Shiren frequently shook his head over and over, paused shortly, frowned and continued while mumbling words to himself like No, That's not right or Such an idiot as he was answering to his own thoughts.

He slithered trough the stony and cold corridors from this ruins, slowly making his way to wherever the rest of the expedition went when he was arguing with Viper.

Fortunately for him there weren't many different ways this corridor provided except for the most obvious straight onward. Some other corridors were collapsed or ended pretty shortly like they just leaded to some rooms people might have called houses once or something. He was not an expert on what certain houses were used for but everything he explored looked as pathetic and deplorable as he expected it to be.

The walls were way past their best days, looking dirty, cold and unwelcoming, had cracks here and there and even some vegetation made it's way here.

Nothing he saw really bothered him since he was used to this old and broken style at this point. They were just some ruins with some history they did not want to share with him. There weren't any ancient papers, scripts or some other kind of writings to tell him anything.

If Shiren would had to make an evacuation, he would at least give a hint somewhere to find.

But this was not given here; Not in the slightest. Just the normal broken amenities, furnitures and hallways. It was indeed possible that something cleaned everything up, that was leading to what actually happened after the events were done and left all the rooms pretty much empty.

They all now painted the same picture about a sad and abandoned place where the villagers seemingly had no time to prepare their escape and even had to make their way trough a rough combat or something.

And whoever won this fight, did loose as well.

At the end this place was only inhabited by plants, a wolf and maybe even a dragon.

But there was nothing confirmed in any way, everything was just a giant puzzle and Viper now put pressure on them to leave this land as soon as possible, just because a dragon told her to.

Her attitude made him sick.

Such a goody-two-shoes that did everything the people wanted her to do. Never even daring to ask about about any reasons, arguments or anything. Everyone who was not with her seemingly was her enemy or something. He wasn't sure what she thought about him, but they weren't friends.

At least that was Shiren's impression on her at this current point.

And of course Tigress had took her side in order to stop their argument.

There was nothing more to say at this moment so he left them alone. Crane and Mantis seemed the most relaxed people around here.

Although he barely saw Crane around. Mantis however made the most reasonable impression for him when he was just doing his job. Their motives were to keep the party save until the end of the expedition. They hid nothing trough all of this, or they at least did not show it, so why did the other two?

Yong and the professor were the last ones Shiren was worried about.

Yong was… maybe paid or something to come with them, and probably because of an old depth and old time sake. And the professor leaded this expedition.

That's why he got so angry about Vipers behaviour and kept complaining to himself about this conversation. It was just straight awful.

And he hated himself for telling such things he regretted he said.

He never should have apologised to her at the first place. Making himself vulnerable to her was the first step that leaded to this pitiful outcome.

He grew tired from all of this. If they clearly did not want him around here, then why bothering?

There was nothing he could imagine being a valid a reason they could come up with which could change his mind like nothing.

For now he still needed them. Going out all on his own could make things more difficult than he would probably expect. Especially with an alarmed dragon around.

He saw light around a corner which leaded towards stairs from where he heard voices. Familiar voices luckily. Finally this corridor was over. He got excited to see other structures around this area. Maybe some cultural places, maybe eve a library. He hasn't seen anything like this around here. Not even something that looked like a marked. On the other hand, he hasn't seen everything in this area but checking everything would just take too much time.

Perhaps later, if the other areas won't show any more details he would go more in depth into the buildings. There surely was no way that there was no real clue for anything here.

There were still too many questions. Why did his Chi work here although he was not even able to use it at this point?

What was this about this anomaly? Was it really just a dream? What did the dragon protect?

He hoped on finding the answers the more they progressed trough this land.

Another corridor next to the little hallway which leaded to the stairs made it's way directly back to this complex but he did not wish to go back.

When he made his way upstairs he started hearing Yong's voice talking to Crane. Seemingly Yong was telling a tale from old times.

She narrated: "I told him like: No, Kuz. You better drop it. And guess what: he actually took them both."

"Hold on," Crane asked: "he actually just took the rope? Not fix it to something?"

