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CC: Chapter 51
🕑 Added 2024-05-13 14:30:01 +0000 UTCThe Xu’Jan charged XJ-V as a unit, swords swinging, screams echoing through the thunderous cacophony of the skies above. Rain pelted off the Cog’s calm limbs and hands as he stepped forward and brought his right leg up in a fiery kick that then led into another Flaming Dervish. He felt the boys’ faces crumble at his swift strikes, each blow delivering a stunning effect on their nerves and causing them collapse – their once confident faces kissed the wet mud of the village they had just destroyed.
XJ-V did not relent. He brought the boys down just as he said they would, every strike forcing him to look into the burning hatred that the warriors harbored for him, every parry of their blades a grim reminder that he was fighting little more than slaves to the Orders’ lies.
When the last Xu’Jan felt the flaming strike of his palms, XJ-V assumed his Siulubu and stared down the commander again, noting that in the wake of his melee, the world seemed more silent than ever.
The eyes of everyone – including that of the Pale demon himself, were trained on the Cog’s burning chest. They were spellbound by the glowing fire that raged within his heart, blazing in brilliant flames of energy as he stood there above the bodies of his nullified foes.
“You…” the Pale leader said – his voice an ashen whisper on the crashing winds sent by the heavens. “It is you, isn’t it?”
And XJ-V only now realized his mistake. The leader had watched, and waited, not out of pure cowardice, but because he wished to confirm a suspicion that his mind could not process without evidence.
The burning, living flame radiating from the Cog’s chestplate was all the evidence his eyes needed.
“I’ve heard rumors about you,” he said, licking his dry, black lips. “You are the one who fled as Hensha burned. The one that bears the Gift…”
It was as he feared – this man was no mere marauder come to pillage and plunder like a bandit. He was here on a very specific mission…and his objective had just taken the bait.
XJ-V cursed himself for his ignorance and his desperate submission to his desires. But, even knowing he had just been led into a dark spider’s web, he couldn’t see himself doing anything different. It was as Ori’un said – the Dao showed us choices, but sometimes one merely picked divergent paths that forked and turned in the dark, only to eventually lead to the same outcome.
“Oh, shove it buddy,” Ori’un spat at the stalking demon from the crowd of villagers. “Can’t you see you’re beaten? Give up this little villain monologue you’re starting and turn tail now. You aren’t gonna beat this one.”
The pale specter took a series of steps forward, the trimming of his robe gliding across the burned ground as though he had no feet at all.
“How the Lord favors me,” he murmured, almost to himself. “After the High Eagle himself failed to extract you, now Great Yuwa has delivered you to me as a sign of his divine providence.”
XJ-V grit his metal teeth. He could feel the energy swirling in this man. Not Qi – the power running through his ashen veins was something entirely different.
“Your God is dead,” XJ-V told the pale specter. “I do not count the deceased among my enemies.”
“All of this world is your enemy, machine. Have you not realized this by now?”
“You lie,” XJ-V said, readying two Dragon Tooth strikes as the bone-bleached vulture glided towards him. “The Cultivators still stand strong, despite your God’s wish to eradicate them. And they are more accepting than He ever was.”
A low, gravel-like sound stuttered from the leader’s black mouth. It took the Cog a second to realize that the warrior of the Eagle was laughing at him.
“You think those slaves to the Dao are human?” he said. “I suppose that makes sense. One slave often follows another. The blind lead the blind into captivity and death. Your destruction is mutually assured, now.”
“Is that why you attack these villagers instead of the monastery?” XJ-V countered. “You know you would stand no chance against the true guardians of humankind.”
“Guardians?” the specter spat. “Those infidels live off the scraps the true Gods left in heaven. Did they not tell you that, machine-man? The Dao is nothing more than the ashes of the dead Gods you so cheerfully blaspheme before. Normally, I would correct your ignorance and leave you here to lament your mistakes. But I am not one to look a gift from my Lord in its eyes and leave it be.”
The warrior drew the blade at his side with such speed that XJ-V couldn’t even follow his arms as they tore the impossibly long Jian blade from its hip-scabbard. With a single, emaciated arm of nothing but thin muscle clinging to bone, the pale warrior leveled his weapon at the Cog.
“Know me,” he said. “Know the name of your death-bringer. I am Sheloth. I am the Eagle’s righteous talon clawing at this barren earth. I am the bringer of Yuwa’s justice to the unclean, and the undeserving.”
The Cog watched as the otherworldly light of the Order’s paladins flare into brilliant, evil life across the edge of Sheloth’s sword, and he felt the light within his own chest react and pulse in recognition.
“See how my Lord recognizes one of his own?” Sheloth grinned. “Soon, the thief who dared to steal from a God shall bow before the might of His light.”
“Pfft!” Ori’un hissed behind both men. “Kick his ass, XJ-V!”
While the Cog looked into the rainswept face of the pale demon who stood before him, his frail body utterly incongruous with the ungodly size of his shining blade, he spared a moment to wonder why Ori’un was still doing nothing but sitting around and enjoying this show.
Planeswalker…The Cog thought with a sudden horrific surge of probability. Are you…watching me? Are you…testing me right now?
Sheloth’s blade came down, its tip aimed directly at XJ-V’s amber-clad heart.
A strike of lightning signaled the release of more rain. Both warriors – human and Cog - wore a blanket of hail upon their shoulders.
“Do not disappoint me,” the demon whispered. “Let us see what a Cog Cultivator can do.”
