Dry twigs crackled and shattered under his worn-out shoes. The night air inside the Forest of a Thousand Purple Leaves grew thicker and more humid. His right knee was nearly numb. He had to drag his leg with every step, leaving a long trail on the wet ground that was immediately filled by drops of blood from his chin and chest. His vision began to blur. The darkness of the forest seemed to spin, and the shadows of the trees appeared to stretch and narrow.
Yet he refused to stop. In his head, stopping meant death. The youth did not know which direction he was heading. The concepts of north or south no longer held meaning in a place so foreign. He just kept moving away from the riverbank, away from the place where his dignity was trampled level with the ground, and away from the memory of his friends' faces being carried away across the sky.
"Keep walking," he whispered to himself, his voice cracking and trembling violently. "Do not stop now."
The sound of a very subtle rustling of leaves was heard from behind his left. Initially, Xinghe thought it was just the sound of the night wind sweeping through the underbrush. But the sound repeated. This time closer, heard from the right. Something was moving with a steady pattern, circling him in the darkness. Xinghe halted his staggering steps. The hair on the back of his neck stood up at once.
A primal instinct within him screamed a warning. A very thick fishy aroma, different from the smell of his own blood, wafted into his nostrils. Slowly, Chu Xinghe turned his head toward the pitch-black bushes. Between the twisting roots of a silver tree, two pairs of yellowish-green eyes glowed in silence. Those eyes did not blink, staring straight at him with a gaze of savage hunger.
From behind the bushes, two figures of creatures slowly stepped out, revealing themselves under a beam of pale moonlight. They were low-level spirit beasts that roamed the outer layers of the forest. Their shapes resembled wolves, but their size was equivalent to a calf. Their fur was dark grey, coarse and stiff. From the gaps of their half-open jaws, long, dirty yellow fangs dripped thick saliva that hissed softly as it touched the ground.
Xinghe took one step back. His dragging foot hit a protruding tree root. His heart pounded incredibly fast, pumping blood that made the wound on his chest throb madly again. Pure fear, without a trace of doubt, exploded in his head. This was no wild dog. The creature in front of him radiated a deadly aura he had never encountered on Earth.
"Help!" The hoarse voice escaped his throat just like that, without him being able to hold it back. "Anyone, help!" His cry broke the silence of the night forest.
Both spirit beasts lowered their bodies, emitting low, vibrating growls. To them, this wounded mortal human was just a walking pile of meat whose aroma was very appetizing. Seeing the creatures prepare to pounce, Chu Xinghe turned his body and forced himself to run. Panic took over all control of his body to move faster.
He crashed into thorny branches that slashed his cheeks and arms, blindly smashing through the bushes in front of him. His breath came in hard gasps, and he dragged his leg with all his might, limping down the steep and slippery forest slope. The wet soil made his footing slip repeatedly, forcing him to grab onto small tree trunks to maintain balance.
"Ah!" Xinghe tripped over a mossy rock and fell face-first. His face hit the soft ground. He crawled with both hands, trying to get up again, spitting out the soil that had entered his mouth.
A savage growling sound suddenly sounded very close, right above his ear. A hot breath smelling of rot hit the back of his neck. One of the spirit beasts had jumped. Before Xinghe could turn his body, a very heavy weight slammed into his back, pressing him back to the ground by force. Claws as sharp as butcher knives dug deep into both sides of his body, piercing through layers of his jacket and shirt, and tearing the skin of his back.
Chu Xinghe shrieked in stifled pain as an extraordinary ache stung his nervous system. The creature's jaw opened wide and immediately bit Xinghe's right shoulder. Those dirty fangs pierced the flesh, brutally chewing the muscles of his shoulder. The sound of tearing cloth rang out as the modern jacket he wore was destroyed, pulled by force. Fresh blood sprayed out, soaking the face of the savage wolf and flowing heavily, wetting the ground around it.
"Arghhh!" Xinghe struggled with all his might. He struck his left hand backward, trying to push away the creature's head, but his hand only hit coarse fur that was hard like needles.
