New Eden: Live to Play, Play to Live-Chapter 1087: Meeting The Master

The fog obscuring the side of the mountain suddenly split apart, giving everyone a glimpse of the sun still shining above their heads as a figure walked down the path Elder Bai had been guarding, heading their way.

Elder Bai, reluctant to stop pulling at the vines, paused his actions only momentarily before resuming his frantic attempt at saving his disciple’s life.

But the intruders were all eyes on the newcomer.

The still-upright disciples suddenly kneeled, lowering their heads until they couldn’t see the man walking down the path. All they saw as he walked past them were his bare feet gently pushing off the dirt path while remaining clean and pristine.

"Elder Bai, let go of the vines. You are not helping," the man said, stopping next to the Elder, Alex gawking at him in surprise.

"Gu Fang? I thought you were a prisoner..." Alexander muttered, his surprise unabating.

But when the man snapped his head toward him, the golden eyes and pressure coming from him pushed Alex’s surprise away.

"This is not the place for us to speak, mortal. Keep your thoughts for yourself, for now," the man replied, the faint aura of nine tails flitting behind him, narrowing Alex’s eyes.

"You aren’t—

But before Alex could finish his sentence, a force slapped on his mouth, blocking the words from spilling out, as the golden-eyed man glared at him.

Aether welled up from within Alexander, as the fur on his face and hands retracted, making place to sharper ears and spectral horns on his head, his eyes suddenly glowing white.

The force keeping Alex’s mouth shut broke, as the Aether ate away at it, and Alex glared at Gu Fang’s look-alike.

"A World Deer? I thought you had all gone dormant with the world," the man said, his eyes growing slightly wider.

"Don’t fucking touch me again," Alex growled.

The man scoffed.

"A mere spectre, I see. Shame."

He ignored Alexander’s appearance and turned his head toward the writhing vines, which Elder Bai had finally let go of, his face pained.

"Kūwěi," the man whispered, touching the vines lightly.

In an instant, the vines started turning grey where he touched, before spreading across the entire pillar, withering and shriveling to nothing, before falling to the ground, one by one, inanimate.

The pillar of green vines died in moments, revealing a broken young man inside, contorted in ways that shouldn’t have been possible, his face locked in a rictus of fear.

Cory hurriedly kneeled next to him, his body already drenched in sweat, as he focused his healing on mending the man’s torso so that he could repair the broken internal organs.

Bones cracked and popped back into place, the sickening sound making a few people gag. But Cory didn’t relent.

Feeling his strength wane, Gu Fang’s look-alike stepped forward, wanting to give a bit of his power to the teenager helping his disciple, but Alex stepped in between them.

"Touch him, and we’ll find out who’s stronger between us two right fucking now," he growled.

"I am trying to help him. At this pace, your friend will weaken too much to save my disciple," the fox sneered.

But Alex clicked his tongue at him.

"Your power is not compatible with ours. You won’t help," he spat, before turning his back to the man and laying his hand on Cory’s shoulder.

The moment he did, Cory felt a searing pain in his shoulder, groaning as it burned into his body. The pain then turned into a soothing current that rushed up to his head, refreshing his senses and filling him with a sense of power.

The feeling wasn’t unlike when Solaris had entered his body, and Cory looked at Alex from the corner of his eye.

’Does he know he wields strength close to the gods of New Eden?’ he wondered.

But he couldn’t let his mind stray too far, so he re-focused on the mangled man in front of him.

He could still feel the faint pulse of life coming from him, but it was quickly fading away. He needed to work faster.

"Solaris, help me save him," he muttered, closing his eyes.

The warm presence of the god echoed inside him again, his magic suddenly shining bright gold as it enveloped the young man.

The fox looked at the teenager, his eyes narrowing.

’Gu Fang’s memories were true after all,’ he mused, letting his senses brush upon all the other intruders.

’This group is filled with so much potential; if the gods were still present on this god-forsaken rock, we would have a war on our hands... I wish he hadn’t hidden this from me until the end...’

He refocused his thoughts on the matter at hand. He watched with satisfied astonishment as the golden light popped all the ribs back into place before mending the internal organs inside his disciple, finishing with the punctured lungs.

As the lungs mended, the gaping holes inside them sealing back, the disciple took in a deep breath, his lungs looking for the precious air it had been deprived of for so long.

"AAARRRRGGGHHH!!!!!"

He then erupted into screaming, the pain catching up with him.

With a wave of his hand, the fox sent Qi directly into the young man’s head, knocking him unconscious before he could tear his throat apart from the screaming and, by proxy, rip their eardrums asunder.

Alex turned to look at the fox in human clothing and grimaced.

"What? Are you going to complain about how I treat my men now, too? He was in pain; I made him unconscious. It was for him. Not for myself and my about-to-pop eardrums," the fox replied to his grimace, rolling his eyes.

’He has no care about the humans around him,’ Alex surmised, still grimacing at the man who looked like Gu Fang.

He could tell by his presence that it wasn’t Gu Fang, but the resemblance wasn’t just uncanny. It was a perfect imitation.

’What has he done to Gu Fang? Is he still alive?’ he started wondering, not liking this turn of event one bit.

Once Cory was done mending the broken human, he let himself fall to his back, exhausted.

"Man... I could take a three-day nap, right about now," he joked, looking at Alex’s upside down form.

"Maybe later," Alex chuckled. "You good to stand?" he then asked.

"Mhm. I’ll need a hand, but I’ll be fine," Cory replied, nodding tiredly.

Their troubles were far from over, after all.