We all needed a few seconds to process what Corwyn had just said. None of us has ever of a different entrance to the Library, let alone one that would exist in a different world. Could something like that even be possible? Yes, of course it was possible. I brushed away my doubts about it almost immediately. There were still far too many things nobody knew about the library.
"So, what now? Are we going to look for that exit?" I asked, having considered the option for a moment.
"Absolutely not!" Rogier quickly denied my suggestion. "We have no idea where the exit would be. Besides, if we actually went there and got to a completely different world, what would we do then? We need to get home, not to an even weirder place!"
His words made sense. As far as we knew, this new world may have been even more dangerous than the corridors of the library.
"Wait," Amy squeaked. "Does that mean... there can be other Delvers here? From that other place?"
If the previous revelation didn't scare us enough, this idea certainly caused our concerns to skyrocket.
"How would we even recognize them from the Guardians?" The more sentences Amy said, the more uneasy we all felt.
"I know what they look like. I think... I should be able to tell if it's the creatures I saw," Corwyn quickly provided an answer.
"I think a telling sign will also be some equipment. Guardians are either mechanical or organic in nature but none have ever been documented to use external tools. So if we see someone with gear like ours, they will most likely be fellow delvers. Nevertheless, we have no idea if they wouldn't think of us as Guardians, so we shouldn't really be trying to–"
"GUARDIAN!" Corwyn yelled, interrupting Rogier's line of thoughts.
If we were freaked out before by the idea of sharing the library with potentially a whole new species, the sight of an incoming monster certainly did not bring ease to our hearts.
We all turned to the corridor from where we came. Truly, Corwyn was right. Long and slender hands came clawing out of the corridor in three pairs. The scales that covered them seemed to be gently flapping, creating an image of waves travelling up the Guardian's appendages. An elongated body quickly pulled itself into the room. It was a serpent. That was the only comparison I could offer. A serpent whose four, yellow eyes were darting across the room until they eventually stopped at us. The pupils narrowed. It opened its mouth and growled. Surprisingly, it seemed to completely lack any sign of teeth. Its maw was wide enough to swallow three of us in one go, yet smooth and seemingly harmless, at least at first glance. The Guardian proceeded to lift up most of its body, revealing a bubble-like shape of its long belly, which displayed a moving texture of a flowing golden nebula. The entire creature towered over us. Its length, and now also, therefore, its height, was unlike anything I'd expect from a Guardian.
"RUN!" Rogier yelled at us. "WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU WAITING FOR?!" He was the first of us to turn around and snap out of the shocking sight. The moment he bolted it out of there, however, the creature sprung forth as well. The scales of the Guardian began lifting a lot more now, changing their colours as they went up. The ripples that travelled along their body now looked like bright yellow waves, flowing down across a dark-blue sea. We all tried to move but something was wrong. I felt my eyes following the distracting shades of yellow, automatically sliding away from the serpent's head and towards a small glowing orb on the very tip of its tail. If it wasn't for Corwyn, who quickly turned my head away, I would most likely keep staring at it until my demise. We followed Rogier as soon as possible, but my legs felt like I was walking across the floor of an enormous bouncy castle. Judging by how both Amy and Corwyn swayed as we escaped, I realized that I wasn't the only one suffering from the same slight confusion. We all heard the creature slithering after us. Its long claws were scratching against the metal floor, making horrific sounds. I clenched all the muscles I could and squinted my eyes, preparing for the incoming blow.
Something behind me suddenly popped and I could hear the creature hissing. My curiosity simply did not let me be and forced me to turn around to see what was happening. Corwyn had seemingly scooped up as many of the cube books as he could from the "bookshelf" beside him and was now tossing them at the serpent. Each time the box hit the ground, it popped open, releasing a wave of an invisible force that pushed the Guardian back ever so slightly. I remembered how Corwyn also got tossed back, and quite the distance too, when he opened the container.
"Smart," I complimented his idea.
"Shut up and run!" He yelled back at me, while still tossing the boxes, panic having taken away his ability to properly aim.
"Move it you two!" I heard Rogier yell at us. There was no time to waste. Corwyn tossed a few more at the Guardian to further stun it and then joined me in my frantic sprint towards the end of the corridor. For some reason, my step seemed to be a lot more stable now. Not a sign of the previous clumsiness remained.
With my mind a bit clearer than before, I remember something important from the floors high above.
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"Valmiria!" I shouted over my shoulder.
"What?!" Corwyn yelled back.
"Nothing, nothing. I just tried something. Doesn't work!" I replied when it seemed like the Guardian didn't even flinch upon hearing it.
It didn't take long before I heard the creature crawling after us once again. Soon, the metal scraping of its claws got replaced with the sound of creaking wood, which let us know that it had left the open space of the Glassroom and was now crawling through the rather narrow hallway.
"FUCK!" Rogier swore as we ran around the corner. The corridor almost immediately opened up into a truly enormous area. "Don't stop running!" He instructed us and continued forward.
