there is no hell. all the demons are here. they play with us and show us

the things we don't want to see.

every sixth day of the snake month. the hundred demons would descend upon the utter islands.

this is known as the hundred demon festival.

they dance. make merry. they are more joyful than us humans.

and then, upon sunrise, they disappear into their abodes.

—the shadows. the specks of dust captured by moongleam.

is it not amazing to realize? that these demons bear

more joy

then we, stream-enterers?

Song of the Hundred Demon Festival

The High Chief Trasan dreamed of heaven that night.

Within the great royal chambers of his attic-room—a four poster royal bed, draped with silks and veils colored sunset.

Smelled of semen and sweat and human juices mixed with incense and jasmine oils. Scattered around the room were men and women, naked; some bled. Awake, lying back-against-the-headboard, was High Chief Trasan. His willowing hair fell about him, his gaunt face and blackened eyes strong, his skin the color of bleached bone.

He breathed. There was work to be done, he knew.

Cold winds breezed in, from the sea. The whims, perhaps, of the Code of the Sea. Trasan pushed aside the man that had fallen asleep upon his manhood. He did not remember having opened the windows to his chambers.

A woman sat on the windowsill. She was short but muscles rippled against her skin. Heavenly sashes and robes wrapped around her. A thin silk wrapped around her waist, embroidered as if for nobles. Her breasts strained against thick wrappings, tied double, triple.

Her brow burned with a third eye. A mark of lesser Enlightenment. Her skin was white porcelain. Her eyes were twilight. Her platinum hair floated about her, constantly whipped by an invisible, divine wind. She was beauty carved from heaven's very stones.

And Trasan trembled.

"High Chief of Imos," said the woman. "Pray, I find thee at a time auspicious?" Her voice was soft. Slightly hoarse. Frayed silk timbre.

Trasan nodded. He took a sash and wrapped it around his waist. His dark hair fell about him like cypress, a hood to cover his face. "What business must ye conduct here at this time, Saint Ashtasi?"

"Ye forget thyself, great High Chief," Ashtasi said, without looking at him. Her hair floated about her. A beautiful ruby frame. "Heaven itself conspires with you by our blessing. Remember that."

"Yes. Of course." Trasan looked away. How humiliating. To be brought down to this level by a mere bitch woman!

"Art thou quite done having thy way with thy pitiful subjects?" she asked. Pulled out a dagger; blade chopped in half.

No doubt a threat, thought Trasan. "Yes, quite so, graceful and saintly one. Why hast thou shewn themselves to me, this blessed night?"

Ashtasi smirked. Enjoying the fear penetrating Trasan. Ashtasi did not particularly like Trasan. "It looks like the utter workings of karma have returned to thee, whatever merit ye collected for yourself. You curry favor with heaven by performing this deed, by accomplishing this very thing."

Trasan swallowed a lump in his throat. For all his dark sorceries and powers, he was utterly helpless under the Will of Heaven. He knew this to be true: they were on a completely different stratum from him. And so, all he can do—all he must do—is follow. Kiss their ass, suck their cock. "And what might this thing be... great Saint Ashtasi?"

Ashtasi swung her feet into his room--this whole time, she was respecting him. The saintly veils and robes swam around her, in constant flurry. Truly she be the zephyr. "Doubtless ye have set thine eyes upon a new vagrant upon thy village. Dost thou remember?"

High Chief Trasan furrowed his eyebrows, knotting his forehead as he tried to remember. Has this bitch lost it? A thousand louts and nomads pass by this port city every single day. The world revolves not around Heaven's machinations! "A vagrant, milady...?"

"Aye. Cloud-haired, scarlet eyed... a mien reminiscent of a woman, but the swording hand of a man...?"

How could he forget? The one with that traveled with the bitch that beat up his port chief...? "I... yes, lady saintly one. I have seen such an entity. Are they..."

"Capture that vagrant and bring them to me. Heaven itself conspires against them: they are a blasphemer against the Tenets of Bliss and Happiness. They are a thief of Heaven's treasures and magicks, they are a heretic and shirker of the very gods that keep this crumbling world together. They Who Danced Against The Heavens... Raxri Uttara."

Trasan nodded. So they seek after such a being... If this is a being that can leap to heaven's ends and break it with their being and their finesse... what power do I have to match them? "Milady, if this being be so great as you speak, what power have I to subjugate them?"

