Chapter 9 — The Ruined City of Powdered Bones Greets the Black Tide
The Herdsman of the Wasteland · Page 1 of 3
"There really is a ruin ahead!
" Shen Mu ran with the herd, and all at once saw the land ahead drop away. A canyon opened before him, and within it many ancient buildings still stood — palaces tumbled rank on rank, broad plazas, towering halls. And at the front of these ruins rose a gateway of immense height, spanning the canyon from wall to wall, its thick ornamental pillars carved with coiling dragons.
The herd was charging straight at that gateway, pouring into the ruins. "The darkness is coming!
" Shen Mu looked up, his scalp going numb.
The darkness was like ink pouring down the cliffs from above the canyon, flooding into it.
Soon it would reach the gateway of the ruins, and drown it. The herd grew more frenzied still, hurling itself madly at the gateway; it had become a deadly thing — beasts colliding, beasts trampling, and one misstep meant being crushed to powder.
But there was no time to care about any of that now.
To fail to get inside the ruins before the darkness came meant a death far worse. Shen Mu charged madly forward and suddenly seized the tail of a colossal beast.
That creature was magnificent, like a black mountain racing at speed, sending strange beasts flying and flattening them wherever it passed.
And the beasts left behind in its wake leaped up too, seizing its tail and letting the giant carry them into the ruins. Shen Mu looked down. Beasts that were ordinarily fierce as devils now clung trembling to that tail, not daring to stir.
He looked back and saw Senior Brother Chu, Senior Sister Liu and the other three of the five who hunted him also racing madly toward the ruins, not far behind. At last, before the darkness drowned the gateway, the giant beast plunged through the vast portal, and in the same instant the darkness, black as ink, swallowed the gate.
Senior Brother Chu and Senior Sister Liu and the rest came screaming up, but only Senior Brother Chu, Senior Sister Liu and one other youth made it through before the darkness closed over the gateway. Of the two remaining youths, one was a step too late — only a single arm thrust through the portal; the other got his face, his chest, his legs, half his belly and one arm inside, while the rest of him was caught by the darkness. Senior Brother Chu landed beyond the gate and at once reached out to grab his two junior brothers. He caught one by the hand and hauled hard, dragging a bleached skeleton out of the darkness.
Before his other hand could seize the second youth, he saw the boy fall face down. Senior Brother Chu and Senior Sister Liu shuddered with dread: the youth's front still had flesh and blood, but his back had none at all.
Something in the darkness had eaten the flesh from his back clean away. "What in the darkness is it? How can such a thing exist? " cried Senior Sister Liu shrilly. Senior Brother Chu steadied himself, spat out a foul breath, and said in a low voice, "When a man dies, his lamp goes out.
Our two junior brothers died in the defense of the Way, slaying demons. They died where they should, and they died gloriously.
That little spawn of evil deliberately waited until the very moment before the darkness came to reach these ruins — he meant to use the darkness to kill us!
" The other youth, choking with righteous fury, said hatefully, "He is in these ruins too, and darkness is all around — there is nowhere for him to run! Find him and cut him into ten thousand pieces, to avenge our two junior brothers! " "There he is!
" Senior Sister Liu saw Shen Mu leap down from the giant beast's tail and shrilled, "Little monster, you killed two of my junior brothers, and you still think you can run?
" Shen Mu was sick with rage. "You are the ones who hunted me down for no reason at all, chasing me without letup until nightfall, and got yourselves killed — what has that to do with me? I never provoked you, and yet you came to kill me. How am I the guilty one?