Chapter 24- CAUGHT IN A STORM

On the top of a slightly eroded rock with carpet grasses and moss scantily forming a blanket over it, there was a strange sight.

Anyone present would scream from the mere sight of just two dirty and bleeding bruised hands, a foot, and a mass of golden tresses where the head should be with nothing else in view.

Looking back, everything within the area was just dense rows of thick and tall trees without the marking of a path on any part of the green land. It was evident that the place wasn't visited by people. So, fortunately, there was no one present to behold the strange sight.

A soft grunt sounded, accompanied by a slight moving bulge. Then an insect-like creature crawled out of the golden tresses.

"Ahh, some fresh air at last. It was so stuffy I thought I was going to die." The creature said, sounding feminine, all the while trying to stop itself from staggering. "I still feel dizzy."

"Now, where is this place? Hmm, wait a moment. Why am I seeing things in eights? But I stopped feeling dizzy already." It finished, ending it's statement with a puppy like whine.

Zooming in, this creature's body was black and segmented with a hard exterior. Eight legs, a pair of silver pincers, a black tail ending in a gleaming sharp silver sting and two pairs of transparent thin wings on its back, makes it look like a mutated scorpion king.

" Hmm..," Another grunt sounded this time, accompanied with the sound of shuffling clothes. The partially invincible figure slowly moved into a sitting position, clutching her head with both bruised hands.

As most of her body was still invincible, the sight of her posture was extremely strange.

"Finally, the spinning stops." She whispered, slowly letting go of the golden tresses she was clutching. But those parts of her hair now have blood smeared on them and the originally scary scene was finally qualified for a thriller.

"Where is this place?" she asked no one in particular, her voice a little bit above a whisper. She tried looking around but her eyes refused to open fully. Suddenly, the veins leading to her eyes started bulging and pulsing wildly.

"Great question because, I do not know either." A feminine voice responded to her question, making her jump to her feet. She managed to force her eyes open a bit but after some seconds she couldn't see anyone.

Then she shut her eyes again, clutching her head in slight pain. Her breaths became rapid and she didn't know what was going on with her again. But she needed to know who just responded to her.

"Who are you? Show yourself please." She requested. Her heart beats sped up and she bent on her knees as she started feeling sharp pain within. As soon as she felt like screaming from the pain, her heart started beating slowly... incredibly slow.

Suddenly, her eyes shot open, glowing with an intensity that pierced through the spaces between her hanging hair strands, through the big trees of the forest. Her vision darted from one big tree to another, revealing the tiny movement of water through the sap of tiny plants and the newly devoured prey in the belly of a black cobra coiled in the dark hole of a tree. Her vision kept going through the vast expanse of the thick forest until it crossed the sea behind it and pierced through a mountain, going over a horde of countless cocooned bat-like creatures.

At the same time, her ears stood straight, picking up every sound made within the area including the sound of a large river running close by. Too unknowingly close by. All this happened within few seconds. Then her heart started beating wildly again and she clutched her ringing head once more, rolling on her sides while grunting in pain.

Slowly, her heartbeat went back to normal and all signs and memories of glowing eyes and bulging veins were gone without a trace.

"Eyes down here goldie!" The 'feminine-voiced' scorpion said, sounding like it was annoyed. If it were to be a human, one or two finger snaps would have accompanied its statement. This mutant creature had actually been speaking the whole time but the partially invincible golden haired girl kept rolling around like it was s hard to find the creature. There was no way she was that minuscule.

"Why do you keep grunting by the way? Even though you aren't loud, my ears are pretty much sharp you know." The creature finished. This proves just how oblivious it was to it's situation because scorpions don't actually have ears.

"Goldie??" The partly invincible girl repeated. "Down where?" She started searching, finally getting frustrated.

"Urrgh! Right over here!" Miss scorpion shouted and no sooner had she finished doing so, did both parties let out shrilled screams.

