Oh my, I forgot to describe Dai Gui's human form! o.O Thank you, Regrem Erutaerc, for reminding me! Ok, it's very simple, actually. He has golden eyes (more or less like Jade) and dark brown hair *almost* reaching his shoulders.
Thank you for the reviews!^_^
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Chapter 18: The Zhou Wen Library
Tchang Zu, Bai Tsa and Dai Gui left the house and watched how the jet landed. They didn't have to wait too long for their siblings, but were surprised as they saw that only Tso Lan and Po Kong had returned.
"Where are the others?", Tchang Zu asked in suspicion.
"We did some change of plans and the others went to Hong Kong.", Tso answered. Jade, Hsi Wu and Valmont opened slightly the door so that they wouldn't be noticed.
"And what they are going to do in Hong Kong?"
"We are not sure, but they assured that it will be fast and that the other prisoner would be enough as a bait for our ambush.", Po Kong replied and after some consideration, Tchang nodded.
"Very well. Let's begin our ambush without them.", he decided.
"We still have to think of a lot of things. For example, how are we going to attract Chans' attention?", Tso reminded.
"Do not worry. We still have the whole night to think of every detail."
Jade carefully closed the door and turned to face the other two.
"Did you hear that?", she asked.
"Yes, it means that soon the world will be dominated by the demons. Finally...", Hsi Wu said in victory.
"Do you have any idea of what Shendu and the others are going to do in Hong Kong?", Jade asked to the demon, ignoring his last remark.
"Perhaps Shendu has gone there to look for something in his palace."
It was early in Hong Kong, and four figures went quietly in the darkness. The group approached of a building with some Chinese characters written in the door.
"Zhou Wen.", Julia read, smiling.
"You can read in Chinese?", Xiao asked and the girl nodded.
"For two years I have been looking for this library. Of course a seven-year-old little girl doesn't have many resources to find this place, mainly when her father doesn't collaborate. But that's nothing that the company of two demons and a descendent of a chi-wizard family can't resolve."
"What do you want in that library?", Jack asked.
"You'll soon see it.", she said coldly and made a gesture the group to follow her. She quickly managed to unlock the door and they entered the dark library. None of them had ever been inside it, but Julia leaded them as if she knew that place very well. They finally found another locked door, which wasn't an obstacle to Julia either. The girl opened it and inside this room there was a lampshade.
"Ah, finally some light...", Jack commented while Julia turned it on. Everybody observed the library, and Jack felt cold shivers going down his spine as he saw that there were two skulls and some weird artifacts and potions on the table, and now he already had an idea of why only the chi-wizards were allowed to enter this place.
Julia took a fast glance around herself and soon looked to have found what she wanted. She took a very dusty green book with yellowish pages and leafed through it until finding a map. Shendu frowned and approached of her, and Xiao Fung did the same after a while.
"I found it! It's not far away from here." Julia kept the map in her pocket and tore one of the pages out. When seeing that, Jack's eyes widened.
"Woahh! Why did you do that?! That must be a sacred book!"
Julia ignored him and turned to face the demons.
"Now, I'll need your help."
While the demons thought of how the ambush would happen, Jade and Valmont had been imprisoned in a windowless room that had just two single beds and a dresser. Each one was in a bed, frowning angry and with crossed arms. After hours of silence, Jade finally was sick of it and stood up.
"Enough! I can't stand this anymore!", she complained and walked to Valmont. "You know a way to get away from here and yet you don't want to tell me! Why?"
"Because I don't want to get away from here!"
"But Valmont, we have to! I gotta ask help to my uncles and you need to go to a hospital!"
"No!"
"Jade placed her hands on her head ready to pull her hair out and clenched her teeth. She then drew a deep breath to calm down and sat beside him.
"Listen, nothing is gonna happen to Julia. She will be alright, I promise. Jackie and Uncle will take care of the demons before they can ever try to do anything to your daughter!", she tried again and Valmont lowered his head in deep thought. "We quietly run away now and I get help before they notice that we are not here.", she added. After a while, Valmont raised his glance and reluctantly nodded.
"All right...", he murmured and Jade smiled pleased.
Shendu, Xiao Fung, Julia and Jack arrived at a type of temple in a region slightly far away from the city. Julia took one more glance at the map to make sure they were in the right place.
"What do you want here, after all?", Xiao asked curiously while they entered the temple.
"Have you ever heard of this temple?"
"Yes, it is a very ancient temple. When it had been just built, the chi of the wizards who had built it was so powerful that we could not even approach.", Shendu said.
The temple wasn't very big, and they soon arrived at its end. Everybody, except Julia, was very surprised as they saw a small golden dragon statue. In the dragon's left hand there was a sphere that looked like a pearl and had the size of a marble.
