KRRAAACK!
A sharp echo rippled through the clouds like a scream tearing the sky apart in a white glow and rolling like a furious snake refusing to die. Tiny drops of rain began falling after the lightning struck for the fifth time, diving and slamming a tree into two, burning it with natural fire that cast smoke across the air.
The intensity of the rain increased, falling like a machine gun set on fire, plucking the leaves of almost all the trees being hit by the relentless thunder, and pushing them in the slight stream now forming beneath the trees.
Kai stood at the wall, his hands placed tightly on the stool of the winds as he stared at both the sky and the trees now burning in the rain, with astonishment filling his eyes. Cozy air painted the glass at the window like a breeze of snow as air gushed out of his nose.
Raising his right arm and placing his palm on the glass's surface, a cliché coldness struck his spine, making him pull his palm back without knowing. Yet, he felt the coldness still flowing through him like fire after placing his arm back on the stool of the window.
Every single thunder sound he heard ramped in him so hard it collided with his breathing and made him breathe in the same synchronization with the thunderous sounds. But he didn't move away; he stood there, gazing intensely, looking at the sky, and focusing on the small figure that seemed to be appearing whenever lightning struck.
After an hour of not knowing whether to conclude it as a human or something else, he moved an arm and turned, letting his back face the outside world on the other side of the window, where the rain was falling, while he faced the thick, dark texture of his room and nodded.
'It wasn't in the plan to spend weeks there, but why change the plan suddenly?' he thought, raising his right hand upward, using the grown nail on his thumb to remove the slight dirt that was stuck in the other fingernails.
His eyes began to undergo a small transformation, looping in an endless opening and closing as one of the new shadows he'd been seeing entered him and merged itself with the one already in him, turning him unconscious.
His body began to tilt slightly, his back screeching on the surface of the wall before crashing heavily on the ground, hitting his head and causing blood to seep out of the wound now pumping on its own.
Blue particles began falling on Kai, hitting him and forcing him to crack his eyes open, only to see himself in a different environment altogether. Ancient Chinese buildings stretched long before him, starting from where he stood and vanishing in the far distance without showing their end.
…
Cries of dying wolves struck the air as Oin led the twelve soldiers toward the remaining wolves that seemed to be retreating, scattering in pairs and moving about, jolting past and under all the buildings and sub-tunnels.
After effortlessly slamming the last wolf, Oin walked past the unmoving creatures, swinging his sword in the air and focusing his gaze on the last wolf resisting death after receiving cuts on its body and head.
Oin paused, raising the weapon in his hand and slicing off the ear of the creature, letting blood spill out of it, and continuing to cut the other ear, the eyes, and the nose, which mysteriously made the creature finally accept its grave.
"HUH, these creatures cause fear on first sight but are less strong when fighting with them," he said, crushing the sword in his hand onto the head and leaning on it.
The other soldiers joined him, repeating the same act and posture, but Jinx and Mike stood there staring in the direction Lieutenant Gray took and exchanging glances as if communicating in a language only they could understand.
One after another, Oin and the others began crushing the heads of all the wolves, removing their canines and placing them in pockets on their uniforms, adding the entire remains of the creatures to the ones already packed in the locked under of the bus and at the back seat as well.
"Who else wants to follow the direction the lieutenant took and have a clue of what's keeping him long?" Jinx said, raising her sleek sword upward and tilting her gaze sideways, looking at the puzzled faces of the soldiers.
She began moving in that direction, Mike walking by her side, not waiting for an answer from the rest. But little by little, they joined, jogging and stopping when they reached her.
Oin stayed behind, shaking his head as he watched them vanish from sight, walked back to the bus, pulled all the canines he had placed in his pocket, and began counting them.
…
"Hhh – hah… hah – damn it! Why am I struggling to bring these two creatures down?" Gray said, gasping for air as he stared at the trembling sword in his arms.
The ground shook heavily, erupting buried stones as the gold-feathered eagle shredded the dirt and pulled the sliced feathers from its wings, jolting high into the air and bouncing heavy wind and dust onto the ground.
"No matter what, you have to go down!" Gray said, straightening himself and tightening the grip on both swords, sweeping his right leg low across the dusty floor, tracing an arc that curved leftward. As his body twisted, following the movement, his left leg followed, carving a seamless arc in the opposite direction.
He closed his eyes after creating an invisible Yin-Yang leg spiral on the ground, then spiraled his body around, shifting his weight and allowing his scale to match the level of the swords in his arms.
Meanwhile, as Gray perfected his stance, the eagle dived down, its torso and beak glittering under the moon's gaze. And when it moved past the building, reaching the window level, Gray moved, jolting upward, stretching the sword upward.