'The Seamstress isn't there… am I safe?' Liro was currently heading down the ladder in the most silent way possible. 'I hope I didn't make any sound… still, it doesn't seem she has heard me.' With that, Liro arrived on the floor, and as he glanced around, he couldn't help but feel small.
Every wall around him was yellow and the rooms were huge. As Liro took some steps, he felt his heart beating fast. As he remained still, he noticed that in the room where he had just arrived, there were multiple paths that he could take.
'I wonder where they'll bring me…' Liro took the first path on his left and started to walk with his eyes wide open. 'Tyel told me that I might find some of the plushies we fought on the ground… I hope they aren't alive.'
Liro turned a corner and arrived in another part of the sanctuary that seemed really huge. 'I wonder if the two minutes will be enough for me to search around…' Liro shook his head, and instead of a surprised look, a serious one appeared over his face. 'I can't afford to lose any time. I need to warn the others if something bad happens.'
Liro glanced around the room he had just arrived in, and realizing that it was totally empty, he returned to the same room where the stairs were and took another route. 'It feels like there aren't any cameras nearby… at least not around the stairs.' Liro noticed that in this huge room he had just arrived in, there wasn't any camera.
'And now that I think about it, Tyel hasn't even told us that he saw any cameras… I wonder if there are actually cameras here,' thought Liro as he kept walking around, still counting the two minutes.
"Why hasn't he arrived yet…" said Darian as he slowly smashed his fist on the ground while his body sweated hard, scared that it might have ended badly for Liro.
"Calm down, Darian, the two minutes have just passed. Liro will be here soon," said Orechin with a reassuring tone. Darian, still fused with Snowy, looked at the trapdoor in anxiety.
After some seconds, the hatch opened again and Liro, no longer invisible, came out. "C'mon everyone, I haven't seen the Seamstress around. We're free to go," said he. The others all looked reassured to see Liro back, like Darian, Lily, Syrmax, and Tyel, and unlike them, Orechin and Vane were both excited to head inside the sanctuary.
"So? What did you see down there?" asked Vane while he was the first one to head down the ladder, while Liro, underneath him, reached the floor once again.
"Literally nothing. It was empty most of the time," said Liro as he waited near the stairs for everyone to come down. As everyone headed down the stairs, their faces became filled with surprise, as they had never seen anything like this.
'And here I come to this place… once again…' thought Tyel. The moment he stepped on the floor, the thoughts of when he had returned here popped up again in his mind. These thoughts were just interrupted a few seconds later by Liro's voice.
"Tyel, you said you didn't see any cameras in your future, right? I haven't spotted any in this short walk," asked Liro the moment he noticed Tyel putting his feet on the yellow floor.
Tyel snapped once again back to reality and shook his head. "No, but I don't think Zrelekai has placed any cameras here. He's someone who places them almost everywhere."
"Then it is probably because the Seamstress is the one defending this place…" murmured Lily as she looked at one of the multiple paths and gulped, wondering if the Seamstress would arrive to greet them.
"It's safe. I've looked around and there are no traces of her," said Liro as he heard Lily's worried tone.
"Still, I don't think there are other places she might be. She's definitely around… we just don't know where…" answered Tyel.
"Well, still, based on our plan… I'm going to remain here… yawnnn, it will be a bit boring," said Lily as she sat down near the ladder, followed by Syrmax.
"Remember that you've got the most important role. Once we return, and if we're being followed by the Seamstress, with your power you have to close the path and push us up," said Orechin. The group had to divide into two small teams.
The first team would be made of Lily and Syrmax. Both of them would remain near the ladder and wait for the group to arrive. Because it was late and the light wasn't enough for Syrmax to get loaded up, he would be useless, so they decided to leave him charging as much power as he could thanks to the artificial light and attack the Seamstress in case she got close.
Meanwhile, Lily had to remain near the ladder so that if the group was running away and they passed through one of the paths, Lily would close the path thanks to her power. The moment everyone was close enough, she had to create roots on the floor that raised directly to the top of the room so that everyone could escape without any problem, except for Vane, who would be the one to turn into an eagle and open the hatch for everyone else.
Meanwhile, Tyel, Darian, Liro, Orechin, and Vane would go around the Seamstress's Sanctuary searching for some clues about the Seamstress and how to save Catripple.
"Be safe, everyone. We'll wait for you here," said Syrmax as he waved at the group going away, taking one of the paths.
"I wonder how far this sanctuary actually goes… Tyel, do you have any idea?" asked Orechin, amazed by the sight of this huge room.
"I don't know either. From what I saw in the future, I think I explored only a portion, and for our time we're going to…" Tyel was about to make a prediction of his future to make his fake power believable, but he felt a bump against his back.
"We don't care. We're going to lose the thrill of exploration if you tell us what happened. We came here because we wanted to explore and see it with our own eyes," said Vane as he took some steps forward and took the lead together with Orechin.
"We agreed with that. We know that in the future you see, you can't see what we think or have discovered. Letting the natural flow of things happen is the better choice," said Orechin as he spoke with a reassuring tone.
"Yeah… still, it's good to know if someone dies. Are you seeing something, Tyel?" asked Darian. Tyel, while walking, closed his eyes for a moment and spoke soon after.
