Volume 2, Chapter 14: Escape from San Desquiciado (Part 1)

“Well, that was rough.” Davis winced each time he plucked out one of the few splinters of wood that sank through his shirt and into his skin. “How about you guys?”

“I’m okay, thanks,” Viola said, unbracing her arms and untucking her knees.

Davis was surprised, but pleasantly so. Not a single stray piece of debris or dirt had touched Viola or her clothes despite the mess they went through.

He sighed in relief. “Great, looks like we’re all good.”

“Uh, no. Not all of us.”

A posh voice he now despised, complained from another direction. Davis looked over his shoulder and got an earful.

“Davis, you feckless tosser!

The blond man’s face was a twisted mess, seething of loathing and contempt. He was probably as angry, if not more upset, than the wife theft and beating he suffered at the hands of Logen Thayne. And why wouldn’t he feel this way? Shards of wood in different sizes were sticking out all over his back!

“C’mon, so what if you got more splinters that me?” Davis shrugged. “It’s not that much of a difference.”

“That’s far off the point!” the blond man exclaimed. “Good lord, it hurts so much right now!”

Davis remained indifferent. “And your point is?”

“In your panic, you used me as a human shield!”

Without changing the aloofness he was wearing, Davis lowered his gaze – and saw how one of his hands continued to clutch the blond man’s plaid shirt.

“Oh, my bad.” He released his grip. If there was anything he admitted doing wrong, it was putting his hands on another man’s chest.

Despite the lack of sincerity in Davis’ apology, the blond man cooled down. He hated to admit it, but what Davis did was actually the best course of action for all of them.

Behind himself, he saw why only half of the weapon case had sunk into the wooden organ even though an impact of their magnitude should’ve buried them deeper into the huge instrument.

It was because of his gauntlet. They stopped sinking further right after the organ came into contact with his gauntlet.

With the weapon case now hanging in the balance, Davis figured it was dangerous to stay where they were. He carefully scooted himself off the weapon case’s edge, dropped down to his feet--

“…Oww…”

--and fell shivering on all fours.

It seemed like a decent idea at first, but the shocking jolt coursing mostly through his legs and spine told Davis he had underestimated the height of his fall. At least his legs didn’t end up broken. That helped put him at ease as he fought through the wobbling numbness in his knees during the slow climb back to his feet.

“Okay, now let yourself fall. I’ll catch you!” His words went up to the blond man and Viola, the latter who was working quickly to pull out the rest of the wooden splinters still sticking out of the former’s back.

Although Davis stood by his word, he wasn’t pleased with who became the first-ever person he caught in a princess carry. His hands twitched on impulse and threatened to fall loose.

“Don’t drop me.” The blond man scowled. “Don’t you dare drop me!”

“Then stop trying to tempt me!” Davis talked back and quickly put him down to his feet. Afterward, Davis wiped his hands clean against his pants. He made sure the blond man saw that.

With that setback out of the way, Davis tried to replace his disappointment with optimism and excitement. He readied himself to catch Viola, who was preparing to jump off the weapon case.

“Don’t worry! I promise I won’t let anything bad happen to… you.”

A frown marred his face as Viola landed away from him by a few feet, curling herself into a human ball the moment she hit the ground. That rolling maneuver allowed her to fall from great heights and suffer only minimal levels of shock upon impact.

Well, that sucked.

Davis was starting to think that maybe there were some not-so-amazing aspects to being trained in martial arts.

Meanwhile, a fissure began to branch down the organ’s wooden structure. It was caused by the weapon case, which was forced down when Viola jumped off it.

Davis, Viola, and the blond man shielded their eyes as the weapon case fell straight through the organ, breaking down its wooden body and mangling its hollow pipes. With a final smash to its many keys and a tone-deaf musical boom, the organ fell apart and created a dust cloud of wood in its wake. The last organist playing it had some decent common sense and managed to get away before he could get crushed.

As for the weapon case, its four wheels landed back on solid ground. The big hunk of metal came out a little dirty from its new coat of dust particles, but other than that, it was undamaged.

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That pipe organ sure looked expensive. The intricate carvings all over its wooden structure implied that it probably was.

Butterflies of anxiety fluttered inside Davis’ stomach as he, Viola, and the blond man stared in awe at the collateral damage they’ve caused. Someone was definitely going to lose his temper on them, considering where they ended up.

“YOU IMBECILES!”

There it was.

Davis sucked his lips in as he and his companions rigidly turned their heads, speechless and wide-eyed, toward the source of the distorted voice that called them out. He had a feeling on whom it belonged to.

“Oh God, oh man. I knew it,” he said.

“Bloody hell, who’s this shady fellow?” the blond man whispered.

Davis bit his lower lip and tried to ease his nerves. “He’s San Desquiciado’s Tyrant of the East. Lord—"

“Xadrian!?”

Davis swiveled to his other companion. “No, Viola. His name is… wait, hold on!” His hands clamped her shoulders. “How come you almost got his name right?!”

Viola didn’t answer him. Shock and awe had overtaken her the moment she laid eyes on the Tyrant of the East.

