Chapter 17: Call Of The Masquerade (II): A Trial
[In the cultivation world, many occurrences are likened to fate, destiny or luck. While it might be true, there's one occurrence that is actually a combination of all three.....that occurrence is the discovery of a legacy. A legacy holds great power, martial techniques and more often than not, mysterious and supernatural energy that would give normal cultivators of Qi a run for their money. When legacies are found, every major power in the world fight for it because a legacy can only be gotten by one person in a single lifetime, and the person has to be lucky and fated to be chosen and accepted by that legacy. From that moment on, that legacy become his destiny, and his future path in life is decided by it. There are some really lucky people who find a legacy by a sleight of hand and favor from fate, 99% of the time, this people end up part of, if not one of the supreme power of the earth itself. A legacy is power that goes against the very laws of the heavens and the earth itself, they make one a god amongst immortals.]
Bartholomew Álē
As soon as Alex fell into the hut, he kept on falling, at least for a second. There was a ten foot deep, four meters wide and four meters long hole in the hut. A fall from that height did nothing more than dirty his clothes, as such a fall wouldn't be able to even leave a scratch on him with his cultivation of the ninth level of the body refining realm. Alex could hear bangs and loud wails from outside the hut as the masquerade tried everything it could to follow him in, but to no avail.
Alex was even more confused as this masquerade had chased and maneuvered him towards this hut, now it's attitude had taken a sudden turn, and it was not really happy about him getting into the hut....what gives. Alex picked himself up and looked up at the hole he now found himself in, it was as if someone had dug a pitfall trap, so that anybody who walked into the hut would fall right down the hole. The only difference, was the door that was opposite him, placed right at the wall of the hole.
Well it couldn't be called a door exactly, it was more like an open doorway with a white curtain serving as a barrier between what lay beyond and Alex himself. There was something about this doorway that sent shivers down his spine, even if there was a part of him that wanted to go through it. But it has already been established, anything that has to do with masquerades was bad, so Alex turned and got ready to either jump or scale his way out of this hole, out of this hut, and this cursed area, never to return.
At the ninth level of the body refining realm, the strength of any martial artist would be weighed at 90 kilograms. And they would be capable of jumping 6 meters into the air, however the moment Alex tried to jump up, a formless pressure suddenly appeared, and pushed him back down into the hole, and this time it was strong enough that impact force him to spit blood, as his almost healed injuries were aggravated.
Alex was shocked by the sudden turn of events, and no matter what he did, regardless of which methods he employed from jumping to attempting to scale the wall of the pit, the pressure kept on pushing him back down. He was trapped, and there seemed to be no way out for him. After thirty minutes of fruitless and rather painful attempts, Alex gave in an decided to see what lay beyond the white curtain.
He took slow methodical steps forward as his heart began to pound in his ears, and his soft breathing became extremely labored as a chill settled within his bones. This place was creepy, and as if to prove his point, a slow wind came and ruffled the white curtain, raising it up a bit to show him an image of what lay beyond, and all he saw was darkness.
His heart beat a little faster as he took another step forward. The cultivation world was amazing, with each day that passed, Qi and technology became more and more engrained with each other, creating a better life for people and explaining a whole lot of things with the most logical explanation required. But there were things in this world that went beyond the simple explanations of Qi or it's capabilities. Things that where downright supernatural and mysterious. In the face of such a power, even Qi will have to give way, because before there were immortals...…there were Gods, and there were Titans.
Alex steeled his nerves and just walked through, pushing the curtain aside as he embraced the darkness beyond without hesitation. It was not as if he wasn't scared, but all he could do was keep moving forward. He left his eyes open, and walked forward for almost three steps before a fire came to life beside.
It's appearance was so sudden Alex screamed in fright, it was a huge animal skim drum. The fire rested on top of it, and alternated between a sliver, green, blue, red, gold and black flame. Bathing the entire revealed hallway In front of him with a rainbow of colors that made this place look more spooky than eerie. Alex looked back at the way he just came from and only saw a solid wall, the entrance had disappeared.
'of course it just up and disappeared. I'm currently enacting a horror movie in real life, why wouldn't the path I just came through vanish, so that I can't escape when the monster ahead is eating my intestines.'
Alex had a colorful imagination no doubt, but it wouldn't render any help to him in this scenario. The drum was not the only one of it's kind that held a flame on it, as there were actually twelve of them, with six placed individually on both sides of the hallway. On the walls, the same tribal markings on the body of the hut could be seen, as they depicted stories that Alex could not help but get enamored with.