"Coward!" said Ashtasi, spit from her mouth like venom. "Fool. Did you not notice? Ye felt no burning Force within them, aye? They have lost their Cultivations after being killed the first time. Take them while they are shorn of their strength, and thy reward shalt be greater than ye can ever imagine."

Reading on Amazon or a pirate site? This novel is from Royal Road. Support the author by reading it there.

"What strengths does this Raxri Uttara hold?"

"Multitudes still," said Ashtasi, staring at the ceiling. The night was black and sad. "Multitudes yet. I have been told that they were able to slay a Semidevil ally of heaven, which means they have been able to cultivate. Raxri must be stopped before they can cause the havoc they once did upon Heaven and upon Earth. Assume that they are peerless yet with the sword, and beholden to magicks Red, White, and Black: the Arts of Destruction, Creation, and Transformation. Know also that they can change their mien, shape their form, and speak with the voice of a thousand lions. They can duplicate themselves up to ten thousand fold. They can leap to the ends of the earth, to the Pillars of the Universe, where one finally finds the Fingers of the Unsurpassed Sage." She smiled and turned to Trasan. She reached out and touched his forehead, and then shuddered. Disgusted. Trasan resisted the urge to spit a globule of blood from his mouth at her face. "Do this, and the very treasures of heaven will split open for you."

Trasan inhaled, nodded. Perhaps, finally, I will be able to fuck a god. "Anything for Heaven, great Saint Ashtasi. However..." Curse my damn curiosity, my damn tongue! Trasan bit his lip and wished he hadn't spoken. That final word... if only he kept his temper.

"Yes? However what? You stupid, foolish, malicious, evil cur?"

Trasan knew all that to be true, and he relished in such namings. Power cannot be taken without a bit of adamantine heart, after all. Into the hells I go... "Why does the saint not take Raxri Uttara herself?"

"Fool. I will not dirty my hands with the tasks of the ant. Heed my words, little-dick: the world must break first before I lay my hands on Raxri Uttara."

And what meaneth that...? Trasan felt a confusion. Was that an admission of... fear?

"Steel your heart," said Saint Ashtasi. "Heaven awaits ye, Dark Lord." She stood up on the windowsill, and then fell backwards. A ribbon of light swallowed her, consumed her form, replaced by nothing.

Trasan watched the empty space before him, now devoid of the blissful presence of Saint Ashtasi. His heart trembled with a mighty shaking. "The workings of heaven and earth have been set, it seems. And I, the mighty jester of it all... for now. What fate awaiteth me?"

He rose to his feet, and walked to his throne. Leaving the mess behind.

The next day, leaning against his throne, draped in a shadowy raiment so black it swallowed light, High Chief Trasan waved his hand. The doors swung open, and in walked a woman clad in intricate armor. A full armor of malachite-hued aerosteel (four times stronger than mundane steel, and a third of the weight) draped over with intricate sharkskin livery. In her left hand she bore a steel shield cut in the shape of a diamond. On her waist hung a long and thin sword that resembled a rose thorn.

The woman was tall, around 170cm in height. Her boots had heels that lifted her height by a good 3 inches. She towered over the ministers and guards of Trasan, and stood dangerously close in height to the High Chief. Her hair was the color of deep dusk night. Skin the color of pearls. Eyes the color of stained glass--a mark of martial prowess, of advancing enlightenment. Her boots struck the stone of the palace like thunder.

Her height betrays her North Shennin lineage, the Prime Minister Tun Moriwasa thought when he had first seen her. Her monolid eyes combined with her height showed heritage to the tribes in the utter north. Her pearlescent skin tone paired with her sharp and thin nose... one would wonder how such a North Shennin could have ended up here, in the End of the World.

She knelt on one knee as High Chief Trasan rose to his full height. Trasan's dusky mien cowled her, his shadow choking her bright aerosteel plate. "First Knight Rengka Tarsi." A choker of Dark, in the shape of thorns, wrapped around her neck. Invisible wounds blossomed, unseen by all save for those with Wisdom cultivated.

"At your service, Ocean Lord."

"I have summoned thee under the pretense of utmost secrecy." If one were to look at the room, one would not find a single soul, save for Prime Minister Tun Moriwasa and his jaunty belly, and the shadow-beings chained to Trasan's magick might. Even the flames were devoid of spirits and demigods. "For a mission most important."

