The Blue Dragon: Chapter 8

-- CHAPTER 8: Yaoguai --

****

We all reflexively reacted to turn our backs and raise our arms to shield ourselves from the onrushing spray of shattered glass. But even though my eyes had snapped shut in instinctive preservation, I knew from the velocity and trajectory of the thousands of tiny glass projectiles hurtling straight at me that I was about to receive quite a few uncomfortable cuts at the very least.

But I felt nothing, not even the wind that should have been rushing inward from the gaping hole in the side of the Seattle oceanfront skyscraper where a Presidential Suite window used to be. And after three or four seconds of continuing to blindly shield myself while nothing happened at all, I finally cracked an eyelid open and then slowly turned around.

A new transparent wall stood before me, completely see-through and yet shimmering ever so slightly with a distinctly blue-green tint. It almost looked like the Low-E glass from my Santa Monica apartment, with a thin film coating designed to reflect the Southern California heat away and keep my apartment from roasting within, although the color was a bit more… well… azure. The way the wall shimmered also told me that it wasn’t quite solid glass, but rather more… liquid, like water. Still, it had been solid enough to stop every last piece of shattered glass, and when the wall of water evaporated into nothingness over the course of two or three seconds, those pieces of glass fell harmlessly to the floor.

By then my attention had been drawn to the large cloud of blue mist pouring in through the gaping hole in the wall but coming to a halt on the other side of the shattered glass forming a neat line across the floor. Jade immediately hissed while Rae cupped her fingers and started creating fresh electricity balls, so I gathered that they both knew what this fresh cloud of mist was all about, and also knew that it wouldn’t be friendly.

But before I could ask aloud what was going on, the cloud started changing shape from a formless mass into… well… a human shape. Two, in fact, as the cloud separated and then each new ball started growing legs, and then arms, and finally heads. They also descended downward, and as soon as the legs touched the floor, the human-shaped mist clouds rapidly transformed into the solid matter of two women.

Quite scantily clad women.

Scantily clad women that absolutely terrified me.

Both were barefoot, wearing ragged short-hemmed dresses that had perhaps once been white but were now soiled and torn in various places that exposed large patches of skin beneath, not that I was trying to catch a peek. I was too engrossed with their wild manes of dark hair, perpetually wet and hanging over their faces like that creepy girl from The Ring, and specifically their gaunt and grotesque faces with wild eyes and bared teeth that were exposed whenever their hair swung out of the way as they stalked forward towards us.

“Shui gui!” Jade exclaimed, immediately adopting a fighting stance with both hands raised to eye level and sharp-clawed fingers pointing forwards. The left hand extended, and the right hand cocked beside her right ear as she hissed, “Stay back!”

“Water ghosts,” Rae explained while taking a step just in front of me in a protective manner. She also raised her hands, each one containing a glowing ball of electricity. “They’re the souls of those who committed suicide by drowning themselves. But they shouldn’t be able to step on land!”

I backed up while watching the two water ghosts step neatly over the line of shattered glass, muttered, “Well they’re stepping on land as far as I can tell!”

“I can see that!” Rae called before throwing both of her electricity balls at the shui gui. Both impacted their targets, forcing the ghosts to step back. One of them stepped on the shattered glass and howled an unearthly cry that made her wet hair fall back, fully exposing the hideously decaying face of a drowned young woman all gooey and rotting away.

“I think I’m gonna be sick,” Dong muttered, dry-retching and thumping his chest.

Jade then transformed into her human-snake hybrid form, coiling her tail and launching herself at the nearest ghost. But right when her fangs were about to strike, the ghost suddenly evaporated into a puff of mist, allowing Jade’s body to fly right through it. And then the ghost re-formed its body and started crawling after us again.

Meanwhile, Rae was charging up new electric balls and throwing them as fast as she could generate them to keep the ghosts at bay. Some of them hit and caused the ghosts to howl. But others the ghosts managed to dodge by evaporating and re-forming. At least they couldn’t advance on us while doing so. Still, we had to keep backing up and backing up, and we were running out of room fast.

“Hey Dong!” Rae hollered back over her shoulder. “It would be really great if you could make that water barrier again so we can try to make a run for it.”

“The water barrier? I didn’t do that,” the blue gecko replied casually. “Aksel did that.”

“Wait, what?” Rae exclaimed while I simultaneously squawked, “Wait, what?”

From across the room, Jade exclaimed, “Look out!”

One of the shui gui had taken advantage of Rae’s momentary distraction to launch itself at us. I flinched instinctively, turning my head away and throwing both hands up, palms out. A loud [thump] sounded right in front of us, and I opened my eyes just in time to see the grotesque and yet comical sight of the drowned ghost woman’s cheek pressed flat against the magical water barrier that had suddenly appeared in front of us, identical in shape and consistency to the one that had stopped the shattered glass earlier.

