Chapter 22. Puppy That Looks Like a Bear Cub

The lone rail had been rusting for many years in the dense deciduous forest. The old station has long since rotted away. In its place now grew bushes and ferns, and between them stood thick and tall tree trunks with large double leaves. It seemed that the train would never travel along this railway again.

But the day came when this place heard the train whistle again. Thickets of ferns, bushes and young trees parted and allowed a black and red train with one locomotive and one carriage to pass. But the train could not travel further. The rail ended.

The hatch cover on the metal locomotive opened. The head of a girl with long gray hair, from under which two straight metal horns protruded, peeked out from the hole. The lower part of her face was covered by a gray metal mask. It was not a person, but the spirit of metal.

The being looked around, after which it jumped out of the hatch and landed on a layer of yellow fallen leaves. The metal skirt, which covered thick thighs to the middle, swayed with a ringing sound. The metal corset, in which there was little room for large breasts, also began to move with a characteristic sound.

The only thing that did not ring was the bracelets on her arms and legs, which fit too tightly to the girl's limbs.

The being turned towards the train and with a movement of its hand made it go in the opposite direction.

When the train left and the metal clothes stopped ringing, the girl heard a noise behind the trees and went in that direction.

A blue background appeared behind the tree trunks. The noise intensified. Soon the forest ended, and a huge expanse of water opened up to the horizon. It was separated from the forest by a strip of sandy shore.

The source of the noise was soon discovered. It was made by sea waves that slowly hit the shore.

"This water makes a lot of noise," the being thought. "There is too much water. I can't cut it. Maybe I'll find a place where there's less water and cut it?"

The metal spirit went along the seashore. The landscape did not change: the sand, which on one side was bordered by a deciduous forest, on the other, was washed by the sea.

But the coast did not end. The spirit of metal approached the water, but felt that her foot had stumbled upon something soft. It was the head of a girl with blue hair down to the lower edges of her cheekbones. Her eyes were closed and her mouth was sewn shut with black thread.

"Is this head alive or already dead?" the horned girl thought. "Is it separate from the body or connected to it? I need to check."

The spirit of metal grabbed her head by the hair and pulled it up. The head was pulled out of the sand and found itself hanging freely in the hand of the horned girl.

"Put my head back," a voice was heard. "It's charging."

The spirit of metal noticed that someone was approaching her. She turned around and saw a girl come out of the forest with a short shovel in her hand.

"Is it charging?" the spirit of metal asked.

"Yes," the girl answered. "The head is charged from the sun."

The horned girl tilted her head to one side and then to the other.

"Is the head alive?" asked the spirit of metal.

"No," the girl answered. "It's made of plastic, but it looks like a real head."

"Can it fight?"

"Yes. This is a weapon. Why do you ask?"

"I'm wondering if this head is dangerous for me or not."

"Do not worry about it. This is my weapon. I could use it against you, but I won't."

"Are you evil?" the spirit of metal asked.

"I don't know," the girl answered.

A metal hand came out from the back of the metal spirit's head. The girl stuck a shovel into the sand, and the spirit of metal sank there up to her knees. But the force of attraction of metals turned out to be stronger. The shovel escaped from the girl's hands and moved into the metal hand.

The head, which was lying on the sand, moved into the girl's hand, and was now directed at the horned creature. The eyes and mouth began to emit a white-blue glow. A blue and white lightning shot out from her mouth, which then struck the metal spirit and caused her to convulse from the electric shock. Then the shovel returned to its owner, and the metal hand went back to the back of the horned creature's head.

"So you control metal," the girl guessed. "Who are you, girl?"

The lightning released the spirit of metal, after which she climbed out of the sand and looked at her opponent.

"I am Kyotyoryon, the spirit of metal," the horned girl introduced herself. "I'm alive and good. And you're dead and bad."

"In a way, you're right," the girl agreed. "I'm really not a living being. I am a battle doll. My name is Sitihi."

Short blades emerged from the bracelets on Kyotyoryon's arms. The spirit of metal ran to attack Sitihi and tried to pierce her with a blade, but the doll fell into the sand. Kyotyoryon noticed the disappearance of the enemy and stopped.

The sand under the feet of the spirit of metal began to rise and soon bound her feet. Kyotyoryon tried to free herself, but fell face down on her large breasts. The sand rose to her neck, wrapped around it and became hard.

Sitihi rose from the sand near the spirit of metal and put a shovel to her neck.

"I'm sorry I deceived you," the doll said. "I had to use head against you."

"She's not really evil?" a thought flashed through Kyotyoryon's brain.

***

Unana woke up and realized that she was in her room under the covers.

"Yueret," the girl thought. "Why did you send me out of your room? I wanted to sleep next to you, like when I was a child. Yueret, you're bad."

Little time has passed. Unana threw off the blanket and almost fell asleep. But the thought of her older brother, who did not allow her to sleep in the same bed with him, bothered the girl and did not allow her to fall asleep.

"It's time to go to the kitchen," Unana thought. "There will definitely be something edible there."

The girl slowly lowered one leg to the floor, hugged the pillow, and then let it go. After some time, the girl's second leg was on the floor, which means that the most difficult period of that day was over.

