Journey to Wubang 01 - Earth to Hell (42 page)

I looked around. I was in the same place, the cavern under the nest, and the Tiger and Simone were standing next to me, their faces fierce with desperation. Some human-shaped stone figures stood nearby—obviously this had happened to a few of our group.

I kept the Murasame loaded with demon essence and went to the nearest figure. I shaded my eyes and touched the blade to the stone.

‘No, Emma, wait!’ Simone shouted, but it was too late. The stone shape exploded outwards in a shower of gravel, releasing Precious, who blinked at the light.

I turned to Simone. ‘What?’

‘Those stone prisons are the stone Shen that were held here,’ the Tiger said. ‘You just killed two of them.’

I turned back to the stone prisons. ‘Oh
no.
’

‘They turned on us,’ Simone said. ‘They enveloped you in casings. We’ve been trying to talk sense to them, and even strike them to make them come around, but they won’t budge.’

‘Touch me to one,’ the stone in my ring said.

I went to one of them and touched the stone to it.

‘I can’t talk to it,’ the stone said. ‘It’s controlled. They’ve done something to it. Destroy it.’

‘No.’ I turned. ‘Precious, come and have a look.’

Precious approached the stone prison and put her hand on it, concentrating. ‘Silver is in here,’ she said. ‘Give me a moment, we’re talking about options.’ She lowered her head. ‘Nothing.’

‘Move back,’ I said, then loaded the Murasame with demon essence, and blew up the stone Shen.

‘What are you doing, Emma?’ Simone cried.

The Tiger attempted to take my arm as I loaded the sword again, but he jerked back and shook his hand. ‘Shit!’

I went to each of the stone Shen in turn, blowing them up with demon energy, and freeing Michael, Na Zha, Sylvie and the Rabbits. When I was done, I turned to face the rest of the group.

‘Is that you, Emma?’ Simone said, sounding forlorn.

‘Of course it’s me.’

‘You
killed
them!’

‘That’s right. I killed them. So that means they’re on the tenth level of Hell now, freed from the control, right?’

Simone hesitated, then turned to the Tiger. ‘Uncle Bai?’

The Tiger didn’t reply for a moment, then said, his voice gruff, ‘She’s right. They’re in Hell, and they’ll be back soon.’

‘Ordinary humans aren’t really supposed to know about the existence of Hell,’ the Monkey King said.

‘Well, since I’ve been there under Celestial sanction, I guess the rules have changed,’ I said.

I studied the group of stone Shen that had come with us. ‘Are you guys sure you won’t be controlled by this demon as well?’

The stones were silent; probably discussing among themselves. I waited for them. We didn’t need about fifty of them turning on us.

‘Since we haven’t been held by this demon, we shouldn’t be affected,’ one of the stones said. ‘Let’s go. We have unfinished business here.’

We continued into the nest, down the tiled grey stone corridor. It reminded me unpleasantly of the nest under Kowloon City where Simon Wong had held Simone.

The corridor opened out into a nest cavern, with indentations for Mothers; but it was deserted, not even eggs left behind.

‘Looks like it’s been evacuated,’ Na Zha said.

‘The King tipped them off,’ the Tiger said.

On the other side of the nest cavern was another corridor, and we all went down it. It started to slope downhill and the sides became rougher. We arrived at a smaller cavern, only about fifteen metres across, with rough walls but a tiled floor. A dead Mother in True Form lay on the floor near one wall. The three Leo copies that John had mentioned lay on their stomachs in the centre, dressed in old-fashioned paisley cotton pyjamas. The room smelt strongly of frangipani flowers, pungent and sweet.

The rest of the group, except for the Monkey King and the Tiger, put their hands over their noses.

‘Oh my God, that is awful,’ Michael said. ‘I thought out in the cavern was bad, but this is enough to make you throw up.’

I went to one of the Leo copies and turned it over. The frangipani smell was coming from it. It seemed uninjured, but its stomach was bloated from death. I checked the inside of its wrist—it was number two.

‘Do the other two Leos have numbers?’ I said.

Michael and Na Zha checked them.

‘This is number three,’ Na Zha said.

‘Five here,’ Michael said.

‘That’s two, three and five here, and the one that we rescued from Sham Shui Po was four. I wonder if number one is the real Leo,’ Simone said.

