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Cursing himself for his faltering courage, Tsea-gong pulled deeply on his anger for all things coward. Directing that rage fully upon his own wavering legs that carried him on towards the flaming eyes. His vitriolic cheer doing little to quicken his step as the orb sailed further away into the darkness. Still, it was enough to keep him going. The effort akin to pushing through a mountain in his path.

The eyes pierced and smothered at the same time. Not only did they see right through him but their dread weight crushed those brave enough to look and see. As the fires of the Sun might consume the fool who ventured close enough to witness their flame dance.

“An unfair fight!” He spat. “Let all Cultivators take pity on these infernal fires the day they dared challenge TSEA-GONG!”

The orb disappeared entirely from view, leaving behind only the tinkling white noise to suggest it had ever been there. With a cry of defiance, he broke through. Bringing forward his great staff of power, with practiced might. Blue light blasted through the darkened passage ahead as much as it did his limbs.

A faint wooden gong sounded somewhere off in the deep recesses of his mind, with the odd notion of burning incense too. His vision blurred slightly but returned just as quickly possessing greater clarity than before. Free to lift his gaze, the terrible weight of dread was gone and so were the eyes.

In their shape two flaming sconces flickered in the dark, their flames crackling gently as they illuminated the path before him. The way was opened.

Stepping forward with haste, his staff clacked audibly against the cold rock floor with each step he took in pursuit of his prize. His gait natural with his beloved staff in hand and knew exactly where he had to be.

He halted suddenly in confusion. Peering at the staff in his hands and the passageway before him. He had no idea what he was doing.

Since when did he own a staff? One with a huge blue Moonstone attached, a Relic of the old world. The wires that coiled the staff looked vaguely familiar, but... Ofcourse they were… they were his! Weren’t they?

“No!” Tsea-gong bellowed.

How the hells had his mind slipped so quickly? Was that shadow mist creature still in here? Alarmed he knew he had to get a hold of that Chi orb quickly, less he succumb to the dream. Although the Aura of fear no longer held sway over him, he recognised its power lurking further in the darkness ahead. Waiting.

Barely a few steps past the once dreadful flaming sconces, his mind sharpened at the unplaced scent of incense.

How strange.

The darkness had encroached further than should be possible against the two burning flames. With a rush of power, he slammed his staff forward once more. Exuding the blue light deep into the shadows beyond.

His skin crawled at the sight revealed to him. The shadows receded swiftly under the power of the Moon stone’s brilliance, but there was a lingering darkness there too. Slow to react. With thin tendril whisps, it trailed behind after the receding shadows, angry at being exposed. Its departure revealing corpses strewn all about his path. Dried husks of warriors all. Terror etched on their distorted faces.

Tsea-gong spared the macabre sight but a cautionary moment. There was a mystery here that he couldn’t care less about. His prize was getting away. A lesser mortal might give heed to caution and return to the land of the living, but so too was the complacent cowardness accepted from lesser mortals. An option not open to one such as he and he had known far more gruesome gardens of death.

With a searching glance at the darkness ahead, he raised his staff on high in the narrow rock-hewn passageway. Almost hitting the ceiling as the light spilled out further into the darkness.

With strengthening resolve, he stepped over the first body carefully before grunting in disgust at his timidity and breaking into a full-out run. Chasing after that tinkling noise. Quickly the air behind him filled with the plumes of white dust as his footsteps crushed the dead beneath his boots. Power was not for the timid or hesitant.

Running for what felt like hours, Tsea-gong slashed at the darkness with his Doa dagger. It and his boots were the only two things from the real world that lingered here in his dream world. Marking himself to be the man he thought he was and not the one the insidious thoughts pressed upon his mind.

He had caught up to the orb once before. Seizing it and Cultivating its riches, before it had slipped away once more. Since then, the darkness had come alive. Screams in the distance ahead and pulses of terror echoed down the passage at him. Each polluted his mind as the flaming eyes returned to pulse through him and away.

Once he imagined himself to be running above a vast encampment of Royal soldiers, but that had to be wrong as whatever creature had come through here would have to have gone through them. Other times he thought he recognised faces in the dried husks, but that also had to be wrong as they were courtiers.

Cowards these, they had died fleeing. Mummified fingers held up before faces frozen in horror as the life had been drained from them. Not a wisp of Chi left in any of them. Not a whisp of Ki left in all the Cored lanterns. All had shattered along the passage, leaving behind only the glass like crystal powder as a testament to powerful forces coming through this way.

