Dust drifted overhead, concealing the heavens as the yellow-furred monkey pulled herself upright. She panted as she tried to refill her lungs after I choked her with my detached limbs. I’d hoped to kill her, but no such luck.

  I clicked my arm back into place.

  Fire burned in her eyes as she twirled her staff above her head. The ground rumbled and shifted. She continued twirling her crooked staff as she prepared a technique I really didn’t want to experience.

  So, I charged toward her.

  She snarled as I closed in.

  I gambled that she couldn’t control her big technique and trigger the smaller earth spears at the same time. If she were going big, then she would be forced to focus on that alone.

  I was right.

  Nothing stopped me from getting up close. I struck with bony fists, hitting her stomach, chest, and face. She grunted and stumbled back as I swept a bony kick against her core. I was hitting as hard as I could, but my bones lacked the impact of my muscles.

  She kept her staff raised and spinning. The crooked wood trembled as it drew on qi I couldn’t detect. She went on the offensive, and a spinning kick came my way, her long toes curling into fists to punch me.

  I took a couple of hits and slid back along the dirt. She was strong, but even with her cultivation, she had clearly developed the ability to manipulate the earth at the cost of her physical power. I figured she was a little weaker than the talking white-furred monkey.

  Though her earth qi made her far more dangerous.

  She continued to keep her staff raised as rocks flowed out of the ground and spiralled around her in some grand technique. I couldn’t let her complete whatever she was trying to build.

  “Aim for the joints!” Cabbagy shouted.

  I launched forward, ducking a kick and striking her knee. She came down off balance and exposed her elbow. One hard punch there, and she cried out in pain. Her gnarled staff slipped, and the technique exploded.

  Rocks poured up out of the ground and wrapped around the yellow monkey. They shifted and wrapped her nine-foot form like gravel armor, but they didn’t stop pressing against her. She screamed as the rocks she summoned punctured her flesh and snapped her bones. More rock flowed up, and blood leaked out of the cracks.

  The screams from the yellow monkey caused the lesser monkeys to race toward me. They shrieked and hollered, red eyes burning, as they saw the statue that was their former master.

  And me, standing there, looking like something to chew on.

  I backed away, my hands up in a guard position as the monkeys crawled toward me.

  “Any suggestions, Cabbagy?” I asked.

  “You can take the little guys,” he said. “Just keep moving.”

  Before they could charge, the earthen statue shivered and shook.

  I knew the yellow-furred monkey was dead. There was no way she was alive, but somehow the statue or rock that entombed her corpse was moving.

  Loose, bloodstained pebbles clattered to the ground as the rocky head glowed. White fire billowed out like two demonic eyes. The silvery light erased the dark field outside the town. A hush came from the wall as the guards witnessed the new development. There was no longer any mist protecting the battered wooden walls.

  The untouched troop of monkeys could take the walls if they were willing to lose numbers. I had to hope they weren’t, but even if they were, Qian Ling and Mu Min were up on the battlements. Even though their qi-powered defences had fallen, I trusted those two cultivators could fight off monkeys — but that many?

  It was a lot of fangs and claws if you wanted to avoid being eaten.

  And if the rocky goliath could truly move — as I feared it could — then the town stood no chance.

  But neither the monkeys nor the statue took their eyes off me.

  That pale, burning gaze fixed on me, and a new, smooth voice echoed out of the corpse.

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  “You killed my yellow-furred daughter,” said the voice. “But though I have lost a child, I have gained a brother!”

  The blocky goliath of stone stood fifteen feet above the ground. Boulders and rocks cobbled together with loose earth formed the limbs and body, now more masculine. The yellow monkey’s broken form was lost to the earthen technique that collapsed around her. Now, something else took control, and eyes of pale fire burned in a misshapen, simian face.

  “Ever since you entered my forest, I knew you came for me,” rumbled the statue. “Cease your resistance. You have proven your might. Allow my soldiers to escort you to my throne.”

  I had no idea what he meant.

  “What does he mean?” Cabbagy asked me.

  “I don’t know,” I said. “Who are you?”

  The red-eyed monkeys circled me like scavengers awaiting a kill. There were no exits I could take.

  The statue took a thudding step forward.

  “I am Ghost Fang,” said the voice. “I am the King of Twisted Pine Valley, and I would have you visit my court.”

  My bones shivered with his booming declaration. This was the demonic ape the guard mentioned to me, the leader of the Howling Spirit Monkeys. He must be powerful if he could possess the statue entombing the yellow-furred monkey.

  It seemed likely that he was the presence tugging on me from deeper in the forest. I was tempted to go with him, just to find out why he was calling me.

  But…

  “What about the village?" I asked. “Why are you attacking them?”

  Rocks fell as a low rumble came from the statue. Ghost Fang was laughing.

