Guardian: The Broken World

The Valley Of Tribulations

-Shen Wei-

There were two contradicting things once they stepped inside the labyrinth. One, despite the day light was still present when they arrived, once they crossed the entrance, darkness was the only thing that they could see far and wide. Second, the maze that was plain to see outside was now replaced by an endless rocky terrain with picks of all sizes dividing the valley with narrow roads in all directions.

As they stood at the entrance, mostly to give the humans a chance to adjust their eyes to the sudden darkness, only illuminated by moon rays, Shen Wei widen his senses to see if he could made use of them inside the maze, but he could only sense that enclosed world for less than a mile, which held a numerous unknown creatures all around. He unconsciously summon his slayer blade, just in case they were ambush from the very start. He was not going to take any chances, because this was a serious matter.

"Shen Wei?" Zhao asked at his side and Shen open his eyes to look at him.

"There are a lot of... creatures ahead, but I can't tell what they are. I'm more use to demons and ghost, guardian beasts are not my specialty." Shen admitted.

"Well, this place can be consider the hell for wicked fairies, so I can probably tell you more about them when we cross paths." Da Qing said.

"We should ready ourselves anyways. I can't have a full picture of this maze, only of what's ahead. Finding our way to the center is going be harder than expected." Shen added, almost in apology.

"There is no need to worry about reaching the center, I know the way." Zhao said, taking everyone by surprise.

"You do Chief?" Lin asked first, while Shen Wei carefully observed his lover, trying to decipher what was going on with him. He notice that his eyes, which turned light golden in the morning, were a shade darker. Zhao, by his part only smiled at him, as if nothing was wrong.

"Yes, using my third eye, I can see the way to the center quite clearly." Which was true, because there was a faint red ribbon floating in a particular path, he knew it was the right way to go.

"Yunlan, don't over use your powers..." Shen whisper to Zhao.

"It's fine. I'm not really using much energy." He whisper back.

"Alright then, I will go after Zhao, Guo, Lin and Zhu, stay in the middle. Stay alert and ready to act at any second." The Professor advised and they moved forward in a single line, while watchful of any sudden movement. Shen Wei even discreetly created a cover to hide their energy as they walked in the narrow roads, turning left, right, or front, under Zhao's guidance.

Apparently, Zhao truly seems to know the way and they avoided a few beasts along the way, but after what looked like an hour of walking, things begin to get ugly. Shen sensed a large group of beasts that were heading their way in all directions and so they stopped their slow advance to prepare for the inevitable coming battle.

The first one to act when a big guardian beast jumped from a high pick, slightly covered with snow was the Ghost Slayer, whose blade sliced it in half before it could harm anyone. After that, more beast came their way and their fight began. Zhao summon his celestial sword and fight back, always making sure to stay close to Shen Wei and have an eye on his team, but luckily for him, they all were holding their own fairly well.

Lin's flute was proving to be useful to control those beast who came too close and Zhu Hong's hypnotical eyes also get her out of troubles a few times. Chu was doing fairy well on his own, while keeping close to his scared monk. However, even Guo, was using his baton to shoot fire balls to those beast that came from above, as well to those dragon like creatures that came, thinking they would have an easy feast.