"It's still chasing us!" Says Esmeralda. "I told you we shouldn't've torn it down!"
"How would we know it was THAT dangerous if we didn't try to look inside it, Hag?!"
"Samuel, this is your fault we're running in this darn jungle!"
A FEW MOMENTS AGO . . .
The whole time they were falling, Esmeralda was aware. She was fully conscious and was in possession of all her abilities. The duration of the fall with the gravity's pull took only a few seconds—and a moment's notice, she fell to a lagoon. Samuel held her the majority of the fall and pushed her in an attempt to 'save,' her. She couldn't stress enough how futile it was because the two of them were taken to a stream and Samuel drowned. His face landed exactly on the water, as opposed to Esmeralda who fell with her back to the lagoon.
She immediately retrieved him after snapping back to the reality that she was alive.
She was panicking, but she knew first aid. She thanked the Heavens he coughed after being placed to the ground. Esmeralda started sobbing the moment her teammate gained consciousness—the two of them survived the earthquake. They were alive. That thought alone caused her to sob uncontrollably.
Samuel remembered shortly afterward how they ended up below ANDROMEDA as soon as he woke up. And she was as baffled as Samuel when she eyed the spectacle. It was something out of a fairytale book. The plants were glowing, and the place was akin to those fantasy movies and RPG games with clear lagoons in the jungle where nymphs played.
This was the place underneath such a worn-out house.
"Why do I feel like we're somewhere we're ought to be?" He says. "Reminds me of a movie . . ."
Samuel and Esmeralda blinked.
"Journey to the Center of the Earth!" The two of them said to each other in chorus.
"This is strange," says Samuel, as he picked the leather journal on the pocket of his belt. He was coerced by their team leader to wear the same archaeological equipment he was accustomed to wearing. The journal was made of leather and had safeguarded the journal papers.
Samuel started to take note. Esmeralda and Samuel stood up to examine the place, with her looking closely at the plants and examining them.
"I've never seen anything like this before," Esmeralda says, looking at the glowing plants with her big, forest-green biologist eyes. She eyed a particularly large one, almost her size. "I've read an article where scientists infused luciferase—an enzyme that makes firefly glow—into kale, watercress, argula, and spinach. The result is that they emitted light . . ."
"Huh," Samuel saunters towards the plant. He then proceeded to poke it. "So this one has the luciferase enzyme, huh? Still, this flower is a big one. I wonder if they genetically modified it."
"I think," Esmeralda answers. "If it's indeed made by man, they would have modified the plant. But it seems like this flower has its petals enclosed to a certain light source inside. I don't think luciferase works like that."
"Why don't we check it out?" Samuel exclaims as he pinches the petal. "Research purposes."
Esmeralda blinks. "You mean we have to destroy this beautiful flora?"
"What else do you think?" Samuel frowns. "Hag, are you really a biologist? Even a junior researcher would understand that we have to break down big things to smaller pictures to get their gist."
Esmeralda bit her lips. "F-fine,"
Samuel grins. "After we examine these things, we'll find Berthold. I know he's here somewhere."
Esmeralda nods, readying her pen and paper.
Samuel held the stem of the plant, and then from the top, he pulled the petal down slowly.
Both Samuel and Esmeralda blinked.
A slimy, rosy-colored creature with a sluggishly opening eye and thick lips resided in the middle of the flower Samuel had plucked. Samuel dropped the petal as the eyelids of the creature opened, as well as his mouth which had a set of sharp, razor teeth peering over Samuel and Esmeralda's frightened faces.
"Run," Samuel says, and then as if on cue, the creature lunged itself in front of them. Esmeralda grew pale as she ran with Samuel. She looked back, only to see the creature groaning, moaning, and grunting as it ran towards them. Its petals were still intact, as well as the stem. The vines surrounding the large stem and acted like the flower's legs.
"It's still chasing us!" Says Esmeralda. "I told you we shouldn't have torn it down!"
"How would we know it was THAT dangerous if we didn't try to look inside it, Hag?!"
"Samuel, this is your fault we're running in this darn jungle!"
"Why is it my fault?!" Samuel asks as the two of them ran from the flower. "I didn't know we're handling a flower-monster!"
