Chún dropped from the trees as he neared the border of an unexplored region on the 'map' that shimmered in his Essence sense. The Monkey Movement Dao was useful among branches for swift travel, but he was not yet skilled enough to explore safely at that speed.
The Mountain's forest here grew thinner. The ground was rockier, slopes steeper, great boulders jutting from the earth like ancient bones. The trees stood farther apart, their roots gripping stone instead of soil. Vines were fewer, the air cooler, sharper in his lungs. Light fell in wide golden beams, revealing a forest bright yet strangely still.
The trunks showed subtle hues beyond brown and green, their bark streaked with ochre and grey, their leaves small and rustling in the breeze. Almost no flowers grew.
Chún looked back, frowning. Only a few dozen paces downslope, the forest thickened again into the humid tangle he knew. That contrast struck him now as odd. The natural forests of the Mountain were like this—open and cool—not the dense jungle around his clearing. Perhaps he had simply been too dull to notice before. The heavy growth surrounding the Heaven and Earth Vine did not match the wider landscape at all.
"Mountain? Can you show me on the 'map' how far the jungle extends?"
A great teardrop shape shimmered within his Essence sense, its heart bright with living green where the Vine's clearing lay, the glow tapering downslope along the waterways like breath through hidden veins.
He traced the pattern absently with one finger, stirring faint motes of light that rippled through the vision as if acknowledging his thought. "Ah. Curious. Any other odd changes in climate or growth on you?"
Dozens of other regions flickered briefly across his inner vision in answering colours.
He nodded slowly. "So there are other strange areas. Probably Treasures like the Vine at their heart." He shrugged. "Another mystery for another day."
He began climbing the slope, prodding through fallen leaves with his staff. "Mark useful herbs and vegetables, please, friend." After a moment, he unrolled his cloak and pulled it on. "Glad I brought this—temperature extremes may not harm me, but sharper senses make them feel worse."
Wrapped again, he felt almost human—closer to the quiet simplicity of the days when Yijing still guided him. A tune slipped from his lips as he walked, the staff tapping rhythm on the earth. Each thump sent a ripple of Essence through the ground.
"Winter comes, autumn is here,
Harvest in, before wolves near."
He chuckled softly. "Eh? What is this?"
One of his staff strikes had exposed a pale cluster of mushrooms. In his Essence sense, the Mountain marked them with a faint, sickly green outline—an echo of a Dao symbol that felt of illness and imbalance, pulsing beside the true sight as quiet warning.
"Poisonous, eh? Thought so. Well then—where are you leading me?"
A cliff ahead shimmered through his inner sight, narrowing to the area directly around him. The narrow cleft burned faintly red, edged with the rhythm of Fire Essence—a heartbeat of warning the Mountain sent through their bond.
Yet even before that sign had flared, something about the shadowed passage in the face of the cliff disturbed him. The air around it felt thin and unclean; sound seemed to die before reaching it, as though the world itself wished not to notice. A faint shimmer of violet—almost unseen—stirred within the darkness, wrong in hue and rhythm for Fire or Earth Essence alike.
"Because that is not suspicious at all, Mountain. Is there a problem?"
"Torn…"
The word came heavy with stone-dust and grief, as though the Mountain itself bled.
"Serious, then. I do not know what torn means, but it sounds bad. Is there going to be a fight?"
A clear sense of affirmation.
"Well, I shall take the cloak off then. I do not need it shredded."
"Leave… cloak… on."
The voice rumbled like shifting boulders, carrying both worry and command.
"Huh? It will only get ruined—"
An image struck his mind: a rock just ahead, from which a large Essence spring welled up—its motes swirling thick with Earth and, strangely, Water, rising like mist from hidden depths.
"You want me to ignite that Essence spring first?"
A memory followed—him seated before the Silver Sapling at its ignition, Essence streaming through his staff.
"You want me to do that again? Is it possible to add more than one Essence to an object?" He studied the staff, which thickened in his grip, bark rippling into its true form.
Frustration pressed through the link. The same memory repeated—but now he wore the cloak instead of holding the staff. The scene shifted to the spring before him.
