This Isn't Right (5)
For several minutes now, I had been treading the empty air with Void Steps. Yet no matter how far I cast my gaze, every single building was an identical, copy-paste brick house. At this rate, would I even be able to find an apothecary or an herbalist?
"Uuuugh..."
Her groans grew steadily more frequent, knotting my chest with an unbidden restlessness. Granted, we had only met today, and our first impression of each other was far from stellar. Still, perhaps because she was the very first karmic tie I had formed in this strange realm, I couldn't bring myself to simply abandon her to her fate.
Just then—
"Oh!?"
Far in the distance, a steeply pitched roof caught my eye, crowned with a wooden cross at its spire. A church?
In proper circumstances, the orthodox routine was to seek out a secluded mountain temple and entrust the damsel to some eccentric monk living like an idle immortal.
"Tsk."
I suppose that was too much to ask in a foreign land. Since every passing second counted, I kicked off the air and sped straight toward it.
Thud! Thud!
I hastily kicked against the massive wooden doors. Before long, the weathered timber creaked open with a long, drawn-out groan.
"Who is it at this late hour?"
A silver-haired nun poked her head out from behind the door.
"Damn, she's gorgeous."
The words slipped from my lips before my mind could catch them.
"...Pardon?"
"Ah, no, no, pay that no mind! Just rambling nonsense. More importantly, this young lady is in grave peril. Is there anywhere nearby where she might receive medical treatment?"
Only then did the nun seem to register the woman in my arms. Her brow knit into a deep furrow. Though with her eyes closed like that, can she even see anything?
"Quickly, this way!"
"Hm?"
Grabbing my forearm with surprising urgency, she pulled me inside before sprinting off somewhere on her own.
"Well, look at this..."
The interior had the rustic air of a weathered chapel. Worn wooden pews stood in orderly rows, while moonlight filtered through stained glass, bathing the sanctuary in vibrant, fractured hues. The ethereal ambiance possessed an enchanting quality that swept away every shred of my lingering complaints.
"Lay her down here! Hurry!" the nun cried out, rolling an iron cot over with a metallic rattle.
"Ah, right."
The moment I laid the woman down, the nun took a pair of shears and sliced her bodice wide open with a sharp rip.
"Whoa, hold on!"
Her unrestrained breasts sprang free like tight rubber balls, forcing me to wrench my gaze away in a panic. Thump, thump. My heart pounded violently, and my breath hitched. Even when I first possessed a body in the Murim, my pulse hadn't raced like this. She could have at least given a man some warning.
Right at that moment—
"Lux benigna, lumen vitae··· descendere, descendere··· per carnem, per sanguinem, per ossa···."
A soft whisper drifted from beside me. Hearing that serene, comforting cadence, my head turned back almost on instinct. Kneeling beside the cot, the nun had placed her palm against the woman's chest, murmuring under her breath. It sounded like an actual language, though certainly not English. Well, of course it wouldn't be English. In any case, it was entirely unintelligible to me.
What truly mattered was that the woman's ragged breathing was gradually settling into a calm rhythm. Reaching out, I pressed two fingers gently against her pulse point.
"..."
What I felt left me speechless. Her qi and blood vessels, which had been contorting in violent turbulence, had settled into serene stillness as though nothing had ever been amiss. To accomplish such a feat by merely resting a palm upon her chest?
I stole a glance at the nun. Just what in the world is this woman? Could she have already attained the realm of a Divine Physician? But she looked far too young for that. Twenty at the very most.
"Unbelievable."
Even the legendary Ho Cheong-hu had reached middle age before earning the revered title of the Butterfly Immortal Divine Physician. There was no conceivable way this young woman had already crossed that threshold.
"Mu..."
Just then, the unconscious woman's lips parted with a faint tremor.
"Mu... myeong..."
"...?"
Is she calling me? She had been squawking at me earlier demanding my name, so I'd merely told her that I was nameless, 'Mumyeong.' How was I supposed to explain this misunderstanding later? Yet hearing her repeat that word so weakly, again and again, sent an uninvited ache through my chest.
No, this was no time to get sentimental.
"I leave this woman in your capable hands," I said.
The nun whipped her head toward me in surprise. "Pardon? Where are you going in the middle of the night?"
"There is somewhere I must go."
"B-but this young lady..."
"She appears to be the scion of a prominent family. Once she has recovered, please see to it that she returns home safely."
The nun parted her lips to press further, but I cut in before she could speak.
"I leave her to you, then."
Spinning on my heel, I hurried out the door.
"W-wait just a moment!"
Her voice echoed behind me, but without a second to spare, I vaulted straight into the air.
My destination was that grand brick mansion where I had encountered the Demonic Cult.
Swish! Swish!
Across this foreign quarter, my feet bounded effortlessly from rooftop to rooftop. The estate was conspicuously larger than anything around it, and the foul, rancid energy wafting from its grounds served as an unmistakable beacon.
"Phew..."
Arriving at the estate, I came to a halt along the ridge of a rooftop, catching my breath as I peered down into the courtyard. Within the high stone walls, mindless abominations were stumbling about in aimless delirium. A few shoved one another in blind aggression; others smashed their heads rhythmically against the stone walls; still others snapped their bared fangs at empty air. It was a bizarre spectacle straight out of a zombie film.