"As you could imagine. A few seconds later Ku Zhan realised his mistake and had a very hard landing. But he wasn't even mad, that's the funny part. Even though he had to stay in a hospital for a few days."

"Luckily for me, I can fly. But what was about the bird in your party? This eagle one. Did he not save him?"

Yong chuckled: "Oh, Lao wasn't even watching."

"I see."

She took a few steps to somewhere while speaking. "When he refused to look up when I called at him to fly down, I took a stone like this and threw it after him like this. I didn't even care, maybe I ripped the paper a little bit but I got-"

When Shiren was about to appear at the surface of the garden, he got hit by a small stone that directly hit his chest, directly the big scar and he started screaming out of pain that interrupted Yong's narration.

It did not hurt at all until now but somehow this little thing hit a very vulnerable part of his body that wasn't completely healed yet.

He fell down and curled around the wound. Even though the stone fell down on the ground after hitting Shiren the pain still felt like it just tore trough his body like an arrow, or a sword that's slashing trough this chest. For a second the pain was indescribable but after a few moments the pain grew weaker but it still hurt.

He heavily gasped as Yong and Crane came to him.

"Oh, I'm so sorry, Shiren!" Yong said which probably confirmed that she threw this stone.

"Are you alright?" Crane asked and tried to help him up again but Shiren refused and instead coming up all on himself. "I have survived worse things. It was just… unexpected," he coughed, took a deep breath and then started to look normal again.

Crane frowned and checked: "Are you sure you want to precede like that?"

Shiren turned up again and looked at Cranes eyes when he said: "I'm more than willing."

"You taking care of this one, Yong? I'll alert the others that we are going to precessed soon."

Yong nodded at Crane then walked close near by Shiren while Crane flew away and they made their way up, away from the stairs and towards a little stream in the garden where they paused:

"Shiren, look: I know you really really want to investigate this place and you can't wait finding everything you seek. But I don't think it's wise to push yourself to your limits for that. Take it easy and do things step by step. These ruins are not running away from you. You have plenty of time. And we surely can-"

Shiren nodded several times and said: "Yong, I appreciate your supportive suggestion. I will make a short rest until Tigress and Viper are here. I am going to do fine if someone isn't throwing stones at me."

"I'm pretty sure Manits would suggest otherwise. And he is a real doctor."

"I put it to consideration. Now if you excuse me, I want to be a little bit on my own."

"… I understand. You know where to find me. I'm not going to leave this place without you. But I will give you the time you need." Yong said and wanted to go away when Tigress came to them and addressed Shiren.

Yong tried to stop to her by asking: "Tigress, can you leave him for a bit?"

"It's important, Yong. And it will be short, don't you worry."

Yong turns around then turns away leaving.

Shiren looked up to her and a bit offendedly he said: "I have nothing to say to you. Go to Viper if you seek for a conversation." Despite his words he was ready to listen.

When Tigress said that it would be important she wouldn't be stopped by that.

Tigress looked around, seemingly made sure nobody was around before explaining herself:

"Shiren, I've known you for a bit of time now. witnessing you sacrificing yourself for your companions, giving me the time I needed by facing Kai alone. Then later, in the war you were joining us when you knew it was the right call despite the fact you betrayed the alliance and were to face your former friends and allies. From that I know that you are intelligent. And brave."

Shiren raised up to get a better eye contact with Tigress. "And what is it that you want? As I have said multiple times now-"

Tigress interrupted him with a sharp tone before he could fully speak up: "I'm aware of what you say and what you went trough. I did not come to discuss that topic yet again. I just wanted to make clear that in order for all of us getting trough this together we need to stay calm.

Yet we don't understand everything about this place and there still could be some things we need to be aware of." She waited for a second until preceding:

"Just for you to know: Viper is going trough a lot of her own trouble here, just as you do. And likewise it's not easy for her to do or say the right things, especially after speaking to a dragon. Regardless of what you may think of her, she is not talking balderdash. If she says it's important to her then you can believe her."

She looked into his eyes and made sure she had his attention. Then she continued: "You are smart. So when I saw you arguing with Viper and I supported her in the argument, I trusted you to understand. To be a bit considerate of her. I acted on the assumption that you would be tough enough to take it."

