It is not the way of the world,

That the Lord would be put down

And buried underneath the

Very thing They created,

Peace, Peace, upon Earth,

But hell, Hell upon that Gleaming City,

That which hath impaled God when it fell upon its spires,

Forget not the cursed name:

Biringan.

/// IN THE MONASTERY OF THE MOON, AFTER THE INCURSION OF PANGINOON HUMABON

“Where are they?” asked Jonathan and Mattheo as they walked back into the Monastery. The teachers and other volunteer workers of the Monastery that had been left behind had begun the cleaning, scraping off blood and goop and flesh and broken Garuda bodies off the floor. Those students that had died, they carried off.

Brother Owl stopped for a moment, before inhaling and turning to Jonathan and Mattheo. “But before that, follow me. Brahm, help with the cleaning and restructuring.” He turned and walked forth. Nevertheless, the two boys still walked up with him, following him to wherever he was going.

“Yeah, but where are they?” asked Mattheo again, looking about the monastery only to find that their friends weren’t there.

“They are safe, do not worry. However, they must be picked up soon, lest they stray from one of my roosts. Especially since…” Brother Owl inhaled. “The balete led them to that place.”

“What that place?” pressed Mattheo, but he received no answer. “Alright then, nice talking to you.”

Jonathan noticed that Brother Owl moved… weirdly. He had his hands behind his back as he moved, but as he walked forward, he looked like he barely moved his legs. It was as if his feet didn’t even touch the floor as they walked forward. Jonathan opened his mouth to say something but then decided not to press on. At this point, anything weird he had learned to just accept and to just wait for the answer a bit down the line.

Soon enough, Brother Owl had led them to a place behind the Monastery. There, were rows upon rows of little white stone graves. Each headstone had the sculpture of a bird with wings spread open. “A sign of Batala,” said Brother Owl, gesturing at the bird sculptures. “The mythic bird Tigmamanukan. It no longer exists.”

“Why?”

Brother Owl made his way to the places where the graves were fresh. “Because God is dead.” He uttered silent prayers over the corpses of the students now gone. Some were no older than 13. Others had been staying in the Monastery, helping Brother Owl run the solitary Gahumnon training center, for over three decades.

Jonathan and Mattheo decided to respect the harrowing procession by staying silent through it all as Brother Owl finished the rites.

Jonathan peered past Brother Owl as he lifted the names of the ones dead for the cause of the Monastery to Batala: “O, mighty Sidapa, death divinity, guardian of the Tree of Life, dweller in the Highest Point Beneath Heaven, accept these humble souls, for they are young, and deserve a joyful afterlife.” He prayed.

Past Brother Owl was the sea. Jonathan could hear the waves crashing against the stones of the cliff face below. However, he noticed that the water of the waves wasn’t exactly… blue. They were a strange, silver-pink color that seemed to scintillate with purples and greens and blues and reds. A serene color that called to mind the aurora borealis.

“Is that… the sea?” Jonathan asked Mattheo. Mattheo simply raised his shoulders in a shrug, unsure of what to think of anything anymore. “Let’s just stay quiet and respect the procession.”

/// IN AN ALLEYWAY ON THE 76TH ROAD OF THE 8TH DOMINION, IN THE CITY OF CITIES: BIRINGAN

The Balete tree vomited out the five girls. Susanna came out first, followed by Jenna, both of them stepping elegantly to the brick stone floor that, of course, smelled of a mix of piss and vomit.

Jenna caught Angela easily when she was spat out of the Balete. Esther was pushed out, but she managed to find her footing, stumbled, and then slammed--harmlessly--against a stone pillar that was holding up the bahay-na-bato behind them.

Gala, being the literal small demon imp that she was, was spat out of the Balete, and Susanna had to catch her. Gala clung to Susanna. “Ya, get down,” Susanna said, squinting at her, but nobody thought she wasn’t enjoying being hugged by Gala.

“Ah, right, right, sorry about that.” She slipped off, grinning, her canines longer than normal, her pink irises burning with a low flame.

Esther pushed herself off of the stone pillar, dusted herself off. The balete before her was large but smaller than the others they’d walked into before. The roots were still humongous, however, and that Balete tree was leaning against a stone house before them. A bahay-na-bato: she’d seen those, specifically in Vigan. They were the stone evolution of the nipa huts: instead of a bamboo house on stilts, they were wooden houses upon stone bases.

“Where… where are we?” Esther looked up. Gleaming spires of stone and crystal peeked from behind the bahay-na-bato, each of them looking like amazing constructions, altars pointing up to god. The stone cathedral towers emitted a strange, neon light that signified that they were, in fact, being used.

