Chapter 1:

The door of Hades

In a dark jungle, there was a tree house. A group of six high-school students were gathered there, to celebrate the end of their final examination.

The tree house was cozy and spacious with Wi-Fi signal, so they were enjoying themselves. Two of the girls were making TikTok, two were cooking, while the two boys were playing video games.

Mabel's POV:

It was a really fun and warm place. Callie and I were making TikTok, as we found the perfect, wooden aesthetic background for it. Suddenly we heard a loud thud from the kitchen, and we couldn't help but roll our eyes. It must be Valerie, she’s a clumsy girl.

"Is everything alright!?" Callie asked, just to confirm.

"Yes! It's just that Valerie dropped a little cutlery!"

It was Sam, who replied. She was a great cook, so she was cooking today, and since it's Valerie's tree house, she was helping her with the ingredients. We just chuckled, being clumsy was so Valerie. She was only good with books and Judo, otherwise no one was clumsier than her.

Soon after, a maddening fragrance came from the kitchen and our stomachs growled in hunger.

"Is the food ready!?" Alaric yelled, tossing aside his gaming console.

"Just a few more minutes." Sam replied.

Alaric whined dramatically, as we couldn't help but laugh at him. After around 10 more minutes of starving, Sam and Valerie finally served the food.

As we sat down to eat, Devin suggested something extremely crazy and exciting.

"Let’s go out for exploring tomorrow!"

We were all about to agree, but Valerie didn't seem happy with the suggestion and smacked his head.

"Are you dumb? It's a jungle outside, and mountains at the back. Any wild animal can attack from anywhere." She spoke.

"C'mon, don't be a coward!" Devin argued.

Before they could debate further and start fighting, Alaric interrupted, suggesting eating first before and then discuss. We were thankful to Alaric for stopping them,, or they might’ve started fighting.

After the dinner, we sat around the couch to discuss, whether to go exploring or not. Valerie tried to explain how dangerous could it be, as it's a wild area. I agreed with her point, it was very risky, but also thrilling.

"Val, ya, don't be so boring, let's just explore a little." Callie spoke up.

After debating on it for a few hours, Valerie finally agreed to explore, but only at the near areas. We understood her concerns and agreed.

As decided, we all were ready by 6 am to go out. We all wore tracksuits and boots, with a backpack for all the necessities. We all had small backpacks, but Valerie had a huge tracking bag on her back.

"Val, are you talking the whole tree house along?" I raised an eyebrow at her.

"It's dangerous outside, I don’t trust you idiots with survival." She replied.

I wanted to retort, but it was kind of true. Even though Valerie was the clumsy one, she was still the one who solves the problems we get ourselves into.

We walked out, locking the door behind us. As we walked forward, the trees kept growing. I was also starting to feel a little uncomfortable in my chest, as if something is going to happen. I instantly went beside Valerie and held her arm, which was a lot more comfortable.

Valerie's POV:

The jungle is very deep, with many wild animals here, the mountains are even more dangerous. I didn't want to come out here with them. I had done survivals here with my grandfather, but these five aren’t really that good with it. It's dangerous for them, but they just wouldn't listen.

As Mabel held my arm, I instantly knew, she was feeling uneasy here, which was very normal. Devin, however, was having too much fun for his own good. He just kept going further and further.

We had been walking for half an hour, and were already too deep in the jungle that the sky had turned into leaves. Mabel held my arm even tighter and I patted her back in reassurance.

Soon they all got hungry, and being dumb as ever, Devin suggested we eat right then and there, in the middle of nowhere. As this point, I really wanted to slap him really hard.

"Are you dumb!? What is some wild animal came here, attracted by the smell of food? Huh!?" I yelled at him.

"Nothing would happen! Stop overthinking!" Devin replied and pulled out a pack of snacks.

Before I could scold him, we heard a loud roar from behind the bushes. From the roar, I was sure it's a leopard. Devin, finally felt scared as I shot him a glare. I could see Callie trembling, Mabel has gone pale, Sam was trying to act tough, but her legs were shaking, Alaric picked up a stick for defense and Devin froze in his place.

