Chapter 4: Flames in the night pt.2

At this point the whole dorm was nearly filled with the blazing, orange flames.

Wei Jinhai and the mysterious person were still stuck under the fallen roof beam. The person tried with all his might to lift the beam, but couldn't.

"Ugh, this is all your fault. How can someone be such a heavy sleeper that even when the building is on fire you couldn't wake up." He said as he tried to give the beam one last heave.

"Huff, huff, huff," He panted as he almost gave up all hope, "Is this really how I'm going to die? Am I seriously going to die while trying to save someone else's life?"

A thought then flickered in his head, "I can't die. Not yet. Wei Jinhai is still here, I have to get the both of us out of here."

He then came up with one last plan. If this didn't work then they really were goners.

He tried to focus all of his spiritual powers into his arms and gave it one large heave. He pushed with all his might and the beam slowly started to rise. Once he knew he had control over it, he lifted the beam up completely and threw it off of them.

"Huff, huff, huff," He panted as he slumped onto the floor.

It was not long until he quickly got back up. He ran to Wei Jinhai and flung him onto his back. He proceeded to walk out of the door and into the hallway.

He could barely see where he was going. There was thick, black smoke everywhere. He was coughing and stumbling while trying to avoid the scorching flames and more falling roof beams.

Suddenly another beam came falling down, but luckily he dived out of the way, just narrowly missing it.

"Phew, that was close," He gave a sigh of relief as he continued trying to find the exit, quickening his pace in case another beam came falling down.

The smoke was now so thick that it was nearly impossible to see or even breathe. Yet, the mysterious person still carried Wei Jinhai on his back, desperately trying to find the exit.

Just as he was about to pass out, he caught a glimpse of the exit and mustered up the remaining bit of strength he had to continue walking.

The minute he walked out the door, he gasped for air then collapsed onto the ground.

A few of the braver students ran forward to help drag them to a safer distance away from the burning building.

"Wei Jinhai!" Qi Chaoxing and Mo Dingbang yelled as they ran to the two collapsed people on the ground.

Qi Chaoxing was tapping on his cheek to try and wake him, "Wei Jinhai! Wake up! You have to wake up now!"

Mo Dingbang couldn't take it anymore and went over to help, "Wei Jinhai, if you don't wake up now I'm going to punch you."

No response.

Mo Dingbang sighed, "Fine, you leave me with no choice." He then raised his fist and slammed it onto Wei Jinhai's chest.

Wei Jinhai's eyes flew open and he gave a big gasp, "Mo Dingbang! Why did you hit me?"

Mo Dingbang stared at him in disbelief, "What do you mean why?! We nearly thought you were dead!"

"Huh?" Wei Jinhai then turned around to see that the dorm buildings were on fire. "What happened? Why's the buildings on fire?"

"You only now noticed!" Mo Dingbang yelled.

Before Mo Dingbang could say anything else, someone else came running towards them.

"Chen Liwei! Where did you run off to? Are you okay?" Jin Fu asked frantically as he tried to wake up the other person on the ground.

"Mmm," Chen Liwei groaned as he slowly opened his eyes.

"Why the hell would you go back in there!" Jin Fu yelled.

"It's nothing. I just forgot something that meant a lot to me in there," Chen Liwei said as he got back up on his feet.

"No matter how expensive that thing was, was it really worth more than your life!" Jin Fu continued to ramble on about Chen Liwei's terrible life choices.

Headmaster Shen then spoke, "Have all the students evacuated from the building?"

Everyone took a look around then nodded their heads.

"Good," The Headmaster gave a sigh of relief. He then gave a nod to the other teachers.

The teachers stepped forward and pulled back all the students that were a bit too close to the dangerous building.

Mr. Bai was the first to react. He drew a symbol on the palm of his hand using his finger then turned his hand so his palm faced the fire.

A large amount of water immediately gushed out towards the fire, instantly putting it out.

A few of the students cheered, but before they could get too relaxed, the building burst into flames again.

This time the flames were bigger and even more wilder than before. Bits of ash and spark flew everywhere.

The teachers had to move everyone further away in case someone got burnt.

"What in the world is this? Usually that would have been enough to put out a regular fire," Mr. Bai said as he was getting ready to make another attempt.

"I'm not sure if you can see, but this is not a normal fire," The demon teacher, Mr. Zhang said in a steady, monotone voice.

"I can see that," Mr. Bai said through gritted teeth.

"Well, if you could then you should know that your little magic trick won't work," Mr. Zhang said as he glanced at the other's raised palm.

Mr. Bai immediately dropped his hand and retorted, "Since you're so smart why don't you give it a try."

Mr. Zhang took a few steps towards the crackling flames and pulled out a blank talisman. He bit his finger and used the blood to draw a few strokes on it. He then sent the talisman into the flames.

Nothing happened at first, but after a few minutes a bunch of sparks flew into the sky and a burnt talisman flew out and landed in Mr. Zhang's hand.

Mr. Bai scoffed, "Well that's helpful. At least my magic trick actually did something."

"Don't be so quick to judge," Mr. Zhang said as he examined the half singed talisman. "It did in fact do something."

"Like what exactly," Mr. Bai said while crossing his arms.

"Like telling us that this is no ordinary crafty trick, but something even worse," Mr. Zhang said with a dark expression.

After seeing his darkened expression, Mr. Bai's expression turned serious as well. Even the other teachers started to gather around wearing the same serious expression on their faces.

"This has been done by using wicked sorcery," Mr. Zhang finished wearing a grave expression.

There were a lot of gasps from some of the students who were eavesdropping on the teacher's conversation. Even the teachers were rooted to the spot, wide-eyed.

"It can't be!" The Physical Training teacher, Mr. Li, blurted out.

"Are you sure it is wicked sorcery?" The Headmaster asked while trying to regain his composure.

Mr. Zhang didn't say anything, just nodded his head in response.

"How is that even possible?" Mr. Bai asked, still holding doubts, "Wicked sorcery is against the law and it requires a lot of spiritual power. Not to mention the school is heavily guarded so who could have possibly got in."

Headmaster Shen sighed, "There are only two possibilities. Either someone somehow managed to sneak in, or it was caused by someone who was already inside the premises."

"That's crazy! You think one of the students did this," Mr. Bai said unconvinced.

"It could be possible," The Spirits Department teacher, Mrs. Liu stated, "Most of the student's here spiritual powers are above most Heavenly Officials."

"Yeah but-" Mr. Bai was about to protest against this idea, but got interrupted by a loud, bird like screech that erupted from the fire.

"Look!" one of the students shouted and pointed towards the top of the flaming building.

"What in the hell..." Mr. Bai trailed off as his eyes locked onto the top of the building.

There came another high pitched screech, but this time something actually emerged from the flames. A giant bird covered in fire flew out and started circling the building.

"It can't be..." Mrs. Liu gasped and slapped her hand over her mouth.

"It's..." Mr. Bai stared utterly dumbfounded.

"The Hellfire Phoenix," Headmaster Shen finished breathlessly.