The first thing he felt was shaking on the ground. It didn’t feel like an earthquake at all, but rather like a giant stomping on the ground.
What was…?
The next thing that came to his senses were the sounds. It took him a while to realize that they were tons of explosions, and it was hard to tell where it came from, and although he couldn’t tell what it was or what caused it, the explosions sounded off, which he couldn’t exactly pinpoint. Regardless, he instinctively attempted to rise up and wake.
But as he opened his eyes, what he saw was not what he thought at all.
He knew that he opened his eyes, but he couldn’t see anything. It was all pitch black. Not even a single dot of light or a single color was visible. At first, he thought that he had become blind, for some reason.
But before he processed that, he heard someone shouting. Judging from it, the person, who appeared to be female, was in quite a vicinity. However, he didn’t understand at all what she was saying. It took him a while to realize that the woman was actually saying something, but in a language he didn’t understand at all.
And the next thing he knew, he had his hand pulled.
What the hell…?! The pull was really strong, he didn’t have a choice but to follow along. The grip itself was firm, but not too tight to crush his arm, although he suspected that the person could do it. He thought that it was the screaming woman who pulled him, probably to save him from whatever that caused the explosions. A part of his mind thought about resisting the person and running the opposite way, before he was reminded that he couldn’t see at all, in the midst of utter blackness.
The best thing he could do, at that moment, was feeling where he was, based on the steps he took. Although he couldn’t be sure, it seemed to be a forest, with round and long pipe-like roots and rocks on the floor, as his legs stumbled upon them. Occasionally, however, he also stumbled upon something else he couldn’t exactly describe, as it seemed to be something metallic.
He thought that his eyes would get used to the darkness, allowing him to see even at least the silhouette of the person that pulled him, but to no avail. It felt as if his eyes were being covered by black cloth, without him realizing it. He started to suspect that he was, somehow, actually blind.
But… no way… there’s no way I get blind…
And as if to answer his confirmation, he suddenly could see.
The person said something, still in the language he couldn’t understand at all. But at least from the tone of it, he thought that she was saying a sort of self-confirmation, more to herself. She then pulled him forward, a bit slower than before. Soon enough, it became apparent to him that they went into what appeared to be a room.
The blackness disappeared from his sight. They were in what he guessed was a house. There were chairs and a dining table, except that they were all flipped over and broken to pieces of wood. That being said, the room was still illuminated by sorts of light lanterns, the kinds that he had never seen in his life.
And above all, the room itself appeared to be roundish. Unlike an ordinary room, with windows and corners on the edges, it was like being inside an oval-shaped ball. There was not a single window on the wall, and he noticed that it wasn’t made of concrete. It was made of a sort of wood, but it rather looked like it was naturally made, instead of covering the walls with wooden planks or with man-made woodworking. Although he didn’t know what kind of wood it was, a part of his mind told him that, looking at the shape of the room, they were, most likely, inside a hollowed out tree, gigantic enough to make a room within.
The woman sighed, before breathing deep in; she seemed to be a bit tired. She wore a long, dark cloak, nearly covering every part of her body. With the hood and the goggles on her head, he couldn’t really see her face. She then turned to him, and produced something from her pocket.
He automatically stepped back, his eyes scanned around, looking for something he could use to defend himself, even though a part of his mind thought that he wouldn’t be able to defeat her.
It wasn’t clear if she noticed his sudden reaction. Regardless, she produced something tiny and white from her pocket. It was a pair of what seemed to be pebbles, about the size of a bean.
But she then made a gesture. She pointed at the pebbles, and then onto her own ears, before pointing at him. That was when he realized that she apparently noticed that she also had the pebbles stuck onto her own ears.
“Do you want me to put those things on my ears?!” He spoke loudly, quite blatant and hostile.
She pointed at the pebble things, her ears, and himself again, this time, while speaking. He didn’t understand a word of what she was saying, but he was now convinced that she spoke an otherworldly language, the kind that he had never heard of before. He could only catch the urgency from her tone and her expression.
Reluctantly, he took the pebbles. It turned out to be squishy and flexible, but still solid and intact, completely nothing like a hard pebble. He did hesitate to put something he didn’t know onto her ears, but the woman spoke again, seemingly urging him to put it quickly.
He simply had it in contact with his ears, and he could feel that the squishy thing moved by itself, attaching onto his left ear completely. Panicked, he dropped the other one, and was about to pull out the attached one.
But the woman already moved to stop both his hands. It almost looked like she blinked from a distance in front of him to directly in front of him, though he did spot the afterimage of her straight movement. He tried to resist and break free from her grasp, “What the… let go of me!” But the woman’s grip itself was strong and solid, he couldn’t do much.
She kept talking in an unknown language.
But he realized that, somehow, it slowly turned into Japanese.
“… about now…? Can… understand… I’m saying?”
“What… what the hell…?”
“Say something! Can you understand what I’m saying now?!” repeated the woman.
“Y-Yes, but… but, how…?”
The woman finally let go of his arms, as she sighed in relief. “Finally…”
As they were just a few centimeters apart, he happened to see a pistol on a holster, tied on her belt. So instinctively, this time without hesitation and doubt, he took the gun from the holster, and drew back as far away as he could. He quickly aimed it toward the woman in the head. The gun appeared to be pretty much the same as the gun in his world, so he moved his left hand to pull the top part of the gun, which he thought to be the barrel of the gun.
“NO!” the woman screamed, swinging a roundhouse kick toward him. In a blink, his hands were suddenly numb and pained, because the gun was thrown off his grip, kicked away onto the wall.
I knew it’s impossible…
“For crying out loud, that’s not something your likes could use!” shouted the woman, now sounding frustrated.
Her mouth movement and her words didn’t seem to be the same, but her voice was pretty much the same, and she now spoke Japanese, as fluently as a Japanese would do, but only through her left ear; he realized that he was still listening to her words in an unknown language through his right ear, making him listening to both languages at the same time. Baffled, he could just rub his pained hands and say nothing.
“That gun uses your power to fire ammos! It could kill you if you pull the trigger!” she said, as she took the gun back from the floor.
Seeing her expression, he thought that she was telling the truth, although he didn’t understand what she meant by “power.” It made him realize that, even though the guns looked the same, it might not function exactly the same. Does she mean that it uses the user’s energy to fire the gun, or something like that…?
“For crying out loud, what the hell is wrong with you…!?” continued the woman.
“I don’t know you, I don’t know where I am, and you suddenly pulled me here, while speaking some weird words.” he defended himself. “How could I trust…?”
BOOOOMMMM!!
The entire house, if it was indeed a house, shook. It was clear that whatever caused it came from outside, and it seemed relatively close to their vicinity.
“Because we’re under danger right now!” answered the woman. She picked up the other white squishy thing from the floor and offered it to him. “This allows you to translate my language to yours! Now put this on and follow my leads!”
He still doubted her, but listening to the explosion sound from outside, and the fact that he couldn’t outwit her, he took the squishy thing and put it on his right ear. He then asked, “What now?”
He produced rope from her cloak. “Can you do a tie?”
“On what…?”
