Lingyun watched the fire gather in the dead thing's mouth and felt every pleasant thought in his head step aside.
The zombie had no style.
That was its first offense.
Fire should move like something alive. It should answer the hand that called it, curl around the wrist, wait at the fingertips, and strike exactly where it was told.
But this thing's fire was sacrilege.
It crawled out of a split chest and broken throat like a disease with light attached. It leaked through cracks in its ribs, smoked through its teeth, and shook inside the body as if the corpse could barely keep from bursting apart.
The second offense was a death sentence.
It had burned Rouxi's plants.
Lingyun stepped forward as the glow in the zombie's mouth brightened. Rouxi's vines lifted around him, blackened tips trembling from the last attack, and his smile vanished so completely that even Yuche stopped laughing.
Rouxi's voice came from behind his shoulder. "Lingyun."