"Oh…"
He lifted a sleeve, eyeing the cloth. Thick flax, lined in leather—both once alive. If circulating Essence had awakened the wooden staff, perhaps it would work for the cloak too. But would he lose the cloak? His staff now lived like a tree; would the cloak become a herd of cows and a patch of flax sprouting in the dirt?
A pulse of impatience from the Mountain. Hurry.
"Very well then—I shall try." He stepped before the Essence spring. The motes swirled so thickly they pricked his skin. "A large one… how should I direct it?"
An image formed—the staff plunging beside the rock, sending Essence downward.
"Very well. What type?"
A braid of Water, Earth, and Fire shimmered in his mind. He grimaced. "How in Dao do other True Cultivators ever work this out?"
He lifted the staff and drove it into the ground. In his Essence sight, green-gold Wood and pale Metal light flared, the staff twisting, sprouting roots and leaves.
Moments later, he held a small, luminous tree. Essence pulsed through its trunk to the steady beat of the Mountain's heart.
"Oh, ancestors save me… with that much Essence, this ignition will shake the hills." He shut his eyes, channelled Essence through his cloak, and let it flow back into the staff.
The pulse struck the ground like a war drum. Deep, distant horns echoed through his mind—ancient and mournful—a call to arms. The thunder might have knocked him down if not for his fusion with the tree-staff. Each beat drained him further as he worked to balance the Essences. The scent of wet stone and sap filled his lungs, as though the Mountain itself exhaled through him.
He sensed Beasts slipping from the forest, forming a crescent around the cleft with himself and the rock at its heart. Their roars filled the air. He could not move, yet somehow knew their fury was aimed at the corruption, not at him.
The pulse reached its height. From the cleft came an answering surge of foul Essence. The wrongness crawled along his bones, stirring anger so sharp it burned. Determination flared—he would tear it apart for threatening his home.
The staff-tree blazed, reshaping into a vast leaf-bladed spear. The Beasts roared in unison as the Essence spring ignited.
———
No quake followed—only a beam of power channelled through the spear, blasting into the cleft like the hand of Heaven.
The world split into blinding light and darkness. Pain lanced through even his tempered body. Something heavy folded over him—the cloak, hardening into armour. Trees shattered; force slammed into him like a tidal wave. Through it all, he felt the Mountain's steady heartbeat—and the wrongness falter.
Then movement. Many shapes. Chittering, shrieking, roaring things poured from the cliff. Behind them crawled something greater, seething with pain and hate. He might have vomited from the sensation of it if not for the battle-fury rising to meet it. The Song of Battle thundered through the link.
He howled and charged, spear blazing. The first monster burst into fragments beneath his strike. Around him, Essence Beasts surged forward, roaring their defiance.
The Mountain's heart beat in time with his as they clashed. Water Essence flowed from his cloak, deflecting a lashing tentacle from a spider-octopus horror. The spear's haft shattered it like an eggshell; the blade cleaved another creature mid-leap.
Battle drums pounded in his head as Beasts fell and tore through the horde, red in tooth and claw. Essence flared in every colour, wind and heat and frost whipping through the chaos.
Chún slammed his spear's butt into the earth, channelling Metal and Earth together. A shockwave blasted outward, hurling demons aside in a hissing, smoking tide. Victory cries rang out as the Beasts leapt upon the dazed stragglers.
He sprinted up the back of a massive bear—the same great beast from the forest's heart, its fur still scorched from their last meeting. He ran along its foreleg as it swiped an enemy into fragments. "Throw!" he shouted.
The Bear reared, hurling him aloft. He spun, spear flashing in all directions, scattering ichor as he flew through the smoky air.
He landed blade-first on the skull of a bear–boar–bull hybrid, pulsed Essence, and blew its skull apart. The corpse collapsed, crushing smaller demons beneath it amid a thunder of stone and flesh.
———
A flicker of motion to his left. Chún rolled just as wolves lunged over him to meet an unseen foe. His cloak blasted a storm of razor-edged ice forward, clearing the space ahead. A dozen frozen creatures shattered as he crashed through them like a boulder.