“Waist. We’re going to make a run for it. You’re going to need a rope for that.” said the woman. “You saw it yourself that you can’t see at all outside, and I only have one pair of goggles with me…”
She then handed one of the rope’s ends to him. He thought of asking her about the darkness outside, but then decided to postpone it later, as he tied it on his waist; the best he could do was tying it with a simple knot twice. She already finished tying the other end of the rope on her own waist, with her fast and smooth movement.
“So I just follow where you’re going?” he said. “With myself being tugged with you?”
“I don’t see any better ideas…”
“You’re sure you can protect me?” he frowned, “I’m pretty sure I won’t be able to run as fast as…”
“That you don’t need to worry about.” cut the woman. “I’m what you people would call ‘a knight,’ after all.”
So she knows about Earth…? He thought. Nothing came to his mind as a better idea, so he sighed, and then said, “Fine. Where are we going, actually?”
“Gutar. A village. My place.” said the woman.
“And it’s a safe place?”
“Of course it is.” responded the woman.
“Okay. Let’s just get it done…”
The woman stood still and looked at him, and in a weird way. For a few seconds, they both stood still and looked each other in the eyes. He noticed that her eyes were entirely different. Instead of black pupil surrounded by colorful iris, it was iris on all parts of her eyes. It looked as if her eyes were made of thread being messily crocheted. The other thing that looked out of ordinary was her skin color and hair: even below the warm light, he could see her dark gray skin and white hair. At first, he thought that it was due to color shading, due to the lack of clear light in the room, but after seeing it from another perspective — and even then, the light from the lantern was bright enough — he was now certain that they were gray-skinned.
However, nothing from her appearance seemed terrifying.
Because aside from her eyes, skin color, and hair color, he looked just like a human being.
It was hard to tell if she was Japanese, or at least, if her face resembled any of the features of a Japanese person. But regardless, without regarding how the colors were completely different from those of a human being, she didn’t look like an alien or a monster at all — she rather looked like a person.
It was just for a few seconds, before she eventually said nothing and turned toward the walls of the house, when she said, “Anyway… sorry for kicking your hands…”
Before he responded to that, the woman already moved away to leave the tree-like house. He was initially about to ask how they would get out, when he noticed what seemed to be a doorknob, in the shape of a small tree branch that shaped pretty much like a doorknob. As she gripped on it, she turned it.
Lines showed up on the walls, forming a wide box. That was before everything turned black, just like outside. But this time, because there was light from within, he could see what was going on.
Something like a moving, living shadow, spread out from the lines. It looked like it simply spread on the walls, but he thought that it actually filled the entire room in less than a second. The light from the lanterns was quite bright with the warm color, but it wasn’t strong at all to pierce the abnormal darkness. In less than a second, the entire room was covered in darkness, the kind that was not simply the absence of light, but rather the kind that was a sort of purely dark, abstract blanket, completely obstructing sight.
But this time, he knew that the problem wasn’t on his own eyes.
“Now!”
He ran as soon as the woman gave the signal. Considering that he didn’t feel a pull from the rope, he thought that he was running as fast as the woman did, or that she slowed her pace to his own. Fortunately, the ground wasn’t as rocky as he thought, allowing him to follow just well enough.
Now that he was fully conscious, the sounds he heard were those of stomping and explosions, in such unnatural repeating pace, somehow. As he heard the stomping sound, he felt the shake on the ground; it didn’t seem to be caused by a giant’s foot, but it sounded more or less just as loudly. The sounds of the explosions were no less confusing. It was hard for him to imagine what could have caused plenty of explosions, nearly without a break, at least within technological or physical manners. And as far as he could tell, he hadn’t felt any of the pebbles or dust from the explosions landing onto his body. Hearing it, it came to his mind that whatever caused the commotion seemed to be alive, or at least, controlled to cause danger and apparent destruction. So the next thing that he was curious about, was the very person or being that caused it in the first place.
The next thing he heard — because he couldn’t see at all, he set his focus on running and listening as much as he could — was the sounds of shots, just nearby him. Must be the weapon I stole from him… he thought. It sounded somewhat like an ordinary gun, even though he couldn’t be fully sure about it. Along with the sounds of gunshots, he also heard sounds of what seemed, as best as he could guess, to be clashes between bullets and a metallic thing. He could almost imagine bullets ricocheting as it hit the cause of commotion, flashing in random directions in the dark, some of them probably even nearly hitting his own head, he started to wonder if this was a good idea anyway.
Nevertheless, they didn’t stop running.
Considering that he was pretty fit, nonstop running hadn’t troubled him yet, though he could slightly hear his own ragged breath. He couldn’t say the same on the woman, however. For a reason, he suspected that the woman ran like a robot, simply moving her legs forward without the need of a breath. He was then reminded of the moment in the house, when she kicked him on the hands with her leg; it was faster than he could see, but he thought that it was a sort of a roundhouse kick in such great speed and precision.
As far as he could feel from his legs, he hadn’t encountered anything serious enough to make him stumble and fall, which was a good thing. However, he still had to mind his steps, so in order to not get stumbled and fall down instead. His hands held onto the rope, trying to guess and sense where the woman was heading, solely based on the direction the rope was pulled. He also had to be careful, because he was running without seeing anything on his path. He also couldn’t help but fear because of the weird sounds and all the audible-only chaos.
“How much further…?” he asked, keeping his voice as low as he could.
“Just hang in there…” said the woman instead, her breath clearly unaffected by running.
What made him rather concerned was the way the woman decided to respond. It felt deliberately distracting from the bigger, real problem.
The next thing that happened, to his surprise, turned out to be an actual explosion, right behind him; it felt much closer behind him than he’d like to hope. The difference was, it didn’t appear to be simply a sound of explosion far away from his position, because he, and the woman, were propelled forward by the impact of the explosion, with unpleasant force.
“Aagh…!” he felt a hug from his front, and then, somehow, he spun around. In the next second, he landed pretty steadily, not falling down at all, although he was a bit dizzy by the sudden movement. The only thing he could think of was that the woman moved him immediately to anticipate the explosion’s impact, since he did feel her hands on his waist.
“Oh, fuck…” cussed the woman. The cuss sounded relatively normal to him, but at the same time, it also sounded strange and unusual to him; at first, he thought that it sounded strange and unusual because it came from a living being that was not from Earth.
After that, he felt his left hand being grabbed on by someone else’s hand. It took him a while to realize that it was the same woman who attempted to escort and guard him, because she then said, with frustration, and a tint of what he thought to be despair, “Come on, stick to me…” before continuing on running.
He started looking around. What he could see was nothing but blackness, as if a piece of black paper was stuck on his eyes. He couldn’t even see a silhouette or gesture of a movement, the rope that was tied on his waist, or where they were heading. It was the complete opposite of the moment when they were in a house, where he could see normally. This feels more absurd and ominous than I thought it would be… he thought to himself.
The best he could was imagining the woman running and leading him with a supposedly clear purpose, thanks to the goggles she had on her head. However, they had been running nearly nonstop, without a clear intent or destination, and her own voice sounded suspiciously hesitant and confused. At first, he thought of undoing the tie, taking the goggles off her by force, and running away on his own, but at the same time, his mind reminded himself of how fast the woman could move to kick his hands and let go of the gun he took. Therefore, he had no choice but to follow along and throw away his initial plan.
