Chapter 4

-Hiroshi-

Library, huh? How nice… thought Hiroshi with a huge amount of sarcasm. It's gonna be a real bug festival…

He put the key in his uniform's overcoat.

That is, if the key even fits in the lock with all that rust on it…

The boy sighed and walked back toward the main hall. It was probably all planned by Takuro. He surely organized a sort of game. What was the point of it? No idea, maybe it didn't even have a purpose, knowing Takuro. That weird game with all these keys would be overly long, he just knew it. He looked at his watch. It had already been an hour and a half since they stepped in the mansion. It had felt like three. He only grumbled as he made his way back into the main hall.

Everything is huge in this place, the library will be no exception.

He guessed a massive library would not be on a high floor due to the unbelievable weight it would put on the floor, so he decided to start with the first floor. He walked to his left, since he remembered the bathrooms were on the right. There was one locked door on that side, but he guessed it was another bathroom, so he'd check it last. A very faint grin appeared on his face when the key fitted in and easily turned. Hiroshi pulled it out, to find half of it cleaned of the rust.

Did it stay in the lock…? How did it even happen? He decided to ignore it and walk in the room instead. Let's just hope the floor didn't break with all that weight.

The floor was intact when he came in. He couldn't see anything yet, but the dead end at the other side and an opening at approximately half the distance. The floor felt uncomfortably cold through his shoes and an obvious smell of humidity and old paper came to his nose. He walked through the opening and took a quick glance around. There were huge bookshelves to his right filled with books that Hiroshi couldn't help, but stare in disgust. They were gray from dust and mold and had a green color on certain spots due to mushrooms or something. He quickly turned away from them to not get sick and looked at the broken table forming a V (An M if the legs were counted) in front of him instead. The few yellowed papers that had probably been once at the corner of the table were piled up in the middle, their side on the muddy floor. Hiroshi could bet it had been a beautiful (and even dreamy) room before it became… rotten. He quickly snapped out of his observation and turned his head to look around for a few second.

If I was Takuro, where would I hide the key?

Of course, he didn't wish to be Takuro. He didn't wish to be a dumb cocky douchebag. That guy really looked like a douchebag with his sleeves rolled up, his ear piercing and his expensive-looking watch. There was also that weird habit of his to always rearrange his shirt's collar with one or two buttons detached to show… Hiroshi wasn't so sure what Takuro wanted to show. His collarbone? Nothing was really special about his collarbone. Let's say when you get bullied almost every day by the same guy, you get to notice some stuff.

Hiroshi headed to the table. He didn't want to touch the book, so he started there hoping he'd find something to continue Takuro's game. He moved some sheets and found another rusty key.

Good thing he was dumb on that one… Though if he's really making a game, he'll probably make it harder later.

He heard the door slam behind him. He turned toward the source of the noise, the opening.

"Kazuya?" he said, hoping to get an answer from his friend.

He expected to see Kazuya's frail shape, but froze into place seeing the large purple hand gripping the wall. A head followed, so did the rest of the body, and it was the most horrible thing Hiroshi had ever seen. The creature's skin had the same color as an internal bleeding. Its head had the same size as the rest of its body, and its face was distorted by a wide smile. Its teeth were light brown close to red, the same color a dried drop of blood had. Hiroshi couldn't get his gaze off its eyes while it slowly walked toward him. They seemed so empty, he felt like his mind was getting sucked by them, forcing his body to stand alone like a stone statue.

Hiroshi had never experienced pure terror. He never knew what it felt to be so scared that it was impossible to scream. He knew now, and no matter how he tried to snap out of it, he couldn't move or make a single sound. The monster stopped when it stood at his level, tilting its head as if it asked itself what this little thing in front of it was. Hiroshi finally moved, but slowly. He didn't know this horrible monster, he'd rather play careful. The back of his foot got stuck between the two table parts behind him, making him fall on his back (More on his schoolbag) right in the middle of the papers with a quiet grunt. He noticed the small space between the broken table and the wall. Maybe he could escape from there if he was quick enough. The problem would be to get up. Just by falling, he seemed to have made the creature react, what would happen if he stood up?

