TTT Vol. 1 pt. 32

Damn it! I shouldn’t have let him run off! Why didn’t I make sure he went home?! Especially when I saw that beast around earlier!

I couldn’t stop blaming myself for the kid’s disappearance even if I knew that I wasn’t actually responsible for it. In a small town where everybody knew each other and where beasts didn’t approach, it was fine and safe to let kids move around on their own. Everybody did it and the parents expected him to go home on his own in the first place.

But I was the last one who talked to him. I was the one who might have inspired him to go out and do something stupid, and now he was missing.

Where would he have gone?!

I used my tentacles to swing my way all around the village. I checked behind every building, in every alley, and everywhere else I could think of, but I just couldn’t find him. Nobody could.

And everybody got involved. Every adult, whether young or old, was up with a lantern or
torch looking around. Most of them began spreading out into the woods since there was no sign of him within the village itself.

If anything bad happens to him, then I’m… no. I’m not going to let anything bad happen to him. I don’t care if I have to look for him for the rest of my life, I’m going to find this kid and bring him back safe.

Then I remembered what exactly it was that we were talking about.

I didn’t want to believe that he might try something so stupid, but he was desperate to get people to believe him. He wanted to convince everybody that he wasn’t a liar. To do that, he’d need some kind of proof.

And where would he get proof that an airship battle happened other than from where it supposedly happened?

There’s no way. There is absolutely no way that he could be stupid to think about trying to traverse the islands, at night, on his own. Please don’t be that stupid, kid.

The more I thought about it, the more I realized he probably was that stupid. It was the only thing I could imagine him doing that would explain why he was missing.

Damn it! He’s going to get himself killed!

As tempted as I was to immediately head out in that direction to look for him, I couldn’t leave yet. The responsible thing to do was let the guards know what I knew first so that they could come up with plans of their own. Not to mention that there was always the chance I might make a stupid mistake somehow and end up falling into the endless sky, and then nobody would know where to go looking for the kid.

So, I went to find the guards and explained everything to them.

Kresimir sighed and rubbed his forehead after reading everything I had to say on my board. “Niko always has been a troublemaker… but an honest troublemaker.”

Niko’s parents were also there. His dad was the first to speak up. “I tried explaining to him that it wasn’t like we thought he was a liar, but…”

“Can you blame him for thinking everybody thought he was one anyways? Never met a kid more truthful than him in my entire life, but even I didn’t believe a word of what he said.”

I chimed in next.

I’M SORRY. I SHOULDN’T

HAVE SAID ANYTHING.

I TOLD HIM I BELIEVED

HIM. THAT MADE HIM

DO THIS.

Kresimir shook his head. “This isn’t your fault. If anything, if the rest of us would have done the same as you sooner, we might not be in this situation right now.”

Hearing that was a huge relief that I didn’t realize I needed to hear. I didn’t want to be blamed no matter how much I was blaming myself.

Niko’s mom crouched down to get closer to me and asked, “Would you please help us find him? I know we don’t know each other that well, but I’ve seen how you move around. You’ll be able to search faster than anybody—"

OF COURSE. ALREADY

PLANNED ON IT. READY

TO GO RIGHT NOW.

She sighed and smiled. It was clear how worried she was, but she was trying her best to keep it together.

What a strong woman.

“Thank you,” she said.

I saluted and looked back up at Kresimir.

WHICH DIRECTION WILL

TAKE ME TO THE FAR

ISLANDS?

The boy made it sound like the fight happened as far out over the islands as it could have happened, so I assumed that was where he was going.

“Go straight north or east and it’ll take you to the edges. But if we can’t narrow it down between that… we’re going to have to pick a direction and hope we get lucky,” Kresimir said.

Or maybe not.

I looked up at the dad.

WHERE DID HE TAKE

YOU TO SHOW YOU THE

FIGHT?

The father lit up as if just made a revelation. “East! We went to the eastern edge of the island!”

THANK YOU. WILL GO

NOW.

“Wait,” Kresimir said. “You should let us get our island traversal equipment. It’s dangerous to try jumping between islands.”

Hearing that, the mother let out a slight gasp and winced, but she recovered and put her strong face on again.

As for what Kresimir said, I extended my tentacles out to the nearest tree and wrapped them around it.

WILL USE TENTACLES AS

ROPE. I’LL BE FINE.

Kresimir nodded. “Right then. I’m glad to have you here helping us. Do you need anything at all?”

I shook my body before looking up at the mom again.

WILL FIND NIKO AND

BRING HIM BACK SAFE.

DO NOT WORRY.

I saw just a hint of a tear form in the mom’s eye before she said, “Thank you.”

Then I saw Lada returning with Korova. She went to go get her as soon as we learned something was wrong. As much as I wanted to go and let them know what was going on, I couldn’t waste any time. The guards could fill them in on what I said.

All I did instead was wave to them before leaving for the edge of the island.

Hang in there, Niko. But please don’t be in a situation that requires you to literally be hanging.

I made it to the edge of the island before long. I never learned how to track people or beasts or anything, so I had no idea if there were any signs nearby that might tell me Niko was there.

There was one thing I could do, though.

Niko was a small boy. Assuming that he was smart enough to take some rope and hooks with him, because he was probably already dead if he didn’t, then he would most likely choose the shortest possible gaps between islands to travel over. He wouldn’t be strong enough to throw the hooks over larger distances.

So, I looked for where the next closest island to the main island was. Once I found it, I used my tentacles to reel me in over to it and repeated the process looking for the next closest island.

