Hardcore: Qi Worlds Chapter 57: Dawnharbour 10

As the Grandmaster concentrated on the Land Core, Benzhi viewed him with qi sight, he did, after all, kill two masters without a scratch on himself or them. Grandmaster Huan appeared as never before, deep blue concentrated qi circulating throughout his body and a thin umbilical qi cord extending out from his back, similar to the Myrkalfar warrior in the tower level three.

'Curiouser and curiouser,' Benzhi thought, 'Huan was evidently neck deep into something.' Benzhi considered leaving the Land Core chamber and the Grandmaster to his schemes when a third party entered the room.

"What is going on here?" the stranger demanded.

"I am merely waiting for the Grandmaster," Benzhi answered smoothly.

"And who are you?" the stranger asked Benzhi, then spying his robes and bare feet he asked, "are you Benzhi the healer?"

"Ah, yes I am," Benzhi answered, "who might you be?"

"Bai Ming and I am here for the healing, but what I want to know right now is why are there two masters lying on the floor and what is Huan doing with the Land Core? He is supposed to be suspended," Bai Ming stated.

'Oops, forgot about him,' Benzhi thought, 'was it an Earth day already? Ah, the time dilation has been stuffed around.'

"Well, other than healing you, everything else has nothing to do with me," Benzhi answered.

"I want you to deal with the Grandmaster now, remove him, forcefully," Bai Ming ordered.

Benzhi thought about it for a moment, "Yes I can do that, I suggest to leave to a safe place, it will get messy and he is not himself, he is receiving aid from some higher power," Benzhi responded.

Bai Ming nodded, he did not have to be asked twice to get out of the way of danger and left in a hurry.

Benzhi considered leaving from a window, but he still had Anastasia with him and he did not want to be seen leaving by Bai Ming.

Anastasia left the chamber in a hurry.

"Oh, what a pleasure this is. The meddling slave has returned to the scene of his crime," the Grandmaster sneered.

Benzhi would normally not bother arguing with idiots, especially possibly possessed ones, but if he could gain information from the Grandmaster he would. Benzhi put on his best "astonished" act, "what have you done?"

"Something that need not worry you in a few moments," the Grandmaster derided.

"You know, even if you were able to kill me I would just return to my pod," Benzhi retorted.

"Oh really?" the Grandmaster laughed maniacally, "so little you understand. What if I bound your qi core, what if I consumed it? Would you respawn then, Enlightened?" The Grandmaster said the last with loathing.

"What has got into you Huan, we used to be...," before he finished the jibe the Grandmaster attacked.

He moved with impossible speed, closing on Benzhi and slamming his fist into Benzhi's stomach. Benzhi had barely enough time to think, let alone activate stoneskin, dodge or block the blow. The Grandmaster left his fist on Benzhi's stomach and proceeded to suck qi directly from his core.

Benzhi did not panic, not yet, he engaged qi sight as soon as he realised what was happening, he was rapidly losing qi the to Grandmaster, he would need to do something and now. Benzhi engaged qi strength and attempted to break the contact the Grandmaster had with his stomach by smashing down his sword hand onto the Grandmaster's arm.

Benzhi managed to budge the Grandmasters' hand, but only just, it felt like he broke his arm in the process. The Grandmaster not only possessed incredible speed but strength and toughness also. Benzhi pushed his shield, strapped to his right arm, into the Grandmasters' chest and used a full force qi strike to push him back.

The Grandmaster wavered but still held firm, sucking the qi from Benzhi's core. Force wasn't working and he didn't have long to keep trying different methods of removing the threat. Benzhi tried a totally different tact. He attempted to pull his own qi back and a tug of war ensued over Benzhi's qi.

Benzhi pondered, perhaps he should have cut off the Grandmasters head while he was engrossed in the Land Core, hindsight is a wonderful thing.

The Grandmaster pulled at Benzhi's qi with all his might, there was certainly some sort of power behind the Grandmaster, whether it was through the tether or had possessed him, whatever it was, it was powerful. The skills he had displayed with body enhancement were superior to Benzhi's however when it came to manipulating his own qi, despite the massive strength of the Grandmaster, Benzhi had dominance.

Benzhi clawed back his qi, slowly but surely, first stemming the flow, then reversing it. The Grandmaster screamed, "No..., I shall not be denied."

Benzhi would not be caught off-guard again and prepared to line his front with stoneskin. He could not manage any qi abilities and win this tug of war at the same time. Benzhi clawed back almost all of his stolen qi when he felt a tingle of foreign qi, the concentrated qi that the Grandmaster possessed.

It was strange, not unlike the concentrated qi from a land core, it was, most likely, from whatever was assisting the Grandmaster. Benzhi attempted to put a block on the connection, similar to when he blocked a friendly connection with Huineng or Gisael.

The Grandmaster struck at his head, however this time, Benzhi was able to activate stoneskin just in time. The blow was so quick, he had no chance to block and even with stoneskin it still rocked him. Stoneskin would stop a sword cut, but it did only so much against blunt force trauma. The shockwaves of the impact were only softened, the internal damage was drastically reduced, but the impact was enough to momentarily stun Benzhi.

