Path of the Berserker

I took another sip of Blue Lemonade and cultivated the burning hot liquid to replenish the Frenzy in my Dantian. It’d been ten days since Wing Pho had cooked up his first batch of the stuff and now I had a supply of two canteens worth to carry us across the planet and hopefully some left over to take home.

From the tunnel entrance, I glanced out onto the Bloodmoon drenched hellscape where Blue Rose, Wing Pho and Wu Liang were cultivating their spiritual fortitude by subjecting themselves to both the monstrous creatures driven mad by the moon as well as the influence of the Bloodmoon itself.

They had been progressing steadily each night, starting at midnight and going until they simply couldn’t push themselves anymore. When that happened, I would engage my [Sacred Soul Shield] technique at the edge of the tunnel to give them a source of refuge from the Dark Frenzy.

When they recovered enough, they would go back at it again, killing demons and fighting to stay alive. By the sixth night they were already lasting till dawn before needing a break. We revised the training after that, starting earlier each night to give them more and more exposure.

At dawn I would begin my own training, subjecting myself to the Cursed Star and then returning to my tunnel and using my [Sacred Soul Shield] technique to recover. I chugged Blue Lemonade like it was water most days, just to ensure I always had enough Frenzy to fuel myself through both fighting off the Star Born demons and maintaining my spiritual defense technique. If not for needing to use it, I would probably have three canteens of surplus by now.

But it took money to make money, as my dad used to say.

Which meant I couldn’t progress unless I was willing to spend some of my winnings.

I myself had made it to lasting a few hours past noon right now.

My goal was being able to last the entire day.

While Blue Rose and the crew were out there fighting, I released my [Sacred Soul Shield] technique to slip into the spiritual realm and go looking for Kelsey. I hadn’t had much luck thus far, but I did believe I felt a few nibbles here and there. A few days back, I sensed her briefly, but she was gone before I could zero in on her. Maybe being this far away it would be harder than when I was back at Du Gok Bhong.

I split my vision while I traversed the spiritual landscape, keeping a small window of what my physical eyes were seeing in the corner of my spiritual sight. I kept an eye on the crew that way, ensuring they didn’t run into hordes of demons that were too large to handle or a stray behemoth.

Blue Rose was impressing me with each night. She was a fearless warrior and could pump out damage like nobody’s business. A Super high DPS Glass Cannon, I had told her once, but she of course didn’t get the English or the video game reference, but in truth that’s exactly what she was. High damage and high speed, but fragile and in need of protection from direct contact with the enemy. That’s where Wu Liang and Wing Pho came into play. Wing with his barrier and Wu with brute force. Song De helped out too, for as long as he could manage, but as predicted he usually had to bail and retreat to the soothing of the aetherite crystal an hour or two before everyone else quit.

While within the spiritual realm, there was much less for me to monitor and see.

I could sense I’xol’ukz everywhere and could even discern the trace outlines of behemoths when they appeared, perhaps sensing the power of their awakened demon cores. But the only other thing to see was the spiritual sides of the various dimensional gates that littered the landscape like monuments to the Dark God.

I paused for a moment as I studied one of them and sensed the power of Dark Frenzy coming from within it. But I sensed something else coming from it as well. Something faint but familiar. A sound almost.

Kelsey?

I could definitely sense her now. Somewhere out there.

I was about to run off to find her, but then I swore I could sense her coming from inside the gate as well. I thought about it some more, about how all the gates and moons might be connected.

Perhaps I could use it like a short cut.

But could I take the risk trying to find out right now?

I glanced at my window of vision from my true eyes. Blue Rose and crew were fighting back against a moderate sized horde and would need the refuge of my [Sacred Soul Shield] soon. Still, there was a way to move more quickly within the spiritual realm as well.

I focused my senses and sped up within the spiritual realm, which essentially slowed everything down outside. As Blue Rose moved in slow motion, I quickly hopped within the spiritual portal of the gate.

