186 Mirrors

Zhao Wei sat next to her quietly for a while, listening to her tears drip down. Her breath turned ragged, her throat trying to stifle the soft whimpers that were struggling to escape.

"I... may not know exactly how you feel.." Zhao Wei spoke.

He remembered when he first met the people of Dracas, Eyisha and Kitsi. He'd sobbed uncontrollably from simply hearing them speak words he understood.

Even then, before he met them, he was accompanied by Panda then Myra. Even if they couldn't exactly speak properly with him, they made him feel a little less lost..

When he found himself alone where he was, he felt truly isolated from the world, from speaking to someone, anyone on a daily basis, he was suddenly, in the truest sense of the word, alone.

Not to mention that all this time, he had been looking for a missing piece of his memory he wasn't even sure was there.. Hence.. "But I know what it's like to think you're crazy."

Her head perked up, revealing her glistening eyes which previously wet her sleeves.

He considered how it must've felt for her, right now and the her in the past.

The world was as unforgiving to everyone, looking all this, Zhao Wei considered himself lucky. He wasn't genius like her past self was, looking at this whole place, he knew he was probably way too far from that title.

With all his education and what not from the old world, he'd been reduced to the primal instincts of his ancestors to survive. She was able to control this massive structure to keep her alive till today.

But the world got to her. If he knew one thing it was that the silence was deadlier than anything else he'd faced. That first day as he woke up, the echoes of his own thoughts descending into madness was much harder than every beast and every person he faced.

He preferred the roars, the crashes and the screams, because without them, he'd wonder if he was even alive. And to be honest he dreaded the day he'd be left alone with himself.

And the silence got to her. He didn't believe that a genius would do this to themselves without noticing. Somewhere at the half way point to all this, she must've realized something wasn't right.

Yet her descent continued, the need for companions drained her of her own force, and even then the only thing she was left with was all these mirrors of herself.

Even if they seemed alive, even if they were given certain character traits, at the end of the day it was still her inside them. They couldn't tell her anything beyond how she felt and how she thought, all they did was perpetuate all that she already knew.

And by then, a broken girl was all that was left.

He shifted from her side and knelt in front of her.

"Close your eyes for abit." Zhao Wei requested.

"*Hic* Look man, I don't know what you think is going on or what kinda of loli fetish you got, but this is definitely not the right time to hit on me." She joked, trying to dry her eyes. "Geez, all men get horny when they see a damsel in distress."

Zhao Wei's earnest expression nearly twisted off from that response, if it wasn't for the fact that she was holding herself from going into a full on sob.

"Look, just trust me, close your eyes for 30 seconds.." He gathered himself and looked at her earnestly once more.

Seeing him talking to her this way, she felt like she could trust him a little despite this being their first time meeting.

"Fine.." She fervently wiped away the last of her tears. "But you better not try any funny business, cause I'm a biter." she threatened as she closed her eyes."

The moment she did however, she felt him lift her up.

"Hey! I said no funny business!" She shouted at him, but feeling him do nothing beyond that she stayed quiet while blushing quite strongly. She cursed her past self in her mind, thinking she must've been single for too long for her body to react like this just from being touched by a guy, while she counted.

One, Two, Three...

Nineteen, Twenty...

"Ok I'm going to open it!" She opened it early as she was curious about what he was trying to do.

As she opened her eyes however, she saw that they were quickly rushing down a hallway!

---

"What the heck!?" Grendolyn screamed.

At some point, Zhao Wei had exited the door of her room and dashed out of it without her feeling a single thing.

Zhao Wei had considered her wish, and thought about her condition. And he figured the best way to get her out of that room was really to get her out before she even noticed she was out. Of course, the extreme shock of it all did help distract her from that fact for now.

He'd been stepping as small as he possibly could while activating wrap traps on the ground so that she didn't notice they were moving from all the shaking. And the best part was that he was doing this backwards so that his body blocked most of the air she would feel from going this fast.

Now that she opened her eyes however, he decided to do a quick turn and dash as fast as he could to get her as far away from her room. The sudden onset of strong winds from the dash gave her another shock and him another few seconds to go even further.

But at some point he had to start slowing down. The realization had finally dawned on her as he felt her dig her fingers into his body and all the way down to his bones.

He understood that it was a reaction from her fear, but with how hard she was gripping into him now, he was worried she might just snap his bones if he decided to keep moving forward.

What are you doing!? do you want to get caught?" She said with a trembling voice, it seemed that while her body was still reacting to the fear, she agreed with what he did and was waiting for him to make his move.

"Not really, but I'm worried you're going to hurt me if you hold on that hard..."

Looking up at his face, she noticed that he was gritting his teeth while his face turned flush and veins began to sprawl up his head.

"Trust me, if we stay here, you're going to get hurt even worse." She replied while hiding her face back into his body.

"How so?" He asked.

While holding herself from going limp, she answered. "Because the hallway has all kinds of sensors to make sure that I stay inside and so that nothing can reach me, which is why I used the vents last time, and by my guess, they've already noticed us right about... Now!"

But as the seconds passed, the blare of alarms that he expected to go off, didn't. He was hoping for a more mission impossible kind of vibe for their escape with red flashing lights and the sound of marching soldiers at their heel.

"Hello! Are we doing this? Cause if not then I don't need to hold on so hard anymore!" Grendolyn shouted, pulling him back from his delusions.

Zhao Wei quickly started moving again, "Sorry! Sorry, I was expecting something else."

"Like what!?"

"Uh..." He wasn't sure how to explain he was expecting red flashing lights and alarms that rang out like they showed in those spy movies, to be honest he was a little disappointed it didn't go that way. "Just forget about it... By the way, don't forget to repay me for this okay?"

"Hey! I let you out of that prison." Grendolyn screamed as she ran. "You at least owe me for that."

"Wait, you're the one who opened the walls?"

"Yup!" They vaulted over some pipes.

"Hmm... Nope"

"What do you mean?"

"Yeah... I think I was doing just fine in the prison."

"No you were not, all those injuries happened after the first trap you faced, each of those rooms hold at least 10." Grendolyn shook her head. "Now we just have to.. Whoa!"

She suddenly jumped up and brought her weight down on him, pushing his body down as a gigantic hammer swung over head, it's massive size cutting through the air just above them. A raspy voice sounded off, "Miss, I hope you come back with us quietly while I deal with the outsider." Both were sprawled from the fall, turning around to face a slightly massive Golem who was much more muscular than her peers.

"Ohh.. Crap." Grendolyn gulped.

"What's crap? 'Crap' usually means bad." Zhao Wei switched his gaze between the girl and the hulking figure.

"It's Gary, or as the others call her, Gren1."

The thing frankly, was quite terrifying.

Standing a whole human body higher than him, she was equipped with a torso the size of a wall and pillar like limbs to support it, the very shift of her muscles sounded like two rocks grating against each other.

Zhao Wei had felt the wind from it's blow just now. It was swinging that gigantic hammer like a toy, it felt like a speeding train was coming towards him. Gary stepped forward, cracking her neck and joints as she closed in on them. As she got closer, she stopped in her tracks, looking at Zhao Wei curiously. "You're the guy I caught earlier, wonder how you got out..." She murmured as she raised her hammer over her head.