Whoosh—slam!
I dropped straight down into the center of the sprawling courtyard.
"Guh... kehhhk...!"
Alerted by the impact of my landing, the creatures nearby jerked their heads in unison. A sea of blood-red pupils locked onto me.
"Kieeeeh!"
In the next breath, they swarmed. This was no mere handful; there were easily over thirty of them bearing down on me at once.
"...Maybe coming back was a mistake."
I sprang into motion without hesitation. As they surged forward, I struck their necks with the knife-edge of my palm, drove my knees into their abdomens, and slammed my elbows into their temples.
Crack! Crunch! Snap!
The sickening splinter of bone mingled with monstrous shrieks in a chaotic din.
"Kieeeh!"
"Gaaargh!"
Yet no matter how many I put down, the ranks of these Demonic Cult remnants showed no sign of thinning. I had assumed the courtyard held all of them, but they continued to pour endlessly from the depths of the mansion. In the end, the slaughter dragged on unbroken until the pitch-black sky began to bleed into the pale blue of dawn.
"Haaah... whew..."
My breath scraped against the roof of my throat. Before I knew it, jagged bite marks scored my forearms and shoulders, bleeding profusely from deep gouges.
"At this rate, I'm going to run dry."
Time for a gamble. Lowering my center of gravity into a slight crouch, I brought both hands together beneath my dantian.
"Sssssss... fhuuuu..."
Drawing a fine breath through parted lips, I exhaled long and slow. Internal energy coalesced between my palms. I compressed it. And compressed it again. Soon, a heavy, volatile mass of qi thrummed violently within my grip.
"Graaaagh!"
The abominations lunged from all directions with bloodcurdling howls. The exact instant their razor-sharp fangs pierced my flesh, I released the compressed energy in my hands all at once.
Compressed internal energy erupts outward in a singular cataclysmic blast.
Rumbleeee—!
The entire atmosphere vibrated.
And then—
BOOOOOOM!!!!
The earth cratered beneath me, blasting a tempest of dust and debris into the air as the massive stone perimeter walls crumbled in an instant. The cultists clinging to me were caught in the catastrophic shockwave and blown away like ragdolls.
Thud! Splat! Crash!
Severed limbs tore free and mangled torsos slammed into the rubble. In an instant, absolute silence descended upon the courtyard.
"Urgh!"
My body lurched violently. Perhaps as a recoil from discharging such an immense volume of internal energy all at once, an agonizing sensation as though every bone in my body was shattering washed over me. I bit down hard on my lower lip.
"Whew."
That was genuinely close. A hair's breadth more, and I would have plunged headlong into qi deviation. I still have so far to go... To think I still couldn't wield this level of internal energy with total fluidity. It was a rather bitter pill to swallow.
"Still, looks like that took care of most of them."
Straightening my back, I surveyed the aftermath when—
Clatter.
"...?"
Far off beneath the collapsed perimeter wall, a familiar figure thrashed wildly, clawing his way out from beneath a mound of stone. Dragging his feet with a heavy limp, the man took one staggering step after another toward me.
Heath.
Impossible. I saw him die with my own eyes.
"...Are you dead, or are you alive?"
"Grrrrr..."
Something was wrong. His once-clear blue eyes were stained a horrifying, bloody crimson, and his limbs twisted at grotesque, unnatural angles. He was no different from the other cultists.
"A Gu parasite... is that it?"
"Graaaagh!"
Heath lunged at me like a ravenous beast. Pivoting to the side in a fluid motion, I slipped behind him and drove my index finger deep into both of his Huantiao acupoints. His balance shattered, bringing him crashing to his knees. Yet because he continued to thrash relentlessly, I seized a fistful of his disheveled hair to hold him still.
"You will no longer be able to use your legs," I muttered, though knowing he was infected by a Gu parasite, such measures were largely meaningless.
"Kkrrrgh... g-gurk..."
"..."
What was I supposed to do now? I had slaughtered every other monstrosity without a shred of hesitation, yet merely having shared a brief acquaintance with this man made my hand freeze. Just then—
"...lease."
Heath's faint voice brushed against my ear.
"Have you regained your senses!?"
Even though reason screamed that such a thing was impossible, I foolishly allowed hope to rise. But as his head creaked upward, revealing his face, the tears spilling from eyes torn between clouded blue and bloodshot crimson crushed that fleeting hope to dust.
"K-kill... kill me... please..."
"..."
"The agony... it hurts so much..."
It had to hurt. I had read that when one is infected by a parasitic Gu, the agony feels as if every fiber of one's flesh is being consumed by fire.
"M-Milady..." Heath weakly clasped my wrist, his violent trembling transmitting directly through his fingers. "Please... our young lady..."
His breath came in ragged, wheezing gasps. To even speak coherent words in this state should have been an impossibility. Was it because his infection was fresh, unlike the others? Or was it born of a devotion to his mistress that transcended the corruption of flesh and mind? I could not say. Yet of my own accord, I chose to believe the latter.
"I shall see to it that your mistress returns home safely. I swear this upon my honor."
"..."
Only then did a faint, contented smile touch his lips. The hand gripping my wrist slipped away and fell limp.
And then—
Snap.
I broke the man's neck.