"Did that first strike even do anything?" he roared down the link, swinging the spear in an echo of the Bear's movement, smashing a dozen crawling wolves that burst like split gourds.
An image formed in his mind: a huge shadow forcing its way through the cleft, spilling lesser demons from its sides.
"Demon King… the others cannot face that! Pull them back! We need reinforcements! Where is His Majesty?"
The 'map' brightened within his inner sight, pulsing red. The jiāolóng's marker glowed twenty-five li away.
"Dao above—there is no time. If that thing escapes, nothing will stop it."
More spawn poured from the fissure. Chún sprinted for the gap, desperate to seal it.
Wild Essence stormed through the air, crackling around him—and with it, an idea.
"Spark… heh." He shouted into the link, "Pull everyone back from the entrance now! Keep them busy in the clearing!" He hurled bolts of Metal Essence at passing demons, Monkey Movement carrying him between shattered stones. "By the Nine Springs—"
A titanic paw struck down, shaking the ground like ten thousand drums. Debris and boulders flew. His hood clamped tight over his face as the cloak shielded him. He bounded off tumbling slabs, leaping upward like a carp climbing a waterfall.
"There is no time…" He visualised the Fire Rune from the cave, remembering how it had fed on itself while Essence lasted.
The spear flared crimson, drawing Fire Essence from every direction. The demon below spewed flame.
"Thank you!" he bellowed. The spear caught the torrent and drove it back through the creature's eye. It screamed as it fell.
"There is no time…" He ignored the tumbling corpse and aimed his dive at the cleft's mouth, sketching the Fire Character over the entrance. Hundreds of shapes writhed beyond.
"Burn!" Chún roared, thrusting Essence into the rune.
The explosion hurled him half a li backward. Fire unfurled like a crimson flower, devouring the gap.
He landed staff-first, grounding the shockwave and crushing the few demons nearby. Screams echoed from within the fissure as burning shapes writhed and fell, the flames climbing higher as they drank the wild Essence.
But the blaze drained faster than it grew. Even with Fire Essence flaring from the battle, the storm was starving. Once it failed, only ordinary fire would remain—and the demons would pour through.
He had to kill the King Demon.
———
The army of Essence Beasts around him was smaller now, panting and bloodied. Reinforcements still arrived from the forest, but too slowly. The Fire Rune would collapse before the jiāolóng could reach them.
"Mountain, you and I will have words later. For now—show me the King Demon."
An image appeared: a colossal bulk twice the size of any before, a purple rune spinning before it, sucking in Essence like a whirlpool.
Chún studied it coolly. First to panic loses. "It is preparing something. I cannot let it finish."
He tilted his head. Two-thirds of its mass was melted, burned, like a lump of rancid, blackened fat left over from a previous night's cooking fire. "So, the first attack hurt it. Good—it can die."
Nearby Essence springs lay shattered. He could not repeat the ignition. Only one path remained.
He exhaled, steady. "Mountain, I need to see it directly. Have the others keep the small ones away. I will only need a tánzhǐ."
The surviving Beasts closed ranks around him as he stepped into the scorched cleft. The rock hissed and cracked with cooling heat. Only the faint chime of falling pebbles broke the silence.
Perhaps the King was too focused on its rune to spawn more.
He ran.
The King Demon's presence slammed into his Essence sense like the weight of a mountain. Its rune hummed—a sound like laughter twisted backward.
Chún gathered the patterns of Ending, Unimportance, and Completion and forced them into the Essence of the Demon King, even as the Beasts behind him met a final wave of defenders.
The shapes locked. The patterns spun.
Nothingness bloomed.
He sagged, trembling, as the monster's rune sputtered like a dying spark and vanished. The scorched and vile body blurred, collapsing into dust that drifted upward as grey motes, instead of falling to the ground.
"Just like the leaf," Chún whispered.
All around, the lesser creatures dropped, lifeless. The cleft echoed with howls of triumph from the remaining Essence Beasts. For a breath, the Mountain sang of victory—and beneath it, sorrow.