Chương 270: Open

Thirteen was getting tired of this. She'd spent all this time in Myra's shadow. Despite it's capabilities, a world of black was not necessarily the most eventful or interesting of places. Her right arm hung sluggishly at her side with dagger in hand as her whole body slouched. Each breath felt like it was piercing her lungs and her body had probably gained more bruises in these past few days than all her life in training and killing.

The only thing that retained any sense of fighting spirit was her eyes which tarted across the whole room trying to spot her adversary. Despite there being no indication of anything happening, she raised her dagger up, blocking where her jugular was. Right at that moment something clashed against the dagger which trembled in her hand.

While the hit was heavy, nearly breaking through her defense with all her current strength in it. And even though she knew that this was still her opponent going easy on her, there was some sense of satisfaction she felt by achieving it. Still her hands moved to intercept the next attacks which came at almost the same time, two on her left and one on the right.

They all hit, tearing into her flesh, one on her shoulder, two in her abdomen. While bleeding out, suddenly a small white figure appeared in front of her. "D@#mit Panda! I'm not Zhao Wei, right after I block one of your hits you speed up!?" Thirteen shouted while covering her bleeding wounds.

"Chi Chi Chi Chii Chi, Chi Chi Chi Chiii Chi Chi?" Panda replied.

Thirteen only needed to see her eyes which held some superiority over her and a vein started creeping up her forehead, ready to burst. She spoke through gritted teeth as she tried to preserve her breath, every time she inhaled she could feel pieces of her cracked ribs piercing into her lungs, it was too painful to stay awake but not to retort. "I said... I'm not Zhao Wei, how am I... supposed to.. understand a rat with over grown ears..." Those were the very last words she spoke before she blacked out.

"Chi CHi CHI CHIIII!!?" The insult was not lost on Panda as she reared to ram another whole into Thirteen's flank.

*Bark* bang!

Before she was able to jump in however, a blast of concentrated sound exploded in the space between them as Myra jumped between them to stop the fight and take Thirteen out, dropping her into the embrace of one of those vines.

They had arrived where Zhao Wei was taken for several days already. At first they wanted to spot him within the crowd of apes, worried about his safety in the midst of beasts who were into such barbaric practices. That was... until they spotted him thriving very well, so much that he even followed their custom of not wearing clothing, and letting everything hang out in the wind.

If Thirteen was honest, she had let her gaze linger a little longer than necessary. If she was a little less honest, she'd say she was used to saying naked bodies, seeing as many of her targets were most vulnerable while they were conducting acts which required them to be in such a state.

As Zhao Wei seemed to be doing fine, she decided to conduct some improving of her own, eliciting the assistance of Panda. She'd trained with them both once in a while, and thought it'd be fine. She had to find out the hard way that a Panda with most of her focus on Zhao Wei and a Panda who was fully focused on her were two different things.

Panda herself had a hard time adjusting her strength. Usually she'd be able to use a minimum of 70% of her abilities even on Zhao Wei's worst days. Living at that speed it was hard to pull herself down to Thirteen's level, which admittedly was pretty high at her age. Sometimes even, she forgot to tone it down which resulted in some very ugly injuries. They were lucky of course, that the troublesome place Zhao Wei ended up at this time had a quick fix for those problems.

Thirteen didn't feel this was a good thing though, it seemed like Panda had been letting lose a little too often. And every time it felt like she was pushing the limits of the injury she inflicted, just little by little just to see how far she could go before the plants stopped healing her.

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Stepping out of the plant about an hour later Thirteen was already prepared for the next fight as she entered Myra's shadow. But as she entered she watched as the two beasts were looking at a direction attentively.

Myra had opened a hole in the shadow to view the outside, and they were watching as the crystal thing began to stir violently in it's place. They had been worried a few days back as they watched it form around their friend. Panda gave them both a really hard time as she continuously tried to move in.

But unlike Zhao Wei who was invited into this battle royale, they weren't sure what kind of reception they would've received. If they were caught in the middle of the primate army and were torn apart, would they be extended the same courtesy of being thrown up to the healing vines? Or would they just fertilize the ground as their bodies decomposed? Worse still, if they ended up in the stomach of several of these apes.

They were hoping that Zhao Wei would've come out while the apes had mostly vacated the area to go find some grub. But no such luck.

Though the crystal ball stirred several times there wasn't much of any other reaction. After the third time or so, they began to ignore these false alarms as simply nothing. But this was different, not only was that thing shaking crazily, it was visibly getting dimmer.

The light that had permeated it's surfaces and radiated outwards had begun to retract into itself, leaving only some grayish glass like material in it's absence.

As much as they were excited that Zhao Wei was finally coming out of that thing, the apes that had been waiting had been riled up by the event.

And why wouldn't they, the moment he came out these battle crazy beasts would like to test out his strength as much as possible. At the very least several hundred of them would be leaping in to get a piece.

With baited breaths they waited and watched as the crystal's colors waned. All their hearts beat in unison as the ember like azure pulsated, growing weaker with each beat.

At first there was a great decrease with every step, taking the light away from large portions of the crystal. But as it grew smaller it also begun to slow. Once it reached the size of just a small circle in the middle of this gigantic ornament it became infinitely long.

All their muscles tensed, their eyes straining to see the small ember that refused to die out. Claws, feet and tails dug into the ground, ready to pounce at the moment the light died. Each breath seemed to get heavier as the tension permeated the air. Even as many of them could not take the anticipation any longer, the moment did not come at their schedule and all they could do was keep waiting, and waiting... and waiting.

It might've just been minutes, but it seemed like eternity before the light drew back to the size of a fist... then a candle... Decreasing constantly but ever so slowly until it just became a small flicker. At this point no one dared to draw a breath as they watched it fizzle just a little..... then finally out of existence.

And without another second in between, a loud snap echoed through the whole crowd, so loud it created shock waves that it blew the dust away in waves. coating those closest to the crystal in a layer of light brown. But not a single one of them even covered their eyes as they trained it onto the crystal. A single line drawing through it, starting from the center and cutting through the thing all the way, inducing the sounds of breaking glass with each split.

Though the sound was loud enough to even alert the environment around them, all everyone here heard was the blood rushing in their ears, they weren't even able to notice when the noise had began and when it had stopped...

Finally after an eternity of waiting, the thing shifted and opened to reveal the man hidden inside.