"In this nest of whores and vipers."
- Javert, Les Miserables
Nothing said "total loss" to the three women of the Wu dynasty quite like being knocked senseless and tossed under a swarm of thousands of hungry snakes.
Sun Shangxiang, Da Qiao, and Xiao Qiao stirred occasionally in their sleep, only curling and murmuring weakly as they remained safely tucked under a thick blanket of spells and serums. One was sprawled out at the bottom of her captor's majestic skirt. Another was lying under another pile of snakes beside her. The third was strung upside-down from the temple rafters like freshly slaughtered cattle.
The scene was more reptile than woman. The faces of the captives were only visible for a few seconds at a time as the bundles of snakes constantly tangled and untangled. There was a hand poking out of the pile here, a shoulder there, and a bare foot over there. Mambas and boas slithered contemptuously through cream-colored hills and valleys. Rattlesnakes shook their tails to the soothing rhythm of nursery lullabies. Scales glided across soft, tantalized flesh like river water washing over smooth round stones.
A single wrong move or a nervous jerk from any of the three captives could send fangs stabbing into her veins, snuffing out her life in an agonizing second. This was the ending to their humanity, and the prologue to their new lives as something else.
Diao Chan was the mistress of this mysterious ceremony. She was in her natural form, one that she always kept hidden away behind a thin mask of serene and beguiling beauty. A form only a few souls in the entire world lived to tell about.
Diao Chan was still a being of remarkable beauty once she became her true self, but her gaze was anything but human. Her lithe dancer's arms were wound so tightly with hissing constrictors and pythons that it was impossible to tell where her own body ended and her slithering familiars began. Instead of a complete pair of slender human legs showing through the slit in her dress, wave after wave of snakes spilled out from underneath her skirt, creating an endless knot of winding scales where her ankles should have appeared and spreading out over her unconscious prey. Bleach white bones picked clean of their flesh were strewn about on the floor around her, telling the story of countless others who had entered this terrible place.
Da Qiao, Xiao Qiao, and Sun Shangxiang's frail and vulnerable forms were like three tiny pink pearls trying to shimmer in the murky depths of the ocean abyss, only to be smothered by the darkness. Near each of their sleeping bodies were tatters of colorful silk dresses and chunks of armor that may have been the remains of their DW8 outfits. Three half-sewn garments that were beginning to look suspiciously like their DW9 designs were draped from a stone mantle behind Diao Chan, along with a set of chakrams and combat fans sporting a new serpent motif. Snakes squirmed out of the ancient stone walls and coiled through the fresh linen with the same possessive allure as the snakes piling over the unconscious captives.
Diao Chan paced attentively between the three hissing, slithering piles. She would check each defenseless maiden for her pulse, untangle any snakes that might get too close to accidentally strangling her, and make sure she slept in relative comfort (given the predicament all three of them were in).
The doors of the decrepit temple creaked open. Lu Bu stepped out of the few rays of sunlight allowed to slither into the chamber and slammed the iron bolt behind him. He approached Diao Chan, shared a brief tender moment with his half-human spouse, and glanced over her three "recruits." A brave man with a demonic reputation of his own, Lu Bu never showed any fear, hesitation, or remorse toward being the husband of an ageless two-bodied serpent sorceress.
"What delicate flakes of flesh have you got wrapped up in your scales this time, Diao Chan?" Lu Bu asked her as if he had walked in on her washing the dishes.
"Just these three little mice I dragged out of a Wu camp during the last campaign," Diao Chan replied. "The soldiers thought they would make a marvelous gift after the victory. As you see, they were rather diligent in plucking the fur off of these lovely creatures."
A forked tongue flicked over her glossy violet lips.
"That's the only thing they plucked, I hope," Lu Bu muttered.
"Of course," Diao Chan said with a devilish glimmer in her reptilian eyes. "They would never bring me spoiled meat unless I ordered it. They know what happens when the queen cobra is displeased." A pair of tiny and highly venomous fangs emerged over her lips.
Lu Bu glanced toward the offerings again, then back toward his wife.
"What's so special about a few Wu wenches?"
"Think of the great things we could accomplish with them," Diao Chan said with a rising appetite. "The vessels I'm preparing for my slither-spawn happen to be the three greatest beauties in all of China."
Diao Chan glimpsed over her prey again before rephrasing her claim.
"Well, the two greatest beauties, and a tomboy princess who's not too shabby herself."
Lu Bu shrugged in disinterest. These meek and fae-ish things, while certainly gentle on the eyes, paled in comparison to such a bold and fulfilling woman as his wife.
"They all look like snake food to me," he put bluntly.
"Oh, Lu Bu. You just lack a lady's touch."
Diao Chan flicked her long pronged tongue again.
"Look closer at my darlings," she beckoned with tiny garter snakes wrapping around her black nails. "They're but helpless lambs now, but the curse binds them tight and they've already begun to change. In time, these girls can be nurtured into loyal pythons. They'll live as charlatans pretending to still be human for the next few years, carefully planting the seeds of distrust between our enemies from the inside. Perhaps I'll pull the strings of fate and line up a few marriages for them from behind the scenes."
She crossed her narrow, cobra-shrouded arms and grinned ominously.
"When the moment is right, they'll shed their silly guises and reveal themselves for the deadly snakes they really are. I just have to get inside of them first."
Lu Bu watched as Xiao Qiao apparently stirred in her sleep. Her eyelids only twitched lightly, but she looked almost like she was stubbornly puffing the sides of her mouth to express her disgust. Then the lumps in her cheek moved, and an unraveling baby anaconda poked its small blinking head out of her mouth.
Lu Bu glimpsed toward Da Qiao and Sun Shangxiang in similar states of moral decay and strategic indecency. He cautiously shifted his eyes further down the three women's bodies, quirking his brow along the way.
"You… don't seem to having any trouble accomplishing that on your own." He ended his statement by poignantly clearing his throat.
Diao Chan turned her head and coyly nestled her shoulder to her chin, blowing a tiny kiss toward Lu Bu through curled lips. She sighed and turned back toward her three imperiled prey.
"Don't you have a few prisoners to execute?" she said with a hint of deviousness. "An insubordinate soldier or two to flog? Leave an old lady to her spinning."
Lu Bu left the chamber slowly shaking his head, muttering something about "damned snake charmers" under his breath.