Susanna inhaled. “Biringan.”

They stood there for a few moments, partly in awe, partly in exhaustion, watching, waiting. It didn’t take long for Esther and Angela to register the sounds of carriages being pulled across stone streets, horses and carabaos--and other, more alien counterparts--neighing and roaring, the distinct speech of the tongue that everyone can understand being used to perversely sell and trade goods, sundries, and other services.

“Biringan?” asked Angela, looking about them, realizing that all this looked strangely familiar. They were in an alleyway, flanked by two large roads on either side. Above them, the windows of the bahay-na-bato were opened, seemingly to let “air” in. The entire world was illuminated by a strange, yellow glow as a sun hung overhead.

“Yeah,” said Gala. “The City of Cities, as they call it. This is where all roads lead to. If you keep walking in a single direction in any universe, you will end up here, in Biringan.”

“We should move, but not too far, we wouldn’t want Brother Owl to have a hard time finding us.”

“Oy.” A voice came out from somewhere within the alleyway. Susanna’s eyes narrowed, and she stepped forward, sword at hand. Jenna did the same. Gala raised her fingers. The three of them stood on each side of Angela and Esther, protecting them against the stone pillar.

A little man leaped out from behind a wooden box crate. He brought with him a simple flintlock pistol. His beard was long, reaching and dragging along the floor. His eyes were large and black and wide. He grinned a toothy grin. “This is Tupas territory. You all are part of Tupas’ domain?”

Susanna narrowed her eyes. Jenna licked her lips. She let her Gahum feel around, looking for other signs of life within the vicinity.

“Look, just answer us and nothing bad will happen to ya’ll,” said a man on the other side of the alleyway. He held with him a musket. This one was a man albeit one bruised and without hygiene, though he had an eye open on his brow.

“What’s taking you so long to answer?” Another one came out, a tall being with the head that was reminiscent of a horses’ or a birds’, or maybe both? His mane fell to his waist. He held an ax, one rusted with blood.

Jenna turned and whispered to Susanna. “Susanna, there’s a lot of them.”

“We have to flee.”

“I’ll distract them,” said Gala. She removed her earrings--each which were made of gold.

“Don’t move!” yelled the little gnome man once again.

“No! We’re not part of Tupas’ domain.”

“Oh yeah?” said another man, this one large, almost twice their size, holding a large cigar in his mouth. “Well, all you have to do is pay UP then.”

Gala didn’t move yet. “How much?” asked Susanna.

“Mm…” the gnome thought. Susanna’s eyes darted. Almost every avenue of their escape was blocked. When she looked up at the two open bahay-na-bato windows, snake-men were leaning out of them, with arrows nocked on bows, and bowstrings pulled tautly. “How about… around 700 bulawan.”

“Yeh,” spoke the giant again. “700 sounds good.”

Angela clung close to Jenna. Esther held on to Susanna’s battle gown. “We don’t have 700,” said Susanna.

The giant grinned. “Well that’s too bad ain’t it? Guess we’ll have to take what we can get.”

The Duwende raised his pistol and fired. Witchdust spread out behind it, particles. The bullet sang out. Arrows were loosed, two of them, directly at Jenna and Susanna. The musket also fired, sending out lilac Witchdust into the air as it released a bullet, sending it flying.

“Yeojachingu, together!” yelled Susanna, and they stuck together, forming a wall around Esther and Angela.

Esther narrowed her eyes. “Yeojachingu…?”

“It’s our Korean group name,” interjected Jenna.

The ballistics slammed onto their group then. Jenna had raised her round buckler shield, and the two arrows bounced off of it. Susanna was quick--she raised one hand and caught one of the bullets, something in her fingers flashing with that same red. She then swung her sword quickly, deflecting the other bullet that was in her way.

Jenna didn’t turn as she said: “Here are some swords, easier to keep yourself defended this way.” Two swords materialized, seemingly out of thin air. Angela and Esther grabbed them accordingly.

“Gala, you get the naga above. Jenna, the kapre and the tikbalang. I’ll handle the two men on my side.”

“Got it.”

Gala put her hands together and uttered a quick mantra again. “...Gold and silver piercing through, impale these bastards, lance them true…”

“Yeojachingu, Break!” Susanna surged forward, caught the duwende with a kick, and then threw the sword she wielded at the other man that was raising his musket. The blade went through his heart.

