BALETE CHRONICLES

Chapter 5 - Tyler

The sun read 7:55 and the wind was particularly strong. Hanz sat beside a yawning Carlo on the concrete stairs at the dormitory entrance.

"Were you able to sleep last night?" Carlo asked Hanz. Dark circles around his eyes gave Hanz the impression that he wasn't able to sleep at all.

"Mhmm," Hanz responded with a hum. "What happened to you?"

Carlo kept yawning and crumpling his eyes. "My roommate. That bigass dude named Tiny snored like hell last night."

"A big guy with Tiny for a name?" Hanz almost laughed.

Carlo pulled out a weird-looking food from his pocket that was wrapped in dried leaves. "Have you eaten yet?"

"No."

"You want some?"

"Err... what is that?" Hanz leaned toward Carlo and took a peep inside the dried leaves.

"Never had tikoy before?"

Hanz shook his head.

Carlo took a piece and offered it to him. "Here."

"Are you sure it is edible?"

"Nevermind." Carlo pulled back his hand.

Hanz took the piece of tikoy from Carlo and nibbled on it. "I wasn't expecting it to be sweet."

Carlo took a big bite of his piece and nodded.

"I-I like it." Hanz took another bite.

As the two were eating, Sam appeared. "Morning!" He waved at them.

"Good morning, Sam." Carlo reciprocated.

"Morning." Hanz's eyebrows raised.

"Where's the girl? Barbara, right?"

"She was summoned by Gertrude," Hanz answered.

"That's a bummer..." Sam scratched the back of his head. "Wanna go?"

Hanz and Carlo nodded at each other.

"We're ready," Hanz said as they both stood up.

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The three had been walking in the forest for two hours now and they couldn't find the way out of it. They seemed lost.

"Are you sure we're treading the right path?" Carlo asked Sam who looked less confused.

Sam was holding a map of Balete City—his index finger hovered on the drawing of the Black Woods. "I am 100% sure that we're on the right path. It's just that..." he stopped looking at the map and turned his face toward Hanz and Carlo.

"Let me guess..." Hanz took a deep breath to scan the area, "are we dealing with a tikbalang?"

"Yes, there's an old one that lives here in the Black Woods and he is known to play pranks on by-passers—disorienting them." Sam with a sinister tone of voice, explained.

"How can we escape this illusion then?" Carlo asked. "And darn that smell is too strong! Even for me."

The tikbalang is a humanoid with a head of a horse—they are known for producing a pungent odor that disorients anyone who smells it.

"We can't escape it," Hanz answered.

"That can't be true." Carlo denounced.

Sam rolled up the map. "Hanz is right. But if we can figure out where the tikbalang is, we can kill it and stop it once and for all."