R&R please. Thx.
It had taken the combined efforts of the Jade Palace masters and the Imperial soldiers to extinguish the flames consuming the storage building, and even then the process had taken nearly three hours. The moon was high in the sky by the time the tiniest flicker of flame was doused, and by then, the building was a blackened ruin. Once Mantis had bravely volunteered to enter the building and confirm that all the powder kegs had been destroyed, the soldiers set to work salvaging what they could. All the wooden weapons and supplies had been reduced to cinders, and only a fraction of the metal weaponry could be saved. Normally this would have been a disaster, but the massive storage area inside the fortress's left hand tower still had a lifetime supply, but no powder kegs, and more weapons could easily be made in the still functional foundry in the right hand tower. On General Tujiu's orders, soldiers were already prepping the foundry for mass production.
The medics, meanwhile, were having a busy time tending to the soldiers who had been too close to the building when it had exploded, and the Jade Palace masters who had actually been inside the building at that fateful moment. According to the medic treating Monkey and Mantis, they had been extremely lucky to be alive; due to adrenaline, Monkey hadn't noticed the small piece of shrapnel in his shoulder that had barely missed his vital artery, and the only reason Mantis's legs hadn't been badly burned by the debris that had fallen on him was because Su had taken off her winter coat and smothered the burning piece of wood while he had been unconscious. When he learned this, Mantis reminded himself to thank Su once the second medic was done treating her.
As for Su, other than irritated red eyes from the smoke and soot marks on her fur, she was unharmed, much to Viper's absolute relief. The snake had not left her side the entire time. She and Crane had escaped from the ordeal unscathed, save for some singed feathers on Crane's part, though the same could not be said for Tigress and Po. Like Monkey, Tigress was lucky her shoulder injury hadn't been worse, and Po had severe bruising on his chest, back and throat. The other medics had their hands full with the injured soldiers, so Shifu volunteered to clean and wrap Tigress's shoulder himself while Po sat on a small chair and double-checked that his ribs weren't severely damaged. As he stopped checking a grabbed a full jug of water, Po noticed how Shifu kept asking Tigress if she was feeling any pain in her chest, or having trouble breathing. No matter how many times Tigress had tried to reassure him, Shifu's fears had only been eased when one of the medics returned and checked her himself.
It wasn't until midnight that the masters, General Tujiu and Emperor Xian decided to return to the fortress of White Fortitude. As the medic had advised them not to let Su overexert herself, Tigress carried her in her powerful arms. While they journeyed back to the fortress, Su told the others what had happened inside the burning building after she had been separated from the others. The creature had indeed approached her, but Su had been able to slip beneath a falling burning beam and avoid him. In the process, she had reached the outer wall and discovered a portion of the wood was burned and severely weakened. With a few kicks, she had managed to break it down and escape.
"That's our cute, brave girl." Viper said with a relieved smile.
"Courage is one of the most important traits a warrior must have." Shifu said in praise. "You did very well acting on your own."
"Thank you." Su replied shyly. "Master Tigress, are you sure it's okay carrying me with your shoulder?"
"It's just a scratch, I'll be fine." Tigress replied gently, inwardly thinking how Su no longer called her 'missus Tigress'. "Besides, we're almost there."
Sure enough they reached the fortress. While Tigress took Su back to her room, Shifu and Xian ventured to Eagle Jr.'s room after they heard him demanded to be let out of his bed in order to go find out what that the explosion he had heard come from. Crane, Po, Monkey and Mantis returned to their own guestrooms to wash the soot off of themselves while Tujiu and Colonel Sao returned to the study to document the explosive event that had just occurred.
After half an hour, everyone except Su and Di Tan were gathered in Tujiu's private mess hall. The gathering started with Monkey telling them about the creature's clever timing device. Then Po told them about his encounter with the creature, though when he finished, Shifu sensed that there had been something he had left out.
"Okay, here's what we know so far…" Tigress said after a minor argument between Shifu and Tujiu over whether or not to attempt to pursue the creature. "This creature is eight or nine feet tall. Probably weighs five hundred or so pounds, but is very stealthy. It prefers hand to hand combat, but is smart enough to set up effective traps and is strong enough to fling heavy objects from a distance. It has very thick skin, meaning that it will be difficult to inflict significant damage without edged weaponry, so normal punches and kicks are out of the question. Because of its naturally thick hide, it doesn't wear much in terms of armor. It's also an astonishing jumper."
"And unless it has a super powerful potion hidden somewhere, it's also a pretty fast healer." Po added. "When I saw it up close, the neck wound Eagle Jr. made was gone."
"Right, so it also appears to have a supernaturally fast healing factor." Tigress said. "That indicates that this is no ordinary animal like us. Probably a demon."
"So basically it's a super smart, super strong monster who is resistant to kung fu." Crane said. "So far I'm not liking our options."
"Stop that." Shifu said abruptly. "There is too much at stake to be thinking cynically."
"I'm not being cynical" Crane said quickly. "But unless we find out what this thing is, and where exactly it's hiding, then the chances are we're all going to die."
