The salamander's snout flashed intermittently in on Shanson. Shanson, who had finished his class, noticed the salamander's snout navigating like a compass. Curious, he followed the direction indicated by the salamander until it stopped blinking in front of a crowded scene. There, he saw Gate squeezing between the seniors. He tip-toed behind Gate, wanting to surprise her. But before he could scare her, the scene before him filled him with dread. To his horror, he found a washed-out pale-looking slime trembling in the summer weather holding a bloodied knife. The onlookers were horrified, and so were Shanson and Gate.
There were witnesses this time, and at the most inopportune time, the pale slime evolved into a giant dire-wolf man. The monstrous silhouette with carved-out marble-like muscles shadowed the limp lifeless body. It was as if a life had been traded for another.
The giant dire-wolfman jumped and fled the scene, leaving the bloodied corpse behind. Everyone was taken aback that Marvyn, an esteemed master, was brought to a brutal end by his trainee in cold blood. "21 stabs," someone counted. Some trainees, including Shanson and Gate, chased after the giant figure. But everyone lost track of the perpetrator in the middle of the pursuit as if he had teleported and vanished into thin air.
Standing before the enrolment hall, Gate and Shanson exchanged a curious look. Out of the 9 pursuers, Gate and Shanson were the only juniors. Senior 1, "I can't believe we lost track of him!" Senior 6, "We're lucky we are still alive. Let's disband and report this incident to the headmaster for our safety." Everyone nodded in agreement and dispersed, leaving Shanson and Gate the last to leave.
A small squirrely shadow hid behind the building, eavesdropping on every word and monitoring the situation. Ensuring everyone had left, the squirrel climbed into a hole in the tree.
"Strange, did you see the burnt mark on the grass?" Shanson asked bouncing furiously with Gate back to their dormitory.
"It's just a darker patch of grass," she said. Her answer removed Shanson's last shred of doubt and insight as he silently agreed.
Above the exosphere, a giant dire wolfman crouched in a fetal position on the cold metallic floor, trembling from the traumatic turn of events. "I didn't do it! I didn't do it!" the creature howled in tears. A familiar old man with a wispy white beard and a jolly belly approached the shaken creature with caution. His red glove slowly extended toward him and pat the crying canine. The dire wolfman felt the sharp contrast in warmth and jolted upright in fear. His glistening teeth gnashed in defence.
"Don't worry, I believe you Gully," said the man with rosy cheeks.
"Headmaster?" Gully mouthed and passed out from the release of stress.
"What shall we do with him, he has nowhere to go," a voice echoed.
"He can't possibly stay with us in space," a second voice said.
"After using him to exterminate the spy? How cold-hearted!" the muscular Santa said.
"Let's just suppress his powers and devolve him back into a slime," said the headmaster. With a few clicks, the machine secured the limbs of the dire werewolf and injected a yellowish serum near its neck.
After sealing Gully's powers, the Santas beamed the speckled slime back to the campus. "There! As if nothing happened. Gully would think it's all a dream," the headmaster beamed with pride and twirled his moustache habitually. "You could have sent him to the dorm," said the muscular Santa with a facepalm. "Ho, ho, ho, let's give him a chance to escape from the school. After all, he is now a wanted criminal," replied the headmaster with a jolly laughter masking the coldness of his cold-hearted joke.
Woken by the light the squirrel-like creature climbed out of its nest and peeked curiously at the slime on the ground. It saw a hissing black leathery creature, its forked tongue tasting the air for directions as if it had detected a prey to devour. The squirrel immediately ran to the black eagle, pushing the avian out of its nest. Rudely awakened, the black eagle pecked at the mouse-like creature. In its defence, the mouse squirrel pointed to the slime on the ground and the dark entity slithering towards the slime.
Grumbling, the eagle dived and cut the air, attacking the black python out of spite. "It's because of you I can't sleep tonight! Die!" it thought using its claws and beak to blind the serpent.
The snake, cursed to roam the ground on its belly, refused to be beaten and fiercely attacked the giant bird. An owl swooped in to snatch the drugged slime but was intercepted mid-air by the bushy mouse. Surprised by the attack, the owl dropped Gully into the hole in the tree. Unable to recover the slime, the owl and snake retreated from the scene.
The bushy squirrel mouse leapt into the hole, curious about the state of the slime. Although Gully's body was wrecked and blood was spilling into the groundwater, he did not make a sound nor did he wake from the pain. Perhaps the trauma had numbed him or perhaps that was the work of the serum, stripping him of his powers and leaving him weak and vulnerable. Roots crawled towards the poor slime and gently cradled him along the tunnel. The bushy squirrel followed, noting down the twist of events.
Sensing the weak breathing, the bushy mouse hastily cast a healing spell. Gully's body relaxed and firmed into a round soft dough-like ball as it sensed the pain leaving its body. His expression softened while the roots gently placed him beside a giant root. Below the ground, one could hear sounds bellowing through the earth- as if caged and trapped by the great tree. The busy mouse squirrel squeaked and animated the whole story to the face in the trunk. Nodding, the wise old tree creaked with a tinge of concern- her brows furrowed with wrinkles that the next war might approach sooner than expected.