“Master Yeng.”

  The name left the herbal cultivator Tseng’s lips with the weight of a deliberate, heavy conscience.

  He addressed the bearded man with a deference that felt ancient, his posture bowed as if trying to shrink away from a light too bright to behold.

  As Zhao Tang stood there, rooted to the cold floor of the dormitory, he realized that a particularly strong presence was emanating from the old man.

  It was difficult to classify; calling it a stench would be a profound disrespect toward the sweet and calming aura that drifted off the man like mountain mist.

  It was an aroma, a scent of rain-washed stone and old parchment.

  It stood as the direct, celestial opposite to the stingy, hostile, and vile odor that the swine-demon had exhaled into the night air before its destruction.

  Tang’s nerves, which had been vibrating like over-tightened lute strings since he first opened his eyes, gradually calmed.

  He registered the character before him, trying to categorize the man as friend or foe, but Yeng defied such simple labels.

  The elder made no movement and uttered no word.

  He remained spokeless, yet in his silence, there resided an unknown, intimidating hue—a gravity that seemed to pull at the very fabric of the dormitory.

  Tang felt the morning sun warming the back of his neck and the breeze of the mountainous winds whistling through the eaves.

  Despite the current stillness, the horrifying details of the previous night remained etched behind his eyelids.

  He remembered the blood, viscous, hot, and vivid---marring every inch of the sect’s summit.

  He turned his head toward Tseng, searching for the grounding reality of time to understand how long he had been drifting in that dark, internal sea.

  “I believe you were resting asleep for two nights straight,” Tseng said, his voice weary and thick with exhaustion.

  “Two nights?” The question burst from Tang. “Two nights… how come?”

  He remembered the massacre as clearly as the sunrise.

  He had been coated in that vicious spray of crimson clay during the struggle.

  Even now, he could sense the phantom of the liquid lingering, nibbling at his skin like hungry insects.

  He felt as though if he looked in a mirror, he would still see the gore, despite the clean, fresh robes he currently wore.

  Tseng looked at him, his gaze lingering on Tang's face for a second too long.

  “It seemed as if the trauma from that night had consumed your mental energy and temporarily corrupted your spiritual purity.”

  “Your mind sought refuge in the void to prevent its own collapse.” He paused, his emerald eyes searching Tang's for a sign of recognition.

  “However, granted time, you have now healed. Tell me… do you remember anything of value?”

  Tang was puzzled by the inquiry.

  He wondered if Tseng meant the transformation of Khetsu, the arrival of the predatory birds, or if he was referring to Tang's behavior prior to the conversion, the way he had recoiled from a smell no one else could perceive.

  If two nights had truly passed, and if the evidence of the dark pits under Tseng’s eyes was any indication, the sect had been a hive of restless, grim activity while he lay unconscious.

  Surely the other survivors had already reported their experiences with this 'Master Yeng.'

  “Let it be,” Master Yeng added, finally speaking. His voice was a dry rasp that seemed to vibrate in the marrow of Tang's bones.

  Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.

  Perhaps seeing the confusion spiraling in Tang's expression,

  “Your mind has weathered a tempest few could endure. That you stand whole once more is a testament to your will. Do not dwell—some threads are best left untangled.”

  Tseng glanced toward the other disciples. They lay atop the scattered bunk beds, trapped in a sleep so endless and impenetrable it looked like a collective coma.

  “It should be stated,” Yeng whispered, his voice dropping an octave, “you were the first one that opened their eyes.”

  -

  “Zhao Tang, was it?”

  Tang nodded, feeling the sudden weight of his own name.

  Yeng gave him a calculating look, his dull eyes suddenly glinting with a foreign, sharp curiosity.

  “Apologies, for I must ask: have you read Chinese history?”

  The question felt like a non-sequitur, a jagged piece of a different world piercing this ancient nightmare.

  Tang wondered if the man sensed the "Xiao Fang" persona hiding behind the "Zhao Tang" vessel.

  “Chinese history? Y-yeah,” Tang stammered, nodding. “I’ve read about it. A bit.”

  Immediately, the old man’s demeanor shifted.

  He didn't become warm, but he became urgent.

  “Ah, that’s wonderfully pleasant! I’ve always had a thing for the Chinese Imperial history, you see. Your name, Zhao Tang…”

  His words were quick-paced, carrying an enthusiasm that felt entirely out of place for a man who had just dismantled a demon.

