Chapter 652 - Mood Swings
Hao Xuan stood in front of that crack in the ground that was referenced to in one of the more coherent whispers while talking out loud to Baracus. The pug was still behind him, at a distance of five meters exactly.
It heard his side of the conversation with Baracus which was, in turn, transmitted back to Princess Na'im, leaving her quite confused and wanting even more questions than before.
"Who is he talking to? He doesn't seem to be 'touched' but the things he is saying..." she mumbled with knitted brows. (AN: touched means mad/insane/unhinged here, i.e touched by the spirits)
Hao Xuan still had no idea of the pug's presence even after this much time had elapsed. It exhibited almost no signs of life, no aura, no energy signature, made no noise, and kept just enough distance to pick up his movements clearly all the while hiding itself in plain sight.
Whatever kind of creature it was, it was made for tailing people.
After finishing up his conversation with Baracus Hao Xuan set out once again. Every few steps he would pause for a short moment, close his eyes as if listening for something before continue moving in a slightly different direction.
There were a few times he had to turn around completely and go in a different direction altogether which kept surprising Princess Na'im more and more.
She was bewildered seeing his strange behavior. Her eyes narrowed to slits looking at the surroundings and when she realized where he was headed, she couldn't help but be left dumbstruck.
She shot up from the bed, her hands clenched into tight fists, "How...is this possible?!? How could he know?!"
She wanted to jump down and run after him, torture him if need be to find out who he really was but she held back in the end, deciding to simply watch from the shadows for now. It would be only a matter of time before he would give something away.
**
Meanwhile, Hao Xuan was wholly focused on the whispers as he moved through the forest arbitrarily. Depending on where he was, which direction he was facing, and sometimes even where he "intended" to go, the whispers changed accordingly.
It was far too similar to tuning into a radio station, trying over and over again to find just the right spot.
After about an hour of this aimless wandering, Hao Xuan passed through a tumultuous region that suddenly descended deeper into the ground and reached a small clearing at the end of it. The whispers in this place were so extremely loud and so many all at once that he even lost track of the ones he was initially following.
In fact, he was so distracted by them that he did not even notice the gradual increase in the spiritual energy in the surroundings.
There were hundreds of whispers if not more, and each of them was wreathed in anguish and misery from start to finish. Hao Xuan opened his mind and allowed to them to enter so he could listen clearly and try to make some sense.
"No please, please let me go, I swear I didn't mean to!"
"I will do whatever you want, just let my family go!"
"YOU LIAR! You promised!"
"You monster! You beast! I curse you! I curse your entire family! May you never find peace in this world or the next!"
"Mommy...it's so cold...mommy...I'm hungry...
"Shh shh, I'm sorry my love, here drink this. It will all be over soon..."
With closed eyes and a furrowed brow, Hao Xuan listened in. Almost all of the whispers were either begging, crying for help, or cursing. He opened his eyes after a few minutes and his previous cheerful mood was gone without a trace. The whispers were affecting his mood and state of mind to a degree.
Hao Xuan looked around at the clearing. It was only 5-6 meters in size with one lonely tree trunk in the center. The rest of the area was covered in a strange black and purple grass that was 10-15 centimeters tall.
The tree trunk itself was extremely old, seemingly hundreds of years if not more. It was cut in half or rather, burned until only the stump remained. Hao Xuan could see the fern-like burn marks all around it that pointed towards some sort of lightning striking it repeatedly.
Some of the patterns were so old that looked like fossils while the others were quite fresh, not more than a few months old from the looks of it.
The whispers had turned into high-pitched screaming now. Hao Xuan closed off his mind and took out another cigarette from the storage space. His gaze cold, lacking any sort of empathy.
"A lot of people died here," he muttered peering towards the shimmering blue and purple silhouette hiding within the tree trunk.