‘We’ll know when we find it,’ I said. I glanced at the Tiger. ‘Can you take these copies to the West and have a look inside?’

‘Good idea. I’ll take them with me when we’re done here,’ the Tiger said.

I rose and brushed off my jeans. ‘We need to find more information than this. Let’s have a look around.’

T
he corridor didn’t have any other junctions or tunnels off it; it just headed straight and slightly downwards.

‘If we continue down here far enough, we’ll end up in Hell,’ the Monkey King said with amusement.

After about four hundred metres we reached a pair of red wooden double doors with the Door Gods painted on them. We stopped.

‘I can’t sense anything on the other side,’ Simone said.

‘Is this an entrance to Hell?’ Michael asked Na Zha.

‘Nah, man, Hell’s a lot further down,’ Na Zha said. ‘Doors would be the same though.’ He paused, thoughtful for a moment. ‘Tell you what. Everybody move back, and us big Shen will open it up and have a look.’

‘Sounds like a plan,’ the Tiger said. ‘Everybody back. Just me, Sun Wu Kong and Na Zha to have a look.’

‘And me,’ Simone said, moving to stand next to them.

The Tiger opened his mouth to say something to Simone, then smiled slightly and closed it again.

Simone turned to speak to the rest of the group. ‘Move back, everybody.’

I ushered them about fifty metres back along the stone corridor. We turned and stood, grouped together, waiting to see what would happen.

The Tiger opened one of the doors and stuck his head through. ‘Can’t see a damn thing.’ He opened it wider, and Na Zha opened the second door, both of them pulling them all the way back so they were flush with the walls. They took a few steps through, disappearing into the darkness.

The room flared into visibility in front of us; Simone had generated one of her balls of light. She made it larger until it was about a metre across, and raised it so that it was more than ten metres above us.

It showed us a large rectangular hall, about fifty metres to a side. At the other end stood an army of demons, appearing as young humans in brown cotton pants and jackets. They weren’t in any particular formation; they just stood as a clump bristling with weapons.

‘How many?’ I asked.

‘About fifty,’ Simone said.

The Tiger glanced back at us. ‘Everybody but us big Shen—me, Na Zha and Sun Wu Kong—hold off. We’ll start by mincing them.’

‘And me,’ Simone said. She raised her hand to the side and Dark Heavens appeared in it.

The rest of the group moved further back. The demons waited for the command to attack.

I stepped forward, brushing Michael aside as he tried to stop me. I stood next to Simone and the men. ‘Six, if you can hear me,’ I said loudly, ‘this would probably be a good time to negotiate. You went back on your deal last time. Now you’re—’

The demons raced towards us, and the Shen drew
their weapons. The Tiger had a large white and gold traditional one-handed Chinese sword; the Monkey King pulled his staff out of his ear; and Na Zha raised his hands and his chain whip appeared in his right hand and his throwing ring in his left.

‘Back up, Emma,’ Simone said, readying herself to face the onslaught.

I moved back, out of the way of any possible demon essence.

As the demons approached, a couple of the Shen concentrated and the demons hesitated, then began to struggle to move.

‘How big?’ Simone said.

‘Big enough to resist our Inner Eyes,’ the Tiger said. ‘Let’s go.’

He raced forward and swung his sword, slicing through demons so fast he was a blur. Na Zha spun, using his chain whip with deadly effectiveness and hitting the demons with his ring without throwing it, slicing pieces off them and making them dissipate into black streamers. The Monkey King whooped with delight and pole-vaulted on his staff right into the middle of the demons, then swung it with wild abandon and destroyed everything around him.

Simone filled Dark Heavens with shen energy, making it glow almost painfully white. Everything she touched disintegrated. She carved a path of destruction through the demons, her tawny hair flying.

As the demons closest to us were destroyed, more sprouted out of the ground behind them, joining the existing group from the rear. Simone, the Tiger, Na Zha and the Monkey King continued to fight, but with the reinforcements we had more to face than we’d started with. Another group of demons sprouted from the ground on either side, tripling the army we were facing. Simone continued to blast shen energy,
but she couldn’t destroy them faster than they were replaced.

Na Zha raised his hands and an energy barrier stopped the demons in their tracks.
Shen Barrage
, he said.
Anyone who knows, move up.

Simone hesitated, confused. ‘Shen Barrage?’