  “You sent someone to harm me in my home,” he said. “It’s only fair I send someone to harm you in yours.”

  Again, I had no idea what he meant.

  “What do you mean?” I asked Ghost Fang before Cabbagy could ask me.

  “Two pretty little cultivators visited me for dinner,” Ghost Fang said as his pale eyes burned ever brighter. “I think they might stay forever. Unless, of course, my brother comes and tells me all his little secrets.”

  He was talking about Qian Ling and Mu Min. I glanced back at the walls, but saw no trace of them. Why had they left the town?

  It was hard to really feel fear when I was just bones, but a sense of cold raced through me like a toothache.

  The way Ghost Fang spoke… mentioning secrets… did he know about the facility?

  “Kid,” Cabbagy whispered, breaking my fugue state. “This is your chance!”

  “What? You want me to go with him?”

  “No, you run for the mountain pass. All the monkeys are distracted, and the cultivators will stay here to defend the town. Nobody will be able to stop you.”

  As much as I wanted to get on with my flower-picking quest, I also needed to know what Ghost Fang knew about the facility. I really hadn’t expected Cabbagy to advocate leaving everyone behind, unless…

  “Cabbagy, do you not realize Ghost Fang has the cultivators captive in his lair?”

  He went silent.

  I decided to put in the final squeeze.

  “I mean, I like your idea of just running away, but —

  “No! To think of Mu Min getting devoured by that gigantic beastly… You have to help them, kid! I can’t have my precious Mu Min suffering at the hands of that demonic bastard!”

  “What about your wife?”

  “Who?”

  “You’re a bastard, Cabbagy,” I said.

  “Enough!” the Ghost Fang statue roared. “I don’t know what you’re trying, but it is over. You will come with me and we will discuss our plans for the future.”

  “I’ll come with you,” I said. “If you spare the village.”

  I just couldn’t shake the memories of cowering behind a wall as a farmer and praying that the spirit beasts would never break through.

  The circling monkeys hissed at me. With my weaker, fleshless body, I doubted it would take long for them to disassemble me. I was truly in danger, but I wouldn't leave the village behind.

  Tears of glass dripped from the burning eyes.

  “The walls must fall,” Ghost Fang said. “My white son and yellow daughter died trying to take this village, and I will not negotiate my revenge.”

  His rocky hand pointed at the town, and the monkeys shrieked. They charged toward the walls like a pale furred tide. A hasty cry came up from the walls as the tired defenders scrambled for their bows.

  “You wanker!” I shouted at the earthen Ghost Fang.

  I charged after the monkeys, bending forward and building to the high speed I could propel my skeleton.

  “Wrong way, kid! Go save Mu Min!”

  The monkeys shrieked as I burst into their ranks. I grabbed at them and tackled some to the ground, and then the mob turned on me. We struggled, and Cabbagy fell from my torn robes.

  I defended as best I could as they mauled at me, but there were too many. Their red eyes blazed with Ghost Fang’s fire as they pinned me to the ground and ripped my skull from my neck with an embarrassing pop.

  A monkey nibbled on my skull until I nibbled back. It squawked at me and threw my skull away. My skull bounced along the ground and rolled along until it stopped up beside where Cabbagy ended up.

  “Kind of a funny view down here, isn’t it?” Cabbagy said to me.

  I looked back at my skeleton as it tried to escape the clutches of the monkeys. They yanked at me and hit me like children fighting over a headless doll. I tried to control myself at a distance, but it was a deeply disorienting experience, and my dodging suffered.

  Arrows sailed from the wall and peppered the monkeys. One arrow clattered off my ribs. The monkeys scrambled away, and my skeleton escaped their clutches. By focusing my willpower, I compelled my bones to run toward my skull as the monkeys charged the walls.

  “You ready to leave the village behind? Cabbagy asked me.

  “I can’t.”

  I clacked my jaw against the ground and dragged myself closer to my approaching skeleton.

  “Damn you, kid!” Cabbagy shouted.

  “I have to do this.”

  “Fine. I prayed it wouldn’t come to this, but you’ve left me no choice.”

  “What do you…”

  My skull gasped as Cabbagy rolled into me. His battered leaves were loose, but determined as he nudged me aside. I rolled a couple of inches and stared at Cabbagy.

  “Why did you do that?”

  “Sometimes a Cabbage has to do what a man should have done.”

  My skeleton reached down and picked up Cabbagy.

  “No, damnit,” I scolded my skeleton. “That’s the wrong head!”

  Something like a smile rustled Cabbagy’s leaves as my hands lowered him onto my vertebrae. With a twist, Cabbagy clicked onto my skeleton’s shoulders.

  “That’s your problem, kid, you’re always thinking with the wrong head.”

  I'm the main character now.

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