Path of Possession

by Harmon Cooper

  “I understand it was the crown,” I told him, “but that doesn’t mean you have to die. I need you alive. Let’s heal you up, and then go from there.”

  “The crown said things to me. It told me where it came from.” A fire ignited behind Hugo’s eyes. “The demon that inhabited it was from the Underworld, and it told me if I ever destroyed it that, that it would return here even stronger in… It threatened you, and Tom, and Bobby, and my people, he told me I needed to make sacrifices to it, to weed out any dissidents. It knew about you. All the demons in the Underworld know, they realize what the Overworld has done by bringing us here, what they’re trying to do… The crown…”

  “There’s no reason to die, we still have a fight left here,” I told him.

  “No, you have a fight here, my fight is down there,” Hugo said through gritted, bloody teeth. “For what I’ve done in this world I’m going to the Underworld, and when I get there, believe me, Nick, I’m going to raise so much hell that they’re going to wish there had never been a demon who inhabited a crown that somehow found itself on my head.”

  “So you’re going to do the Underworld to slay demons?” Lhandon asked.

  “Yes… Someone has to do it. It’s the only way for us to win this.”

  “No, there has to be another way,” I started to say.

  Hugo’s eyes shuttered for a moment. They opened again, life returning to him. “But before I go, Nick,” he said, loud enough for his guards to hear him. “I hereby renounce my throne and give it to you. You are now the Emperor of the Island Kingdom of Jonang, Nick. I wish you luck, Emperor Nick.”

  And with that, Hugo died.

  I looked to the water in the distance, fires still raging, the sea dragons moving in and out of the waves as they tore through what was left of Sona’s fleet. I then glanced at the docks, most of which were destroyed, and the bodies floating near the shore, the smoke in the air, the group of soldiers starting to line up before me.

  “What are your orders, Emperor Nick?” one of the soldiers asked, his head bowed in my direction.

  The end.

  Back of the Book

  Reader,

  I love writing this series, and it continues to reach more readers because of your reviews. Please review this installment, and while you’re at it, write a quick review for books one and two.

  Yes, this takes a moment, but it really helps push this series to more readers like you!

  Here are some quick links:

  Way of the Immortals: Path of the Divine

  Way of the Immortals 2: Divine Madness

  Way of the Immortals 3: Path of Possession

  Now continue for some funny stories about my times in Asia.

  Lion Man

  I first went to Asia in 2010 as part of a study abroad trip to Nepal, where I studied the Tibetan language and lived with a Tibetan family. I fell in love with Asia, and vowed to do whatever it took for me to return in 2011. Upon arriving back in Austin, Texas, I took a job at a twenty-four hour coffee shop, covering shifts for the full-time employees. This meant that I also had to work overnight sometimes, which was very strange.

  Anyway, in March 2011, I set off to India, where I planned to finish a book. My girlfriend at the time planned to join me three weeks later, giving me a hard deadline.

  While I was in McLeod Ganj, home of His Holiness the Dalai Lama, I saw an Asian man with a mane of thick hair handing out fliers. He called himself Lion Man. Here is the flier he gave me:

  I told him I was finishing a book, but that I’d attend his show when my girlfriend came. She came three weeks later as planned, and I handed her the flier and told her, “We’re going on a date.”

  The night of the Lion Man show came, we paid the door fee, and were led to our seats. We were seated with about twelve other foreigners, half of them in deep in their karma cola modes.

  Note: Even though it is played out by now and people have been making this mistake since the 60s, foreigners come to India/Nepal seeking their own nirvana. There is nothing bad about going to India to do yoga or meditate, but many can’t adjust very well to the culture in India, or they change too much in a way that doesn’t always vibe well with the people they’re accustomed to being around. Many of the foreigners modify their dress style once they get to India, wearing clothing that they’d never wear at home, and clothing that the Indian population doesn’t wear. They act like they’ve reached some type of enlightenment, and some even put themselves in harm’s way with some of their actions and decisions.

  Note Two: Karma Cola is a book you should read if you’re interested in going to India for spiritual enlightenment.

  Anyway, some of those people were there at the Lion Man show.

  (I’m going to switch to first person present tense here because the rest of this story works better that way. Bear with me.)

  Lion Man comes out, and just as he is about to start up his performance, a march for Tibetans who have self-immolated plays out in the street below the restaurant. We all wait for that to finish, most of us tucking our heads because we know it’s odd for us to be sitting in a restaurant while people are marching for those who have sacrificed their lives to bring international attention to the exploitation they are experiencing in their home country. Once the Free Tibet rally is done, Lion Man continues his performance.

  Over the next hour, he tells us his story about how he came from Tibet with his mom. He shows us pictures of his homeland, he sings a Tibetan song, he goes on and on.

  Everyone seated looks a little bored, all aside from a pair of German tourists, who make eye contact with me and whisper, “Just wait.”

  So I wait.

  The Lion Man sings another traditional song, and once he finishes, he announces that he will be taking a small intermission.

  Of the fourteen or so people seated, a handful leave, mumbling that they were expecting an interesting performance.

  Boy, should they have waited another few minutes.

  Lion Man comes back out, a little more energetic this time.

  The Germans make eye contact with me again, one gives me the thumbs up.

  I don’t know what their deal is, but I’m ready for anything.

