ghostgirl

B4

The hot, humid air clung to them and Reniku's back became slick with sweat. She panted and drank a gulp of water. She didn't know how long they would be there, so she had to drink as little as possible to save for later. "You alright?" Aster patted Reniku's shoulder as she marched on beside Azukae.

"Yeah," Reniku said. She did feel a little giddy and her breaths were hot. Aster looked energetic, but tired at the same time. "Jen, you look unwell."

"Better than you," Aster replied, glancing back at her. Reniku sighed with a smile.

Reniku wiped some sweat off her forehead, packing the bottle back into her bag. "I don't even feel sick, though."

They trudged through the dark shadows of the dense jungle. It was quiet, even crickets dared not to make any noise, as if something ominous prevented them from doing so. The occasional rustle in the trees above turned out to be tiny sparrows that minded their own businesses, flying off. Insects crawled all over tree trunks. Still, there was no sign of Dr Yanago, or the Chamber of Fear.

"Is it just me, or is everyone feeling a little feverish?" Azukae said, fanning herself with a smaller, laminated version of the World Map that Dr Yanago had.

"I think Dr Yanago mentioned something about radiation," Rouya said, "But I don't know if it's something that'll give us headaches."

"Yeah, I think it does," Azukae used an old, rusty blade to slash away at some bush sticking out in their path, "only if we're exposed to high radiation for a while, though. That means if we are exposed to dangerous levels of radiation, we're all kind of dead, seeing as we're all wearing some metallic object that didn't have the potential to kill us before exposure."

"Yeah," Rouya shrugged.

They walked for another hour or so, and the walk seemed to stretch on

"Reniku, d'you think it's safe to walk here?" She asked, and stopped in her tracks at a slip road that offered a particularly nice, big shade on one side, and their sunny, hot route they were currently on, with everyone else following, "I feel like if we continue on our current route, it's just going to be forever before we find anything. Anyway, if Yanago happened to come across this path, he'd rather enter this one."

"He would?" Rouya asked, and Azukae shrugged. "I remember that one time he..."

Reniku studied the long, straight stretch of the silent and shady forest road, with big clumps of mushrooms growing on either side of it. It was as if someone had cleared up a path and walked straight through. The colour of the trees were a darker shade, compared to the light brown of the oak trees in their main path. The ambience was just right for Reniku's comfort zone, a scene with little sunlight, yet bright enough for them. The place looked lonely, but other than that, it looked safe – from the outside, at least.

"...Oh," Rouya said, "I didn't go with y'all on that one. No wonder."

"I don't think it's a bad idea," Reniku mentioned, "like what Azukae Senpai said earlier, I think our current path is gonna turn out really draggy as well."

The new atmosphere made walking much more interesting. With the absence of birds and insects and devoid of any disruption other than the skidding of old, crusty leaves below, they were sheltered from the wrath of the sun. Somehow, the humidity seemed to be much lesser compared to their original lane, and made breathing easier.

"Wow, some of my feverish-ness disappeared," Azukae said, "I guess a part of it was caused by the sun."

The Captain studied the trees briefly as he followed them from behind. "If we use a knife to create a hole in and attach a small pipe to one of these trees, we could harvest plenty of water that may be within them."