When I arrived in the Spirit beast slums I immediately noticed that someone had produced a level four barrier which the residents were hiding within, and that the barrier was surrounded by an angry mob. Occasional attacks were thrown at the barrier, but nothing over level three hit it. From the racial slurs and irrational demands the outsiders were making, it was apparent that this wasn’t an attack from outside, but civil unrest caused by the paranoia of the citizens. The Ambassador and I landed just outside the barrier, between the mob and the beast people inside of it, and the people stopped throwing attacks in order to avoid hitting us.
The city guard landed only a few seconds later, but in the middle of the mob. “Why are you rioting during an emergency?” asked the guard Captain. “All crimes committed during a state of emergency will result in double the normal punishment.” At the middle of level four he was more powerful than any of the people in the mob, but there were enough in the early stages of level four that if it came to a fight I wasn’t sure that our side would win.
“This isn’t a riot!” one woman in early level four said, and the people behind her agreed with her statement. From how fancy her clothes were I assumed she was a member of one of the noble families. “This is us protecting our city from an outside threat!” The people cheered a bit at that statement.
“Care to tell me how you are doing that, when you are so far from the wall, where the outside threat is attacking?” asked the guard captain.
“These beasts are spies for the invaders!” she stated as if it were an undeniable fact.
“Do you have any proof of this?” he asked, and the woman nodded, then motioned for someone to come forward.
“I saw several of them sneaking out of the city and meeting up with other beasts.” said a late level three man, stepping out of the crowd. “They were likely trading secrets with the enemy, or being paid for spreading the plague. We all know it came from spirit beasts.” The crowd agreed with him.
“We know that some of the people who purposefully spread the parasites were beast people, about half of those we caught so far, though we haven’t finished the investigation yet so we aren’t sure of the real numbers. How do you know it isn’t humans attacking us? This could easily be the result of another city or demonic cultivators who only hired spirit beasts because they are more likely to have issues with the city government. We also don’t know that this beast tide is caused by someone, but even if it is, what do you have to show that the plague is connected to it? It could easily be two different enemies.” While it seemed obvious to me and likely most of them, based on the timing, as far as I knew there wasn’t yet any solid evidence that the parasites were part of a plan to weaken the city prior to a natural beast tide, nor that this wasn’t a natural occurrence.
“Then question them!” demanded the man. “Let the monkey explain why he was sneaking out of the city last night to deal with outsider apes, and why they exchanged storage pouches. He’s obviously being paid for his help with either intelligence gathering or sabotage!”
The guard captain nodded and sighed. “Very well, I’ll ask him.” He walked to where the two of us were standing and motioned to the middle level four old man that was straining himself to keep such a large barrier up. If I had to guess, I would say that man was old Gitan, but that he had managed to cure or at least deal with his infection enough that he could properly use the shifting technique.
When the guard asked to talk to the man that was being accused of colluding with the enemy, the old man nodded and a stone monkey stepped forward. Unlike most of the others, who were at least partially shape shifted into human form, he was still in his natural one point two meter tall form, and only wearing a robe to indicate that he was part of the human society. When asked about the secret meeting he sighed. “That was supposed to be a business secret, and as Madam Zhan,” he motioned to the noble woman that was leading the protest, “owns a brewery which specializes in the production of wine from spirit grains, a direct competitor of mine, I suspect that her man was following me in hopes of stealing those secrets.”
The Guard gave her a look of annoyance, then looked back at the stone monkey. “Even if she was conducting illicit surveillance of her competition, she still saw you acting suspicious. Care to tell us why you need to sneak out in the middle of the night to meet with outsiders?”
“I need to sneak out because of that surveillance. My brewery, which is the largest employer in my community, is larger than the three smallest breweries in the city, and is known for its production of the highest quality monkey wine in the city!”
The guard captain nodded. “Most of us already know about your wine. I buy some myself occasionally, though I also buy from the Zhan Distillery as well, so that isn’t a conflict of interest. How does that relate to you sneaking out, though?”
The monkey sighed. “I need to sneak out because many people want my company’s secret recipes so that they can steal my market share. While Madam Zhan is willing to merely spy on me and hope her man sees or overhears something, some of my competitors would likely be willing to kidnap me or even eliminate me to try and get rid of the competition. I’m sure her man can verify that I brought two guards with me when I went to the meeting. That’s to protect against kidnappers and other attackers.”
The guard captain look at madam Zhan and her man, and the two of them nodded. “Yes, he had one that looked like a wolf and one that looked almost human, but was too brown. I didn’t get a good look at his face.”