“Hide…!” said the woman with a small voice, still with confusion and panic. He could feel that she suddenly made a turn, but he didn’t know where and how he should hide, without her guiding him. The only thing he could tell was that they appeared to be hiding behind a sort of a wall, but beyond that, he couldn’t exactly tell. As he stopped running and sat on the ground, he felt that he was apparently sitting on a puddle.
“What’s going on? We’re hiding now?” he asked firmly.
“It’s worse than I thought…” responded the woman instead. “We’ll probably have to find a ride to get to safety, or stay here till it’s safe…”
He frowned; he couldn’t tell why exactly, but her response ticked him off. Even though it was dark, he thought, and expected, that the woman would be able to see the frown on his face. He continued, “What was that, the loud thing that caused explosions and whatnot?”
“Wild beast. Sort of, at least…”
“What do you mean?”
“It’s not entirely a wild beast as you know in your world, but that’s not important for now — right now is to get you to safety…”
From his hearing, the woman seemed to also sit down, hiding behind the sort of wall on his left. His right hand moved, initially planning to feel what kind of the wall it was. But what happened instead was that his hand happened to encounter something entirely else.
He gasped, although silently. The woman asked, sounding confused and somewhat panicked, “What is it…?” But he said nothing. He instead squeezed what his right hand encountered. Although he couldn’t be sure, he thought that his right hand’s position was covered by himself from the woman’s vision, which would explain her vague confusion and panic.
What made him quiet, however, is the fact that he recalled something else.
How could I fucking forget it…? He cursed himself. Of all things…
“Hey… are you okay…?” The woman continued asking.
At first, he wasn’t sure of how to word it. If I’m not careful here, things could go wrong in a second…
But, otherwise… I don’t really have any other choices here, anyway…
He took a deep breath, before he finally said, “How are the others, by the way…?”
This time, she didn’t answer. The sounds he heard were those from the mysterious being that seemed to chase them, explosions and footsteps and whatnot, but she was completely silent to him. Even though he couldn’t see her face, he could imagine in his mind of her face, expressing panic and fear.
Another explosion happened. Judging from the sound and the vibration, it felt close in their vicinity, as if the explosions themselves were sentient and heading to them both. He kept waiting for a response, but she said nothing at all. Because of that, he decided to press further, “Unconscious? Unaware of what’s even happening?”
He woke up again, because before he opened his eyes, the sensations he felt were those of being half-buried by something rocky and heavy, as well as pain all over his body; he also noticed that he was lying down. So he concluded that he was unconscious, again.
The sounds of explosions and battles were still there, reaching to his ears, except that it somehow sounded more intense and rapid, as well as somewhat closer. One sound that he felt and noticed to stand out more than the others, quite recently, was that of gunshots. He opened his eyes, and found himself still unable to see everything around him; it was still pure blackness, with zero amount of light onto his eyes. Regardless, he slowly rose and said, “What happened…?”
He pulled the rope from his waist. It took him a while to realize that it was apparently cut.
“Wha…?”
He grasped the rope and pulled it to him, but he didn’t feel resistance on the rope. In fact, he happened to touch the cut on the rope with his own hands. It felt a bit blunt, hairy, and not sharp, definitely not caused by a clean cut nor brute force of pulling the rope to snap. “Where are…?”
Oh, yeah… it was the blast from the beast thing… whatever it means… he thought. But… where is she…?
Could it be that the gunshots were hers…? Judging from the sounds, it seemed to him that it came from her own gun he previously attempted to take; it didn’t sound like it came from a sort of machine gun or a sniper rifle, although he couldn’t be certain about it. So she was fighting the beast thing…?
I guess she was indeed suspicious, to say the least… he thought to himself. Now that I pressed her, she… ditched rescuing me and fighting the beast thing…?
No, there’s no telling in that. Everything is too vague for me. Right now, I need to do something, whatever it is… damn this dark thing… I needed those goggles to see here, after all…
The one thing he decided to do, considering that he couldn’t think of anything else, was groping on his surroundings, hoping that he would find something of value. He could tell that he was sitting on a flat rocky ground, on his butt; it seemed to be the same place he was before he briefly passed out, although it was simply a guess based on feelings. But beyond that, he thought that it was best to not move from his position, at least until he didn’t get to grope on anything of value.
He managed to tell that behind him was a wall. It felt quite sturdy and thick, enough to protect him. On the other hand, he couldn’t help but feel like it was actually a broken wall, because he was quite certain that all the explosions and battle sounds he had heard came from behind him, beyond the very wall he found; at most, it simply hid him from the enemy’s sight, whoever they might be. It felt like the explosion could hit and destroy the wall anytime unexpectedly, so he moved as quickly as he could.
It didn’t take him long to grope on something pipe-like and rough-surfaced, squishy, but sturdy. It was quite huge, he couldn’t wrap it around with his finger, but he could still lift it up if he needed to. He groped more, and found that it wasn’t completely straight, but pretty curvy, and the pipe thing was bent. He used both hands to grope, and found that it was bent on both ends, one end continued to a bigger pipe thing, while the other end felt to be a roundish, small, somewhat-triangle-shaped thing.
It took him a while to realize what it actually was.
This… is a leg…!
He groped further. He could now tell that the rough surface was apparently long pants, while the roundish triangle thing was the shoe — it appeared to be that of the right foot. He then found a pocket on the pants, before finding more pockets on them. The first thing that came to his mind was army cargo pants, something that was usually worn by a military soldier, particularly a modern one.
But he didn’t have time to think about that. He attempted to examine each of the pockets, albeit that he could only grope in blind. He pulled the leg closer to him, in order to stay hidden behind the wall — the owner of the leg didn’t seem to object to the pull at all.
The first thing he found was something roundish, like an egg, but with something like a short stick attached to it. Grenade.
No doubt about it. This world is somewhat quite modern, with guns, military pants, and grenades.
But… with… something like magic…?
No… not now…!
It should work the same way like any other grenades back in my world… just pull the pin and throw it away…
But he then remembered what the woman said to him… But if it doesn’t…
He then went for the belt. As he predicted, there was another gun holstered on the belt, at least according to the shape he groped. Guns seem to be a no-go…
He groped further. He found something multiple, like a weird-shaped chocolate pack, but with a round shape on one of the ends. It felt to him that the round thing was separate from the chocolate-box thing.
Ammo… for the gun…! He thought. But I thought that the gun uses energy to fire it…! What the hell…?!
Regardless, he quickly picked it up, along with the ammo, and put it into his pockets. He continued groping on the person, although he couldn’t be sure if it was indeed a person, or something entirely else. He noticed that the person didn’t move at all, considering that he dragged and groped on the person quite roughly. They… are they…?
The thing was, aside from a knife, he didn’t find any other weapons around the person. So this person only uses a single gun…? A pistol, of all things…?!
No… it could be that their main weapon, whatever it is, was separated from them, when they were in the battle… I shouldn’t assume too far yet…
He moved to the upper part of the body and started groping to search for anything of valve. At first he found something that appeared to be tiny, solid, and stiff. He started to grab and squish it, but he then gasped in shock, squealing in pain, as he released his grip on something sharp. “Ack! What the hell…?!”
