On Master Liaoran’s side, he remained in his position, in the same pose as he was. The Vajra’s blade was buried deep inside the trunk of the tree, with his Qi pouring into the tree through it. The master’s left hand kept rotating the string of prayer beads on his left hand, his fingers clenching the beads harder and harder, so much so that some of the beads even began to crack.

Marcus lost count how many spirits the invisible wall of Qi had blasted away. The weaker ones were even burned to ashes just by approaching. Yet there were others, stronger ones with darkened, twisted bones and even some kind of hardened exoskeletons that could withstand the burn. And even though fire and smoke burst out of their bodies, and the energy from the wall was igniting, crushing and obliterating more and more of their body parts, they still tried to reach for Master Liaoran in attempts to stop him.

“Namo Amitabha.” Seeing the claws of these stronger evil spirits gradually making their way through the wall, Master Liaoran said a prayer, still standing straight and unperturbed.

“Make it work, Wuzui!” Marcus jumped over the red flag array and swung his coin sword at the spirit with a crumbling exoskeleton and extendings arms pointing at Master Liaoran. This time, Marcus felt the coin sword cutting into something solid - the flesh and bones on this spirit resisted the force and impact of the coin sword like a piece of bread would a sharp knife - the flesh was sliced, the bones cracked and caved in with the almost completely edgeless blade. Dark smoke gushed out of the wound where the forearm once was, and the spirit took a step back while screaming at Marcus. The severed arm turned into sparks and cinder before it even hit the ground, and the entity missing an arm fell on the ground, squirming and twitching in pain. The energy from the wall seeped into its body through the wound, and in an instant it burst in flames from inside.

Seeing that this attack worked, Marcus immediately charged at the other spirits that were closing in on him and the master. Even though these spirits appeared to be much more dangerous and durable than the rest.

“The Gods of one and nine, lend me thy power and watch over me!” Wuzui chanted one more time with his bamboo stick pointed upward at the sky, the red flag array glowed in a faint orange light and pushed back some spirits that tried to gang up on him. But nothing else happened.

At the expense of being scratched and clawed, Marcus sliced the head off another eyeless spirit with an extra long and slender physique, a dark exoskeleton and similarly dark nails. The disconnected head flew off and landed on the ground to the side, still screaming at Master Liaoran and Marcus, even with the black roots and branches protruding from its eye sockets Marcus still felt like he was being grudgingly and vengefully stared at.

Two of these spirits switched course and targeted Marcus instead. When Marcus swung his coin sword at one of them, it raised its two forearms and tried to tank this attack head on, while the other tried to ambush Marcus from the left, even risking at getting closer to Master Liaoran and getting burnt more harshly by the invisible wall of Qi.

“Clunk!” The sound of metal clashing together exploded from the collision between the coin sword and the hardened arms of the spirit. The red threads holding the coin sword together tore and broke from the impact. The coins scattered all around Marcus. At the same time the outer shells on the spirit’s arms were cracked and shattered, and its right forearm was almost cleanly sliced off.

The other spirit lunged at Marcus, grabbed onto Marcus’ left arm and crashed onto the ground with him. Before he could even see what hit him or try to get up, Marcus felt a source of danger coming right at him. Purely out of instinct, he infused the coins still in his right hand with his Qi and threw it in the direction of the sense of danger.

A spirit, with its mouth wide open and black, crooked teeth ready to tear into Marcus’ flesh was blasted by the coins at a point blank range. The spirit’s face and chest area, though mostly covered with shells and black, hardened roots, was instantly covered with scratches, cuts and even coins embedded into its flesh and skull. The Qi on these coins burned this screeching spirit, making a cracking and sizzling sound as smoke rose.

Marcus felt that his left waist and parts of his left arm had become numb again - possibly due to the attack he took from this very spirit and others. But he had no time to check on his wounds - more of them were closing in on him. Since he landed on the outer wall of Qi around Master Liaoran, he became the easier target.

“Wuzui! Is it ready yet!?” Marcus yelled as he swung his hand in a half-circle in front of him like a knife/sword, the Qi concentrated on the edge of his palm cutting through three spirits, turning them into ashes and smoke in the process.

“I’m on it! Stop rushing!” Wuzui yelled back with a trembling voice.

