Of Foxfire and Cultivation Ch.16 (Patreon)

Onari dismissed the illusion surrounding him and Yu Wu as they began to walk the streets of Seoul. Their swords were also put away, and to the rest of the world, they looked like a normal teenage couple. Their supernatural beauty did draw some eyes though…

In the city of Seoul, the darkness of the night was simultaneously pushed away and welcomed. Neon lights shined down on the people walking the streets. Long shadows were cast onto every available surface and seemed to warp the moment one looked away from them.

Onari and Yu Wu found themselves on what looked to be a purely pedestrian street filled with bars and clubs. Even this late at night, the street was still busy and filled with drunk people. Cheers and music flowed out of open bar doors, making the whole street feel more alive.

Yu Wu hummed along to a faint song she recognized. She gasped, getting an idea when it ended, “We should go karaoke!”

Onari winced, “The last time we did karaoke, you got us kicked out after the second song.”

“It’s not my fault that their booths can’t withstand a dancing cultivator,” Yu Wu pouted.

“Do you really think the karaoke rooms in Korea are gonna be any better?”

“... No,” Yu Wu mumbled, still pouting.

Onari put his arm around Yu Wu as they walked, making her quickly abandon her pout and cuddle into his side. Their aimless wandering of Seoul continued. The brightly lit main streets soon began to blur into more shady side streets and alleys.

They started to regularly stop and observe the goings-on of these dark alleyways. It was kind of like visiting a zoo for the two cultivators. The late night happenings of these alleys made for good people watching.

From the simple stuff, like people smoking and loitering, to the more intense, like prostitutes propositioning and servicing their Johns. Yu Wu and Onari began to build a mental picture of the more hidden side of the city from the slices of night life they saw in these alleys. Even Seoul’s supernatural population occasionally made themselves known as Yu Wu and Onari walked the dark streets.

They watched a demi-goddess drag what could only be a drunk god out of a titty bar. The god was a white-haired old man wearing a monocle and he kept making grabbing motions at the strip club’s door as he was dragged away. The woman was acting like she had done this exact ‘escape’ a thousand times before.

That particular scene made Onari and Yu Wu exchange looks and giggles, but it wasn’t the only supernatural occurrence of the night. Seoul’s supernatural scene seemed to be alive and thriving tonight. Soon after, they ran into another supernatural incident.

The couple stopped at the mouth of one alley. Peering into the shadows, they saw a group of what looked like Yakuza thugs facing off against what they could sense was a devil. The devil wasn’t very strong, but the thugs obviously didn’t know how outmatched they were so Onari and Yu Wu felt content to just watch the alleyway confrontation unfold.

Devil ages are notoriously hard to guess from appearance alone, but the devil looked to be a young girl in her late teens. Like all devils, she was supernaturally beautiful, but her appeal seemed to lean more towards cute, girl-next-door than the classic dark femme fatale stereotype.

Her body was still ridiculously sexy though. She was even shorter than Yu Wu, yet her body was actually curvier than the young mistress’. When combined with her thicc shortstack stature, the devil’s innocent face and aura made her look like the perfect target to corrupt and play with.

“Whatcha starin’ at, brat?! You lookin’ fer trouble?!” The lead Yakuza thug said. “We just claimed this turf, girlie. Run along home before we decide to have some fun~ with you…”

The young devil girl just giggled, “Hehe, sorry, mister. I’ve gotta inform you that this area is already under someone’s control. The South City Jopoks send their regards.”

(AN: Jopok is basically the Korean version of Yakuza.)

The Yakuza thugs started cracking their knuckles and approaching the girl threateningly, “Haaaa?! You workin’ fer those goons?!”

“No…” the devil girl said, tapping her lower lip and cocking her head cutely. “They work for me.”

The lighting in the alley took on a neon tint as she said that. The Yakuza began to look around, confused, as the girl slowly rose into the air. She let out her bat-like wings. Demonic power crackled in her hands.

“Shit! It’s one of those freaks!” one of the thugs yelled.

The devil girl pretended to pout, “That’s not very nice. I’ll have you know, I’m perfectly normal for a young devil.”

“Scatter!” another thug shouted.

The girl sighed as the fully grown men turned and ran, stumbling over themselves to get away from a teenage girl. Jagged bolts of lightning shot out of magic circles that manifested over her hands. Starting with the thug that had gotten the farthest, the group of Yakuza were cut down one by one with holes the lightning seared through their hearts.

