CRIMSON GUARD

"This place looks awesome with the natural glow. It's changing my whole mentality about nature.", the shady guy had said while smiling away and checking out his environment.

Dopamine rushed throughout his whole body; his excitement knew no bounds. Those around him also shared similar expression as his.

Mina took her time while looking around the area to try and see if she could figure out any form of landmark which could tell her that they were on earth.

"What are you doing?", one of the siblings had asked with squinted eyes. Her gaze was fixated on Mina Rodriguez who was busily trying to climb a tree. She hugged a tree tightly while pulling herself up each time she felt she had assumed balance.

"I need to have a better look of this place.", she quickly replied back. Harry had felt a spear almost strike his chest when he heard her words. 'Is she taking my job from me already', he said to himself with a saddened face.

Mina continued with what she was doing even though his teammates were staring daggers at her. She knew her role in the squad and didn't want to slack off from her responsibilities.

Grabbing a branch and pulling up her body, it was now left with a few branches before she could reach a place where she could have a good view of the whole forest. This was her plan all along.

She knew that even though gathering information was a such a dangerous job, she had to do it in order to prevent Harry from coming into contact with danger. Her conscience wasn't going to allow her to let the poor boy take part in such a dangerous thing. That's why she was now using all her might to climb to the top of the tree.

With each branch she grabbed and each bit of energy she wasted, the rising contentment she had in her heart continued to rise slowly. Her family's ancestral occupation was that of adventurers and explorers. Due to the new world order and the advancements of the 21st century, the works of these people had been undermined and their existence were now nothing but a fable.

Though she was worried when she had first appeared inside the cave, her calmness had been revived when the angel had told them about the mission. This had reminded her of some of the stories her father had always told her each time she went to bed but this time she desperately wanted to be the one to tell him about her own adventures.

Without checking the height she had covered from the ground, she continued effortlessly with a smile on her face.

Harry had his eyes on Mina all along since he knew that what she was doing was dangerous. His eyes narrowed when he had noticed that the next branch Mina was going to grab was too old to support her weight. Opening up his mouth he had tried his best to shout but nothing had come out of his throat.

Tap!

Tap!

The heavy footsteps of Harry persisted throughout the still night as he made his way towards the tree Mina was climbing. Everyone else stared at him in disgust since they thought he was already scared by the forest and was chickening out on them.

"Hey! Why are you running, there is no one chasing you bro? You don't have to do this to us now", the shady guy said with sacarsm while trying his best to disgrace Harry as much as possible.

Mina had heard their commotion but her mind was so lost in what she was doing. She stretched her right hand to grab the next branch but before she could get a good grip on it, it had snapped into two, causing her to fall at an unprecedented speed.

Paw!

Pah!

Pah!

The sounds erupted each time her body crashed one of the branches she had used to climb up the tree. Her consciousness slowly faded away as pain shot out through her entire nervous system. Being a daughter of a wealthy had its perks and this was one of them: she wasn't use to this kind of unbearable pain.

Her body had finally crushed into the last branch and shuttered it into pieces when Harry had hopped into the air. He caught her unconscious body before any other form of damage could be meted to it.

All the others stood with their jaws ajar as they stared at the wonderful sight in front of them. The scene resembled that of a princess being rescued by a her prince in a shiny armor.

This prince didn't have a shiny armor though, he even lacked the voice to propose his love.

"Aww, I love love stories. Their love was never meant to be…. You get me Frank", the female sibling said to her brother while smiling frantically. Her eyes radiated a beautiful glow as her eyes widened like that of a puppy.

"Get a hold of yourself Stellar, you can't act like this in public. I don't want others to see that my sister is a love maniac…", Frank replied with a heavy heart as he stared at Harry who had Mina held tightly in his arms.

"I thought I had lost you there.', Harry said while hugging her with a hand coiled around her shoulder and another in between her thigh and the back of her shin.

Harry almost shuddered in fear when he had felt the heat which emanated from the place. He could feel a rhythmic pulse between that area and he calmed down since he knew that Mina was safe and wasn't in jeopardy.

Cough!

Cough!

Harry looked down after his ears had picked up the sounds from Mina's mouth. He quickly dropped to the ground while cuddling her body in his arms. 'You are going to be alright', he said as he brushed the strands of hair which had covered her face due to the intensity of the fall. Her face was as beautiful as always but only that this time her smile wasn't evident anymore. The smile which had warmed Harry's heart each time he had stared into her face was no longer present.

'You, you told me to always keep smiling but now where is yours when I need it the most.'

Closing his eyes, Harry allowed his senses to diffuse into the environment. He had noticed a feint sound coming out from a far away place within the area.

Thud!

His ears had picked up the sound once again and this time it was a little bit louder than the previous one. 'What is happening?', Harry had asked with a curious expression on his face.

Before he could act though, he could feel something touching his face softly. Turning his head to the side, he had noticed whose hand had come into contact with his face.

Mina Rodriguez had her smile on her face even though unimaginable pain was coursing throughout her body. A little streak of blood escaped her lips as she tried her best to remain strong.

Harry wanted to tell her that he knew she was already strong and she didn't have to show him that she was. He used his thumb to clean the streak of blood from her lips while staring into her eyes without fidgeting.

Thud!

The sound reverberated throughout the night once again and this time the others could also hear it clearly since it was loud enough to shake the place slightly. Harry had his curiosity piqued and wanted to satisfy his hunger right away.

He got up from the ground and carried Mina on his back. With a simple hand gesture he had told the rest to follow him into the stillness of the night.

The sound from before echoed throughout the place once again as they progressed much deeper into the woods. Mina laid her head on Harry's shoulder with her arms around his neck.

Her face continuously flashed red as her legs coiled around Harry's waist with her groin directly touching the back of his waist.

After walking for a while, the sound had gotten worse with each step they took. The leaves of the trees rattled non-stop, telling them there was an inevitable danger lurking ahead of them.

Harry had quickly gotten excited from the feeling. He decided to rush towards the end of the road ahead of the others. The others who were not even sure of the reason why they were following him, stood with an intrigued look on their faces as they saw him ran off into the darkness.

What was surprising though was the intensity of how red the person who was on his back's cheeks were. This was as a result of a certain action Harry had performed involuntarily while lost in his excitement.

He had grabbed her behemoths in other to hold on tight to her whiles running. This was her first time of having such a mixture of emotions about what was happening. A certain part of her wanted to bite and tear off flesh from Harry's body for doing such a thing to her in her weakened state.

Another part of her understood Harry and knew that it wasn't his fault for such a thing to happen. Though her thoughts were persistent than ever, they had quickly disappeared when Harry had suddenly come to a halt in front of a gruesome scene.

Ahead of them were the mutilated bodies of beasts of all kinds. Harry stared at all of them in horror while taking in what could have happened here.

Boom!

His thoughts were disrupted by the sound of an untimely explosion. Harry quickly turned his head to the the side and could see rubbles flying everywhere. Upon further inspection he could see two shadowy bodies fighting off in a distance. Harry swallowed hard when he had realized the kind of damage these two behemoths had caused to the environment.

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