It was Tian’s first time beating someone to death with money. He didn’t really have time to savor the experience, as not-dying was taking all his attention. It was for that reason that his timing on using talismans was a bit off.
“You missed, sorcerer!” The grand shaman hacked at him with a saber Tian didn’t dare block with his staff. It was glowing with a silvery light visible even in the bright sun. Tian flowed backward, the Moon Crossing the Lake carrying over the grass like a fleeting reflection. He pulled out another talisman, yellow paper and long, twisting red characters. He rubbed it between his fingers and poured his qi into it, sending a brilliant line of green qi out. The beam cut through the tortoise shell armor that manifested around the grand shaman, cut through the metal disks stitched to his quilted jacket, cut through his ribs… but didn’t kill him.
He had missed again. Tian narrowed his eyes slightly, before darting in. The heavy staff swung around seemingly trying to end the fight in one blow. The Shaman swore, or yelled something that sounded like swearing, and raised his saber to block. The iron tip of the staff was checked in its fall, then the butt swung around and smashed the shaman’s knee into scrap. The nomad screamed, fell, but Tian couldn’t finish the job because there was a spear coming at his back, and yet another damned archer shooting at him!
Tian pulled out another talisman. A golden bell made of qi manifested around him, blocking the spear and the arrow. He could feel the bell holding on, but it couldn’t take much more abuse. He had to capitalize on the moment. Ignoring the frantic attacks, he raised his staff once more and slammed it down. The earth was stained red, inflected with gray brainmatter and white bone.
The spear was wielded by a man with a wild mustache and fierce eyes, jabbing down at Tian from the top of a horse. Tian took a swing at the horse, but like the green furred horse of the Dire Wolf Shaman, it danced backwards as though it had movement arts of its own. Tian narrowed his eyes slightly and pulled out yet another talisman. The spearman didn’t wait for him to tear it, and the horse charged in. A snarling wolf’s maw opened on the head of the spear, and the strength of the bell talisman suddenly seemed a bit too weak.
Tian threw his staff at the horse’s legs and drifted to one side. The spirit horse jumped over the stick, the shaman’s focus never wavered. The spearpoint never shifted from its aim at the center of his chest. There was a second to act, a fraction of a second. Tian cut over to the other side of the horse from the spear, forcing the point to track and follow him. He didn’t try to grab it or block it- he grabbed the horse’s bridle instead. The horse was no ordinary beast. It should have dragged him without losing a step. But Tian was heavier than he looked, and his old faithful Light Body Heavy Hands came into use once more. He slammed into the earth, so heavy the ground sank six inches below him.
The horse twisted, the head serving as an anchor, a pivot and a fulcrum all at once. The shaman went flying off. He came up without his spear, fierce eyes turned frantic looking at the horse, then filled with madness as he rushed towards Tian. A bright saber rose, filled with hatred and vengeance. Tian stepped into it, his open palm landing softly on the man’s chest. A bear’s maw manifested, snapping down on his arm, breaking bones and leaving rips in the black and gold mermaid silk robes.
A broken arm for a dead enemy. An acceptable trade, usually. But there were still more grand shamans to deal with, and part two of the plan hadn’t even started yet. He popped a medicinal pill into his mouth, feeling a mixture of wood, water and earth qi sinking into him, easily directed to the broken bones to speed healing. It wouldn’t instantly repair the damage, but he could keep fighting, at least.
The battle was seemingly flowing in their favor, but they were tiring fast and accumulating wounds. Burning Flag City only had two effective Heavenly Realm defenders. The Yuu could afford the bloody trade. The overall situation seemed set, the course of events could no longer be changed.
Heavenly cultivators had a pattern, though. One which could be exploited, if you were daring enough. He opened his mouth to yell.
“You think you can win with mere numbers? I will spend all my stolen fortune to destroy you, to take you down with me rather than let you live! You hear me? I will destroy it all rather than let you enjoy a single sprit stone! All will be used to destroy you! Every last talisman, pill, weapon, armor, every spirit stone, all the gold and silver, EVERYTHING will be burned in the fire of your destruction!”
He closed his mouth. It seemed Liren had gotten to the same place he had, just faster. She slammed down a formation plate and a handful of spirit stones, forcing a small ward into existence. Four grand shamans were trapped inside the array with them. Both sides seemed to like those odds.
“Ah, foolish rabbits. You might have managed something, but you were overconfident. Now you and your city both are trapped like the fat prey you are. Did you think we feared your petty gods? See how the Great Wolf eats your hope!”
The old man’s voice echoed across the steppes, seemingly coming from the swaying grass itself. There was a wave running through the short grass, rising higher as it neared the city. Rising up, and up, then the grass ripped apart and a wolf emerged from the steppe. Its head was the size of a city gate, its eyes bigger than bells, white smoke trailing from them. It pushed itself up, fighting free of the grasping earth. Before the earth reached the ground from its back, it stood, looking down on the defenders on the wall.
