A chill went down Misha's spine.
"How do you know that's what she is?" he asked. He trusted Bran, but he also found it hard to believe that the sad woman he'd met earlier that day would have such evil intentions.
"Intuition," replied Bran. He could tell Misha wasn't satisfied with that response. "I'll explain more to you later, promise."
Misha bit his lower lip and nodded. While he had his doubts, he was also very aware that he wasn't the best judge of character, especially not when all this supernatural stuff was in the mix.
"What now?" he asked.
"Now, you head back home," said Bran, plucking the compass jar from Misha's hand.
"What?"
"It's more dangerous than I thought it would be and I don't want to make any more mistakes. Do you know the way back?"
Trusting Bran's judgement that the woman was a gui that likes to kidnap children was one thing, but letting him push him out of the equation was not something Misha would stand for.
"No," he said. "I'm helping."
"Misha."
"No, listen." Misha pointed at the white, ghost-like flag trailing off from Bran's sword into the darkness. "That wispy thing it's another compass spell, right? You're tracking the… the…"
"Gu-huo-niao."
"Right. Her. Well," Misha tried to take the jar back from Bran, "while you're looking for her, I can keep looking for the grandpa."
"Misha…"
"I'm serious," said Misha.
"Alright, and if you find him? How are you going to talk to him?" asked Bran.
"You said I can understand other languages."
"That only counts for gui, yao, shen[1], and other beings like that, not humans."
Another time Misha would have asked why, but, of course, this time he did not. "Let me be useful," he said, trying another tact. "I won't help at all if I'm just sitting at home. Sure, maybe I won't be able to do anything, but being out here means I have a chance to do something."
"But-"
"I won't get hurt," said Misha. "If something happens to me, if the gu-huo-niao attacks me, I'll transform into a dragon. That's what happened with my father, and I knew even less then." He took a step closer to Bran and looked into his eyes. "Please?"
Bran looked away then sighed.
He held the jar out to Misha.
"If you really do get in trouble, don't try to suppress the transformation. Just let it happen. Follow your instincts. Don't worry about being seen. If someone does see you, there are ways of dealing with that. Just… be careful."
Misha nodded and took the jar.
--
The further down I went following the tuggings of the ink in the jar, the more the environment around me changed.
No more were there cosy restaurants with happy families or couples on wholesome dates. Instead, there were dim streets and cold, red lights and the kind of people who gravitate to that kind of company.
A few times women in heavy makeup and short skirts called out to me or even walked up to me but, after giving them a once over and confirming they weren't the gu-huo-niao, I pushed passed them, hoping they wouldn't keep pushing the point. And, to my surprise, they didn't. Perhaps the way I was walking around holding up a jar of chili sauce made them think twice.
And still the ink blobs in the jar directed me down.
I didn't recall how many storeys high the buildings had been when we'd come out of the train station at ground level, but surely, I was past that by now. Did the Walled City have buildings underground as well? I hadn't heard any mention of them in the movies, but I knew film was hardly a good source of information.
I shook my coat a little to get some of the rain off and drew it closer around me. The night was warm, but all the rain had still found a way beneath the plastic and into my clothes. I shivered.
There was hardly anyone on the streets now, but I could see blue and red lights reflect off the wet ground. I slowed and peered around the corner. I had a feeling I knew what I'd see.
Some metres away, part way down the street were a pair of police motorcycles with flashing lights lighting up the misty rain. Near them were a pair of officers using blue and white tape to cordon off the rest of the street. And, naturally, just outside the tape were a crowd of onlookers, some even with their phones out recording and taking pictures. Despite the situation I had to admire their dedication in this kind of weather.
I checked the jar and saw that it wanted me to go that way. Was the old man nearby, in the building, or perhaps further along?
I went closer to the crowd, but I couldn't understand anything that they were saying and looking around didn't help. Your words earlier about not being able to talk to people replayed in my head.
I left the corner and continued walking. The layout of the place was unpredictable, but I'd found a bit of a pattern on my way down and I had a feeling that if I went a bit further, then turned, I should be able to circumvent the scene and test where exactly the jar was taking me.
I reached another turn and was about to give the jar another wipe to better see the ink when movement up ahead caught my attention.
It was the woman. The gu-huo-niao.
The woman looked at me, then ducked into an alleyway. I raced forward without thinking and rounded the corner…
And found it empty.
The alley was a dead-end with only the exhausts of air-conditioning units lining the ground and walls. I took a few steps forward, peering up into the rain to see if the woman had somehow climbed up to some higher level. She looked frail but if she was a gui, then, well, maybe she had superpowers in this department.
Then I saw it.
The blood streaming down the walls.
There wasn't a lot, just a few trails at the end of the alley, but it stood out from the light grey walls. I put the jar into the pocket of my raincoat and grit my teeth then walked closer. I didn't really want to, but after what I said to you earlier, I wasn't going to back down now. Even if you never found out, I wouldn't be able to live with the embarrassment.
But as I got near the wall, I realised that my initial aversion might be misplaced. It wasn't blood that was dripping down the walls, it was something else, something that looked a lot like a soup of all those little spell inscriptions you'd showed me earlier - not the same, but very similar.
I reached out a hand and touched the 'blood' and instead of running over my fingers like a liquid, it instead shifted along the wall to avoid me. I chanced the red specks, but they continued to swirl and jump out of my grasp.
Okay. Definitely not blood then.
I stepped back and cast a more level-headed eye over the whole scene.
It was spooky, yes - like a scene out of a mid-tier jRPG - but not nearly as scary as I thought. If anything, I was intrigued. Clearly it was some kind of supernatural something and I had a feeling I knew what it was.
I stepped under one of the larger air-conditioning units and fumbled around to get the charm off my tail. Brushing the rain off the surface of the wood, I then stepped back into the rain and went up to carefully compare the carvings on the wood to the endlessly trailing red markings on the wall. They were nearly identical.
I tied the charm back on my tail then got out my little ink jar just to be sure. And, low and behold, while the majority of the ink clearly wanted to go back the way I'd come, a small section was now pressed up against the bit of jar closest to the wall.
I'd found the girl, or at least, I'd found the 'Coil' that she was in and determined that this 'Coil', whatever it really is, was related to the spell that tries to push attention away from itself.
So how to get in?
I recalled your instructions on how spells work, that they need three things: an inscription, a medium, and an energy source.
For the little charm on my tail, you said that since it was supposed to push attention away from its subject, not entirely shield them from prying eyes, it could function on just the ambient energy in the immediate environment around it - no need for a proper battery.
To achieve this energy efficiency, when the subject of the charm, my tail in this case, wasn't being looked at, the charm would go dormant and would only start to function when attention was being thrown its way, kind of like an automatic door.
So, what about this Coil? To fit an entire person inside, even a small one, it had to be a lot bigger and need a lot more energy. Could it still run on the same pay-as-you-go system or did it need an actual proper energy source. I looked around, trying to see if I could spot any sparks of light or anything else that might indicate where the power was coming from.
I saw nothing.
[1] 鬼，妖，神