A silence fell over the alley as the last thug fell. The young girl slowly hovered back down to the ground. Her wings faded into her back, making her look like a normal girl once more.

“Now I gotta take care of the bodies,” she grumbled. “Ah, fuck it. I’ll just call the boys and tell them to clean up after me. It’s too late for me to be dealing with menial work like this.”

As the girl turned and started walking down the alley away from them, Yu Wu turned to Onari. She had a devious smile on her face.

“Do you know what I’m thinking?” Yu Wu asked.

Onari sighed, “Probably…”

“She is perfect hookup material.”

“We don’t even know her and we just watched her slaughter a group of goons.”

Yu Wu rolled her eyes, “I’m not saying you have to date her. It’s just a hookup. Ya know, a one-night stand? Completely casual sex? I just think she’s cute and I want you to play with her a bit. We’ll give her a night she’ll never forget and then be gone in the morning.”

“Yeah, I’m gonna have to veto that idea for now. She’s hot, but I don’t think I’m a hookup kind of person.”

“Fine… Let’s at least follow her though. My mystery senses are tingling and it’s not like we have anything better to do for a few hours.”

“Not hungry anymore?”

Yu Wu waved off the idea of food, “Nah, now I’m curious why a High-class devil is involved with what sounds like a street gang.”

“It’s really none of our business…”

“Bah! Everything is our business! We’re cultivators. It’s basically our job to be overly nosy and then reap unexpected rewards because we’re favored by the heavens.”

“That’s not tru-...” Onari started to say before he stopped to actually think about it. “... Wow. Yeah, I guess that is kind of accurate.”

Yu Wu giggled, “Of course it is! This young mistress has studied all of the sacred texts after all!”

“You can’t call your Wuxia and Xianxia novels ‘sacred texts’. The real world doesn’t work like that,” Onari deadpanned.

“It totally does. You just keep yourself willingly ignorant of real life tropes. Do not worry though! This genre-savvy young mistress is here to help!”

Onari and Yu Wu continued to bicker playfully about the veracity of tropes in real life as they followed after the young devil girl. The devil unknowingly led them through the streets of Seoul with obvious familiarity. The streets got darker and darker as they trailed after this girl.

Suddenly, the girl turned a corner and ducked into a small walking tunnel. When Onari and Yu Wu followed and turned the same corner, they were struck by a blinding amount of light. Up until this point, the streets leading up to this place had only been lit by street lamps sparsely placed along the side of the road.

The light streamed through the tunnel, silhouetting the girl as she walked out the tunnel’s other side. Onari turned to Yu Wu and shot her a look with a raised eyebrow. Yu Wu looked more curious than ever, walking forward and motioning for him to follow her.

As they breached the other side of the tunnel, they were greeted with an interesting sight. The tunnel was apparently some kind of service tunnel or entrance for an abandoned facility. The facility itself was spacious enough to hold hundreds of people. Which was appropriate because that’s exactly what it was doing at this moment.

The old factory had been cleared out and a whole shanty town had been built in its place. Scrap metal, wood, and leftover components from the factory formed makeshift houses and tents that decorated the facility’s floor.

Surprisingly, the inhabitants of this factory shanty town didn’t look like typical homeless people. Some wore their hair spiked or gelled back like delinquents. Some wore suits that, while worn, were definitely not cheap. Others just looked like normal people who had been displaced from their lives by something disruptive.

People greeted and bowed to the devil girl as she walked through the shanty town. She was obviously well-known and well-liked here. She greeted everyone back equally with a genuine smile on her face. Even the delinquent guards patrolling the shanty town stopped their routes and waved to the devil girl.

Thankful for how well Onari’s illusions concealed them, Onari and Yu Wu slipped into the shanty town. They ghosted after the devil girl from a closer distance while still keeping their eyes open and observing the rest of their surroundings. What they saw was both concerning and heartwarming.

This small town seemed to be the result of a community banding together. They all looked to have gone through some tough times, but they stuck together and managed to build something unconventionally beautiful here. The devil girl seemed to be part of the glue that held this community together.

The girl walked to the center of the shanty town. The makeshift building there was slightly better crafted and bigger than the buildings surrounding it. She stepped into the obvious headquarters. Onari and Yu Wu slipped in behind her.

