L.O.R.D - Volume 1, Section 4: Engulf
L.O.R.D (New Version)
Movie t.i.tle: L.O.R.D (Legend of Ravaging Dynasties)
爵迹
Author: Guo Jingming
Published: 2016
Translation: [email protected]
Volume 1: Divine Beginning
Section 4: Engulf
“Jiejie don’t you already have a soul beast? Why are you still here?”
“I don’t want Bing Mo at all, it’s my brother Kins who wants it.” Shen Yin sticks out her tongue. Qi Ling feels dazed.
“Then why did so many of you come?”
“Bing Mo is a pretty powerful soul beast, even if it’s not as powerful as my "Dreamweaver", haha,” Shen Yin leans closer to Qi Ling, “Don’t tell that to my brother, if not he’ll be angry again. Capturing a soul beast is no laughing matter, because you have to release most of your soul power to swallow that of the opponent, I’ll put it more simply, it’s basically when you release your naked soul from your body and then getting it to swallow the soul of the opponent, if anything goes wrong during this process, it’s easy to be swallowed by the opponent. Then it won’t be fun……that’s why, usually we concentrate on attacking the soul beast until it’s life is hanging by a thread, and then taking the opportunity to engulf it when it’s soul powers are at its weakest, making it ours. Which is why, today we’re here to be the hunters for my
brother, we’re in charge of attacking it until it’s almost dead, and then my brother will be in charge of engulfing it.”
“Ah, so it’s like this……” Qi Ling nods without understanding.
The darkness of the night envelopes Fauser town snuggly, the biting chilliness like lake water permeating in every corner.
At forest at the end of the path, it’s deafening silent in the night. In the darkness that has no end in sight, enormous sounding footsteps, like the beat of a large drum, approaches.
Light snow falls from the sky, at first they are just a scatter of snowflakes, reflecting starlight in the night, yet in the blink of an eye, the surrounding temperature drops drastically, the whole town as if being pulled into the depths of a valley of glaciers, a second before the ground is full of soft soil, the next second they became hard, frozen soil.
In the gloomy forest, the surging blizzard spreads forward in a speed that pulls in everything in its path. It clambers forth, engulfing everything with a body temperature as if it’s goal is to freeze all between the heaven and earth.
The calamity-like danger is approaching the inn at lightning speed, yet those inside don’t seem to realise that, seeming like squirrels resting peacefully in their hallows, not feeling the blizzard outside.
“Jiejie do you still want to drink tea? I’ll go get some for you.” Qi Ling shivers, looking out the window, it seems as if the wind has started to blow. Standing up, he walks to the window and sticks his head out to look at the empty street. He then shuts the windows tightly. Qi Ling turns to head behind the bar counter. Pulling a burning piece of wood from the stove, he moves to the fireplace on the wall and lights the charcoal in it. The temperature rises slightly as the fire burns.
“Why did it suddenly become so cold? It’s just the start of window.” Qi Ling pokes at the firewood as he tightens his collar.
At this moment, Lijier who has been curled up in the chair far from them, stands up lightly. Waving her hands around, the bangles slam into each other creating a sound akin to dense rain. An icy-blue glare emits from her pupils, on her face is that pure but unsettling smile, “Ai yah, finally it came. I waited for so long.”
After saying that, she steps towards the door in slow steps. In a corner of the lobby, a lump of blurred yet dense green light follows her closely. In the light there swims some strip-like shadows, winding, tangling and emitting a low decibel shriek. When Lijier pa.s.ses by Kins, she looks at him and smiles: “I shall go first then —“ Just as she finishes speaking, she whips her hand back, her whole body contorting into an extremely unsettling position, like that of a bird before its taking flight, and the next second, with a loud crash—
Within the large ball of green light in the corner, the ma.s.sive Gu Die suddenly appears in thin its dense bones of the dead spreading, releasing unsettling cracks, in a flash, it has extended its wings to the fullest and dashed towards the sky, with its wings fully open, it resembles a ghoul enveloping the sky, uncountable slime and green liquid splatter from from its wings like ghastly green rain. It knocks a large hole on the roof, destroying the beams and tiles, crashing down in a disorderly manner. Just as Qi Ling is going to escape, Shen Yin raises her hand gently, her fingertips moving in a complex pattern with a humming sound, a large silver-white web of silk umbrellas out over their heads. All the rubble crashes on the web instead, just like insects trapped in a spider’s web.