The monster looked at him for a few seconds before raising its hand above his body stuck between the two table pieces. It's only at the last second that Hiroshi realized what it was about to do. Its hand falling toward him reactivated completely both his entire body and his vocal chords. He pushed himself on the wall with a loud scream. He shot straight up, not even raising his arm to protect his face from the few pieces of wood flying around. He darted to the opening and turned to the door. He could hear heavy steps behind him.

The creature was following him.

-Kazuya-

"Do you mind hurrying up?" said Ryota. "You see he's not here…"

"Maybe he's hiding around here…" replied Kazuya.

"He wouldn't have stayed hidden if he heard you."

"Well, he probably saw the monster after us. Maybe he saw something we didn't."

"Like…?" asked the teen.

"Hallucinations maybe."

Ryota only rolled his eyes and crossed his arms.

"I highly doubt he'd hang out in this shit room. Let's just go."

Kazuya had a feeling as he peeked behind the plants. Why did he feel like Hiroshi had been there not so long ago? He turned away and joined Ryota at the door.

"I wonder where Takeshi went…" wondered the teen out loud. "I did see him run up the stairs."

"He probably moved downstairs while we were searching."

"Maybe… though he's not the type to move around."

"Maybe the demon found him, so he went somewhere else."

"Find Takeshi? Nah, that guy is the master of hiding. I could spend half-an-hour looking for him when we were little," he snickered.

"Half-an-hour? And you could last that long looking for him?"

"I was a patient kid… or maybe my pride took over my patience."

They took a few steps away from the room and got down the stairs to their left. They had searched through the entire upper building (well, the rooms they could search in anyway), and there was no trace of Hiroshi or Ryota's gang.

"Maybe he's looking in the bathrooms," suggested Kazuya when they reached the main hall.

Ryota didn't say anything and walked toward the doors to their right. They had already checked the second bathroom, and they had been hiding in the first one, but they could always take a quick peek before searching the other side and the back part of the mansion. There was no place to hide anyway in there, so it would take less than a minute for both of the rooms.

"Was the bath full when we left?" asked Kazuya once they were in the bathroom they used to hide in.

Ryota walked closer to the bath. It was indeed filled with a thick-looking murky liquid. It had splashed a bit on the wall and the floor, making the surroundings even dirtier. He didn't know why, but he felt uneasy in front of that bath.

"I don't know, who cares? It's just a bath," he answered, trying to hide his sickness.

Kazuya noticed his voice was lightly quivering, but he blamed it on the cold (He had a vest while Ryota had only his shirt). The teen turned around to get out of the room.

"Let's check the other side," he said.

Kazuya nodded and followed him through the main hall. That's when he noticed his school bag.

"Should I take it?" he asked.

"Is there any food in it?"

"No," replied the child with a confused frown, "I ate home today."

"Then leave it there, I doubt this thing has any interest in your homework."

"But, what if—"

"Do you really want a weight to slow you down?"

"No…"

"Then leave it."

The boy didn't argue and silently followed the teen to the other side. The two first doors in the hallway were locked, but the third one at the end of the corridor didn't resist to Ryota's wrist.

Kazuya flinched and clung to Ryota's arm. At first, the boys though they were about to fall in a hole. When the child realized he jumped for nothing, he let go of the teen's arm and put them in his pockets, a bit ashamed of himself. The room wasn't dark; it was covered in soot and cold ashes. They could feel this black dust trying to get into their nose, leaving a strong and disgusting smell of burning wood. Hiroshi and the others were surely not there; they would have looked like shining statues in this. They were about to leave when Ryota noticed a shining doorknob. It was the only thing clean and not covered in soot. He opened the door (That was also unlocked) and stepped in the room, their feet leaving a few black marks behind them.