Once inside, the devil girl was greeted by a mousy-looking young man who couldn’t seem to stay still for a single second. He was constantly twitching and seemed to have been awaiting the devil’s return. He jumped slightly when he saw her, clutching his clipboard to his chest in a way that indicated more surprise than fear.

“C-Cho Soo-Yun!” he squeaked. “Y-You’re back…”

“Sure am, lil’ secretary buddy!” Cho Soo-Yun said, half acting and half genuine. “What’dya got for me tonight? Oh, also, we have to send the boys to take care of some bodies. Some of those Japanese assholes got uppity again.”

“... Noted, boss,” the mousy man said, scrambling to follow after Cho Soo-Yun as she walked further into the building.

They finally made their way into a private room and Cho Soo-Yun was able to drop her cutesy facade. She was still cute without the over-the-top cuteness act, but the difference was very noticeable for people who had seen her with the act and without.

Soo-Yun sighed, “The Yakuza are only getting more and more bold, Ryu Young. I don’t know how much longer we can resist their advances…”

The mousy man, Ryu Young, winced, “Uh, about that, boss… Some of our boys have been telling me that they’ve started seeing demons working with the Yakuza.”

“What kind of demons?” Soo-Yun hesitantly asked.

“Uhm... The Japanese kind, boss?”

Soo-Yun facepalmed, “Helpful… Just… Just leave your notes here and go do something useful.”

“Yes, boss. Right away, boss,” Ryu Young squeaked before dropping his clipboard on the desk in the room and scampering out.

Sitting down at the shabby table in the room, Soo-Yun sighed and began to read the notes. As she read, she became more and more distressed. When she finished, her head dropped into her hands.

“What am I gonna do?” she asked herself. “Things were bad enough when it was just human thugs coming in and wrecking shit. But now, the Yakuza have allied themselves with Hells-damned Youkai?! How are we supposed to survive this shit?...”

Soo-Yun fell into a stressed and almost hopeless silence. Yu Wu glanced at Onari and nudged him with her elbow.

‘See?’ Yu Wu expressed over the bond. ‘It pays to be nosy as a cultivator.’

‘I mean… yeah, we should probably do something about the rogue Youkai. I don’t see how that’s a reward though. It’s kinda just my job to keep strays from making the whole faction look bad,’ Onari replied.

‘Not just that,’ Yu Wu rolled her eyes. ‘We get to help a cute girl protect the homeless. And we can get proof that some Youkai are working with the Yakuza. If they’re working together here, then they’re definitely working together back home.

Yu Wu continued, walking Onari through the political implications step by step, ‘Cracking down on Youkai-Yakuza relations will get you a lot of goodwill and political influence. Even Tsukuyomi will like you more since you’ll be fighting the impure and criminal aspects of society. It might even be enough to make him stop backing Nurarihyon’s play to put his son in your place.’

‘... So the unexpected rewards are mostly political?’

‘Don’t forget the karma from helping a cute girl defend the homeless! But honestly, yeah. Breaking up a Youkai-Yakuza crime ring will do wonders to secure and strengthen your position within the faction.’

‘It’s a good thing I have you to help explain this kind of stuff. I still don’t get how you're so fluent in politics…’

‘Once again, thank the sacred texts! Now go offer the cute girl our help before she starts crying!’

Onari rolled his eyes as he allowed the illusion around them to fade. Soo-Yun did seem to be worryingly close to tears. Clearing his throat, he spoke.

Onari’s voice emerged from the room’s shadows, “Well, well, well… It seems like this little situation just became my business.”

Soo-Yun went rigid, looking around the room for the source of the voice, “What?! Who’s there? How did you get in here?”

Lightning was crackling around Soo-Yun’s hands as Onari and Yu Wu stepped out of the shadows, “Be calm, little bat. We come in peace. I believe we may be able to help you with your Youkai problem.”

Soo-Yun tried to play tough, “Oh, yeah? S-Says who?”

“Just a curious couple who happened to see your troubles while they were passing by.”

“Then why would you be able to help me?”

Yu Wu cut in, “Do you not understand who you speak to?!? You have eyes but you cannot see Mount Tai?! Onari Fokushi and his loving fiance, Young Mistress Yu Wu, stand before you!”

“That… still doesn’t tell me anything… I don’t know who you are.”

Yu Wu pretended to fume as Onari chuckled, “That’s understandable. We don’t really put our names out into the wider supernatural community all that often. Allow me to introduce myself. I’m Onari, the current heir to the Youkai faction. That is why I think I would be able to help solve some of your troubles.”