The monkey nodded. “I brought along a wolf and a boar as body guards. I can ask them to come up here and talk to you if you want.” The guard did so, and Flame Li and a large man with thick muscles stepped forward. While Flame Li looked the same, with only his top-of-the-head ears and tail giving away his identity, the other man just looked like a two meter tall body cultivator.
The two identified themselves and verified the monkey’s story about meeting a business contact. The other man was apparently a full blood oak boar, and both he and Flame Li took guard and escort jobs from time to time. The monkey man, who was apparently named Stone Quan, apparently hired them around once per month to escort him to meetings outside the city, but they were sworn to secrecy about the contents of the meetings.
The guard captain continued to question him about the nature of the meeting and eventually Mr. Stone decided to tell him. “If it will give me some peace, then I’ll tell you, even though this will reveal business secrets to my competitor. They are stone Chimpanzees from one of the villages near the beast planes. I am trading them resources from city that they can’t get, like weapons and pills, and in exchange they are bringing me rare spirit fruit that I use to make my limited run brews. Everything is above board. I just didn’t want my competition to know, as it could put my associates at risk.”
“You see!” said Madam Zahn, pointing and nearly shrieking out the accusation. “He admits to selling weapons to outsiders! And they are from the same Beast Planes where the enemy is coming from!”
“There is no law against selling weapons to outsiders.” said the guard. “Many caravans export goods from this city, and due to the large number of spirit beasts that are hunted every year, bone based weapons are a major export. In fact, the Zhan family routinely sells spirit bone weapons to the cities in the Mortal Valley.” That at least got her to shut up, but the rest of the crowd still seemed suspicious.
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A few of them accused other beast folk of similar things, but the beast people that were accused either denied that the event happened or had a reasonable excuse for dealing with outsiders. In a city with a large spirit beast population which relied on outside trade to survive, spirit beasts conducting trade was apparently quite common.
Eventually, armed with the fact that none of the claims were proven, the guards managed to calm the crowd down enough that they were willing to disperse. Whatever training these guards had received, deescalation training had obviously been a part of it, as they seemed to do a better job at defusing tense situations than most cops in the USA. Once the people had left a lower ranked guard landed nearby and came over to speak with him. The guard captain said something to the subordinate, and the man nodded and bowed before flying off on his sword. He was likely going to keep either the leaders of the rioters, such as Madam Zhan, under surveillance, or investigate the people here in the slums, possibly both, but with every guard needed on the wall at the moment that would have to wait.
He came over to the Ambassador and myself and thanked us for helping, even though we didn’t do much here, and informed us that another beast army had been detected approaching. This one didn’t appear to just be a wave of mindless beasts, though, but an organized army of over one million which would be arriving in less than an hour.
“Then the first two waves were meant to soften us up.” said the Ambassador, and the captain nodded.
“The second wave managed to punch a hole in the wall, too,” the captain responded, “which means that they have an easy way into the city if they can get through the barrier, which I have no doubt they will do. The only questions are if the work crew can rebuild enough of the wall in time to slow them down and how long the barrier will last.”
The Ambassador nodded. “In that case, I’m an Earth cultivator. I can help on the wall if you want.”
The barrier behind me disappeared and the old man stepped forward. “Actually, if you are willing, some of us might be able to help as well. Assuming you are willing to pay us properly and not cheat us the way we normally are.” I nodded to Gitan and he nodded back at me.
“I’m sure we can use the help, but if you were willing to help, then why didn’t you do so earlier?” asked the captain.
“How many of your men agree with those people who came to attack us?” Gitan asked. “Can we trust them to not stab us in the back during battle and claim it was an enemy that did so? They would think they were protecting the city and say that we were going to turn on them anyway. Repair work, though? I think most of them will be willing to let us work.”
The guard captain nodded. “In that case, follow me.” he said, and lead the group of spirit beasts back to where the wall was damaged.
The Ambassador and I flew back, only to notice that several of the men were trying to catch Xiao. Most of them were trying to use binding techniques or nets, but when one of them threw an ice shard at him, Xiao responded by throwing a stun bolt at him, knocking him off his feet but not knocking him out. Several men armed more lethal spells in response, and I landed in between them and Xiao to stop them.
“Get out of the way.” said one of the guards. “That bird is ours. We saw it first.”
“He isn’t an enemy combatant.” I said. “He’s my son, and if you attack him again, I’ll defend him.”
The men looked confused. “Your son? What are you talking about?” one of them asked. “Are you a beast too?”
