Chapter 33: A Plan

"We met those two pretty quickly after we found one another in the Marble," the girl said.

"They introduced themselves as Yi Lingshi and Wang Haisheng. At first, they were nice, but then they noticed we had Partial Divinities. When that happened their attitude changed completely."

"How so?" Feng Biao asked.

"They got angry at us for not mentioning it from the start, then they said we couldn't be trusted to lead the group so we needed to just shut up and follow their orders."

"How did that go?"

"Not good, they used both of us as bait for that green oni. They were laughing as it chased us, it nearly killed us and those sickos just acted like it was a game."

"Anyway, Shunzhi got tired of it and together we decided to run off. But not before grabbing some Oni-no-Ochoko the oni had been drinking from."

"I see..." Feng Biao replied.

Frankly, Feng Biao felt he was now in a difficult position.

"If I attack these two for the Oni-no-Ochoko at best I'll get a piece of the pie, but I doubt that will really happen. No, as soon as those two are alone with me they'll alter the deal, make up some excuse, all to delay paying me. They probably won't kill me, but as long as they outnumber me they'll be able to enforce their terms on me."

That was how Feng Biao judged the two of them. They didn't bother hiding the fact they meant to kill these two from Feng Biao, the implication had been clear. They were untrustworthy and he'd be an idiot for believing them.

Of course, he never intended to.

"It's good they weren't smart," Feng Biao thought.

"Alright," Feng Biao heaved a sigh, "let's form a plan."

"A plan?" the girl said.

"Yes, I doubt your friend can keep this up for much longer based on his current state. Your two friends outside will be entering the cave the second his Divine Ability drops, and when that happens they will kill you two."

"Wait how do you know about Shunzhi's DA?" the girl said.

"Honestly, they sent me in here to kill the both of you, or at least make you drop the barrier," Feng Biao responded candidly, "but I never really felt like I could trust either of them from the start, so now I think we should move on from that and focus on surviving."

"No, you can't just try and brush off the fact you were gonna kill us!"

"I wasn't going to harm you, I told you that, I was sent here to but I never intended to do that."

The girl looked stumped but Feng Biao didn't really care.

"Look, I have a plan. To make it work I'm going to need to know all your Divine Abilities just to see if any of them can be included. Oh and names too, you should introduce yourselves after all."

The girl looked at Feng Biao with a raised eyebrow, but before she could say something the boy breathing weakly on the cave wall interjected.

"I'm-" the boy said through labored breaths.

"Don't speak more than you need to Shunzhi. Save your strength, you're already overdrawing Divinity..."

Looking towards Feng Biao the girl began to speak, "His name is Hu Shunzhi and my name is Cui Meizhu".

"Next I'll need your Divine Abilities," Feng Biao said flatly.

Cui Meizhu looked apprehensive, and after looking over at Hu Shunzhi she turned back to Feng Biao and said meekly, "Well honestly my Divine Ability is terrible."

"All I can do is make light..."

"How bright?" Feng Biao questioned.

"Umm, I don't know, pretty bright."

"Be more specific, can it get so bright it burns a person?"

"No, but that's intentional. The light is meant to be a guide for lost people, I think that's why I can't use it to harm people. No matter how bright it gets it never burns the skin."

"That's fine, it doesn't need to. How do you project it?"

"Well I just activate my Divine Ability and it appears in the palm of my hand."

"And can it leave your body?"

"No, it comes from my palm."

"Good to know, now what about Hu Shunzhi, what are his Divine Abilities?"

"Just the one he's using right now. Shunzhi can fortify an area, and if he knows the names of people he can make it so they can't enter that area. The radius isn't huge so we haven't been able to explore further into the cave."

"I see, makes sense. Well, here's the plan."

"Hey, did you see that?" Yi Lingshi said to Wang Haisheng.

"Yeah, I did," Wang Haisheng said sticking his hand through the cave's entrance.

For a second the space around the cave had seemed to flicker, and with his body now inside it, the two quickly understood what happened and made their way inside.

"Heh, he actually did it," Yi Lingshi remarked.

"Think he offed em'?" Wang Haisheng questioned as the two walked deeper into the cave.

"Hopefully, would save us some trouble later on," Yi Lingshi quipped.

Honestly, he would rather he hadn't. If Feng Biao was willing to casually murder he would have to place him in the same tier as Wang Haisheng and the rest. Yi Lingshi did not abhor violence, but he did not indulge in it.

He agreed Part-Marked were inferior, and it certainly benefited him to exploit them. But the overt sadism Wang Haisheng would engage in was tasteless. He only participated because he knew how much Wang Haisheng valued such actions.

In the end, it would come down to him defending the Part-Marked from Wang Haisheng if he wished to stop his fun, and what benefit would that bring? None, it would only make him a target, marking him as a sympathizer to Part-Marked.

His career opportunities would be shunted and his social circle would shrink considerably. He had already thrown his lot in with them so distancing himself from the group now would be stupid.

"Honestly, it's not like Wang Haisheng is a serial killer, if they had just accepted their place all it would have amounted to was some fun."

Indeed, Wang Haisheng never intended to kill the pair until they ran off with the Oni-no-Ochoko. But now that they had slighted him he was going to kill them if they were still alive, and Yi Lingshi had no intention of stopping him.

In the complete darkness of the cave, Yi Lingshi heard a voice.

"Yi Lingshi? Wang Haisheng? Is that you?"