He couldn’t see, but he was certain that he was bleeding, since the pain was still there. “Fuck!” he cursed loudly, squishing his hand in frustration to stop the bleeding. “What the fuck was that!?”
This time, he groped slowly. Now that he paid more focus and attention, there was a part of the thing that wasn’t sharp. He also noticed a hole in the middle of it, large enough for his finger to fit in, and it was quite thin. He couldn’t tell what it was simply by groping on it, but he noticed that there was more than one of it, kept in the pockets of the person’s dress. What kind of moron keeps knives on their chest?!
Regardless, he didn’t find anything else on the shirt — he couldn’t tell what kind of a dress they were wearing simply by feeling it with his hands. So he moved to the neck and the head.
He couldn’t tell if it was a male or female; he could only suspect that the person he was groping on was most likely the same alien being like the woman she encountered. At first, he was shocked when he groped on something hairy, before he realized that it was most likely a person’s own hair. As far as he felt, it seemed to be somewhat similar to a human being’s hair.
Oh, this person seems to have a flat chest… but a long hair… he realized. He continued toward groping on the face. Surprisingly, the skin also felt the same as his own skin. It gave the same sort of softness he would feel from touching his own face. He recalled the moment back in the house, that the woman appeared to have the same look on any human being, except for the skin color and eye color.
That was when he felt something on his hands. When he was supposed to touch the eyes, the eyebrows, and the nose, he found something else.
It was solid, probably made of something metal, and fairly huge. He felt that it was a sort of cylinder, until he realized that it was a pair of cylinders, located at where the person’s eyes would be. Considering that it was hard, he tried squeezing it, but nothing appeared to happen as a reaction. The one thing he learned was that it seemed to not really stick to the person, so he tried, with nervousness, to pull it.
He started slowly and gently, as if the person would react to it, even though he was certain that the person was already dead. As he guessed, it wasn’t stuck to the person. He felt a sort of resistance from the thing as he pulled the cylinder stuff, but not enough to stop him. As he shook it off a bit, he could still feel the resistance, but it felt like the resistance followed his movement along, as if it somewhat depended on his own hand’s movement. So he thought about feeling the thing further, trying to grasp what it could actually be.
He found something else that appeared to be attached with the cylinder thing. It was on the side of the person’s head, and it was thin, giving a different sensation from the person’s skin to his hand. He rubbed it with his fingers; it was quite rough, but he noticed that there was a pattern on it. As he pulled the cylinder thing, he noticed that the surface moved again, in accordance with the cylinder thing. That was when he realized that it was flexible, almost like it was made of rubber.
He groped on the thing roughly, when it clicked on his mind. Stupid me, taking so long to realize what it was… he thought to himself. Now that he knew what it was, he pulled it off the person’s head, learning its shape and position, and eventually wearing it on his head, no longer thinking of the possible consequences of him using it. Although it was a bit late, and in a stupid way, he realized that it was the goggles, most likely the same one the woman wore to see in the mysterious darkness.
No matter what and how he tried to do to his eyes, it was still pitch black that he saw. He couldn’t help but think that the shadow, or whatever it was, blocked his eyes literally, considering that it moved fluidly and freely, back then in the house. That was his thought, even though he suspected that it was quite unlikely.
After wearing the goggles, his thought proved to be wrong.
He still didn’t, and couldn’t understand what it was in the midst of the air in the world he was in, but regardless, the moment he properly wore the goggles…
To his own sight, the shadow in the air moved away, the same way it did back in the house. The difference was, it seemed to move away, either from the lens of the goggles themselves, or from his own eyes, although he couldn’t tell and didn’t really care which it was anyway. It moved as if there were hands which covered his eyes, and moved away to bring his sight back the moment he wore the goggles. When it was pitch black, he could finally see everything around him.
It was dark anyway, because the sky itself was pitch black, without moon or stars. However, he could see better than before, as the whole surroundings seemed to be illuminated the moment he wore the goggles; he thought that it was probably night time. He looked around, and found himself in the middle of what appeared to be a forest, or at least, what remained of it.
In a glance, the trees’ diameter is about half a meter in average, more or less the same size as his own body; he saw that some of them were up to ten meters. Nevertheless, lots of them around him were devastated, either burnt to crisps, holed beyond repair, or actually snapped to its lower trunk, despite the thickness of it. It clearly showed that it was no mere chaos caused by natural disaster, but rather done intentionally and deliberately. He saw that inside the bigger trees were rooms, looking like the same room he and the woman entered previously. Seeing that, he learned that the world had the culture of living inside the trees, whether they hollowed the trees out or grew the trees with hollow centers. However, whatever caused the entire destruction was powerful enough to destroy the trees, to a point where the upper parts of the trees were nowhere to be seen.
The next thing he saw, now that the goggles allowed him to see clearly enough, was his closer surroundings, where there were at least about ten dead bodies. They appeared to wear light leather armor and cloak, the typical kind of outfits of soldiers in medieval times, all of them appeared to have the uniform pattern and style. However, he saw from the dead soldier right in front of him — apparently, he was a male — that his leather armor had pockets on his chest, containing small throwing knives, as he guessed. It gave the sense that, despite the medieval appearance, there was also a touch of modernity on the whole design of the world. Of course… there are these goggles and guns in this world, so it doesn’t seem like it’s an ordinary medieval world in the first place… he thought to himself.
However, he noticed that most of the dead bodies were dead by a shotgun, and likely not by an ordinary bullet. That was what came to his mind, because on one of the dead bodies, she had the head destroyed by what appeared to be small, digging quite deep into her head, before eventually exploding, into a crater nearly as big as her own head. It looked almost as if a meteor, that was the bullet, hit a planet, that was her own head, creating a crater, that was a grave wound, most likely giving instantaneous death. He could see the flesh of the dead bodies, wide open because of the gunshots — surprisingly, or not, they appeared to have the same color as their skins respectively. As expected, the whole place, now that he could see with the goggles, was puddled with, most logically, blood.
It wasn’t red-colored liquid, like he initially thought, but it ranged from black to white, all of them eventually gathering and mixing into a vague and random mix of colors. He just realized that he was sitting on the puddle itself, filthing his own pants with white-to-black liquid. He quickly rose, just enough to put himself to squat, while still hiding behind the wall — it was apparently the remains of a wrecked thick bark of what used to be a tree. He touched a bit of the blood with his hand, trying to feel it. Although he couldn’t really tell, it seemed to be as watery as a human being’s red blood, not counting the color. The black color of it was equally as black as the black sky itself, while the white color of it seemed to be as white as snow.
What happened here…? He wondered. Was it that gun of hers…? How deadly could it be, then…?
He took a look at the dead body in front of him, the one he took the goggles from. It was clear to him now that he was dead, seeing his eyes — it was also all iris on his eyes. He started to wonder if their kind had their eyes simply in one plain color. Now that he could see, he paid closer attention to the dead body in front of him.