"Oh! That reminds me!" Mantis pulled out what appeared to be a small piece of dark red paper that was burned around the edges. "I managed to get a good look at the lantern that started the fire before everything went to hell. It was a red paper lantern shaped line a cone."
"Go on." Shifu asked as Po and Viper leaned over to inspect the paper.
"So when I went back in to check that all the kegs had blown up, I found a little piece of it that wasn't completely burned up." Mantis said.
"How is this significant?" Viper asked.
"Look at the texture and pattern on the paper." Mantis let Po take the paper. "It doesn't look Chinese to me."
"You're right!" Po suddenly exclaimed. "This is Lotka paper!"
"Lotsa paper?" Crane frowned.
"Lotka paper. It's a paper indigenous to Nepal. My dad had some imported for the winter festival when I was thirteen." Po said.
"Strange." Sao said. "We didn't have any Lotka paper lanterns in the storage building, and there are none like that in the fortress."
"There's only one other place this lantern could have come from." Mantis said. "The creature's lair."
Eyebrows raised, Tigress politely took the paper from Po and inspected it herself.
"Judging from the quality of the paper, this lantern must have been hundreds of years old." She muttered. "Wait, there's white dust on it. It doesn't look like it came from the storage building."
"Yeah, I saw that too." Po said. "It's just like the secret ingredient I put on my super sticky dumplings."
"You mean the stuff we patch walls with?" Mantis chortled.
"Shut up." Po shot him a look.
"Patch walls…" Tigress turned to face Tujiu. "General, are there any other ruins or buildings in the surrounding area?"
"No." Tujiu shook his head. "The only architecture in these mountains is this very fortress."
"Maybe it's underground!" Po said. "You know, maybe an underground tomb like that one in the Shidao mountains!"
"That's actually plausible…" Xian rubbed his chin. "But unless we know the lair's exact whereabouts, this information is next to useless."
"Unless, Monkey…" Tujiu said, turning to the primate. "Is there anything you'd like to add?"
"I already to you about the creature's timing device." Monkey replied shortly. "There's nothing else to say."
Shifu blinked. Aside from General Tujiu and himself, Monkey was the only one who had been to Nepal before, when his family had briefly moved there to be closer to his father, a military commander. And yet aside from the news about the timing device, he had contributed little to the mission in terms of information. Yet Tujiu had just hinted that he knew more than he let on…
"General, is there anything you'd like to add?" The red panda asked.
"I told you all I know the other day." Tujiu replied coolly.
"Oh yeah?" Po stood up, suddenly angry. "Did you tell him about the clear message that thing sent to you to leave this place before the murders started?"
A flash of surprise crossed Tujiu's features.
"What message?" Sao demanded.
"That monster thing told me about it while it was choking me to death!" Po snapped. "It told me that it had sent you a message to leave the fortress, but you ignored it!"
"Is this true?" Xian asked dangerously.
"And it also told me that the bunch of dead guys we found in the snowdrift had been all those who knew the existence of the tomb!" Po went on before Tujiu could answer. "The only person with the authority and the stupidity to send them out there was you! What do you have to say to that?!"
"A COINCIDENCE!" Tujiu roared.
"ENOUGH!" Shifu yelled. "That is enough!"
The room fell silent.
"If we begin fighting amongst ourselves then disaster will be guaranteed to happen." He said. "Tujiu, I and the emperor will speak to you about these recent revelations later. In the meantime, I want us all to focus to finding a means to kill this damn thing! Is that clear?"
Tujiu and Po nodded.
"I'm sorry, Master." Po muttered.
Tujiu said nothing.
"You are forgiven, Po." Shifu said, though he couldn't really blame the panda. If there was one thing Po didn't believe in, it was expendable assets. "Now let's review what we know so far and come up with a strategy."
"Monkey, are you sure there isn't anything else you wanna tell us?" Po asked.
Monkey shook his head.
First Tujiu, now Po… Shifu thought.
Okay, that settled it.
"I think my bandage needs changing." Monkey said, and went to the door.
He grabbed the handle, pulled it open… and Shifu slammed it shut again with a deafening bang.
Again, the room fell silent.
"Master?" Monkey asked in mild alarm.
Shifu didn't answer. Instead he slowly paced towards the middle of the room, emotions mixing and bubbling and thoughts and suspicions running through his mind over and over.
Though he had been suspicious ever since the first incident with the boulders, it was Po's question that had confirmed Shifu's suspicions. Po cared deeply for his friends. He trusted each and every one of them wholeheartedly, even the primate who pranked him on a daily basis. And yet now even he suspected that Monkey knew more than he was telling them. If Po thought Monkey was hiding something… then something was definitely going on. And as for Shifu, the thought of one of his students lying to him…
Made him explode.
"How big a miserable old fool do you take me for?!"
All in his presence jumped at his sudden outburst. Po fell off his chair and Monkey backed up against the wall.
"M-Master Shifu?" Monkey stammered.
"Do you think I don't know what's been going on?!"
"Er…"
"I'm talking about you seeing the creature right before the boulder ambush, lying to my face about it, putting yourself in danger trying to go after it, and overall pretending that you don't know anything about it!" Shifu continued to holler. He had never felt so angry before in all his life. "And I'm interested to know what you have to say for yourself!"