But a surprise awaited Unana in the kitchen. The refrigerator door was open, and its contents lay nearby. The girl came closer and noticed a dog-like tail behind the refrigerator.

Unana carefully walked around the refrigerator and saw between it and the wall the creature to which this tail belonged.

It turned out to be a girl with brown dog ears, wearing a short brown fur dress. She looked fearfully at Unana with large red-brown eyes.

A small black bow with a white-blue arrow immediately appeared in the archer's hands.

"Don't…" the girl with ears and a tail said in a moaning voice.

The appearance of the discovered creature was so pathetic that even Unana decided to put away her weapon.

"I... I didn't want to..." the animal girl continued to moan. "Don't …"

The bow and arrow disappeared from Unana's hands. The beast girl noticed this and tried to run away, but was caught by the tail by the archer's hand, after which she screamed in pain and stopped.

"How did you get here?" Unana asked.

"No way," answered the animal girl. "I... I... was... here."

"Yueret definitely brought her here and didn't tell me!" Unana was scared. "Yueret, you must answer for this."

Unana let go of the dog girl's tail, and then summoned a bow with a white-blue arrow. But the little animal girl no longer tried to escape. She rolled over onto her back and then crawled to the wall and pressed herself against it.

"What is your name?" Unana asked.

"Ki... ki..." the animal girl tried to answer. "Kim...chan..."

"Kimchan?"

"Yup."

"That was my dog's name."

"It's me…"

"Are you Kimchan?"

"Yup."

"Why do you look like that?"

"I cannot... constantly... be in the form of an animal... This is my original form."

Unana noticed the brown fur collar and bracelets on the animal girl's arms and legs, which indicated that it was a pet.

"I see," Unana thought. "It's good that Yueret didn't bring her. I wonder where he is."

***

Yueret and Halankuo sat on a rock near a small stormy river with rapids and looked at the low waterfall on it. There was a mixed forest around with old thick trees, under which only moss and few ferns grew.

"We were already here as children," Halankuo said. "The air here is so fresh. I wish I could be here forever."

"It won't be forever," Yueret answered. "Unana will come and see me with you. Then I'm finished. She is very jealous."

"She's worried about you."

"Yes. But she doesn't like other girls. I hope she doesn't know about this place. "

"Only you and I know about this place, like in childhood. Now it seems strange to me that I could forget you. Now the memories are coming back to me, and it's so strange to relearn everything."

"There is so much information in the world that there is not enough memory for everything. Maybe buy memory cards?"

"Are there really memory cards for storing the memories of living beings?"

"No unfortunately. But maybe someday they will appear. Then I'll buy it."

Halankuo laughed. Yueret looked at the girl and remembered his sister. He was too used to Unana, so when he saw any girl he immediately remembered her.

"She's so cute, like Unana," Yueret thought. "If she were my little sister, it would be good. I would have two cute little sisters, only one would be kinder."

But soon Yueret realized that with Unana this was even theoretically impossible. Then he rose to his feet and looked deeper into the forest.

"Are you that afraid of meeting your little sister?" Halankuo asked.

"Not that much," Yueret replied. "I just remembered something. I found a horned statue in an abandoned village not far from here. Do you remember when we were children we often walked through all sorts of ruins?"

Halankuo wrapped her hair around her finger and thought.

"I remember something like that," the girl answered. "But then we were children, and we were interested in everything new. I don't know how it will be perceived now."

"I'm interested to know what kind of statue this is," Yueret said. "Last time I didn't have time for this because I was looking for Unana."

"Okay. Let's go if your sister isn't there. I don't want to meet her."

The path to the abandoned village ran along the river. The terrain gradually rose, the river became thinner and faster, and the shore more rocky. Finally, the river turned into a stream, and the path turned in the opposite direction from the reservoir...

... Yueret and Halankuo found themselves on the only street of the village, of which little remained. Only the remains of wooden walls, here and there peeking out from behind the trees, indicated that someone had once lived here.

"We have arrived," Yueret said. "All that remains is to find the house where the statue was."

Yueret began looking for an abandoned house among the thickets of trees, bushes and ferns, and quickly became convinced that it was not easy. Halankuo followed her friend, and soon they found themselves at the other end of the village.

"I guess it just seemed to me," Yueret said. "Sorry".

"This place is located between our villages," Halankuo looked at the branch with wide double leaves. "I was here, but I don't remember this place. Too much time has passed. Maybe you really saw the statue, but it was a long time ago?"

"It was a few days ago. Somewhere here there was a house, and in it laid a statue with horns. I remember this."

Yueret noticed a fallen tree, behind which stood some kind of wooden structure. The guy came closer and realized that this was a house. Halankuo walked up to Yueret and noticed it too. A wrench appeared in the girl's hand. Halankuo pointed it at the fallen tree and moved it to the side.

A view opened up to an old wooden house with windows without glass. The door lay on the remains of the porch and served as a bridge. Therefore, Yueret and Halankuo easily entered the corridor, and from there into the room.