“Youkai are the source of my troubles!” Soo-Yun hissed. “Why would I trust another Youkai to help solve them?!”

“Because right now, we’re the only ones who can solve your problems. I am willing to give you my word that we mean you no harm and that we are neither the cause of your Youkai problem or associated with the Youkai who have allied with your enemies.”

“Swear?” Soo-Yun’s desperation won out after a minute of silence.

“I swear.”

“... Do you have any proof you are who you say you are?”

Onari shrugged, “Probably none you would immediately recognize.”

“You’re asking for a lot of trust from someone you don’t even know.”

“I’m aware of that. But really the only way for me to prove I’m worthy of that trust is through my actions.”

“And I really don’t have any other options…”

“I do not envy your position.”

“... Why are you helping me?”

“I gained a vested interest in this situation the moment Youkai became involved. I cannot have strays and rogues making my people look bad.”

“How did you even know I needed help? In fact, why are you even here right now?”

“Oh, that’s easy! We saw you killing all those thugs earlier. Seeing such a cute girl act so ruthlessly was really hot so we followed you! Basically pure coincidence!” Yu Wu chimed in, completely unashamed of how that sounded.

Soo-Yun was struck speechless for a few moments before she began to giggle uncontrollably, “Hehehehe, this is so surreal. A foreign prince comes and offers me aid in my time of need… Then his sexy fiancee tells me they were basically stalking me because they thought I was hot? This is like something straight out of fanfiction!”

Eventually, she managed to stop giggling, take a breath, and put on her serious face, “Right. How are we going to do this?”

“If you know where the Yakuza headquarters is, we can probably take care of this within the hour. Do you want the Yakuza gone too?” Onari said.

Soo-Yun nodded, “Yes, but I’ll take care of the Yakuza personally. They pushed my people out of their homes. They took our turf and jobs. Driving them out is my responsibility. You can just focus on the Youkai.”

“How did a High-class devil end up involved with these people anyways?” Yu Wu asked.

Soo-Yun looked hesitant, but still explained, “I’m a reincarnated devil. I was born into this community. My father was an office worker and my mother ran one of the neighborhood Jopoks. When the Yakuza basically invaded Seoul, they were both killed to make an example. My king found me afterwards and offered me the power to control my fate…

“I obviously took it. I spent about a year gaining strength. When I reached High-class, my king allowed me to come back to my roots and resolve my unfinished business with the Yakuza. When I returned, my old neighborhood was gone. All of the residents had been forced out of their homes. I searched the city for them and eventually found this little shanty town.

“I’ve been watching over them for almost half a year now. Fighting a defensive war for them. I became their boss and protector. Every day I worry about my king calling me back into her service prematurely. I don’t know what will happen to the town if I’m not here…”

“Who’s your king?” Onari asked.

“Seekvaira Agares. I’m one of her pawns.”

Onari nodded, “It might not be my place to say anything, but why don’t you just talk to your king about your problems? She’s a devil heiress. She may be able to do more for your people than you can do alone.”

“I’ll… I’ll think about it. For now though, we have more important business to take care of…”

The Yakuza base was only a 20 minute walk from the shanty town. For supernatural beings like Onari, Yu Wu, and Soo-Yun, it took less than a minute to fly there. The main group of Yakuza that had ‘invaded’ Seoul had taken up residence in an isolated compound located on the bank of the Han River.

The compound consisted of an office building and warehouse combo that was walled in by a metal-bar fence. Even this late at night, the compound was well guarded. A number of suit-wearing thugs sat at the main entrance, and even more thugs patrolled the fence’s interior.

Before Onari or Yu Wu could ask how they were going to approach this, Soo-Yun was already landing and walking up to the main entrance. Onari and Yu Wu shrugged and followed after her. This was her crusade after all.

“Hello, boys~ Will one of you do me a favor and go get the rest of your gang?” Soo-Yun said, sauntering up to the gate with swaying hips.

Most of the thugs openly admired the cute shortstack that had just appeared in front of them. One or two went stiff though, recognizing Soo-Yun as the Jopok devil that had killed so many of their brothers over this past half year. One of them, probably the smartest thug in the group, even scrambled off to do as she requested and get reinforcements.

One of the thugs leered at Soo-Yun, “You tryna let the whole team hit? Hell, let me go first. I’ll show ya a good time and satisfy you more than any of these bozos can.”