Marcus crouched down and side stepped to evade one charging spirit and to grab some more scattered coins on the ground. Once again he threw his whole handful of coins along with dirt and pebbles at the spirits that came close to Master Liaoran. This time, only three spirits with exoskeletons were pushed back by this attack. As a result, in order to prevent the master’s action or ritual from being interrupted, he had to rush over and try to fight them with his bare hands.

A spirit with protruding black roots in its eye sockets and mouth swung its right claw at Marcus, and more spirit burst through the wall of Qi and grabbed onto Marcus’ shoulder from the back. Marcus had no choice but to block the incoming attack with his arms crossed before him, while pushing his Qi in his body to strengthen his defenses.

“Boom!” Marcus was thrown in the air and involuntarily flipped a whole circle before he hit the ground. The same numbness creeped into his back and shoulders due to one more spirit grabbing onto him and trying to chew through his skin and flesh.

“The Gods of one and nine, lend me thy power and watch over me!” Wuzui tried his chant once again after no one knew how many failed attempts. Finally it seemed to be working - the red flags flapped in the air along a circular wall of wind. Some kind of golden lightning started flashing and appearing between the flags. Wuzui laughed out loud in excitement and relief, and immediately chanted the next part of the spell with his bamboo stick still pointing upward: “The Lords of Six and Eight, turn your eyes of justice my way and rain down your fury upon the wicked!”

“Kabang!” A bolt of golden lightning descended from the sky, forked into nine thinner bolts in the mid air and landed on the tip of all nine red flags around Wuzui. The wind circling around the red flags turned into a powerful tornado, with golden lightning sparks and arcs shooting out in every direction. The sudden lightning strike also brought about a powerful explosion, the shockwave released from which instantly blasted the spirits around him into barely recognizable smoke and ashes.

The shockwave swept through Marcus’ body as well, yet it did not inflict direct impact to him like it did the spirits. Instead, it just flowed through his body, halting the flow of Qi in his body for a short moment, taking away the cold numbness left by the spirits on his body, and leaving him with a sensation like he was just electrocuted.

Master Liaoran grunted from the impact as well, yet he remained standing in position, his hand still holding the Vajra firmly in his hand. Many of the spirits trying to break through his wall of Qi were instantly vaporized by this shockwave, and those who survived ended up being burned away mere moments later by his wall of Qi.

“Boom!” Another explosion happened, this time somewhere deep underground.

More cracks appeared on the ground, some of which merged together, fell apart and caved in, revealing some kind of underground tunnels underneath. Marcus tried to hold onto some solid ground, but it was never solid ground to begin with and he fell through the collapsing debris.

“Detective! Are you okay?” Wuzui asked from the edge of the irregularly shaped sink hole.

“I’m fine! Check on master!” Marcus struggled up and checked his body the moment he was able to. The electrocuted sensation did not linger for too long, now all he felt was a little bit of tingling feeling in his muscles. The numbness from the attacks of the spirits came back, but much weaker than before.

The ground shook once more, and foul smells started coming from deeper parts of the ground. Marcus looked around, covering his nose and mouth with his left sleeve. Aside from the debris, rocks, pieces of dirt and grass, he could clearly see things that did not look like they belong - bones, rib cages and skulls, with roots of trees, grass and fungi crawling all over them.

Marcus was about to alert Master Liaoran and Wuzui, when he heard a surprised and startled gasp. He immediately stomped on the ground and launched himself back on the surface, just in time to see Master Liaoran’s palm strike landing on the chest of the dark shadow of a humanoid monster with a wooden and root-covered body. This menacing looking shadow did not even get a chance to growl, before the golden palm mark on its chest consumed its whole body. The remainder of the tree in the backyard was completely gone at this point, all that was left was a hole on the ground.

“The cleansing is done.” Master Liaoran coughed and greeted Marcus and Wuzui with a smile, then took a look at the morning glow behind them: “The sunlight should cleanse what’s left there. The rest will be left to you, detective.”

“Of course, master.” Marcus bowed.

“Wuzui, leave the rest of the talismans to the detective.” Master Liaoran sighed: “The earth, the air and the vegetation is still tainted. It’s not much, but still bad omens for civilians.”

“The bones under there, what happened?” Marcus looked down at the biggest sinkhole, the one he just fell into, and asked.

“The light is here.” Master Liaoran raised his right hand, seemingly to touch the beam of sunlight piercing through the edge of the clouds and gradually moving towards the depths of the sinkholes: “Time is of the essence, detective. We’ll leave you to it. Take care.”