“Fujimoto! Get back here!” Shinji said loud but he didn’t yell again because he didn’t want to put them in more danger.
He heard a meow coming from there. Not long later, the surface of passage had started turning fleshy.
Manhunter cat. He got confirmed when the passage began to shut and cat’s mouth got visible.
Terrified, Shinji poked cat’s moth roof from his sword. Little did Shinji know he was standing on cat’s tongue. As it moved its tongue, Shinji fell on its lower set of razor sharp teeth. And the mouth was shrinking.
His sword remained attached to its mouth like it was a piece of fish bone.
Shinji somehow leaped out from its mouth.
“Don’t let it close his jaws!” Shinji heard Housekeeper’s voice from inside.
With nothing to help him around, he grasped a door and heaved it out of the frame. It cost timing and strength from Shinji to place the door plant inside closing mouth of the cat.
Somehow jammed the door inside.
The cat struggled to shut its mouth so Shinji hoped both of them would come back if they hadn’t reached to the cat’s stomach.
When Shinji went back in to retrieve his sword, he saw Fujimoto and Housekeeper covered in slime running towards the opening. They jumped out from there when the door began to crack.
But Shinji’s sword was stuck.
“Let the sword go!” Fujimoto clutched Shinji’s shoulder.
Shinji didn’t listen to him and ran inside, jumping over its teeth. The mouth snapped shut from the effort by man-hunter cat a second after Shinji had made his way in.
Shinji’s sword had come out from the cat’s forehead like a horn. Fujimoto saw the sword move sideways. Then Shinji came out by tearing his way out through skull and brain.
The dead cat got to its normal size as it took its final breath. Even its brains and torn bits resized.
“This is what it was preparing for.” Housekeeper gasped, looking at Shinji, “Even I couldn’t detect it this time.”
“What about him?” Fujimoto said in Housekeeper’s ear.
Shinji heard it as well and turned around to see what Fujimoto was talking about.
A monster having similar shape to a human was walking out of the broken door towards their direction. As it took a step, it changed its shape to a bird – this time too being as tall as a human. Its skin colour was changing every second.
At some point it even became transparent.
But there was something common in every shape he was taking. Its eyes were close all the time.
“He is sleeping.” Shinji muttered.
“And dreaming.” Housekeeper said, “This is Son Monster, a sleepwalker. He turns to anything he is dreaming about.”
Shinji watched it turn into a mirror. In the mirror he saw Housekeeper’s face.
“We should be moving.” Housekeeper walked in front of the dream reflection.
Shinji nod and began to step further. But the monster followed.
“Are you sure he is in deep sleep?” Fujimoto was unsure.
“Yes he is.” Housekeeper killed his skepticism, “Don’t make any sound. He will go away.”
