Chapter 112: The Masked Fugitive

It was another cold and snowy day. Zen ignored the flakes that gathered on his shoulders as he focused his ki into his palm. He repeated the training technie onlyto be once again met by failure. He sighed in frustration. He was starting to wonder if he would really master the technique. A small pile of leaves that had escaped his whirlwind had formed on the ground.

He heard the crunching of snow behind him. He tensed as he spun around, wondering what could have sneaked up on him without him sensig it. He froze, it was no beast that had come but a human. A man, by the looks of it, limping toward him with a single edged sword in one hand and a mask on his face. The mask did not help, as Zen knew exactly who was behind the mask, for it was the same mask Zen had gived him as payment for his help.

“Hui Yi.” Zen said.

Hue Yi stepped closer and Zen stepped back. In normal circumstances he would not be so afraid, but Hue Yi had just appeared in the night out of nowhere with a blood sained sword. Hue Yi felt his fear and stopped, taking off his mask and smiling at Zen to put him at ease.

“Forgive me for coming like this, Zen but I don’t have much time.” He said. “I need you to help me. I need you to hide me.”

“O-Okay,” Zen gulped.

He smiled in thanks and put his mask on. Removing his hand from his side, where it had been pressed since he showed up, revealing the wound that was there. He produced a rag, turned red with his blood. “Is your Scorch Ape here?”

Shibi climbed onto Zen’s shoulder from behind.

“Good, tell it to burn this.” He held the rag closer to them.

“Do it,” Zen said.

Shibi raised both her arms, causing fire to sprout from his hands before he thrust them both into the rag, making it catch fire and burn.

Hue Yi still held the burning material in his hands. Zen looked at him in confusion, wondering why he was not throwing it away. Then, Hue Yi did something that shocked him; he turned the flaming material to his wound and held back a scream as he got burned.

“W-Why?”

“Cauterising the wound.” He said as he withdrew the charred material away from him. Spinning around, he slammed the charred rag into the snow, sending snow flowing forward, burying the rag and removing his footprints.

Zen sensed and by the way Hue Yi looked back I the same direction as Zen, he could tell that the olde by sensed it too. Three powerful beings were coming quickly onto their position.

“I need to hide.”

“I know!” Zen said grabbing Hue Yi’s arm, who sent out pulses of ki to hide his tracks. “Here.” En said, stopping.

Hue Yi looked around. “How’s this going to help?”

“Get down.”

Hue Yi trusted him and and crouched low to the ground. Zen thrust his ki into the tree. All the leaves fell off burying Hue Yi in a hill of leaves. Zen turned just as three people landed where Wang Zen had been.

One was a woman, who had curly ginger hair with light brown eyes and pink lips. Her cheeks were red with the cold as her breath steamed over. On the left side of her thick dress was a bade, marking her as a teacher in the academy. On either side of her was a man and a woman. The man had a sphere of water floating between his palms, while the woman had the same, however, her water was red-ish. Zen clenched his fists, noticing that the two wore the blackand red uniforms that beared the insignia of the Red Dragon Sect.

“You, Boy,” the woman said as they walked closer to him. “Have you seen anyone here, wearing a mask.”

“No,” Zen said, walkng closer to them in order to avoid them getting too close to the pile of leaves hiding Hue Yi. “There’s only me here.”

“Then who were you talking to.” The man with the clear water sphere said. “I picked up the vibrations a few moments ago.”

“I-I was speaking to my companion.” Zen said.

“Companion? Where is he, Boy?” the lecturer said.

“Here,” Zen raised his elbow, allowing Shibi to climb up him and sit on his arm. “This is Shibi, my companion.”

“Some dumb beast?” the woman from the Red Dragon Sect shouted, making Shibi jump off of him.

“The boy doesn’t know anything,” the lecturer turned to her companions.

“Wait…” the Red Dragon Sect said. “I may have lost his blood trail but I’ still have basic tracking skills.” She said moving the hovering sphere over one hand while walking forward. Zen’s heart nearly stopped when she froze in place aand bent down on the ground, examining the snowy ground with her free hand. “There is a partial footprint here.” She said. “Bigger than his.” She narrowed her eyes at Zen’s feet.

