CHAPTER 14: THE ENCOUNTERS

CHAPTER 14: THE ENCOUNTERS

That night, Cecilia and Xing Fu had fallen asleep and their fire had died out. Thick fog started to appear onto the earth’s surface and blanketed them, making it invisible for anyone to notice their presence. Then a faint voice called out his name from a distant and it woke him up from his sleep. He noticed a cloudy mist above him and quickly sat up to realize it was fog. He began to feel unease from the haunting setting.

“Xing Fu…”

The faint voice sounded like Cecilia; however, it didn’t come from where she was sleeping. It came somewhere in the dark creepy forest.

He asked himself, "Why is she in the forest alone? ...What if it’s a demon instead?"

He began to have goosebumps and slowly turned his head toward their hung clothes.

"I have to make sure if the voice that I’m hearing is a demon or Cecilia…"

His hand reached to the draped clothes and lifted to the side. With thick fogs surrounded the area, it was hard to see if she was lying there. He began to fan the fog with his hand and as the fog moved away, Cecilia was not there. He exhaled in relieved.

“Xing Fu…”

He let go of the draped clothes and turned around. A hundred feet in front of him was Cecilia. She stood there with a radiant glow from the moonlight wearing only a thin red robe to reveal her bare upper shoulders, her cleavage, and slender silky legs. Her sexual appeal stunned Xing Fu and he wondered if this was a dream or reality. He pinched himself hard on his forearm and felt pain. This was indeed real. She started tp walk away from him.  

“Wait!” he shouted.

He grabbed his talisman and put it on around his neck. Then he got up and went after her. The deeper he went inside the forest, the thicker the fog was, which made everything around him difficult to see.

He stopped and panned around. “Xiao Xing?”

Then the fog died down and disappeared. He scratched his head from the strange sudden occurrence but was glad. Now, he could find Cecilia with ease.

“Xiao Xing! Where are you?!” he shouted.

Then her giggles echoed through the forest. His eyes wandered around in search for her, but he couldn’t pinpoint where it was coming from. He heard her giggle again. This time it was close to his left side. Xing Fu turned and saw her stood ten feet in front of him, giving him a leering look with those big hazel eyes of hers. She began to walk slowly toward him and her bottom robe opened to reveal her bare ivory thighs as it alternated every step she made.

He couldn’t help but gaped at her luscious body. His eyes stared down at her feet and made their way up to her legs, hips, her cleavage, and then her lips. His body started to get steamy hot and sweaty.

He gulped his saliva, “Xiao Xing…Wh…what are you doing?”

She didn’t answer and got closer to him. His head slightly turned to the side and he shut his eyes, not wanting to continue lusting at her. Suddenly, a strong musty fragrance stung his nose with heavenly sweetness. He couldn’t resist the strong scent and slowly turned his head back toward the front. Then he opened his eyes and saw her face up close to his; he jumped in fright, ready to scream, but she placed her index finger on top of his soft lips to calm him down.

“Shhh…” she whispered as his eyes locked into hers.

He stood frozen and closed his mouth. Her fingers slowly traced his lips as it made its way to his chin, then to his cheekbone to feel his soft skin. Cecilia threw herself forward to hug him tight. He felt her breasts on his chest and could feel her hot breath close to his neck. His heart began to race rapidly from the close physical contact and gulped his saliva nervously. Then she began to lick and suck his neck, which caught Xing Fu by surprise. He tried to pull her off, but her grip was too strong.

While she continue kissing him, he politely pleaded, “Xiao Xing…please…don’t…”

She ignored him and took off his shirt. Then she pushed him down to the ground and got on top of him. She continued her seductive behavior by sucking and licking him as she made her way down to his lower abdomen. He loved how her lips and tongue felt against his skin and enjoyed every bit of it. Then she gave him one, long lick up from his abdomen to his chin like an animal. His skin tasted deliciously against her tongue, turning her on, that she wanted him inside of her badly.

She took off her red robe and was completely naked. He gaped at her plumped breasts and was speechless. Quickly, she grabbed both of his hands and cupped her breasts, forcing him to squeeze them to feel its firmed tenderness. She rubbed herself against his groin to arouse him even further.

