bubble // zhuiling

five

TW ⚠️ In this chapter, self harm is mentioned. DM me if you need details, or skip ahead!

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Jin Ling

        Jin Ling had woken up half an hour ago, but he hadn't moved an inch. His face burned at the thought of facing his captors. He tried his very best to compose himself and he decided that he would, for now, ignore the thousands of questions bubbling in his brain.

He'd fainted after seeing the... tails? Surely he'd been mistaken, right? Nothing was making sense. He exhaled sharply from his nose and flinched when he saw bubbles rise.

          Nothing was making sense at all. 

He brushed that thought aside. He'd have to adapt to the situation and then escape. A plan was coming together in his head. The legends had been wrong, it wasn't just a monster! There were multiple tailed, humanoid beasts in Lake Lan. He'd pick up that big rock by the entrance of the cave, smash it over their heads and then make a run for it. Oh, how he wished he hadn't abandoned his bow and arrow at the lake shore.

         The heir to the Jin Clan had almost mustered enough courage to get up when a loud voice startled him.

         "Sizhui, I think she's awake!" exclaimed Jingyi, closely observing the Surfacer's breathing patterns. Jin Ling jumped and turned to face the voice.

         "Jingyi..." a much quieter voice said off to the side.

"Ah!" Jingyi fell backwards as Jin Ling made eye contact with him. "Um... Sorry."

         Jin Ling saw the tail and willed himself not the nervous vomit. 'Okay, Jin Ling. This is okay. You're okay. You got this. It'll be over soon,' he told himself. He envisioned himself eating chicken with Fairy in Carp Tower; his happy place.

He quickly stood up, and bolted for the rock that he'd been eying.

Well, he tried. The water stole his momentum, and replaced it with dense liquid that weighed down his many robes and caused his movements to be sluggish and flowy. Not only that, but his legs refused to work. The energy that his Golden Core normally supplied just wasn't there anymore.

To Jingyi and Sizhui, it looked as if he just threw himself to the sand.

         Jin Ling felt consumed by exhaustion as he propped himself up onto his forearms. Why was he so tired? He pushed through the thought and crawled forward. The rock was so close.

          He almost had it when one of his captors stopped in front of him. Jin Ling froze, watching in fear as the monster settled on its tail and smiled at him.

          "Hi," Sizhui greeted him.

          Jin Ling said hello back by whimpering.

          "My name is Lan Yuan, and my courtesy name is Lan Sizhui."

          'The monsters have names? "Sizhui" as in yearning? Yearning to eat human flesh?!'

          "Jingyi and I found you drowning yesterday so we took you in."

          'They took me in? Have they been waiting for me to wake up just so they can eat me alive?'

           "We're not going to hurt you," Sizhui put his hands up to show he had no weapons. "We just want to help," he said, but Jin Ling had found a sharp shell beside him.