“Hey, snap out of it!”

“The three of you…”

Davis tried to shake his friend out of her trance but was forced to stop when Lord Xavion’s voice reminded him of the Tyrant’s presence.

“…For the atrocity you've committed, you have no right to judge the penalty I shall inflict!”

Lord Xavion had two responses ready: His words, and the shroud of darkness and glimmering light writhing around his body!

His transportable throne shook from the pressure he exerted. The strongest fanatics carrying it tried not to plummet to their knees, and it didn’t look like they were going to last much longer.

Finally, Lord Xavion slammed his hands together into a gesture resembling a beast’s head while stretching his arms forward and squaring his shoulders. He was readying an attack, one with an impression that froze Davis in place and made him think it wouldn’t matter even if he tried to run away.

“Davis… get behind me.”

The urgency in a girl’s voice coaxed him to look slightly back.

Viola’s face was a mixture of fear and desperation as she forced her shivering body to act. Her shoulders were squared, her arms were stretched forward, and her hands shook less when they clasped together to form a gesture.

Hang on, Davis noticed something.

The stance Viola took looked exactly like Lord Xavion’s!

Not only that, another shroud of energy that was white and cloudy with specks, conformed around her body. Its warmth reached out to Davis and the blond man, telling without words of its intentions to protect them no matter what.

“Davis!” Viola yelled, eliciting his feet to spring off the ground for a second. “What the fuck are you waiting for!? Get your ass behind me, NOW!”

She didn’t like intensifying her words, but if that meant getting results, then so be it. The vulgar touch came out naturally.

Snapped out of his fascination distraction, Davis hauled himself and took cover behind Viola alongside the blond man, who was already anticipating what was going to happen next.

The black and white shrouds of energy condensed into their users. Nobody dared to move as the once rowdy battlefield entered a moment of silence.

Then a pair of voices broke it.

“《 虎的 Path of the Tiger…” Lord Xavion began.

“…Baihu Jī rén! 路径》” Viola ended.

The two shrouds of energy went berserk and leaped from their user’s bodies. Each took on the form of a tiger with outstretched claws and sharpened fangs.

One of the tigers, composed of darkness and fragmented body parts, frightened those nearest to it with its distorted roar before rushing on four legs toward another that was white as snow with a fluctuating radiance.

They clashed.

A shockwave of black and white energy detonated across an open space of the battlefield. Leaves erupted off the ground and scattered about. Those nearest to the blast crossed arms over themselves out of instinct and braced against its pressure.

Throughout their roars and snarls, the two tigers ripped and tore into each other with their front claws and fangs. Their battle escalated literally when they fought standing on their hind legs. The height they reached dwarfed every person in the scene.

Everyone held their breath, but they didn’t have to for long when a claw struck out and clutched the white tiger’s face.

With its superior brute strength and size, Lord Xavion’s black tiger lifted then slammed Viola’s white tiger to the ground, invoking another shockwave that caused it to vanish from the scene in a flash of white light. Now the last one standing, the black tiger roared once more in victory before it also faded away.

Lord Xavion and Viola broke out of their stances, but unlike the winner whose arms momentarily dropped loose, the loser collapsed like all the stamina she had was taken away.

“Viola!”

She fell backward, but a pair of arms caught her in time. Slowly, her eyes fluttered open.

“Davis?” she asked as the concerned face in her vision became more apparent. “How sweet of you.”

Davis calmed the racing in his heart before it could go too far. “Can’t you save that for when we’re alone, or something? I need you to tell me you’re alright!”

“I’m fine,” Viola assured weakly. “A little dazed, but I’ll be fine, thanks to you.”

Once again, her gratitude struck deep into his heart and nearly made it race again, but Davis fought off the emotion. They had bigger issues to deal with, now that they had unintentionally barged into the turf war as a third party. It was also ironically safe to say that no one else was on their side.

“That sure was unexpected,” Davis said as he supported Viola back to her feet. “But it’s great you had something to take on Lord Xavion and his shadow powers.”

“Lord Xavion? Shadow powers?” Viola questioned as she reoriented herself with the ground. “Back in Xina, those 'shadow powers' were called Yin Qi,” she informed him, much to his surprise. “And if my hunch is correct, ‘Lord Xavion’ is actually Xadrian Li.”

Davis adopted another look of concern. “And who is this Xadrian Li supposed to be?”

“He’s someone I occasionally trained with,” Viola revealed. “Not only does Xavion sound similar to his name, but Xadrian also invented that technique we just did.”

“Oh.” Davis dismissed at first, but then --“Wait a minute!” -- sprang as soon as the realization set in. He pointed a finger at the robed Tyrant in the fair distance. “You mean, that guy’s a student from Shǔxiàng!?”

A few trickles of sweat trailed Viola’s cheeks and smudged her make-up.

“Not just a student,” she muttered, enduring the wrenching in her navel and airiness in her chest. “He’s one of the Academy’s twelve elites, and some of us had been wondering where he disappeared to.”

