Luckily, Su Bai didn’t hear the announcement: "mission failed", which meant Lam Ching-Ying was still alive. He stood up, walked to Lam, crouched down and felt his breath.
He was not dead yet, but dying, with more air breathed out than in. Gyatso thought Su Bai was under attack and had no time to think before hitting that Taoist. Most importantly, he didn’t know Ching-Ying Lam.
Kuan saw that his teacher got hit and was lying still, and immediately ran to him and cried "Master, master!" But it was not a movie cliche. Gyatso didn’t give him the chance to get closer, ready to break out with full potential and kill them all. With a sweep of Gyatso’s stick, Kuan was struck down and forced to lie still with the stick pointing against his chest.
Then Gyatso looked at Su Bai who was examining the Taoist:
"Don’t tell me that person is Ching-Ying Lam."
Su Bai sighed, "Right now, I really wish he weren’t."
Gyatso close his eyes and soothed his mind. He knew how heavy that hit was. it was a miracle that the Taoist hadn’t died yet. But he must be very close to death and probably walking straight to the hell right now.
"If I had known that, I wouldn’t have saved you. You’re a vampire, surely you could survive."
Su Bai rubbed his nose, then crouched down and carried Lam onto his back. "Let’s put him in bed and think of something to save him."
"I’ve got a little knowledge of medicine." Gyatso said, then he pointed to Kuan. "What about him?"
"Tie him up."
Gyatso nodded.
In the bedroom of the mortuary, Lam Ching-Ying was lying on the bed. Gyatso had given him a massage. According to Gyatso, the rear part of a human head was quite vulnerable and Lam was in deep coma after that hit; he could wake up in a day or two, or pass away without knowing anything.
Kuan and Councillor Chen was tied to pillars, and so were Liang and Miss Chen after they woke up. Lam was the only one that wasn’t tied up.
Su Bai sat on the threshold. It was a dark night with a bright moon and few stars. Without industrial pollution, the sky was crystal clear.
Gyatso washed his hands and walked to Su Bai. "Haven’t heard from the monk yet."
"He has caused a lot of trouble in that nest," Su Bai said, "But I don’t think he’ll be killed."
"He won’t die easily." Gyatso said. "Besides, that nest has been repressed by some master monks years ago, obviously. Seven’s got advantages there."
"He’ll be alright, as long as he’s careful."
Su Bai thought of the scene when the fox demon burst into roar and flew out to find the monk. Actually, Su Bai had suspicion that Seven must have come across something in the nest and taken the risk so as to achieve something more. Otherwise, it would be absurd that Seven couldn’t escape with all the advantages he had, while Su Bai and Gyatso could get away.
Putting himself in Seven’s shoes, he would make the same choice if he mistakenly ran into a place where vampires’ secret treasure was hidden. The brave could get much more than cowards; he who didn’t go for chances would die sooner or later.
Suddenly, the moon seemed to be dyed scarlet. Su Bai felt it and looked up to the sky. Gyatso also raised his head and watched the anomaly.
"Misfortunes never come alone, right?" Su Bai asked.
Gyatso took a deep breath and answered in a tone sounded like Seven: "Exactly."
Apparently, Dreadful Radio Game would never have a dull story. It would be boring if the story was all about trying everything to cure the Taoist. In fact, Su Bai thought, maybe the Dreadful Radio was surprised when Lam Ching-Ying was hit so heavily that he was now in a persistant vegetative state.
With the blood moon in the sky, Su Bai could sense more evil in the air.
"It’s a time for evil to act. And we are in a mortuary."
"Aren’t you the greatest evil in this place?" Gyatso asked.
"You’ve been following the wrong example, Gyatso. Seven’s a bad influence. You’ve picked up irony from him." Su Bai patted his trousers and stood up. "I sensed restlessness in the mortuary. It’s the zombie army of Lam Ching-Ying. What’s that for anyway? Lam’s not plotting a rebellion, so why does he need such a large zombie army?"
"Those are your peers, you should go pacify them. There’s a lot of ghosts and evil sealed in the wing-room over there, must be Lam’s collection. I’ll go and keep them under control."
"That’s not too much, if that’s all for tonight." Su Bai said.
