Plague Doctor

Bang! The whole pentagonal table was flipped to the ground. Silence dominated the room for a few breaths before the group gasped in shock. The Zoog jumped onto Gu Jun’s head frantically, Gold rushed to pick up Ma Feng from the ground while Gu Jun and Lou Xiaoning readied their pistols. Once the food hit the ground, it was as if the illusion put upon them was shaken off as the food took on a different appearance. The juicy chicken thigh dissolved into a pool of yellow pus, an apple turned into a bloodied white pus… The floor instantly flooded with liquid that appeared to ooze out of purulent tissues. An indescribable stench permeated every corner of this enclosed room, contaminating every air particle.

“Oh God, the smell.” Kathlyn’s eyes watered from the stench. If not for Peacock’s strength of determination, she’d be vomiting already. One could not blame her weak stomach because even Gu Jun, who was familiar with the smell of Formalin and dead bodies, almost retched. Other than a biological response, there was a sense of disgust that incited nausea. The stench slowly swamped up the room. With no ventilation, the situation was getting worse by the seconds.

“It stinks greater than cat shit!” The Zoog patted Gu Jun’s head to complain. He’d be dead if he had chomped on the ‘food’ earlier.

“What the fuck…” Lou Xiaoning hissed angrily. Her explosive anger was lit up. “You bunch of bastards from Lai Sheng Company, come out and face us!” Suddenly, the color of the opaline bracelet around her wrist changed, this was a signal of mental corruption.

“Calm down!” Gu Jun immediately casted an Ancient Seal to help Lou Xiaoning clear up her mind.

“Fuck…” Lou Xiaoning staggered backwards before she steadied herself. The light on the stone dimmed and she groused, “Who would have thought the smell can influence one’s mind as well…”

“I don’t think the culprit is just the smell but this whole environment.” Gu Jun said darkly. His mentally-drained mind caused his vision to blur. The whole room radiated a sense of malice. The pus, which was slowly turning the floor into a swamp, was just the beginning. And those purple carpets and tapestries… Gu Jun was suddenly reminded of a lesson in color symbolism. He studied them when he did his research into the colors of the opaline stone. The color purple symbolizes royalty, dignity, saintliness and godliness in both eastern and western cultures…

He looked around and he believed it was the cultists from Earth who decorated this room. However, the Zoog mentioned that the cultists dreamed their way into this place so everything here could be an illusion.

This lobby did not represent the House of Worm, that impression suddenly struck Gu Jun. It could just be a borrowed extension of the house, a room where the cultists committed their wicked activities.

“We need to find the exit soon.” The Zoog patted Gu Jun’s forehead in worry. “Or else we’ll die from asphyxiation here.”

“Then please help us find one.” Peacock retorted. “You Zoogs are expert at finding small gaps.” Lou Xiaoning then interrupted, “The fireplaces will have to connect somewhere. Why don’t you climb up them and see where they lead.”

“This…” The Zoog hesitated. His beady eyes stared at the blackened fireplace and his whole body shook like he was staring at the door into hell. However before the group could frown on the Zoog’s cowardice, something else happened to distract them. After all the food dissolved into pus, a human carcass suddenly dropped down from each of the five fireplaces. They were strung upside down with burlap rope that tied around their ankles. When Gu Jun’s group inspected the room earlier, they were sure there was nothing inside the fireplaces, definitely not these bodies.

Instantly, Gu Jun’s heart twitched because he was afraid that he might see Uncle Dan’s face stare blankly back at him. Kathlyn, Tom and the rest shrieked. Thankfully it was not Uncle Dan’s team but whom the bodies belonged to did not make things any better. They were bodies of small children. They were of the same age as the girl with the ponytail whom they encountered in the fog earlier. And their faces…

“Ah.” Kathlyn felt her stomach churning. Peacock clamped her hands over her mouth. “Kathlyn, help me think of something else!”

“These poor things.” Lou Xiaoning hissed through her teeth. The opaline stone was shining again. “Fuck…”

“Do they look that way because of some kind of disease?” Malachite asked coolly.

“Most likely…” Gu Jun narrowed his eyes at one of the children, “That child appears to have died from leprosy.” He had not seen an actual leper before because vaccination for leprosy had curbed all cases as humanity entered the modern ear. However, in history, leprosy was a plague that influenced human history for thousands of years. Even today, there were still villages in China which were built back then to isolate victims of leprosy. Leprosy was caused by bacillus leprae. The bacteria induce mutation to the victim’s skin and nearby nerves, causing deformation and disability. Such was the poor state of the carcass inside the fireplaces. The inverted face was barely human and their neck and hands were clustered with bulging pustules…

Gu Jun turned to the other carcass. It was a victim of smallpox. The face was peppered with small blotches, some of them were opaque while others had darkened. The exposed skin was covered with round scars like blisters from being burnt by hot water, this was typical of a smallpox victim.

Gu Jun shifted to the next fireplace. The body’s eyes were oozing pus and the skin had traces of blebs and pustules. Different from the victim of leprosy, this body was also covered with patches of black scabs. This was the victim of pestis… or better known as the Black Plague.

With discomfiture, Gu Jun whipped his head to the next fireplace. The carcass inside was as thin as a stick. Faecal matter stuck to parts of their body. Cholera… this was a victim of cholera.

Leprosy, smallpox, black plague and cholera. These were all plagues which had left a huge mark on human history, in fact cholera still ravaged third world countries to this day.

There was one last fireplace left. Gu Jun looked over and he was overwhelmed by a sense of familiarity. It reminded him of Jiang Xin Hospital… The purplish skin, parched lips and bloody vomit all over the face and body… It was the legionella pneumonia but it was unclear whether this was the common kind or the supernatural kind.

“This is an altar.” It finally dawned on Gu Jun. His heart shook from anger. “These bodies are part of the ceremony.”

Five different illnesses representing five different plagues, but what was the goal of the ceremony? Were these dead bodies sacrificed to the House of Worms?

“Ceremony? Then those food wasn’t meant for us.” The Zoog gasped, “That was also part of the ritual sacrifice.”

Unfortunately, none of them knew what the ritual was for and more importantly, whom or what the ritual was supposed to summon.

The group looked around as they stood back to back in the middle of the pentagonal room. The stench rolled into a palpable mist and surged at the group. Behind the mist, there appeared to be endless eyes peering at them.