Chen steps from the car after Yue tumbles out, sword drawn, knuckles white on the hilt, breath tense. In comparison to what had just happened, Ysel seemed tame and restrained, and Elkibrand must have been an angel gifted specifically with driving skills for Chen's personal comfort earlier. Chen had drawn her sword around one particularly tight corner on a steep curve, absolutely convinced that the car was going to flip and she was going to need to either try and right it or pull everyone out before they crashed to the bottom of a nearby ravine. Somehow that hadn't happened, and she couldn't remember if she had panicked and helped with the cornering herself, or if she'd simply been clinging to Rose the entire time, sword clenched tightly in one hand as part of the tightest hug of her life. 

A-a-anyway! Clinging to Rose had been the perfectly sensible choice. She was by far the strongest, so if there was a crash, having her and Chen together gave them the best chance of weathering it, getting out, and being able to save everybody else. S-so, it made sense that she would hug the huntress as tightly as possible, and squeeze with all the might of her tiny little arms compared to that thick, deep chest. So, that was totally normal, smart, and sensible and everybody was perfectly fine with that. 

Oh, right, they were out of the car now and she had let Rose go so that they could all get out because that was [i]also[/i] what normal, sensible people did and now she was stepping a few feet away so everybody else could get out and taking in the new scenery. And they were...oh for the love of the suns. This entire space just screamed arena duel. Each of those pillars was thick enough to hide behind and sturdy enough to bounce off of, creating a hundred different angles for surprise attacks. The pyramid offered a perfect landmark to orient yourself from any angle and a potential goal if the contest was more than just a sword duel (maybe a race or offense/defense sort of contest?). 

Chen already had her sword in her hand, the crystal blade sparkling merrily, her own stance not quite staying still, keeping light on her feet and ready for a sudden movement in any direction. She could feel the sort of hunger that Qiu had for this contest reflected in the landscape all around them. Was she going to have to defend her new friends in a duel after Yue refused Qiu's coterie? She didn't think she could beat Qiu straight up, even if the three-shard princess didn't use any sort of shard cheating, but she could make a fight of it and give the rest time to escape. She knew Qiu wanted that badly, Chen had danced around ever facing her directly and the tantalizing prospect of that duel had kept Qiu's interest even before they'd shared art tips on the boat and Qiu had wrapped her tail around Chen so...enticingly.

A blush was creeping onto Chen's face, when she was saved by poor, sick, blessed, wonderful, Yue, asking for flowers and peach trees. Chen laughed, covering her blush. "Oh, this isn't for decoration. This is a dueling ground! Qiu loves a personal contest of skill best of all, that's how she won all her shards." Chen's levity let her at last relax her white knuckle grip and settle herself, though she did not put her sword away just yet. Something about the place held her back from that, maybe the first creeping of Qiu's shards already influencing her, and that took the smile right off her face. "Be careful when you meet Princess Qiu Tian. She has three sunshards and even more than Yin they let her influence the whole world around her. You might find yourself feeling things you've never felt before. Right now I'm still sort of on an errand for her, but when she realizes that's not what's happened, she might try to push any of us into competing with her. So, be ready for the unexpected and don't try to confront her directly." 

Chen spares a glance for Hyra and Rose in turn, the other two most likely culprits to do something stupid in this scenario besides herself. Then she looks up to the pyramid, wondering where the three-shard princess has gotten herself.