The Grandmaster began to transform his hand, long claws grew in place of his fingers, and he pulled back his hand ready to strike at Benzhi's heart. Benzhi did not wait, he shunpo'd to the left, finally drawing his sword, he spun angling to get behind the Grandmaster.

The Grandmaster turned and moved with impossible speed again, not only could Benzhi not match it, he had trouble following the transformed Grandmaster. The Grandmaster struck him again in the side, knocking the wind out of him, he then began to pummel Benzhi in the head, attempting to knock him out. Benzhi was saved from being shredded by the stoneskin technique.

Benzhi crumpled to the ground, losing consciousness, for a moment, and his sword. He then he lay still on the ground trying to think of his next move. The Grandmaster, spat on him, "filthy beast, I will finish you now."

The Grandmaster began to syphon his qi again, the connection was reopened, but this time instead of pulling his qi back Benzhi pushed a small amount of qi in, under his control, and pushed it through to the qi umbilical attached to the Grandmaster. Benzhi closed the connection from the Grandmaster, to who or whatever his patron was.

Benzhi then pulled back on his qi with all his strength, stood and qi struck the Grandmaster in the head. This time, his strike had the desired result. Rocking the Grandmaster back on his heels. Benzhi had regained all his lost qi, again, he was determined to not lose one ounce to this leech. He closed the connection and retrieved his sword.

Benzhi was fighting with qi sight engaged, the objects from the physical world were not visible, but he could see all the qi movements and the qi cord attached to the Grandmaster. Sighing in relief, the cord did not reconnect, the Grandmaster was vulnerable.

Benzhi bent over and picked up his sword, he turned and angrily cut off the filthy claw from the Grandmaster's arm. The Grandmaster's blood was spurted everywhere.

"It's funny how I am the filthy beast, yet you are the one growing claws and a tail," Benzhi spat at the Grandmaster.

"I have evolved into a higher being," the Grandmaster rasped.

Benzhi laughed, "You have borrowed power, you moron. As soon as it is cut you are back to your useless old self."

The Grandmaster lay on the floor, bleeding profusely from his stump where his hand used to be, "just stay and chat a little longer," he mumbled.

Benzhi thought, oh shit the core. He kicked the Grandmaster in the head viciously as he ran over to inspect the Land Core. Merging with it he noticed immediate the shields were down, all the shield settings were at zero. Benzhi considered removing the Land Core and taking it with him, but the precious minutes it would take were unpredictably risky and he had never taken a Land Core that was owned before, it may not be that simple.

Benzhi decided that he had to leave, with all haste, and catch up with Anastasia. But not before ensuring the shield stayed off dooming Dawnharbour and hopefully covering his tracks. Benzhi made his way back to the Grandmaster and picked up the severed hand. It looked like a demon hand, not that he knew what a demon hand looked like, but the hand certainly fit the bill with its shrunken scaly skin and black nails. He gave the Grandmaster another swift kick in the head and stabbed him with his own hand, aiming for the heart.

"Can't have you coming back to haunt me, now can we," Benzhi informed the dying Grandmaster. He engaged qi sight, Benzhi wanted to wait until the last possible moment before fleeing, he watched for what he expected would be a rush of the spawn from hel.

It was not long before a giant wave of tiny cores appeared climbing the temple's exterior. Benzhi swept passed the Grandmaster, checking his qi core, it was fluttering out, he did not have long for this world.

Benzhi ran out the window and down the wall of the temple, heading as fast as he could to the fountain where Anastasia was waiting. As soon as his feet hit level ground Benzhi engaged shunpo and qi speed, running through the streets faster than the hel spawn could follow.

He approached the last leg towards the trade district when he saw from the east, the west and in front of him, small creatures skittering across the pathways. 'Aww Baby demons,' Benzhi thought. The only problem was there were hundreds if not thousands of them. The small, in stature, hellspawn were variations of red and red so dark it looked black. They ran around on all fours with pointed clawed feet, the noise they made running across the stone pathways was a scratching sound, similar to what giant crabs would make.

It was not long before they were aiming hundreds of beaks at Benzhi, as he got closer to them, they were not so small. They ranged from two to three feet high when running around on all fours. When they reared they were up to five feet tall at the beak.

Benzhi swept past them, leaning left and right cutting a path with his sword on one side while dodging or blocking on the other. Benzhi cut down a dozen before he broke their line and headed to the fountain where Anastasia stood nervously.

Anastasia looked nervously at the charging swarm, in mere moments they would be swamped.

Anastasia dived through the portal, rolling into a cold cave with a diving Benzhi behind here and two intruders from Hel. Benzhi closed the portal and proceeded to slice the critters in half.

"The Seer can have KFD when he returns," Benzhi joked.

"KFD?" Anastasia asked.

"Kentucky Fried Demon," Benzhi said chuckling at his own joke. No one else was.

Chapter end