Jenna rushed forward, ducked low--avoiding the tikbalang’s sweeping headhunter ax--and pushed her blade straight through the tikbalang’s stomach. The kapre was upon her then, bringing with him a huge tree that more or less doubled as a hammer. He brought it down upon her, and Jenna yelped as she raised her shield and caught the tree. “Damned bitches! Don’t move!”

Gala leaped up in between the two nagas leaning out of the windows and uttered: “Spear!” throwing out golden beads that were once her ear piercings towards the two nagas. The minute they touched the scales of each body, they exploded, turning into vicious spears that impaled both of them.

“Jenna!” Gala yelled as she fell and bounced on the kapre’s head. The kapre shook itself, dazed, and Jenna took that opportunity to slip away from under the hammered tree, summoned a spear out of thin air, and threw it straight at the kapre’s face, pushing him backward and down, pink ichor dripping from his face.

Susanna ran forward, and the man that she had impaled fired a wild bullet. She ducked low, evading the bullet completely, and threw her hand out. The impaled sword flew back to her open hand.

“The man cursed. For Panginoon Tupas!” he yelled, and he threw a pellet down onto the stone alleyway floor. It exploded, filling the entire place with white smoke.

That was the last thing he did before Susanna cut his head off.

Her eyes opened wide. Esther. Angela.

Something invisible grabbed Esther and Angela’s wrist. “Susanna!” They heard Esther cry out.

Jenna, Gala, and Susanna all turned up to see Esther and Angela, hanging by their wrist, held by… some invisible cloaked figure. As the smoke cleared and the sun slowly fell, however, the being removed their veil, showing a hooded man wearing a sharp and clean suit and tie getup, and wrapped with a long coat over it. The man’s white hair gleamed in the twilight, and his eyes were the purest of grays. He was exceedingly slender and somewhat tall. He smiled, revealing sharp canines. “Panginoon Tupas will enjoy these for sure.”

“Boy, put them down!” yelled Susanna, getting ready to issue another order to her team.

“No,” said the man, his eyes now suddenly relaxed, chill, half-closed, as if he were bored of them. “You don’t give me orders.”

Susanna scowled.

“However, you all do seem to be interesting people. Chase after me, and maybe we can make things fun, and not dreadfully boring. Biringan has been dreadfully boring as of late.”

“Susanna!’ yelled Gala, as she clapped her hands together before putting them down onto the floor. The stone of the alleyway rose beneath Susanna, sending her flying towards the roof that the man was standing on.

“That’s what I want to see! Come, then, chase me.” He held Esther and Angela so nonchalantly. As if they weren’t whole human beings. He ran across the rooftop, leaped, gracefully and without flaw, and landed on the other rooftop. He leaped across an entire thirty-foot wide road.

Susanna cursed, stopping at the edge of the roof. Gala bounded beside her. “That’s too wide. You’d die if you fall.” Dividing them was the traffic of carabao- and horse-pulled wagons, carriages, huge crocodiles, and more. A flow of movement, never stopping. If you fall into that river of dynamic rushing, you will die.

“What’s the matter?” yelled the man from across the room. Angela and Esther were knocked out at this point, and the man had put them down. “Too scared?”

Presently, Jenna joined them. “Ugh, I am gonna kill that guy--”

“No, wait. You’ll die if you fall into that.”

“We can’t just stay here--”

“I know. Wait.”

The man put both of his hands in the air. “Ah, I get it now. You can’t leap as far as I can! How unfortunate, you little mortals are so fragile. Ah well, this is the truth of the world, not all things can be given.” The man smiled sharply. “However, due to my merciful heart, I shall grant you a single truth, a single nugget of inspiration, to know where I might bring your little friends. Seek out the abode of Panginoon Tupas, the Sinking Field. Ask, high and low, seek information from the shadows, from between the whispers of the customers of the panciterias, from the mad ramblings of the drunk gods. Then you will find where we are. Ah, see you later then!”

He grabbed the two girls again, this time more gently, and then dashed off, running, before suddenly turning into shadow, never to be seen again.

The night sky had turned into that leaden shade of purple-orange to herald the coming moon. The neon cathedral spires of Biringan framed Susanna, Jenna, and Gala into a frame as they watched the white-haired demon disappear with their friends. The sky was dotted with birdmen, with flying serpents, with skyships shaped like karakoas, with drifting islands, and beneath them, the sea of moving people. Huge gigantic stone creatures, animated by some multicolor flame, were hollowed out and filled with seats so that the Biringan people could traverse the city, as large as a continent.

Before the girls: Biringan, the cesspool of crime and villainy, once the holy city, once the City of Cities, gleaming with radiance and unbounded promise.

Susanna cursed. “Where is Brother Owl?!”