Chapter 1

The wind howled as the group of three wound their way through a labyrinth of snow and ice. Two were bundled up so tight that they could hardly move as they trekked through the snow. The third one had only a thick brown cloak on over a tight gray body suit and a pair of red tinted goggles. The group was going to investigate the recent discovery of a supposed Japanese temple in the Himalayan's deepest recesses. If it was true, then it would open up a whole new world for archeologists and bring about new questions about how far the great samurai army actually marched. This had been enough to catch the attention of the cloaked person. If one was to look closely enough one would get a glimpse of two 9mm pistols on the person's slim figure. Her attention was called by the leader of their group. She walked though the snow like it was butter as she made her over to where the guide was at. He spoke in his native language, which to any regular person would sound like gibberish, but to her it was as clear as crystal. "The temple is over there." He said. She looked down to see that it was indeed a Japanese temple. She smirked and thanked the guides for leading her and paid them. As they started back she sat her pack on the ground and pulled out a nylon rope. The temple was located in a five story five story high ravine.

She only had 16,000 meters of rope, so she looked for cracks and crevices to use as hand and foot holds. She looped the rope around her shoulder and lowered herself over the edge and began to climb down the cliff face. Thirty minutes later she looked over her shoulder and peered down to check the remaining distance and saw that she was still a ways from the nearest outcropping. She continued on until she could feel the wind begin to pick up, forcing her to halt and press herself against the cliff face to keep from being blown off of her precarious position and once it died down she resumed her climb. When she reached the outcropping she was not surprised to find that it was only big enough for her to kneel on. She looked over the edge and judged that it was far enough to repel, so she set the anchor and secured the rope to it and clipped the other end to her harness and leapt backwards off the outcropping

After twenty minutes of leaping down she found her feet touching solid rock and disengaged her harness. After she had taken the harness off she turned and faced the entrance to the temple looked up at the columns that supported the roof and raised an eyebrow. She walked up to one and ran her hand across the surface as she looked at the area where the snow had been removed. "Interesting." Underneath the ice was a Japanese kanji. She bought out a camera and snapped a digital shot of it and stowed the camera away. She turned to the entrance and whipped off her and goggles to reveal a slender face with brown eyes and framed by brown hair that was done up in ponytail. On her back was a shotgun and a cable launcher. Her legs had a pair of Uzis strapped to them and in her left boot was a concealed hunting knife. Lara croft, daughter Lord Raven had croft had seen plenty of supernatural things and fought over half of them, meaning that she was ready for anything this temple would throw at her. Lara walked calmly through the stone entrance, her hands hanging loosely near her pistols as she looked at the walls. They had the usual drawings of the Japanese gods and fantastic battles, until she came to one that instead of a god, there was a painting of a giant blonde fox with nine tails and blue eyes. Beside it was a pale nine tailed fox with nine tails and pupil less lavender eyes. In another picture it showed the two foxes battling a giant snake. She took several pictures of the drawings and continued on through the passageway. She stopped at an intersection that split off in two directions. One seemed to lead deeper into the temple, while the other led to what seemed to be a chamber where the Japanese worshipped their gods and so forth. She decided to check the first one and see where it led and check the other room on her way out.

She started down the first path and had only been walking only a few minutes when she heard a click, then a familiar thunk, and looked to her sides to see a slopping surface she sighed and started to run as she looked over her shoulder and saw a boulder heading strait for her. She sweat dropped as she sped up and looked forward and frowned, there was a large wooden door ahead that was just large enough for her to go through, the problem was, that it looked like it was sliding downwards to trap and it would be too low for her to sprint through. So, she did the only thing she could do, she head dived through the small space and rolled to her feet just as the door slammed shut. She turned to find herself facing enormous canyon that seemed to go on forever and in the middle was a stone platform supported by a single column that hung from the ceiling of the chamber. On the far edge of the platform stood what looked like an altar that was lit by a thin beam of light that seemed to come from a hole in the ceiling. A thin walkway stretched across the abyss ton the platform. Lara kneeled and scrutinized the ground, checking for any trip wires, stones, ect… and found nothing. She placed a foot on the bridge and held it there and waited as she eyed the abyss below her. She then started to cautiously cross the bridge and kept her hands near her pistols, ready incase giant spiders dropped down or bats decided to flock her. After several minutes she made it the platform and walked around it to the altar. On it was a scroll with a strange spiraling symbol she had never seen before. She looked around to check for any last traps and slowly picked it up and blew the dust off. As soon as the dust settled she saw something written in kanji that read:

Do not disturb the two lovers

Or

Great tribulation will follow…

The rest was blurred and couldn't be discerned. As she was slowly and gently stored the scroll in her bag, she failed to see the spot where it had laid glow until it was too late, for she noticed just as the platform jerked, throwing her to the ground. "Oh, great." She thought as she heard a low rumbling sound and dust rained down on her. She turned and was about to dash across the walkway when she heard a "CRACK". She looked up to see a chunk of rock plummeting strait for the middle of the bridge. A quick glance told her she wouldn't make halfway across before it would hit. "CRASH" The chunk continued on down the abyss, leaving a gap the size of an American stretch Limousine. Another glance told her the gap was too large to jump even if she had a running start. She looked up to see cracks forming in the ceiling above as she reached back and unholstered the cable launcher from her back and loaded it with a cable thick enough to support her weight. She looked up to look for area that didn't look like it would break. She aimed and fired just as another chunk took out the back half of the platform where the scroll's display had sat. "WHOOSH" The cable buried itself in the ceiling as the entire room began to shake and a crack ran down the column supporting the platform. She walked back as far as she could and ran forwards to the edge. When she felt her foot touch the edge, he leapt just as the platform broke free and plummeted into the bottomless canyon. She soared though the air like a bird, the rope as the only thing that kept her from falling to her doom. As the other edge approached she disengaged the cable, letting the momentum carry her to the edge. She landed roughly and rolled into the door as the room chamber around her fell into the abyss. She felt a rumbling feeling through the stone door, her eyes widened as she leapt to the side and almost fell off the ledge as the boulder from earlier somehow broke though the wall as the ledge started to shake, so she did what any other smart person would've done, she ran. The cave floor heaved upwards as she ran, causing her to stumble as there was an explosion behind her, then another as pieces of the ceiling fell, She tripped as the ground heaved again, giving her a nasty cut on her left cheek under her eye, but she jumped up and continued on. As she was running she felt a surge of heat behind her. She looked behind her to see a wall of flame shooting strait for her. Ahead she could see the exit, only the walls and columns were collapsing, fast. She pushed every bit of energy she had into her legs and did a swan dive through the collapsing entrance just as a final explosion sent her fly even farther than she had anticipated, causing her land hard in the cool snow. As she activated the homing beacon on her chronometer, she thought "well that was easy" as she blacked out.