Being able to shout right now would be useful so that I could ask him if he hears me.

But because I couldn’t shout, all I could do was continue going from nearest island to nearest island while occasionally climbing up to the tallest tree I could find to look out over the area.

Unfortunately, looking didn’t exactly accomplish anything. It was too dark to see far with any amount of precision.

Onto the next island.

How… how far could this kid have gone? I have to have been at this for a couple of hours already.

The moon was significantly higher in the sky than it was before.

I should have brought a lantern or torch with me. Maybe the kid would see me and call out to—

I stopped in my tracks.

Right in front of me was another one of those beasts I first encountered in my new body—the one I stole a tail from.

Good news was that it was asleep and didn’t look bloody at all, so I doubted that it got its claws on Niko. Even so, it just made me even more worried about him. Not only was there a chance of him making a mistake and falling off one of the islands, but there was the chance of him coming across an aggressive beast who would be happy to tear him apart and eat him.

The island surrounding the village’s island were where most of the aggressive beasts lived. Those living on the island had their populations kept under control by the guards, and they avoided ever going around the village.

But the rest of the surrounding islands were nowhere near as safe.

There’s a chance that I passed Niko up without noticing him. There’s also a chance he might try heading back in this direction. And if I find him up ahead, I’ll have to bring him back this way anyways. There’s no guarantee that this beast will remain sleeping that whole time and fighting will be more difficult if I have to try and protect Niko at the same time.

While the beast slept, I picked up the largest rock I could find and pointed the more jagged end of it downward.

Killing a sleeping beast was nothing to be proud of.

But there were only good reasons to kill it while a child was missing in the area.

I slammed the rock down into the beast’s head as hard as I could.

The first blow didn’t kill it, but the second one did.

Surprisingly, I didn’t feel hungry after seeing its corpse. I planned on ignoring that hunger in the first place even if I did feel it, but it wasn’t there at all.

Maybe it only happens the first time I eat something? Or maybe it’s because I didn’t want to gain anything from it?

I didn’t know, but I returned my attention to the task on hand.

What felt like another hour passed by and I was beginning to give up hope.

Maybe he didn’t even come out here. What if they found him hiding somewhere around the village and I’m searching for nothing?

But there was still a chance that he was out there. As long as that chance was there, I wasn’t going to give up.

It was easy to imagine a lonely, scared Niko crying in the cold of the night, clutching onto a tree whenever a strong breeze rolled over the island. Crying for his parents. Pleading for somebody to help him.

I wasn’t going to give up until I either found him or until every single island was searched.

I swung over to the next island and—

And I heard a sneeze.

Niko?!

I went in the direction of the sneeze but stopped when I heard a voice.

And it wasn’t Niko’s.

“Look at you shivering,” the voice, which sounded like a rough, feminine voice, said. “You poor thing. All alone and cold without any fur to keep you warm.”

Is there somebody living out here?

I couldn’t disregard the chance of the voice’s owner being hostile. Jumping right in to where I heard their voices coming from would potentially put Niko in danger if they were aggressive.

“I wonder how many they will send looking for you.”

I climbed up into the tree next to me and was careful to hide myself in its foliage.

“Hopefully more than a few. That livestock hasn’t been satisfying me lately… and I’ll never inherit more levels from killing beasts.”

I found Niko.

He was sitting down with his knees against his chest, his hands over his ears as he tucked his head down to avoid looking at the giant beast circling him. The hooked rope he must have been using was next to him.

However, walking on all fours was what appeared to be a canid-like beast covered in white and grey fur. Assuming that she was a she, her claws were long, sharp, and curved as if they were designed for grappling onto prey. Or maybe grappling onto islands. Then there were her fangs that she occasionally bared at Niko with a growl just to torment him, and her fangs managed to look even deadlier than the claws of the beast I killed earlier.

I also noticed what looked like feathers sticking out from the backs of her legs, tail, and along her spine.

But more important than everything else was the fact that she was massive. She was even larger than Kresimir, an adult, male Chosen.

There was one more obvious feature to note, and it was that she was a soul beast. That was obvious from how she could actually talk.

And she couldn’t have been a soul beast without first being a beast that killed somebody else.

Korova became a soul beast without ill intent and evolved her body to become more like a Chosen’s.

But when it came to the soul beast in front of me, I knew that she was nothing like Korova. From the way that she looked and what she said, she had every intention to kill more Chosen to grow from their souls.

That was what most soul beasts were like.

And that meant Niko was in extreme danger.

“Maybe I should take you closer and make you scream,” she said. “That should draw their attention and work faster than waiting for them to come out here looking for you.”

Damn it… you really got yourself in trouble here, kid. But I said I would get you back safely and I meant it.

I reached one of my tentacles down behind the trunk of the tree outside of the soul beast’s sight and felt around until I found a rock to pick up. Unlike earlier, I wasn’t going to use the rock as a weapon. Instead, I threw it up into the air, over the tree, so that it would land a bit farther away and hopefully draw her attention away from Niko.

And it worked.

The rock made a loud sound upon hitting the ground which made her lift her head and run over to it.

I didn’t have any time to waste.

I propelled myself off the tree toward Niko and—

—got swiped out of the air, forced down against the ground with large, curled claws around my body. One of them tore right through me and impaled me against the ground.

“You didn’t really think I fell for that, did you?” she asked, bringing her snarling maw right over my body. “I smelled you the second you came to this island. Now, I wonder how you taste.”