I crash landed on the spiritual plane of the Bloodmoon and immediately began cleaving through the swarming hordes of demons. I focused my senses while doing so.

Where are you, Kelsey?

I looked at all the crystals chained to the surface.

Each one of them led to another gate on the surface.

Too bad we couldn’t all just traverse through here, I thought. Wouldn’t need to slog it 900 miles across the surface if I knew which one of these led to the next drop zone.

But if all these led to other places on the surface? Which one would lead me closer to Kelsey?

The answer came in the form of a giant upside-down triangle that hovered off in the distance.

There was one just like that on Earth’s moon. That had to be the one that linked the moon to whatever source this all came from. A sense of curiosity and anxiety gripped me as I considered exploring it.

I truly had no idea where it could lead.

It could send me on a one-way ticket to I’xol’ukz for all I knew.

Still, something drew me to it.

Kelsey again.

I could sense her flame.

But she could disappear at any time, just like before.

And so too could the Bloodmoon.

I didn’t want to think what would happen to my soul if I lost connection now.

I could be trapped here forever while my body died.

Speed, I thought. I needed speed.

I took to the air with [Ride the Lightning] and blasted across the purple sky.

My [Bloodlust] yearned to kill all the demonic spirits below me, but I had bigger things on my menu right now. I flew to the entrance of the enormous gate and stared of the purple haze inside. Once I crossed that, I would truly be venturing into the unknown.

To hell with it, I thought.

My Berserker nature took over, and I blasted forward.

My world spun as I tumbled down yet another set of chains and then like déjà vu I found myself crash landing on the surface of a moonscape again. This time however the crystals littering the hellscape were as tall as the gate I had travelled through. The pressure of Dark Frenzy crashed in on me like I was at the bottom of the ocean again. My Flame was nearly snuffed out, but I engaged my [Sacred Soul Shield] technique to push back against it.

My Frenzy was draining incredibly fast now.

It was like when I first traveled to the surface of the moon.

But now, I supposed, I was one layer deeper than that.

I could still just barely see my vision to the outside world back on Fhae I’ung. I needed to do something. With a piercing mental strain, I willed my arms to mechanically put the flask of Frenzied Elixir to my lips and drink.

It was like operating through a hazy dream, but it must have worked because I suddenly felt the contents of my Dantian replenished.

This shit is crazy, I thought.

A malevolent presence suddenly surged from behind me.

“Cursed Husk of a Flame,” a feminine voice said. “Thou doth now seek to invade the very depths of my loins?”

I looked over my shoulder to see the giant blue bitch, I’xan’dra hovering in front of the crystal I had just descended.

I smirked at her with [Indifference]. “Invade your loins? You wish you were so lucky, bitch. And as much as I like to hack you down right now, I need your services in another form today.”

I took to the air again before she could respond.

As I flew across the terrain with [Ride the Lightning] I’xan’dra followed me, reappearing at the nearest crystal I passed. Below me the ground was littered with demons, but they weren’t normal sized. They were all behemoths and within them were giant monstrosity that dwarfed even them.

I increased the stream of Frenzy to my [Sacred Soul Shield] to not go mad from just the sight of them. On the horizon, there was something that moved slowly across the landscape, like a giant conch. I couldn’t even conceive how massive it was, but next to it was something even more massive. There at the center of the hellscape was another giant gate.

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If this hell scape connected all the Bloodmoons, I thought. Then where did that one lead to?

To the true source of I’xan’dra?

Or To I’xol’ukz itself perhaps?

“You won’t escape here!” I’xan’dra called out to me, swinging at me with her scythe from the nearest crystal. “You’ve ventured beyond your depth.”

She wasn’t wrong about the depths part.

Where was I even going?

There were hundreds of crystals here.

“Kelsey!” I cried out. “Speak to me!”

I wasn’t sure if she could hear me or not, but I focused my senses to try and hear her respond. Nothing… and then, faintly I sensed a blip of her. A resonance. I turned in mid-air to direct myself towards it.

