A warm energy enveloped me, the kind of comforting embrace I imagined a mother might give. I opened my eyes.
“Hey.” Jordan pointed up toward the sky with a dazed look on his face. “The stars are brighter than usual tonight.”
I followed his gaze. Jordan was right. Lit up by countless stars, the sky was more brilliant than it had been before.
“No,” Ren said softly. “Those aren’t stars.”
I narrowed my eyes. “Those are …” My voice trailed off as the glimmering, swirling lights formed into more solid shapes. The shapes of people. Our ancestors.
A breeze billowed over the grass, whipping my hair around my face. Bright-red dots hung in the sky. As the dots drew closer, I realized they were actually lanterns—which our ancestors gripped in their hands.
“Wow,” Ren breathed. “This is …”
“Magic,” I finished.
Old and young, tall and short, thin and thick, the bright spirits of our ancestors floated in the sky above us. So many that they could’ve populated a small village. Their shadows blocked out the moonlight. They surrounded us in a circle of gray-blue light.
“We could’ve had a whole army of spirits at our disposal this whole time?” Jordan asked in disbelief.
I couldn’t quite believe the sight before me. Even after meeting my ancestors in Diyu, I wasn’t sure until now if they truly considered me, who was only half-warrior, part of their family. My eyes filled with tears. I wiped them away as discreetly as possible.
A familiar elderly woman broke away from the circle of spirits descending above our heads.
“Nai Nai,” I said. “You came. You all came.”
“We meet again sooner than I thought we would, warriors,” my grandmother responded. “We’ve received many prayers during this Hungry Ghost Festival. Many more than usual. I have never felt this strong.”
“Faryn!” Out of nowhere, a ghostly pair of arms reached out toward me as though to grab me in a tight hug, but they instead just passed through me, leaving a cold chill.
I shivered and looked up into a familiar, though slightly confused, face. “Moli!”
“Oh. Forgot I can’t do that anymore,” she said with a sigh. She awkwardly folded her arms across her chest. “I totally wasn’t trying to give you a hug or anything anyway.”
“Uh … yeah, no worries,” I said. My eyes fell upon the jovial-looking man standing on a cloud beside Moli. He seemed very much alive. I hadn’t seen him in six months, but I’d still recognize the twinkly eyed, kind, slightly chubby man anywhere. “Zhao shū shu! You—you’re alive!”
“I’m alive.” Moli’s father beamed. “Thanks to my wonderful daughter.” Mr. Zhao gazed at Moli as though she were the most precious thing in the world to him—which I knew she was.
“I was pretty great. I rescued Bà ba, restrained all those pesky demons, and put Meng Po in her place.” Moli tossed her hair over one shoulder. “You should’ve seen me.”
“Won’t King Yama be mad about you disturbing the peace?” I asked.
“Nah,” Moli said smugly. “King Yama actually gave me a promotion. Said he was glad I put an end to the ruckus all the spirits were stirring up. I’m now his personal assistant, and the best part is I get to boss around Meng Po.”
“Oh … okay. Congrats?” said Ren, scratching his head.
Moli grinned. “Thank you.”
Nai Nai coughed and gave us a stern look. “Your request sounded quite urgent, Falun. What do you need?”
“A monkey tamer,” Jordan muttered.
“Sun Wukong went back on his promise,” I explained. “We gave him the Ruyi Jingu Bang, and he refused to join our side in the war.”
The spirits exchanged knowing looks.
“That isn’t surprising,” my grandmother said heavily. “The Monkey King is known for being—”
“A trickster figure,” I finished. “Isn’t there something you all can do about this?”
The solemn expressions on my ancestors’ faces didn’t reassure me.
“We spirits?” Nai Nai shook her head. “I’m afraid Sun Wukong is beyond our control. Frankly, he’s beyond anyone’s control.”
Great. “Then what are we supposed to do?”
“You, child?” A woman stepped forward, her long, silvery hair blowing in the breeze. I recognized her almost immediately. Cindy You. Her eyes found Ren, and a warm, sad smile rose to her lips.
“Mama,” he said.
My heart slammed in my chest. Oh no. If she had been summoned here among the rest of the spirits, then there was only one explanation. Ren’s mother walked among ghosts in the Underworld now.
“Ren,” Cindy said. Her eyes swam with ghostly tears. “My son. My boy. I’m so sorry I couldn’t be with you growing up. But I’ve always been watching you from afar.”
“Ren …,” I whispered.
His eyes, when he turned them to me, shone with wetness. But he didn’t cry. “It’s okay. I’m not sad. I think I … I already knew.”
I heard Ren’s unspoken words. I can’t cry over a woman I didn’t even know. I reached for his hand and squeezed it. My own mother was still nowhere to be found. All the chaos overwhelmed my emotions. I’d have to worry about finding my mother later.
Cindy watched us, her sharp black eyes still shining with tears. “To answer your question, Faryn Liu, you warriors should prepare to fight.” She tilted her head up toward the sky. A huge, dark shadow of a cloud had just shifted over the moon. “If our hunch is correct, Sun Wukong will need your help very soon.”
“Our help?” Ren echoed. “Why would he need our help?”
A drumming noise sounded beyond the tall trees of the Mountain of Flowers and Fruit.
I gasped. It wasn’t just a dark cloud that had passed over the moon, as I’d thought. Figures stood on top of that huge black cloud. Powerful-looking soldiers who were dressed for battle. Several banged huge red war drums. And hovering in the air above the soldiers were … dragons. The magnificent creatures’ scales shone black instead of the colorful hues that I was used to seeing, as though someone had taken a calligraphy brush