Weaving ghost fire torches to light the way ahead, he plastered them against the dead sconces as he ran. The darkness would not creep up on him, nor would he slow down. He drew on his powerful staff to aid in his flight, more so aiding him against the lecherous Aura of Death that had seeped heavily into this place. Wherever this was.

From what he could piece together of it, he imagined this to be some sort of grand escape tunnel. That it was hewn of rock obviously meant he was within the Deep realms of the Nobles. The varying frayed finery bearing different House symbols added to this, but to him it was all a maze and all he had to go on was the light of the Chi orb he pursued.

Leaping over the grinning skull of a freshly withered corpse, he reached out and slammed his hands over the prize. Immediately absorbing as much of the Chi orb as he could manage. Flooding his meridians and Core with the condensed Chi of such purity it left him in a drunken stupor. The orb slipped away yet again.

Hollering his protests, the orb escaped his hands yet again. Flashing forward and then sailing away quicker each time, as if it had someplace to be in this maze of death. That had been the third time it had happened since entering the dream and he almost smashed his staff in rage, catching himself at the last moment. An end to the light would be an end to his pursuit.

The pursuit had not been easy, nor short, but it had been fruitful. Extremely fruitful. He had been sprinting for what felt like days now and he had not gone unchallenged in the darkness. There were times when he had gotten close that the fear would suddenly return full fold and cripple him to his knees. It galled him profoundly, almost spiritually, that he should succumb and have to battle the same fear time and again.

Then there was the darkness itself. Alive and angry at his trespass.

The tendrils now took shape as elongated claws of living darkness and fanged skull. All alike but utterly unknown to him. They swiped out at him from the shadows intent on ending his trespass, each of them burning in the blue light of his staff. He cut them down swiftly, with the practiced ease of the veteran of war he was.

Though they slowed him not, he could hear voices within. Thousands of them whispering and screaming as they lashed out at him. Thankfully his spiritual power had seen immense growth in his prior brief Cultivations of the Chi orb, sensing their attacks before they launched at him.

So too did the distinct aroma of high-grade incense keep his mind sharp against fatigue. Each time the orb had slipped from his Cultivating grasp, a wooden gong had sounded the alarm in his head. There were other forces at play here, urging him on to victory.

He smiled as he closed in on the fleeing orb once more, this time he had a plan. It had slowed before another set of doors, this time he would not let it escape.

Slapping both hands against the blasted thing, as one might a mosquito, Tsea-gong drew on it once more. This time weaving threads of his own Chi to craft a fine lattice net within his hands, so that it might not slip from his grasp again. He had reached the end of his patience as much as he had the end of this dead-infested maze. Their corpses piled high before these doors

It had not escaped his notice that each corpse he had ground into dust in his passing had died prostrate, their backs exposed. Weapons still sheathed, bodies still whole and fear clawing their faces long after death had claimed them. Their tattered finery possessing far more character than they had ever had in their lives.

No, he felt no sympathy for these wretches.

One and all, these cowards had fled. None had turned to meet their deaths with swords drawn. When he had first stood upon the Wall beside boys and girls Seeded and barely 18 years of age, with piss running down their legs as titanic Beasts came out of the mists screaming. They at least had had the temerity to hold their spears firm.

What he had seen here beggared belief. All the fine talk in the world of superior Noble Bloodlines and yet none here had resisted the Aura of Fear. The incense returned in strength, warning him instead to think on the creature that had done all this. Tsea-gong refocused on the orb in his hands, checking to ensure the lattice held.

He did not want to be here a second longer than necessary. With the Chi orb straining against the lattice and bumping forward trying to reach the doors beyond, he stood his ground and drew it in, to the last drop.

The long fight done, he took a moment to appreciate the divine prize he had rightfully earned. His meridians, long stretched and frayed in the many years of service to empowered violence, now felt like a soothing balm had seeped into them as he had Cultivated. Not only had he layered his Core immensely, rising in power, but he felt a rejuvenation beyond anything he had known. The warmth sent a climatic shiver through his limbs.

A sudden hope gripped him with great intensity, the opportunity now back on the table for him. He could try another Ascension. Break through the Fifth Don. Condense his core to a higher level of purity and purge his meridians once more.

It was possible, more than possible. He should survive it.

Tsea-gong exhaled in vindication, his descent into madness well worth it. His exhalation reaching and touching the great doors before him with the gentlest of nudges and the quietest of clicks. It was a click his immortal soul recoiled at with gritted teeth, even the gong had sounded louder this time.

Instantly he could hear voices coming from within.