The spirit beast growled in anger. It backed its body while still biting Xinghe's shoulder and clothes, dragging the youth across the rocky forest floor. Xinghe was dragged backward helplessly. Tree roots and sharp gravel scratched his back and legs. His head hit the ground repeatedly as the savage creature pulled him with raw strength that far exceeded the limits of ordinary animals.
The second beast walked casually beside them, sniffing Xinghe's blood trails on the ground while occasionally licking its lips, waiting for its turn to rip open the prey's stomach. In the midst of the pain tearing through his consciousness, Xinghe's eyes caught something on the ground where he was being dragged. Under a protruding tree root, there was a lump of black stone whose end was broken and very sharp. The size fit in his grip; as his body was pulled past that stone, Xinghe reached out his left hand quickly and gripped the sharp stone.
The edge of the stone scratched his own palm, but he gripped it tightly until his knuckles turned white. The spirit beast biting his shoulder stopped its dragging to adjust its bite. Its jaw loosened slightly before preparing to sink its fangs deeper into Xinghe's collarbone. With the remaining strength he possessed from the adrenaline burning in his blood, Xinghe twisted his body upward.
He ignored the feeling of his shoulder meat being further torn. His left hand gripping the sharp stone rose high and lunged straight down, aiming exactly at the yellowish-green eye of the spirit beast. The sharp stone pierced the savage creature's eyeball with a disgusting wet sound, entering into the eye socket. Thick black blood splashed onto Xinghe's face.
"Graarrghhh!!" The spirit beast released its bite from Xinghe's shoulder and howled with a deafening sound. Its howl was filled with pain. The beast threw its head up very fiercely, trying to release the stone stuck deep in its eye.
The wild movement filled with panicked power from the spirit beast resulted in a fatal outcome for Xinghe. Because his hand was still tightly holding the stone, the jerk of the massive-bodied creature's head lifted Xinghe's body from the ground. The raw power of a low-level spirit beast exploded. Xinghe's body was thrown into the air like a ragdoll with broken strings. He flew past the canopy of bushes, sliding heavily down a steep, dark abyss on the edge of the forest slope.
His body hit hard tree branches, breaking thick twigs that slashed his skin. He continued to be thrown down the cliff, rolling at high speed past sharp rocks and tree stumps. Every impact shattered something inside him. The distance was very far, down a deep valley whose bottom was not visible, jolted by the physical strength of a creature that had absorbed natural energy. Thud! Xinghe's body finally landed, hitting the muddy ground at the bottom of the canyon with a loud thudding sound.
His ribs cracked and broke. He bounced once before finally going still, face-down on the wet and cold ground. Silence. The sound of the savage beast's howling was heard faintly from the distant cliff above, too far to chase him to the bottom of this valley. Xinghe's consciousness was on the brink. His vision was pitch black, his right shoulder was shattered, blood continued to flow without end from the bite wounds and the tears on his back, forming a small dark red puddle in the mud.
His breath was very slow and shallow, sounding like the sound of an air bubble bursting in a puddle. Not long after, raindrops began falling from the night sky. Rain fell slowly, slipping through the gaps of giant leaves, falling to wet Xinghe's hair and clothes. The cold raindrops touched his wounds, mixing with his still-flowing blood, dissolving the red color into the black soil. Cold began to creep up from the tips of his toes and fingers; his body went numb.
All memories of Earth, his grandfather's face, and his friends slowly began to fade from his mind. His eyes were half-open, staring blankly at the puddle of mud mixed with blood in front of his face. Exactly at the moment his heart began to weaken toward the lowest point, a strange warmth suddenly crawled from behind his torn shirt. The bronze pocket watch left by his grandfather suddenly reacted. The rusted bronze metal surface was now in direct contact with Xinghe's blood seeping into the shirt. The fresh blood was as if absorbed into the gaps of the ancient carvings on the watch cover.
