There is voilence but it's not super graphic or anything so I don't think it should be considered mature but here's a warning I guess.

We were walking down a long, dark corridor for what seemed like hours before we finally made it to the end, a big, no, ginormous room.  Emily turned to us and spoke, “Welcome to the main hideout for us vampire hunters.  Is everyone here?”

“Um… where’s Gérald?” Sharla asked.

“He decided to stay behind.  We will send someone to kill him after we get you all safely to the next room,” Emily explained.  “So,” she pointed to a man in a dark cloak.  “This is Sven,” next she pointed to a very short woman that was holding a crossbow.  “Lattice.”  Next is a very tall woman, “Matilda.”  A man that seemed to be absent mentally, “Sean.”

“Now that introductions are over we can keep you here for a few days before we must send you on your way.  There are free cots over in that corner and food over there.  You may each choose a weapon from over there and over there is a game.  It gives you riddles, and if you answer correctly you get a ticket.  You may check your ticket amount over there.  Bathroom’s there.  If you need anything come to see us,” as soon as she finished talking she walked away.

I headed over to the cots and plopped down on one.  Finally I can rest without worrying of being murdered.  I curled up and drifted off to sleep.

---

Being woken up to a bucket of ice water being dumped on me is not enjoyable.

“Hey, Tom.  You up?” Danita asked.

“Yeah, how could I still be asleep after that?” I grumbled at her.  She snorted.

“Go take a shower and get changed.  Then come meet me over by the weapons,” she commanded.

“Yes ma’am,” I drawled in a very sarcastic voice but she was already gone.  I did as she instructed.

“Tom, do you think I’d be better with a bow, crossbow, or sword?” she asked, trying out each one.

“Sword?  You can’t really miss too much with that,”  I was still annoyed at her for waking me up.

“Okay,” she said as she took the crossbow.  What did she even want my advice for if she just ignored it?  “Now, I think you’d do well with blow darts.  What do you think?”

“Sure.”  She handed me the weapon and we went to the small practice area that was in one of the corners.  Despite my earlier comment about her aim she was actually pretty good and turned out I wasn’t terrible at the weapon she chose for me.  We basically spent the whole day joking and practicing.  The others were either relaxing, training as well, or in Bel’s case solving riddles.  The next couple days went the same way.  

On our last day we all gathered around a table and set our stuff down.  Echo had a bunch of tickets and a longbow, Nate had a dagger, Sharla a bow, Dani had her crossbow, Arch had a hammer, Jamie chose a mace, Bel a dagger, Sarah a few spears, and so did Gertrude, Eva had an axe, and Adam had a sword.  The hunters had given us each a small backpack with enough food for 3 days, sleeping bags, and some basic healing supplies for Arch.  Together we had 79 tickets.  Echo was looking through the shop to see if we needed anything.  A couple times she saw something we might need but after debating we decided we didn’t need it.  Eventually we decided to get another 2 days worth of food, alcohol, some healing salve that was supposed to heal injuries in days, and some poison arrows and crossbow bolts.  We were left with 0 tickets.  We packed everything up in silence and left.  There was a short corridor that led to the 3rd room.

We entered the room tentatively but were met with no resistance which surprised us all.  We found a table with a piece of paper and a few doors.  Sarah read the paper out loud.

Dear Traveler,

You have made it far.

You must find the star.

In the middle of the maze.

There must be no delays.

As you travel through the corridors.

In this labyrinth lay many wonders.

Uncover each and make it to the other side.

If you don’t you may wish you have died.

Bring the star to the man.

The man with the tan.

He will guide you to the next clue.

There will not be few.

Monsters in your path.

Do not encourage their wrath.

Luck I wish to you.

As soon as she finished reading the words on the paper the paper burned up.  She dropped the paper with a hiss and she shook her hand that was holding the paper.

“Well, seems as if we have to go through one of these doors,” Echo mused.

“L-left,” murmured Bel.

“Left?” Adam.

“Y-you always g-go l-left in a m-maze.” Bel.