Lijier turns and lifts her head to stare at the large silver web above her head. She turns her gaze back to sweep over the members of the Shen family. Her cold voice slithers out from her small and deep purple lips like a snake, “Sigh, look at that, I have really bad luck, encountering such strong compet.i.tors sighting for Bing Mo with me, I’ll have to strike first to get an advantage then.”
Kins scoffs coldly, saying: “It’s good that you know that.”
Lijier tilts her head and smiles with her lips pressed tightly together. Her gaze is complex but halting. She says nothing as she exits the inn slowly.
She turns back once she walks out. Looking at Kins’ backview back in the inn, she murmurs to herself as in in a dream-like state: “By opponent, I wasn’t referring to you. I was referring to the thing conversing with the little kid over there, comparing the two of us, the real monster should be her……”
In the room, Shen Yin who is currently speaking to Qi Ling with a smile, seems to have sensed something. Turning her cheek lightly, she glances out the door at Lijier, throwing her a mesmerising smile.
After Gu Die Lijier left, the only people remaining in the room are the members of the Shen family and Qi Ling.
A woman sitting beside Kins who looks slightly older turns to speak to him: “Are we really going to let her go first?”
Kins says: “It’s fine, with her abilities, she won’t be able to subdue Bing Mo. It’ll be good to let her exhaust some of Bing Mo’s soul powers first.”
Despite having no positive feelings towards Lijier at all originally, he suddenly feels that she is pitiful after hearing what Kins said. A negative impression of Kins forms. Although Lijier must not be some unimportant figure, but no matter what, it is still unethical for a group of adults to want a young girl to head to her death.
Qi Ling looks at the silhouette of the twelve or thirteen-year-old girl disappear at the end of the path, a faint feeling of sympathy wells up in his heart — of course, if he looks up at this moment at the thing that’s following Lijier slowly, the Gu Die circling above her head with its wings spread like a large ghoul behind her, that is another feeling all together.
Even after the time of one lamp pa.s.ses, no one has spoken in the inn. Even Shen Yin has her head down in deep thoughts, no longer communicating with Qi Ling. This kind of silence is stifling. Everyone’s expression seems tense, most probably due to them preparing for the upcoming capture.
Qi Ling sighs and turns towards the counter. Two steps in and a bone-piercing coldness spreads from his chest. As if losing strength in his legs, he collapses onto the ground.
In the blink of an eye, the entire room is engulfed in a faint white glow. A thin layer of ice on the ground creeps from outside, very soon, the entire ground is covered with ice.
The door of the in is suddenly blown open by a gust of wind with a loud bang, unsure of the exact time, Lijier is already standing outside, on her face is a slightly twisted smile of extreme excitement; it looks appalling.
In the air, there the unsettling sound between that of a string instrument and of a hummingbird, piercing the eardrums, no one knows where the sound originates from, as if an invite extended from h.e.l.l, luring a person’s soul.
The bright light outside the window grows paler and paler, as if the tragedy of an apocalypse is approaching.
Lijier’s expression is tense as she moves in step by step in awkward movements. Raising her left hand gently, she points towards the outside, “Hehe, really happy, today……” Her gaze sweeps over everyone in the room.
Kins’ heart falls. He clenches his teeth in hatred. “Seems like I underestimated you……I’ll forget it today, I don’t want Bing Mo anymore!” Standing up with force, he suppresses his anger, as he gets ready to leave.
“Ai yah,” There’s a sound coming from within Lijier, sounding like the sloshing of sticky liquid, “I’m not done yet.”
Kins turns around and from his expression, it seems as if he’s seen his worst nightmare, he steps back in shock.
And Qi Ling is already pallid as he retreats to a corner in fear.