“Make love to me,” she moaned.

His eyes widened in bewilderment.

---

Back at the stream, the fog had already disappeared. Cecilia suddenly woke up with a strange feeling that something was wrong. She shouted Xing Fu’s name. Nothing. She went to check on him to make sure he was sleeping. She peered through the draped clothes and saw that he wasn’t there. Worried, she got up, quickly put on her top robe, and went to search for him.

---

Feeling Cecilia’s body on top of him felt so good. Touching her soft skin on her breasts and making his way down to her hips; he wanted her. However, back in his mind, he contemplated if he should or should not. He began to think about her complicated life. Although he loved her, this wasn't the right time.

She leaned forward to kiss him more on his chin and neck while her hand slowly slipped into his pants. He felt her fingers down there and knew what she was going to do next. He had to stop this immediately and pushed her off of him with all of his strength. Cecilia fell to the side and onto the ground. He quickly got up to fix his pants.

“Xiao Xing, I’m sorry that I pushed you away. As much as I want this…I…I can’t. I love you too much for you to not do this.”

Frustrated, she let out a high pitched cry and it made Xing Fu became flummoxed. Her naked body got onto all fours and suddenly shape shifted in front of his eyes as he watched in horror. Her beautiful ivory skin was torn off like nothing to reveal a thick charcoal fur. Her face extended into a bear-like beast, eyes glowed blood red, teeth transformed into huge fangs, and fingers morphed to huge sharped claws. Now, Xing Fu realized he was led into a forest by a demon beast. Too petrified to move, he let out a loud cry of terror. The demon beast mimicked his cry and roared loudly in unison with him.

Cecilia stopped in the middle of the forest when she heard Xing Fu’s and the monstrous cries. Her heart sank to know that Xing Fu was in trouble, so she ran with great speed to the direction of the cries.

Xing Fu frantically searched for his talisman on his neck and found it. His hand trembled as he held it in front of the demon beast to scare it away. It wasn’t affected by the talisman and leapt in the air toward him.

BAM! A huge stick struck the demon beast across the face so hard that the stick broke in half. It flew backwards and hit a nearby tree. Xing Fu turned to look who helped him and saw that it was the real Cecilia. She saw that he was half naked with red marks all over his chest and neck area. Then she looked down at his bulging pants and was disgusted. She didn’t want to know what just happened. It wasn’t a good time to ask questions now.

“Are you ok?”

Still trembling from the event, he nodded. Then she turned and glared at the demon beast. It shook its head to refocus from the blow. Besides Guo Jing, from hearing all of the demon encounters, she never thought that she would see one in person; especially an ugly one.

Still holding onto the broken stick, she stood firm, ready to fight it. It got back up onto its feet and saw her. Frightened, it quickly ran away and left her puzzled by its behavior. Then she knew why; it was because of her special qi.

The demon beast didn’t get too far though. As it leapt to the nearby bushes, two men flew out of with their swords and slashed the demon beast in the front. It let out a painful roar and fell to the ground. The men stood a couple of feet away with their swords aimed at it, ready to fight. 

Xing Fu and Cecilia were surprised to see their unexpected presence. One was a young slender man. He had a cute baby face and big espresso eyes. His hair was up into a high bun, wearing a cleaned, midnight blue robe, and across his shoulder was a raggedy bag.

The other man was an older man. He looked very different comparing to the cute baby face man. He wore a tan, raggedy layered outfit and on his belt was a bottle of wine and a strange ivory vase. His beard was overgrown, but it matched with his scruffy hair. Only a small portion of his hair was tied back, leaving many strands of hair to cover his hidden face. Then Cecilia saw the old man’s sword was glowing with blue flames. She had never seen anything magical like it before and was intrigued by it.

The demon beast charged at the men with full force and swung its sharped claws at them. They swiftly dodged the claws and counter attacked with their swords. Then the old man shouted to the young man.

“Take out the holy beads!”

The young man stopped fighting and stuck his blade onto the ground. He searched in his sack for the beads while the old man continued to fight with the demon beast. The young man found it and wrapped it around his fingers. He started to chant and beads began to glow golden yellow. The chant was finished and he flung it in midair and the necklace expanded ten times it's width.

