Pacifying Souls

The two giants crossed through the busily moving people.

The streets were still noisy and crowded, but no one met their eyes, and no one blocked their path.

As they walked, they snatched and drank wine jugs from people drinking at roadside taverns, and cleared out several skewers being grilled at stalls.

But no one stopped them.

Even patrolling government soldiers merely pretended not to see them.

Standing a head taller than even the well-fed government soldiers, with builds that looked not human but like bulls.

Through their carelessly worn upper garments, heedless of the cold, dozens or hundreds of black skull tattoos and scars large and small were clearly visible.

They were of the Black Bone Faction,

They were martial artists.

Superhumans born with the talent to handle the mysterious power called 'qi' in the form of inner power.

No one dared stand in their way.

***

Shortly after, they arrived at the street with the mask workshop.

"Ah, that looks like it?"

The mask craftsman's workshop was in a quiet inner alley off the main road.

They stood at the alley entrance looking at the mask workshop.

"...Doesn't look like that mask craftsman bastard to my eyes either."

"Indeed."

At the mask workshop's entrance, a youth wearing plain white clothes sat at the shop counter.

Though people passed by occasionally, the youth's posture as he silently carved the wood in his hands seemed endlessly bored, yet also endlessly at ease.

"Did he... have an apprentice?"

"We can just ask directly, can't we?"

People passing through the alley discovered the giants and turned back to scatter.

The youth seemed not to notice the two giants approaching, just keeping his head down and focusing only on carving wood.

"Hey."

"Where did the mask craftsman bastard go?"

The carving knife stopped.

The youth who had been working with his head deeply bowed raised his face.

"...?!"

The giants' eyebrows twitched.

On the youth's face was a mask with no patterns and no eye holes.

For some reason, the white gleam flowing on the roughly finished mask shone ominously.

"Hmm."

Even if momentary, to be startled by a mere mask.

It was impossible for their usual selves.

"Hey, kid. The elders are asking you something."

He subtly leaked his pressure.

Like a ginseng digger meeting a tiger, it would have made ordinary people's knees weak and skin crawl.

But the masked youth showed no sign of fear at all.

He even showed the leisure to smirk.

The youth's neat white teeth showed.

"Do you know the face of Guanyin Bodhisattva?"

At the completely unexpected question, the giants were displeased.

Usually, either one would have thrown a punch.

Their fists were clearly larger than this ominous youth's head, and could have shattered that skull more easily than crushing dry leaves.

However, neither of them did so.

No, they couldn't.

Something felt wrong.

It was uncomfortable.

"Well, how could I discuss the Buddhist way with creatures like you."

Giggling, the youth stood from his spot.

Then before they could even react, he went inside the shop.

There was no sound of footsteps.

Only the youth's soft laughter echoed emptily.

When they came to their senses, only wood shavings remained where the youth had been sitting.

"...Huh, fuck."

Though they cursed trying to raise their spirit, it just scattered emptily in the air.

Being bewitched by a ghost in broad daylight.

Their pride prevented them from either retreating or immediately following.

"...What was that?"

"I don't know either."

Deep shadows fell inside the shop where the youth had slipped in.

With the noonday sun, it was natural for shadows to be deep where it was bright, but for some reason it didn't feel like simple darkness to them.

"Still have to catch and rough him up though, right?"

Drawing up their inner power with all their might, some confidence returned.

"...Right."

They were the type who considered twisting off someone's head trivial.

Fists always came before words, and they had killed their share of renowned martial artists.

Though their current behavior was clearly abnormal for such people, they didn't even properly realize it themselves.

They headed inside the shop following the youth who had already disappeared into the darkness.

The shop walls were full of masks.

Yet according to reports from their subordinates who came yesterday, they had trashed everything from outside to inside.

And they heard all valuable items had been taken.

Why were there so many splendid masks hung everywhere in the shop cloaked in deep darkness?

Masks of various colors and forms, some laughing and some crying, somehow seemed to be watching them.

"Isn't this some kind of evil technique?"

The answer came after a moment.

"...I don't know either."

The evil techniques they had seen and heard of were nothing more than trivial tricks that deceived the senses with illusions.

Such tricks couldn't work on superhumans with inner power that broke human limits.

"...This way?"

"...Seems like it."

When the somehow too-long corridor of masks ended, a side door came into view.

Since it was a straight corridor, the youth must have passed through the side door.

Through there would be an inner courtyard, and spaces used as a workshop and living quarters.

Light leaked through the slightly open door, and somehow that sunlight felt very welcome.

The two whose minds had somehow been pushed near their limits walked quickly toward the side door.

It was closer to running than walking.

The moment the giant who reached the side door first pushed it open,

"...Huk?!"