“Gentle Wind Pulse!” the lecturer said before slamming her palm into the ground. A pulse of air spread outwards, blowing snow away.

The wind passed Zen and looked back at the hill of leaves, hoping in horror, realising that the wind pulse would surely distabalize the leaves and reveal Hue Yi hiding beneath! To his amazement, the hill held strong, the leaves making it hardly even shivering in the air. He breathed out in relief before returning his attention to the trio.

The man from the Red Dragon Sect compressed his water sphere into nothing before running forward. His hand thrust into the snow and pulled ot the rag that Hue Yi had! “What is this?”

“My scarf,” Zen said. “My Scorch Ape burnt it while we were training.”

“Is there any blood on it?” his Red Dragon companion said.

The man passed his palm over it but nothing happened. “If there was, it was burnt away,” he looked at Zen accusingly.

“You are hiding something, Boy.” The Lecturer said.

“N-No, I’m not!” Zen waved his hands in denial.

“Then why did you bury this rag?” the Red Dragon Sect man said.

“I… I didn’t!” Zen said. “It’s snowing. The snow buried it.”

There was rustling and everything went silent. At the same time they all looked back at the leaf hill.

“What was that?” the Red Dragon Sect woman said.

“Nothing.”

“We’ll see about that!” the man said, running for the hill, a blade made of water forming around his hand and wrist.

“Don’t start this nonsense!” Zen shouted as the man sprinted past him.

A figure emerged from behind the leaf hill, leaping over it and kicking at the Red Dragon Sect man, who blocked with his forearm and leapt back to dodge the follow-up kick. The man slid to a stop, glaring at the mannequin that had just attacked him.

The mannequin sped forward to attack…

“Stop!” Zen said, stepping between it and the Dragon Sect man. He breathed a sigh of relief when the mannequin went limp. “Alright, you’ve found my secret out.” He said, turning to look at them. “I train this deep because I know many people won’t come here in winter and I need the privacy so me and my Scorch Ape can train with my Battle Mannequin, Man Doll.”

“Man Doll, what an appropriate name,” the Red Dragon Sect woman said.

“While we’re wasting time with this clueless boy, our prey is getting further away.” The lecturer said. “We should investigate that track I saw and that you saidwas just an animal.”

“Fine,” the other woman said getting up, looking at her ball that looked like water tainted with wine. “Considering I can’t draw any blood, that may be our best clue.”

“Before we go,” the man said gathering water. “Missile Water Rush!” he shouted before sending out a stream of water with a jagged tail heading for Zen.

Zen held up his hands in defense, knowing t was a useless gesture to block an elemental attack. The attack curved over him and slammed into the mannequin behind him before exploding, sending its arm, broken into tow pieces, scattering. He glared at the Red Dragon Sect member who laughed.

“You can’t expect e to forgive your little Man Doll attacking me without me retaliating.” He said.

“So petty,” the woman said before they followed the Academy lecturer.

Zen looked at his manneun which was lying limply on the ground, which was mostly intact although damaged. Shibi stepped from behind the leaf hill and ran to Zen’s shoulder, handing him his storage stone. With each disaster Shibi helped him through, Zen was growing ever more thankful that he had given Shibi access to his storage stone, if he had not hidden behind the leaf hill and summoned the mannequin, then Zen would not have been able to activate him by using the phrase ‘Don’t start this nonsense!’

Zen looked at one of the pieces of the manneuin’s arm, and saw a piece on the leaf hill. He tilted his head before walking closer. With its momentum, the broken arm should have sent the leaves sliding down the moment it hit but it was still there, stuck to it like a dart on a wall.

He grabbed it and had to apply a little more force than usual to pull it free. He realised this was how Hue Yi had kept the leaves from falling over, he had been usung some kind of ki technique. As soon as the arm was free, the leaves started following the laws of nature and fell down, revealing Hue Yi underneath, who fell on his butt.

“Thanks for your help, Wang Zen.” He laughed.

“Why were they after you?”

“They were angry that I was meeting some of my friends.” Hue Yi said before shrugging. “What can you do?”