Night had fallen, and the clouds hid the starlight.
It was the perfect moment Asti and Lucien had been waiting for.
"You sure about this?" Asti asked Lucien.
"Yeah, I even feel like I never lost my lung," Lucien replied.
"But it's weird to think this lung is made from blood. And man, these people are nuts—healing us just to torture and kill us later," Lucien added.
"At least we can steal their healing potions," Asti said.
"And you take everything. We're not leaving them a thing!"
A few moments later...
"Okay, now that we've got everything, how do we get out of here?" Asti asked.
"Have you tried the door?" Lucien said.
"It's locked," Asti replied.
"What about the window?" Lucien asked.
"It's glass, so we can break it easily… The problem is, it'll make too much noise, and all their wooden houses are right next door," Asti explained.
Placing his hand on his chin and motioning for Asti to come closer to the window, Lucien whispered:
"I know what to do."
And with a single punch, he shattered the window.
Caught off guard, Asti blurted out:
"Is this guy insane or what?"
Lucien jumped outside and said:
"Well, come on, hurry up! You want to get caught?"
Asti wore a stoic expression, holding back tears.
"Why did I have to end up with this guy?" he muttered as he jumped through the window.
"What do we do now?" Lucien asked.
"Shhh… Follow me, okay?" Asti said.
"Okay," Lucien replied.
"Now run!" Asti ordered, breaking into a sprint.
Catching up, Lucien asked why they had to run.
"You made noise—way too suspicious to ignore. All we can do now is hope the woman who used that mantra on you is as tired as she said and still asleep," Asti explained.
Unfortunately for them, there wasn't just one woman in the house they'd been in—there were two. They had heard the glass shatter and were now standing by the broken window. One of them stepped forward, scanned the surroundings, and shouted:
"The two prisoners from the healing house have escaped! They must still be nearby—find them!"
Asti froze at the woman's announcement and glared at Lucien.
"Okay, fine, I messed up," Lucien admitted.
"Whatever. Now we have to hide, or we're done for," Asti said.
"But there's nothing but houses! We could climb onto the roofs," Lucien suggested.
"No way. First, they're wooden, and given their condition, I can't even imagine the noise we'd make stepping on them," Asti shot back.
Suddenly, they heard multiple voices shouting from the houses around them. Bedroom doors were opening, creaking loudly.
"Are they all synchronized or what? Look around carefully. If we're still here in a minute, we're toast," Asti said.
The two scanned their surroundings, but nothing—no hiding spot in sight.
"Uh… uh… uh… I know! Behind!" Asti exclaimed.
"What do you mean, behind?" Lucien asked.
"No time to explain. It's do or die!" Asti rushed into the narrow gap between the houses next to them.
"Please, let me be right, let me be right," Asti repeated to himself.
Behind the row of houses, a deep hole lay before them.
"Wait, you want us to go in there?" Lucien asked.
Suddenly, a door creaked.
Asti and Lucien exchanged a look. More doors opened, each with the same grating squeak.
"I think we'd better get in that hole and go as deep as we can," Lucien said, pausing to finish his sentence while Asti had already dove into the tunnel halfway through his words.
With a conflicted expression but hearing the shouts of people coming out of the houses, Lucien followed Asti's lead and plunged into the hole without looking back.