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There is darkness, then there is light. You wince, screwing your eyes tighter shut, trying to block the pervasive brightness that turns the back of your eyelids red. Your head spins, and you realize, There’s light. So you open your eyes.
Your eyes, you think, blinking them wide as a blurry filthy room comes into sight. You reach up your hands--your hands! To rub at your eyes, smearing something across your face. Your sleeves fall back down your wrists, sending stinging pain down your arms. Deep, oozing cuts are on either wrist.
You push yourself up. Head spins, stomach whirling dangerously. You look around. You’re lying in a pool of blood. Streaks of it are dragged out, deliberate. You’re not stupid, so you know it’s an array. You try to stand. Your knees don't hold you, however, and you fall back down. You can hear voices outside, muffled as if through water.
Holding the wall, you manage to leverage yourself up.Your legs shake, and your stomach whirls dangerously. You take a step, another, haul yourself towards a dingy door blocked by barrels of rice.
You throw yourself at the barrels, tipping one over in a cascade of “shush-shush”-ing rice grains. The door swings open inwards. You grab the frame and stagger out, black spots dancing in your vision, and the muffled sounds you heard earlier solidify themselves into screams.
You can hear the clash of blades, in the distance, the wet tearing of flesh, throat-rending screams. The tang of copper coats your tongue. In your empty rib cage, you can feel the black pull of undeath.
You move towards the sounds. You stumble, catching on your own feet, your legs shorter than they’re supposed to be, unused to your own body. You trip over a corpse, foot sliding in the wet slime of an intestine. The sounds grow louder, the smell thicker.
You emerge into a courtyard, wracked in carnage. You can see the dark forms of bodies, stinking and steaming. You can smell their stench, the reek of shit and vomit and blood. You can hear death rattles, the gurgle of blood. You can see a boy in golden robes, unarmed, kneeling in supplication.
You can see me.
I cannot see you. I am consumed, my vision warped into a screen of predator-prey. I am distorted. I am ugly, horrible, a mass of too-long limbs, my not-face twisted and warped beyond recognition.
You know me, though. You can see with your new-not-quite eyes the set of my jaw, the lightning arcing up and down my limbs, the same eyes you’ve always known. You can see my twisted claws, and you can see the matching wounds the corpses carry. You can feel that empty tugging in your chest, screaming, UNNATURAL, pointing directly at me. You aren’t stupid.
You were dead, and now you are not. I was alive, and now I am not. You were the monster, and now I am.
That is why you are back, isn’t it? You are the grandmaster of demons, aren’t you?
I can feel your horror. You are sick to your stomach. It’s okay. I’ll make it easier for you. I turn to you, away from the sobbing boy. He is calling out, whimpering, “Jiujiu, Jiujiu,”
My face twists up into a horrible snarl, baring teeth that are too long, too sharp. I am far gone, but I know deep in my dead bones I cannot let you near the boy in gold. He is all that I have left. You have taken everything else. I do not know this--I only feel.
You reach for a weapon that isn’t there. You haven’t had it for a long time. I took it years ago, off your cooling, bloody remains. I snap at you.
You scramble back, fumbling in your pockets for anything to defend yourself with. You come up with a little pot of makeup. You throw it. It passes through my chest, thudding into the grass. I open my jaws and wail, eyes animalistic and wild. The air waves shudder. But you, you, you’re clever. And maybe some little part of me remains, and remembers. You put your fingers to your lips and whistle.
The sound echoes, trilling, and I stop like a dog hearing his master. My head tilts, bright eyes focusing on you. Something flickers behind them, but you’re too far away to make it out.
“Jiujiu!” The boy in gold cries out, crawling towards me. He is our nephew. I reach out to him, trace the air near his face with one hook-clawed finger. He is so bright. He shudders at the proximity, eyes bright with tears, pleading. Then he notices you, A-Jie’s eyes narrowing in confusion. “You! What are you doing here!”
You don’t know who--or whose body--you occupy. You don’t respond. But you, you’re a good person. That’s all you ever wanted to be, wasn’t it? That’s why you died in the first place. Trying to help everyone all at once. You move to put yourself between me and the boy, even though you don’t know who he is. How important he is. That’s just how you are.
I wish I could know who you are. I lunge, again, my face right up in yours, and you can’t help yourself--you gasp, in recognition, breathing,
“Jiang Cheng.”
Clever boy. If I could be happy, I would be. If I could be heartbroken, I would be. I rage, caught in the bindings of being Known. I disappear in a twist of lightning, ozone permeating the air. You figured it out.
Now come and find me, Wei Wuxian. Come and find the demon.