A Flying Sword Through the Chest

The wind howled along the bank, whipping up a thousand heaps of yellow sand.

Xuanzang did not blame his disciple. He merely gazed quietly at the river.

Then he turned his head slightly and beckoned to Zhu Bajie.

"Bajie."

"Master, I'm here!"

At his call, Zhu Bajie hastily shoved his feet into his shoes, grabbed the Nine-Toothed Rake, and ran over. With a guileless expression, he asked, "Is that monster hiding and refusing to come out? Want Old Pig to go down and catch him? That fellow's a turtle with his head tucked in. He ran when he couldn't beat me earlier, and now he's surely cowering in his lair, afraid to show his face."

Xuanzang shook his head and motioned for Bajie to bring his ear closer.

He whispered a single sentence into Bajie's ear, his voice very soft.

"Go."

Xuanzang gently patted his broad shoulder, his expression as calm as still water.

"Just deliver the message. No need to say anything else."

"Huh? That's it? Nothing else?"

"Just that one sentence."

Xuanzang waved a hand. "Go."

"Fine, fine. You're the master, so you have the final say," Zhu Bajie muttered.

Zhu Bajie hoisted the rake onto his shoulder. Though he grumbled, the fight earlier had been left unfinished, and a pent-up fire still burned inside him. This was the perfect chance to go down and make trouble for that red-haired monster.

With that, Zhu Bajie wasted no more words. Wielding his rake with both hands, he parted a path through the water and used his old skills from years past, leaping through waves and rolling through swells as he plunged into the murky yellow abyss.

At the bottom of the Flowing Sand River, there was no proper cave dwelling to speak of.

There was only an enormous stone hollow scoured out by the shifting sands, cold and damp, filled with a suffocating earthy stench.

The red-haired monster was curled up on a slab of bluestone in a corner of the hollow.

He was neither tending his wounds nor wiping down his weapon.

He was trembling.

Counting the hours, it was time again.

"Ugh..."

A groan, suppressed to the utmost, squeezed out from deep in his throat.

The blade had no physical form, yet it was sharper than any divine weapon in the world.

It was an invisible "flying sword," arriving precisely on time, once every seven days.

It emerged from the void, carrying a biting cold gleam, and passed through his chest without the slightest resistance.

No blood flowed, but the pain made him wish he were dead.

Yet the monster clutched the flesh of his chest, his nails digging deep into it, his entire body convulsing as cold sweat mingled with the river water and rolled off him.

Pain.

Only pain could grant him a moment's peace.

In his daze, those images appeared before his eyes again.

Those people who had tried to cross the river, those hands struggling in the Weak Water, those desperate cries for help.

In the end, they had all sunk.

Their bodies rotted at the riverbed and became white bones.

"I killed them... I killed them all..."

The monster muttered to himself, his eyes unfocused.

I don't deserve to be an immortal.

I'm a demon.

I'm an evil spirit that eats people.

This flying sword through my chest is the retribution I deserve.

Shhk-

The formless sword energy passed through his chest again. The agonizing pain numbed him, yet also allowed him to drag out his wretched existence amid the torment.

Just then.

Zhu Bajie came through the parted water.

He had intended to let out a mighty shout, then smash his rake down and teach this monster a lesson.

But when he clambered over the scattered rocks and peered inside, the rake he had raised stopped dead in midair.

The red-haired monster had set up no defenses, nor did he look as ferocious as before.

He was curled up in a silt-covered corner of the stone hollow, rolling frantically on the ground like a mangy dog driven mad.

One moment he slammed his head against the rock; the next he buried himself in the mud and sand, as though trying to escape some invisible torture.

"Has this fellow... gone mad?"

Zhu Bajie clicked his tongue at the sight, silently muttering to himself:

He was perfectly fine when he fought Old Pig earlier. How did he come down with the falling sickness the moment he got back?

Though he could not make sense of it, he still had to complete the task his master had given him.

Zhu Bajie could not be bothered to go inside. He stood at the entrance and thumped the Nine-Toothed Rake against the ground, sending a tremor through the surrounding water.

"Hey! You red-haired monster!"

At the sound, the monster abruptly froze.

He did not immediately spring into action. Instead, he remained curled up and slowly raised his head.

What a face it was.

His indigo-blue skin was twisted into a grimace, his face smeared with cold sweat and muddy water. His eyes were blood-red, but held not a trace of ferocity-only the numbness and despair of someone tortured to the limit, who wanted nothing but death.

Seeing that the newcomer was Bajie, a flicker of exhaustion and disgust passed through the monster's eyes.

"You again."

His voice traveled through the water with a dull echo.

"I told you, this way is blocked. You worthless fools can't get across. Turn back..."

"Bullshit!"

Zhu Bajie already had a fire bottled up inside him. At those words, his fury flared three feet high. Throwing Xuanzang's instruction to "say nothing else" to the back of his mind, he raised his rake and cursed:

"Turn back, my ass! Are you really stupid, or just pretending?! Enough talk-take this!"

"You want to fight again?! Come on! Kill me!!"

The red-haired monster suddenly snatched up the Demon-Subduing Treasure Staff and charged recklessly forward, attacking without defending, fighting as though to trade his life for his opponent's.

"Kill me, and the Flowing Sand River will know peace! So will I!"

Boom-!

Mud and sand erupted from the riverbed.

The two clashed once more.

The river depths were the monster's home ground, after all. He moved like a phantom, borrowing the force of the current as he whirled his treasure staff in an impenetrable screen. Every strike aimed to take them both down together.

Though Zhu Bajie was also skilled at fighting underwater, the restraints of this place, coupled with his opponent's suicidal tactics, gradually began to tax him.

How is this fellow a completely different person in the water? What a lunatic!

Watching his frenzied state, Zhu Bajie felt a little unnerved.

Though the monster was ferocious, his fighting style was riddled with openings. He was plainly seeking death.

A thought stirred in Zhu Bajie's mind, and he remembered Xuanzang's instructions. He suddenly leaped backward, out of the fray, and held his rake across his body.

"Stop, stop, stop! Look at you, half dead already. I'm not fighting you anymore!"

Zhu Bajie steeled himself and bellowed in his rough voice:

"My master sent me to give you a message!"

The monster halted, panting violently, a rattling sound rising from his throat. He seemed to lack even the strength to speak. He merely stared fixedly at Zhu Bajie, the treasure staff in his hands still trembling slightly.

Zhu Bajie looked at him and curled his lip. Imitating Xuanzang's tone, he delivered the message word for word:

"My master asks you-"

"Do you want release? If you do, come with me to see him!"

His words faded.

Only the monster's harsh breathing echoed through the murky water.

"Re... lease... Release!?"

The monster murmured the word over and over.

The invisible flying sword that had been savagely tearing through his chest, tormenting him beyond endurance, seemed to pause for a moment upon hearing that word.

He did not want to be a demon, did not want to eat people, did not want to suffer this heart-piercing agony every seven days.

He dreamed of death, yet he could not even die. All he could do was roll and wail, day after day, at this sunless riverbed, dragging out his wretched existence like a maggot.

That monk... how did he know?

Clang.

The Demon-Subduing Treasure Staff fell into the silt.

A mud-covered hand reached out toward Zhu Bajie.

That hand trembled, as though grasping for a lifesaving straw.

"Yes..."

The monster's voice was hoarse and broken, yet carried a heart-rending yearning:

"Take me... to him..."