It showed a man with a strange walking stick, walking side by side with seven masquerades of varying sizes, and appearances. Two of them were so tall, that Alex would have called them giants, though they looked incredibly ferocious with their carved masks. Another two seem to have average height, but one of them was actually crawling on the ground like a snake, while the other flew in the air with massive wings made of leaves. There was another stout masquerade that also flew about, but it's painting was a little faded, but not by time, rather it seemed to be done deliberately to make the masquerade seem more ghost like.
And the final two were strange, but Alex actually recognized the concept behind their inception. They looked human, and the chalk used in painting them was rather colorful, or not, because it seemed this two were painted differently from the others. They were more like canvassed paintings, rather than chalk like cave man drawings.
They were human like, had clothes, shoes, even weapons.
But they had no face, or hair, one had completely black skin, and the other had completely white skin. It was as if they were made from rubber, like some sort of toy, and they stood so close together if Alex did not know better he would have said they were the same person. But there was an understanding about what this two final masquerades represented, after all, Taoist sects like Wudang have been practicing their martial arts based on the premise and philosophy of the concept this two masquerades embodied....The Laws Of Yin and Yang.
Either way, the tribal markings told a story, and the man was not the only one on the wall who held a walking stick, or was followed by seven different masquerades. As Alex walked down the hallway, he was exposed to more and more markings and paintings, some of them were males others females, many of them had more than seven masquerades, others had less. But it didn't change the ultimate message they were trying to convey. It was generations upon generations of men and women who had power over a number of unique masquerades, and no two masquerades were the same. It looked like an inherited position of some sort.
When Alex got to the end of the hallway, the flames began to flicker, and the drums began to beat, softly at first, before they picked up power and a heart pounding crescendo began to emerge. The rhythmic sounds the fire drums were letting out was so intoxicating, it was taking all of his power to not just let loose and dance with reckless abandon. Then the drums started beating faster and faster before coming to an abrupt stop with a boom. Then Alex heard a screeching whisper. And it said to him
"Fiiiiiggggggghhhhhhhhttttttt!" The voice drew out the length of the words with a grating sound of metal rubbing against each other.
Then the hallway started to separate, moving farther and farther away, then it shook and the hall began to twist and turn and the very ground Alex was standing on, roiled with the change. The entire hallway change to now look like a circular chamber, wide and enclosed with no way in and no way out, the fire drums acted as a barrier of sorts as they surrounded Alex, placing him right in the middle of what could only be a battle arena. One of the fire drums began to beat really fast as its flames shook and vibrated, then it's flames surged upwards like a massive pillar of colorful fire, heat and death. And out of that pillar came a masquerade.
The masquerade had a plain mask, it was completely blank, there was no defining feature, even it's human like body just seemed to be made of a blank grey like wood material. Then the whispering voice came out once again, this time it was more clearer than the first.
"Defeat the masquerade, and subdue your first mask. If you win, the Égwu will belong to you."
The masquerade took a fighting stance, and Alex realized that it actually had a cultivation base. And not just that, the name the whispering voice just called out was from the old tongue. The language of Alex's ancestors, Égwu was the Igala word for masquerade. But before Alex could answer, the Blank masquerade attacked.
From his observation, this masquerade was in the body refining realm, Alex was just not sure which level it was. The masquerade ran towards Alex and threw a punch, Alex was a passive aggressive fighter, even though he was still trying to figure out his own style of fighting, he always preferred to take a step back and observe his opponent before making a move. Of course he has not been in many fights, so his experience in regards to fights would probably be called into question, but he could get along just fine.
The punch that was thrown was not fast, in fact from the speed and angle, Alex deduce the masquerade should at most be at the second level of the body refining realm, so in a nut shell it was not a threat to Alex at all. Knowing this, he took a step forward, and slapped the hand of the masquerade to the side, then he threw his right arm forward, folding it so that he could bring his elbow smashing straight into its face.
There was an audible crack as the masquerade's entire body broke to pieces, there was a release of wind and a sharp tremor went through the arena, then the floating pieces of the masquerade gathered themselves back together and formed itself back into a simple unadorned and blank white face mask.
The mask then floated towards the pillar of colorful fire and went into it. Immediately, the pillar of fire was absorbed into the mask, until all that was left hovering around the mask was a small wisp of pale blue and light green flames that hung around the mask as it now floated over the fire drum, which had now gone out, turning into a simple traditional two feet tall drum with cowries and colorful beads woven into it's wooden frame in a rather peculiar way.
"Defeat the Shade, and subdue your second mask. If you win, the Égwu will belong to you."
The whispering voice spoke up again. Another drum flared up, and another blank masquerade flew out of it to fight me, but this time, the masquerade was holding a dagger.
CREATORS' THOUGHTS 
Anone
Anone Okay, so anyone who has any suggestion or ideas for the novel, please dont hesitate to let me know. And as usual, please comment, vote, rate and review. Thanks for reading and God bless you.
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