An icy knot in his throat reduced Davis’ voice into a whisper. “You gotta be kidding me.”

“I wish.” Viola tensed, having become wary of the hostile Tyrant and the indistinct design of his uniform. Her hands clenched and tightened themselves until her knuckles turned white. “But if he’s really who I think he is, then we’ve just found the long-lost Deva of the Tiger Path.”

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Located in the Eastern nation of Xina, Shǔxiàng Academy’s curriculum of Kung Fu allows its students to dedicate themselves to one of the martial art’s twelve styles, known as “Paths.” An animal represents each of them, and their particular training methods focus on bringing an aspect of human capability toward perfection.

Among the twelve, the Dragon, Rooster, and Tiger Paths are considered the most bizarre and challenging anyone can choose to follow. This is because students among those three have the potential to learn unconventional techniques that must be seen to be believed.

Students of the Dragon Path, which represents affinity, learn to wield or improvise natural elements of the planet, such as consciously increasing their internal body temperatures high enough to emulate fire in at least their hands.

Those training in the Rooster Path, which represents mentality, devote themselves solely to evolving their minds toward enlightenment. In time, they become capable of performing psychokinetic feats, such as moving an object around without physical touch.

And then, there’s the Tiger Path. It represents balance, but its meaning is different from what most people would think at first. Its students are primarily trained in a Xinese discipline known as Qigong. Defined as the cultivation of qi, or “lifeforce,” it is commonly seen as a dated system of coordinated body postures, breathing, and meditation used for health and spirituality purposes.

In the past, there were many infamous cases of martial artists claiming to have mastered the discipline. They have boasted of using their qi to project blasts of energy or to create barriers and other constructs as portrayed in some forms of fiction. Skeptics eventually tested all of them, and the results were disastrous. The martial artists suffered constant humiliation by the media, and their claims were declared false with no logical proof to back them up.

But Shǔxiàng Academy’s unique environment allowed its dedicated scholars to nurture the Qigong system as their own. After half a century of extensive experimentation and practice, they successfully re-invented it into the very mystical art form that was once alleged to be fake.

Their version of Qigong made it possible for a person to manifest their lifeforce into two forms anyone could see.

One form of lifeforce shined white for humanity’s potential in creation. It was called Yang Qi. The other form dimmed black for humanity’s potential in destruction. It was called Yin Qi.

While both forms were powerful, neither was complete without the other.

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Jio Kurenai here, hoping I've given you the entertainment you deserved!

Let me point out now that a couple of details from previous chapters had been retconned here. At the very least, they were very minor and wouldn't affect the story. Well, here we go:

1.) The technique Lord Xavion and Viola used in this chapter, "Path of the Tiger: Baihu Jī rén," was previously performed in a slightly different way by Lord Xavion in his fight with Mary Glow in chapter 12, Tyrant of the West and East, (Part 1). The retcon was how his hands were clasped to form the technique. In chapter 12, he simply clasped his hands together with interlocked fingers. In this chapter, his hands formed a gesture resembling a Tiger's head. Try Googling "Daytime Tiger hand seal" to see what the gesture actually looked like.

2.) The Dragon Path of Shǔxiàng Kung-Fu, which was first mentioned in chapter 7 of Volume 2, had its aspect changed in this chapter. Previously, Viola said it represents elements, but in this chapter it represents affinity. Because of how the Dragon Path had been defined so far in the story, I am bound to mention the word "element" all the time, so I wanted its aspect to use a different word that can be connected but also wouldn't make me sound redundant. "Affinity" sounded like the perfect replacement because it can mean "natural understanding, attraction, or kinship" like how a student of the Dragon Path must understand the elemental flow of nature in order to utilize the natural elements of the planet like they're literally manipulating them. The term, "Elemental Affinity" is also used in some Fantasy RPG videogames to describe a character's relationship to an element.

With that being said, the previous chapters have been updated with these changes in the hope of causing less confusion. I'll be sure to point out more things like this if they happen, but as much as possible I don't want to retcon anything, especially something major.

Moving on...

Following the upload of this chapter, I'd like to inform you guys that there won't be any ParaRene chapters for a while. This is not because of the hiatus I announced before, but because I'm currently working on a new side-project. 

It's a one-shot that I'll be submitting for Honeyfeed's monthly writing challenge. This month's designated genre is Romance, and the theme is "First Time Experience." This is a challenge to me because while ParaRene does have some romance elements, they are mostly meant for light-hearted moments that happen on the side, so using it as the main genre feels like a step out of my comfort zone. Luckily, I was able to come up with a potential story around the time the month started, so I want to grasp the opportunity and get it done before the end of June! I hope you'll give it a shot once it's ready! :D

Please react to this chapter to let me know how I did for you, and feel free to drop a comment whether it be your thoughts on the chapter or constructive criticism to help me improve! If there's anything I love more than cooking up a new chapter, it's interacting with those who give my work a chance. ;)

I'm also on Twitter and Instagram where I post the latest news and artworks mostly related to this novel. Find me @jio_kurenai

My illustrator has an account on Twitter too! Find her @HikariPrezi