“Told you,” Dong pronounced proudly.

“Holy shit!” I exclaimed.

“Holy shit!” Rae agreed. And then she went back on the offensive.

While the first ghost was still smashed up against the water wall, Rae fired two electric balls into the body of the second ghost before following it up with a jumping kick and then a couple of kung fu punch/chop things that I wouldn’t be able to replicate myself with a thousand years of training. Moments later, her long, two-handed sword sprouted forth and she started slashing away.

I dropped my hands and the water barrier evaporated over the course of a few seconds, but by then, Jade had already leaped at the ghost from the other side, and the two supernatural creatures tumbled to the floor for a second before the ghost evaporated, leaving the viper-girl struggling with nothing, only to reappear a moment later standing up.

“Oh shit!” I exclaimed, taking a step backward and raising my hands defensively as the shui gui once again advanced on me. It was clear that I was their target, as neither ghost seemed interested in fighting Rae or Jade. Thankfully, the water barrier flashed into existence once more, and the water ghost shrieked with rage as it slammed its fists against the transparent wall.

“We can’t stop them!” Rae called, still trying desperately to slash her sword at the ghost nearest to her, only to have it keep popping in and out of solidity.

“I know!” Jade hollered back, jabbing at the shui gui nearest to me, but it kept phasing out every time she did and implacably came after me. At least it still couldn’t penetrate my magical wall, whatever its form might be. But then Jade stopped attacking, and instead she turned to yell, “We need fire!”

“I’ve got an idea!” Rae announced from across the room. “Aksel, just hold them off as long as you can! Don’t die!”

“Don’t die! Got it!” I called while keeping both hands up to maintain the water barrier currently blocking one of the shui gui from reaching me. “Don’t die, don’t die, don’t die.”

But whatever Rae was doing, she was unfortunately no longer distracting the other water ghost. It advanced on me from my left, suddenly moving faster than I would’ve thought possible, and on instinct, I stabbed my left hand palm-out to block it.

And block it, I did. A second magical water barrier popped into existence, leaving a narrow gap between the two. Both ghosts made to try and move around their respective obstructions, outflanking me. But I retreated several steps until my back was against the wall, and when I started sliding my hands horizontally side-to-side, I found that I could expand the water barriers until they connected in the middle, forming a single curved wall of shimmering azure water that shielded me in a semi-circle.

“Jade! Look out!” Rae shouted.

Through the transparent wall, I could clearly see Jade turn around, her eyes bugging out. Her powerful tail coiled, and the bright-green viper-lady sprung out of the way just as a large, flaming object suddenly grow very, very large in my field of view.

It was the sofa.

It was on fire.

And it was flying through the air.

The two water ghosts turned around and shrieked unearthly howls of terror, raising their arms protectively over their faces, not that it would do them any good. The flaming sofa slammed into both of them, and I had mere seconds to see both shui gui evaporate into puffs of black smoke in a way unlike any of their previous phase-outs had been.

Mere seconds to see our enemies defeated.

Mere seconds before that flaming sofa blasted straight through my magical water barrier.

Mere seconds before the flaming sofa slammed into me.

And everything went dark.

****

I opened my eyes, but everything was still dark.

I lay flat on my back, the soft cushioning of a bed beneath me. I was tucked under the blanket, my head comfortably resting on a pillow. Various parts of my body ached, felt sore, or just plain hurt, which was to be expected after getting Hulk-smashed by a flying, flaming sofa. Plus, I was sure to have been weakened by my recent brush with death when Jade had beaten me up, bitten me, and sent venom into my veins. But despite all that, I felt mostly… well… alive. And after all that I had recently been through, simply remaining on the right side of the grass had to be considered a win.

The darkness of the room felt slightly suffocating. I’d never been afraid of the dark before, but then again, supernatural creatures from Chinese mythology had never been hunting me before. I would’ve felt much safer with some lights on, but there were none, not even a nightlight. And apart from the faint glow of the moon’s illumination backlighting the edges of the curtains, the room was basically pitch black.

Which is why I jumped a bit when a disembodied voice spoke, “Hey big dude. You alright?”

It took me a second to get over my surprise and started to relax before I groaned, “Yeah, little dude. I think I’m alright. No thanks to you.”

“No thanks to me?” He sounded offended. “I saved your life back there.”

“I got flattened by a sofa,” I grumbled. “Didn’t you promise to protect me back there?”

“Actually, I promised to ‘help’ you, not ‘protect’ you; I’ll leave the protection bit to the two kung-fu-ninja babes out there. And I did help you! I helped get your water-power mojo going, didn’t I?”

“So that magical water barrier thing WAS because of you? You told Rae that -I- did that.”

“You DID do it. I didn’t give you water-control powers, I helped open you up to a natural ability you had inside of you all along. You’re special, big dude. You just need to realize it for yourself.”