Little dust particles came out flying like blood and disintegrated every time when the old man slashed deep into the demon beast’s flesh with his sword. Then he kicked the demon beast and it fell to the ground injured. The young man aimed his index and middle finger at the demon beast.

“Capture,” he commanded the beads.

The beads quickly flew toward the demon beast and wrapped around it. The demon beast struggled to get out, but the more it did, the tighter the beads gotten to restrain it.

The old man stuck his blade onto the earth’s ground and pulled out the small ivory vase from his belt. He aimed the vase’s open hole at the beast and did a quick hand motion to activate it. Wind began to pick up as the vase’s open hole glowed golden yellow. It became a vacuum, sucking any supernatural beings that would be in front of it. Then with his index and middle finger, he commanded the beads.

“Come.”

The beads did as told, and as it got close to the vase, the demon was sucked into the hole and disappeared along with the wind. The beads came straight to his hand and he grabbed it. The golden-yellowish glow disappeared from the vase and he hung the vase back on his belt. The sword’s blue flame also disappeared and became a regular sword. He pulled it out from the ground and placed it back in its sheath.

While Xing Fu finished putting on his shirt, Cecilia stood dumbstruck by what she had just witnessed and wondered who they might be. The men regrouped and began to walk toward Xing Fu and Cecilia. They stood a couple of feet in front of them.

Xing Fu folded his hand in front, “Thank you for saving us heroes. My name is Yu Xing Fu,” then he guided his hand toward Cecilia to introduce her to them, “and this is Xiao Xing.”

The young man introduced themselves. “We are the demon hunters, but everyone calls us the Wanderers of Seven Seas. My name is Cui De Ming and this is my master, Ma Guo Wei.”

They exchanged greetings and then Guo Wei asked, “What brings the both of you here in the forest. You know that it is dangerous roaming at night.”

Xing Fu responded, “We fell asleep and thought with our talismans, we would be safe…” Then he took off his talisman from his neck and showed it to the demon hunters. He scratched his head. “I don’t get it. It supposed to protect me, so how come it didn’t?”

Guo Wei quickly grabbed it from his hand and threw it far into the dark forest. Cecilia and Xing Fu looked at him shocked.

“Why did you do that for?!” he said upsettingly.

Guo Wei huffed at him. “IT’S FAKE!”

Cecilia was upset and scoffed. “That perverted bastard was a con artist after all,” and crossed her arms in front as she glanced at Xing Fu.

Xing Fu blinked a couple of times in disbelief. He felt stupid from being conned by him. “I’ve lost fifteen pieces of silver…” and lowered his head.

She felt bad for him and patted his shoulder to comfort him. “It’s ok. You didn’t know.”

The demon hunters shook their heads, pitying Xing Fu as well.

Then Guo Wei turned to them. “Since it is very late, we will sleep here tonight. I will put up a protection spell so no demons can harm us.”

Xing Fu and Cecilia nodded.

Guo Wei did some hand formations and stomped his foot onto the ground. A huge gust of internal qi came out of his body followed by a wind. The wind brushed against her body and then she felt something hot for a split second, then back to normal.

“Why did my body feel hot?” she asked Guo Wei.

“That was the effect of the protection spell,” he answered. Then he turned to De Ming. “Get a fire started for the night.”

“Alright.”

---

De Ming was hungry and caught a rabbit for a late midnight snack. It had been roasting on top of the fire for a while, so he pulled the stick with the meat out. He then handed it to his master, who sat next to him with a bottle of wine in his hands.

“Here master, eat.”

Guo Wei pulled out a leg and took a bite out of it. Then he signaled to De Ming using his head gesture.

“Offer some food for them.”

De Ming handed the meat to them in arm's reach, but Xing Fu and Cecilia shook their heads.

“No thank you,” she said.

De Ming shrugged, “Ok, more for me,” and took a bite of the meat. He started to converse with his mouth full. “You know, these types of demon used their victims’ hearts to find who they truly loved the most and shape shifted themselves into them. That was how they lured their victims.” He swallowed his meat and continued while he looked at Xing Fu, “When we saw you half naked with those red marks on your body, we knew you were the victim.”

