded.

Chi boiled, and pressure regenerated incredibly as the monster’s third head roared with black hell flames.

The Elder raised an ancient key. In a flash, we were out of the vault. We fell at the entrance, and I gasped as my body finished regenerating.