“As if I’d let any of you scum lay a finger on me,” Soo-Yun scoffed. “You know what? Just for that, you get to die first.”

The thug didn’t even manage to get out a “What?” before he was seared to a crisp by lightning. A small storm cloud gathered above Soo-Yun’s head, expanding by the second as she released more demonic power and pent-up frustration. A barrage of lightning bolts fell from the cloud, absolutely decimating the group of Yakuza.

Even as Yakuza reinforcements began to stream out of the compound, the storm cloud above Soo-Yun was more than enough to handle them. A year and a half of rage and hurt was being expressed through her magical lightning and she wasn’t about to stop until this group of Yakuza was wiped off the face of Seoul.

“This is for my mother. This is for my father. This is for my friends and neighbors and my home! You bastards only brought this upon yourselves!”

Each of her sentences were punctuated by another flash of lightning. Thunder rolled out of the growing cloud almost constantly. Thugs were flash-fried in droves, leaving nothing left of the Yakuza but literal ashes in the wind.

Onari glanced at Yu Wu awkwardly, “... We should probably just go deal with the Youkai. She has a lot of… stuff to work out.”

Yu Wu nodded, “Yeah, let’s let her work out her anger on the goons while we fulfill our promise of aid. Still, you can’t tell me this isn’t kinda hot as fuck…”

Onari coughed into his hand, “... I’ll admit that the cute, but vicious thing does kinda do it for me. She’d make a great yandere…”

Yu Wu gasped as they casually walked past the raging Soo-Yun and dying Yakuza, “That’s the word I was missing! Hell yes, she would!”

Onari sent a pulse of sensing Qi deeper into the compound. He was looking for the telltale Qi signature of a Youkai and he quickly found what he was looking for.

“Oni,” he sighed. “How cliche…”

Yu Wu hummed, “Hmm, got a seal ready?”

“Yup,” Onari said, brandishing a paper ofuda between two of his fingers. “You wanna take care of this one?”

“Un, I’m faster than you anyway. They won’t even see me coming.”

Onari handed the ofuda to Yu Wu as they approached the door to the compound’s warehouse. It appeared that the Oni had made themselves at home in the warehouse while the office building was used by the human Yakuza. In an instant, Yu Wu disappeared into the warehouse, not even leaving an afterimage where she was previously standing.

Yu Wu darted through the warehouse faster than the eye could see. Her sword intent manifested around her. She didn’t even need to draw her blade for her Qi to take on the razor-sharp nature of a sword. The physical world seemed to freeze as she passed.

First, she slapped the ofuda seal onto an Oni who had passed out from drinking too much. The Oni didn’t even have time to disappear into the seal before Yu Wu was moving on to her next target. With her hands shaped like knives, Yu Wu sliced through another Oni’s throat.

Without a single second passing, she repeated that process six more times. The blood from her cuts hadn’t had time to spurt from the wounds before she was finished annihilating the group of criminal Oni. With a calm exhale, she came to an abrupt halt in the center of the warehouse.

Time seemed to resume with her breath. Fountains of blood shot from the slit throats of the Oni around the room. The Oni Yu Wu intended to capture for later questioning was sucked into the Onari’s paper seal. Yu Wu’s sword intent Qi calmly disappeared like it was being sheathed in her soul.

She opened her eyes and smiled as Onari strolled into the warehouse and picked up the ofuda seal, “Piece of cake!”

“I didn’t expect anything less. Let’s go see if the yandere is finished with her wholesale slaughter.”

“Un!” Yu Wu hummed happily.

To a mortal, the killing might have had a bigger effect on their mood. But Onari and Yu Wu were cultivators. Both of them had killed before, and both knew that death was inevitable on the path to the heavens. They wouldn’t revel in it, but they also wouldn’t unnecessarily shy away from it.

‘Death is just one of those things about life that you have to accept and move on from,’ Yu Wu absently thought as she snuggled into her beloved’s side.

That absent thought dragged her mind back to her mother. Yu Long wasn’t dead, but right now, she was the next best thing to being dead. Yu Wu had no idea if she would ever speak to her mother again. Maybe this was just another thing about life she had to accept and move on from. Maybe she wouldn’t get the closure she so badly desired…

Onari tightened his grip on Yu Wu’s side, pulling her out of her melancholic thoughts. She shook her head to clear her mind. ‘Whether I get closure or not,’ she decided. ‘I’m still happy with how my life turned out…’