Pets or not…

[Hidden Dimension, Realm of Mo]

Stepping out of the formation, Kanghui stared at the sparse smooth white marble walls of the cave with the ancient scripts of the old serpent home world depicting their history.

As soon as her hand touched the scripts, memories, once locked away in the safety of an impenetrable wall in the back of her mind, started flooding in like a deluge of her home world.

Crystal clear images, like a video, vivid and full-blown. Her former mortal life flashed rapidly across as she recalled a very long time beyond the early days of her final evolution. Childhood and then teenage days, but never beyond adulthood.

Tragedies of royal families, regardless of which world, resulted from kin killing.

Kill or be killed - Kanghui understood the realities of the curse befalling those with royal blood, even in youth, before her untimely demise.

In her early days as a serpent being who fully evolved, Kanghui often felt the tumultuous emotions which went through her mind. Death for her innocent crime of birth into a royal house.

Now, Kanghui felt nothing. Her emotions had numbed after millennia of betrayals and intrigues.

Humans or not, all species repeated that same story. To rule was to possess the ruthlessness to kill thousands without blinking or remorse. All rulers had to be killers, Kanghui mused as she trudged her way up the slight incline to the entrance where she found the force field of a seal blocking her way in.

A glance to the side was a smooth silver control pad which read energy signatures. Her palm pressed into the metallic control as the device read her signature. The force field disappeared after the pad beeped.

For several millennia, many from Xitian mistook this shield as a seal to keep the creatures within the Realm of Mo from escaping. What they didn't realize was that the inhabitants in Realm of Mo designed the seal to keep Xitian out.

Familiar voices echoed from afar as the icy breeze found its way into the cavern. Kanghui walked out into the clearing before the entrance only to see four young men in human form, barbecuing chunks torn from an eel-like carcass which they carelessly chucked behind them.

One young man looked up from his stick of meat, with his icy pale bluish black outlined iris staring at her. Another young pleasant looking man, adorning a scarlet hanfu outfit with long reddish hair as he stumbled clumsily on his two bare feet, nearly going face down on the make shift pit when his other partner caught him.

"Kanghui?"

He recognized her, but she didn't know who he was, even though the energy wave felt familiar. The others looked up in surprise.

"Who…" she muttered as the young man in the scarlet hanfu sitting at the far end of the pit disappeared in a puff of reddish smoke. In his place was a bumbling, fat, cat sized faceless beast with four wings, tripping and falling over its six legs, to greet her.

"HUNTUN!" Kanghui exclaimed.

In another puff of reddish smoke, Huntun took his human form and scratched his head sheepishly. "Easier to walk like a human."

"Because you can only trip over one foot, not five," another said as the other two slapped their thighs and guffawed.

"Shut up, Taowu!"

"Taotie, Taowu, Qiongqi?" Kanghui pointed at all of them as they nodded. "Since when did you all learn to shape-shift… into your favorite prey?"

The last she saw them, they lacked shape-shift abilities. Yet now, they could shape-shift into the hardest form for any non-humanoid creature - the human form. Kanghui didn't know if it was a good or bad thing.

"Easier to hunt them in this form," Taowu replied. "We can also change into females, but male meat is not that great tasting."

She rubbed her temples. They were back in their bad habits of feasting on human flesh.

Unlike most primeval beasts, these four could feed on biological flesh for sustenance if they had no soul stones. Hence, most primeval beings and mortals feared them the most.

"Don't tell me you have been sneaking into gateways?"

"Yeah. For the past few centuries since you were gone. Been through a few gateways. Never got caught because Huntun just confuses the guards with his powers. Masqueraded as their own beasts, ghosts etc," Taowu shrugged.

Kanghui narrowed her eyes at Taowu, as she thought of more bad news to follow.

Among the four beast kings, as the Xitian Councils called them, Taowu was the most cunning with the ability to lead others into battle. His intelligence was far above that of Omoikane, especially when foresight is his talent. However, he is also reckless and stubborn, a downfall on his part.

The one guzzling down on the chunk of meat was Taotie. Only Taotie could vacuum food with ease. His transformation was deceptively innocent, for his true form could unleash fear in others, yet protect the group.