“Your men are all dead your highness.” A voice rasped with exotic tone. That sniveling pack of traitors you dared allow trespass my domain, all rooted out and scattered.”

Tsea-gong peeked through the crack. If not for anything but the morbid curiosity of this wretched place and that strange accent. His mind recoiled at the sight before him. He was looking at the throne room with the old emperor surrounded by husks of Imperial Metaled armour. These at least appeared to have died facing their foe. A woman.

With the blackest hair and palest skin, she bore no jewelry other than robes of fine white silk. The same tendrils of darkness that Tsea-gong had been cutting down whirled around her like a swarm enthralled.

He drank in the scene before him, still in shock that he was at the Emperor's throne room, looking through from a hidden passage. He turned sharply at the cries of a child.

Huh,

The ghost of Hiro-Takashi was here too. Cradling a much younger princeling from the grisly sight. That settled it once and for all, he was witnessing some sort of sculptured memory the dog himself had played out.

Stepping towards the dais, the woman blew away the piles of dust that had once been the Royal Guard. The old emperor rose to the challenge and came stuck immediately as that terrible spiritual weight returned, falling upon the throne room. Tsea-gong looked up in fright, fearing the Palace roof might collapse under such strain. Large cracks burst open upon the stone throne as the old emperor gritted his teeth.

“Rarely am I given to emotional tastes these last years and would thank you. If it were not such a bitter pill to swallow, O kin of mine.”

The power concentrated above the Emperor, but surprisingly Tsea-gong felt another source rise. Takashi, that worm, drew everything he had at a suicidal rate.

“I will ask you but once. Where have you taken the Flower?”

The power let up momentarily so that the emperor might answer.

“Not even I know,” he snarled defiantly. “Nor would I ever…”

The spiritual might returned with a scream of rage, Takashi’s added to it. The moonstone above his staff disintegrating as he attacked from behind. Throwing everything he had as the creature seized the Emperor by the neck. The Cultivation of titans clashed.

Huge runic seals in the circular throne room walls activated. Kami rose screaming from the dais, with varying elemental bodies of attack and a great fire Crane Spirit Beast dove into existence from above the throne. Power stones glowed against shining metal in the emperor’s Divine armour, his crown too brilliantly bright to see his face.

It was over in a second.

With a squelch the emperor burst apart, showering half the throne room crimson. Not a drop on the creature’s robes. In its hand, the emperor’s shimmering ghost still struggled against its grip. Her other hand reached out behind her, holding at bay Takashi’s attack. Slowly she turned and faced him, revealing her face for the first time.

Tsea-gong’s heart skipped a beat in fright. This was no woman, but a man. A man so terribly beautiful it was a defiance against nature and a rejection of all others. To look upon it, was to look upon the face of a monster.

Redirecting the power that had obliterated the emperor, the creature nullified Takashi’s attack it held at bay in a smoking hand. The smell of burnt flesh reaching Tsea-gongs nose.

“A heroic attempt worm. You must have drained every Cored lantern on your way over here. Foolish to handle so much impure Ki, suicidal to wield it.”

The creature skitted across the throne room suddenly in the blink of an eye, stopping right beside the devasted Hiro-Takashi, the prince screaming hysterically in his arms. She craned her neck, examing the groaning Takashi. Three holes had burned right through his being, trailing foul whisps of smoke.

“The path of Ascension is cut off to you, worm. You have destroyed your Cultivation in a futile attempt to save your Master. His life was forfeit the second he betrayed me, and not worthy of your loyalty. Give it to me, now.”

Takashi gasped in pain as he prostrated himself over the boy protectively, whilst still submitting before the intruder.

“Do you know where my Flower has been taken worm?”

“Great Master, I have no knowledge of this Flower you seek, but I will faithfully dedicate my life to the creation of many more such treasured flowers for you, if you but spare the boy’s life.”

The creature rolled his eyes in bored loathing at Takashi’s words. “Not this flower you won’t.”

With a flick of its finger, a spiritual rod was waved into existence cracking the hysterical child over the head and silencing it. Hiro-Takashi wailed out sorrow.

“Cease you wails worm, lest you receive the same. I would not end my line this day. Too much bother setting up another. It is these very interruptions to my work I cannot abide.”

Tsea-gong watched in dawning horror as the creature weaved the ghost of the emperor against the compressed attack of Takashi. Two balls of crackling power forming anew in a Heretical Cultivation that combined them. Resulting in a familiar orb being placed into a familiar dull yellow metalled ring.

