Hajime felt the Kylista's tail creeping out from the bottom of the river, and he also felt the water flowing around him, but it was too dark, and he couldn't see how closed the Kylista's tail was to him. Although it was dark, Hajime knew that it was useless to look around at this time, but the shining spots slowly moved towards his feet, making him lower his head. Hajime was now convinced that this must be the Kylista's tail spinning upwards to his feet.
Due to the darkness at the bottom of the river, Hajime couldn't see enough to attack the Kylista first, so he continued to hold his breath and waited for the Kylista to attack first. He felt the Kylista's tail slowly wrap around his right ankle. Immediately afterwards, the end of the Kylista tail quickly tightened his right ankle, pulling him towards the Kylista at a high speed.
Hajime was dragged towards the unknown, while his two thumbnails quickly slid across the tips of his four fingers on both of his hands. After Hajime's blood mixed with the river water, the tree roots on both sides of the river were uprooted from the ground and plunged into the river.
Standing on the oracle boat, when they saw the tree roots digging into the river, the five people on the boat knew that Hajime was still alive and fighting the Kylista underwater.
Bong looked at the dark river and said, "We need to do something, but what should we do?"
Yul looked at Michio and said, "Light up the river."
Michio looked back at Yul and asked doubtfully, "Are you sure?"
Yul nodded and said, "Only by lighting up the river, could Hajime see what he is fighting." He sighed. "Moreover, Hajime has a higher chance of winning."
Abrafo said, "But Hajime might end up getting burn."
U-ri said, "That's not necessary. The fire only burns on the surface and will not dive into the river. As long as Hajime is underwater when the fire burns, it won't cause him any harm."
Michio looked at Yul again, seeking confirmation, "Are you sure?"
Yul nodded.
Michio took out a red talisman from his left sleeve and threw the red talisman into the river. The moment the red talisman landed on the river; the surrounding area was quickly engulfed in flames.
"Ahh....Shit... Michio..." Abrafo yelled as he saw the flames moving quickly towards them. He turned and looked around to see if there were oars on the boat but found none. "We are going to get cook."
As the fire quickly spread to the surface, Hajime could see something underneath the river. He saw the head of an anaconda rushing towards him. In panic, he quickly hit three tree roots directly on the anaconda's head. More roots rose from the riverbed and pierced the anaconda's tail. The anaconda painfully let go of Hajime's feet and used all its strength to pull out its tail from the tree roots.
Seeing the anaconda twisting violently, Hajime knew that if he didn't get out of the water as soon as possible, his chances of escaping would be very slim, so he commanded three tree roots rose up from the riverbed, pushing Hajime to the surface, and then enter the coracle boat surrounded by fire. Tree roots from the side of the riverbanks grabbed hold of the small boat and pushed them towards the light.
"It's a large snake... a large snake," Hajime panted.
"Large snake?" the five men on the coracle boat asked in unison.
Hajime said, "That Kylista is a large black snake."
Yul asked, "Are you hurt?"
Hajime said, "Slightly burnt, but it will heal soon."
Feeling the strong current rushing towards them, the six people in the boat looked back and saw a large, burnt black anaconda head emerging from the river, hissing at them.
Noticing the boat getting further away from the Kylista, the Kylista rushed towards them at full speed.
"Not good," Bong said in horror. "It's coming to us."
U-ri turned to look at the Kylista, who was chasing them. "Ah... so that is what a real Kylista looks like... I think I have to rewrite the history of Kylista," he murmured to himself, but when he saw the head of the black anaconda approaching them, he turned to Hajime and the others. "Whatever tricks you have up your sleeves, now is the time to use them."
Hajime and Michio begin to work together to fight the Kylista from a distance. Hajime changed the direction of the tree roots and tried to pin the Kylista to the riverbed, but as soon as the roots grabbed the Kylista down, the Kylista quickly broke away and chased the boat again. At this time, Michio's energy was running low, and the talisman he hit the Kylista, did little damage on the Kylista.
"We can't kill it," Michio shouted.
Yul said, "It has the ability to heal itself."
Michio asked, "What should we do?"
Yul said, "Since we can't kill it, let's outrun it."
Then a large tree root wrapped itself around the coracle boat and began dragging the small coracle boat towards the opening sunlight.
