Description: Chapter 1: The New World 1 THE NEW WORLD From a distance, Fongyuan village appeared to exist outside of time. Nestled in the lover''s embrace of the Yuanjiang River in the heart of Hunan province, it was an ancient and beautiful place that held tightly to its storied past and fought bitterly against the ravages of change. Lush mountains rose above the morning mists, like spines on a dragon''s back. A dance of stark white cranes stood on its bank, impassively scanning the water for small prey. The muddled algae-ridden river, wide and meandering, curved through the valley like a spotted mountain viper. The village was a collection of densely stacked old structures dating back to the Song dynasty, along with the occasional multistory twentieth-century apartment building, all capped by traditional curved roofs and flying corners. Several buildings on both sides of the river jutted over the water on stilts, reminiscent of the cranes wading in the shallows. A waterfall cut through the mountains in the distance, feeding a narrow stream that meandered to join the Yuanjiang. Apart from the overgrown flora, burned-out car husks, and the occasional toppled structure, the village looked idyllic. Over the centuries, Fongyuan had withstood famine, foreign invaders, and civil unrest. It had fought bitterly against the Japanese during the Second World War and served as a stronghold to revolutionaries during the ensuing Chinese Civil War. Every time destruction had come for Fongyuan, the village had persisted, rebuilding itself dozens of times over a thousand years. What it could not survive, however, was the dead rising from their graves. Out of the mist, two figures ambled onto a stone road at the edge of the village, their movements stilted and clipped. They bumped into one another as they walked, as if deep in a drunken conversation. Chen Wenzhu leaned over the edge of the roof and studied the pair impatiently as they passed underneath his perch. They looked worn, skin flayed to the bones, probably victims from the first days. The lucky ones. The first figure, gaunt and slightly stooped, swayed down the rough, steep cobbled path, shoulder deflecting off a wall before careening into the middle of the street. She was missing her arm from the elbow down. Half of her jaw was exposed under a thin layer of loose flesh that gently quivered in the wind. Her dress, once an ankle-length floral cascade of vibrant pink, was now tattered, faded, and stained dark with blood and viscera. The pair were unusual in that the smaller one followed closely behind the taller one and was holding her hand. Shirtless and barefoot, it looked like a little boy who couldn''t have been more than five or six. He had an untouched, angelic face and black hair in a bowl cut. He could have almost passed for living if it were not for the distant look in his eyes and the ugly gash across his neck. The two jiangshi , as they were now called, were doomed to walk the world forever in this undead existence until someone pitied them with a second death. A final death. Jiangshi. Zhu clicked his tongue. That was what everyone called the dead-who-refused-to-stay-dead. It was an old name, one shrouded in folklore that dated back as far as the Qing dynasty. The jiangshi of legend were corpses reanimated by magic or spirits. They were terrible creatures who fed on qi , or the life force of a person. The dead that rose now, these things that plagued the land, were something else entirely, and their reality was much, much worse than their namesake. Ming Haobo, crouching next to Zhu, wondered aloud. "What do you think, Elena? Mother and child? Teacher and student? Two strangers who found each other when the outbreak swept the village?" The third person on their wind team, Elena Anderson, made a muffled sound suspiciously like a coo. "I think it''s a grandma. She looks like an Agatha or a Maribelle. That little boy''s name is Bobby. Little Bobby came to visit Grandma Maribelle out here in the countryside." "Maribelle probably baked cookies and mooncakes for Bobby." Bo stumbled a bit on the English names, but Elena grinned at his effort. Who knows, one day his English could be better than her Mandarin. "You always go straight to food, Bo." Bo shrugged. "Every time I visited my nainai , all I did was eat well." Elena nudged him in his generous midsection. "That explains so much." They watched as Maribelle led Bobby to a staircase jutting out of a house. She bumped up against its side and continued to walk in place. Elena sounded wistful. "Maribelle probably took Bobby on long strolls through the village." Bo played along. "They flew kites and caught dragonflies at the playground a few blocks back." "They went fishing down at the stream every