Chapter 6

The loud blare of a horn made everyone jump. “The first event will be starting soon,” Canton Hillary announced through a loudhailer. She led the students to the largest mound of the entire reserve.

            Acacia gaped at the entrance of the hollowed-out hill. There were three ways to enter, two on the left, and one on the right. Once Canton re-briefed them on the rules and regulations, and once she made sure everyone was here, she blew a whistle, the official start of the Muzzle Maze Competition, the first event.

            Acacia, Cai Ling, Claris, and Annice rushed towards the entrance, over the words Muzzle Maze above their heads, confident they would win.

                                                              zvzvzvzvzv

            “This way?” Claris pointed down the darker pathway. She had self-proclaimed herself the leader of their group and led them through the maze. The darker path ended in a wall of dark leaves and branches. A small blue crystal sat before them at the foot of the wall.  

             “Ooh! Another blue crystal!” Cai Ling exclaimed. So far, they’d already found two blue crystals, three yellows, and one red.

            The more crystals that piled up in their collection, Acacia believed that they were never going to find a way out of the maze. It didn’t help that they couldn’t see or hear anyone either. All the students had split up somewhere through the maze. It was dark inside the mound, and goosebumps erupted all over Acacia’s skin as a chilly wind rushed through the maze.

“Why is she leading the way?” Annice asked Acacia when Claris brought them to another dead end. At least they had found a red crystal.

            Annice decided to lead after they hit another dead end and had to retrace their steps without getting more lost. Surprisingly, she managed to get them much farther than Claris had before they ran into a dead end again.

            After turning left on a bend, the group paused at a crossroad. There were four paths, each as dark and menacing as the last. One could potentially lead them to the exit.

            “What do we do? Split up?” Claris asked, unwittingly giving Acacia the idea.

“Yeah, good idea, let’s split up,” Acacia said.

            “Wait, what? Do you know how spooky this place is?” Claris whisper-screeched. Acacia couldn’t necessarily blame her. The dark tunnels were moist and musty, giving it a humid feeling. The only light in the maze came from the small candles in the stone pillars that were randomly placed around the tall leafy bush-walls around the maze.

            “I agree,” Cai Ling whispered. “It would be the fastest way. Annice, go to right tunnel. Claris, take left road, I’ll be in the middle, and Acacia in between mine and Annice’s roads.”

Claris hung back for a while, but the others wasted no time, racing for their roads or tunnels, wanting to get out as soon as possible. The Muzzle Maze was super creepy.

            Acacia dashed down her tunnel, half expecting to find a dead end. But she could only sense more water ahead. There shouldn’t be water in a cavern. She slowed down, wondering of the moist was a trick to foil her senses. Maybe the moist feeling was just an illusion? A skilled Illusioner could have pulled that off easily.

            She was so lost in her thoughts that she didn’t hear the snorting noise at first. “Hello? Is anyone there?” she called out. She almost smacked herself after she said that. A normal magiperson wouldn’t snort like that.

            She racked her brain for the light-creating spell she’d learnt that week. Why didn’t she listen during Spelling Class? That spell could easily illuminate the path. Acacia ran around the next bend and hid behind a stone pillar. Heavy footsteps thudded closer and closer to her.

            Acacia held her breath. Snuffling and snorting followed. Then the air filled with the sound of someone sniffing like an Allosaurus, trying to get its prey’s scent. Acacia shuddered. Canton Hillary wouldn’t put anything that would harm a student inside the maze, would she? Could all the eerie noises be sound effects?

            Suddenly, a huge claw-y fist smashed the stone pillar into tiny, itty-bitty pieces.

            Acacia yelped, terrified. A huge bull stared down at her with crescent-shaped eyes. It was standing on its hind legs, and its front legs were replaced with muscular arms that end in a large hand. Both hands had sharp grey claws that looked pointy enough to shred Acacia to bits. 

            Bronze, curving horns protruded from its head, drops of saliva dripping from its chin and mouth. That explained the snorting and moisture in the air.

            Without a warning, the bull (was she even supposed to call it that?) charged at her. Acacia ducked away just as the bull punched the spot where she’d been. Acacia stumbled backwards, but her legs were shaking too badly for her to fully get to her feet.  

            The bull charged at her again. Acacia called all the water droplets in the air to her open hands and formed a big ball of water. She trapped the bull in the ball of water, lifting it all the way up to the ceiling. She turned around, hoping to see someone there to help her, but all she saw was another dark path.

            Once her concentration faltered, the bull was released from the ball of water. Acacia tried whipping a water-arrow at it, but it simply dodged it. What was a monstrous bull doing in a maze for kids? Was it an illusion? A trick to scare them away from the exit?

            The bull looked super real, though . . . .

The bull was only mere inches from her when a long brown rope-like thing smacked the bull’s face hard, sending it flying away.

