Chapter 34 — Ten Thousand Bats
劍問蒼天 · Page 4 of 6
Qi Hao held the ** Mirror in his hand and softly intoned a few words of incantation. The ** Mirror, dull and lightless before, seemed to answer, brightening gradually; then it rose from his hand and hovered two feet above his head, its radiance growing, until a pale yellow halo lit a circle some six feet around the four and held them at its center.
Only then did Qi Hao say, "Eight hundred years ago, Kongsang Mountain was a gathering place for the fiends of the demon cult. And from what I see, this mountain is bleak and strange—I fear it harbors many mountain spirits and spectral things. The ** Mirror has the power to ward off harm; we would do well to guard against trouble before it comes."
Zhang Qingyue glanced at the ** Mirror floating in the air. The little mirror looked unremarkable, yet in its archaic plainness lurked an auspicious air; it was not to be underestimated. Just then they all heard a great crash in the distance, and then a crackling, popping sound, growing ever denser, until at last not only did it grow louder and louder but the very rhythm could no longer be made out—only a vast rumbling din echoing over the desolate hills. Far off, by the little light the ** Mirror cast into the darkness, they saw a black vapor abruptly rise from behind a distant ridge, all the more uncanny in the dark—and from there came the rumbling roar.
Every face changed. Zeng Shuyan said, "The ** Mirror!"
The words had scarcely left his mouth, before the others could react, when the black cloud—growing vaster in the air by the moment—seemed to sense something and shifted toward them. A moment later, as though a piercing shriek came from within the black cloud, in an instant the whole of it wheeled about as one and rushed at the four—at the one point of light in all this dark night.
In an instant the star-strewn sky went pitch black, as though something had blotted it out. A foul stench filled the air around them in the blink of an eye, and Zhang Qingyue and the others turned pale with fright. Only Qi Hao kept some composure, though his face had gone white too. "No rash moves!" he cried. "Whatever you do, do not leave the circle of the ** Mirror's light!"
Another moment, and the shrieking and rumbling were at their ears. By the ** Mirror's glow they finally made out that black cloud—and it was a countless host of black bats, dense beyond reckoning, and by the look of their bodies more than twice the size of any bat they had ever seen. Each gaped wide its maw, and amid that sea of black the mouths were a raw crimson—hideous and terrifying.
But the pale yellow light the ** Mirror cast now showed its worth: every bat was barred outside that circle, and batter and crush as they might, the circle did not stir in the least. Nay, those near the edge, where they touched the pale yellow radiance, gave off a sizzling hiss; a moment later they dropped to the ground and thrashed there—plainly they could not live.
But the swarm was far too vast. As far as the eye could reach, the very stars of the night sky were hidden—surely millions upon millions. Those dead on the ground were perhaps not one part in a million of them. On and on the countless bats came, wave upon wave. The four were ringed in the center; for the moment they were safe, but before, behind, and on every side were those most hideous blood-red maws, and the reeking stench was enough to make a man retch.
After all, the ** Mirror was a supreme treasure of the Dao. Beneath the assault of these countless savage beasts it showed not the slightest sign of weakness or wavering. The yellow circle looked thin and frail, yet it stood firm as a mountain, and before long the bat corpses around it were piling higher and higher.