There! I thought. It had to be that crystal that led to Earth’s moon.

I’xan’dra materialized above it as I approached, ready with her scythe.n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om

“Face me now!” she said. “I am 100 times stronger that what you fought of me before.”

“No time!” I said and blew right past her.

I headed up the chains of the crystal and towards wherever they would lead.

I’xan’dra screamed from below me with impudent rage.

“Rain check, bitch,” I shouted back at her. “You’re on my list, but not right now.”

I passed through the top of the gate and instantly found myself upon a new hellscape with the pressure of Dark Frenzy much reduced. It was like surfacing from the depths of the ocean and I breathed easier. But I was still on the surface of a Bloodmoon.

“Kelsey!” I called again.

This time I felt the response much stronger.

One of the crystals here had to lead to somewhere close to Jurin.

But in truth, either of them would bring me a hell of a lot closer than I was before.

I discerned which crystal held the strongest presence of Kelsey and then, whipping past I’xan’dra again, [Rode the Lightning] up the chains and emerged in the darkness of normal spiritual space again.

I sensed her Kelsey’s Flame immediately then.

Strong and Bold.

I rushed across the expanse of spiritual darkness to find her and realized my spirit was still tethered through the gates of the Bloodmoon somehow. The golden hue of her flame emerged in the darkness and I instantly engaged it with my own.

“I found you!” I said. “Kelsey, I’m alive! I’m still here! But I’m stuck on the Hell World!”

A mixture of emotions and conjecture flew back at me.

Relief.

Hope.

Confusion.

Elation.

But also concern.

Concern for Fia?

But also, something else.

Something I couldn’t quite understand.

Darkness… Hong Feng?

Before I could make any sense of it, my connection was suddenly cut off. My soul flew backwards, rubber-banding back through my travels in reverse. It was like my vision was a video being played backwards at 100x the speed.

I was jolted back into my body again and found myself staring up at Blue Rose as she slapped me hard across the face.

“Wakeup damnit!” she yelled. “Max!”

I came about with a start, shocked to see the blinding rays of predawn streaking across the Fhae I’ung sky. How the hell long had I been in there? Wu Liang was shuddering next to me like he was dying from hypothermia or something. Wing Pho was trying to use some kind of Qi technique on him, but it didn’t seem to be working.

I immediately engaged my [Sacred Soul Shield] and the protection from the rays seem to help him some. But perhaps too much damage had been done already.

“Where the hell were you, Max?” Blue Rose shouted in my face, clearly still in a panic. “You were totally catatonic. It was like you were a million miles away.”

More like a few billion, I wanted to say. Or even a few trillion. Who knew?

But saying that would only make her more pissed off.

“Sorry,” I said. “Let’s get him down to the crystal.”

As I grabbed Wu Liang, I couldn’t help but feel a bit guilty for his condition. I was perhaps only late by half a minute but the effects of not having a barrier present when you needed it were severe.

Still, doing what I did to get to Kelsey was likely worth it.

I’d only had a second or so to communicate with her, but hopefully the message I sent back was clear. I’m here.

I’m alive.

* * *

Kelsey retreated back into her body after her brief encounter with Max.

The timing could not have been more close as she now found herself neck deep in a throng of demons. She pushed them back with a blast of [Wrath of a Thousand Slain Souls]. Her mastery of the lightning techniques had progressed and while she could now definitely enact the technique on command, she was yet to back it with enough punch to kill the demons outright.

But stunning them did just as good a job.

She went to town slaughtering the creatures and then retreated when she sensed the all familiar presence of I’xong’Zhang just staring at her. For over a week now she had risked being attacked by the monster to make contact with Max and it had all finally paid off.

She’d done it.

She’d reached him.

But the short conversation left her with more questions than answers. Where the hell was he exactly? He still seemed a great distance away, yet he felt somehow closer than he was before. Did that mean he was on his way home? Kelsey had tried to convey as much as she could as well.

