A cold, white-blue aura surrounded Timnichan. It seemed the lizard girl would turn into an ice sculpture at any moment, but unfortunately for her charges, only her tongue turned to ice.
"She'll be leaving now," Unana said.
"The main thing is that she doesn't take us with her."
The "bear cubs" didn't notice Timnichan landing near the cliff on her tongue. The bush that grew nearby became covered with ice, after which the lizard girl broke it with her hand.
"Unana, don't look," Yueret summoned a shield in front of her sister's face.
Timnichan's tongue fell out of her mouth. The ice "rail" beneath the character's feet was no longer held in place, and it shattered into pieces.
"What's there?" Unana looked out from behind the shield.
"Don't look..."
The little eighteen-year-old archer saw something she shouldn't have seen at her age.
A new, light-blue tongue darted out of Timnichan's mouth. It landed on the symbol carved into the stone, causing it to activate.
Luckily, the bright blue glow that emanated from the symbol almost hid the character and her "instrument", so Unana didn't have time to be impressed enough.
… The rock moved away from the Timnichan, revealing a dark passage into the dungeon.
"It's a tunnel," Yueret guessed. "Now she'll tell us we need to go in there."
"And he'll show it with his hand," Unana continued.
"And she'll smile."
But this time, the lizard girl surprised the "bear cubs." She jumped to the ground in front of the hole, opened her mouth, and then stuck her tongue inside.
"Is she testing something there?" Unana asked.
"Probably," Yueret answered. "It seems it's too early for her to wave and smile. She's not finished yet."
Observation of the unreasonable character continued. Timnichan took a few steps back, and her tongue returned to her mouth.
"That seems to be it," the lizard girl said. "Now she can call the bear cubs."
Timnichan turned to Unana and Yueret, but didn't smile, simply waving.
"We have to go," Yueret said.
"She won't smile and call us bear cubs?" Unana asked.
"Did you like being called that?"
"No! I'm not a bear cub. I'm just the little sister who likes to eat and sleep."
Unana closed her eyes and imagined a sawdust cake descending from the sky, but when she opened them, she saw a leg with a blue kneepad and green spikes.
"Just a little bit more," Timnichan said, landing on the ground. "You'll be home soon, bear cubs."
"You just have to enter that hole," Yueret continued.
"Yup," Timnichan slapped her tail against the ground. "It's a tube that runs through the entire mountain. Right now, the snow up there hasn't melted yet, so we can't go straight. The first creator knew this, so he made this tube and called it a tunnel."
"What's there, beyond the mountains?" Unana asked. "Will we find out about that later, too?"
"Yup, later," the lizard girl's mouth tried to form a smile, but failed. "But that's definitely your home. You were born there."
"What?" Unana and Yueret shouted simultaneously.
"It's warm there," Timnichan hugged herself by the shoulders with her arms and looked down. "There's plenty of food there, too."
"You already promised something like that," Yueret recalled.
"Yup," Timnichan looked down the tunnel. "And I promise again."
"But nobody won't believe you again," Unana frowned.
Timnichan looked at the "bear cubs". Her mouth opened to reply, but her brain couldn't find the right answer, so the lizard girl simply stuck out her tongue.
"I see," Yueret said. "In any case, it's best to go and see."
"What if there are dolls in there?" Unana looked at her brother with fear.
"Then I will protect you," Yueret stroked his sister's head.
Unana snuggled close to her brother and buried her face in his jacket. Timnichan looked at this scene and smiled.
"Did your creator tell you to smile in any situation, so that's why you smile?" Yueret asked.
"Yup," Timnichan admitted. "He said it was cute. Then I thought I was smiling too much, so I stopped, but now I saw you, and my mouth wanted to do it itself."
"I need to get to dad quickly," Yueret thought. "If her mouth wants to smile, then it'll want to do what Unana's mouth does with the cake."
Yueret took his sister's hand and led her to the entrance of the tunnel. From the outside it looked almost black, but as we approached the darkness cleared a little…
…The tunnel resembled a gigantic stone tube, large enough for even the tallest person to pass through. Its surfaces were partially covered in moss, like those of abandoned buildings, and at the bottom, something resembling water was visible.
"Hey, bear cubs," Timnichan approached the siblings. "Wait a bit."
"Do you want to give us a ride on your tongue?" Yueret asked.
"I want to, but the first creator said there would be a train running through the tunnel," the lizard girl explained. "It will take the bear cubs home."
"Now I understand why there's water at the bottom," Yueret thought. He even seemed a little pleased. "I'm just afraid to imagine what this train will be like. It'll definitely be strange and unlike a train. Maybe even unlike anything else."