“Not special enough to block a flying sofa,” I grumbled.

“Well that’s because it was a flying sofa. The shui gui were magical creatures, so a magical barrier blocked them just fine. But a magical barrier doesn’t do so well against non-magical items.”

“The shattered glass pieces when they first busted in weren’t magical, but the water barrier still stopped those just fine.”

“Tiny glass pieces, which got embedded in the water itself. The sofa weighed what, three hundred pounds?” The little blue gecko somehow managed to make a derisive snort despite lacking a human nose. “A few inches of water’s not gonna stop a flying sofa, dude.”

“I’ll have to remember that for the future.”

“Remind Rae, too. SHE didn’t expect the sofa to bust right through your barrier, either. Got really upset with herself for nearly killing you with that thing. And then Jade got really bent outta shape because she thought the sofa had squished my tiny little gecko body as well.” Dong chuckled. “Good thing I’m the immortal avatar of an all-powerful dragon spirit.”

Even in the darkness, I thought I could see Dong’s twin rows of little teeth gleaming quite smugly.

“So wait, does that mean you can’t die?”

“Technically, I’m not even here,” he explained. “I’m a fragmented piece of the Great Azure Dragon from the spirit world temporarily crossing over into your world with no true physical form. I have no weight or mass. I can’t be touched. And have you noticed that you don’t really feel me standing on your shoulder unless you’re looking right at me? I’m not actually standing on your shoulder, but your human brain processes the phantom weight of a little cave gecko so that your sense of sight and sense of touch line up.”

“So wait… does that mean you aren’t really here? That you’re a like a figment of my imagination?”

“Well, I’d have to be a figment of your imagination and Rae’s imagination and Jade’s imagination, too. So no, I’m not a figment of your imagination. I’m here, but I’m not tangible, and only supernaturals are able to even see me. If a normy saw you right now, he or she would think you were talking to yourself.”

“Normy?”

“Normal. Human. Muggle. Non-superna… Dude, are you really gonna make me spell this out? I was hoping I’d get to be Sacred Dragon Guardian for someone with a brain bigger than a pea this time around.”

“So I guess that answers the question of whether or not you’ve done this before.”

“A few times before, over the centuries.”

“You’ve guarded other ‘Chosen Ones’ on their quests for the Faguang Long?”

“Nah, this is my first quest for Faguang Long. The avatars of Qinglong have been called upon for a variety of other reasons, sometimes for something as simple as helping a poor farming village suffering from drought, and then after a few days when the job is done, ‘poof’ and I return from whence I came.”

“Stuck in the blue crystal, right? That’s gotta be lonely. Do you need me to wish you freedom like the Genie of the Lamp?”

“Pssht, naw.” Dong laughed. “I’m cool being in my crystal during the downtimes, and I was just joking about the whole ‘two thousand years will give you a crick in the neck’ bit. Time and space don’t really have meaning in the spirit realm. My pad is really quite spacious and comfortable. Plus Pornhub.”

“Riiight.”

Dong’s teeth started gleaming in the darkness again. “But even Pornhub can’t compare to witnessing real action up close and personal.”

“Well, I suppose not,” I conceded.

“So don’t worry about me, big dude. I promise I won’t interfere.”

“Interfere with what?”

Dong didn’t reply with words. Instead, he merely… chuckled.

And then my bedroom door began to open.

****

The door had barely opened before it started to close again and then softly shut. The room was still nearly pitch black, but I noticed the shadowy shape of a figure moving whisper quietly across the floor.

“You are awake,” Jade said quietly in a low tone of surprise as she sat down on the side of the bed. I couldn’t see her clearly, but I got the impression of her upper torso twisted towards me with her shadow in profile.

“Yeah,” I muttered softly, the darkness of the room giving me the urge to keep my voice down. “What time is it? Where’s Rae?”

“It is just after 4AM,” she replied. “Rae was watching over you, but she just went into the other room to sleep. It is my turn now.”

“Oh, okay.”

“Perhaps you should sleep more.”

“I feel like I slept enough.”

“Are you feeling better?”

“Better, I suppose. I mean, I feel pretty good for a guy who got a sofa dropped on his head. But it still feels like I got a sofa dropped on my head.”

“We are fortunate that your injuries were not life-threatening. With time and rest, you should make a full recovery.”

“Will I have enough time to rest?”

“That…” Jade’s voice trailed off as she sighed. And in the end she finished quietly, “That remains to be seen.”

She went quiet after that, and I didn’t say anything, so the room started to fall into an awkward silence. I still couldn’t really see her very well in the dimness, so I squinted as if that would bring her face into focus.

Jade chuckled. “Serpents have excellent night vision, but it would appear that you need a little light.” A moment later, the table lamp on the nightstand flicked on, momentarily blinding me.