  Lion Man announces that he’s about to get the party started through some nontraditional dancing. He turns on shitty four-on-the-floor dance music and starts grooving. It’s not great, but I’ve made it this far and the Germans have piqued my interest.

  After a couple songs, the Lion Man pulls his pants down and starts jerking himself off. He bends over and fingers his anus, still grooving to the music as he shakes his hips.

  This all happens in a matter of seconds.

  Then he’s back to his normal dance, all the karma cola enlightenment seekers shocked and angry as hell that he’s exposed himself.

  If someone had been filming at the time, they would’ve turned to me to see me laughing my ass off.

  However vulgar Lion Man’s display was, he had milked us along for close to an hour and a half before revealing what his actual show was all about. He was a goddamn divine madman, using a shocking moment to fuck with foreigners in a way that should have broken them from their molds.

  In the end, there were four of us laughing (the Germans, me, and my girlfriend, who also found it humorous), but everyone else was flaming mad/shocked in a way anyone from the West would be, and not able to do anything about it.

  After the music stopped, Lion Man lined up at the door as we all filed out, shaking our hands.

  And no, he didn’t wash his hand before doing so.

  The reason I mention this story is because of a general theme in Way of the Immortals.

  While Lion Man’s performance took place in a modern setting, it was entirely indicative of the type of “Divine Madness” that the Bhutanese monk, Drukpa Kunley, was known for. Remember him? I wrote about him in the first installment, and he is why Nick’s weapon is named the Flaming Thunderbolt of Wisdom.

  While I haven’t delved too
much in this series about these types of practices, as I am trying to write entertaining fiction here, I have continued to try to slip some of Drukpa’s odd and questionable wisdom into the books. Unfortunately, there wasn’t a space for a long Drukpa Kunley poem in Book Three, but I’ll try to add one in the next installment.

  Another story that doesn’t involve Lion Man jerking off in front of me

  I stayed with a Tibetan family in Nepal, as previously mentioned in the first back of the book ramblings. One story I love to tell is about Tsering, the man I stayed with, who was finally able to relocate to America.

  As you may recall, Tsering had a wife and a son. The wife had been abused by Nepali police at a Free Tibet rally, and the US Embassy had granted her asylum. They, unfortunately, had not granted asylum for her husband or their three-year-old son. By the time I was staying with them, Tsering had been waiting for almost two years for his paperwork to process.

  He was still waiting when I returned to America in May 2010.

  Fast forward to September of that year.

  I get a voice message from my dad: “Hey, it’s me, your dad,” the message began (he always started messages like this for some reason). “Some guy named Shitting keeps calling. I can’t understand him. Says his name is Shitting. Do you know someone named Shitting? Call me back.”

  I listened to the message again, trying to figure out what the hell my dad was going on about.

  Then it dawned on me.

  Tsering.

  I called my dad back and told him that was Tsering, not Shitting, calling, and he was the man I’d stayed with in Nepal.

  “Yeah, Shitting, he keeps calling. Let me get his number off the caller ID.”

  Even though I was saving for India, I knew I needed to visit Tsering at least once to see how he was doing in the States. So I got in touch with him, and we made plans.

  I visited Tsering December 2010 alongside a friend I’d made in Nepal, an American who happened to live in Colorado and speak Nepali.

  And as you can imagine, it wasn’t easy for Tsering once he arrived in the US. In Nepal, Tsering was a business owner with his own carpet factory employing forty-six Nepalis. In America, he was living with his brother-in-law somewhere in Colorado and going on random construction jobs.

  His brother-in-law’s house was also a hodgepodge of America and Tibet. It was a ranch-styled home, but the brother-in-law, a contractor, had converted one of the rooms to a prayer room. Note: most Tibetan households have prayer rooms. If they only have a two bedroom home, they will share a room in order to have a prayer room; at least the more traditional families will.

  And talked about one decked out prayer room! The wooden seats were designed the same way as they were in Asia, as was the altar and the statue of the Buddha on it, the piece surrounded by thankas (Buddhist painting on cotton or silk depicting a famous scene).

  “But look,” Tsering said in accented English as he a pressed button. My friend and I heard a hissing sound as a flat screen television lifted from the altar, in front of the Buddha. “Nice, right?”

  Yes, it was very nice, oddly American to toss a hidden flat screen TV in the prayer room, but nice.

  We ate traditional Tibetan food with them, and they prepared the food in the way they prepared it in Nepal, by placing wooden cutting boards on the kitchen floor, squatting before them, and rolling out the dough for dumplings.

  Tsering was happy to be back with his wife, but he’d lost his mobility in America and his business. It was definitely bittersweet to see him reunited with his wife, but with much less than he’d had back in Nepal. We finished eating, talked some more, and parted ways.

  I moved to India, and later Mongolia, a few months after meeting and we lost touch, but I’m sure he’s somewhere out there in America now, finally thriving. His son should be fifteen or so by now, meaning he would have grown up in America speaking two languages. I hope whatever they’re doing, they’re happy, on the road to success, or already flying down it.

  Thanks for reading this, I hope it helps.

  Harmon Cooper

  P.S. Please review this series!

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  I have written over thirty books. Here are some of the highlights!

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  (This one is related to Monster Hunt NYC)

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