'Nope, Nope, Nope. They aren't - No, I'm certain they died' Bran Ai backed away slowly making his way deeper into the pack of children he had just joined.

If those things got near at the very least having a buffer between himself and those creatures would buy him some time.

"Huh? Hey look they are alright! Look guys the others are ok!" One of the children looked back to see the missing children standing up above the water.

"Oh they are, I guess they were just messing with us"

"Hey that's not cool! Why did you guys scare us like that"

"I hate you guys!

The fake children looked at each other and snickered, one by one they dove under the water creating small ripple's headed in the childrens direction.

To the side the amazonian girls looked at each other contemplating helping the little ones.

"If we help them we might not make it"

"But the ones attacking them are our people"

"They were our people, now they are just beasts"

"Then what should we do?"

"If we wait longer wouldn't more of those things start to appear?"

"We can't be sure of that!"

"Exactly! If we can't be sure, aren't we taking a risk by not helping them?"

The girls argued with each other with those for helping the children gaining more support as the argument continued.

"Fine! We will help them just this once but you cannot get near them, understand?"

"Yes"

"We carry bows for a reason!"

Himenez was alone in the northern most direction of the lake, he had slammed his rifles butt into the invisible barrier holding him captive and even used the bladed edge of the beyonet to try and carve a notch into it to no avail.

He took a step back sweating perfusely as his nerves calmed down and he took a look back.

'Huh? Where did they go?'

His two companions had disappeared without a trace.

Himeze thought for a second, then looking at the nearest group of children he aimed his gun.

'I can't be sure as to the cause of all this, but I can be certain of one thing. Those things aren't human anymore!'

Most of the spaniards on the outside ran away leaving everything behind as they simply did not care to stay any longer in such accursed lands.

The few that remained had taken aim at the creatures inside the lake.

"Fire!" Acosta ordered his men.

The sound of gunpowder blared as metal flew hitting the invisible wall head on, the bullets ricocheted or outwright turned into metal slag unable to pierce the barrier.

"Boss the bullets did not pierce!"

"Amazing! Imagine if we could make this invisible wall, we would change the outcome of wars forever!"

"Blasphemy! This place is the devils den, it must be destroyed!" The monk came back after visiting the western group, he had not garnered any useful information.

"Acosta, we must bring this place under the watchful gaze of god! Capture all these heathens!"

"I'd love too monk guvierra, but as you can see most of my men have run off and the rest of my team is insufficient to deal with all of them"

"This! Just do something!"

Acosta sighed internally, this expedition was simply formed to discover lost and hidden civilizations, the amount of fire power they held was rather minimal.

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At best they could fight off a group of natives that hadn't already been equiped with rifles lf their own.

"Alvaro, bring over six bags of gunpowder let us see just how strong this invisible wall truly is"

To the west of the lake the group lead by Huitaca pinned down one of the lizard men, it tried to break free thrashing it's body making it difficult to hold down.

"Carve out it's eyes hurry!"

"It's moving too much!"

"JUST SLAM YOUR MACHETE ON ITS HEAD!"

One of the boys built up his courage as he slashed down on the head of the lizard.

Blood splattered, gold flakes cracked, the skull was split open after a flurry of blows.

The lizard man became enraged lashing out at those restraining it.

"It's still moving! Hit it's eyes!" With a spear Huitaca pierced the final intact eye of the lizard man.

With this the lizard man stopped it's movement as all signs of life disappeared.

"That's one, seven more to go"

The lizard man watching from afar as their companion was butchered retreated, they occasionally provoked the children by splashing water or hissing at them.

"Why aren't they attacking?"

"This is bad, if they don't come to us how will stop them?"

Huitaca was confused, they had been told that these lizard men acted on instinct with little to no thought's.

So why are they not attacking?

The elder sitting on the west bank pondered, then he looked in the direction of the missing spaniard boys.

'So that's it, the lizard men have gained a leader! But how? Just how were those three able to enter without an offering?'