‘If you don’t know what it is, move back, girly.’ He glanced back. ‘Anyone who knows what it is, move up quick, ’cause I can’t hold these forever.’

Precious, Silver, Michael and Sylvie moved forward.

Simone came back and stood next to me. ‘I’ve never heard of this,’ she said.

‘Part of the advanced energy curriculum at Celestial High,’ Sylvie said over her shoulder to us. ‘Watch.’

They stood in a line in front of us, each about two metres from the other. They raised their arms, lowered their heads and radiated shen energy. The energy linked between them, crackling like lightning and moving in vertical bars from person to person, so bright it was almost painful.

The energy coalesced into a barrier in front of them, a wall of brilliant bright light, then expanded out from them in a large arc from wall to wall, destroying everything in its path. The demons didn’t explode as it hit them; they dissolved into black goo that boiled into nothingness. The shen energy hit the far wall and disappeared.

The group in front of us dropped their arms and waited. The only sound was a couple of pebbles dropping to the floor.

‘I think that did it,’ the Tiger said.

‘Why don’t they teach that at Wudangshan?’ Simone demanded. ‘That’s so useful!’

‘Only Shen can do it, and a very senior Celestial has to be present to guide it,’ the Tiger said, walking back to us. ‘And Shen learn to do it in high school before
they go to Wudang. They teach more advanced energy work at Wudang; they assume you already know basic guided stuff like this.’

‘But nobody taught me!’ Simone said.

The Tiger put his hands on his hips and glared at her. ‘That’s ’cause you’re never there to learn it!’

Simone’s eyes widened and she didn’t reply.

The Tiger continued, hands still on hips. ‘You should have taken me up on the offer to have a look at CH. You’d like it.’

Simone turned away. ‘I don’t want to go to Freak High!’

‘You calling me a freak?’ Sylvie said with amusement as she returned to us.

‘But you are a freak,’ Precious said behind her.

Sylvie turned to face the other end of the hall. ‘I s’pose you’re right, Precious. So are we going in to have a look around? This place is fascinating.’

She was right. The hall we stood in was about fifty metres wide and long, and had a tiled slate floor and smooth rock walls with a ceiling of rough-hewn stone. The far end looked like a village; there were two-storey buildings on either side with a narrow cobblestone road down the centre, leading a long way away from us.

The Tiger whistled through his teeth. ‘Shit, look at that. This nest is fucking enormous.’ He glanced around at the Rabbits. ‘And it was right under your feet, eh, humans?’

‘We did not know that this existed,’ Tu Gong Wei said. ‘We rely on you Celestials to inform us that Hell is growing beneath our feet; we are only human, after all, and cannot see ourselves.’

‘Nobody can see under here,’ Simone said, studying the small town before us. ‘They’ve done something with stones that makes it invisible.’

‘She is correct,’ one of the stone Shen said. ‘We are blind in here.’

‘This is an evil place, full of the death of stones,’ another stone Shen said.

We walked to the other end of the hall, where the buildings and road began.

‘How were the demon reinforcements teleported here?’ I asked.

‘Dunno,’ the Tiger said. ‘That’s a new one on me, never seen demons travelling when they’re that small.’

‘Someone moved them?’ Simone said.

‘Demons can’t be moved by other demons,’ Na Zha said. He rounded on Simone. ‘Don’t they teach you
anything
in school?’

‘She goes to a human school,’ the Tiger said.

‘Well,
that’s
stupid,’ Na Zha said. He grinned menacingly at me. ‘You worried that she’ll be more powerful than you if she’s trained properly?’

‘It was my choice, not Emma’s,’ Simone said.

‘That’s even
more
stupid,’ Na Zha said.

‘Just shut up,’ Simone said, and stormed towards the village in front of us.

The narrow street was lined with two-storey inns and tea houses all constructed of stained hardwood. Most of them were open on the ground floor, with a wooden bar as serving area, and a number of round old-fashioned rosewood tables with round stools, and stairs to the next floor up. Large red lanterns decorated with birds, flowers and good-luck characters provided lighting.

‘This looks like an Ancient China theme park,’ Simone said as we approached the first tea house.

‘It’s completely deserted,’ Precious said.

The restaurants had wooden bowls and chopsticks on the tables, apparently left behind when the demons had fled. The inns had closed-in lower floors, with
paper windows and wooden doors, and signboards next to the doorways.