Martial Arts Worlds

Kiernan quickly grabbed an umbrella from the store's display, walked out into the downpour, and shielded himself from the rain.

He couldn't shake off the nagging feeling that someone was staring at him only moments ago.

With his honed senses that took him decades to develop, there weren't many times he was wrong.

Rumble!

With the loud rumble, silver lightning dazzled across the skies. It gave off bright light, brightening the front of the convenience store.

"Is that a handprint?"

Kiernan walked to the window and saw a handprint of slender fingers. It was quickly covered by the falling rain, though, which meant that the handprint was created only recently.

'I knew it! Where should I go?'

Kiernan turned his head around, followed his instincts, and started running down the street through the narrow, winding alleyways.

Splash! Splash! Splash!

His boots stepped over the puddles, but then he came to a stop and saw a woman walk ahead of him, her back turned against him.

She was wearing something that no one should wear in this weather—a thin, white gown that was completely drenched, and no undergarments to be seen.

"Hey, mind stopping and talking with me for a minute?"

Kiernan fearlessly called out towards her.

The people of Rotaker Island had learned one fact really quickly. Don't speak to any strange figures during the night.

She stopped walking, and with shaking shoulders, she turned around, looking frightened and very vulnerable, like an injured kitten.

Even the men with hearts as cold as stone couldn't help but feel a pang of pity for her.

"I-I am cold…"

She said, her teeth chattering as she wrapped her arms around herself.

'Maybe I am wrong. She doesn't seem like a person responsible for the kidnappings. I guess I encountered another weirdo.'

Kiernan thought at first and then asked.

"What're you doing here, young lady?"

"I…"

She turned back around again, lowered her head, and sobbed quietly.

Rumble!

Kiernan looked with annoyance towards the skies and then heard the woman shriek in fear, followed by her covering her ears and crouching down in horror.

He slowly approached her.

"Where do you live? Do you need me to take you there?"

When she heard those words, she looked at him with her innocent, teary eyes and slowly opened her mouth.

"T-take me home?"

"…"

Kiernan lowered his gaze from her innocent eyes to the rest of her body. The white gown barely covered anything, as it probably wasn't meant to.

'Hmm. A honey trap? Everyone who was kidnapped was a young man of my age. If they saw a vulnerable-looking girl walk alone in the rain, her naked body more than visible, and telling them to take her home, I don't think many could muster the willpower to say no.'

Kiernan offered her his hand and said.

"Sure, I'll take you home."

With a heartfelt smile, she accepted the hand, stood up, and then moved under the umbrella Kiernan was holding, standing so close to him that their shoulders, hips, and legs touched.

"Where to?"

Kiernan asked with a soft tone.

She just grabbed him by the hand and led him through the winding alleyways. Going through from one street to another, through more and more dark and narrow passageways.

In the end, they arrived at the cemetery with an arched entrance. The words on the arched entrance read, "To the fallen warriors of the Dead World."

"This is your home?"

Kiernan asked with a wry smile.

'Am I holding hands with a ghost or what?'

She didn't answer and instead entered the cemetery hand in hand. They went past rows of gravestones until they reached the center of it all.

There was one dug grave waiting for them.

Kiernan's nails sharpened like claws, and he looked at the young woman's exposed, slender neck.

'I guess she really was the responsible one. Should I just kill her off right now then?'

"The final sacrifice has arrived. Now, let me be free, demon queen…"

She collapsed on her knees, bawling her eyes out.

Swoosh!

The cold wind came, and from the thousands of graves, transparent ghosts emerged, filling the surrounding airspace with thousands of them.

The ghosts came down to the ground, stood tall, and cracked their ghostly knuckles. They all looked battle-hardened with bone-crushing fists and scars that were running across their entire bodies.

Kiernan wrapped his sharp-looking nails around the young woman's throat and said through the sound of falling rain.

"Who is this demon queen you speak of? Are you not working alone? How can you summon all these ghosts?"

"The monsters of the mist need six sacrifices. I… didn't have any other choice. The demon queen appeared in my dreams, forcing me to do this. If I didn't, I was going to die a painful death!"

She said through a pained cry.
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"These are all vengeful ghosts of Dead World warriors. During the time when the long-lost paradise vanished, about a thousand corpses floated from there to the shore of Rotaker Island.

"Rotaker Island dedicated this cemetery to honor the fallen warriors of the long-lost world. However, they come to life when six sacrifices are presented and deliver them to please the disgruntled moods of the mist monsters!"

"That demon queen told you all of this?"

"Yes… she told me a lot of things."

"Does that demon queen… live here?"

"I… don't know…"

"Those other young men… Are they already gone?"

"…Yes, their sacrificed spirits have already reached the mist."

At that moment, sharp, skull-splitting headache attacked her.

"Argh, it is her again! She is hurting me again! I might've said too much. Please, just make the pain stop and let the sacrifice be complete!

"If those mist monsters get free, they'll destroy everything!"

Kiernan let go of her throat and slowly walked past him. He dropped the umbrella, letting the rain drench him to the bone, and looked around the sky at the ghosts.

"Demon queens, ghosts, mist monsters—it all sounds very interesting, but I am here for a very simple job. I failed to retrieve Makariah's grandson. All I can offer him is revenge."

Kiernan's eyes turned red, then he shoveled his hands into the solid ground, and with his martial soul revving every inch of power into his muscles, he grabbed the ground and started to slowly lift it up.

CRACK! SPLIT…

In the eyes of the shocked ghosts, the entire cemetery was being lifted high into the air, thousands of the graves, all on top of that same block of soil.

"What're you doing? You're just going to anger the mist monsters!"

"Nah, I am just giving them something else to eat, like these ghosts, for example!"

Kiernan screamed loudly, the veins of his muscles bulging horrendously as if they were about to explode. The skin turned red, and his eyes glowed with a fiery intensity that seemed to burn through the darkness of the world around him.

"Iron Style, Worldlift!"