Chapter 6 The Mysterious Mine 3 (1/2)

As John ventured deeper in mine all he was hearing was the noise of his own footsteps and the shallow sound of his breathing.

It had been already 30 minutes since he entered the mine, and he had yet to find a single creature.

He walked very slowly while carefully looking everywhere. There was no light source but his flashlight.

Now and then he would find some mineral ores that were left behind by the miners and he would impolitely take them for himself. Coal, iron, silver, gold, and occasionally some gems, that was what he was able to find.

”Hm?” John saw that in front of him the path divide in two. The footsteps show that they went to the right tunnel, the left tunnel was shrouded in darkness.

John pointed the flashlight at the left tunnel and saw that there was a building right at the end.

He decided to check out the wood building on the left side first.

As he approached the wood building he was able to see more clearly the infrastructure. It looked like a countryside wood shack, not big and neither small.

He stopped by the door and placed his ear in the wood frame to try to listen if there was something or someone inside.

Nothing. There was no audible sound coming from inside. John carefully opened the door and peeked through the small opening.

Using the flashlight he was able to see what it looked like inside.

There was no furniture inside, just a lot of metal boxes.

He used the flashlight to illuminate the ceiling. The was some creatures dangling in the ceiling. They looked like bats, but they were at least twice bigger and they, strangely enough, had some big tongues coming out from their mouths.

Batongs. The name of this creatures. They often reside in caves from all types of planets. Their existence was recorded inside the Universal Bestiary Codex. This Codex was created by the Terrene Protectorate joining hands with all the races and Explorers. The Codex record all the creatures that were found from across all the possible planets in the universe. One of the few joint research made by all the races.

Batongs don't have eyes, they use their big and developed tongues to taste the particles in the air and this allows them to sense what is ahead of them. They are twice as big as Earth's bats and their entire body is completely colored black, while their tongues in crimson red. They are carnivorous and they often practice cannibalism in time of food shortage. What is threatening is the fact that in their tongues there are small spikes that contain a powerful paralyzer poison capable of causing the heart to stop beating in mere seconds.

John silently opened the door with one hand and he used his other one to store the pistol and retrieve the Razor Feathers, a name that John came up for those feathers he took from the colorful bird, with the same hand. On his way toward the mine, he had killed some more of those birds and he accumulated almost 300 of Razor Feathers.

With the flashlight in one hand and Razor Feathers in the other, he finished opening the door.

With a fast motion, he threw 3 Razor Feathers into the flock of Batongs. He turned around and hastily withdrew from the door. He kept his distance and waited, soon enough he heard some shrieks coming from inside the shack.

In no time flocks of Batongs started to leave the shack from the narrow door, searching for the insolent who dared to kill some of their own.

John sinisterly smiled and started throwing a bunch of Razor Feathers into the door. He didn't need to actually aim since the door was narrow he just needs to throw forward and there would be almost 100% sure to hit one of the Batongs.

In a few seconds, he threw more than 100 Razor Feathers, and he saw that no more Batongs were leaving the shack. He started to approach when suddenly a Batong dashed out of the door toward John.