Both Gloria and Gyuu Park activated their Qi to adjust their as well as Sue’s positions and postures in the air, to make sure that they did not stumble on the ground and land on two feet.

“What is happening?” Sue and Gloria asked Gyuu Park at the same time.

“Spirit Disturbance, something like the paranormal activity of poltergeist, but on a bigger scale.” Gyuu Park shook his head: “Things are bad here at the docks, I’ll explain later. We need to get out of here.”

Another scream erupted, the hairs on Gloria’s back all stood up. She turned her face to the creature and the cloud of fog, and realized that the creature’s eyes had somehow gone fully red, and the size of the cloud itself seemed to have been reduced by quite a noticeable amount. And thus, something inside the fog was beginning to be revealed.

Gloria squinted, and noticed that it looked like a head inside. But she did not have time to look harder, for Gyuu Park had already activated his Qi on his two arms and readied his fighting stance.

“Let me help.” Gloria started concentrating her Qi on her arms, but Gyuu Park instantly raised his right arm and palm to stop her.

“No, only I should do it. This is a special barrier. Repeated attacks wouldn’t help at all.” Gyuu Park pushed his Qi onto his right middle and index fingers, so much so that his fingertips started glowing in orange. He chanted a few words in a low voice, then used his left index finger to slit a small wound on the tip of his right index finger.

Another scream came, this time, it was longer, louder, more hoarse, and more desperate. Gloria grabbed Sue’s hand, trying her best to shield her friend from whatever the creature and the fog could throw at them.

Gyuu Park stood straight for about one or two seconds and retracted his right arm back like sheathing a sword. He then thrusted his entire arm forward with his index and middle fingers pointing forward like attacking with a sword. A faint glowing orange shadow shaped indeed like a long and slender straight blade of a sword shot from his fingers. The shadow reached the glowing aura around the frame of the door in no time. A loud crack came from the collision. Another shockwave exploded from the impact. This time Gloria and Sue were both prepared, and they only recoiled when it blew by them.

Cracks glowing in rapidly changing colors appeared in the air. Beams of blinding white light poke through them, forcing all three of them to close their eyes for but a mere moment.

“Wake up, wake up.” Gyuu Park’s voice seemed to have come from somewhere far away. When Gloria fought through the dizziness, sleepiness and soreness in her muscles and opened her eyes, she saw that she and Sue were still at their original positions, standing around the metal bowl full of rice. The color of the grains of rice in the bowl changed - they were now covered in green spots. It was mold.

“Wake up!” Gyuu Park clapped his hands in front of Gloria and Sue’s faces: “We need to leave. We need to leave, NOW!”

Gloria shook her head, and an idea already formed in her head about what happened. She did not waste another second. She rushed over to her side and threw Sue over on her shoulder and started running towards the door following Gyuu Park.

Chittering and cackling sound came from all around them, when Gloria looked around, she found at least a few dozen of the same creatures, with black hairs covering their bodies, big, jaundiced and bloodshot eyes and slender legs sticking out. These creatures were much smaller, but had similar body proportions as the creature that was in her vision.

“Go!” Gyuu Park lunged at the door and practically kicked it open, then raised his hand in the air, holding a small hand mirror with a convex surface in the air, partially facing the sun.

A thin beam of sunlight was reflected off the hand mirror. It expanded and shone upon a small group of the creatures that were at the forefront. These creatures screamed as the light ignited their hairs and entire bodies, turning into puffs of smoke in a mere instant.

“GO! Go go go!” Gyuu Park stayed behind, as Gloria tried to run further from this very warehouse: “Go into the sunlight! Go into the sunlight!”

Sue was still mumbling something, and was mostly speaking nonsense. This was how she would behave when she was asleep, an indication that she was still trapped in the vision and not awakened by whatever Gyuu Park did.

The sun was slowly rising in the sky, yet there were also dark and thick clouds in the air, blocking most of the sunlight in this area. Gloria kept running in the empty street, while looking back up at the sky from time to time. The sun was clouded, and there were only a few parts around her that were directly lit up. There was one particular bright spot ahead of her, so she pushed her Qi at her hardest, trying to reach the spot.

Without sunlight, Gyuu Park could only use his Qi to shoot out small energy bolts and beams trying to push those creatures back. But this was far from sustainable, as his Qi was draining much faster than usual. His face was getting more and more pale in the process. He started coughing, and his arms and legs were getting slower and slower as well.

“Sue! Wake up!” Gloria reached the bright spot, laid her friend down from her shoulder and started shaking her shoulders: “Sue! Please! Wake up!”

But hard as she tried, Sue was showing no signs of coming out of it at all. And looking back, Gyuu Park’s defenses were waning. She had no choice but to run toward Gyuu Park in order to help. If they did not leave almost everything in the warehouse, they would not be as defenseless.

On her way over, Gloria grabbed half a handful of pebbles and sand from the ground, infused them with Qi and threw them at the creatures as hard as possible.

At least five creatures were struck by this attack. All of them screamed, several of them just fell on the ground and started squirming and rolling.

“Quick! I found a spot with sunlight!” Gloria said to Gyuu Park while trying to find some talismans from her inner jacket pockets - but all she found was ashes.

“Don’t let them touch you! ” Gyuu Park turned back and started running toward where Sue was lying along with Gloria.

“What the hell are they?” Seeing that Gyuu Park was not able to run with full speed, Gloria decided to hold onto his shoulder to carry him along.

“Duster, another kind of Shikikami.” Gyuu Park shook his head: “But something’s wrong with them - they should never become this dark and tainted. They’re scavengers of karmic toxins and karmic pollutants. Just like cleaning cloths or wipes, the more they clean up, the dirtier they get. Then they would self-destruct and turn to dust after a while. But - ”

“Something’s stopping them from doing so.” Gloria looked back, more and more of these creatures were flooding out, as if someone just unlocked giant cages holding them.

The lit up spot in which Sue was lying seemed to be getting smaller and smaller. Gloria’s heart became heavier just as her arms and legs.

They got to Sue’s side, and the spot had shrunk to the size that was barely able to cover up Sue, not to mention Gloria or Gyuu.

“This is it then.” Gyuu Park shook his head with a wry smile: “You bring Sue and go, meet me back at the temple.”

“No - I won’t.” Gloria shook her head: “I can’t - ”

“They won’t kill me right away.” Gyuu Park threw Gloria’s hand off him: “They’ll contaminate me, but I’ll live. I can find a way to deal with omens, trust me. I know them, remember? I can hold them for a while. But you can’t, so GO!”

Gloria took a look at Sue, then took a look at the flooding Dusters coming their way. She could not decide.

But it seemed she did not have to.

A small crack opened up in the thick clouds above, and projected a thin wall of light between them and the Dusters. Some dusters ran into it, and were instantly turned into dust and smoke. The rest stayed back, their eyes showing clear signs of fear, enough to push back their ferocious hunger.

Some of the dark creatures tried to go around the wall, but the crack in the clouds started expanding at the same time, and instantly cut through their formation. More and more of them got turned into dust, and the rest began panicking and backing away into the warehouse.

The clouds thinned and moved away from the sun bit by bit. Dust and ashes filled the street and then was blown away by the morning wind. It was as if they were never here.