Just like the woman, he seemed to be the same as a human being like himself, except for the eyes and the skin color. The shape of the ears, the position of the nose, the curves of the lips, the roundness of the eyes, the thickness of the hair, the way the fingers bent, the form of the body, the proportion of the upper and lower arms, as well as the upper and lower legs, and the upper body and the lower body… they were all just like his own. He even pressed on the butts, and found that it was as pillowy. One thing he noticed was different was the crotch part. He didn’t feel any bulge that indicated testicles or penis of the dead body. He decided to leave it at that.
The difference, however, was that his skin was noticeably darker than the woman’s. He took a look around at other dead bodies, and realized that the skin color was various — he even spotted one which was nearly white as snow, quite far away from his position. Although he knew it was pointless and incomparable, he couldn’t tell if the dead person was Japanese like himself, or any other race that he knew of.
So it’s almost the same… he thought to himself. Me and him… and any of these people…
But, how…? This… this is not Earth… he thought, recalling the house they were in. And the shadow, as well, whatever it’s called… no, this is definitely not Earth…
Could it be that they used to be humans, but somehow evolved… slightly different…?
He rolled the dead body in front of him over, because he noticed that didn’t see such a huge and obvious gun hole on his body, like any other dead bodies. When he initially thought that he was killed by a different method, he found multiple gunshots on his back; it seemed that he was shot at random spots, considering that it could be point-blank shooting out of panic. It was the circular crater-like wound found in any of the dead bodies, except that there were about five of them, destroying his back quite terribly.
So the leather wasn’t enough to protect them from such an attack… he thought to himself. His flesh, also the same color as his skin, was widely exposed; he could even see the bones wide open on the wounds. He looked close at the bones, his finger almost touching the bone itself. Although he didn’t know much about biology, he thought that even their bone structure was most likely the same as his.
He eventually canceled it. Now’s not the time. Right now…
He took a peek over the remaining bark, toward the source of all the chaotic noises. Finally, thanks to the goggles, he could see what’s happening.
The spider — if it was indeed a spider — was at least seven meters’ tall, making the entire size of it creepily humongous. Even as it moved one of its legs to step, it was enough to shake the ground, although slightly. The legs’ width was more or less as big as himself, and just by seeing it, he couldn’t help but think that It seemed to slightly glitter on the body and the legs, as if it was a bug. One thing he noticed was that the beast, whatever it was, didn’t make a sound at all, even though it was attacked.
The woman was apparently fighting the beast instead, using her gun. From her movement, she dodged and attacked the beast well enough, although, all things considered, she could barely handle it. The spider beast itself moved fast and agile, despite its own humongous size, going after the woman while dodging her shots at the same time. Aside from the stomping movements with its eight legs, the spider spat a sort of nasty-yellow-looking liquid, from both the mouth and the spinneret, almost nonstop. It looked like acidic poison from the appearance, but the moment it hit anything, it caused an explosion; thus, it explained why repeated explosions were heard to him. It was probably just as much as a single spit, at least for the spider’s big body, but the explosion, on the other hand, was strong enough to cause destruction on anything it landed on, as if the spit itself was a powerful bomb. It didn’t seem to be spat randomly, but they were all rather aimed at the woman; it became clear to him that the beast intended to kill the woman, while she had quite a hard time to dodge them all and kill the beast.
There was another person around where they fought. From the outfit, he guessed that the person was a soldier; his outfit appeared to have the same pattern and style from those of the dead ones he found from his surroundings. From afar, he seemed to be still alive, but gravely wounded. He sat on his heels, holding his stomach and looking pained; he could see blood flowing from his stomach, its color matched his skin. He had to sustain himself from falling and lying down with his other arm. Neither the beast nor the woman appeared to have the intention of killing him; it was as if he actually didn’t exist.
Realizing something, he turned to take a better and closer look on the crater-like wounds on the dead soldier next to him. As he suspected, at the center of it, he found something small and made of metal, definitely not a part of the bones.
The spider wouldn’t cause this wound… there’s no mistaking it. This is her doing… he said to himself. What would be the cause…? No, rather, “how to get out of this situation” is the right question…
He took a look at the surroundings one more time, this time, to think of a way to assess the situation and find a way to escape. The whole place was a forest, although significantly desolated by the spider. As he thought, the ground itself looked relatively flat to begin with, with few of what seemed to be flowers and mushrooms here and there; it was possible for him to run without looking down and tripping over a rock or a root. The trees themselves, on the other hand, were quite spacy one among another, it didn’t give proper shade for anyone to hide. If anything, it wouldn’t be impossible for one to jump from tree to tree, given the trees’ thick branches and one’s superhuman strength. As far as he could see, there were no caves or a lake, or anything for him to hide, one way or another.
As he looked around wildly, he spotted the wounded soldier, who, apparently, noticed his presence behind the bark and looked him in the eyes.
For a moment, he was a bit scared — although the soldier seemed to be unable to harm him, he couldn’t help but think that it was still possible, one way or another. He took a step back out of surprise, but nevertheless kept staring at the soldier. Now that he stared at him, the soldier didn’t seem to display any kind of hostility or enmity toward him. If anything, it was rather fear and a bit of despair expressed on the soldier’s face, from what he could guess. Did he expect me to save him, somehow…? He thought.
There’s no way I can do that… perhaps he knew that and hoped for it anyway…
But that was when he spotted something weakly glowing, coming from behind the soldier. It looked like a tiny lizard, no bigger than his own palm, but it moved so fast, by the time he noticed it, the glowing lizard was already about a meter in front of him.
This time, with a gasp, he pushed himself backwards. His hand instinctively aimed to grab the gun from the nearest dead body, but the lizard already went and jumped from the tree bark he hid behind, straight onto his face.
From up close, he saw that the lizard didn’t have a face at all — to put it bluntly, it seemed to be made purely out of the soldier’s energy. Even in front of him, the glow was weak, not enough to blind his sight at all. At first, he thought that it would explode and kill him instantly.
It did explode, but only into a small spark of thick, liquid-like light. There was no impact of the small explosion at all, he still leaned backwards in silence and shock, staring at the small spark, which disappeared in less than a second.
He took deep breaths to calm himself down from the surprise, and that was after a few seconds of being still, doing nothing, and processing what he just experienced, as well as what he just received.
Oh… of course… he said to himself, still pulling deep breaths. It makes sense now…
He then slowly rose, and crawled back to peeking from behind the bark. The woman still fought against the spider beast — he thought that it was quite a stalemate, even though the woman looked to have a hard time with the spider beast — while the man already fell down sideways, his eyes now closed. He didn’t know if the soldier was still alive or dead already, but he knew that there was nothing he could do for him, except listen to his warning.
But if that’s the case…
He really thought I could run. As if I were as remotely powerful as them.
Is he stupid or what?
He turned, now scanning wildly, not to search for a hiding place, but to search for weapons he could most likely use. Now that he was actively searching, he found that he recognized the weapons and equipment, ranging from swords to guns, from throwing knives to small spherical things with a thin stick attached to each of them, which he believed were grenades. As far as he could see, however, there didn’t seem to be anything powerful, at least for the caliber of the spider beast.