Tick. A ticking sound was heard in the middle of the valley's silence. The sound was very quiet, yet somehow it was able to pierce through the sound of the raindrops and immediately echo inside Xinghe's head. Tick. The second tick sounded louder. The surface of the pocket watch began to vibrate faintly. The temperature of the bronze rose quickly, spreading a heat that forced Xinghe's consciousness to hold on a bit longer at the brink of death. Tick. Along with the third tick, a voice began to be heard in Xinghe's ears. The voice did not come from his surroundings.
The voice was ancient, hoarse, and fragmented, as if transmitted from across a very distant river of time. The sound resembled the chanting of an obsolete mantra being forced in. "The Great Path is always limitless... nothing determines Life-Death... all rotates within the Eternal Wheel of Divinity... one step asks where Heaven is... but one hand answers that there is no Heaven..."
Xinghe could not move his mouth, but his eyelids flickered softly. The string of words hummed, creating a strange heavy pressure within his mind. The pocket watch on his chest ticked faster and faster. Tick! Tick! Tick! The mechanical sound was deafening, responding to the heavy rain. The bronze metal now felt as hot as embers just lifted from a furnace. Xinghe felt the watch would melt through his chest skin or explode, shattering the remains of his organs into pieces.
The intensity of the ticking peaked. The ancient voice in his head echoed again, this time much louder, vibrating his ears with absolute and compelling authority. "The Dao guides all creatures... but the journey itself is like a judge... walking without end... stepping over Heaven and Hell... who dares to live bringing the storm of Great Chaos..."
The sentence was cut off. Silence for a moment gripped Xinghe's mind, drowning out the sound of raindrops hitting the muddy ground around him. His breath was already at the edge of his throat. Cold had frozen the nerves at the tips of his fingers.
"Heaven and Earth, Eternal Star, Journey without Beginning and End." The ancient voice suddenly echoed back, this time flowing with a rhythmic and pressured tone, as if forced into his skull.
Xinghe did not understand that string of sentences at all; all he knew was the Eternal Star his grandfather had once mentioned. In the midst of the despair darkening his vision, those sentences felt like the only anchor holding him from the abyss of death. "Heaven and Earth, Eternal Star, Journey without Beginning and End..." Xinghe's mind vibrated, following the rhythm of the ancient voice.
"Heaven and Earth, Eternal Star, Journey without Beginning and End," the voice echoed again from the depths of the bronze pocket watch, demanding an answer and repetition.
Xinghe gritted his teeth, which were covered in thick blood. He chanted it again inside his head, focusing all the remains of his consciousness on that string of foreign words. "Heaven and Earth, Eternal Star, Journey without Beginning and End!"
Exactly as the repetition echoed fully in the sea of his consciousness, Xinghe felt the coldness around him jerk backward. The wet air at the bottom of the canyon suddenly vibrated violently. From the gaps of the damp rocks, from the bloodied mud puddles, and from the dark cavities under tree roots, a bluish light emerged. The blue light floated like a swarm of spiritual fireflies, gathering and flowing to form a kind of glowing energy ribbon in the air.
The flow of light moved in a circle, then descended to envelop Xinghe's body, which lay shattered. This foreign blue light appeared to restore his physical form, the truth of which was unknown because Chu Xinghe could not feel it. The flow seeped into the torn wounds on his back, reweaving the broken flesh fibers. His broken ribs cracked softly as they were magically pulled back to their original positions.
His right shoulder, torn by the spirit beast's fangs, slowly closed tight, replacing the destroyed muscle with a new layer of pale skin without leaving a single bite mark. Chu Xinghe felt his body begin to rise slowly, as if pushed by the warmth of that light. His consciousness was fully pulled from the brink of death. He sat up on the muddy ground, staring blankly at the blue flow circling and wrapping his wounds, calming him.
Chu Xinghe steadied his still-panting breath. The strange foreign blue light did not feel like the springtime he had felt inside the furnace of nine corpses; he only felt as if the wounds on his body were wrapped in clouds and the pain that previously struggled was no longer felt. After a few moments, the bronze pocket watch fell onto the ground; the foreign bluish light began to fade toward the sky. Chu Xinghe wiped the remains of dried blood from his face, then picked up the pocket watch with trembling hands.