Black wings begin to beat

Gao grimaced as Yue turned to him and asked,"Gao, what happened last week?" They walked deeper into the cave. Lights were planted strategically down the cave walls, but now, they came upon three large portable lights, with a note in front of them.

Gao stayed silent.

"You're only 200 or so metres left till where the ruptures are," Vadik read aloud. "Stay vigilant,"

Yue looked at Gao, who hadn't replied, and walked up to Roshi, and whispered into his ear, "You are going to inform me aren't you? You and Vadik have been dodging the question left and right. After this mission, we are going to sort this out. Immediately."

Roshi's heart sank. He stole a look at Gao, whose eyes were still glazed over with a look of despair.

The pillar grabbed the three lights, and threw one to Neji, Himari and Astrid.

"The grip's quite comfortable." Himari noted. "Not sure about fighting with it though. What are we fighting anyway?"

The pillar coughed as he mumbled, "A lot of phantasm level ruptures"

Vadik's eyes widened. Just as he was about to start complaining extremely loudly towards the pillar who had brought them to such a dangerous situation with the third strongest level of raptures, when they couldn't teleport or do anything of the like, without any information at all, and anger boiling at himself for not asking at all, Neji threw up and shouted "Bring it on. I'll be the first of us all to kill a phantasm level rapture."

Gao chuckled and slapped Neji on the back, before proclaiming, "No, that'll be me."

Neji side eyed Gao, and sniggered. "It's on."

As they were walking deeper into the cave, the pillar spoke and said, "If you see a bracelet with emerald's engraved on it, tell me. It's owned by someone who is willing to pay a lot for it."

Vadik rubbed his head. "Is that the main goal of this mission?"

"Depends on how bad the fight with whatever's in there goes."

Haru and Vadik sighed at the same time.

After a few moments, they came upon a cavern. There was a singular large stalactite coming down from the ceiling, seemingly black. Then, they saw it. Hundreds of wings wrapped, curled and unfurled. The reflection of back eyes.

"Turn off the lights," The pillar whispered aggressively.

Darkness descended on them all. Just before it did though, Roshi spotted a glint in the far corner of the room. He placed one of his cards under each of his shoes, and stayed quiet for a moment.

"I'll make the first move, when I shout, get ready to move."

3

2

1.

"Commence!"

The lights turned on to reveal an enormous orange and translucent underneath the bats. As it bared upwards, Roshi shouted "Activate!" and jumped towards the bracelet with a boost from the cards underfoot.

Collision! Blood spurted left and right with bats crushed from the spike underneath. An extreme anger seemed to flow throughout all of the bats, as one, then two, then many crazed cries pained the minds of all the aggressors, as a cacophony of screeches scorched the brains of those who listened.

Roshi froze in the air, and slammed against the floor. Red eyes turned to him, and blackwings quickly surrounded and enrapt Roshi.