"But... that's the...", Shendu stuttered.
"The Hun Yu jewel!", Julia said before he could finish.
"I don't understand anything! What's that Hun Yu jewel?", Jack asked in confusion.
"Long story, but this jewel has the power to make any wish of the person who owns it come true, and it gives infinite power. With it, you can also go to any other dimension.", Julia explained and only then Jack understood that a criminal little girl owning such power was really dangerous.
"Oh, now I remember. One day, we tried to get the power of that jewel, but it didn't work very well!", Xiao said smiling and Julia turned to him with a sarcastic smile.
"It's because this jewel is filled with good magic.", she said and took the page of the book that she had torn out. "Long... Zhan... Jing... Xing...", Julia slowly read in a low voice and the jewel began to glow. She was about to take it when Shendu stopped her.
"Wait, that's not a good idea.", he warned.
"Why?"
"Some of us already tried to make humans take that jewel, and all of them had an unpleasant end within few days."
"Ah, I know that the jewel can be used only by someone with pure heart, but I found out that if I combine the power of the tiger talisman with the jewel, any human can use it." Julia took the still glowing jewel from the statue's hand, though she didn't have to touch it. She had just to involve the jewel with her hands and it followed the movement of her hands, floating in the air.
"But you do not have the tiger talisman...", Xiao Fung reminded.
"I will, when we go back to San Francisco."
Julia approached the jewel of her heart, and it seemed to have been absorbed by the girl's body. A white symbol looking like an Arabic letter appeared in her forehead and her body began to shine.
"Haha, who said that money is the best thing in the world never had the power! The true power!", she declared turning to face the other three. Shendu smiled pleased. In that aspect she was very different from her father, who didn't care about anything but money. Finally he had found a human who valued power more than anything else.
"I thought the power of the jewel took a while to make effect.", Xiao remarked.
"Well, I don't have many powers yet, but I already feel quite different. I feel your presence... I feel the power of... the talismans?!", she said in surprised as well as the others.
"A talisman? Here?", Xiao asked glancing around himself.
"Are you sure?", Shendu confirmed.
"Of course yes, and it's in the Zhou Wen library.", she said looking at the direction of the city.
"Uncle, why did we come here?", Jackie asked while they and the J-Team walked for a sidewalk in Hong Kong.
"Uncle has to research a way to banish the demons permanently."
"I thought they had been banished permanently last time.", Viper remarked sarcastically and yelped when she was hit in the head by Uncle.
"How could Uncle know that the power of the Meng Hsie pendant was powerful enough to open the portals again?! That's why we are here! The Zhou Wen library is the best in magic!", Uncle snapped. They arrived at the library and slowly walked for the long corridor. Two wizards were in front of the door of the secret room and one of them raised a hand to stop the group.
"Sorry, only chi-wizards can enter..."
"What? But why?", El Toro asked and Jackie shook his head.
"Never mind. They do that for safety reasons. There are a lot of important thing kept at that library.", Jackie said and they turned around to go to the other side of the room and sit in a sofa while Uncle and Tohru went in the library.
"Paco, what happened? You don't look very well...", El Toro commented and the boy sighed.
"It's nothing... I'm just worried about Jade..." He raised his gaze to see that El Toro was staring strangely at him."...and Jack.", Paco completed to disguise his feelings.
"Don't worry, we'll save them."
"Yeah, you should relax, because this will take a while.", Viper said and suddenly, the door was opened.
"HOT CHAAA!!!!", Uncle yelled and they yelped in surprise.
"Uncle, you found out something already?", Jackie asked standing up.
"No, I was just asking for tea. Uncle cannot research properly without a good tea.", the old man said calmly and Jackie moaned in frustration, lowering his shoulders. A lady quickly came to bring tea and he went back to the library. Jackie folded his arms impatiently. He still was very worried about his son and his niece.
The two wizards were talking about something and because the room wasn't very large, Jackie listened to them.
"Did you know? When Han got here, the front door and this one were open!"
"Do you think someone entered here without permission?"
"Well, perhaps it has been Kimu. He already did that several times, remember?"
"True... He's very absent-minded..."
"Yes, it might have been quite so, since any book or artifact was stolen..."
Jackie frowned and rubbed his chin. Maybe it has been the demons...? Would it be possible?
"Oh, great! So there was a secret passage right below my bed...", Jade murmured sarcastically while she and Valmont walked for a dark corridor, fumbling the wall in order not to go against it. It was pitch-black and Jade followed the sound of his steps to know to where she had to go. Suddenly, he stopped and she bumped into him.
"Aw!"
"Sorry..."
"We... arrived.", he said and Jade slit her eyes trying to see something, but she didn't manage to. She wondered how Valmont knew where they were going.
"What direction now? Forward?"