I held up a hand to ward away the unexpected illumination until my eyes had adjusted, and then I blinked away the sparkles so I could focus on the beautiful young woman sitting next to me. Well, ‘young-looking’ woman, given that I now knew she was actually over a thousand years old. But despite her beauty, a second later I found myself gawking around the room in surprise.

“Waitaminute. I know this room,” I stated a little louder now that there was a light on, whipping my head left and right.

From the non-standard mismatched furniture and decorations, I knew immediately that it wasn’t a hotel room. Further, there was something distinctly familiar about my surroundings. I knew I’d seen that T.J. Maxx mass-production print of a generic mountain landscape on the wall before. The drapery pattern stirred my sense of déjà vu. And after a minute, I realized that I was back in the cozy Northlake cottage Airbnb that Rae and I had first checked into earlier this afternoon.

“Why did we come back here?” I exclaimed.

“Two reasons. One, it had already been booked and paid for, and Rae stated that it would have been difficult to book another Airbnb for this night on such short notice.”

“But we still could’ve gotten another hotel room, right? And Rae said that this location had been compromised.”

“That is actually the second reason,” Jade explained. “Yes, this location was compromised when the Cao Wei were able to trace your laptop usage first to Chicago and then to here. But since they later tracked you to The Four Seasons, it makes sense that they would cross off this location as checked and discarded. No one in their right mind would come back to this house.”

“I dunno. Seems to me the bad guys would leave a stakeout here just in case we returned for some reason.”

Jade shook her head in the negative. “The Cao Wei are powerful, but not numerous.”

“Huh. Rae said the exact same thing.”

“She is right. They cannot afford to leave an extra agent here ‘just in case’. I am actually surprised they were able to source two shui gui to follow me to the hotel.”

“It probably means they didn’t fully trust you.”

“Most likely,” she agreed with a sigh. “Especially after my failure to eliminate you in Santa Monica.”

“How DID you fail?”

Jade frowned. “I believe that Lrrae… Lllae… 为什么这个愚蠢的名字这么难？!… I believe that the fox girl saved your life. Do you not remember?”

“I remember, but I also remember that it took over an hour for your venom to go to work, giving Rae plenty of time to come rescue me.”

“The time delay was not by accident. I injected you with a venom designed to activate only after such a delay and then vanish without a trace. Your corpse would have been found days later, and an autopsy would have shown that you suffered a heart attack.” Jade then scowled, and her Mandarin accent seemed to get a little thicker as she spat, “If only I knew a huli jing was watching over you and would come to your rescue.”

“Well if she hadn’t, I would be dead. So I suppose I’m really glad that Rae was watching over me.”

Jade’s expression softened, and she nodded slowly before exhaling and stating a little more primly, “You are right. My wounded pride hurts for my mission’s failure, but I should be glad it was my destiny to fail. Had I succeeded in killing you, I would still be working for the Cao Wei. I would still be in the dark as to the true chosen of Qinglong. I am sorry, Akserrr. I am sorry for trying to kill you.”

“Apology accepted,” I stated graciously. “In fairness, I understand why you tried. Well, I can’t claim to entirely understand what it’s like to be an outcast race of shapeshifting serpents, branded as ‘monsters’ by everyone else and forced to live in the shadows, but I guess what I’m trying to say is that I don’t blame you for acting the way you did under the circumstances.”

“That is a very generous thing to say to someone who was an enemy only a few hours ago.”

“You already said ‘sorry’. Merethe taught me it’s better to forgive and move on rather than hold a grudge.”

“Merethe?”

“My adoptive mom. She took me in and raised me after my real mom was killed.”

“Ah,” Jade said before looking away. Her eyes unfocused while she added quietly, “I was also an orphan.”

“Really?”

She nodded slowly, still staring out at the wall. But then she gave me an almost accusing look over her shoulder, drawling, “What? No witty remark about how snakes do not raise their young?”

I frowned. “Well, you’re a snake spirit, right? But otherwise human? You weren’t like… hatched from an egg or something, were you?”

Jade snorted in derision, but then immediately blushed and covered her face, clearly embarrassed to have made the rude noise.

“Sorry,” I apologized. “I’m really quite new to the whole mythological creature thing. I didn’t mean that as a joke. I honestly th--”

“It is alright, Akserrr. To answer your question plainly: No, I was not hatched from an egg.” She giggled and then covered her face again while her cheeks turned rosy red.

“You’re quite beautiful when you smile.”

That made Jade blush even more, and she raised her second hand over her face before turning away from me to take several deep breaths and calm down.

“I don’t mean to make you uncomfortable,” I said softly. “But I meant what I said.”

“Thank you for the compliment,” she replied quietly, still facing away from me. “But as to the egg question, that is actually a sad story.”

“Really?”

