Chương 3: Black Judgement

Rowan Rowan had always hoped that his first encounter with demonic cultivation would be one of bravery. He had always feared that it would be one of cowardice. Standing across from his sectmate's corpse - a man whose name he'd never even learned - he felt only loathing. The qi he'd built up chasing the Wandering Bulb thrummed beneath his skin. A hot sensation, egging him on. His father had warned him about that feeling, the certainty that made cultivators reckless right before something killed them.

Something had murdered his sectmate in cold blood. His sectmates had done nothing wrong. They had come into the Wilds to collect some beast cores and advance their cultivation. They even slowed their pace to let some kid tag along. They didn't deserve death. His rosary warmed against his right wrist. Rowan stepped up to the door and paused again, listening. He heard nothing. When he reached out with his qi, it was even more silent. He pulled it open.

A terrible tumble and clank, as body after armored body spilled across his feet. By the end of it, his robes were soaked crimson and the remains of the Formidable Five lay heaped against the threshold.

"Friends of yours?" Rowan looked up. The shack had seemed tiny from the outside, but it had been dug into the slope, the earthen walls giving it depth. On a ratty bed at the back of the single room sat a man who could only be a demonic cultivator. Around him colored mist bubbled from dented cauldrons and corpses hung from the ceiling like pigs at a slaughterhouse. He hadn't sensed him. Not a breath of qi, not a trickle of warning.

The man was tall and slim as a drawn blade, hair falling like a waterfall of ink down his back. He was beautiful in an uncanny way, like a sculpture of a man brought to life. Too elegant, too refined. The feature that betrayed him were his eyes, black pools sparkling viciously in the dim light. Rowan grit his teeth.

"Demon," he declared.

"That's right!" praised the man.

"My given name is Lieren Nostraga. No relation to the esteemed Nostraga family, of course. Not until I've made myself… presentable again." So, he was cast-out, or maybe an illegitimate son.

"I've never heard of them."

"Presumptuous." Lieren's demeanor went cold.

"If I were whole, I would have vaporized you where you stood. A survivor, a philosopher, a voyager on the grand journey of cultivation, who managed to grasp everything the world could offer and form a Core - reduced to draining outer disciples in the middle of nowhere for scraps…" Rowan started.

"Core Formation?" His own father been on the verge of Foundation Establishment before dying. Core Formation was a whole realm, and hundreds of years of cultivation, above that. But this man was also clearly unwell - he said so himself. Rowan tried not to think of what could injure a Core Formation Cultivator to this extent.

"Now you know the respect you owe me." Lieren looked him up and down in a way that made Rowan's skin crawl. His gaze stopped at his wrist. The rosary. And then Lieren was besides Rowan, snatching at his hand, jerking the sleeve up, so quickly that Rowan hadn't even seen a blur.

"Witchwood? Here?" Lieren laughed, long and loud.

"It appears your origins are not simple, junior. Where are you from?" It took everything for Rowan not to scramble back.

"I represent Righteous Mountain and its Sect," he declared, trying to ignore the way the cultivator's overly long nails dug into his forearm.

"So you're not here for me, just to bury your dead. Hm? A boy who hasn't even formed his Qi Sea?" The man released him, amused. Rowan stumbled back, falling to the ground.

"You aren't even worth eating, mortal. I'll allow you to leave. But you cannot have their bodies." What about the rosary had worried the man? Rowan didn't second guess his luck. He needed to notify someone from the sect. He tried not to think of how he would look, running through Righteous Mountain City, drenched in blood—"Just kidding," said the man lightly, smiling widely. Lieren flicked one finger. The pain arrived first.

A line opened across Rowan's chest, shallow and searing, and he fell to the floor howling in agony. The back of his head cracked against the armored chestplate of the woman from the Formidable Five.

"I'm going to cut you so many times," promised the demonic cultivator, advancing towards him. Rowan shakily pushed himself off the ground, but before he could even attempt to run, he saw the flick of the demon's fingers again. He braced himself for pain - and it did come, but not from another cut. His rosary burned. Black, glittering eyes zeroed in on the rosary again, and something in them sharpened into recognition.

"This trinket you have… it's inconvenient. I'd like to take a look at it." Fingers curled. The beads pulled. Not Rowan - the beads. They dragged at his wrist toward Lieren's open palm, the worn cord biting into his skin. With it came a terrible pressure in his mind, like a cold thumb pressing into the meat of his thoughts. Let go. It wasn't Lieren's voice, but the idea of a voice, maybe it was Rowan's own idea. No - it wasn't him.

Rowan grabbed the beads with his other hand and held on to the only thing his mother had ever told him to keep safe. The lotus cross strained towards the demon. He could feel a scalding pain, not just on his wrist, but in the blood and bone beneath. It was far worse than anything the demon had done, but he still held onto it for dear life. Bead by bead, the rosary began to slide out of his grasp.

The pressure behind his eyes became a wedge, prying at the seam between hold on and let go until he couldn't remember which idea was his. His mother's qi was in this rosary. It smelled of incense from years of her devout prayer. So, it was only out of selfishness that Rowan continued to hold on to the beads, knowing that if he opened his hand he would never get this piece of her back. He could barely remember her voice, the way she laughed… there was so little he had left of her.