Since the boat was a hundred meters away from where the sun met the dense willow branches, the Kylista launched an all-out attack on the people on the boat. The Kylista's head hit the boat hard, the boat was knocked over, and the six men and Meiji fell into the river.
A tree root quickly stretched out from the riverbank, grabbed U-ri's waist, and lifted him and Meiji high above the water, straight into the sun, putting U-ri who was holding Meiji on the large rock, in the middle of the river a distance away from the edge of the grayish ash island.
U-ri quickly looked at Meiji in his arms and found that Meiji was staring at U-ri and cooing happily. "Thank heaven you're alright," U-ri said, hugging Meiji tightly and turning to see where his friends were, but all he saw was the Kylista's large tail slamming down onto the river.
Seeing the oncoming tail, the four Tanzanies and Bong quickly dived deep into the river to avoid being hit by the Kylista's tail. As soon as the Kylista's tail touched the water, tree roots emerged from the bottom of the water and the riverbank piercing the Kylista's tail.
Taking advantage of the opportunity when the Kylista was temporarily suppressed by the tree roots, the four Tanzanies and Bong quickly swam towards U-ri, who was standing on the rock less than fifty yards away from them.
"This thing is really unkillable," Abrafo gasped.
The Tanzanies swam as fast as they could to the rock where U-ri was holding Meiji. They grabbed the side of the rock and turned to check if anyone was injured but found that Bong and Michio were not among them.
"Bong! Michio!" Abrafo shouted, and his voice echoed throughout the island. "Shit! We lost them."
Abrafo let go of the rock and swam back quickly, but it seemed that no matter how hard he tried to swim back, the water flowed in only one direction, and when the current surged, he could no longer swim five yards away from the rock before the currents wash him downstream again.
Yul said, "The river flows in one direction. It is impossible for us to swim back to our previous position." He looked around and saw a crystal-clear sea surrounding a narrow island they had just escaped from. "Without the coracle boat, we wouldn't know the direction to No Man's Land, and we might not be able to help Michio and Bong. We need to think of something."
Just when they were about to give up hope, the white coracle boat slowly sailed down the river towards them. Yul and Abrafo swam quickly to the coracle boat. They each grabbed the side of the coracle boat and dragged it forward towards the rock.
Yul looked up and said, "U-ri jumped in."
U-ri looked at the coracle boat, held Meiji tightly, and jumped into the boat. U-ri reached out and pulled Hajime onto the boat, and then Hajime and U-ri helped pull Yul and Abrafo onto the boat. The coracle boat continued to drift slowly toward the sea, as if she were on a mission.
"Bong! Michio!" Abrafo shouted, and the boat slowly sailed away from the narrow island.
When Bong followed the others and swam a short distance downstream, Bong found that Michio was not among the other three, so he looked back and found that Michio had not surfaced yet. He stopped and let the river slowly sweep him away. He was pushed downstream to where Michio last known spot was waiting for Michio to reappear, when he felt something grab his right leg. Fearing that it was the Kylista, he raised the dagger in his right hand and was about to stab it when he saw the top of a ball head. He put the knife in his belt, grabbed Michio's back collar tightly, tried his best to keep Michio's face out of the water, and then dragged Michio to the edge of the river. Looking back, the Kylista was still struggling to break free from the roots that bound her. Worried that if the Kylista broke free, she would charge at them, so Bong believes that his and Michio's chance of survival is to get out of the river and escape by foot.
"Michio! Michio!" Bong shouted. "Grab something, we have to get out of this river."
Michio coughed a few times, reached out and grabbed the root of a willow tree, then climbed out of the river. He reached out his hand and pulled Bong up. He continued to cough until the back of his throat no longer tickled.
Michio looked at Bong and said, "Thank you."
Bong shook his head, trying to clear the water from his ears. "Are you hurt?" he asked.
Michio said, "I'm not hurt."
Bong looked at Michio strangely and asked, "If you weren't hurt, why didn't you swim following the others."
Michio said shyly, "I... I can't swim." He embarrassingly looked at Bong.
Bong's jaw dropped and he asked, "Do your friends know about this?"
"It was embarrassing, so I never mentioned it to them," Michio said shyly.
Bong said, "Well, we are left behind. There is no boat to take us out of here, so we have to leave here on foot." He turned to look at the riverbank and saw many yellow eyes behind the gray bushes stare at them. "Michio... " He reached for the dagger at his waist. "Get ready, we have company."