He stayed low, as he crawled toward each of the dead bodies. As thoroughly as possible, he scanned through everything he could possibly use to defend himself. H He took the armor and the cloak, as well as the belt, of the dead soldier, and wore them on himself. Fortunately, the dead body close to him had the body size more or less the same as his, so he had no problem with wearing it. These guns seem to use magazines as ammo, unlike the gun she had… unless she’s lying…
He looked back. From his memories, her own gun and the one he was currently holding with his hand looked the same, and considering that he looked from afar, he couldn’t be more certain about it. Suppose that it did require her energy as ammo… I don’t see anything like a needle that sucks her energy out… unless it simply sucks out, and I can’t see it with my own eyes… not even with the goggles…?
But the damage is real, that I can’t deny… He happened to see one of the shots hitting the spider beast’s leg. As he thought, it caused a sort of transparent, destructive impact, as if something invisible punched on the spider’s leg with immense force. It did move its leg a few centimeters by force, but it didn’t seem to wound the spider gravely enough.
But that’s not the problem I need to deal with… he added, while continuing to gather all he could use. Although he couldn’t really use swords, he thought that it was best to grab one anyway and saddled it on his new belt. He had to compare all the magazines he could gather within a short time to see if the gun he had could use them. He also stored up to five grenades at his belt, but seeing that the cloak had pockets themselves, he put some more grenades into the pockets, as many as he could possibly store. However, he completely ignored the throwing knives.
To his surprise, there were more kinds of weapons and equipment than he thought and expected, some of them were quite exotic, like lance, ax, maul, and many more he didn’t know what the names were. Conversely, there was lots of modern-wise equipment, like binoculars, helmets, magazines, grenades, flash bangs, and the very goggles he was currently wearing to see through the shadow in the air. Half-medieval, half-modern… this is a weird world, I admit… he commented, as he encountered a small red stick as long as his own lower arm. It took him a while to realize what it was, but it was thanks to the shape that he realized what it apparently was.
So this is the flare… should be useful, for later… he said. But not now.
Now… as he finished equipping himself, he looked back at the fight: both the spider and the woman didn’t seem to notice him at all. The spider was huge, and its movement was significantly fast and agile, aside from being strong as well. The woman wasn’t as strong as the spider, but her movement matched the spider’s, and her gun was quite dangerous.
He then turned to look at the weapons and equipment he had gathered, on his belt, his cloak, and spread out on the ground in front of him. The most destructive thing he could do was throwing grenades. The weapons could probably do serious damage — he thought that at least some of them were enchanted, capable of bringing out attacks equally magical as the woman’s gun — but he wasn’t sure about it himself, and he doubted that he could activate it in the first place. And to begin with, he wasn’t fully knowledgeable with guns himself.
If I kill the spider, the woman will come to me, and by then… I probably won’t be able to do anything.
If I kill the woman, I’ll probably have to deal with the spider… but it can also be that the spider will leave me alone…
He sighed heavily.
Whichever it is, it’s equally risky and difficult… so many things could go wrong, and that’s not to mention what comes next…
But, the thing is, the third choice is equally dangerous, if not more risky than the first one.
Remembering the fact, he crawled back to the bark, trying his best to stay hidden. She watched the fight, trying to gather any information he could get to use, although it was quite hard to do, with their fast and agile movements.
So she uses the goggles to see… she can’t see without it, too. Did she rely on the smell and the hearing…?
The shadow doesn’t seem to hinder both of them. He took a deep breath to grab any smell with his nose; it was obvious that the shadow didn’t block the sound at all. Although he didn’t smell anything particular, he did smell the scent of freshness and leaves from the forest, although faint. So it was possible…
Okay, so, flash bangs… only four of them, and hopefully, none of them are broken, somehow… he said, as he counted the number of flash bangs. He was quite certain that the grenades were round-shaped, so he concluded that the cylinder-shaped grenades were flash bangs. But is it just a flash, or deafening noise as well…?
I ought to throw it toward the woman, and then when she was blinded, I would aim my gun toward the woman. Aim the head — that would kill her. And then…
Run away? Play dead? Show that you’re not a threat? Why did it attack her and chase us in the first place, anyway…?
He thought that he would find clues from paying attention to the spider. But as far as he could see, the spider didn’t seem to be attacked prior whatsoever, considering that he didn’t find any wound on it. What he found from his brief observation instead was the fact that it was spitting explosive liquid, instead of sticky web…
That was when his mind worked on something he just learned.
Wait… is this forest its habitat in the first place…? He realized, and started to wonder. It doesn’t have fur or hair whatsoever… it doesn’t seem to live in open space like this…
So it got disturbed, and chased them off to this place…? Maybe it will leave me alone, after she’s dead…
Wait, I don’t really know what happened before I wore the goggles… it could be something entirely else… A second thought came to his mind, and along with it, doubt started to show up in his mind. And there’s no telling if that’s even true…
Worse, there’s no telling at all that I can kill her… He took a look again at the woman. It seemed that she was getting exhausted, but her movement was still fast and agile enough to dodge the spider’s attacks, both melee and long-ranged. When he was theorizing on how to do it, he was then hit by the possibility of doing it in the first place. My best chance is a surprise attack, but that will — should only work once. Miss that chance, and it’s over…
There has to be…
His mind was thinking of other methods to kill her…
Other ways to deal with…
When another idea, albeit more dangerous and risky, popped up in his thoughts…
Her…
It started from a vague idea, and developed further. Although he hadn’t thought about any of his ideas in proper detail, the ideas did hold onto his mind. He completely refused the choice of running away, so he chose the ideas of going forward, but what came later to his mind surprised even him.
Oh…
Perhaps I can put myself in danger…?
The fact that he’s trying to save me means that I’m quite valuable to her… maybe that can distract her, and the spider will kill her when she’s off guard…
That is if I’m valuable to her indeed… if it’s not — if she comes to value her own life more than mine, then all this would be for naught…
But…
He took deep breaths repeatedly, hoping that it would calm him down. To an extent, it did work, but it still didn’t erase his fear that the entire plan could fail, or worse, derail into something he didn’t expect at all, given that it took his accuracy and focus, as well as a great amount of luck, to succeed.
Nevertheless…
He turned back, took a look one time, pulled the pin of the flash bang, and threw it as best as he could, aimed at where he thought the woman would likely go.
Her position was at the right side from his perspective, while the spider beast was at the left side. There was quite a distance between both of them. When he threw it, he saw that the woman was leaping further from him, to dodge the spider’s explosive spit. It was a forward leap, so her back was facing him. While it wouldn’t hit to blind the woman directly, he thought that it could serve as a surprise attack for her. Regardless of it, the flash bang was already thrown.
He didn’t turn his head away from the flash bang. Instead, he simply lowered himself, shielding behind the bark, and removed his goggles, putting it on his forehead.
Soon, as predicted, the shadow filled in to blanket his sight. The last thing that he saw before taking the goggles off was the woman jumping to dodge the spider’s spit, about to turn her back. He thought that, by the time she realized the flash bang, it would be too late.
He burned her position into his memory, pulled out the gun, and aimed at where he thought the woman would land. At the same time, he closed his eyes as tightly as he could.
Could the flash bang pierce the shadow…?
It seems that this is the place where it’s always dark, and they’ve long adapted to it, in a way. Hence, the goggles…
Now, the thing is… would they create the flash bangs powerful enough to break through this shadow thing…?