"…I understand. I see her struggling with a lot since we went on this journey. And it keeps getting worse. You can tell her that she doesn't need to watch over me for whatever reasons she had. Would maybe take off some bourbon from her."

"I could but I guess that would not be easy for her as well since keeping an eye on you is why she actually came here for. But I'm not the one you should talk about that.

However, whatever happens, I only ask you to not get loud again. Once we are done here, you can have the conversation of your life but until then, I want everyone to play along. I have no problem sending whoever deals too much trouble to the expedition back to the desert in order to wait there."

"Understood. Do what you wish but don't keep telling me what to do or how to think and what not to and let me do my things. That's everything I ask about."

"As long as it doesn't put us into danger, all I will say to you is: Stay save."

"Then we have an agreement."

They looked at each others eyes for a few moments, silently confirming their conversation before Tigress turned away: "I've heard you want to be alone for a few moments. I will catch up with the professor and then we will continue. I would like to not having to wait for you."

After saying that she started moving and Shiren sighed. His wound started feeling okay again but now he knew that one piece of fallen rock could affect him very effectively.

He listened to his reasonable part and decided to stay with the others. He would need help if something happens.

Since the water looked clean enough and the stream not being too strong to being dangerous to him he decided to go into the water where he perfectly fit in, right after putting away his bag aside.

An archive of relics from past times. Things he yet did not want to throw away. Things like an old ribbon from… he did not even quite remember from where he got it but it was somewhat important, or a picture from his aunt he did not want to think about. Hao was gone, as well as Chang and all the other members of his family. Missing somewhere in this world.

He took a breath to get rid of these thoughts and memories. Missing them did never help Shiren after they left him alone.

The stream was not too deep for him and the water still had room to float around him. Somehow it reminded him of Jil, his former master.

Being next to streams was her favourite place to meditate and getting her mind clean from everything around her.

It was not like Shiren missed her that deeply or something. After all she turned against him than letting down her guard. He understood her motivations since she had more responsibilities to her home province Lu Lan. And a husband or something. Enough to fight Shiren.

But even if her motives made sense to him, he really didn't like it. Would it not have been the easiest thing for her to do to avoid Shiren in that battle? No, seemingly it was not.

But back to the topic, Shiren looked back to way he came from.

Thinking about the corridor he just passed he realised something.

On his way here he saw collapsed paths. Which would meant that something or someone broke it at some point. It could be just due to time but if not then they might enter places where the people weren't just running away.

So if there would have been truly a war at this place, they would have to be more careful.

Collapsed pillars, unstable bridges… Things had the chance to collapse. He was sure Yong was watching for those things. Exploring caves was one of her jobs in the past after all.

The further they got the more he wanted to figure everything out about this place. Weirdly the dragon wasn't the first thing on his list he wished to find.

He more sought for knowledge of and from this place. Figure everything out and most importantly, finding out where he could fit in. Maybe there was no future for him to find here after all but he would certainly wanted to know why.

"Shiren," Yong woke him up from his thoughts. He looked at her and nodded since he could already assume what she wanted and he went out of the water.

"They are done discussing?" he asked.

Yong answered while waiting for him to come: "Pretty much. You did not miss something interesting though. The professor said that the interesting stuff is about to come, according to his expectations, his thought process and his overall understanding of this place so far.

As they made their way over the bridge Yong continued: "As for me, I have decided to stay more closer to the group than already. You know, from: Staying in eye-contact and hear range to: Not more than ten meters. Reason being is that I do not again want any one on one conversation with some dragon stuff again or someone getting stuck somewhere and we not noticing."

"Why weren't you doing that earlier?"

"Honestly I forgot. During my work I forgot I was in a party and just noticed how quiet it got while I was occupied. Then when Viper started helping and just luckily returned, why ever she went that far ahead in the first place, I told them about my apprehension and we came to an agreement. Means you should come now and stick close. We do not want to loose anyone."

During the conversation Shiren looked down the bridge and saw a part of the ground, the same level with the bridge from which they were entering this place. They passed like 8 levels already.

