22 Dance of Void and Sound

Using the narrow space they had to run, Aurea and Zenon turned their bodies sideways to fit in between the rocks.

They were three meters away from freedom. Just as Zenon reached the edge, he wasted no time jumping while being blinded by the sunlight, making his armor glow a beautiful white as it swiftly regenerated the last scratches.

This action was no different from a leap of faith. There could be a gigantic ravine that just led to certain death, or maybe a smaller one leaving him with a broken nose... probably.

When his eyes adapted, he noticed the wall was far enough to grab the edge.

Preparing his hands, Zenon stretched both of his arms and managed to grab a rock coming out of the wall. Quickly stabilizing himself, he looked backward and saw Aurea high in the air.

Way higher than him...

'What the hell! How strong is she?!'

After a while, she began to fall and safely landed on top of a rock. Zenon took a deep breath and without looking down, he quickly began climbing the wall and used the rock to get himself to safety.

"Hold it right there."

Out of a sudden, a sword was pointed in his direction and stopped right on his forehead. Zenon slowly looked up and saw Aurea crouching in front of him, squinting her eyes.

Her armor covered in some drops of blood as well as her sword, made Zenon's mind run wild with possible escape routes, of course unsuccessful.

After some seconds of tension, Zenon opened his mouth to at least say some-

"Not a single word unless I say so."

She pressed the tip of the sword on Zenon, who widened his eyes at the thought of having his skull pierced. While keeping the sword still, she got closer to him and maintained direct eye contact for a solid five seconds.

Zenon stayed completely still, not even able of processing coherent thoughts.

She then tilted her head and said, "Why are you drenched in blood?"

Zenon remained still before realizing he's been asked a question. He coughed and said, "Oh! Uhm... Venemous Tarantula."

Aurea lifted an eyebrow and said, "And you managed to escape alive?"

Zenon licked his dried lips and muttered.

"Well, I... actually killed it."

This time Aurea slightly widened her eyes, impressed. She just kept staring at him for a while, analyzing his figure, and the longer she did so, the more doubts appeared in her eyes.

"It was already wounded."

"Now it makes sense."

The sword suddenly disappeared into waves, then Aurea got up and turned around. Zenon however, was still directly looking at her, not wanting to push his luck and end up dead.

This girl wasn't someone he should mess with that's for sure. Add salt to the wound, she was the strongest Unseen back in the shelter... He felt quite intimidated by this.

'I'm fucked.'

Aurea noticed the lack of movement and turned around once again, "You can come up, won't bite you."

Zenon took a deep breath before pushing himself onto the top of the rock. His first instinct was to lie down and process what just happened because it went really fast.

First of all, he somehow slept over ten hours and he didn't even notice it. The last thing he remembers was being dizzy as hell and just letting his head rest on the hard ground.

Then the canyon decided to move around once again and he had to inject himself with natural adrenaline - also known as fear - and run for his life after being awake for five seconds.

And now for some reason... he happened to bump into Aurea, the strongest Unseen in all of the shelter and probably someone that doesn't really like his attitude back then.

'Maybe... maybe messing with her back then wasn't a good choice. I'm royally fucked now…'

"Hey, get up already." Aurea slightly kicked Zenon's head while saying, "Need to get going."

Zenon looked at Aurea and mentally prepared himself.

Less than two minutes passed since he bumped into her and he started hating this girl again, who gave him no time to process what just happened and could've possibly killed him ten seconds ago.

Aurea summoned a notebook and began writing something with... her nail?

Zenon looked at it with intrigued eyes, knowing damn well that she won't let him touch that thing. Sighing, he got up and tried not to fall in the process.

He also analyzed the surroundings and watched the void flow toward the right. He still had no idea where it went, but maybe having blind faith was better than luck.

Probably...

Aurea lifted her eyes from the notebook, quickly looked left and right, and closed it shut while saying, "Let's go."

She grabbed onto a rock and began moving toward the right. Zenon watched her go, swiftly moving across the wall. Since the edge of this ravine was non-existent, they had to rely on the walls for moving.

He then copied her movements and worked on achieving a stable pace. Aurea moved with little to no difficulty as if she was dancing while dangling on top of a raging river. Zenon could also move without trouble... but it was still amazing.

'Oh damn, there he comes.'

But of course, the most shocked of them all was Leviathan. Since the moment he saw her running through the ravine he had his eyes purely focused on her.

Zenon however couldn't comprehend what Aurea had that made such an infamous and unforgiving creature lose his cool.

'Why don't you go scouting high on the air? I need to concentrate.'

Leviathan looked at him for a while before hissing and rising in the air. However, just as he reached the opening, Aurea peeked at Zenon with dead eyes, sending a wave of uneasiness that almost made him lose grip.

It didn't last for long, but Zenon truly felt the danger behind that pair of brown eyes. He took a deep breath and continued following Aurea's trail.

After some minutes of clutching onto rocks, the ravine opened a little bit more, making a narrow but stable edge appear. They both drop on top of it and began walking.

Still, not a single word was spoken until they reached an X intersection.

"Check the left, I'll check the right."

Leviathan, however, thought otherwise.

'Really?! Fuck off yo-!'

"Tch, don't go giving orders like that when you pointed a sword at me. If that's all you will do then I'd rather jump into that river."

Aurea looked at Zenon for some seconds and shrugged, "Do it then. I won't waste time teaching manners to a kid like you."

"And then what? You'll go explore this place all alone? If so... I think jumping inside the river becomes the better opti-."

Aurea quickly turned around and grabbed Zenon by the armor. She looked down standing mere centimeters away from each other and said with a stern tone,

"Listen here you little shit.

You've given me nothing but hell for the past month inside the shelter. However now, I'd love that you to turn that ego down and cooperate with me.

I know that two is better than one but I won't tolerate going around such a dangerous place with such an arrogant and pathetic excuse of a man.

If I had known that the so useful Void Carrier that Dan promised was such an asshole, I'd have let you die from the Fire Keepers' hands. You have no idea how much Harbor and I risked going there.

So please, I hope you can learn the skill of teamwork this instant and do your best to cooperate and get out of this place."

Zenon stayed immobile in place, dumbfounded by the sudden change of attitude.

'That… sure is a divine voice.'

The image of a calm and composed Aurea was instantly broken due to Leviathan - once again - taking hold of his words. He wanted to say something, but it's more than possible that he would end up saying the most annoying and hurting thing and actually end up dead.

So, he took a deep breath while trying to get rid of his Familiar's influence. Once he was out of its grasp he said,

"Alright... but with one condition." He said while lifting a finger, "Try to watch your tone... I tend to lose patience rather quickly. It's hard to explain."

Aurea stared daggers at him before letting him go and returning to the corner. This time she also took a deep breath, turned around, and said,

"Now... could you please check the left?"

Zenon sighed and jumped across the ravine with ease, quickly checking the intersection.

'These are going to be some hard days...'