morning." Bo pointed at a third jiangshi farther back that had just turned onto the street. "Maybe that one behind them is the grandfather. What do you think his name is?" Elena pursed her lips. "He looks like a--" "That''s enough," interrupted Zhu. "We''re losing light." Although he tolerated anything that would take their mind off reality, he didn''t approve of this game. Giving names to the dead made their job much harder than it needed to be. Besides, all this mucking around was going to get someone killed. Zhu pointed to the smaller jiangshi. "Elena, shoot the one on the left. I''ll take the one on the right." He looked over at the third jiangshi. "Bo, take out the yye , the grandfather." Elena and Bo got to work. Bo crept down the length of the curved roof toward his assigned jiangshi while Elena drew her bow. All three dropped down from the roofs at the same time. Elena took a moment to find her balance, favoring one leg as she rose to her feet. The street was slanted and the cobblestones uneven. Zhu didn''t wait for her as he rushed the pair. He was about to bury his machete in Maribelle''s neck when an arrow streaked over his shoulder and punched into her skull. Maribelle dropped like a sack of bones as the undeath left her. Zhu changed targets quickly and brought his blade around to the smaller figure, lopping poor little Bobby''s head off in one fluid motion. He shot Elena an annoyed look and slapped his right arm. "This is right." "Sorry," she muttered, lowering her bow. "I got them confused again." Zhu nodded, but wondered if that were really true. More likely she didn''t want to shoot the little boy; Elena was sensitive like that. Understandable, but developing empathy for things you had to kill was dangerous. It was a lesson he''d learned early in his childhood when he used to name the family chickens. The day his yye grabbed two of his favorite hens and wrung their necks before taking them into the kitchen was one of the most traumatic of his life. Zhu gave her the benefit of the doubt. "We''ll review again later. How''s your leg?" "I rolled my ankle. I''ll be fine." He glanced back just in time to see Bo''s sledgehammer explode the last jiangshi''s head like a melon, splattering flesh and bone against the back wall. The big man immediately pulled out a rag and carefully wiped his hammer clean. Bo rejoined them a moment later and glanced down at their handiwork. He looked crestfallen. "I hope you''re eating mooncakes in heaven, little Bobby." The wind team hurried off the main road and sprinted down the winding side street. Zhu kept an eye on Elena as she tried to keep up with her injured leg. Stones cut from all different shapes and sizes, mashed together like a giant puzzle and worn down after centuries of use, made the path rough and uneven. The single-story buildings that lined both sides were built from a patchwork of wood, stone, and concrete blocks, each layer of materials a time stamp of its era. The roofs above each building hung low and stretched out over the street, covering the sky, save for a narrow strip down the center. As they continued moving, weaving, and pushing past small clusters of jiangshi, Zhu searched for another opportunity to get back to higher ground. It was never safe to stay on the ground in a village for more than a few seconds. Besides, they were a wind team; up above was where they belonged, moving silently and safely like the gusts whistling overhead. Fortunately, they were still at the outskirts, or else the jump down from the roofs would have been suicide. The shadows from the setting sun were growing longer. They had to find shelter soon. The street itself was surprisingly clean and empty, considering it had not been swept or maintained in many months. This was likely due to the start of the rainy season that had drenched most of the province the past couple of weeks. A light breeze was blowing in from the north, kicking up swirls of mist and tickling the hairs on the back of Zhu''s neck. The wind carried with it faint traces of rot but also the freshness of spring and the minute promise of new life. Zhu signaled for his team to stay close. They sped halfway down the street before turning into a narrow alley barely two body-widths wide. A jiangshi with its back to him turned and extended its arm. It just managed to growl before he kicked it in the chest, sending it toppling over a pile of refuse. Zhu''s machete stabbed into its eye socket, and he continued down the alley without slowing. He made a left, then a right, and then stopped at yet another intersection to get his bearings and to check if his team was still behind him. Elena was only a step behind, and Bo pulled up a few se

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