The palace of Gongmen City, when Shiren counted before it's destruction had like 10 levels plus stairs leading up to the palace. He really did not realise how far they came on the first day.

Luckily he had no fear of heights. Just a fear of birds. And lots of them.

He looked up and he saw they still had over the half of the way to go. They did not even climb one third of the entire thing and they were just climbing on one spot. There was a lot to investigate.

Visiting each and every room in this entire complex would take at least a month if done properly.

And then there were the ways downwards he did not even seen yet since the fog could was still blocking the view to the lower levels.

On the other side of the bridge there was the next gate to enter. No garden or anything and he was able to see Crane and Viper outside being in a conversation with one another.

They saw them approaching while Crane was finishing one sentence: "… and that's just what I said so do not wonder please. Flying is not always the solution to everything."

"Yeah, I see. Don't worry, I'm sure we can go on without your input. As Tigress said, being more careful from here on," Viper agreed noddingly and then turned to Yong and Shiren, together with Crane who spoke up: "Alright, then we can move with everyone here. Chop chop, we haven't got all day.

Saying that he walks inside and Viper followed him. She did not have any special expression towards him or anything.

Well, it was what he asked for. There he got it.

Yong did not seem to want context on anything and went into the gate as well.

Like on the entry of this place, this gate was huge again.

Of course that had to mean something. Nobody would build that giant of a gate just for having a fancy house door. Especially not snakes. And with having seen a dragon here it just underlines the obvious. Gates for dragons and tiny houses for snakes.

He made his way to the inside and he saw it was a totally different area of this land.

There were no more houses or anything.

Surprisingly still a lot of space but this time the corridors, walls and the ground did not seem to be that healthy any more than in the last building.

They weren't as damaged as if they could collapse every second or something, there instead were just more visible signs of battles like cracks in the wall like something got pushed in very hard or a rock fell on the ground, several pieces of material missing so the sun was making it's was in here which actually looked very pretty. But everything still looking like it was holding.

The plants, which grew here as well, very much knew where the sun shined during the day and they did not hesitate to show it.

Nearly each spot the sunlight touched was decorated with some plants by this point and out of that they became less and less presence.

The height of this one hall was very impressive with it's more approximately six or seven levels height and an open hole on the top. It was such a round circle that Shiren did not see it as a crack but instead a made hole for something.

Probably dragons to fly trough.

Considering the entire wall consisted of stairs like it's common for towers, this could have been some kind of meeting place where one representative of the dragon comes by and announce something to the snakes or something. The stairs were wide enough for at least four snakes to go up or down next to each other with even comfortable space between each other.

But in order to get to the summit they had to search for another way because this place got a lot of damage when these fights happened. Using the stairs was not just risky but also difficult at times.

Not worth the risk at least.

"And I can just repeat myself:" the professor said to Tigress: "I do not expect to see the houses of the dragons. If I would have to take a guess, then I'd say they lived all beyond the snakes so their homes would be unreachable for them. However, I expect to now see some more history to find here. Not many things that would lead to whatever crisis accrued here. Whoever won was pretty decent at cleaning up the mess."

"You mean the dragons, right?" Tigress asked and turned to Viper then: "No offence."

"Not necessary," the professor answered calmly: "It could also possible the snakes won here and then just vanished to leave this place of lost hopes and start a new life independent of any dragons and without bad memories. And after that, some, like the one Viper saw earlier, might returned. That also applies that these two fractions indeed fought against each other. Yet we don't know if that is even true."

Tigress looked around and when she realised everyone was there, she nodded at the professor like she is valuing this conversation but needed to cut it there for one moment.

Then she stepped forward and said loudly: "Okay, once again to everybody: As you can see, some of the corridors are already collapsed or too dangerous to pass trough so I need everyone to stick close to each other and not going on alone. If anyone wishes to stay here, you can do so and wait."

"One question:" Mantis asked and raised a claw: "Why does Crane not just lift us all up? We need to go upwards, right?"

"Because," Crane answered a bit impatient like he explained it to mantis a few times already: "Not everyone is as light as you are, Mantis and to be fair, I prefer to stick to the ground right now."