"This is only the first day. Our main task lasts seven days, so today might be just an appetizer. The main course is yet to be served."
"Then let’s have the appetizer first."
Su Bai looked at the four people who were tied up. "It’s not safe to leave them here. They’re uncertainties."
"Then break their limbs." Gyatso suggested.
Su Bai shook his head, "Too much. Besides, we are not thoroughly over with Lam, because we can still blame a mistake for everything. But if he wakes up and see all his students and friends are disabled, he will do everything to kill us."
Su Bai walked to Kuan and Liang. They all stared at Su Bai with a terrified look.
Su Bai opened his mouth. He was about to explain something and even thinking about untying them, but seeing the fear and even resentment in their eyes, he just simply asked:
"Gyatso, where’s your stick?"
...
"Bang! Bang!"
With two thuds, Kuan and Liang were out.
Gyatso was standing by with his hands across his chest. "I thought you had some better idea."
"That’ll just do for now."
He returned the stick to Gyatso. Both of them left the bedroom, then one went eastward and the other westward. No matter what would happen in the other parts of the town, their only mission was to protect this mortuary.
Su Bai went back to that room. The wall on one side of this room had a hole in it, and it was cracked up by Su Bai when he was hit by Lam. Even now, Su Bai was still feeling a surge inside since he wasn’t fully recovered yet.
The zombies in the room were still in line, but when Su Bai went in, he found that they were all shaking in situ. Apparently, these zombies were restless under the influence of the blood moon.
Su Bai clapped his hands, moved his shoulders, closed his eyes, them withered into a zombie. His ghostly green eyes ran down the room.
"Quiet!"
All at once, all the zombies stood still.
Su Bai looked at those zombies. Suddenly, an idea occurred to him: was it possible that he could manipulate these zombies to do things for him in this story world?
Or, even in the real world, he could find some zombies to manipulate. Even if they couldn’t be used to do bad things in case he himself would bear the consequences, they could make excellent sec
On a second thought, he realized how useless his idea was. They were not listening to him because he was of a higher level, but because they were being controlled by the spell papers on their forehead and were less intelligent than usual. They were not stable in such a state, and could hurt the wrong people. Beside, with the spell papers on their forehead, they could only jump around, line up for a ceremony, or swarm up and press the target down at most. They couldn’t do anything more complicated than that.
Unless his blood kept upgrading.
Su Bai pursed his lips. He really needed to work out something about that; after all, he couldn’t rely much on the e-shop in upgrading.
However, Su Bai was relieved to see these zombies back in peace and was going back to Lam. He was worried about the situation there since no one was looking out for Lam after both Gyatso and him were gone.
Just when he turned around and set off, his steps paused. Then he turned back and looked at the zombie troops.
He slowly walked through. At last, he stopped in front of one zombie.
"No wonder I felt so strange. Here it is."
This was an aged zombie, looking ghastly pale just like others, but his official costume was a little different.
The Dreadful Radio might have changed a few details in order to make the story more enjoyable, for example Lam Ching-Ying should be living in the Republic of China[1] but he was now in Qing Dynasty, or official costumes were used to dress up zombies in this period of Qing.
But there were certain limits: those official costumes had no detailed symbols. In history, the official costumes were embroidered with different animals for different positions of the first, second or third class. Also, in Qing Dynasty, birds were used for civil officials and beasts for military officials. That was how the idiom "human beast" came; it was original referring to officials in the government, but most officials were disappointingly bad to common people, therefore it gradually became a derogatory term meaning a real brute.
The other zombies were wearing official costumes with merely landscapes or plants instead, but the one in front of Su Bai had a Chilin[2] on his chest.
What did a Chilin mean?
A First-class Military Official!
Su Bai puffed towards the zombie. That spell paper on his forehead drifted down; at the same time, the zombie slowly cracked a smile.
———————————————
FOOTNOTES:
[1] the Republic of China: from 1912 to 1949, the time between the end of Qing Dynasty and the establishment of the People’s Republic of China.
[2] Chilin: or Qilin, or Kirin. It is a mythical hooved chimerical creature known in Chinese and other East Asian cultures. It is a good omen thought to occasion prosperity or serenity. It is often depicted with what looks like fire all over its body.