Jade frowned as she looked back at me over her shoulder. “I was born to ordinary human parents who had no idea the spirit of a serpent lived within me. I was only a toddler when I started growing scales. My parents were horrified, of course. They called me yaoguai. You know this word.”

I winced. “Monster. Demon.”

“The Chinese people sometimes refer to all shapeshifters as yaoguai. Any supernatural being with the power to change forms can be called a yaoguai. Even your huli jing fox spirit.”

I frowned. “I didn’t know that.”

Jade waved it off as if it were not important, and she moved on. “My parents did not know what to do with me. Some in the village wanted to put me to death. In the end I was outcast, meaning I was literally cast out. My parents took me out into the desert, placed me on the sand, and then walked away.”

I blinked twice. “That’s horrible.”

“It was the best thing for me. Other hui sensed my cry, other serpent shapeshifters. They raised me, trained me, taught me how to survive. It was not easy. Ordinary people will always fear us. They call us snakes. They call us yaoguai. They call us monsters. We are a race of orphans. Today when a baby is born with scales, it is immediately put to death. There were 60 million people living in China when I was born, and some ten thousand hui. Today China has more than a billion people, but now I fear there are only a hundred hui remaining. Perhaps even less.”

I frowned. “I’m very sorry to hear that.”

Jade shook her head. “It is not your fault. It is simply… what is.”

“It may not be my fault, but you believe I may be able to do something about it in the future, right?”

Jade’s eyes glittered. “Hui births on Earth are rare. There are thousands of us in the spirit world. But only Faguang Long has the power to cross between worlds. Only Faguang Long could build a bridge and allow more of us to come to Earth.”

“Allow more yaoguai to come to Earth.”

Jade read the hesitation on my face. “We are not monsters, Akserrr. We are immigrants. We are those who dream of a better life.”

I gave her a rueful look. “I’m afraid the nations of Earth don’t have a great track record of welcoming foreign immigrants.”

“You do not need to tell me. I have witnessed a thousand years of humanity’s discrimination. I do not expect my people to ever be welcomed here, but I must believe we can find a place where we belong. To do that, I need the power of Faguang Long. To do that, I need you. Will you help me, Akserrr?”

I nodded slowly. “I will.”

Jade smirked, looking a little surprised. “Just like that?”

I blinked twice. “Um… Well… Am I naïve for saying that?”

She waggled her head. “Perhaps. A more cynical man would question my honesty. A more cautious man would at least wait a little longer to make me prove myself.”

I shrugged. “I saw you fighting those water ghosts to protect me. That’s proof enough for me. Then again, I wonder whether or not YOU should be more cynical… or at least cautious… about me.”

Jade looked confused. “Why should I be cynical or cautious about you?”

“Well you did just take decisive action to betray your former master - who most likely will try to kill you over it - in order to switch sides and fight alongside a huli jing fox spirit--”

“Please do not remind me,” Jade sighed.

“And a clueless sex-obsessed man who knows basically nothing about Chinese Mythology and has absolutely NO idea how he’s supposed to complete this quest. Joining me and Rae doesn’t really seem like the smart thing to do.”

“It does not need to be the smart thing to do, so long as it is the right thing to do.”

“Because of Dong.”

“Because of you.” Jade smiled, a genuine smile that was as warm and welcoming as her previous smiles had been menacingly malevolent. “I AM yaoguai. I AM an outcast. I tried to kill you… twice… We first met face-to-face little more than ten hours ago, and yet you have accepted me without reservation.”

“Well, I’m a pretty accepting guy. And… well…” My voice trailed off as I started to blush.

Jade quirked an eyebrow. “Well what?”

My ears burned as I added, “This is such a stupid guy thing to say, but I believe it also explains why a LOT of guys are so readily forgiving. And that’s because it’s really easy to forgive an absolutely gorgeous girl like you that I’ve had amazing sex with and would very much like to have sex with again.”

The corners of Jade’s lips twitched in a smile, and she turned herself halfway away from me before rather coyly glancing back while using both hands to straighten out the curtain of silky jet-black hair she’d let hang loose instead of binding into the bubble braid. “You’d like to have sex with me again?”

“Well, obviously. You’re incredible, and super-sexy, and did I mention gorgeous?”

“Yes, you have.” She blushed. “Twice now.”

“Gorgeous, gorgeous, gorgeous,” I repeated.

Jade giggled. “I am hui. Flattery will get you everywhere.”

“You are easily the most beautifully gorgeous viper I have EVER seen.”

Jade smiled again. This one wasn’t merely warm and welcoming. This was the kind of smile I had seen many a girl give me over the years since I’d first busted my cherry, the kind of smile that put a little lead into my pencil and told my testicles to start up sperm production, if you know what I mean.

It was the kind of smile that informed me I was about to get laid.