"Stubborn," Lieren murmured, and his fingers twisted in directions that they shouldn't have, grasping at the air." Let go." The cord cut to the bone. Rowan's grip was weakening, and the cold thumb in his skull pressed and pressed and he heard himself, far away, beginning to agree that it was only a useless, sentimental piece of trash. Then, his mind split in two, speaking in unison.

To truly ascend, doesn't a cultivator need to sever away their connections to their mortal lives, and detach themselves from worldly possessions?

Do the hundred and eight beads of a rosary not represent the evils that need to be expunged from the— No. The rosary went slack, the beads cold to the touch. The pounding in his head had stopped. Rowan slowly opened his eyes and unclenched his fist. His knuckles had dug into the blood soaked mud at the door. There was the taste of blood in his mouth. He'd bitten his tongue without knowing. He looked up.

"Who are you??" Lieren wasn't speaking to Rowan, but staring over his head, behind him. Unauthorized usage: this tale is on Amazon without the author's consent. Report any sightings.

"Why are you here?" the man spat. His hands shook.

"How did you follow me here? How did the Black Judgement find me?! There is no one alive who doesn't believe I'm not already dead! How?" Rowan turned. A tall woman in simple white robes stood at his shoulder, her form faint. Her black hair floated around her, buoyed with energy. Her face was gentle, the face of someone who carried insects outside in cupped hands instead of killing them, of someone who pressed sweets into the palms of dirty orphans on the streets. The visage of his mother didn't look at Rowan.

She looked at Lieren.

"You cannot escape, demon," the visage intoned, her voice echoing on the wind.

"We must all face Judgment." The rosary ripped from his wrist, the lotus cross impaling into the ground. The earth shook as the cross instantly expanded in size to the height of a human, bolts of black lightning arcing over its length. Lieren reared back, his face scrunched in a snarl. Qi collected in his palm like a gathering storm. Arcs of black lightning shot rapidly over the den. Lieren grunted as his arm burst in a spray of flesh. The arcs coalesced into a matrix of flashing obsidian wire.

"No," Lieren whispered, holding his arm as he glared at the visage.

"No!" The man roared. Dark energy exploded from his body in a vast column, shooting through the ceiling of the shack like it was paper. The screams of thousands of people in agony howled into the sky, faces of smoke and shadow forming and trying to press out of the column. A myriad of arms and spikes spouted out of his body. His face split open down the center, revealing rows of fangs and multiple tongues. In the center sat a red eye.

"I might not seem a butterfly, springing from my cocoon in a form so ugly as this… but I am transformed!" Faster than Rowan could comprehend, the demon vanished from his place and suddenly appeared in front of him, slashing down with a dozen claws. The sharp pang of certain death fluttered through Rowan. Then, the wires of qi tightened, shocking the demon with so much power that his body froze, back arched, all of his eyes wide open. The clearing became as bright as day, bleaching the area of color and sound.

The demon was inches from Rowan, the outline of his mouth open in a feral scream, but Rowan heard nothing at all. You must watch, came a whisper from his memories, you must remember what they do to us. Those words had been spoken to a child hiding behind a pillar, told to brand the memory of his father's murder into his vision and to keep looking. Rowan was not that child anymore. He watched, because he realized the horrible truth now, a truth he didn't accept as a child - His father had been weak.

It didn't matter how talented a person was, or their cultivation level, if your enemy was stronger than you, you were weak. The Formidable Five had been the strongest of the outer disciples, but look what happened to them? All of their bearing, all their skill and talent, gone in a flash. Without his mother's rosary he would also be dead. Rowan took a step back as the sea of black lightning intensified even further - unspooling from the lotus cross, threading through the entire demon den.

"Birds are the natural predator of butterflies," said his mother. The waves of lightning crashed over everything, leaving behind an opaque flame that drank the light. The black fire took the shape of swallows, drowning Lieren and his worldly possessions in a dark flock. The man - no, it was no longer even shaped like a man. Wires of lightning cocooned the demon in the air, twisting and tangling and strangling. The swallows grew, bursting into gouts of flame.

An inferno burned away any trace of flesh from the hanging corpses and petrified their skeletons into charred metal. The hut exploded, blasting a spray of bones into the clearing. The full moon leered down at the wreckage, as bright as the sun. The only thing that wasn't yet fully twisted and molten was Lieren Nostraga, speaking with too many teeth and too many tongues.

"What right do you have to judge me?! Who gets to decide what is fair? If it's natural for beasts to eat humans, then why can't I?" The demon gave a howling laugh through choked sobs as oily black fire pecked at him, his skin silver in the night. Flecks of his body transformed into piles of eyeballs and intestines, squelching as they hit the floor. They didn't reform. Some of the eyeballs stared at Rowan.

"I don't want to die," said Lieren. Rowan stared back at the man's mouths in horror. Finally, the last of the demon was nothing but dry, black smoke, and Rowan could hear nothing but the a gentle spring breeze rustling through the trees. Stars glimmered in the darkness above. The giant sparking lotus cross spearing the ground shrank back to its original size. Rowan turned to his mother, not knowing which question to start with.