“Hey it makes sense, no?  If we always go left we just have to always go right to make it back to the beginning.” Sarah.

“Who thinks we should try?” Eva.  A chorus of ‘I do’ and ‘Me’ could be heard.

“Follow me,” Adam said as he marched forward first.  Next went Nate, Bel, Arch, Eva, and Jamie since they had the more close range weapons.  The rest of us followed with our longer range weapons.  We took to turns (both left) before we heard a rumbling and turned around.  The walls were moving to block our path back to the start.  Great.

“So… looks like we’re not going back that way…” Gertrude left the sentence unfinished.

“Yeah,” murmured Eva.  Then Adam turned around and marched onward.  The rest of us followed.  We took 2 more turns, both still left, before stumbling upon a sleeping pride of lions.  We had a quick whispered debate before deciding to try to slip past silently.  We got about halfway before a growl froze us in place.

“RUN!” someone screamed, and we did.  Into a dead end.  We turned around to look at the 15 lions.  11 against 15.  Nice odds.

Sarah threw one of her spears, it hit one of the lionesses in the eye but just served to annoy her.  She lunged at us and we scattered.  The blood splattered along the ground.  Everyone was trying to do their own thing and we only managed to take down 5 loins and Nate, Eva, Sharla, and Dani were unable to fight anymore.  Sharla was rocking back and forth in a corner, muttering things about blood, the rest were unable to fight because of injuries.  Nate had his arm and leg broken, Eva had her foot chomped off.  Dani had claw marks on her face, over her left eye and the blood kept getting in her right, rendering her temporarily blind.  She was stumbling about cursing.  7 against 10.

“We need to do this the smarter way!  Long range in the back, short range up front, in a circle around the injured!” Adam shouted.  We tried to do what he said and managed to finally get in a circularish shape.  We started to do better, a neck shot here, a heart stabbed there, but the loins didn’t seem to be tired yet and the long range weapons had run out of ammunition.  Everyone at least had a few cuts somewhere on their body and we were exhausted.  3 against 4.  Well, it was 5 against 4, but 2 of them were long range without ammunition.  I was one of the two and had taken Eva’s dagger but had no idea what to do with it.  A lioness lunged at me and I just stood there with the dagger held in front of me and my eyes squeezed shut.  I felt fresh blood seep through my clothes.  I opened my eyes.  The dagger had embedded itself in the lionesses mouth and she just kept pushing it further in.

She lunged again but this time I dodged, a sword came down on her head and snapped her neck.  I just stood there staring at it.  I looked to see that there were only 2 lionesses left and once they looked around at their kin the ran.  I looked around and sunk to my knees.  I just sat there for a couple minutes before Arch called me over to help clean wounds with the alcohol.  I wasn’t really paying attention as I cleaned wound after wound.  Arch was bandaging the wounds and anyone else was either retrieving any ammunition they could or helping move the injured into the cave that was previously the lion’s den.  As soon as I was done I just slumped against a wall and passed out.

When I awoke again it was to the smell of a fire.  Adam, looking as if he hadn’t slept in forever, was cooking… meat?

“Lion,” he said as if he had felt me looking.  “It’s actually not that bad.  Here, have a peice,” he said, handing me the piece he had just cooked.

Suddenly the smoke twisted into a scene.  I could just make out a deformed body.  Wait was that Gérald?  I looked closer and it was.  Matilda was there as well.  Then it was gone.  Adam and I looked at each other.

“D-did I really just see that?” I asked.

“I think so…”

I decided it was time to change the topic, “Go to sleep, I can do whatever you were doing.”

“Cooking meat and keeping watch,” he yawned and went over to his bag to take out his sleeping bag.  “Thank you,” he slurred as he drifted off.  He looked relaxed in sleep.

I cooked the meat and nothing exciting happened for the whole time I was keeping watch except Arch getting up to look at the various wounds, proclaiming that everything looked okay.    Eva took my spot a few hours later and I went back to sleep.  A dreamless sleep.