So I just saw this picture of a fantasy magical market and thought... what if Shen Wei was a wizzard and Zhao Yunlan a captain... hmm... of the Griffin Riders' Squad! And how to mix Western fantasy with Eastern? Muhaha, let's try!
Strolling towards White Lake, Shen Wei rehearsed out loud what they'd manage to learn about the case of the mysterious disappearings.
"It happens both during the day and during the night. Both good and bad swimmers go missing and there were two cases of someone drowning suddenly with no indication of an underwater stream..."
"To be fair," Zhao Yunlan wriggled himself into the wizzard's monologue, while stuffing tobacco into his slender red cherry wood pipe, "underwater streams are barely visible from outside. You won't know of them, until a strong vortex pulls you down. But I do admit, that happens more in rivers, where the water is flowing."
"Exactly," Shen Wei nodded. "So... do you have any experience fighting water beings?" There was hope in the young teaching assisstant's voice but Zhao Yunlan had to crush it.
"I know how to swim, that's all... I fight both on and above the ground. I think that's enough for one person." Shen Wei was definitely not good for the Griffin rider's nerves, so he searched his coat's pockets for anything to light the tobacco with, cursing himself when he remembered, he left most of his stuff in Rosie's saddle. Afterall, they had only intended to stop by for lunch and replenish supplies for the journey to Silver Mountains.
"Shen Wei, mind you...?" He started the question, before looking up and seeing the wizzard had already ran away around the bank to look at something. Captain Zhao sighed, put his pipe away and strode over to see what's so interesting among the strands of typha.
"Ribbons?" Captain's eyebrows rose up, looking at the various colours, washed off on the tall grass. "This is where one of the female victims disappeared, is it hers?"
Shen Wei looked around, fixing his eyes on a majestic willow tree, only a few meters away from them. He frowned. Red and white weren't exactly colours of this place's folklore. "Maybe..." It looked as if... no, those faul green creatures do not appear in this kingdom...
Straightening up again and walking off, Shen Wei set his next target.
"No way, Shen Wei, you're not getting anywhere near a boat," Captain Zhao strongly protested about ten minutes later after they'd stumbled upon a small abandoned boat. "If one of us is supposed to be the bait, I'm it. You'll cover me from the bank. Water is an element, too, right and that's what you're good at."
The young wizzard tried protesting for a while but his guardian was unyielding, so in the end, it was Zhao Yunlan who rowed to the middle of the lake by himself. He saw as Shen Wei kept nervously pacing along the bank, watching the calm water surface vigilantly. Zhao Yunlan himself felt nervous, leaving Shen Wei so far out of his reach with a witcher on the hunt running around... It would be best if they just dealt with whatever water monster is out there. Just luring it out and killing it seemed like the fastest option of getting Shen Wei back to safety.
Captain's stream of worries was suddenly interrupted by a strong movement of the boat. He quickly sat down from the bench, trying to stabilize the boat while kneeling, unsheating his sabre. "Looks like I'm getting wet..." His eyes darted over the slightly disturbed water surface before another strong push came to the boat, almost overturning it. He looked back to yell at Shen Wei to get ready but when he turned, his heart almost stopped.
A dark clad figure, almost a shade itself with a wide leather hat had appeared out of the bushes behind the young wizzard, grabbing the slender male by his beautiful long raven hair.
"SHEN WEI!" The Captain yelled, getting up, ready to jump into the dangerous water and swim back, no matter the creature bellow, however, at the same time, a green slimy hand grabbed onto the rim of the boat, pulling strongly, completely turning it over finally. Loosing his balance, Zhao Yunlan fell into the deep dark waters. And the last thing he saw was the love of his life being dragged away by his hair by a sadistic witch-hunter.
* * *
The cold dark water knocked the air out of Captain's lungs, causing him to see stars for a few seconds, when the panic finally left, overuled by reason and years of battle experience, honing his nerves into steal, he quickly forced himself to acknowledge his situation. The light of the water surface was quickly fading away as he sank, pulled down by a strong grip on his right leg into the depths of White Lake. Thankfully, his own trained hands would never let go of his precious weapon, he still held tightly onto it but his brain had already started to plead for air. He'll need help and Shen Wei wasn't going to provide it.
Kicking his legs and forcing his arm to move in the high pressure enviroment he tried to swing the sabre after the green hand holding onto his ankle but the hydrostatic pressure was nothing to laugh at, if he was going to deal any damage, the only choice was to stab. And there was no chance in winning this battle by fighting the much stronger lake inhabbitant. Who the fuck was it, by the way, some ugly-ass rotten and mold-infested water sprite? (Here in the depths there was no Shen Wei to hide the faul language from...)
He felt his throat tighten, begging to take a breath in but that would only mean drowning. So Zhao Yunlan forced his reason to override the instincts and against all of his body he started swimming to the depths to get to the creature pulling at him, dragging him down through the wavy underwater plants and treacherous algae. It was almost too dark to see, so as soon as the humanoid shape entered his reach, he stabbed its torso, piercing the thorax, much easier than any living person up on the ground, almost like stabbing a thoroughly rotten fish. He burried his saber in the evil monster all the way to the hilt. Both green, callused, slimy hands grabbed into his and Captain Zhao finally looked at what he's fighting. Except for the very unhealthy green skin colour, the enemy looked almost human, long thin strands of beard and mustache, red madman's eyes glaring at his killer from under a green top-hat with old worn-out reddish and whitish ribbons swirling in the water, the water quickly started to die black with the colour of unpure blood of a magical creature.
Unable to pull his sword out of the dying murderous child-killer, Zhao Yunlan let go of the handle, kicking the body away from himself, watching the green coat sink even further. It was time to head up to the surface but all the plants around, wrapping their leaves around his extremities made it very hard to move and his strenght was quickly fading away. He looked with despair towards the shining light above, no, there was no strenght left in him anymore, his eyesight started to darken. Putting one hand inside his overcoat, he pulled out a single piece of paper that quickly started dissolving in water and as soon as the writtings on it became muddled and damaged, a stream of bright light suddenly shot up towards the sky.
Find me fast... was the last of his thoughts before losing consciousness.
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Muhaha! Does anyone know this creature? I guess, there's a lot of similar ones, just drowning people, but my country's folklore has very special characteristics for this one. XD And funny enough, a lot of people place this guy by their garden ponds - though in a kinder version but he basically does drown people... XP
Anyway! What happened to Shen Wei? Why is he in danger again? XO Who will save Yunlan? (That one is kind of obvious, I think...) And where the hell is this episode's tea? XO XD