"Mom, I-" He wondered if she would be more than an imprint of her qi, hoping that he could embrace her. But she was no longer behind him.

"Mom?" he tried again, but he knew she was already gone. Rowan bent down to gingerly pick the rosary off the ground, winding it around his wrist. He held it against his cheek, but it no longer even held that little trace of his mother's qi. The only proof of her presence was the smoking ruin beside him. I… I should bring back my fellow disciples' remains… It wasn't a trick of the light. The bones that had survived the heat of the dark flame had indeed been transmuted into iron.

Rowan picked through the skeletons in a daze, but he couldn't figure out which ones had been his sectmates. All their clothing had burned away, as had their armor and any trinkets they might've carried. He would just have to report the matter to the sect and let them handle the arrangements. A glint in the moonlight. There was an iron skeleton in the back of the room with something caged between its fingerbones. Rowan carefully picked up the red gem, the size of a small egg. The stone was rough and unfinished.

It didn't sparkle nor gleam. Ordinarily, Rowan wouldn't have spared it a second glance. Except, it was the only thing that had survived. It had probably been the focus of someone's spirit tool. Rowan debated for a moment before placing it in his pocket, resolving to hand it over to the sect when he returned. If he just left it here, who knew what scavenger might take it? He stumbled out of the clearing that had once been the ramshackle hut. The night around him was warm and humid and sticky.

Cicadas chirped all around. Nocturnal birds called for their mates. Rowan squinted upwards until he saw the vague shape of a dark monolith in the distance. The mountain. He started in that direction, stomach flip-flopping at any noise. Bushes rustling. Frogs croaking. The most dangerous beasts were night-hunters… and he stank of burning flesh. His mind was blank as he navigated the forest. This time, he didn't run into any tree branches, and his feet didn't slip in the muddy patches.

He walked with a single-minded purpose. Then, a familiar nuisance appeared, lapping at the blood at the hem of his robes. Rowan jumped.

"You stupid onion! Do you want to get refined into a pill?" The Wandering Bulb let out a quiet trilling noise, hopping obediently behind him. Rowan shook his head. His eyes stung; he dragged his sleeve across them and kept walking. If the wretched thing wanted to die so badly, why would he stand in its way? He didn't have the stomach to kick it away or stomp on it, so he just let it follow him. On their way back, a blazing star shot through the sky, a streak of gold beyond the canopy.

By the time Rowan had reached the Southeastern Gate, the Wandering Bulb had sucked all of the blood on his robes. He no longer stank of iron, and the black fabric hid any stains. Rowan jogged through the city, heading straight for the entrance to the sect. Most of the storefronts had already closed and few people still roamed the streets. When he arrived, he banged against the gate.

"Old Hesser! Old Hesser!"

"What the hell, kid? I've been waiting for you to come back for hours," came the reply from behind the gate. A rush of qi and the doors opened.

"A demonic cultivator! In the woods!" Rowan shouted.

"He killed the Formidable Five!"

"Demons? In sect territory? Are you sure you saw correctly?" Rowan nodded frantically. Old Hesser cursed. He walked up to a rusty little gong positioned on the side of the gate and coated his hand with enough qi for it to distort the air around it, and slammed his palm against the metal. There wasn't an audible ring but Rowan felt the qi within him recoil and resonate with the way it vibrated in the air. Three streaks of light descended within seconds.

Elder Schell, long-bearded and thick-armed, was leaning on a drawn sword. Elder Cloris, hunched, was still clutching the broom he swept the library floors with. Elder Patino, whose white eyebrows ended past his cheeks, landed with his hands behind his back. Rowan had never seen the last elder before, who kept to the grounds of the Inner Sect. Both Hesser and Rowan bowed.

"Junior, what has happened?" rasped Elder Cloris. The gatekeeper quickly informed the elders of the situation. Elder Patino's brow pinched as he scowled.

"Can we trust this boy, Hesser? A mere outer disciple?" Hesser barely paused.

"Yes." The Elders interrogated Rowan about the location for a minute or two before flying off. Distantly, a fourth teal streak of light shot off towards the forest from inside the sect.

"You should return to your quarters," said Hesser, after the Elders were completely out of sight.

"That spirit herb you found will be worth quite a lot. Get some rest, and in the morning, turn it in at the Mission Hall." The Wandering Bulb squeaked and hid in Rowan's sleeves.

"Thank you, sir." Rowan bowed deeply, more grateful than he could say that the old man had vouched for him. He touched the red stone he'd found, unsure why he hadn't given it to the elders. Maybe because, if it had belonged to one of Lieren Nostraga's victims, then maybe it wasn't demonic in nature? He knew it had to be powerful. He was also down to his very last spirit stone, and only a single Wandering Bulb wouldn't fetch him enough merits to buy anything good from the Lower Library.

At the very least, perhaps he could sell the stone off at the Auction House. That was just what the elders would do, anyway… As he walked, he passed the stone between his hands, trying to name all the shades of red he saw within it.