"No, upward. There's a type of ladder here."
Jade heard Valmont opening a kind of metal door and felt better when she could see some light. She also went up and when arrived, saw that hey had just came from a storm drain in an alley. Actually, it was not a storm drain, but a passage that looked like one.
"Is Uncle's shop very far away from here...?", Jade wondered.
"Yes... the best thing would be to take a taxi..."
"Hello? Taxi this late?", Jade said sarcastically and they heard a sound of a motorcycle approaching. Jade went to the middle of the street and stretched out her arms. "Stop!!", she ordered and the motorcycle almost ran over her.
"Are you crazy? Do you want to die, girl?", the man in the motorcycle snapped and Jade grabbed him by his collar and threw him out the vehicle. "Hey!", the man protested, but Jade ignored him getting on it and gesturing Valmont to go with her.
"Sorry, I will bring it back later, thank you!", she said quickly before accelerating and going away.
Hsi said to his siblings that he was going to see if the slaves were behaving and went upstairs. Actually, he just wanted to see Jade. For some reason she fascinated him. Perhaps it was because of her unique character, she wasn't like the other humans. Well, Hsi didn't know, he just knew that he wanted to see her again. Though he would never let his siblings know it.
The sky demon unlocked the door and when entered the room, saw that nobody was there. He was completely confused, after all it wasn't possible to get out through the window – since simply there wasn't any window – or through the door, which was locked. He slapped his forehead in despair. The whole plan of them could be ruined because of that!
He flew to where his siblings were gathered and they immediately noted his urgency expression.
"What is the problem, Hsi?", Tso Lan asked.
"Did something happen?", Tchang Zu wanted to know.
"The slaves ran away!", Hsi announced and the other demons widened their eyes.
"Well, what are you waiting for? Bai Tsa, Hsi Wu! They are your slaves! Go after them!", Tchang ordered.
"Hurry, they mustn't have gone very far.", Po Kong said.
"That's right! If something goes wrong because of them, you two will be responsible!", the thunder demons snapped pointing at them. Without wasting more time, they left the house. Hsi Wu was glad that there wasn't anybody in the streets this late, thus he would be able to look for Jade faster.
"Oh, no..."
'Closed'
"Oh, no!"
'Closed'
"Oh, no!!!!!"
'Closed'
"OH, NOOOOO!!!!!!!!", Jade yelled in despair while seeing the sign in the door with the word 'Closed', and the lights inside the shop were all turned off, indicating that nobody was there. Valmont felt equally desperate, but he didn't want to express it with yells like Jade, since he barely could breathe without a certain pain.
"But why they are not here??? Uncle should be researching a way to banish the demons or preparing a spell!!! Where are they?!?!?!?!", Jade shouted hitting the door with her fist.
"Have you already thought of how ironic it would be if they were fighting against the demons right now?", Valmont remarked.
"No! It's not possible that they have found out how to seal the demons in such a short while with Uncle's books! They must have gone to another place, to ask for help maybe!"
"Perhaps..."
"...the Section 13!"
"Well, then you go there while I-"
"C'mon, Valmont! You can't stay here alone! Soon the demons will notice that we ran away and will come to hunt us!"
"There you are!", a very familiar voice was heard and they two looked surprised to the left side of the shop. Hsi Wu and Bai Tsa were glaring at them, though Hsi was smirking sarcastically.
"You know, Jade, you are very lucky. Usually in a situation like this, Tchang Zu would sentence you to death. Or that another thing we talked about...", the sky demon said and the two humans stepped back. Hsi Wu flew close to her. "Now be a good girl and come back with me before something bad happens."
"Being demons' prisoner already is the worst thing that could happen to me!", Jade shouted.
"Are you sure?" Hsi closed his eyes and laughed a bit in a low voice before looking at her again. "I can see that you don't know what real suffering is.", he continued and grabbed her, immobilizing her.
"Ahh! No! Let me go!"
"Come on, Jade. Don't make me show you what real suffering is.", he hissed and turned to face his sister. "Take your slave and let's go back before Tchang Zu decides to turn us inside out."
"You don't have to remind me of that...", the water demon said and approached of Valmont. "It seems that this human doesn't care about his daughter now, but let's see his regret face when I torture her right before his eyes...", she threatened in amuse, but Valmont was not ready to fail in an escape for the third time.
"Stay away from me, demon!", he demanded taking a fight position and Bai Tsa slit her eyes and smirked. It has been a long time since a slave of hers challenged her like that.
Jade tried to break free from the demon's grip, but when she didn't get any result, she decided to use less common methods. She then bit his arm and Hsi yelped because of the slight pain, and for a brief moment he stopped squeezing her. Enough time for Jade to move and elbow him in his stomach. She moved away from him and also took a fight position.