Blue Dragon

eyes blazed.
    ‘You should have told us this, my Lord,’ Leo said softly.
    ‘I thought I would be coming in after a week with the Lady,’ John said. ‘If I had spent that week with her, I would have been able to retain control long enough to see the demon destroyed. Now…’ His face didn’t shift. ‘I am very drained. It is best if I do not release the Turtle until we face One Two Two. Let’s go.’
    The door opened onto a wider corridor, but it didn’t go down. It did make a U-turn to go in the right direction though. We didn’t hesitate, we followed it. It was lined with the same white enamel panels and seemed to stretch forever.
    ‘Any corridors or turns or stairs up ahead?’ I said.
    Nobody said anything.
    ‘Can anybody see anything at all?’
    There was complete silence as we marched down the hallway.
    ‘Hold,’ the stone said. ‘I think I can sense some demons ahead on the left.’
    Nobody stopped.
    ‘Stop,’ I said. ‘The stone says there are demons up ahead on the left.’
    ‘You will need to relay for me now, Emma. I’m silenced,’ the stone said.
    The Immortals stopped and concentrated.
    ‘Hard to tell,’ the Phoenix said.
    ‘A large number of very big ones, about ten metres along this corridor on the left,’ Na Zha said. ‘I’ll take them. You go past.’
    ‘You sure?’ I said.
    Na Zha transformed into his True Form. His pale blue robes flowed around him and his long hair was down to his waist. He held his whip in his left hand and his ring weapon in his right.
    ‘Just go past,’ he said. ‘Let me take them.’ He shook out his shoulders. ‘I’ve been looking forward to having fun with some real opposition for a while. This should be good.’
    ‘Meet up with us later,’ John said. ‘Enjoy.’
    About fifty metres down the hallway, on the left side, was a door. The corridor turned a corner at the door and continued to the right. Na Zha stopped at the door and nodded to us as we went past. When we were about twenty metres away he opened the door and laughed loudly.
    We didn’t look back. We raced down the hallway. It turned a sharp left at the end. We went around.
    A slime waited for us. It was a fluorescent lurid shade of green and hung off the ceiling in a mucousy stringing curtain.
    ‘What the hell is that?’ Leo said behind me.
    ‘Slime,’ I said. ‘Very rare and highly toxic. Only energy can take it out. Impossible to tell how big it is until you’ve hit it. Energy workers have to be very careful with these; sometimes they’re big enough to kill you with the chi backlash, but you don’t know until you’ve tried.’
    ‘Then it’s obviously meant for you,’ Leo said.
    ‘Obviously,’ I said. ‘It’s probably big enough to kill me.’
    ‘That’s beside the point,’ the Phoenix said. She quickly transformed to True Form and blew a shaft of searing flame directly at the demon from her beak. It shrivelled, blackened and fell off the ceiling. The Phoenix turned back into her preferred human form, with flowing long red hair and a red robe.
    ‘Don’t step in it,’ she said as she lifted her robes to walk carefully over the smouldering mass on the floor.
    We all followed her, the Tiger leaping easily over the blackened slime. The corridor ended about ten metres away at another door. As one the Immortals stiffened and spun. The Dragon grabbed me and pulled me behind him.
    ‘What?’ I said.
    ‘Back,’ John said.
    ‘What?’ Leo said.
    ‘Ah Na Zha was taken down,’ the Dragon said softly. ‘I am not sure what these things are that destroyed him, but they are on their way.’
    We backed to the door. It was tiled with white enamel and didn’t have a handle. I gave it an experimental push. It didn’t move.
    The Dragon and the Phoenix transformed and moved into position in front of us.
    ‘Go,’ the Dragon said, and the door flew open behind me. ‘Go and find Simone. Zhu Que and I will handle them. Tiger, Turtle, take them.’
    I heard them coming down the hallway, but never saw them. The Dragon pushed me through the doorway with his tail, then pushed Leo and John after me. The Tiger came last. The door closed in our faces.
    We were at the top of a flight of stairs that went down about fifty metres to a door at the bottom.
    ‘Simone is at the bottom of the stairs, about twenty metres further along,’ the stone said. ‘You are nearly there.’
    ‘Nearly there,’ I said. ‘Bottom of the stairs, about twenty metres further along.’
    John