Chapter 12 — The Mutation
劍問蒼天 · Page 1 of 7
Zhang Qingyue stared at the bead for a long while, his breathing gradually settling. But apart from noticing that its color and luster had dimmed somewhat, he could make nothing else of it, and so he tucked it back against his chest. He turned to look at Tian Lingsu beside him. She was still unconscious, but color was slowly returning to her face; her condition had improved considerably.
He picked up the amber-red silk and examined it closely. It was the first time he had looked at this treasure from so near, and he found it soft to the touch, quite pleasant. Recalling the graceful figure Tian Lingsu had cut as she rode the air, he felt a pang of envy.
After watching it a while, he mimicked Tian Lingsu's gesture with his hand and cried, "Rise!"
The amber-red silk lay there like a dead snake, paying him no mind, not stirring in the least.
"Chee chee chee chee!" The gray monkey off to one side was clutching its belly, collapsed on the ground, convulsed with laughter.
Zhang Qingyue glared at it, but having just shared danger with the creature, he could not help feeling a certain fondness for it, and the last of his hostility melted away. He stuck out his tongue and made a face at the monkey, then ignored it, laid the amber-red silk beside Tian Lingsu, and let his gaze drift to the pool in the clearing.
It was a small pool, modest in extent, with no visible source—likely fed by an underground spring. The water was a deep emerald green, and from where he stood its depth was impossible to judge. On the western side there was a gap through which the water flowed out, gathering into a brook that wound away into the distance.
At the center of the pool lay a heap of broken rocks, of every size and shape, a few of them breaking the surface. Among the rocks a short black rod was thrust at an angle, a foot of it above the water, the rest submerged. It was black through and through, and what material it was made of he could not tell; it was thoroughly ugly.
Zhang Qingyue paid it little mind. He only felt that the place was strange beyond measure and that it would be best to leave quickly. Yet though Tian Lingsu beside him had grown calm, she remained unconscious and would not wake no matter how he called. The gray monkey, by contrast, was full of energy—scratching its ears and cheeks, grooming itself for lice, never still for a moment. Now and then it darted up into the trees and came back with a few wild fruits, of which it tossed two to Zhang Qingyue; then it plopped itself down on the ground and began eating with relish.
Zhang Qingyue took a bite of the wild fruit and found it sweet and full of juice; his appetite flared at once. He had set out for the mountain at dawn and had been chasing about ever since; it was now nearly noon and he had not had so much as a drop of water. He was already famished. He ate one fruit in two or three bites and was reaching for a second when he suddenly shook his head and set it gently beside Tian Lingsu.
With the fruit in his belly, Zhang Qingyue's hunger eased a little and his spirits improved. He stood and stretched, then looked around. Ancient trees stood dense and dark, a brook murmured nearby—the scenery was quite lovely, in fact. Who would have guessed such strangeness lurked here?
Just then Zhang Qingyue felt a warmth at his chest, and in the next moment came several muffled cracks—"kakaka"—as though something were splitting apart. Startled, he hastily pulled the bead from his breast and was badly frightened by what he saw: the whole bead blazed with surging blue light, and within it the blue vapor churned like wolves and tigers, battering desperately against the bead's wall. And the "swastika" mantra that held it in check was growing ever more fragile, ever more dim, and by the look of it would soon fail.