"Youuu!!" They both shouted as memories flooded their minds, and if the other wasn't a scorpion, it would make it two ladies pointing at each other instead of just one pointing at the ground. Well, miss scorpion's tail was raised high so guess it could count.

"It really is you! Hahaha! I wasn't hallucinating after all!" Miss 'Goldie' threw her hands into the air as the typical behavior of a mad female starts setting in. All tired symptoms from before suddenly vanished miraculously. It's a wonder what anger can do.

Then she continued. "How can you even talk?? Don't tell me my hair has been harbouring something like this?!!" She gasped, covering her mouth at the realization. "And why do you even have wings?? Why is the silver on your pincers and tail fluctuating? In fact, why are there even so many why's about you?!!" A mad, bewildered and exhausted 'goldie' finally finished, literally panting. Suddenly, she started running her hands through the strands of her golden hair, thoroughly shaking them.

"Alright, I don't know why exactly you're mad and why you're asking so many questions but first things first. I'll repeat what I've been trying to say while you were busy rolling and squatting. I don't know how, but my instinct tells me a heavy storm is coming and we need to get under a strong covering. The forest behind us doesn't seem to be perfect for one either, due to high risk of running into danger and right now, my energy seems to be totally drained and I'm guessing it's the same with you. Thus, we need to start looking for a cover right now and then any other thing can follow. But while we do search, I'm turning cold and stiff already and need to keep warm so I was wondering if you could just let me.." miss scorpion started without catching her breath but when she got to the part of 'keeping warm', she was cut off by a wide-eyed 'goldie' who was already stepping back.

"DON'T EVEN THINK ABOUT IT!" she yelled but miss scorpion wasn't fazed and kept advancing towards her with her request still rolling off her mouth.

"I'm telling you!! Don't come closer!" Miss 'goldie' shouted, overwhelmed by fear and stepping back further. The dark sky suddenly lost its final hue of light as it grew incredibly dark.

A bright lightening flash followed by a loud roaring thunder strike, made both jump from a bout of fear. They attempted to dash into the forest but it was useless as 'goldie' realized she was unable to move. Her eyes widened and fear gripper her as more thunderbolts not inferior to the first one started striking. She saw the scorpion turning back and rushing towards her with extended pincers like it wanted to catch her.

The thunderbolts increased and struck the ground between them leaving a deep wide gorge in it with cracks spreading outwards to the edge of the cliff.

The large river below rose and crashed vehemently against the cliff with loud roars.

The two couldn't proceed further due to the gorge and 'goldie' had a devastated look as her condition was worse.

"Goldie!!" A helpless shout came from the scorpion as the huge trees in the forest behind her were also starting to fall with some catching fire after being struck with thunder. The fire started to spread.

The repeated screams from the scorpion successfully snapped 'goldie' out of her trance.

"I'm Rina you idiot! If I'm going to die at least call me by my name." 'goldie' replied in anguish as adrenaline finally kicked in. However, the part where she stood started crumbling down. With a loud scream she fell along with the crumbling pieces of the cliff's edge.

The sky kept growing darker and the wind was howling wildly like it wasn't satisfied as a winged scorpion scrambled forward .

"I'm prin.. no, I'm Heidi!" The scorpion rushed to the edge and watched intently but there was no sign of Rina. Just the raging river and huge rocks sinking down below.

"Goddess, what do I do? what do I do?!" Miss scorpion kept rambling crazily as she stared at the raging river leading to a turbulent waterfall which in turn led to a boiling water body that has a rocky hill over it forming a kind of dark channel beneath.

Miss scorpion didn't need to ask the goddess for long as she got caught up by the wind and was slammed against a steep rocky downside part of the cliff before dropping into the raging river.

As the water rushed through the dark channel, a blinding light illuminated the tunnel and the madly raging water seemed to gain rationality as it slowly became calm, flowing normally bit by bit before the light died down.