31. I Will Follow You Into the Dark
I Will Follow You Into the Dark
The energy of the Palace of Radiant Clouds felt completely different, despite it looking exactly the same.
Where it usually made Dustin feel… floaty, for lack of better phrasing, now the air itself felt heavier.
It was like the very fabric of the dimensional plane had been strengthened.
There even seemed to be a new room (though it seemed like the palace could manifest new areas as needed.
Possibly tied to Sima’s command) that looked like some sort of observatory; massive and dome shaped, with reflective black walls and ceilings that reflected arrays of glowing constellations.
It was like the night sky had somehow been transported into the room.
“Woah, where did this even come from?” James wondered aloud, craning his neck to get a better look as the group entered the room.
“Young Masters, welcome to the Astral Observatory. While Lu Ban worked to fortify the palace, I did not simply stand by idly. I have labored here, working to divine the exact location of Master Ying,” Sima explained, not making eye contact with the group, but instead staring into a large crystal orb device, situated on a pedestal between spinning metal rings.
Dustin breathed a sigh of relief; he figured Sima had some way of finding Chris without the Fire Ring, but he definitely needed something more concrete.
“He’s somewhere in Seattle, right?” Dustin said, immediately moving to Sima Yao’s side and looking into the crystal ball himself, only to realize he couldn’t see anything but more stars, “there’s a big storm brewing there. I figured it’s gotta have something to do with the emperor,”
“Your instincts are as sharp as ever Second Master Ying,” Sima confirmed, “I cannot say what it is that Qin Shi Huang is planning, but he is amassing an incredible amount of energy,”
“He must have the sword,” Chloe said, resolute, “send us in. We need to stop him now before he finds that Heirloom Seal thingy and this goes from bad to unsalvageable,”
“Wait, are we sure that’s a good idea? I mean, obviously I want Chris back like yesterday, but we’re rushing into this without fully understanding what we’re up against,” Bailey said, nervously pinching at the skin on her elbow.
Chloe moved over to her and put a perfectly manicured hand on her shoulder.
“Listen, I’m not a fan of suicide missions. I like getting the job done and coming home in time to catch Gilmore Girls,” Chloe’s stern expression softened into a warm, but determined look, “we’re going to save him Bails. No matter what’s waiting for us out there,”
Bailey took a deep breath and simply nodded.
“Alright, yeah. Let’s do this,”
Dustin fell in line with the others as Sima finally turned to face them all; his face the same mix of determination and deep sorrow as the first time Dustin had ever seen him.
“Young Masters…” Sima began, but James cleared his throat.
“Elemasters. That’s what we’re called,” James whispered, like a director reminding an actor of their line. Dustin chuckled, Bailey shook her head and smiled, and Chloe pinched the bridge of her nose in affectionate frustration.
“My apologies Master Zhang,” Sima replied, the ghost of a fond grin on his even more ghostly face, “Elemasters. The battlefield you are about to enter may very well be a lethal one. In my time, the power Qin Shi Huang possessed was nigh unmatched, even by the combined might of our team. When I conscribed you according to the whims of fate, I did so not with eagerness, but with great pain at the magnitude of the burden being hoisted upon you. As the time arrives for you to meet the full weight of your obligation, I leave you with these words…”
Sima trailed off, his eyes briefly fluttering shut as though he was gathering strength just to say whatever was coming next.
“Ying Zheng, now the eternal abomination Qin Shi Huang, has taken countless lives, in my era and now yours. Your responsibility has never been to undo the sins of the past, but instead, to secure the possibility of a future free of this tyrant. Go now with purpose, and see your destinies finally fulfilled,”
Dustin could’ve sworn he heard something like a tearful waver in Sima Yao’s voice, but he didn’t have even another moment to question it before a sudden fog enveloped them all, sending them headfirst into the unknown with little more than determination and a dream.
Fair enough. There was nothing more to say.
It was time for action.
Dustin never thought he’d see the streets of a city as big as Seattle practically deserted.
There was no one on the sidewalk, no cars on the road, and it even looked like most of the big office buildings had been abandoned.
The only sounds that could be heard were emergency sirens in the distance; likely the efforts of police and first responders trying desperately to control something they couldn’t even conceptualize.