            Acacia looked up to see that Annice was there on the bush-wall, swinging her long tail like a lasso angrily. The bull scratched at its face, leaving bloody claw marks. It let out a bone-shaking roar and charged again. This time, it managed to grab Annice’s tail. The bull swung her against the bush, letting out another roar. Annice landed with an ‘ouch’ on the ground.

           “Hey!” Acacia jumped and transported away. She would’ve transported out of the maze to find Mr Claus if she could, but her Transporter Magiability wasn’t that powerful yet.

           The bull growled at the place she once stood, unaware of the danger. Acacia landed on the ground behind it, blasting the bull with a powerful wave of water, so strong that it fell face forward, coughing and sputtering.

            Annice recovered and with a loud whip! she smashed the bull’s horns with her tail, making it cry out in pain. Even though no blood oozed out, Acacia had to swallow back her nausea. She’d never killed a creature before. But if she didn’t kill this one, it would kill her.

            Acacia sent a surge of water towards the monster, and it let out one last mournful cry before it lost its breath and drowned. The silence that filled the air was deafening.

            Acacia felt a much-delayed sting from her arm, where a shard of the stone pillar had embedded itself in her skin. “Are you okay?” Annice asked, noticing Acacia wince when the latter saw her injury.

            “Yeah, it only hurts a little,” Acacia replied. Dyians had naturally stronger physical endurance than the aliens in Cloudstorm, since magic ran through their blood. Even so, Annice’s injuries looked really painful.  

             Annice had it much worse than Acacia. Long scratches were carved down her usual smooth tail, and cuts covered her arms and legs. There was a long gash behind her left ear that looked fresh too.

             “What was that?” Annice queried.

             “I don’t know, it just attacked me the moment it detected me on this path,” Acacia answered. She glanced at the dead bull again. She hated killing things, but she’d never come across such a creature before.

            And since Annice clearly didn’t know what this bull was, it might not even be an actual creature. “It could be an illusion,” Acacia said after a moment. “Or a trick to scare us away.”

            “Wouldn’t Canton Hillary have warned us in some way that a bloodthirsty bull was waiting for us at the end of this maze?” Annice deadpanned. “Because I don’t recall her say anything about”—she gestured at the bull’s body—“that.”

            Acacia agreed. Canton Hillary would’ve warned them. Or she should’ve gotten rid of it if she knew it was in the maze, which could also mean she had no idea the bull was in the maze in the first place. Speaking of the maze—"How did you know to find me?” Acacia asked. So far, the bushes that separated the paths seemed soundproof, and the tangle of branches and leaves were too thick to see through.

            Annice shrugged—then grimaced. “When you get excited, there’s more electricity in the air, so when I sensed it, and it wasn’t your usual excitement, I knew something was wrong,” Annice explained.

            Heavy footsteps echoed behind them, and Annice shushed Acacia, leaping to her feet, all ready to face another bull down. She gathered the electricity in the air, forming an electro-ball. “What hap—AHHH!” Claris’s question morphed into a scream as she ducked to avoid Annice’s electro-ball.

            She ducked so fast that she slipped on a leaf and plopped on the ground. Annice stopped her lashing tail fast enough to stop it from hitting Claris. “Whoa, what did you do, get in a fight with a yeti?” Claris asked, pointing at Acacia and Annice. “And also: What did you do that for?”

            Annice and Acacia breathed equally relieved sighs. It wasn’t another bull, just Claris. “Sorry,” Annice mumbled. “We thought you were another one of those.” She pointed to the dead bull on the ground. “Something like that,” Annice mumbled. Acacia explained what had happened to Claris, adding in extra details and exaggerating moves.

            Claris visibly paled. “A bull? Why would that be in a super-safe and specially inspected maze?” she voiced out the thought circling their minds.

            “Um,” Acacia stalled. “We don’t really know.” Claris raised an eyebrow at Annice, who shrugged in a way that seemed to say, I know stuff, but not everything.

            Who would put a bull on the path? A bull that could destroy and looked so scary? It had been on Acacia’s path, like it had been specifically put there to kill her . . . but why Acacia of all people? Acacia wasn’t anyone special, just a normal Dyian whose parents dropped her off at boarding school and went off mapping charts.

             A blaring horn interrupted their musings. “First group has reached the end of the maze, I repeat, first group has reached the end of the maze!” Canton Hillary’s voice boomed around the maze.

             The three girls looked at each other, eyes wide. “We forgot the maze!” they all yelled together, rushing to follow the winding paths in the Muzzle Maze.

             “Hey! I see daylight!” Annice shouted after a while. There was a rocky exit hole up ahead. They all shielded their eyes from the glaring sun, waiting for their eyes to adjust from the darkness of the maze to the usual sunlight.