“Take this and clean up this mess. Do try keeping things from falling apart whilst I’m away. I must hunt down these other traitors and retrieve my materials.”

Plucking the ring from a marbled finger, the creature bounced it off Takashi’s head, eliciting a sharp yelp of pain.

Tsea-gong fell to the floor shaking as if himself struck by the ring. His realisation of the source of power he had obtained sickened him. His tumble within the dream distorting the memory. Breathing to calm himself he looked up through the now wide-open doors, the vision frozen and hazy. Distantly the words played on, but Tsea-gong had seen enough.

“Slave, is that you?” The same accented voice called out, as the dream began to crumble. “Do you have information of the prize I seek.”

Tsea-gong shrugged it off, taking his leave as he grabbed a hold of the chord and made to return to the world of the living. He had overstayed his purposes, but come away with vital information on the so-called ‘trouble in the depths’ excuse that Takashi had played over and over in his many excuses.

But right now, he just wanted to wash himself clean. Sullied by the knowledge, it would take him time to appreciate his newfound position. The world shifted and dulled when suddenly he was yanked back down onto the throne room floor. The creature wrapped in whirling darkness stood on the opposite end, its foot placed firmly over the frozen image of Takashi. Attached to the dream ring on Takashi’s finger was the other end of the chord.

“You. Are not him.”

Tsea-gong jerked back in alarm. Fear rising in his soul that this being should be here, exerting dominance over his dream.

“Where is my slave and what have you done with his property?”

Tsea-gong started to panic and drew on his staff once more, before realising the futility of it. It was completely wrecked and minus the large blue Moonstone. Glancing at the chord in his hands, he realised he was no longer attached to it, but holding on to it. The real world still lay on the other.

He backed up, pulling against the chord and trying to exit the throne room as the creature tilted its head at him.

“It’s not often a soul can rebuff my Isekai techniques. While it was a given my materials at hand were lacking, it is still rare. Who are you, Cultivator?”

He would give it nothing. A terrible dread rose up in him and suddenly he realised the creature had not waited idly for a response. The tendrils of darkness wrapped around his legs, having stretched out silently along the darkened floor. His heart hammered audibly to his own ears.

“I asked you a question.”

“Shi-baal!”

Without thought, he cast ghost flame with a stomp of his foot. His constant use of it as he ran the darkened passageway, more a reflex now. But the power he had absorbed saw himself flooding the room entirely with ghost flame, including the dais the creature stood upon.

Of all the terrors to face him, Tsea-gongs heart nearly failed him as his ghost flame touched the creature. Thrashing painfully enough to explode in a single beat, even for a Sacred Artist as he. It was but for a single beat that the true image of the creature was revealed by the flames he exuded.

The dream flashed again. Just him and the creature.

“Insolent worm!”

Its face contorted in a rage, the first emotion of any he had seen it express. Raising its hand, Tsea-gongs eyes widened in alarm. On its finger was the heavy ring. A gong sounded and he knew immediately it would be the last as even the creature glanced off into the distance momentarily. Somehow silencing it.

The creature reeled Tsea-gong in by its raised hand, but he was having none of it. Blasting himself out of the throne room with a crafted weave meant to fail, flying falsely under the resulting explosion as his two Diaymo’s were constantly performing. The creature flew after him, faster.

With a cry of zealous desperation, Tsea-gong hurled his Doa dagger down on the chord. Cutting through in a single swipe, but losing it to the void. The creature screamed in pursuit as he was violently yanked up and away, holding onto the other end of the chord.

The dream shifted once more, falling away into a world of tunneling void, but with the creature still flying in pursuit after him. Tsea-gong answered it with the largest fireball he had ever cast.

With a catastrophic explosion and the very real scent of burning materials, Tsea-gong woke up gasping. The first thing he saw was a wide-eyed bald-headed child in saffron robes, rising up from a seated prone position. The child glanced momentarily at the silver Doa dagger stuck firmly in the main tent post beside his head and then up at the gaping hole in his tent. The roof blasted away with a rising fireball.

WHA…!? What are you doing here?

The bald child sniffed the air, ignoring his question as he shifted his robes. The cries of alarm rose throughout the camp as midday light spilled in through the roof. In one hand he closed an incense burner, placing it down beside him next to a small wooden gong. Two fierce-looking monks entered the tent behind him and knelt silently.

“Your Arch-Tenant was worried you were having a bad dream.”

The fireball exploded in the distance, a fireworks display showering out in the distance. The child glanced up to take note.

“I feel he was not entirely truthful.”