Myra woke up around the early hours of the morning to the sound of shuffling and scratching noises. She groggily sat up from the bed and rubbed her eyes sleepily.
'What is that noise?' she stood up from the bed. Amba who was beside her all the time also took himself off the bed to accompany her.
He jumped onto the window sill of the only window in the room and opened it. Myra went over to take a look. She couldn't find the cause of the noise. She looked around for anything out of place but didn't notice anything abnormal except, "What is that?"
She noticed a faint red light glowing around the corner of the building accompanied by soft slow footsteps. The light seemed to be moving as though someone who was holding a lantern was searching for something.
Suddenly, the light started moving faster out of her sight and towards the forest. "Who is that, really? Don't they know it is dangerous to walk out at night?"
She looked up at the moon in the cloudy sky and gauged the time, it would still be about 3 hours till dawn. She couldn't understand why someone would want to go to the forest around this time.
She wanted to yell out but then reconsidered it. There were people sleeping and it was still late. And also, she might end up alerting whatever danger might be out there.
'But there is someone outside. It is a visitor like us? None of the people here would go out at night.' She thought to herself.
She considered it for a while before making up her mind. 'Someone might be in danger, I have to help them.' She thought decisively.
She looked at Amba who was staring up at her the whole time. "Hey, Amba. I want to go and get that person to come back. Will you protect me?"
Amba smiled back at her with closed eyes before nodding.
"Thanks Amba!" she smiled back.
She turned around and was about to go out the door when she remembered that the old man had locked the inn's main door.
"How am I supposed to get out now?" she paused in her dilemma.
Seeing as she was confused, Amba waved at her to get her attention before jumping down the window outside.
"Eh! Amba!" she whispered loudly and ran to the window sill but what she encountered there shocked her the more.
She saw a huge palm opening up in front of her as Amba's body grew to a ludicrous size to reach the window of the top of the two floor inn.
"Amba...." She stared with her mouth open. Amba just smiled as he gestured at her to hop on and he would take her down.
She carefully climbed on top of the hand from the window and Amba gently took her down. After dropping her, Amba reverted to his tiny size and Myra picked him up before they started moving.
She ran towards the direction she saw the light move to, hoping to catch the person before they got too far into the forest. She soon left the settlement and had to go a bit far into the forest before she saw the light again.
She ran carefully and tried not to make as much noise as possible as she ran. Apart from whatever the danger was at night, there were other possible animals that could be alerted by their movements.
'Wait, animals?' it was when Myra had this thought she suddenly noticed something weird. She couldn't hear the sounds of any animals this night!
There were no sounds from any nocturnal birds or animals roaming about. Just the occasional wind and the rustling under her feet as she approached the red light. The oddity confused her and she slowed down to a walk.
'Why are there no animals? Did the danger scare them off?' she was so lost in though that she didn't notice that the red light had stopped. She kept walking towards it without noticing that now, the light was walking towards her!
Amba who was looking up at Myra's face suddenly noticed something odd. He looked in front of him before his eyes widened in shock. He tapped Myra's arm which brought her to a sudden attention as she looked up.
Only for her eyes to meet the burning red sockets of a tall, black boned, eerie skeleton!
"Eeeeeek!!!!" she yelled out in intense fear and turned to run away
But the skeleton had already raised the fairly large and very chipped sword it had in its hands high up to slash down at her!
ROAR!!!
Amba was already on the ground and transformed into his 2 meter height which was significantly taller than the undead skeleton and stood in front of Myra. The sword clanged harmlessly at the golem's chest and Amba didn't hesitate to raise his clenched arms above him and smash down mercilessly at the Skeleton.
CRASH!!!
Pieces of bones were scattered on the forest floor as the skeleton got destroyed in one strike. Myra turned around to watch the sight in a daze, her heart beating loudly in her chest.
Amba turned around only to meet her slowly widening eyes and face twisting in horror. Turning back to see what had her scared, he noticed countless glowing red eyes from the depths of the forest staring in their general direction!
"A-Amba…" Myra's voice stuttered as she grabbed onto the golem's hand.
Amba grunted before grabbing Myra and mounting her onto his shoulders before taking a mad dash towards the settlement with countless burning red eyes chasing after them.
"I caught her staring at me again today man, I feel like it's now at the point where I should talk to her" Reo told Natsu about the girl he saw staring at him in the morning.
"I've been telling you man! Sara Fujino has the hots for you!" Natsu was basically yelling.
"Damn man! Shut your mouth! People might hear you fool!" Reo frowned as he downed his lunch, it was recess and they were eating out on the school compound away from the crowd.
"You should have talked to her since the beginning of the year when she transferred in. Are you an idiot? Hey, are you really an idiot? Is that it? You are an idiot?" Natsu looked at him with a deadpan face.
"Nah man, I don't think it's like that. Something is probably just up. I think I would talk to her tomorrow and see what's up" Reo looked uncertain.
"Hey... Reo-san, you are a hopeless case you know? You will probably be a virgin at 30 I'm sure." Natsu chuckled.
"I mean really man…..fuck you" Reo laughed back.
THUMP! THUMP! THUMP!
Amba's loud footsteps echoed through the forest. Behind them, Myra could see the countless pairs of fiery lights rushing towards them in a clatter of bones. She felt her heart seize in fear just by the amount of them, there must be at least a hundred!
By now, the settlement was already in sight. Myra was just about to sigh in relief, thinking about how she would be back to safety when she realized the big problem.
"I am stupid! Very stupid!" she suddenly cried out slapping her forehead.
She was about to put the hero and the entire settlement in danger!
There were no soldiers or warriors in the settlement as far as she could tell. They didn't even have a wall! And with the number of undead chasing after them, only a large number of people should be able to take them on. And the hero was not back yet!
"No! No! Amba! Turn to the left! Let's go away from the settlement!" she yelled at the top of her voice.
Amba nodded and turned left to another part of the forest. The countless eyes followed them just as quickly as a massive chase ensured.
'What do I do? What do I do now!? Why did I come out in the first place!?' Myra was basically tearing up now.
They were just running. She had no plan or no idea on what she should do to stop this. She had foolishly gone out in the middle of the night after all the warnings and now she was in a situation she couldn't face.
'Hero…. Why aren't you back yet? You are supposed to protect me' she sobbed quietly on Amba's shoulder.
Noticing her distress, Amba patted her on the head while he ran. They kept on running for a few minutes before Amba suddenly stopped.
Myra looked up from her tears and wiped her eyes. They had reached a stream that flowed through the river. It was wide at that point and as she looked to the right to see if it gets narrower, she noticed a house made out of wood a bit far down. It had big logs stacked in a corner by the front and a water wheel by the side of a large sort of machinery in the water.
'The mill!?' Myra saw the building and felt her heartbeat seize! That was because she could see light shining from the wide open front door, there were lots of glowing fiery pairs of light roaming within it!