A white hand stretching out from inside grabbed his throat.

"Kuk?!"

Already having raised his inner power and prepared for anything.

The giant protected his grabbed throat with inner power while simultaneously grabbing that arm with both hands.

With his innate great strength and inner power, he should have been able to crush that thin arm more easily than a dry branch.

But,

"...!"

That white hand too easily dug into his throat protected by inner power as if tearing it apart.

His hands using all their strength not only failed to crush the opponent's arm, they couldn't even leave nail marks on that cold skin.

Then without even leaving a scream, he disappeared as if sucked through the side door.

"B-brother?!"

The giant left alone fell back in shock.

He got up rolling and ran in the opposite direction.

Though he was confused whether what he was displaying now was lightness technique or footwork, he threw his body forward with his life on the line.

But somehow that scenery of the sunlit alley right there felt distant.

It seemed to grow more distant.

"Kheuk!"

Had his mind just rushed too far ahead?

His legs tangled and he fell.

It was an unseemly sight.

There had never been such an unseemly sight.

Though he would submit to the strong and bow to power, when had he ever looked so pathetic?

But he couldn't even feel that much.

He tried to jump up, but one leg wouldn't move.

Something was holding his ankle.

It was that pure white hand.

"Uh, uwaaaaah!!"

His ankle felt both frozen and burning.

Would it feel like this if dozens of cattle pulled at once?

That hand dragged his body inside with unimaginable force.

The giant dug his fingers into the ground trying not to be dragged.

His fingers infused with inner power dug into the paving stones.

But the speed didn't slow at all.

Sparks flew and nails broke.

Fingers broke off.

Still it couldn't be stopped.

"S-save me! Save..."

Though he tried to hold onto the doorframe with his last inner power, it was futile.

The doorframe he had grabbed broke away, and his form disappeared through the side door.

Clatter- clatter-

In the empty shop, only the side door that had devoured two people swung leisurely.

Somehow it seemed the sound of masks laughing echoed through.

***

Yuan Zhaoxian knew that if he showed himself at the mask craftsman's shop, the Black Bone Faction would send people.

He leisurely carved while letting go of the small fry who were peeking from afar, and those small fry brought proper big fish.

Martial artists were precious whether black path or white path, and naturally they held high positions internally and knew quality information.

The same was true for these big fish.

But Yuan Zhaoxian wore an unsatisfied expression.

"No, no. Was it this?"

He squatted on the ground and wiggled his hands.

Then he backed away slightly to look carefully before shaking his head.

"This expression doesn't seem right either..."

Then he approached again to look at the two heads.

The giants with bodies gone and only heads remaining wore the most agonized expressions in the world.

Their tongues hung out long, and their bulging eyeballs had all blood vessels burst with blood flowing in streaks and dried.

The head rolling beside them was in much the same state with only slightly different expressions.

"Tsk..."

Yuan Zhaoxian who clicked his tongue for no reason sat down right there on the dirt ground and picked up the carving he had been working on diligently.

It was a Guanyin Bodhisattva statue with the face portion uncarved.

"I still can't quite figure it out."

It wasn't a problem of memory.

He remembered all the Buddhist paintings he had seen, down to the most trivial details.

But...

"Just imitating the form isn't enough."

What face does the Buddha who symbolizes endless love and compassion wear?

What face does the Buddha in his heart wear?

Yuan Zhaoxian's carving knife moved like dancing after being briefly lost in thought.

The skills he hadn't touched would be faster to count from behind, and carving was also one of his domains.

His unhesitating hands clearly created form.

"...It's complete."

Yuan Zhaoxian turned around and placed the completed carving on top of the burial mound.

He placed the carving knife with it.

It was the joint grave of the mask craftsman's family that Yuan Zhaoxian had made.

The warm midday sun fell on the new grave covered only in red earth.

Yuan Zhaoxian's Guanyin Bodhisattva statue lay shining white on top.

Instead of a compassionate expression, that Guanyin Bodhisattva's face was carved with a mask covering it.

It was the same shape as the mask Yuan Zhaoxian had received.

The crooked expression mocked the world, and the unpierced eye holes turned away from the world.

"...Black Bone Faction, and Golden Lady."

Yuan Zhaoxian who had been looking up at the sky for a moment murmured softly.

"Mock and sneer. Ridicule and disdain. For that will be your only possible resistance..."

And probably by now.

The needlessly diligent 'gatekeeper' would obviously be searching desperately for him with the momentum to turn over all of Luoyang.

Kuk kuk, Yuan Zhaoxian's form disappeared from the graveside with a burst of laughter.

The ice-cold winter wind swept past two heads rolling randomly on the dirt ground.