Chapter 122 - Set Fire To The Web Of Lies

Tang Jin held his breath, his eyes kept wide to track not only the widowed Teng Shien but her two children Long Wei and Long Wing as well. At eleven winters of age, Long Wing had started to show the signs of a boy becoming a man. While his face still held no trace of hair, he'd shot up in height recently, his figure becoming long and gangly. Long Wei on the other hand, took after her mother, displaying a calm and composed face to the world with eyes that promised hidden mischief. 

Tang Jin had agreed with Zhang Bai that they were unlikely to find the other members of the Long family if Long Ma had truly hidden them away but evidently, he had moved in haste to relocate them to a hunting cabin a few li into the forest. Long Ma, it seemed, had underestimated what it took to conceal children with a caring mother. Even as they pushed the shallow drafted boat toward the place where Ao Yan had been held prisoner, Long Wei needed only hold out a hand for her mother to fish out another large, succulent cherry and press it into her daughter's waiting palm. The trackers Tang Jin had brought along with men from the City Lord's manor had followed a clear trail of spat-out cherry pits nearly the entire way from the Long family manor to the hunting cabin they'd hidden in. 

Teng Shien hadn't even protested when Tang Jin asked her to come with them. She hadn't argued that the crime he'd accused Long Ma of couldn't have been committed by her brother-in-law or that there must be some other explanation. Instead, she'd refused offers to have someone stay with her children and brought both of them along with Tang Jin to see what the truth was with their own eyes. 

"Brother-in-law," Teng Shein said, her gentle voice carrying on the still night air. "Was husband's death truly as you said? Did he die defending you from some beast all those years ago? Or did you fight him like you're fighting this little girl," she accused, her voice sharpening like a knife. 

"Sister-in-law, you shouldn't…"

"Don't call me that," Teng Shein asked sharply. "Not until you've looked in my eyes and answered my question. What really killed my husband?"

"Sister-in-law doesn't understand," Long Ma said, shaking his head. "Your brother was doomed to die in Blood and Slaughter, by my hand then or another's hand in the future. Virtually nothing he could do would change his fate," Long Ma continued, his voice heavy as though divulging a secret that had burdened him terribly. "At least by dying on my blade, his power wasn't wasted! It lives on in me, fulfilling his promise to protect you and to let your children grow. Haven't I kept you all safe all these years? I promised him when I consumed his heart that I would never forsake any of you!" Long Ma shouted, the flames burning within him searing his soul, leaving it desperate for the cool water of thanks and gratitude. To receive praise for his sacrifice, and acknowledgement for his accomplishment, only these things would put out the flames that burned with the word 'Inferiority' within him. 

"Uncle Ma, you…" Long Wei began, her lips trembling and tears welling in her pure childish eyes. "You killed father?"

"That's who he is," Ao Wen said, pouring on her energy and manifesting every bit of dragon aura she could, pressing down upon Long Ma, leaving him feeling that he hadn't grasped a person but rather had taken hold of the burning trunk of a large tree! "What he cannot surpass he destroys unless he thinks it's useful to him, in which case, he devours it," Ao Wen ridiculed, letting loose another series of sparks that caught at Long Ma's aura. This time, however, while one hand had pulled a fan from her waistband to fan the flames of 'Inferiority', another hand pulled a fan to set a new blaze, this one consuming 'Long Ming' from 'Long Ma.' 

Ao Wen didn't even know if it could work, not with a low-level technique like Wind Blown Embers. She had to find the perfect purchase point to start a conflagration, particularly on a stronger cultivator. But knowing that Long Ma had consumed Long Ming's essence and power, there had to be a binding that bridged what he had stolen to the rest of him. She sent her embers in search of that binding, not to destroy Long Ming's power, but to separate it from Long Ma, weakening him greatly in the process. 

"I said SHUT YOUR MOUTH!" Long Ma shouted, pressing the tip of River's Bite into Ao Wen's throat, applying enough pressure to release a rivulet of blood. "Sister-in-law, Little Wei, Little Wing, I promise, this will be over soon and then we'll go. Since Ao Wen involved so many people, I'll take you all somewhere safe for a time, somewhere that people are much stronger than here, but don't worry. We'll come back to rule what is rightfully ours, just like I promised your father!" 

"Long Ma, stop this madness!" Teng Shien shouted at him. Didn't he know how insane he sounded right now? What possessed him to do all of this? To say all of this? Couldn't he see that he was only making this worse? "Put your spear down, let the little girl go. Submit to Young Lord Zhang Bai and Lady Wan Yue until City Lord Zhang returns. You can still do the honorable thing," she insisted. 

"Honorable thing? THIS. IS. THE. HONORABLE. THING!" 

"No it isn't," Ao Wen said, curling her knees up to her chest as she made simultaneous physical and verbal assaults. "You're an inferior serpent, an inferior member of the Long family and inferior soldier, an inferior failure of a man," she spat, placing both feet on his chest and shoving off it like a springboard, propelling herself into the air even as she pressed down on him with her dragon aura and soul flames. Gracefully, she flipped backward, feet over her head, flames sputtering along her soaked boots. Fans spun in her hands adding much better lift and control to her descent as she completed the long arc through the air, landing gently on the roots of an ancient tree not far from the place Feng Xi waited with Zhang Bai, the hunters, and the Soldiers of the City Lord's manor who had come to arrest Long Ma. 

"It's over Long Ma," Ao Wen said sharply. "Admit your defeat and surrender."

"Me? Defeated by you!? NEVER!" He shouted in response, swinging the spear around above his head in a continuous flat spin calling out to the waters around him to follow the motion of the spear. Soon, first one, then a second, and finally a third water serpent formed from whirlpools within the water, rising up to flank Long Ma like loyal soldiers. Raising his voice in a shout that shook the trees and sent ripples across the water, Long Ma gave a deafening roar to command his water serpents. "DROWN THE WORLD!"