Esmeralda grunted, and then she blinked. She noticed sets of glowing flower earlier, and now—
A loud grunt sufficed. The two of them turned to see that the flower-monsters chasing them had multiplied. Esmeralda turned pale as her knees weakened. The next thing she knew, her face landed to the ground with Sam yelling her name.
She tripped.
Esmeralda felt fear washing through her body. All she could do was to close her eyes to wait for her impending death.
Except death did not come.
A foot did.
Samuel kicked the flower-monster away from Esmeralda, and then he grabbed her arm to pull her up as he drags her away before the other floras could lunge themselves around her.
"Hag, don't you die on me!" He exclaims. "Keep your eye forward!"
Esmeralda, who was sweating profusely, nodded her head numerous times as she ran with no sense of direction. The place was indeed a jungle. There were branches, streams, a puddle of water, and grass all around.
Before Esmeralda and Samuel could proceed any longer, the two of them were stopped shortly as they bumped into something transparent and sturdy.
Glass!
<< UNAUTHORIZED ACCESS >>
A large red text appeared on the glass and disappeared shortly afterward. Both Esmeralda and Samuel leaned to the glass as they soon realized they were surrounded by the flower-monsters.
"What the hell, where the hell are we—" was all Samuel could utter. He then proceeded to hide the trembling Esmeralda to his back. He then with his uninjured arm tried to ward off the flower-monsters lunging themselves to him. He gritted his teeth. He couldn't die a meaningless death—especially to creatures which he didn't completely understand.
Even if he protects Esmeralda and dies afterwards, they would eventually kill her as well.
Samuel cursed as a flower-monster bit his injured arm. He swung his arm and threw the monster away. Its companions groaned and then threw themselves forward to Samuel.
Esmeralda stabbed the one in front of Samuel with her pen.
The flower-monster groaned as it spilled a thick, green ooze as it fell to the ground. It didn't seem dead, but Esmeralda's pen had gone through the monster's petal, piercing through the bottom of its mouth. Samuel eyed Esmeralda, who was still trembling and pale.
"Hag . . .!"
"W-we'll have to fight them, Sam!" She says. "We have no choice!"
Samuel gritted his teeth, and then with his uninjured arm, he tried to push the flower-monsters away. Their razor-like teeth almost getting his arm at a second, but always fend off at a moment's notice. He was barely dodging the attacks, and his stamina was getting lower at this point. His wound had reopened, his blood dripping down the floor.
The creatures were getting lesser at this point. Samuel noticed Esmeralda's movements were also getting slower and weaker—but he predicted that they could kill every last one of the creatures as they reach their limits.
Samuel was almost sure they would make it out alive.
Until he sees a gigantic flower with two eyes, a large, opened shark-like mouth, walking on two green legs. Behind him was another batch of flower-monsters, walking also with two green legs, much smaller than the one in front.
He didn't have the stamina anymore. Esmeralda shrieked as another one of the flower monsters lunged towards her. The ballpoint pen she used as a weapon was consumed by one of the monsters now, and she had nothing more to use. Samuel cursed as he tried to punch and kick the monsters throwing themselves at them.
Until it came.
The large creature eyed them with its red, veiny eyes. He reeked of sulfur and wood, mixed with the smell of plants and ooze. Samuel knew he didn't stand a chance, and they were now surrounded by the smaller plant monsters, so an escape would be futile.
All he could do was to embrace Esmeralda and protect her from the monsters. He knew it would deem useless because they would kill the two of them anyway. But it was instincts who told him to protect his teammate. He didn't have the time to think. He was waiting for the pain, for death, and then he wondered why his life did not flashback to him.
And then it had occurred to Samuel.
He wasn't dead even after a minute he was using his body as a shield for Esmeralda.
He slowly turned his head to the side—and then his eyes widened as he beheld a peculiar sight.
A man with a rifle at hand.
"Ninja g—Hiroaki!" Samuel exclaims, and then his eyes shifted to the man who had stood alongside Hiroaki.
"Doctor Wagner!" Esmeralda exclaims.
Berthold looked back to Esmeralda and Samuel.
"You're safe now," he says. "Leave this to us!"