The hallway got quickly replaced by a long, wooden bridge. As we ran across, I couldn't help but let my eyes wander ever so slightly. The entire area was the biggest we had seen so far. Even the Glassroom with the lake and a big floating head now seemed like a tiny dwarf when compared to this. We saw countless wooden boxes floating around us, some connected to each other, others joined by simple bridges, while a few simply remained isolated from the rest. Up ahead of us was a wall. I tried looking up to see how high it went, but its height quickly made me sick, forcing my gaze back to the path ahead. To the left and right, the place seemed to just continue into eternity, or at least far enough for my eyes to be unable to see its end. Briefly, I looked over my shoulder. Sure enough, the Guardian was still following us, emerging from the entrance to the corridor, which seemed to sit inside a parallel wall of most likely the same height. It was like crossing a bottomless canyon, where the only source of dim light was a few glowing "windows" sitting on both of the walls.
I tried my best to stick next to Amy. Out of the four of us, she was the slowest runner, which wasn't that surprising given the luggage she was carrying around. For a moment, I considered telling her to simply ditch the backpack, but then I remembered it contained pretty much all our supplies of food and water.
The sounds of the Guardian were getting closer and closer.
"Amy! Can you run faster?" I shouted.
"I'm trying!" she yelled back, visibly exhausted.
"Corwyn! We need to stun it again!" I said, looking at the few leftover boxes he was holding in his arms.
"I'll try! We just need to make it across!" he shouted back at me and pointed to the end of the bridge up ahead. At first glance, it seemingly led to nowhere, ending only on the roof of one of the floating wooden boxes. "I'll try to make it fall!"
I grabbed Amy's hand and ran as fast as I could, pulling her along. Although we weren't that much faster, I liked the idea that I was at least doing something to help, rather than being just an extra weight on our team. By the time we finally made it across, I could swear I felt the Guardian's maw grazing my back.
Corwyn did as he promised. The moment we made it to the floating box, he was already standing there with the cubes prepared. When it finally looked safe for Amy and me, he tossed two of them right underneath the approaching Guardian.
The wave created by the boxes was suspected, but we didn't think it would hit us as well. We were slow. Too slow. It hit all of us, the serpent included. I did my best to hold on to Amy, and her heavy backpack ended up slowing us down, like an anchor. Although we got tossed to the ground, we didn't fly too far away.
The Guardian took the worst of the blow, stumbling over the edge of the bridge and falling down. It was a success. We managed to beat it. At least so I thought before my eyes slid over to Corwyn. He also got tossed back but flew too close to the edge of the wooden rectangle we were now lying on. I saw as the stumbling Guardian wrapped its tail around his waist.
Something inside me pushed my body to act. I sprung up to my feet and ran to him as fast as I could. The ground under me felt wobbly once again. This time, I was almost sure it was because I was looking at the lights of the Guardian's scales, however, that did not change my intention in the slightest. I had to save him. I wasn't willing to lose anyone else. I had to do something. Anything. Anything to be at least remotely useful. My hand reached out just as Corwyn began sliding away, pulled by the falling Guardian. Seeing that I couldn't grab him in time, I decided to jump, trying to quickly cross the small gap that remained between us.
"IDIOT!" Rogier yelled at me but I didn't listen. There wasn't even any way for me to listen to him. I was already leaping. The only thing that would stop me now was gravity.
I fell to the floor right at the edge of the wooden box. I saw the terror in Corwyn's eyes as the creature pulled him down. In one last feeble attempt, I extended my hand over the rim, hoping that I would still somehow manage to catch him.
Our hands touched and my fingers gripped his forearm with all the strength I could muster. I wondered why he wasn't doing the same. The answer was so simple, yet in the heat of the moment, I didn't realize it. How could I ever hope to pull him away from the Guardian? Instead, I was the one being hauled behind him, sliding over the edge of the floor. I felt someone grab me by my legs, pulling me up and shouting at me.
My arm let go of Corwyn, though not of my own will. It moved away in a single, sharp movement. The adrenaline in my body made everything drag out. I found it strange that it was acting without any such impulse from my brain. And it bent to the right? My brain had a hard time catching up. It took me a few moments before I realized that my elbow had moved far beyond its maximum range of motion. The pain, however, hit only when the rest of my hand decided to part ways as if there were two more joints between the wrist and the rebellious elbow. Long, shallow cuts opened on my skin, progressively getting deeper and deeper, soon colouring my arm red. I felt the hands that grabbed me pulling me up. A similar shade of red filled parts of my eyes as the curse of the library's depths took hold.
"You moron! I said we can't go down! We're far too deep! Your body's not used to it! You can't just jump over the edge!" Rogier began scolding me, but the pain I felt completely drowned out his voice. I wasn't even paying attention to him. He was right though. I reached down with my arm and slid too deep. Why did I do that? What was I thinking? Nothing. I wasn't thinking anything. The idea of losing someone blinded me. So much so that I didn't even realize that I saw the Guardian and Corwyn fall onto another giant box just below ours. However, at that moment, I had my own worries. I lay there, curled up on the ground, clutching my arm and screaming. Amy was next to me, saying something, but I couldn't hear a word. Everything around me began to fade. For a moment, I felt like I was on an elevator, descending deeper and deeper into the darkest depths of the library, until eventually, it got all too dark to see.