"The future hasn't changed yet; we're still all safe," said Tyel. As the group turned a new corner, the walls around them started to change.
Instead of being yellow, the walls soon became completely pink, and all around there were multiple black plushies like the ones the group had fought some weeks ago.
"Then there really was pink, just like you said, Tyel…" pointed out Darian, amazed by this sudden change.
"You said you've seen her where the walls suddenly turned pink, right? We need to pay attention to what's about to come," warned Liro the moment Tyel nodded his head, realizing that if there was a place where the Seamstress might be, it was definitely around here.
"Yeah, and we don't know when she might arrive. We should be more careful around here," said Tyel as he lowered the tone of his voice. Even if before they were all extremely cautious, now the group turned even more silent, and they all walked slowly, scared that they might make a loud sound.
"Do you think she will be able to see us through the plushies?" asked Vane as he noticed multiple plushies around, wondering if these plushies were actually the cameras instead.
"I'm not sure… in the future I've seen, I happened to pass in front of a plushie but she didn't spot me at that moment. I think that we're safe to go for now," answered Tyel, his voice barely a whisper.
"Still… do you remember how I told you that on the other side there was just a dead end?" asked Liro. Everyone else stopped and nodded their heads.
"Do you think that they might have placed the Seamstress here because she has to protect something?" pointed out Liro. The others all turned silent to think.
'Maybe the entrance to the secret laboratories…?' thought Tyel. "Maybe she's protecting the door that leads directly into the secret laboratories? This is the only thing that comes to my mind," answered Tyel.
"Hey, Darian, do you have something in mind? Like something that was present during your time and Zrelekai wants to protect it at all cost?" asked Vane. Darian remained silent for a few seconds before shaking his head.
"Nothing comes to mind. I've never been around here, as the desert actually turned into a desert land because of a war fought multiple years before I was born. But I don't think Zrelekai could have found something related to that; it would have been destroyed as time passed, and no one built their base in the desert anyway… it's probably the door Tyel is referring to," answered Darian.
"Some day you'll have to tell us about this war too, Darian. You've never mentioned it before," said Orechin as he returned to walking in the front, followed by the others.
"I promise I'll do it some other da—" Darian was speaking, distracted by the fact that the group had stopped. "Shhh, there's something there…" pointed out Orechin as he stopped everyone, having spotted something strange around the corner they were about to turn.
"What's there?" whispered Darian, as he was the only one who couldn't see. As he tilted his head, what he saw made his heart beat extremely fast. In front of them, there were some plushies jumping around together. They were two bunny plushies, totally black, and they hadn't spotted the group yet.
The room the bunnies were jumping in had a beautiful pink carpet on the ground and some small tables with other plushies that weren't moving, just remaining still and looking at the other plushies jumping without an actual reason.
"Strange… why the hell are they doing that?" asked Liro as he stepped away from the corner and gestured to his group to take another route. Everyone else, seeing his gesture, nodded their heads and began to follow Liro.
"I don't know… Tyel, what do you think?" asked Orechin as he walked forward, positioning himself near Liro. "Remember that I have to be the one in the front, with my blue crystal, I'll be ready to warn you if someone arrives," said Orechin. In his clothes, he had hidden a small blue crystal. Even if it didn't slow down reality much for the people around, it was enough for Tyel to realize if someone appeared nearby and warn the group to go away.
"I don't know… like, it really doesn't make any sense. I've seen her playing with the plushies, not the plushies playing with each other." As the group kept talking, they arrived in a room that actually had multiple pieces of furniture inside.
"What's there?" asked Orechin, surprised that no one was in this room, where there was a bed, a huge mirror, a beautiful pink and blue carpet, a small table with some small chairs, and some plushies on the table. On that same table, there were the exact ones Tyel had seen when he entered here for the first time.
"I recognize this place…" whispered Tyel as he couldn't believe his eyes. "What is it?" asked Vane as he entered the room without any problem and started to see what was inside.
"This is where I saw the Seamstress playing with her toys… and these… they are the exact toys that were playing with her…" As Tyel walked near the table to touch the plushies, a long cold shiver ran down his spine. As he looked over them, he remembered that they were the same ones that had followed him once he escaped from the Seamstress.
"Let's not remain here long… there is only this entrance in this room, but we don't know when she might arrive," said Orechin. He was the only one who hadn't entered the room, leaning against the corner to warn his group in case the Seamstress, or someone else, should arrive.
'But wait… if this is the place where I saw the Seamstress, it means that close by is the door that connects to the prison… and even the secret laboratories…' Tyel looked at the path he had followed some days ago and realized that it was the same one that brought him directly in front of where Zrelekai had arrived.
'But we saw that the sanctuary went deeper, especially in that room where we saw the plushies playing together… there was another room, so this isn't the end… then this means that there might be something more that the Seamstress is defending?' thought Tyel, when suddenly his thoughts were interrupted by Darian, who was searching in the drawer near the mirror.
"Guys… what's this… Project Seamstress?" thought Darian while his heart began to beat fast. As the group walked near him, Orechin screamed loudly.
"Guys, we've got bigger problems… she's here!!" shouted he. As everyone turned around, they noticed her. The Seamstress had spotted the group and was looking at them threateningly. Behind her, some plushies appeared, and with a loud cry, they all rushed towards the group, ready to kill them.