The other room was clean (well, compared to the other room; there was still that layer of mud), but it looked like someone went on a rampage inside. There were only two tables, a couch and an old disc player with the said old black disc, but he doubted they were at their original place. The couch was turned upside down and almost blocking the following door, the what-used-to-be a coffee table was broken in half, one part next to the wall on the right, the other near the center, but closer to the left. The second table was right next to the boys while the disk player was broken in several pieces in the upper right corner and its splited in four black disk was under Kazuya's foot. Again, there was nowhere to look, except the walls and floor.

When Ryota put his hand on the knob, they heard a faint sound of a door slamming.

"He's there!" exclaimed Kazuya.

The teen took a hold of his arm before he could leave.

"Do you realize how loud that was?" he said. "That's the demon, not your friend."

"That means he's in there too!"

"No, that means that demon is walking around. We should go as far as possible from this thing."

"But, what if—"

"I'm sure he's not in there. Come on, let's get away."

Kazuya hesitated, but changed his mind and followed Ryota. The room was filled with several bookshelves with tons of books placed in it, some on the floor, others fallen on their shelf. They took a few steps forward, until a voice caught their attention.

"Ryota!" exclaimed a voice in a half-mocking tone.

The said-teen turned toward the source.

"Takuro?"

The leader of Ryota's gang took a few steps closer to them.

"I see you brought a little friend with you," added the red-haired.

"Did you see the others?" asked the other teen, ignoring his leader's remark.

Takuro only shrugged.

"Meh, they're probably hidden somewhere, knowing Takeshi and Megumi.

"And you didn't, maybe… you know, look for them?"

"Nah, I didn't feel like it."

The leader approached Kazuya (who glanced at Ryota out of uneasiness) and lightly crouched.

"How's this thing doing?" he asked.

The child didn't understand what Takuro meant before he pushed his nose sideways. The boy backed away and put his hand around his nose with a moan.

"Hey! Knock it off!" exclaimed Ryota as he pushed away Takuro's hand trying to get to Kazuya's nose again.

"You're on his side now?" said the leader with a frown.

"I'm not taking sides. I'm just intelligent enough to know it's not the time for one of your bullying session."

"Come on, you can't say no to a bit of fun…"

"Fun? Because you count breaking someone's nose as fun?"

"I know you thought it was funny."

"I don't remember laughing."

"When did you start defending the little guys?"

"Since you fucking break noses."

The boy looked up at them. Was that hatred he could see in their eyes? A scream came to their ears. Kazuya immediately recognized the voice.

"Hiroshi!"

The child ran out of the room, soon followed by Ryota who didn't really want to stay in the room with the leader. They ran back in the room with soot and ashes, but blocked when they reached the other door. It was covered with those plants dug into the ground that Kazuya started to pull violently.

"Help me!" he said, looking at Ryota with pleading eyes.

The teen didn't want to get close to the demon, but he didn't want to be stuck in this room either. The plants looked pretty solid, so maybe by the time they would have made their way through, the monster would be gone. He grabbed a couple of branches, put his right foot on the wall, and started pulling.

I had a long trip in car, so I had all the time I wanted to write. The problem was to revise, though :P

(I feel like it would be weird to answer to your comment through PM because it's an old one Anon/Author, so I'll answer her for now, but next time's gonna be through PM)
I decided to put Takeshi behind the plants because I decided closets didn't exist in my story! I wanted to make the mansion dirty and abandonned, so I went aaallll the waaayy XD
What grew? Plants only the mansion itself can have... Though none of the guys are really familiar with plants and all, so they don't realize it. But to be more precise, vine-like, but it's majorly wood :P
Don't give me ideas you could regret giving me~ But I saw zombie Ryota and I think he looks sooo cooool!

Sorry, people, I have no idea when my next upgrade is going to be...
I also have a little poll on my profile if you want to answer :)

So, please leave a review and see you in the next chapter!