I instantly grabbed the snacks from Devin's hand, and shot him yet another glare. He had a pack of chicken nuggets in the wild. The leopard roared again, and I threw the pack of chicken nuggets far away. As expected, the leopard jumped put from the bushes to chase after it.

"Seriously! Chicken nuggets, in wilds!? Did come here prepared for death!?" I scolded him.

"I... C'mon now, nothing happened in the end, right!" He retorted.

I was about to slap him, but Alaric got in between again. I huffed loudly and looked away, while Alaric and Sam tried to talk sense into Devin. Meanwhile, Callie also came by my side to hold my arm.

"Devin, don't you dare do anything this dumb again!" Sam said to him, as he begrudgingly agreed.

I suggested going back, but they still wanted to explore further, which frustrated me even more.

Alaric's POV:

This was intense when we heard the leopard's roar. We're all very thankful to Valerie that we survived it, or god knows what could've happened. Devin would never listen to anyone, he was stubborn, and it was annoying Valerie a lot.

I know the decision to go further is even dumber, but I too wanted to explore a little deeper. What I didn't expect was, that the leopard would come back and with his friend.

As we walked deeper, we heard that roar again, louder. We froze on the spot and looked at Valerie, who literally glared back at us. She signaled us to not speak a single word and run as fast as possible.

She pushed Mabel and Callie towards us, as we ran. It might be stupid, as the leopards are the fastest animals, but no, it wasn't, as Valerie stayed back. The four of us were concerned about her, but Devin didn't even look back once. We ran until we found a hiding place behind a huge rock.

Time passed, minutes then hours. It had been three long hours that we have been waiting for her, but she was still nowhere to be seen.

"Why isn't Valerie here yet?" Callie asked, her lips trembling as she spoke.

"Must've gone back, leaving us here. That coward." Devin snorted.

This was enough of his nonsense. I finally glared at him, not just me, the girls glared at him too. It was all his fault that we were stuck here, in the middle of nowhere, without Val, and yet he had the audacity to blame her.

"Enough! She had told us not to come. It was you who argued, it was you who got those nuggets and attracted the leopards, it was you who didn't even look back once when we ran from the danger, leaving Valerie. She warned you multiple time, she even stayed back to give us the time to run, yet you dare call her the coward, while you're the one being spineless!!" Sam burst at him.

He was speechless and couldn't say anything at all, as it was indeed what he did. Just as he finally found some words to speak, we heard a ruffle from the bushes behind.

We finally saw Valerie's tracking bag and soon her too, as she walked up to us. Her arm was injured and clothes torn, as she was covered in blood.

"Val!" We all yelled and helped her to us.

Mabel started crying seeing her. Callie couldn't hold back her tears either. Sam just smiled bitterly, and I held her.

"Relax, don't cry, I'm fine. Nothing happened." She comforted us, and pulled out a medical kit from her bag. Something we all didn't think of keeping.

"Hey... I'm sorry." Devin finally mumbled.

Valerie just brushed it off.

"By the way, now we'll have to wait for a while before going back. It's dangerous." Valerie told.

We all got scared hearing that, we didn't want to go any deeper. Looking around, we were probably on a mountain already, and it was also starting to get dark.

"Then... should we explore more to find a shelter?" Devin asked, and we glared at him.

But we didn't have much of a choice either. We all looked at Valerie to get her approval. After thinking for a while, she finally nodded and got up.

We started walking very carefully. Every few minutes, I kept glancing at Valerie. She was very badly injured, yet she was walking just fine, as if nothing happened. I couldn't help but admire her.

She kept giving us some glucose candies and snacks, that didn't attract wild animals but kept us going. I checked my watch, when we got out of the tree house, it was 6am, and now it was almost 4pm.

After walking for half an hour more, we saw a huge, dark and abandoned building and walked up to it. There was an enormous metal gate, and the headboard said, "Sheol The Ivory Tower". The metal bars of the gate seemed weird though. As if it said something.

Valerie's POV:

I glanced at the gate with narrowed eyes, and my heart skipped a beat. Its bars were in a way, that if one noticed clearly, they can read it say, "Door of Hades".

We were in big trouble...

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