As uncanny as it was, it absolutely wasn’t surprising…
Not when there was an enormous swirl of ominous black clouds overhead, surging with lightning in a way that looked anything but natural.
“Must’ve been a citywide alert for everyone to stay inside,” Chloe said as the group made their way through the streets, bracing against the intermittent bursts of wind strong enough to push them back.
“That part’s not surprising!” James yelled over a particularly powerful gust, “what’s shocking is that people actually listened!”
“I wonder what could’ve been scary enough to scare an entire city into compliance,” Bailey mumbled as the group rounded the corner… and immediately found the answer to her question.
Bailey screamed, James immediately shielded his eyes and nose, Chloe’s entire body stiffened, and Dustin dropped to his knees.
On the street in front of them, right in front of Seattle’s famous Space Needle, were the immolated bodies of at least a dozen people.
Abandoned police cars and ambulances were parked at odd angles, sirens still flashing as their doors hung open.
Caution tape had been hastily set up, but had since snapped loose and was now flapping violently in the intense wind.
Whatever happened here, clearly overwhelmed any official response before it had a chance to take shape.
The bodies had clearly been hit by something unforgiving and intense; their clothes and shoes had been blown off, their jewelry was melted to their skin, and what little recognizable skin was uncharred, was marked with strange branching red marks.
“Oh my god… w-what the fuck happened to them?” Dustin could barely even process what he was seeing as he spoke. Chloe placed a hand on his back and pointed at the body closest to them; what looked to be a larger man… possibly a father given the much smaller body curled up next to him.
“Those markings, we learned about them in science class last year, remember? Lichtenberg figures… from lightning strikes,”
“So, Qin Shi Huang did this? He fucking… murdered all these people with lightning?! Just for getting in his way?!” Dustin’s hands balled into fists as his gaze drifted upwards to the top of the Space Needle, which seemed to be the center point for the swirling clouds overhead, “we’re ending this. Right fucking now,”
“He’s probably up there, inside the disk,” Chloe replied, tapping her chin in thought, “but I’m sure the building is locked down. How are we supposed to get up there?”
Bailey stepped forward, rolling up her sleeves.
“I have an idea, but I genuinely have no clue if it’s even gonna work,”
“Any plan’s better than no plan. Whatcha got?” James wondered aloud, quirking an eyebrow.
Bailey didn’t reply, she just kneeled and placed her palm on the asphalt.
The veins in her arms glowed bright yellow and a tremor ripped through the ground as cracks spread around the group in a circle.
Bailey’s eyes squeezed tight in concentration as the small section of earth started to jostle itself loose from the street, lifting them into the air on a personalized Earth Sage Elevator?.
“Oookay, wasn’t expecting that!” Chloe shrieked, holding onto Dustin’s arm like she might die if she let go, “heights are not my thing, I must admit!”
“Sorry,” Bailey grunted through gritted teeth, “I’ll try to make it quick,”
Dustin’s stomach lurched as they hurtled through the air and the smaller buildings surrounding them began to fall away. They finally came to a shaky stop on eye level with the disk’s windows. He tried to look inside to see if he could spot Chris, but everything was obscured by an impenetrable mist.
“I’m getting us in there,” Chloe said before Dustin could think of a plan, already holding her arms out in front of her.
The metal reinforcing the windows aggressively buckled inward, shattering the glass and allowing the group to hop off Bailey’s improvised hovercraft and into the SkyCity restaurant.
Dustin had only been inside this place once; when he and Chris were kids and their mom brought them with her to Seattle for work, she treated them to a nice dinner there. He remembered it being a bit touristy, but ultimately a really cool experience…
Nothing like it was now.
The mist rushing out of the room through Chloe’s makeshift entrance, allowed them to see the extent of the horrors Qin Shi Huang had unleashed inside this place.
Bodies were strewn all over, many of them violently hurled against the cracked windows with wind, others burned right through by concentrated lightning blasts.
Almost all of their faces were still warped into the horrific expressions they had at the moment they died.
In the center of it all, sitting atop a dining table with his legs crossed and eyes closed in meditation, was Chris himself. Still shirtless, now even thinner than Dustin, with his shaggy hair grown out so much that only the ends of it were still blonde.
But his physical appearance wasn’t what was the most alarming.