Our own hell; lord of the death trial

They crawled down the sloped tunnel, hastened by the furious shaking of the cabinet doors, the damp hole causing itchiness on their shoulders, arms and legs, while they struggled to ignore it.

It was painful for Yue, he was crawling with his palms that had been cut by the fanged thing, while using his back to go down the hole instead of his face. It had struggled with him before he had been able to seal the tunnel opening with the iron cord he had been given. He heard the screams of Lily and sighed, 'isn't it a long night already.'

Emma was the second to crawl out of the sloped tunnel, dusting herself and wiping down the mud that stuck to her. She quickly lit a torch by silently mumbling some words, and made sure to spread the fire around, illuminating the place. The place stank of rusted iron and dampness, the walls covered in green algae, swords and other weapons littered on the floor along with human bones. Lily sighed as a rat scurried past her feet and checked around for a comfortable place to sit. She heard Emma instruct the others to stay within the sight of the light as they exited the tunnels and sighed again bemoaning the loss of warmth and comfort. 'Couldn't they have just pleaded with the owner of the mansion to let them stay the night.' She watched as the others cleared up a portion of the floor and stood up from where she sat, joining the others to sit in the circle they made. The silence was deafening, as the unasked questions hung in the air, they all faced various directions, rubbing their arms and legs for warmth when Kai broke the silence. "What was that thing?" She asked facing Emma and waiting for her answer. Emma stood up and walked over to Hei Yue, stretching out her hand to him as she squatted besides him " let me see it" he placed his already swollen palm on top of hers and watched as she inspected the site of the cut which was now purple in colour. She took out a small blade from her pocket and created two cuts on each side of the wound, pressuring the cut with her fingers as a yellow pus started oozing out of it. "It was a night creeper" she said and pointed at the bag of supplies near Lily"please pass me a napkin" Lily loosened the straps of the bag and poured out the contents of it before she found napkins as Emma said, she passed three to her and turned away quickly facing the other direction while she piled everything back into the bag, she was disgusted by the sight of what was oozing out of his palm. Emma wiped it away and continued pressing onto the wound to release everything, cleaning it up again, until all the napkins were fully soiled. He clenched his teeth in pain, watching as she stood up, removed a torch from the wall and walked back to him. She set the knife over the fire watching it heat up before she placed it on the cuts, watching his face contort in pain"you can cry if you want to" she said with a blank face. Kai laughed at her statement, and tucked her feet under her legs, resting her head on her arms that were folded on top of it, "why would he?" She said and raised her head slightly looking at his contorted face. She bursted out in laughter, shaking her head hysterically, before she placed it back on her hands, her body shaking with laughter.

They were in the mansion, the whole place was engulfed in darkness, she ran up the stairs, running away from it, but it was with her in the darkness and kept calling her name. They grabbed her by the leg and drew her through the corridors as she screamed. The walls were shaking, thunder and lightning flashing all around the house. She kept screaming as they dragged her out of the house. "Lily...Lily" she heard her name. "Lily" Emma shook her awake. "Do not sleep, nobody should sleep until daylight." They all sat in silence, as Kai and Lily kept fighting drowsiness and the cold, trying hard to stay awake as their heads kept nodding off in sleep only for them to be startled awake.