About Fia and the upcoming match.

About him needing to get home.

But most of all, her concerns about the monster now staring at her without making a sound at all. She sensed it had grown even stronger. Even from where she stood, just outside the city’s barrier she could sense the strength of its Dark Frenzy.

She released an exhale.

If Max was on his way home, then maybe together they could defeat it.

That brightened her spirits and her Flame.

“You’ll get what’s coming to you, asshole,” she muttered. “Max is going to have the pleasure of killing you twice.”

A low chuckle was all she heard in response.

She didn’t have time to wait around for more of its bullshit though.

She had great news to share with Fia.

Max was close and he would be home soon.

And it wasn’t a minute too soon.

Her match was in three days now.

Hopefully he could make it home before then.

* * *

I breathed a sigh of relief once Wu Liang came back around. He seemed to have all his memories still intact as well, after recovering under the warmth of the aetherite crystal. He’d gotten the briefest of tastes of the Cursed Star and the results were extreme.

It was a reminder of how harsh the journey would be to cross the surface and just how much I couldn’t fail. Losing my [Sacred Soul Shield] for even a second could spell disaster for us all. And that meant every second I spent now counted.

“I’m going back to train,” I said, and Blue Rose shot me a questioning stare.

She didn’t say anything though, so I left, but sure enough, after I’d gotten only a few minutes into my Cursed Star exposure, I sensed her approaching through the tunnel behind me.

I activated my [Sacred Soul Shield] to protect her. “What is it Blue?”

“You want to tell me what happened just now?” she said. “What were you doing?”

I gave her a goofy grin. “Getting in touch with a friend.”

Anger brewed within her as she scowled. “Look, enough with the jokes. I trust you, Max, but you’re doing things I don’t understand. How the hell are you even able to do the things you do? You’re cultivating the damn Cursed Star, eating demon flesh, drinking pure aetherite.” She then paused and I saw true concern in her eyes. “What has this place done to you, Max?”

I had to hide my own emotions with [Indifference]. Blue had become like another sister to me, perhaps even more than that—a true ally and friend. She was pretty smart too, so whatever bullshit I was spinning to basically act out my Berserker nature was clearly wearing thin on her.

But how could I explain what I truly was to her?

Should I even?

Could I trust her with knowing that much?

Would she even care?

I sighed.

One thing I knew.

I didn’t want to lie to her anymore.

Especially if crossing this planet could mean the death of us all.

For all that she’d done for me, I owed her that much.

“There’s a reason I can do all these things,” I said. “And its not from being here. Or at least, not from being here directly.”

“What do you mean?”

“I’m willing to tell you Blue, but it’s something you can’t share with anyone. It could cost me my life and yours.”

Fear emerged in her soul now, but she didn’t seem deterred.

“Go on,” she said.

“I follow a unique form of cultivation,” I said. “One condemned by the empire. I’m a Daoist and I follow the Path of the Frenzied Flame. Some people, know us… as Berserkers.”

I waited for a reaction, but all I got was an empty stare.

“A Doaist?” she said.

I guess the whole berserker part went over her head. It was a reminder that not everyone even knew of the term. And maybe that was the best for now.

“The point is,” I said. “I cultivate something other than Qi. And I’m somewhat closer to these demons than you think. I’m not one of them, but I have one inside me.”

She shuddered a little. “A demon?”

“Not the bad kind. It’s like a fire inside that helps me kick all kinds of ass.”

“So that’s why you’re able to be so far ahead? You can cultivate what’s outside there?” She pointed to the rays of the Cursed star.

“Not directly,” I said. “It’s different for me.”

She shook her head. “No wonder you’re so damn strange.”

I laughed a that and felt the tension finally break.

I was right to have trusted her.

Blue Rose didn’t seem to give a shit, but that didn’t mean she wasn’t concerned about things overall. “I’ll get us home, I promise.”

She smiled and sat down next to me in the tunnel. “I know you will. You always manage to keep your promises. Even from beyond the grave apparently.”