Jade reached down to take hold of the blanket covering me, tugging it aside so that nothing remained between us. She reached out to stroke my arm, her fingertips tracing feathery touches along my exposed skin. “Can I tell you a secret?” she murmured softly.

“Go right ahead.”

“I also would very much like to have sex with you again,” she intoned.

And then she kissed me.

Jade’s mouth sealed over mine as she climbed on top of me, pressing hard to silently communicate her raw, sexual desire while her crooning moan more audibly communicated her raw, sexual desire. My nostrils were filled with the scent of her: spicy and yet sweet, almost like cinnamon. Her fingers interlaced with mine so that our hands were pressed palm-to-palm, and with a surge of supernatural strength that sent her long, pointy fingernails rather painfully into my skin, she pinned my hands back to either side of my head.

And then something sparked deep inside me.

It felt like someone had placed a metaphorical cigarette lighter somewhere within the very center of my being and then flicked the wheel. Steel struck stone. The spark bloomed to life. And after a pause the length of a deep breath, that spark suddenly exploded outward like a flaming torch, roaring to life and sending surges of energy all throughout my body.

I clamped my fingers down, gripping Jade’s hands even tighter than she had previously been gripping mine. I sat up from the mattress and rolled us over, pinning her flat on her back beneath me. I likewise pinned our still entwined hands flat against the mattress to either side of the pillow beneath her head, establishing dominance and literally growling at the feral creature beneath me.

Jade hissed back in challenge, baring her fangs. She jabbed her fingernails into my hands and struggled beneath my weight, only to have me drive my pelvis downwards to keep her pinned through brute force. I still had all my clothes on, but my bulge was as hard as a rock, and it pressed against her mound almost painfully.

Her clothes disappeared. One moment, Jade was wearing the same long-sleeved black unitard that she’d been wearing in the wrecked Presidential Suite. The next moment, the very fabric of her unitard started melting away to be replaced by nothing but creamy, pale skin, and I wondered for a moment if she was technically naked ALL the time. Her breasts were just as full and as round as I remembered them, capped by dusky rose nipples, and I couldn’t help but immediately duck my head and immediately start feasting on those succulent teats.

Amazing titties, Dong’s voice murmured appreciatively in my mind.

I immediately pulled my head up and furrowed my eyebrows.

Oops. My bad. I promised not to interfere. I’ll shut up now. Go back to sucking away!

I rolled my eyes and looked down at Jade, blinking twice and then refocusing on her exquisite face. She really was one of the most beautiful women one could ever hope to meet, assuming you could get past the whole shapeshifting-viper-assassin thing. She had the almost alien look of a Paris-runway high-fashion model combined with the mouthwatering bosom of a porn star. I realized now that her irises were actually green - those weren’t color contacts - and the way she stared up at me with an expression of fervent devotion made ME feel like I was the god.

She no longer struggled beneath me. Instead she relaxed and spread her thighs apart, inviting me in. I still held her hands but no longer gripped them tightly, and she slipped both of them free to instead start unfastening my pants. Moments later, she shoved both my pants and boxers down to my upper thighs, grabbed my ass with her palms, and yanked down so she could feel my steel-hard shaft sliding up and down her already soaked snatch.

“Take me, 青龙之选” she intoned. I didn’t completely catch the Chinese part, but I heard the name ‘Qinglong’ in there. As much as I wanted to believe Jade wanted me just for me, I knew that a significant part of her attraction was because I was the apparent Chosen One of the Great Azure Dragon. But as if to dispel that notion from my mind as soon as it had entered, she then smiled and added, “Fuck me, Akserrr.”

“Oh, hell yeah.” I lined myself up. And then I thrust.

Perhaps it was her shapeshifter muscles, but Jade had absolutely no trouble accepting my big dick despite my rather thick girth. Once again, I felt that incredible sensation of her pussy actually pulling my prick inside as if it had its own vacuum suction. And once I had buried myself all the way inside so that my short and curlies were pressed up tight against her completely bare twat, it felt like her inner muscles continued to pulse, practically sucking my dick as if her pussy had its own mouth in there.

“Exquisite…” I groaned.

“You like that, do you?” Jade laughed with a bit of an evil cackle in her tone and eyes full of pride. But her eyes were playful as she concentrated on continuing her cuntal convulsions. “I know you have bedded a lot of women, Akserrr. But you have never been with a woman like ME.”

I gasped at the sensations but managed to smile and chuckle, “We have done this before.”

“Our first time together was good, but I did not want to give away my true nature.” Her smile was all teeth, fangs and all. “Now that you know what I am, let me show you what I can REALLY do.”