Feeling embarrassed, Xing Fu’s head lowered to his chest. De Ming continued, “You were lucky that you didn’t sleep with it or else it would have sucked the life force out of you. Then you would have become a dry corpse.”

That freaked Xing Fu and Cecilia out. Xing Fu was so close to be dead, but at the same time, he was glad he resisted it.

Cecilia turned to Xing Fu, “So who did it shape shifted to?”

Xing Fu stared at her and then her naked body came into his mind. He blushed and turned away. The demon hunters saw his facial expression and knew who Xing Fu was thinking.

De Ming blurted out, pointing at her. “YOU!”

Guo Wei smacked De Ming back on the head.

“Ow!”

“Shut your mouth!” Guo Wei scorned.

Stunned, Xing Fu and Cecilia’s eyes widened. Cecilia turned to Xing Fu and saw his face was red like a beet. Her heart fluttered with happiness to know it was her he loved the most. Besides the beast trying to kill Xing Fu, she was glad that his feelings were shown through it and tightened her smile. Then she thought about him being stupid to almost have sex with the demon beast and punched him on the arm.

“Ow…” he looked at her confused.

Guo Wei and De Ming froze with their food in their mouth. They were surprised that she had the nerve to hit him.

De Ming turned to his master. “She reminded me of you…”

Guo Wei got offended and raised his hand to smack his back head again, but De Ming was already prepared. He quickly scooted away from his master. Guo Wei saw what he was trying to do, so he took his sword and reached to hit him with its handle instead.

“Ow! That hurts even more!” De Ming rubbed his back head.

Both Cecilia and Guo Wei scorned De Ming, “You deserve it!”

De Ming was surprised of their similar behaviors and wanted to say something, but he remained quiet. He didn’t want to get smacked again.

She was disappointed at Xing Fu. “I can’t believe that you couldn’t tell the difference between me and the demon beast!”

“How…how can I? You were…I mean…it was…uh…never mind!”

Guo Wei interrupted, “Miss Xiao, you have to understand that when a man is approached by a seductive woman, it is very hard for him to control himself when being aroused.” He took a drink of his wine and continued, “You should be glad that Mr. Yu resisted. He’s a pure man. A lot of men in his situation usually cannot control their urges and die sleeping with these lustful demons.”

He turned to Xing Fu, “Here…” he threw the wine bottle at Xing Fu and he caught it. “Drink up. You are one strong man to resist a sexy demon..." Then Guo Wei dug into his shirt pocket, took a small pouch of wine out, and drank it.

Xing Fu gave him a slight smile and knew it was true. Then he looked at Cecilia from the corner of his eyes and saw her poking the dirt with a small stick vigrously.

“Still, he should know the differences…” she mumbled upsettingly.

Xing Fu's smile disappeared and took a big gulp of wine from the bottle. His face cringed from the bitter taste, but that didn’t stop him. He kept drinking so that he could forget the incident and her naked body.

While she continued to poke the stick through the dirt, she felt violated that the demon beast shape shifted into her to arouse him. Although it wasn’t her, Xing Fu may have seen her naked body now. She looked down at her body and sighed to know she couldn't do anything about it. Then she turned to Xing Fu and saw that he was already drunk.

He smiled at her.  “…I...didn’t sleep with you…” Then he plopped onto the ground, passed out.

“I guess he can’t handle alcohol,” commented Guo Wei and took a drink from his pouched wine.

Guo Wei got up and went to grab his bottle of wine on the ground next to Xing Fu and walked back to his seat. 

She stared at Xing Fu and thought, "Xing Fu, you did fight the demon beast well. No matter if it tried to tempt you to have sex, you resisted..." She smiled, "You are a pure man; a man with a good heart and good intentions.That was why I fell for you." Then she touched the heart necklace around her neck and felt the warm feeling.

"If I developed these new feelings toward Xing Fu, will it change my lost love for the faceless man, Kai? If not, how will I handle it if my memories come back?"

Not knowing what to do, she sadly sighed.