I looked at her with a creased brow. “What?”

“You promised you’d be with me on my first tour and well, here you are,” she said. “Not exactly what I was planning when I jumped out of the skiff with revenge in my heart for Jei Su Long murdering you. I’m glad I didn’t off the bastard now.”

“You were going to kill him for me?”

“Of course,” she said. “If you haven’t noticed, I’m pretty big on revenge.”

I laughed, but her mention of revenge reminded me of something. “So what’s yours?”

“What’s mine what?”

“Your revenge,” I said. “When we first met, you told me that was your sole purpose for leaving Du Gok Bhong.”

She chuckled. “I told you that?”

“You were pretty pissed at the time,” I said. “You probably don’t remember.”

“No,” she said. “No, I remember… I just don’t like sharing it much.”

“Well, I just shared a hell of a lot with you,” I said nudging her. “I think you owe me.”

“It’ll probably sound petty to you.”

“Isn’t all revenge kind of petty?”

“You’re just saying that to be pokey now.”

I laughed. “You’re probably right.”

A pause came then, and I could see Blue Rose staring into nothingness.

Eventually she spoke.

“I told you I was from a core world, right?”

“Yeah.”

“What I didn’t tell you, and why I make a rule of not telling anyone, is that my family is probably twice as rich as Jei Su Long and his damn uncle.”

I blinked at her. “What?”

She chuckled. “I was good at the lab work at Du Gok Bhong for a reason. It’s our family’s core business. My personal name is Lin Yi Fae, fourth born to the so-called Barron of Elixirs, Wen Yi Fae. We operate out of the core world of Genisha. Or did.”

I was looking at Blue Rose with new eyes now. “Barron of Elixirs… so you’re a filthy rich bitch?”

She glared at me. “Was… is… supposed to be. Whatever. It never mattered much to me to be honest. That was my father’s work. I took after my mother. She was an elder of the Dim Mak clan. She taught me her style.”

“What happened to her?”

“Huh?”

“You said was. Is she dead?”

Blue Rose sighed. “She is now. Along with my father. She died defending him in court.”

“Against what?”

“My father was gifted but was a far too trusting man. He couldn’t see the vipers all around him. By the time they sprang their trap and turned the ruling family against us, it was too late. They had the ear of the princess.”

“What did they accuse him of?”

“Treason,” she said. She then let out a mirthless chuckle. “Maybe that’s why I pushed you to keep Jei Su Long alive so much. I know what happens to you when lies are told and believe. Clearing you name is important, Max. For your future and that of your family.”

“Are you able to clear your father’s name?”

Blue Rose shook her head. “I don’t know… I don’t think so. Maybe. But all I have for sure right now is revenge.”

I felt a bit of ire stir in my gut.

A stirring of my Twin Dao.

Blue Rose was a victim of the vicious cultivator society as well.

“Hey,” I said, tapping her arm and then waited for her to be looking at me fully before speaking with [Struggler’s Resolve]. “I’m going to make another promise to you. When I’m done saving my family, we’re going to go avenge yours.”

She snorted out a laugh. “Come on, Max. It’s okay. It’s my struggle.”

“Well, I’m adding it to mine,” I said. “I’ll make sure whoever is responsible feel’s [Everyone’s Pain].”

As I evoked the technique her eyes widened.

I could tell she believed me then.

Finally, she smiled. “Well, I’m not going to turn down free help. Especially from a badass berserker like you, or whatever the hell you are. Thanks, Max.”

She held up her fist and I gave it a bump with my own.

“Alright,” I said, standing up. “Back to the grind. No one’s getting any revenge if we don’t get off this rock. We got two days left before we start our run. I’ve got to make sure I’m ready.”

Blue Rose smiled. “Your secret is safe with me too. You can trust that.”

“I’ll hold you to it, Lin Yi Fae.”

She rolled her eyes and gave a laugh. “That one stays a secret as well.”

I laughed with her.

“Deal.”