'He is really a panther,' Arsh thought, when he noticed the black shadow jumping over him.
Just as he was about to fall into Apeirolimos's grasp, Bera jumped over Arsh and knocked the creature to the ground. Then, he sank his teeth into the creature's arm. Arsh heard cracking sounds and a few seconds later, he saw Bera threw back an arm from wood he was holding in his mouth. Arsh hadn't realized that the creature's body was made of wood.
Although the creature let out agonizing shrieks one after another, Bera kept leaping onto it without pause and continued tearing pieces from its body. After the arm, he jumped toward the creature's neck and prevented it from getting up for a while. Then he spat out another piece he had torn off. This time, he tried to move toward the other side of the neck, but when the creature swung its claws at him, Bera leaped toward its other intact arm to block the attacks.
'So that's why he was confident he could kill the creature. But will tearing it apart be enough…?' Arsh thought.
Then he pulled himself together and jumped onto the counter. Although he was not sure whether there was anything like what he was looking for, he continued searching. The surface of the bronze chest wasn't overly hard. It was soft enough to be engraved. If Bera failed, this would be their last resort.
'Anything with a sharp tip… come on, even a fountain pen would do,' he thought, as he hurriedly snapped off pieces of branches and tried to open the drawers.
At that moment, he heard a cry. When he lifted his head, he heard the whimpering of the panther lying on the ground. The creature had swung Bera aside with its remaining arm, causing him to crash into a tree.
When Mr. Herman ran toward Bera, Arsh saw the creature smear the black saliva coming from its mouth onto its damaged body parts. Within seconds, branches grew from the cracks filled the places of the broken pieces. It rose from the ground as if it had never been harmed at all. Now it was ready to catch its prey again. Arsh had to distract the creature before it reached Bera.
'I need something to make a noise... something loud,' he thought.
At that moment, the golden threads extending from his left hand wrapped around the pocket pistol he was holding in his right hand and forced him to raise his arm. After that golden threads reached toward the globe. In that moment, Arsh realized that the siuni had given him another ability he had not noticed before. Without wasting time, he pulled the trigger.
The sound of the pistol shot was immediately drowned out by the bullet clanging against the metal globe. After a moment of hesitation, the creature turned away from Bera and Mr. Herman and lunged toward the globe. This would only buy them a few seconds. But Bera had only just managed to get up from the ground.
Arsh saw the blood flowing from the panther's left shoulder.
"Run to the others!" he shouted, while aiming at the globe again.
Without objecting, Mr. Herman ran in that direction with Bera, while Arsh began to retreat without turning his back on the creature. Around every five seconds, he fired at the globe together with them, making the sound echo. He had only one bullet left. There had only been five bullets to begin with. When he saw the others disappear through the corridor, he fired the last shot and started running as fast as he could.
Recalling what Mes said, he estimated that there was not much time before the library reshaped itself again. If he could reach the door now, he could probably prevent the creature from following them, at least for a while. But running with the nearly twenty-kilogram bronze chest clutched in his arms was not easy.
When the effect of the sound made by the last bullet faded, Arsh heard the sound of running coming from behind him. The creature was closing in on him. Although Bera had saved him moments ago, this time there seemed to be no luck. He quickly threw himself to the ground and rolled, narrowly avoiding the creature's claws that slammed into the floor.
He threw the pistol at the creature and started running again toward the entrance of the corridor. However, along with the sudden pain he felt in his back, he felt himself being thrown backward.
When he crashed into the trunk of a tree and fell, he was stunned for a moment. He could feel that his head and back had been split open, and the warm blood flowing
Struggling to stay conscious, when he opened his eyes, he found himself face to face with Apeirolimos. Two black hollows were only inches from his face. The same feeling he'd had when he first looked into those two empty holes surged through his entire body again. The creature had no eyes. But he felt that something was looking at him from within those hollows.
As if something was pulling him inward. He felt numb.
At that moment, a sound he heard brought him back to his senses. It sounded like a rattling noise. The sound was getting closer.
"Aaaaaaa… aaaaaaa… Arsh, where are you… ruuunnn…." Walter ran into the hall, shaking a strange object in his hand.
The monster pulled its attention away from Arsh and started chasing Walter instead. Arsh quickly pushed himself up from the ground, grabbed the bronze chest a short distance away, and began running toward the corridor.
'At least that thing is dumb.' Arsh thought while running.
"Arsh, don't forget to find me later….. aaaaa"
Only a few seconds later, Walter's voice could no longer be heard. When he looked back, he saw that the hall from moments before had been replaced by bookshelves again.
"Just in time… I hope you'll be okay, Walter," he thought. He started running quickly down the corridor, following the golden threads.
…
Mes was sitting on the ground, holding Bera's head in his lap as he panted. He was stroking his fur, while also looking at the pocket watch in his hand.
It would take some time for Bera to return to his human form.
Bera had two siunis. Both had been passed down to him by his family. One of them was related to emotions. He could easily read emotions of other people. This siuni was called the Reader.
The other was the siuni that allowed him to transform into a panther. He had not acquired this siuni later; he had been born with it like other people in his family. However, this siuni made it harder for him to control his emotions. When he lost himself, he was no different from a wild animal. While in panther form, he rarely maintained control, so he generally avoided transforming, but he tried to make use of the extra strength, speed, and agility this siuni gave him.
The purpose of the Reader was to help him control his emotions and prevent him from fully turning into a panther. Everyone in Bera's family possessed both of these siunis. But unfortunately, according to what Bera and Professor Reiner had said, no one else from the family had survived.
Mes knew that he was an exception for Bera. Because he considered him his own family, he could recognize him even when he lost control, regardless of the form he was in. But when Bera was still young, there had been times when he could not control himself and had attacked Walter once or twice. Mes was simply grateful that, at least for now, even though Bera was in panther form and still has some consciousness as a human.
Luckily, before eight minutes and forty-four seconds had passed, Walter had gone to them for help. On the way, he had run into Mr. Herman and Bera. If they had been separated, it would have been harder for Bera to regain control, and he might have harmed Mr. Herman.
Mes had given Walter one of the artifacts from the exhibition hall. At first, he had feared that the object would break immediately, but it turned out to be quite sturdy and still working. The object had small round disks attached to a brass handle. While walking through the exhibition hall earlier, this object had caught his attention. It was a musical instrument belonging to the Yulos culture.
This was enough to distract the creature for a while and help Arsh to run away. Walter now knew that he needed to be quiet. As long as he distracted the creature, he could easily hide by passing through the walls.
As he was thinking about all this, Arsh appeared at the entrance of the exhibition hall. He was covered in blood and clutching the bronze chest.