---

Early the next morning, Cecilia woke up from a faint hum. She sat up and saw Xing Fu and De Ming were still asleep, but Guo Wei was nowhere to be found. The humming continued. Curious of who it maybe, she got up to follow it. As she walked through the forest, the humming got louder. She listened carefully and the humming turned to out to be a melody. The melody was sweet and full of love, like it was meant for a love couple. The weird thing was that she felt like she heard it before.

Is this one of my lost memories? She asked herself.

Finally she reached to the place where the melody was being hummed and saw Guo Wei sitting on a big rock. His eyes were closed and head tilted up toward the sky, humming. In his hand, he held his magical sword closed by. She stared at him and wondered what his story was to hum such a lovely tune. Nevertheless, she wanted to know if there was a connection between him and her.

Could he be the faceless man?

With his thick beard, she couldn’t tell from his chin. She needed to know.

Her brows furrowed. “Kai?” she asked, interrupting him.

Guo Wei stopped humming and turned to her. He raised a brow and looked around to see who she was addressing to. He was the only one here with her, so he pointed at himself.

“Me? Are you talking to me?”

“Are you Kai?” she asked again.

He chuckled at her question and shook his head. “Miss Xiao, you have mistaken me. Have you forgotten my name already?” He got off of the rock and walked toward her. “You didn’t even drink wine last night…I’m Ma Guo Wei…”

She guessed he wasn’t Kai. “I’m sorry. I thought you maybe someone that I know…”

“Oh? And his name is Kai?”

She nodded.

He crossed his arms in front and stroked his beard. “Sorry to disappoint you, but I’m not him.” Then he leaned forward and became curious. “Is he your…lover?”

She was stunned by his question. “I…I…think I am…”

He gave her a strange look. “Huh? It’s either you are or you aren’t. So which one is it?”

“It’s complicated.” She turned to the side and crossed her arms in front.

“Tell this old fellow what’s rambling in your head.”

She turned to him and lifted a quizzical brow.

“Ok…I guess not…”

He shook his head and sighed. They were silent for a bit and then she asked, “The melody that you’ve just hummed, did you composed it?”

His face lightened. “Honestly, I don’t know. I’ve been humming this melody since…I do not know when.” He stared at the blue sky, thinking deeply as he stroked his beard with one hand and the other hand placed on his waist. Then he continued, “You know…it’s always been a mystery to me.” Then he shrugged, “Oh well.”

He reminded her of the forbidden love story of Lu Bing Wei and Chen Da Chun. She thought to herself. Whatever this drunken demon hunter’s story was, it must have been tragic to hum a lover’s melody and not know why.  But surely she knew that her, Chen Da Chun, and Guo Wei had something in common; lost memories. She wondered how many people out there were like her.

Then a white dove flew overhead. Cecilia and Guo Wei stared at it as it circled in the sky; Guo Wei knew what it was. The dove unraveled into a letter and he started to read it. Cecilia was awed by this magic and stared at the characters in the letter. After he was done reading, he had an unpleasant look of urgency.

“What does it say?” she asked him.

Guo Wei was surprised that she couldn’t read. “It says I need to leave to go somewhere important.”

From what she could tell by the letter’s many characters, it was a lengthy letter. “You didn’t read to me what it really said.”

Guo Wei waved his hand up in the sky and the letter dispersed into many particles and disappeared.

“I summarized it.” Then he turned to her, “You do not need to know what it completely said because it wasn’t for you.”

She had a bummed look on her face. She thought he would at least teach her some of the characters from the letter so she could read.

“Come, let’s walk back to the site.”

He walked ahead while she trailed behind. They got back to the site and Xing Fu and De Ming were already up. Xing Fu ran to her.

“Where did you go? I was worried about you.”

“Don’t worry, she was with me,” answered Guo Wei. Then he asked, “Do you two perhaps know who Chen Guo Jing is?”

Both turned to glance at each other. Knowing that Guo Wei is a demon hunter and that Guo Jing was an ex demon, they wondered what Guo Wei wanted from him. Cecilia thought about the dove letter and pondered if it had something to do with Guo Jing.

Curious, she nodded. “We’ll take you to him.”

Xing Fu stared at her surprised by her answered. "Had she forgotten about Wu Jian?"