Could they even do it in the first place…?
I can’t help but feel that it’s unlikely…
BBBBIIIIIIIINNNNNNNGGGGG…!!!
A loud sound, a sort of a high-pitched shriek, was heard. Even though he wasn’t around the flash explosion, the sound was quite deafening to him already; nevertheless, he didn’t waver and lose focus, he let the deafening sound unfiltered into his ears. That was when he knew that the flash bang exploded, but what he didn’t expect was the sound accompanying it as well. A few seconds later, he slightly opened his eyes.
The flash was visible, despite the shadow intensely blinding his sight in the air, but it didn’t appear to be too blinding for him. As proof, he could see the woman and the spider under the light of the flash bang.
She appeared to be shocked, even though he couldn’t exactly tell, because her face was obstructed from his sight by the flash bang itself. He didn’t waste the time, pulled the gun to aim at the woman, and pulled the trigger all the way, till the ammo ran out. He held with two hands, thinking that each of the shots would be powerful, but to his surprise, he could handle them fairly well, without being propelled backwards. He couldn’t tell if the aims themselves were accurate; nevertheless, he looked at the target through the front sight, as best as he could, and pulled the trigger.
From the corner of his eyes, on the other hand, he saw that the spider made a sort of shrieking sound, for the first time, possibly because of the sudden deafening sound. He didn’t pay attention to the spider, so he couldn’t tell exactly what it looked like, but from the corner of his eyes, he thought that he didn’t find the spider’s eyes anywhere at all. The spider took a step back, before spitting multiple fires of explosive spits toward where the flash bang was around. It made him think that the spider possibly sensed its surroundings through sound, instead of sight, since it was the flash bang that caused the deafening sound. By the time he realized it, he had already fired the gun multiple times, he could only hope that it didn’t disrupt or redirect the spider beast’s attention.
Soon, the flash disappeared, although his ears were not recuperating yet from the bang. The shadow started to swallow the fading flash, returning to pitch black on his sight, so he returned to wearing the goggles. It didn’t take long for the goggles to function back and clear the shadow off his sight, and it didn’t take pressing or casting anything to activate it, leading to his relief. After that, he took a look at the result of his attack with his goggles.
The woman didn’t steadily land from her leap, but instead crash-landed on the ground. Seems to be working…
But before he could check further, he heard that the spider hissed. It seemed to be the kind of hiss for being provoked. As he turned to see the spider, his guess was right: the spider had its head — there were no eyes, but it definitely had its face, with fangs, pedipalps, and a mouth that spit the explosive acid — even as he looked, a bit of the acid dropped from its mouth, although it didn’t explode whatsoever when it hit the ground. But the one gravest thing he realized was that the spider appeared to look at him.
Oh, no… is it looking at me because I fired the gun…? It was his first thought, as he crawled backwards.
Panic started to creep into his mind. He expected that his plan could fail, but he realized that he didn’t expect to directly deal with the spider, not fully, at least. Seeing that the woman couldn’t hurt the spider, even with her gun, he was quite certain himself that his own gun he took from the dead soldiers would do even less. He thought of grenades holstered on his belt, but he wasn’t sure himself that the grenades would be enough to cause any damage on the spider beast, and his panic took over him, by the time he came to think of that, it was a bit too late already. The spider beast took some steps forward, as if about to eat him, while he couldn’t bring himself to run at all.
Fuck… he cursed himself —
BBBOOOOMMMM!!!
— when another explosion occurred behind the spider beast.
It wasn’t like the flash bang he threw. It was an actual explosion, as if someone planted an explosive device behind the spider, and it seemed to be an extremely powerful one, because he could feel the impact of the explosion, despite the distance. As a result, the spider beast screamed in pain. It took him a few seconds to notice that the explosion did cause damage to the spider’s abdomen. He saw the spider beast’s abdomen being torn, spilling out all kinds of organs and fluids from inside, including the explosive spit liquid and what seemed to be the production organ. The spider itself, when about to crawl toward him, lost its balance and dropped down in pain, still screaming, but it still tried to turn its back, as if to see the cause of the explosion.
It was the soldier who warned him, apparently gaining his consciousness back. He saw that the soldier, despite being gravely wounded and in pain, stretched his hand toward the spider beast, specifically, on its abdomen. There was nothing else he saw that caused the explosion, making him think that it was a spell cast by the soldier. Soon enough, however, he dropped his hand, seemingly losing consciousness again.
The thing. however, was that the spider beast leaned backwards, losing its own balance, and eventually dropped down. It seemed as if the spider still wanted to go after him, only to end up falling. He couldn’t exactly tell, but he had a feeling that the spider dropped down directly on top of the male soldier.
BBBOOOOOMMMMMMM…!!! Judging from the loudness alone, the spider beast appeared to be quite heavy, despite its relatively slender body anatomy. He didn’t hear anything that sounded like a squish sound, so he thought that the male soldier wasn’t crushed; on second thought, however, he thought that he could simply miss it.
He then turned to look at the woman. Unlike the male soldier, she was still alive. But seeing her crawling away, really slowly, he thought that she was wounded quite badly. Nevertheless, he thought that it was best to stay and hide behind the bark.
“What… what the fuck…?” said the woman, weakly, but audible to him.
That was when it hit him that the danger and its tension had finally passed — at the very least, the climax. There was nothing to be heard around him, other than the nearly-inaudible burning sounds around, thanks to the explosions, as well as her wheezes of pain. As far as he could tell, there was only him and the woman in the midst of a chaotic place — he didn’t know if the male soldier was still alive or not. No one else, and nothing else, came toward them. He looked around, and found nothing but near-complete silence in the midst of the forest, in replacement of loud explosions and thumping sounds.
And amidst the silence, he heard the woman saying,
“You… you knew…?!”
She didn’t continue, because she coughed. He couldn’t help but imagine that she coughed blood, judging from the sound.
“How… how could…?”
He opened his mouth.
“Did you… just assume that I forgot about it right away?”
The woman didn’t respond; instead, she panted and coughed more. And before she could muster a response, he reacted first.
It was initially a chuckle, supposedly loud enough to reach her ears.
At first, he thought that he would laugh louder, like a crazed maniac. But eventually, the chuckle died, because he didn’t find it any funnier. So he sighed, and said, “How could I… what? What do you mean?”
And before she responded, he cut, speaking in a joking manner.
“How could I shoot you? I admit that it was lots of luck involved.” he said. “Even I didn’t expect that it would work.”
Her response, however, refuted his answer. “No… how… could you… know…? You were supposed to… be unconscious…”
…
He turned and took a peek at the woman. She was still lying on the ground, about five meters from his position; it seemed that she was wounded too gravely to jump around like she did before, although he couldn’t be entirely sure of it. She was apparently looking at him, straight in the eyes. Her eyes, which previously looked friendly enough and vigilant of the surroundings, were now furious and spiteful, it was quite clear that it was aimed at him. Although it made sense to him now, it still shocked him a bit to realize that the friendliness she showed before was nothing but a mask, all to disguise her true intent and fool him. What he paid attention to, however, was the woman’s hands: to him, they appeared to hold nothing at all.