  “It’s a beautiful name, combining the precious surname from the Tang Dynasty and the famous first name from the Qin. Naturally, you must be of Chinese birth, I assume?”

  The rapid admission bamboozled Tang.

  He stood poised, trying to keep his balance while his mind desperately swiped through the piles of memory belonging to the original Zhao Tang, the "barren vessel" he now occupied.

  Sorting through decades of someone else’s experiences, sealed trauma, and mundane desires was a manual, agonizing process.

  To truly know if this body was born in China or Tibet, he would have to relive those moments, essentially drowning in the past.

  “I was born in China, yes,” Tang lied, deciding that the deep-dive into the "old" memories was a problem for a later hour.

  He still hadn't addressed Yeng as "Master." He wanted answers about the pig, the birds, and the shadow, but the elder kept diverting the topic toward lineage.

  Just as Tang prepared to demand a broader explanation of the night's horrors, Yeng interrupted him again.

  “How peculiar,” Yeng mused, stroking his unkept beard. “Did anything along the lines of my admission regarding your name ring a bell?”

  Tang shook his head, his lower lip jutting out in a strained expression of annoyance.

  He wasn't here for a history lesson; he was here because he had died once and didn't care to make it a habit.

  “I suppose you deserve a word with me,” Yeng said, his fingers combing through his beard with an unnerving, rhythmic naturality. “Follow.”

  The man turned his back and began trotting out of the room.

  He didn't look back to see if Tang complied; he simply expected it.

  Tseng stood quietly, observing the exchange with a look that spoke of a final farewell.

  “Take rest, Tseng,” Tang whispered as he passed the herbalist.

  He thought he saw a smirk etch itself onto Tseng’s face for a fleeting moment,

  A recognition of his own exhaustion finally drawing to a close.

  Tang then entered the hallway, trailing behind the indomitable geezer as he was led deeper into the guts of the Evernest Sect.

  The hallway was long, dim, and smelled of cold stone.

  As Tang followed Master Yeng, the opulence he had seen in the foyer seemed to strip away, replaced by a functional, austere architecture.

  The walls were bare, and the air grew colder as they arrived at a destination that made Tang’s skin crawl: a massive door.

  The entrance was riddled with heavy, shimmering locks that covered nearly every inch of the wood.

  Binding the silver-plated bolts was a cluttered mess of intertwining, coarse obsidian chains.

  It appeared designed to keep something powerful contained.

  Tang stared at the sheer complexity of the restraints.

  An expert locksmith, even with a skilled crew, would have taken hours just to map out the sequence of these locks.

  He wondered if the old man expected help or if he was simply demonstrating the rigor of the sect’s security.

  Given the quality of the protection, the items beyond it had to be of a value far beyond the average range, or perhaps they were cursed.

  Tang leaned in closer, his eyes catching a darkened piece of the steel sheathe.

  Upon closer inspection, he noticed a plethora of spotted marks and symbols carved into the metal.

  Some resembled traditional Chinese characters, while others were in a distant, flowing language he couldn't translate.

  Interspersed among the text were animal silhouettes: a poorly scribbled sigil of a hog’s snout and a marked outline of a bird’s head.

  “Huh,” both Tang and the master uttered at the exact same time.

  Tang watched as Yeng examined every nook and cranny of the entry point, his fingers tracing the cold metal.

  “It appears as if Khetsu had made a few changes while I had been absent,” Yeng said, his voice dropping into a low, dangerous register.

  He leaned his ear against the wood, listening to the internal clunks and jammed echoes of the mechanism.

  Suddenly, the master staggered back.

  His hand flew to his ribs, his body tensing as if he were feeling a sudden, sharp pain.

  Even from a few feet away, Tang could sense the intense, frantic pounding of the man’s heart.

  It was a rhythmic thumping so loud it seemed to vibrate the very air between them.

  Yeng steadied himself, nuzzling one arm beneath his loose robes while the other went back to grooming his beard.

  This was a momentary crack in his otherwise indomitable facade.

  “I suggest you step back, Zhao Tang,” he stated, his voice regaining its stone-cold edge.

  Tang traced his foot back several inches, his own heart beginning its frantic rhythm.

  The air around the door began to change. The sweet, calming aroma of Yeng was being pushed back by a sudden, sharp chill that felt like a needle to the senses.

  “This place,” Yeng whispered, his hand hovering over the central obsidian chain, “this place has been… defiled.”