Qiongqi, the one with the symbol of wind emblazoned on his tiger striped hanfu, had immeasurable strength and the ability to manipulate air.

"What is this creature?" Kanghui pointed at the chunks of meat.

Taowu offered her a stick stuck with the roasted meat as she waved her hand in refusal. "You know I can't really taste things."

"It isn't human, just some creature we found in Asgard. Krake or something," Taowu replied.

"You entered Asgard," Kanghui smacked her forehead.

"Well, there's Mag Mell, but the fae folk aren't tasty," Taotie quipped. "Aztalan wasn't fun, but there are mouth watering giant chickens."

"Tell me about that human soul you picked up," Taowu asked. "Is he going to be part of our party?"

"Why do you ask? Don't tell me you plan to consume him for soul stones."

Taowu gave her a wry smile as he tore off a piece of meat and chewed on it.

"He can't kill, not much of a destructive streak," Qiongqi said. "His species grow too soft after they become 'civilized' with all their bullshit modernity, morality and laws."

She sighed. They have ventured into Earth as well. And they have ears in Youdu.

"Neither is he a royal with a strong blood urge to kill is strong. Just ordinary," Taowu said. "He will have to consume others at some stage. Even your spider has a predatory instinct to kill."

"This one has no killer instinct" Qiongqi scrunched his face up and shook his head as he grabbed another stick and took a bite.

"Almost like others on Earth bred these types of humans to farm or control by those willing to rule," Taotie added.

Kanghui regretted the way she described them as pets to Arahabaki and Alex. No longer cute and cuddly, with shape shifting abilities, they were deadly now.

***

[En route, Akama Jingu, Shimonoseki, Yamaguchi Prefecture]

A palatial shrine with its bright white and vermillion colours stood on the hill by the straits with a large stone Torii overlooking the ships passing by and cars driving past the road. Before the shrine was the grand romon gate.

Ghostly Taira warriors wandered back and forth past Alex, Shimoji and Yata like a trail of ants marching up and down the cement footsteps among the visitors, who walked through them without an inkling. A few ghostly heads turned their way, as though curious at the three visitors, but said no more.

On approach to the stairway, in front of the bushes, was a metal plaque stuck in the ground, displaying directions to the mausoleum for Emperor Antoku, Li Hung Chang's way, with the final being Akama jingu in front of their very eyes.

"Why does this path have a Chinese name?" Alex pointed at Li Hung Chang's way engraved in the metal plaque.

"Treaty of Bakan when the Qing Dynasty envoy signed on the conditions that hastened the decline of their dynasty. Before Shimonoseki was Shimonoseki, Akamagaseki was its name, and before 1902, it was called Bakan," Shamoji said.

Alex found it almost too coincidental that Akama jingu was in the area which preceded the fall of two emperors, albeit that one was from China.

The sound of a child's laughter distracted him for a moment and he glanced up the stairway to see a young boy with tied long hair in Heian period clothing, riding on a jumpy Komainu, the Japanese lion-dog guardian, guarding most shrines.

"That is Antoku," Shamoji said as he walked up the stairway with the bottles of sake.

"Ani-ue!" the boy greeted with a wave as he hopped off the tortured looking komainu, which ran back to its statue in haste.

"He addresses anyone he doesn't know as big brother," Shamoji muttered through his feigned smile.

"Speaking of which, won't someone collect the sake instead of us climbing up?" Yata asked.

"Only if I am delivering to the bottom of the sea without these ghosts around. Ōwatatsumi only comes out once in a while. He doesn't leave his servants here because of all these Taira warriors."

A tug on Alex's sleeve, and he looked at Antoku who was eyeing him with curiosity in those doe-eyes.

"Want to see my pets?" Antoku asked while rubbing his shoes shyly on the path, blinking his eyes.

The way Antoku looked was so cute that Alex felt the urge to pinch his chubby cheeks.

Yata nudged Alex and gestured towards a group of ghostly Taira warriors in their armor, waving their hands frantically in panic behind Antoku's back, almost like they were telling Alex to not to agree.

Antoku turned around, following Alex's gaze, only to see the ghost warriors pretending to walk on.

An innocent looking Antoku frowned for a moment at them.

While Antoku faced the other direction, Shamoji raised his eyebrow and mouthed the word 'No'.