Fabre in Sacheon’s Tang

It had definitely made eye contact with me. Yet aside from lifting its head at first, the creature remained frozen in place, as if paralyzed.

The unsettling sensation in my head refused to fade, but for now, I decided to quietly retreat.

Since it had yet to react, the best outcome would be if I could slip away without provoking it.

‘Maybe… maybe it didn’t see me? That’d be for the best, but…’

I pressed my fingers firmly against the vocal sac beneath Hwayang’s chin, preventing it from making any sound.

The moment I did, Hwayang tried to chirp again, only for its cheek pouches to deflate with a pitiful hiss.

I immediately pulled the squirming creature close against my chest, suppressing its movements with both arms.

Despite being a mystical beast, it had short legs, making it difficult to exert much strength while restrained—a small mercy in a situation like this.

For once, its insignificant little body was proving useful.

-pp!

‘Stay still, you little thing! This is serious!’

『Food. Food. Food. Food. Food. Food.』

‘Ugh, if this were my past life, I’d be feeding you black food rations right now!’

Just as I was stepping back, holding onto the tiny creature that was spamming "Food" over and over in my mental chat window, a chilling noise came from the creature’s tail.

-Scrape. Scrape.

‘Yeah, of course. There was no way it’d just stay still at a time like this…’

That sound—one that could make any man’s knees buckle.

A sharp, grating noise like the edge of a well-honed blade scraping against another. The kind of sound one would hear from a pair of sharp scissors. The eerie noise echoed off the cave walls, spreading an unsettling chill.

I had hoped for luck, but the sound in my ears told me that hope was meaningless.

For just a moment, I froze in place, cursing my bad luck—right before the creature lunged at me, its pincers slashing toward my head.

-Shing! Scrape!

“Hiiik!”

I threw myself to the ground just in time, the giant scissor-like pincers sweeping over my head.

The sharp ends of my tied-up hair were sliced clean off, and the blades, narrowly missing me, instead struck the stone pillar I had been hiding behind—splitting it clean in half.

-Crack! Rumble!

A natural monument that had stood for hundreds, if not thousands of years, crumbled in an instant.

As the stone pillar broke apart, I dodged to the side, barely avoiding the falling debris from the cave’s ceiling.

“Haaaah!”

“So-ryong!”

“Ryong!”

I had been so focused on running while clutching Hwayang that I hadn’t even looked back. But before I could react, Tang Hwa-eun and Seol rushed in and caught me.

Their familiar voices, filled with relief, echoed in my ears.

“Are you okay?”

“Are you alright, So-ryong?”

Hwayang, in its reckless idiocy, had ended up drawing the attention of a creature in its most violent and aggressive phase.

Thanks to that, I had a sinking feeling we would have to run for a long time.

• Heaven and Earth, Black and Yellow
• Sun, Moon, Stars, and Thunder 
• Clouds, Rain, Snow, and Hail
• Gold, Silver, Water, and Fire
• Red, Blue, White, and Black
• Flowers, Trees, Grass, and Fruits