The Castle

Hours passed by, yet to everyone summoned here, it felt like an eternity of terror. After luckily escaping from the giant bear, Sora and Jong-un were able to cover a lot of distance without any new encounters. They are now walking through a dense foliage, all the movement and the minor blood loss accumulated stress on their body and mind, but they cannot stop walking, they are thirsty and hungry, the only thing keeping them forward is the intimidating castle at the distance that shines as a beacon of hope.

"..Haa, you sure you don't have any water left?, why carry the backpack if nothing's in it?"

"Erhh, I shouldn't have given you my  water, I really regret it."

"Hey, I'm just asking."

"Haa, I'm the one carrying my bag, what's it to you, stop talking, my lips are getting dry."

'hmph, ...wait those are..?'

Suddenly looking around him, Jong-un discovered something.

"H-hey, that, that's called water something vines right?, I have seen those in tv." He pointed to a large brown vine tree on their left.

"Ahh, y-yes, there must be water in those, let's cut it."

The vine tree in question is called water bead vines, a type of plant only present in ancient ruins and dungeons, often containing small amounts of water in their vines and beads, it is taught as a plant to look out for when in the ruins as the water in them contains nutrients and boosts energy.

They both approached the vine tree and using the crude edges of the Spears, they were able to cut and drink enough water from them, and kang sora refilled her bottle.

"Drink your fill now, I won't be giving any from this." She said to Jong-un with a glare.

"Tch. I don't want it anyways."

After some bickering, they continued walking towards the castle, now with renewed vigor, but soon enough, they were again met with Horned rabbits, this time 3 of it.

"Shit." Jong-un cursed out and both of them took a fighting stance, with the improved stamina and previous experience, they were ready this time. immediately as one of the horned rabbits zipped towards them, Sora anticipating it to zip pass in between them thrust her spear slightly downward towards the coming rabbit.

*Shwvaa* the spear pierced the rabbit, killing it in a single strike.

Jong-un stared at her in disbelief, the two other rabbits seeing this became enraged and charged towards them, this time the speed of the rabbits seems much faster and both Sora and Jong-un's slashes kept missing them.

One of the rabbits charged at Sora from a blind angle, she tried to block the charge at the last moment which deflected the rabbit but it broke her spear, capitalising on this opportunity, the second rabbit charged towards her head, she dodged it on impulse but a deep cut appeared on her left cheeks, she fell to the ground, adrenaline suppressing the burning sensation on her cheeks but the rabbits aren't done, they came around again but this time they went for Jong-un who was now standing in front of sora and pointing the spear at the rabbits trying to help her and trying to create distance between them and the rabbits.

Sora held her left cheeks with her left hand and slowly stood behind Jong-un, One of the rabbits rushed straight at Jong-un who thrust the spear forward with all his might, the spear pierced through the rabbit, killing it instantly, but the second rabbit came from his right and due to his forward momentum, he lost balance and was unable to counter the charging rabbit, as the rabbit neared closer towards his head, he instinctively closed his eyes.

*Splurt* warm blood splurted on Jong-un's face but felt no pain, so he slowly opened his eyes, there he saw the horn of the rabbit so close to his face but the tip of a dagger was protruding on the side of the rabbits head, holding it in air, then his gaze followed onto the hand of sora who was holding a dagger that pierced the rabbit.

"..wha?, how?" Jong-un asked with shock and relief.

" Hah, in there...Argh" she tried to say she got it from the ground but the wound on her cheeks caused a strong pain while talking, thus after calming her pain she pointed to the ground.

Jong-un has more questions but seeing her state he refrained from asking, he remembered hearing that there is a slight possibility in finding weapons inside the barrier if one is lucky and so he looked around to see if there is more but unfortunately there wasn't anything.

Now both injured and no way to heal, they walked silently deep into the center and after cautiously avoiding all monsters, they encountered three other humans, one Indian, one French guy and an American who wore a copy uniform and was carrying a gun, fortunately they all speak english and were able to communicate to some extent and decided to move togather.

The American introduced as David Fridman a police officer in his mind 40's, the French guy is Adrean Louis a businessman in his 30's and the Indian guy is named Franco a youth in his 20's.

On their way their group encountered a goblin squad, and with joint efforts they were able to subdue the green skinned goblins, but right when they are about to move on, a hobgoblin nearly 2 meters height and large musculing body ran towards them, the cop seeing this pulled his gun from the holster and shot three shots at the charging goblin, it slowed down the charge of the goblin and after few seconds bled to death. Unfortunately this gunshots alerted all monsters and they could hear the sound of a monster horde coming their way, dread washed over them as realising this they ran with all their might towards the castle that's almost at their reach.

Sora and Jong un were running at the front with all their might, followed by Adrean and Franco, the cop David was behind them and a monster horde was right behind him, after a couple of minutes of running, a sabertooth tiger reached David and swing it's claws at his back, it tore a deep wound on his back and David flying in the air crashing into jong-un and the group, they all fell on the ground, now on the ground and only a few meters between them and the monsters, all hope was lost, the monsters horde leaped in air trying to pounce on them, as the mouth of a monster neared Jong un's face, he closed his eyes fearing the worst but the feeling of pain never came but a loud *DONG* sound was heard, curious he opened his eyes and saw the monsters horde slamming into an invisible barrier right before him and the he heard the relieved words of kang Sora

"we arrived here, ha haha."

Looking back he saw the rest of his team looking up at the super tall castle, he noticed they unknowingly run straight and safely towards the castle, he suddenly turned his attention to David and saw that a green hue envelope him and his injuries were healing at a rapid pace, in a few seconds only the claws mark on his uniform is what remains of the attack. And similarly they were all healed without leaving a scratch.

Turning around he saw the monsters horde has started to dissipate in random direction.