"And of course," the professor said: "although we generally go upwards, our goal lies within these chambers. The answers to this place and the pieces of information we need to collect to learn from it. So if we fly around, we might miss the important part."

"Alright, alright. I got it," Mantis spoke up loudly with a tone of annoyance.

His little grumpy facial impression told Shiren everything he needed to know, that Mantis did not want to argue with the professor in any way.

Shiren asked: "So if each of these corridors are collapsed, which way are we going to take?"

As he came closer to talk to Tigress he saw Viper and Yong next to a wall and started talking about something. Seems like the big announcement time is over.

The professor made his way to the stairs and started heading there with Crane while asking him a question again. Perhaps about what he would be able to see from up there if he would fly.

Tigress however turned to Shiren and answered to his question: "Well, I have heard what Yong scouted here when she was here with Crane and Mantis earlier. It appears the most save route would be taking the stairs to get to the second floor and take a pathway from there. The stairs after that started cracking and collapsing when she stepped on them."

"What if we are heading to a dead end?" Shrien wondered and waited a moment for Tigress answer.

"Well…" she explained and frowned: "We do what we can and if it's just not possible, we might look for another way or accept that we won't go any further as long as Crane is not flying and I won't blame him."

Right as she finished answering Viper called at her: "Tigress, look what we just found."

Tigress and Shiren both made their way towards Viper and she made place for them to see a specific part in the wall.

"Looks like a whole from a rat," Mantis commented sceptically. Shiren just realised him sitting there as well. He was very tiny and not easy to see between all the plants.

"That's what I thought too when I first saw it," Yong replied and pointed on the hole again: "But I looked at it, called Viper and we figured out it's actually something more. Look here. It's too big for a rat."

Viper turned to Shiren and Tigress and explained: "It's a hole for a snake to fit in trough. Most likely a tunnel system."

Yong sighed: "We just can imagine how many of these things we already missed. I studied everything but not snake-architecture."

Tigress kneeled down and looked at it properly. After some time of careful inspection she went up again: "Then what are you waiting for?" she asked and looked at Viper who looked up and told her with a worried voice: "Well, if it's collapsed somewhere or something, I would have problems to get back."

Their both views immediately went to Mantis. "You," Tigress asked: "you should be small enough, right, Mantis?"

Mantis replied perplexed and caught off guard: "I-I-… eh… And if a stone falls on my head?" he asked and looked around if anyone else had any opinion.

Viper said derisively: "Then you should feel bad for your future wife. I'm sure she prefers a healthy head for dinner."

Mantis grew very grumpy and turned at her. "Ewwww, Viper, what is wrong with you?"

"What? The joke came from you originally. Remember when we invaded Gomgmen City?"

"Mantis," Tigress cheered him up to interrupt this unfitting conversation: "You are the most strongest from all of us. If something happens, from all people I would take care for you at last because you can handle yourself pretty well."

"Uh… Well then… alright." he got convinced and went in.

Crane and the professor came back and Crane started asking: "Tigress, since when did you get so touchy? I can't remember you ever saying such things before."

She looked at him a bit unwell but spoke with confident voice: "Well, I never had to lead people before. And to be honest, it's pretty much what I just thought Mantis just wanted to hear."

"I can still hear you!" Mantis shouted from the tunnel.

"Keep moving!" Tigress responded with a very strict voice.

This was weird seeing her just responding gently and then getting stiff again. It was sort of a tiny funny moment but he did not had a spark of joy. The last time he laughed was quite long ago.

He could not remember any day after the death of his aunt Hao.

After a few moments they heard him again: "Guys, you need to see this! It's amazing!"

"What is there?" Tigress asked.

"Come, it's-" he tried to say but Tigress immediately warned him:

"Mantis!"

"Oh, sorry. Maybe… hold on, maybe this could work!"

"What are you doing?"

Instead of an answer there was a moment of silence before the wall started shaking.

"Mantis?" Tigress asked again and took some steps away from it like everyone else next to the wall.

"Should I go and check?" Viper asked, ready to slither trough the hole.

"Wait. There is something going on," Crane held her back.

The wall was moving and very slowly revealed a way to a new secret room.