The Truth Behind The Pit

"Reo!" With a distressed voice Hinata exclaimed highlighting her fears as the Drakon launched itself at Reo.

"S-Shit!" Reo exclaimed within his thoughts, his eyes widened to the absolute limits as he could clearly visualize his death. Thanks to the fog his senses couldn't function properly. He had no idea the Drakon had launched itself at them till it was too late.

SWOOSH!

Before the Drakon could bite his head off, Renji appeared above its head in an instant. Rotating his entire body with precision, he executed a roundhouse kick which was targeted directly at the side of the Drakons neck.

THUD!

Due to the fog they could only hear the body of the Drakon as it tumbled down the roads of their village.

[Enemies defeated: 1/1]

[+10XP]

With the message from the system appearing on such notice, it became evident that he had successfully killed the Drakon. The skin on the side of its neck was tougher than he imagined, he could feel a little strain on his leg but it was easily manageable.

"Are you alright!?" Hinata couldn't help but worry, she immediately approached Reo and held his shoulder as he tried recovering from the shock.

Attempting to catch his breath slowly, Reo maintained his composure and smiled softly before facing face Renji who had just saved his life. "Your skills indeed are as formidable as I thought warrior, you have my gratitude." He said, praising his ability to react much faster than both him and the Drakons thanks to his highly trained acute sense of hearing.

"Let's get going before any more of those hideous things show up." Renji declared, facing one Drakon in this kind of environment was one thing, but multiple Drakons? Their deaths would most likely be assured.

"Right, the Reaper's Pit is just at the end of the road." Leading them down the road, Reo ran swiftly towards the Reaper's Pit with Renji and Hinata following swiftly behind him. They followed the shortest route possible to avoid any unnecessary confrontations with any more Drakons.

Slight growls and howls travelled through the air momentarily, although with it's pitch and density one could tell it came from far away. They seemed to have discovered the body of the Drakon whose neck Renji broke.

"You guys hear that right?" Hinata asked as they all ran side by side advancing towards their objective.

"I have never heard such many growls." Reo answered with slight worries.

"They are on to us, let's move quickly. That many growls means just one thing, they know something dangerous is moving within the fog." Advancing forward to the side of Reo, Renji stated as his arms were placed behind his back which was bent forward for easier mobility.

His running style came as a shock to both Reo and Hinata, first his skills were so unusual but so advanced one could only imagine he was trained as a samurai. Now this?

After a while advancing through the shortest routes available, they arrived at the Reaper's Pit. It was a large river located just at the edge of village, given its name the river looked surprisingly clean and safe despite all the transfigurations it had caused.

"So this is the Reaper's Pit huh." Hinata said, stepping forward to take a closer look at the river.

"Yeah, it's the accursed water of immortality which has turned my people into these accursed creatures for years." Reo spoke as he rebuked the river.

Crouching to his feet, Renji bent forward to take a closer look at the river.

"Raymond said there was something beneath the river, what could possibly be beneath this river?" Hinata asked, the fact that this was a Drakon mass producer was proof enough that no other thing could be found here.

"Or did he perhaps see another Drakon emerging from the river?"

"Only one way to find out." Renji proclaimed before stretching out his right pinkie into rhe river.

"Wait!" Reo exclaimed at the top of his voice.

"Renji! You idiot! Do you want to get turned to a Drakon!?" Hinata chimed in, reminding him of the consequences of what he was about to do.

"The villagers are well aware of the end results of an individual who makes contact with this river, so if it was a Drakon Raymond spotted here doesn't that mean someone jumped into the pit despites knowing the implications?" Renji asked, throwing around several stipulations behind what Raymond had seen.

"I find it hard to believe." He immediately dipped his entire right hand into the river, Hinata covered her mouth in shock as she couldn't believe he could have taken such a gamble.

Drawing his hand out of the water, they discovered it was still the same. Infact it was cleaner and more shinier than before.

"Nothing... happened." Both Hinata and Reo muttered softly.

"T-That means the assumption that the Drakons are created from here is false?" He stammered.

"Makes one wonder, if the assumption that the transfiguration of an individual's body into a Drakon is what produces these fogs is false, what truly causes it?" Chuckling softly, Renji stood up to his feet and walked directly behind Hinata.

"Uh what are up to Renji?" She asked as she was highly confused by his movements.

"Down you go." Smiling radiantly, he pushed Hinata down into the river. Reo's mouth was left hanging as a result of the shock that coursed through him.

"Why did you do that!?" He asked.

"Three reasons, one is to test my theory of what causes this fog. Two, if Raymond says he saw something down, now that we know humans are perfectly safe in this water that is where we are going. And finally to confirm my first theory, you all raised your voices too loud and attracted them." Renji said with a sense of relief, pushing Hinata into a presumably deadly river was more than enough to pay her back for all the nagging.

"Renji! I'll make you pay for this!" Hinata exclaimed as she resurfaced, her hair which she spent hours on was utterly wasted as it got drenched.

The growls that filled the air got louder and louder and in a matter of minutes, they could spot several Drakons rushing from within the fog towards them. They had wasted enough time and because of that the Drakons closed in on them.

"This is where we move!" Renji proclaimed as both him and Reo jumped into the river with several Drakons who also jumped in pursuit.