An open stone coffin was located in the middle of the room, on a stone pedestal. In it laid a gray stone statue of a girl with two horns on her head. There were several cracks on her face, one of which reached her neck.

"I saw a similar statue in a train carriage," Halankuo said confidently. "This is not a human."

"What is it?" Yueret asked.

"Such a coffin was the vessel for the character in "Mausoleum of Nature," Halankuo thought. "There were several types of vessels. For Kyotyoryon I chose a metal coffin. This statue may be a creature transferred from the "Mausoleum of Nature". But I can't tell Yueret about this. He shouldn't know about the "Mausoleum of Nature". If Itinit finds out that I told someone other than Tuot, he will close me in such a coffin and leave me like that forever."

A short sword appeared in Yueret's hand. Halankuo's heart rate increased.

"Don't do anything to this statue," Halankuo said.

"Do you think she'll come to life?" Yueret smiled.

"No. But doesn't it seem strange to you that the statue lies in a stone coffin in a wooden house in an abandoned village?"

"It seems. So I decided to show it to you. I need to take a photo."

Yueret ran his finger through the air. A blue translucent virtual screen with several icons appeared in front of him. Yueret pressed the camera icon. Another window opened above the screen, with an empty black frame, inside of which there was an image of the room ahead, and several round buttons at the bottom of different colors.

Yueret pressed the red button. The frame turned red for a moment and then returned to its previous black color. Yueret then repeated this action before closing the screen windows.

"Now we can go back," Yueret said.

Just as Yueret finished his sentence, a loud crack was heard. The longest crack on the statue's face quickly lengthened and reached its chest. The remaining cracks on the face widened, and then several pieces broke off. White light began to emit from the "wounds" that formed.

Yueret grabbed Halankuo's hand and tried to drag her towards the exit of the house, but was stopped by the girl's wrench.

"Wait," Halankuo said. "I'm interested to see what it is."

"I don't want anyone to save me again," Yueret thought. "If Halankuo saves me, I will be ashamed, because she is not my sister."

The statue slowly rose above the coffin. The stone crust that covered it crumbled into pieces. Halankuo deflected one of these pieces with a wrench, and the second with her gaze. But there were too many pieces. Luckily, Yueret summoned a blue energy barrier around himself and his friend. The pieces hit its walls and fell to the floor.

The statue turned into a white glowing silhouette of a man with two horns on his head. Soon the body of a girl in a translucent black helmet, from which two black horns protruded, with long brown hair, and a short black fur dress without sleeves, "hung" above the coffin. On her feet are fur boots in the shape of hooves.

Yueret ran out of the house. Halankuo caught up with him on the path in the middle part of the village.

"Where are you going?" Halankuo asked.

"I have to catch up with her," Yueret didn't even turn around. "She was the one who killed my parents."

Yueret ran out of the village and disappeared into the forest.

The horned girl climbed out of a large stone on the top of a mountain covered with a coniferous forest, and noticed below, in a meadow near the river, a man in black clothes and a helmet, with a short sword in his hand.

 "He's stalking me," the girl thought. "I sent him a signal to leave me behind, but he misunderstood it. I'll have to move underground again. I hope this skill has already recharged."

The girl went underground and emerged a few moments later on the top of the opposite mountain. Then she looked around and realized where she was.

"I forgot that I can't move long distances underground," the girl thought. "If this continues, this man will catch up with me. And I'm still too weak to fight him."

Yueret approached the mountainside and stopped.

"I have to go home," the guy thought. "Unana is waiting for me. I can't leave her in danger. This is more important now. If someone comes to Unana and does something to her, I will not forgive myself."

The horned girl came out of the forest into the meadow. Yueret noticed her and activated a blue energy aura.

"She's already close," Yueret thought. "A little more and I'll be able to catch up with her. Unana, wait for me. I will come to you with the head of this creature, and you will pat me on the head like an older brother."

A translucent energy copy of the aura separated from Yueret and flew towards the enemy. The horned girl did not notice this and was knocked down. Then the copy of aura swung her sword and tried to hit the enemy, but the girl went underground.

"Hey!" Yueret shouted. "Why are you hiding?"

Halankuo came running into the meadow with a wrench in her hand. The girl was breathing heavily.

"Yueret... Go away... From here," Halankuo said. "It's... She didn't kill your parents."

Yueret looked at Halankuo and noticed her eyes. The girl's pupils emitted a purple glow. The guy felt a slight pain in his head, and remembered how, when he first met the doll, he also had a headache.

"Your eyes glow like a doll," Yueret said. "Even the face is similar."

Halankuo sat down on the ground. The girl's breathing gradually returned to normal.

"What?" Halankuo could not understand. "Which doll?"

Yueret approached his friend. The aura around him disappeared.

"I saw one battle doll with eyes like that," Yueret said. "She can move objects with her gaze. Perhaps you can do this too?"

Halankuo's pupils became normal.

"No, I can't," the girl lied. "It seemed to you. Today is a difficult day. Go home before your little sister finds you. She may forgive you, but if she sees me with you, she will try to kill me."

"Exactly," Yueret agreed. "Unana is like that. I'll have to go home. Nothing is more important than a little sister."