The reason the elders did not enter the lake to undergo the challenge themselves was simply because it would be unwise.

Currently the lizard men that had appeared were childlike in appearance and demeanor, they acted based on instinct.

If the old people had entered the level of the challenge would have in turn increased to match the challengers.

Being that most of the elders that came to the lake had some level of spiritual Qi or warriors glory as one might call it, the challenge would likely have summoned creatures only heard about in myths.

This knowledge wasn't somthing everyone knew.

The eastern group sent in children as a rite of passage, while the southern group (amazonians) only had basic knowledge as to the rules of this place.

Elder Qez had come to this place many times yet each time he was rejected, failing to enter the golden city because he was simply too strong to undertake the challenge himself.

If not for such limitations why even bother sending in the children?

Bran Ai peeled away some of the bark on his spear, he wanted to make it smoother so as not to injure himself.

Looking at the distance between himself and the oncoming ripples he placed himself behind one of the larger kids.

'When they get close enough all I have to do is wait until they grab him'

He could have warned the others about the incoming danger, but given how fast the situation was developing he panicked choosing to prepare himself instead.

Either way who would believe him?

From this distance it was near impossible to see the red water deeper in the lake, given the gloomy light covering the entire area it would be far from easy to see that far clearly.

"Elder Qez those guy's deserve to be punished!" One child thought that elder would rightfully punish those kids that caused everyone to panick.

"Yeah elder teach them a lesson!"

"Yeah they deserve it!"

The elder gave them no response.

Being near the shore the water shouldn't have been more then a few centimeters in depth, yet without anyone noticing the waters level had increased by around a foot.

Below one of the fake children looked up at one of the real kids smilling at the ignorance of it's prey.

The child unaware of it's arrival until the last moment could do nothing as the fake rised from the water.

"Huh?"

With one leap the fake mounted the child wrapping his arms around the kids shoulders and bitting at his neck.

"Hey! Get off me!"

The surrounding kids looked at the scuffle in confusion.

"Why are they fighting?"

"How should I know?"

"Hey someone stop them"

Blood gushed from the neck of the kid, splattering on the faces of those nearby.

Cleaning themselves with their hands the kids took a moment to stare at the red liquid.

With the first among them to fall, the kids stood in disbelief.

Splash*¹⁶

Sixteen more bodies jumped out of the water attacking the nearest kid they could reach.

"Bran Ai stood still, his legs had stopped working as his hands gripped the spear with all his might pointing it foward.

Infront of him the larger kid fought with the fake that climbed onto him.

The fake attempted to dig it's mouth into the childs neck but instead it meant a fist.

The larger kid reacted not with panic but violence.

"Get off of me you rat!"

He grabbed one arm of the fake while his other hand gripped onto it's jaw and swung his body, this sudden movement launched the fake of off his body and into the spear Bran Ai was holding.

"Oh crap, I did not mean to do that! You saw it, he attacked me!"

The fake impaled on Bran Ai's spear flailed it's arms attempting to claw at both Bran Ai and the larger boy.

"Why did you point the spear at me anyway? It's your fault he ended up like this! I was throwing him into the water!" The boy tried to push the blame away from himself unwilling to get in trouble.

"Huh? What wrong with his eyes?"

The surroundings had gotten chaotic, kids struggled to fend of their attackers as most had been attacked from behind.

"Get them off! Help me!"

Breaking out of their shock several kids assisted those being attacked, they punch and pulled with every blow becoming fiercer then the last.

While many kids held spears or daggers they did not use them on this occasion as they did not know exactly what was happening.

Finally one of them had had enough, whacking at the fake with his staff.

"Get off! Get off of em!"

The rest seeing this also started to pick up their weapons to swat at the attackers.

At this moment a loud hissing noise spread among the group.

Its was the fake child that had been impaled by Bran Ai.

The fake had yellow eyes with slits for pupils and it's hands were claws while its legs seemed slightly deformed, closer to that of an animals.

"Wha- What is that!?"