Xiao returned to his smaller size and flew over to land on my shoulder. “I’m human, I just adopted him.” I said, before turning my head to talk to Xiao. “Why didn’t you tell them you were on their side?” I asked him.
‘I tried, but they just got excited that I was special.’ he broadcast to the area. ‘After that they started trying to play catch with me, so I decided to play with them. Then the mean man tried to hurt me, so I shocked him.”
The men looked extremely confused. “Wait, so you adopted a lightning sparrow, and then left it here while you ran off, causing us to think that an enemy had woken up and we could catch it. And it just thought we were playing catch with it because it’s a child?”
I nodded. “Pretty much.”
The man shook his head. “Yeah, this is weird. I’m going to go back to catching enemies.”
He started to walk away, but I stopped him. “So, once you catch one, is there a special place you are supposed to take them? How do you get the contract done?”
“Oh, every time there’s a beast tide or attack on the city, all of the people which can do beast contracts or slave contracts come out to offer their services.” He told me where the group was staying, and I thanked him and left. These soldiers were likely trying to catch any beasts they could in order to sell them, meaning that the market was about to get swarmed with high quality beasts.
I found the group and after finding someone that could do a slave contract I brought the tiger out of the bag. He opened his eyes and looked at me. ‘So, are you going to enslave me, now, like you do all of my people?’ he asked. He had apparently given up fighting back, but I still kept my guard up just in case.
“Technically, yes. But only because you are still a threat to us. Once I know you aren’t going to hurt anyone, I’ll release you.”
He sighed and nodded. ‘I doubt it, but there’s not much I can do at this point. I doubt that you’ll keep me captive long. When my King arrives he’ll free all of the beasts in the city and enslave the humans instead. At that point, I think you’ll be a good pet for me.’ He chuckled.
I shrugged and paid the slaver a spirit stone. He used the contract technique and I felt another slave appear in my head. I thanked the man, put the tiger into the bag, and returned to the wall. Once there I released him and started looking around for a large level three beast. Most of the bodies had been taken away already, but I did find a Panther. I found a nearby storage building where I could hang it and started draining its blood so that I could make more talisman papers. I was almost out of them, but if I could make more before the battle started again I could do more in battle.
‘Why did you bring me out of the bag?’ asked the tiger. ‘Are you going to make me fight my previous allies?’
I shook my head. ‘No, that would be too cruel. I’ll keep you in the beast bag the whole time.” He nodded. “I brought you out so that you could see what your attack caused. Rather than talking to us or trying to negotiate, you attacked, and now hundreds of thousands of your people are dead, as well as thousands of mine.”
‘They died fighting for what they believed in.’ he said, and I nodded.
“Yes, both sides did. But they didn’t have to.”
He laid down to think and I returned to the draining panther, pulling out my sword to skin it. I doubted I could use even one complete skin before the enemy got here, but hopefully that would be enough.
By the time the gong began to chime I had only managed to make twenty one Called Tribulation talismans, though I had seventy eight pieces of talisman leather left. The rest of the body had been taken away by the clean up groups, some of which came from the spirit beast slums, to be properly disassembled. The boar man and several other spirit beasts with Earth roots had helped rebuild the wall as much as they could, but as thick as it was they only managed to get it to a height of about three meters. The main issue was that, unlike on Earth where the wall would have been filled with rubble and sand, here they filled the wall with large stones that were cemented into place. This, combined with the fact that many of the larger stones were destroyed when the wall came down, meant that they had to fuse the stone back together using more advanced Earth based techniques, which greatly slowed them down.
When the gong sounded, however, all of the civilians decided to leave. No one from the slums decided to help in the fight, despite their high levels, as they didn’t trust the guards. They did, however, promise that if the enemy made it into the city they would help with defending their homes.
At the line of trees large numbers of beasts of every type started to step into the cleared area around the farms. Enhancing my sight, I could even see that there were deer and rabbits and squirrels and a dozen different verities of bird with them. There were even a few turkeys mixed in. It seemed that they had brought everyone that might want to fight with them.
There were a few things about the groups that concerned me, though. Near the back were several bears that were over four meters tall, boars over three meters tall, and snakes over two meters thick. All of these were level four, though they weren’t the only level fours. There were also over a thousand stone apes of various types carrying weapons, most of which wore armor, and which were all level three or four. Some of the tribes in the area had likely allied themselves with the leader of the group.
Behind these were a woman that looked like she was part snake and a four meter tall gorilla. While the woman seemed to be in the late part of level four, or even at the peak, the gorilla was far stronger. I guessed that he was probably level five, though wasn’t sure where he was in that level.
