The Broken Temple

"W-What...the F..."

Caleb Li jumped forward his heart skipping a beat. He turned to looked behind only to see nothing but darkness.

Tension gripped him like a death claw, gnashing on his soul. He exhaled and inhaled trying to calm himself but the dreadful surrounding made him unable to relax.

Everything around was eerily dark, he could barely see his hand. His instinct was telling him something was approaching him but he couldn't see it with his naked eyes.

He unsheathed his twins sword and took a battle stance, sweats dripping from his forehead.

The atmosphere was still, the wind blew gently, carrying an echoe of a sorrowful wail.

At first, the sorrowful wail was indistinct but as the seconds passed by, it became more audible.

The wind got stronger, the rustling of leaves became stronger and Caleb Li heart pounded heavily against his chest.

He wanted to escape but to where?

That was the question that was eating him inside-out. The further he went into the more dangerous it would get.

Now, his path of retreat was filled with an unknown danger. Thinking of all this, he couldn't help but cursed his luck.

Screech!

Suddenly, a anguish wail came from the distance, waking up the most surrowful path of his existence.

He felt his hand weaken and his eyes clouded with tears. His emotion spiral out of his control, he felt like crying.

He was sad, depressed from the depth of his soul. With the sorrowful feeling gnawing on his soul, tears stream down from his eyes uncontroable.

From the distance, he saw a beautiful faceless woman in an overflowing red gown walkiing toward him.

The most disturbing part was, every part of her gown was filled with a human head, wailing in angony with tears flowing continuously from their eyes.

Lost in trance, he was wailing in conjuction with those heads on the woman gown.

The faceless woman walked toward him and with each steps, her wail inscreased by an octave, drawing her target into labyrinth of pain and sorrow.

Suddenly, Caleb Li body tremble and he blinked twice, wakinig up from his trance.

"W-What just happened!" He exclaimed in fear and panic.

He heard a loud piercing cry from the faceless woman and all the air on his body stood straight.

He saw the faceless woman with hundreds of head around almost closed on him and his body tensed up.

Without thinking twice, he acted on his instinct and dashed into the forest.

He knew he was lucky to woke up from his trance and if he were stay there any longer. He may not be so lucky anymore.

Drenched in sweats, he urge his body to the limit. He was scared silly and the only thought was to leave these forsaken forest.

From behind, he heard the wail of the faceless woman but didn't dare look back.

Perhaps, if he had looked back; he would have seen three ghost coming from the heads around the faceless woman gown.

The three ghost continue to wail in both pain and agony but their speed of pursuit was astonishingly fast.

Suddenly, he heard a whistling sound coming from behind and with each seconds, the sound was getting closer.

His body tensed up and he looked over his shoulder. There he saw the three wailing ghost on his tail, in a hot pursuit.

"Fuck! Fuck!" He cursed, pushing himself to the limit.

Even though he was moving extremly fast for a person at a Rank-3 Mortal Warrior. His current speed would rival a Rank-6 Mortal Warrior.

Yet, he was losing the three wailing ghost. It was the opposite, they were closing the distance at the rapid pace.

"I can't continue like this!"

"I need to do something!"

With that thought, he took his bow and nocked it an arrow while running at his top speed.

Whoosh!

He turned and let lose of the arrow. The arrow sailed at a blinding speed, carried by the wind and nailed one of the ghost to a tree.

The wailing ghost didn't expect their prey to shoot an arrow. Furious, they let a loud wail that resounding throughout the Dark Forest.

The ghost nailed to the ancient only screamed louder before he move forward.

Though nailed to the tree, the ghost didn't find it difficult to move forward. In a blink, it had escape from the arrow, joining the hot pursuit.

Watching the ghost easily escaping from his attack, Caleb Li furrowed but that didn't stop him from shooting.

Whoosh! Whoosh!

In a second, he released two arrows in quick succession. Unknown to him, he was using the Whispering Wind technique to the limit of the Small Success stage.

If he was improve any further, he would breakthought to the Greater mastery of the Whispering Wind technique.

Bang! Bang!

With such swift archery, two ghost was nailed to a tree. But that only stop them for a second before they escape from the arrow and continued on their pursuit.

This continued for five or minutes and Caleb Li was getting exhausted and his arrow in the quiver only remain one.

With one arrow, how could he hit three fast speed running ghost. It was impossible that was for sure.

Though impossible, he need find a way to pull it off. Else, the ghost would catch up to him.

Just as he was trying to come up with a solution, he saw a broke temple in the distance.

Without thinking twice, he race toward it while his mind was calculating how to hit three target with a single arrow.

The closer he get to the temple the faster the ghost moved. It was as if they were scared of the temple.

'I can do it! I can do it!' He shouted in his mind.

He knew if he didn't hit them and delay them for a couple of seconds, there was no way he was going to make it to the temple.

Taking a deep breath, he took the last arrow and nocked the bowstring.

He held the bowstring, looking over his shoulder as he steady his hold.

Now, his persona resembled the killshot.

Whoosh!

He let go of the arrow.