The stink of it reached across the battlefield. Tian could smell it through the ward. Earth and sharp piss and bitter herbs, the smell of old blood which always made you taste metal, as though the blood at your feet was enough to make you bleed in your mouth. It was bitterly cold nights and blazing summers, running for hours without tiring, hunting with your pack, calm and steady, because your pack was your family, each generation beginning the hunt anew. It was everything a wolf was, meeting everything a human saw when it stood in front of a wolf. The terror and the allure of it.
“Uudam truly loves his people. How strange. You don’t think of an old devil like that loving people.” The inane thought popped into his head, as he stared at the monstrous wolf. There was a chunking noise, and one of the strange qi-breaths in the formation vanished.
“Focus, Zihao!” Liren’s voice echoed in his mind, and he snapped back to the killing at hand. The shamans within the formation were grinning, the leering smiles of hungry predators. Tian met their eyes.
“I don’t know why you are smiling. I dare to guarantee that whatever happens to the city, you won’t live to see it. And I think you need a corpse to be buried with grave goods.” Tian’s voice extinguished the fire in their eyes. The staff came back to his hand with a thought. He spun it with one hand, then rested it on his shoulder. The shamans kept sliding their eyes back and forth, trying to keep both Tian and Hong in their sights. Liren mirrored his move, both putting the shamans back to back between them.
They didn’t need a signal. They had fought together for too long. They struck as one, because it was the right moment to strike.
Liren shouted, and a blaze of fire cut through one of the shamans. The shaman managed to deflect with a buckler, putting the spear through his shoulder rather than his heart. Then he grabbed ahold of it, and sent a saberlight, cold and ghostly, chopping down on Liren. She met it with a snort and a punch. The saberlight should have been too fast to block or strike. Should have been. But Liren walked the yang path. A fist harder than Earthly steel jabbed upward, shattering the strike. With her other hand, she lifted the spear, shaman and all, and slammed him into a shaman in the process of transforming into a grand stag.
Tian’s staff dao was nowhere near so advanced. He simply raised it up high in his right hand, as though he were knocking fruits off a high branch, then rushed forward. The two shamans facing him charged to meet him, one draping his arms in bear paws, as his boots picked up a greenish tint, the other cutting his charge short, and threw a knife hard enough to make a ripping sound as it passed through the air.
Tian didn’t dodge. He strained to push the staff even higher, and channeled his heavy water qi into it. He pushed an excess in, giving the whole thing an eerie blue hue. His left hand threw out a small glass ball which slammed into the flying knife. The flying knife split it, unleashing a blast of fire that sent the shamans tumbling and crumbled Tian’s protective golden bell. No matter. He was on them before they could rise. His staff rose and fell, beating without artistry, the savage efficiency of an ape. They tried to roll away, defend themselves with spirits, attack with concealed weapons, but they were isolated and overwhelmed with single use tools. They never got the chance to rise again.
Liren was done when he finished. The shamans outside the ward were bombarding it with cursed arrows, hacking away with spirit covered swords or summons. The spirit crystals were being burned through like bamboo in a kiln. No matter. They had a lot, and didn’t care if they spent it. Their eyes were on the giant wolf towering over the city wall.
The wolf howled. The word didn’t do justice to the force of the sound. The piercing, ululating wail, the terror of it. It was the cry of a beast declaring that all within earshot were its food. It clawed at the listener’s courage, eating the warrior heart within them. It was the howl of the steppe wolf, ready to chase its prey endlessly, for it was endlessly hungry.
The shrine bells started ringing across the city. First the temple of the enshrined generals, but quickly spreading to the temples of the Celestial Court, the Queen Mother of the South, the little shrines for the land spirits, then even the little bells hanging from altars just inside the door of shops started ringing, with no hand to strike them. Offering vanished from plates, incense burnt to ash in seconds. The primal howl was drowned out by the ringing of the bells, and when the wolf drew another breath and raised its paw to smash down a section of wall, a new voice spoke, ancient, yet full of youthful vigor.
“When the battle comes, march forward as one!”
A broom handle, broken and battered, jabbed the wolf in the forehead, knocking him back a pace from the wall. The hand that held it was slim and pale, extending from a robe that wasn’t fit even for cleaning rags. There was a near-ruined straw helmet covering his head, worn from endless days under the sun and rain. An acetic, devoted to serving the people and preaching the dao, indifferent to fame or glory, despising the vanities of the flesh. In his left hand, a rosary slowly turned, as the right drew back the broom handle. The Martyr Venerable came forth, ready to slay demons once more.