I was flat on my back before I realized what was happening. Near as I can tell, Jade’s legs suddenly transformed into her serpent’s tail without her pussy letting go of my dick. My shaft felt squeezed as if in a vice, almost too tight, while her tail wrapped around my legs, cinched them together, and then made it easy for her to roll us over. Her tail then switched back to legs in an instant, allowing her to kneel over me in a straddle position and start humping her bare-naked body up and down at a rapid pace. And with her pussy pumping my prick while her inner muscles continued to work their contraction magic, combining the two pleasures in a way I’d never, ever felt before, I lost ejaculatory control and started erupting great gouts of scalding sperm into her serpent’s snatch in less than sixty seconds.

“Yesss…” Jade hissed while she felt my steaming spray against her inner walls.

“Hngh! Hngh! HHHNNNGGGHHH!!!” I groaned while spilling my seed into her welcoming wet box.

And then I collapsed.

Well, most of my body collapsed. My dick remained rock-hard and ready to keep going of course.

“My favorite flavors mingled together,” Jade pronounced while slipping off my schlong and then sliding herself backwards between my legs until her face was parked directly over my prick. She smiled up at me first, maintaining eye contact while fisting my cock in her right hand and giving it a few pumps to ensure it stayed erect. Then she opened her mouth and ducked down to feed on me, slurping up her own feminine ambrosia mixed with my masculine spunk, and she moaned in rapturous ecstasy as if sucking my dick made her even happier than getting fucked.

Hell, maybe it did.

I recalled the way she had gazed in awe at Dong with the beatific expression of a Fremen fanatic before Muad’Dib. Jade now looked at ME that way, as if this were the greatest moment of her entire life…

… while she had my dick in her mouth.

Jade had always possessed an angular beauty. Now that I knew she was an actual viper spirit, it was easier to see the snake-like elements of her appearance, from her exotic eyes to her proportionally wide mouth to the sharp lines of her cheekbones. I found myself studying those elements even while enjoying the fruit of her labors, specifically the pleasure her supple mouth and ridiculously agile tongue were able to give me. And without prompting, I reached down to cup her cheek and murmur sincerely, “You’re so fucking gorgeous, Jade.”

She blinked in surprise and pulled off my prick, blushing cutely. “Thank you, Akserrr.”

“I mean it. You are gorgeous, you are beautiful, even more so now that I know what you really are.”

“Would you still think of me as gorgeous looking like this?” she shifted into her hybrid-snake form. Her silky curtain of shimmering jet-black hair transformed into the green Mangshan snakeskin hood. The balls of her eyes turned almost entirely black, interrupted only by her glowing green irises and diamond-shaped black pupils. Her fangs became more prominent, extending outward so that even when she closed her mouth, the two jagged points remained outside of her lower lip. And while the pale color of her face remained the same as when she was human, I could plainly see that her body was now covered in snake scales instead of skin.

There was a fear in her eyes as she looked up at me. For a moment, she wasn’t a thousand-year-old battle-hardened viper-warrior who had seen and done it all by now. Instead, she was just a little girl with snake scales on her skin, staring up at horrified parents who wanted nothing to do with a yaoguai, with a monster.

“Gorgeous. Simply gorgeous,” I told her sincerely.

“Really?” she asked, smiling wide with those two long fangs covering her lower lip.

“Well…” I drawled with a bit of a smirk, “the fangs honestly make me worry about you biting my dick, but everything else? Still gorgeous. Truly beautiful,” I insisted.

“Don’t worry about these,” Jade told me with a bigger smile, gaping her mouth open so that her long fangs could somehow fold back and tuck away. A moment later, she ducked her head again, swallowing half of my dick in a single gulp. And then she pushed her face down lower…

… and lower…

… and lower, until she’d deep-throated my entire rod right down to the root.

“Ffffuuuucccckkkk…” I groaned, letting my head loll back against the pillow for a moment as I soaked in the sensations. But I only let it loll for a moment; I wanted to actively watch her continue making love to my dick.

Jade smiled around a mouthful of meat when she realized I was watching her. She still seemed a little self-conscious about her appearance, but when I reached up to stroke her snakeskin hood, she reacted as if it were an intense erogenous zone, cooing around my cock and then pumping her face up and down its full length, taking it entirely into her throat over and over again without a hint of hesitation. I supposed her shapeshifting abilities made swallowing my thickness quite easy, and for once I didn’t need to worry about choking a girl.

“Ohhh… ssshhhiiittt…” I moaned while letting my arms dangle back, letting my entire body go limp as I surrendered to Jade’s epic oral attention. She banged her head up and down in my lap, harder and harder and harder, creating exquisite suction and giving me incredible pleasure with every plunge.

Next, she pulled her head up and wrapped her right hand around my rod. I took note of the scales covering her hands and fingers as she started pumping my prick. One look at the metallic glint and you might think her grip would feel stiff and abrasive, but her touch was silky smooth, warm, and supple. She panted softly for breath, green eyes gleaming with a happy smile on her face. And when I reached up to caress her snakeskin hood, she leaned into my touch, savoring the feeling.