"I can only serve." First Knight Rengka's lexicon was overwhelmingly polite, almost to the point of sarcasm or parody. As to be expected, of course, as she learned the language only after Trasan defeated her in combat and took her as part of her entourage.

It had only been 5 years since then. Rengka was a young and promising swordswoman to the Junyo Province official Rangjie. Her swordsmanship was nigh undefeatable, and she mixed that with internal alchemy techniques, the secret kung fu of Shennin make. And yet even that was not enough to overcome Trasan's occult power.

"Yes," said Trasan, as if in both reification of his power as well as a means to move to the next topic. "There is a warrior that has arrived here in our quaint port town. It seems they have been here for the past few days. It just so happens that--"--Trasan thought carefully about his next words--"--the bright, beautiful, and o so respectful Heaven has found that this warrior is the target of their scorn for the present time. Therefore, First Knight Rengka: thine heart is charged with the hallowed service of carrying out Heaven's mandate. Bring to me the cloud-haired Raxri Uttara, alive."

"No deaths?" asked Rengka.

"Some blood, cuts, bruises, and broken bones must not be too much of a penalty. Whatever it takes to bring them back alive, lest Heaven crumble and fall upon us."

"Understood," said Rengka. Rengka knew full well the machinations and whimsies of heaven. Before she went out to defend that bordermarch town from raiding pirates, the family geomancer had told her that the essence of that action was overwhelmingly skewered through with burning negative energies. She went anyway, because she was mandated under the order of the Duke of Junyo Province, who was a sworn brother of her father. She had had to go. Such were Heaven's cruel jokes. "I shall go at first light."

"Yes," said Trasan. "Let's not make things more complicated."

"Is there anything I must know about this... Raxri Uttara?"

Trasan crossed his hands. "I am told they be peerless with the blade, and wield the three prime magicks: Red, White, and Black. They can change their mien and shape their form and speak with a hundred voices. They can duplicate themselves ten-thousand fold."

Tun Moriwasa's brows were furrowed, deep in thought. No doubt he was thinking to himself how he had let this Raxri Uttara get away, when they were right there in front of them this whole time.

"I see," said Rengka, simple and clean. "If that is what must be done, then that is what I must do. I will wield--"

"If you are in need of strength," said Trasan, taking a blade of darkness out of his shadowy cloak. "Then I shall give you strength. This will hurt, but only for a moment. The greatest victories come only after pain, after all. Take off thy breast."

Rengka hesitated for a moment, but this would not be the first time she would do this in front of him. And so she did, removing first the sharkskin--carefully, for it could harm even herself--and then her aerosteel gauntlets, her pauldrons, and then finally her aerosteel plate. She set it down softly on the ground. Underneath, she wore chain mail made of abaca fibers. She took that off too, until all she wore on her torso was a black wrap. That kept her breasts flat against her chest.

An athlete's build—broad shouldered, tall, with a large pane for a back. Her body was one that bodybuilders could only dream of. And she attained it after a lifetime of combat.

Trasan nodded in approval, though he was not looking at her at all. The Dark Lord High Chief wove the signs with his fingers; chanted the elder syllables. The chanting crescendoed—his hands shot out; a javelin of darkness skewered through Rengka's heart.

Instead of pain: coldness and numbness blossomed. Rengka cried out in pain. Turned into a muffled, mangled gasp as the cold caught her throat. After a moment, the pain quickly subsided. On her chest, a black inky residue--tattoo-like--blossomed out like a lotus growing into the mud instead of out of it. Worse so, a certain understanding now rang throughout Rengka. She knew now, inexplicably, how to weave Magick.

"You can now wield the Dark for a short amount of time. Be careful, for though the Dark be a well of bounteous power, it is also an easy path to Cessation and Dissolution."

Rengka bowed. She thought to herself: Would it be possible to slay Trasan with this power?

"Thank you, High Chief." Not yet. I must bide my time yet.

"This will last for only a day and a half, so wield it wisely. The super-knowledges required for you to use these are there, in your consciousness." And they were. Almost impossibly so. So this is the power of a true warlock!

"I will put it to good use, and I will not fail thee, High Chief."

"Good. As should be the case. Now, go. Make haste. Set your heart ablaze."

If you find any errors ( broken links, non-standard content, etc.. ), Please let us know < report chapter > so we can fix it as soon as possible.