Priya and Saleen's Magical Journey

Priya stood in the center of the circle, surrounded by a black void, with infinite stars glittering in the darkness above her. She could feel the cold presence of death all around her.

She breathed in and out slowly to calm herself, then took out the old parchment from her satchel. She began reading the words as she walked around the circle, eyes glancing at every word.

As she reached its first corner, she spotted something. Something moving from beneath the ground. The movement was very slow, but it was there—there was no doubt about it. She continued reading from the parchment to the next corner of the circle, trying not to let her eyes wander down to whatever that was beneath her feet.

A dark figure emerged from below, crawling above where Priya had been standing before she moved on to the next spot. It looked like a giant spider, with many legs carrying it forward. It kept moving forward until it ran into another figure approaching in a similar fashion from another direction. They seemed to be fighting each other with their thick legs and sharp claws, but they did not stop moving forward and disappeared into their own corners of darkness.

She started walking again around the circle, still reading aloud from her parchment as she moved through each corner of darkness and light, breathing deeply while focusing on one step after another after another and nothing else but that—one step after another after another and nothing else but that—one step—another step—another step—nothing else—just one step after another after another and nothing else but that—nothing else but that one step after another after another and just nothing else...

She snapped back into reality when she reached for the last corner of light. Her back hit against something hard and she almost fell backwards. She turned around quickly to see what it was. There was a wall behind her!

Her heart racing for so many reasons, Priya took out a small torch from her bag and lit it with a flintstone from within her satchel. The flame rose up slowly among her trembling hands as if it was telling her to hurry up before all is lost. But she knew that wasn't going to happen anymore because all has already been lost long ago when they entered this cursed place... No use crying over spilled milk now... no use getting dragged down by fear now... If they were going down, they're going down together...