“Simply gorgeous,” I repeated sincerely.

She grinned.

And then she slammed her face down on my dick again.

This time she held the deep-throat, mashing her lips around the very base of my cock. Her inner muscles went to work, suctioning my mushroom head and compressing around the shaft with a rippling movement not so different from the way a snake might slither across the sand.

It produced incredible sensations for me, of course, and I moaned in rapturous wonder while holding onto her hood with both hands, keeping her head pressed down against my crotch. “Oh, FUCK, Jade. Holy fucking FUCK!”

She took my curses as high praise, eyes beaming and her wide mouth grinning. She pulled up again, high enough to kiss my crown and tickle its tip with the forked tip of her tongue. But then tongue extended out… and extended more… and extended more… and extended more. She swirled the length of her elongated muscle around my shaft, coiling around my cock in a swirling spiral all the way down to the base of my rod.

Then she fucking licked my balls.

While her tongue was still swirled in a spiral around my shaft.

The feelings were insane.

“Oh, holy FUCK, Jade! Fuck! Fuck! FUCK! FUCK! FUCK!”

And then her tongue squeezed.

I knew Jade was a viper, not a constrictor, but that didn’t mean she didn’t pack some serious power into her muscles, including that wicked tongue. Her tongue not only squeezed my shaft, but it coiled and released repeatedly, bouncing like a spring that stroked my schlong with stupendously strong suction and speed.

“FFFFUUUUCCCCKKKK! FFFFUUUUCCCCKKKK! FFFFFFUUUUUUCCCCCCKKKKKK!!!” I howled, unable to contain my ecstasy, holding onto Jade’s hood for dear life.

Her green eyes glowed. With her tongue extended, the human-hybrid serpent girl was able to stare at me with an almost malevolent grin and a hungry gaze that promised she wanted to devour me whole like a juicy, fat street rat. Yet I had no fear of her. I could see the determination in Jade’s eyes to feast not on my flesh, but to suck down every last drop of life-giving semen I could feed her, and she was about to get her wish.

“UUUUNNNNGGGGHHHH!” I grunted while tugging Jade’s snakeskin hood down, forcing her mouth around my meat at the same time that I thrust upwards with my hips. She took my lunge easily, accepting my cock into her gaping maw and quickly adding the suction of her mouth to the already incredible sensations around my shaft.

“UUUUNNNNGGGGHHHH!” I grunted again, stabbing upwards to skewer her face until I could feel her teeth being embedded into my pelvis. Her hands clutched my ass, her sharp fingernails digging into my soft skin, sending little tendrils of pain to mix with the pleasure bolts assaulting my brain.

“UUUUUUNNNNNNGGGGGGHHHHHH!!!” I bellowed one last time, feeling the dam burst to send a flood of pent-up jism racing through my rod and then pouring out the top of my prick which had penetrated its way several inches down her throat. Fireworks of ecstasy exploded in my mind, each one building upon the ones that came before in a tidal wave of cascading bliss that threatened to completely overwhelm me.

Hell, maybe it did, at least for a little while.

I must have blacked out, because the next time I blinked, I found myself staring at the ceiling with my arms askew, no longer holding onto Jade’s hood. She smiled down at me from above, an expression of deeply satisfied pride on her pretty face as she observed the results of her oral efforts. Ever so slowly, she let her face and body transform back into her fully human self, with her shimmering curtain of jet-black hair returning while the Mangshan-green hood melted away. The whites of her eyes melted back into place while her diamond-shaped pupils rounded back into circles. Her lush, full breasts capped with dusky rose nipples swung pendulously just out of reach of my lips. And her snakeskin scales settled back into pale skin.

“Actually, keep some of the scales,” I told her between breathy pants. My chest was heaving, and I still felt a little dizzy after what had perhaps been the single greatest orgasm of my life.

Jade looked at me curiously, but she then smiled as she let some of the scales return to her neck and behind her ears, neatly framing her pretty face.

“Simply gorgeous,” I told her sweetly. Then I suddenly lunged upwards, rolling her onto her back and notching my still-hard schlong at the entrance of her soaking wet snatch.

And then I pushed.

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

Prologue & Chapter 1: The Ax Effect: https://www.patreon.com/posts/102225387

Chapter 2: Santa Monica: https://www.patreon.com/posts/102437478

Chapter 3: The Zellij Fountain: https://www.patreon.com/posts/102691018

Chapter 4: Euhemerism: https://www.patreon.com/posts/102919819

Chapter 5: The Fremont Troll: https://www.patreon.com/posts/103191700

Chapter 6: Jade: https://www.patreon.com/posts/103443053

Chapter 7: The Blue Gecko: https://www.patreon.com/posts/103699709