haven - zb1

38

It was not, indeed, fun at all. The beasts gave them a fraction of a second to prepare themselves, before the entire army charged towards them.

Above them in the stormy red sky, a luminescent projection of an hourglass appeared, bright blue particles slowly trickling down.

"Here we go," Taerae murmured under his breath, and chaos ensued.

The beasts, to be honest, were nothing much. They weren't fast and they weren't cooperative with one another. They weren't fond of any of their powers, either. The true obstacle was the sheer amount of them.

"These things are endless," Gunwook complained as he smacked one of the beasts out of the air with Quanrui's spear, sparing a quick glance to see the reaction of its owner, before continuing.

"Well, at least they're nothing much," Taerae smirked as he slashed his borrowed sword, "Just a good workout, hm Quanrui?" Quanrui didn't respond, only sending a jet of air to incoming flying beasts, which were nicely thrown into a burst of fire Yujin released.

"You're a natural at fire, huh?" Quanrui smirked, clapping Yujin on the back so hard he nearly stumbled. Together, they worked closer and closer to the stone, surrounded by corpses and splattered with blood.

Gunwook released a jet of fire, which fried everything it touched, the screeching beasts and even some dried debris on the ground, the fire soon getting out of control. Gunwook was momentarily stunned as he watched his careless flames smoulder and scorch everything it could latch onto.

Jiwoong was right beside him and quickly doused the fire, offering an encouraging smile as he said, "You got too excited. You have to be careful."

Bashful, Gunwook smiled apologetically before Jiwoong turned to slice at another lunging beast.

Gyuvin worked tirelessly, cutting through beasts as water churned around him protectively. He was so focused he yelped in surprise when Yujin pat his shoulder in greeting, before twisting sharply to shoot down a rogue beast.

"See?" Yujin flashed a bright grin, "I can take care of myself." Gyuvin was slightly stunned, then he chuckled, shaking his head, "Alright, alright."

The two newly turned earth users were a little shaky with their bows, though Woohyun got the hang of it pretty quickly. Hanbin struggled to procure an arrow long and thick enough to release, while Woohyun was firing arrows and manipulating rocks with ease.

"How do you do that?" Hanbin huffed as he gave up and physically beat a beast out of the air with his bow.

"I don't know," Woohyun shrugged, "It's actually not too difficult. It's like having to control many spheres of water at once." He released another arrow that embedded itself into a beast a few feet from Hanbin. "It's tricky to keep track of everything going on but think of it as streams of water instead -" Two of his rocks smashed into another beast lunging towards them.

Hanbin, amazed, watched for a few more moments as Woohyun fended off ten beasts single-handedly, before tossing himself into the fray as well.

Taerae had successfully tore a path towards the stone, when he was mere metres away, he gazed up to the sky, where he could see the hourglass nearing the end.

He turned back to see that most were still far, and without hesitation, he sprinted back, catching a beast in midair with a stream of water that saved Gunwook from being beheaded.

"Thanks!" Gunwook flashed a grin, and returned the favour by spearing another beast behind Taerae.

In front of them, Quanrui, Jiwoong and Gyuvin were nearing the stone. Taerae urged Gunwook forward and looked around, searching for the others.

He spotted two of the water heirs quickly, Hanbin and Woohyun supporting a limping Yujin between them, it seems from the excitement the youngest House of air heir had strained a muscle.

Taerae did a quick headcount and realised someone was still missing. Scanning the field of corpses and gore, he saw Zhang Hao, wincing with a gash on his arm.

It seems the other heirs also realised Zhang Hao was injured and far away, Hanbin nearly dropped Yujin in his haste to dash to his fellow water heir.

But before Hanbin needed to leave Yujin's side, Taerae planted his hands to the floor and tried to will the water to work like the earth he was familiar with, and managed to conjure a puddle of water that rushed across the floor like an unfurling carpet.

Upon reaching Zhang Hao it cocooned him to protect him before all but dragging him towards Taerae and the rock.

With bated breaths, everyone watched the last few grains of sand near the end as Taerae held Zhang Hao and practically pressed him against the stone.

"That's new," Zhang Hao choked out, and Taerae laughed, overcome with relief. As all their hands finally brushed the stone, a brilliant white light burst forth, blinding and everything was gone.