He chose to instead throw a grenade, as accurately as he could, aimed toward the woman. It was a real grenade, not the flash bang like what he used before. He waited for a second after pulling the pin; he was hoping that the grenade would explode by the time she saw what was thrown, leaving her no time to react to it. It came to his mind later that the grenade could have a shorter delay time than he thought, but at that point and moment, he stopped caring about that.
“No, wait — ”
BBBBOOOOOOMMMM!!!
And before she finished her words, an explosion interrupted her.
Bits of dirt showered on him from above, indicating that the explosion was quite significant, to a point where it destroyed the ground where it landed — a part of his mind digressed if the grenade would be enough to damage the spider beast. But after the explosion, what followed next was complete silence.
Carefully, he took a look at the result of the explosion.
There was a crater quite close to the woman, on the spot he assumed was the spot his grenade landed; it wasn’t big, and it wasn’t deeper than five centimeters, but it told him enough that the explosion was significant, probably equal to the explosions caused by the spider beast’s spits. As a result, what was previously a body of a gray-skinned woman became a shapeless pile of flesh, bones, and organs, shattered, smashed, and splattered all around the crater. Flesh and organs were splattered all around, while he could see the bones, at least those exposed off the flesh, shattered to bits, and around the body was blood, in gray color. He noticed that the color was a bit darker than her skin, but he couldn’t draw any conclusion from that trivial matter, nor did he care to.
What came to his mind was instead relief.
Phew… didn’t think it would actually work… he told himself, as he sighed heavily. And faster than I thought…
Adrenaline and tension dropped down within his body, which made him realize that it had apparently been quite high when she was dealing with the tension of dealing with the woman and surviving from the spider beast at the same time. He leaned toward the bark and closed his eyes, trying to gather his energy and calm, as he took deep breaths. He thought that he would actually fall asleep, but on second thought, he rather found himself too tired to even sleep.
It took him about a minute, in his estimation, to calm himself down, although he wasn’t fully calmed, and he didn’t allow himself to stay relaxed for too long in the first place. After calming himself, as best as he could, he checked on his equipment. As far as he recalled, he had only used one grenade and one flash bang, while the entire magazine was spent, leaving no bullets inside at all. He threw it away and grabbed a new one, a fitting magazine for his gun, nearby him, to load it on his gun. After that, he sat still and…
Now… what’s next…?
He stayed still, looking at what was ahead of him. The dead bodies were spread around him, while there was nothing far ahead of him, other than the trees, or at least as far as he could see. However, his look was unfocused.
How could I go back…?
He shook his head.
No, never mind that, what should I do right now…?
Where should I even go? It doesn’t seem to be a place to camp in the first place, anyway…
He looked to his right. He noticed that, from far ahead, there were huge trees, on which there were only doors on the trunks. Some of them, however, were destroyed, more or less like the mess he saw around. The place seemed to be a village, or at least a small settlement… but now it’s ransacked and destroyed…? He then looked at the dead bodies around him. Were they all from that settlement…? Seems like a military settlement or something…
Assuming that the place is now empty, it doesn’t seem like it’s safe to stay there… there’s probably some food and weapons and stuff, but ultimately…
Oh, yeah, that guy. Is he still alive…?
He rose and walked toward the spider’s carcass, but still with vigilance. A part of his mind thought that the carcass would either explode or have the spawns coming out of the carcass, so he had his gun ready on his hand, ready to shoot anytime. At the same time, he looked around as well, in case an unexpected guest came to visit him.
On closer look, the spider beast was indeed huge. Even as it lay down on the ground, it towered his own height. Its skin was smooth and slightly glittering, under the faint light of the fire due to explosions, reminding him a bit of a beetle’s elytron. It didn’t have eyes, indeed, but it had sorts of holes on both sides of the head; seeing the positions, he thought that they functioned as ears, allowing it to catch any sound as a way to sense the surroundings. Like a bat…? That’s quite interesting… He commented. Despite that, the spider looked menacing and terrifying to him, in a way that it shouldn’t have existed in the first place.
He went around the carcass, wondering if the male soldier was still alive.
“Oh, it’s you…”
Someone spoke. At first he jumped backwards, about to shoot, before he realized that the sound came from the soldier himself. “Oh, you’re still alive…”
The soldier had his lower body buried under the carcass. He himself was drenched in the orange-colored liquid, but it didn’t seem to be acidic, since his body didn’t melt at all. The wound on his stomach was still there, but he noticed that they didn’t seem to be that grave, compared to what he thought he saw.
“Well, yes, by luck only…” chuckled the soldier weakly. “But this sure doesn’t look good… it’s not like you can lift this dead spider off me, right…?”
“I can’t.”
“It’s alright… reinforcement should come here soon… we have called them, but… it seems that we reacted to it too late…”
“What happened here, after all?” he asked.
“Well… I’m not entirely sure myself… they suddenly popped here out of nowhere…”
He twitched, although he tried his best to hide it.
“I suppose you know nothing about this world… We have outposts outside the colony for purposes of security and resources — well, I’m sure you get the idea. We have always been stationed here, although it’s a bit far from the colony, but suddenly they just showed up, as if they were… they were teleported onto this post… they acted to us with hostility, so we reacted as well… but we didn’t get to react to it properly — it was too sudden, and there were plenty of them, with lots of those fancy weapons, and… well, as you can see…”
“How many are they…?”
“A lot… no, not exactly, my mistake… it’s rather that there are some of them, but they seemed to… they seemed to carry lots of hostages…”
The soldier then stopped, because he looked at his face. He didn’t exactly know what was on his own face, but he guessed that the soldier was surprised to see the reaction on his face.
“You…” he started, and then stopped.
“W-What is it…?”
His mind suddenly had lots of thoughts and emotions. One of them was the emotion of panic, but as he realized it, he calmed himself down. This time, unlike previously, he didn’t have a hard time to calm himself down. It was the same thoughts and emotions he had before he killed the woman right away.
While his mind was busy sweeping them all under the rug, his body moved, almost on his own. It was similar to what he did, with the difference that there was a part of him that felt hesitation, even if it was slight. Nevertheless, he didn’t stop.
“W-What are you…?”
He didn’t respond to his question, nor did he allow him to finish his question.
It was a point-blank shot, straight to his head. As he thought, he stopped speaking the moment his head was shot. When he lifted his head up talking to him, his head now dropped down and turned to the opposite direction; it was as if the soldier refused to speak with him any further and looked away. His eyes were still open when he was dead, but he didn’t bow down to close them down.
What he did instead was grabbing two grenades and pulling the pins, before dropping them onto his body and walking away quickly.
Even after distancing himself just enough, he could still feel the impact on his body, although just slightly. He tripped himself due to the force from behind, he nearly fell down. He felt a bit of something small and wet from behind, he was certain that it was the blasted organs of the male soldiers.
Ew…
He looked behind. He saw that the spider carcass was still there, seemingly untouched by the grenades. The male soldier, on the other hand, or at least what remained of him, was out of his sight, hindered by the spider beast’s carcass. Nevertheless, he chose not to check on it. He turned forward, restocked his grenades from the dead soldiers, walked away, and then headed to the settlement in front of him, no longer giving a thought on whatever was behind him.
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