As soon as Yueret thought this, a rumble echoed through the tunnel. The "bear cubs" moved aside, but Timnichan remained standing in the same place.
"Don't be afraid, bear cubs," the lizard girl stopped smiling. "It's just a train."
Soon the rumble stopped. Unana and Yueret returned to their previous spot and saw something with a smooth white-blue surface and two appendages in front.
"What's that?" Unana grimaced.
"It's a train," Timnichan explained. "It's made to run on water. When it moves, the water underneath it freezes."
"I see," Yueret guessed. "It's like your tongue."
"Yup," Timnichan "joyfully" jumped up. "But, unlike my tongue, you can get inside."
"How…" Unana approached one of the appendages and almost touched it with her hand. "There's nothing there."
"What?" Timnichan approached another appendage. "Everything's here. I'll show you now."
The lizard girl poked her finger at the small ball at the end of the appendage. The next moment, the strange entity began to tremble like jelly.
Unana screamed, and then hid behind her brother. Yueret watched as the space beneath the tendrils parted, revealing a passageway...
... Into a carriage with soft seats like small beds, with brown and white-blue pillows shaped like bear heads.
"Unana, you can look," Yueret said. "There's nothing scary there."
The little sister peered out from behind her brother.
"Bearries..."
A few moments later, Unana was already inside the carriage, on a brown seat, hugging a brown pillow.
"There's one brown one," Timnichan looked at the archer. "Now there is one more bear cub left."
The lizard girl turned her gaze to Yueret, who looked first at her, then at his sister, and then turned his attention to the second, opposite seat, with a white and blue pillow in the shape of a bear's head.
Yueret's mind immediately flashed to the plush bear with glowing blue eyes that had asked him to name it.
"No, it's just a coincidence," Yueret said as he entered the train.
Unana was already lying on her back, her eyes closed and mouth open, a pillow over her breast and belly. The girl held her tightly, as if she were her new pet.
"Unana felt like she was little again," Yueret said, sitting down in "his" seat. "And that was after she saw a pillow that looked like a bear's head. She used to love animals, but she was especially obsessed with bears. Maybe it's not a coincidence? Then that lizard calling us 'cubs' isn't a coincidence either. And the color of those toys isn't a coincidence either. It resembles different types of bears I saw somewhere online. There's a brown bear that lives in the forest, and there's a white-and-blue bear that lives somewhere far north, where no trees grow, where there's only snow and ice."
"Oh, it looks like all the cubs are together," Timnichan said. "We can go."
The passage into the carriage closed. The walls, floor, and ceiling began to sway, as if they were made of something soft and springy. Only then did Yueret notice that the seat was also made of the same material, and then he looked at the walls and realized...
…that it weren't exactly walls. It was something like jelly, light blue, almost white, like the outside.
"It's some kind of animal," Yueret felt stupid. "I don't remember its name, but in nature it's much smaller. It shouldn't be this big."
Unana, on the other hand, wasn't at all bothered by the moving walls of unknown origin. The little sister was happily hugging her bear-shaped pillow, lying on the soft, warm "bed," and didn't notice that it was also moving.
"What is she thinking?" the thought flashed through Yueret's head.
"About bear cubs, about how soft and warm they are," the voice in her head replied. "She imagines herself as a little bear, wandering through the forest and eating everything in sight."
Yueret turned his head towards the "wall" and soon discovered a blue-white bear cub with glowing blue eyes, somehow "hanging" in the air.
"Hey, I warned you. If you get out again, I'll lock you out."
"Are you really going to lock a small, defenseless bear with glowing eyes?"
"Yeah, I'm not Unana. I'm big than her, so I'm already grown up."
"Then I won't tell you what Unana is thinking."
This phrase made Yueret doubt. He sat down on the moving seat and then looked at his little sister's contented face, lying on her side and hugging a pillow.
"No, reading her thoughts is too much. Unana is in no danger right now. She has a teddy bear too. He probably knows what she's thinking."
However, within a few moments, Yueret's opinion changed completely.
"Okay, let me name you," Yueret looked at the blue and white bear. "But 'Unachan' has already been taken by Unana."
"I like edible names. Bears like to eat."
"Edible? Paw in dough?"
"What? I'm not going to be called that."
"I didn't say it was a bear paw covered in dough."
"Give me something normal."
Yueret began to think, but didn't manage to come up with a suitable name. The walls, floor, and ceiling stopped moving, after which the nasty voice of the spirit of cold lizard filled the air.
"Welcome home, bear cubs."
Yueret stood up from his seat and noticed that in place of the back "wall" a passage had formed, reminiscent of a hole in the slime from some game.
"It's called a slug," Yueret thought. "It's really nasty. Unana brought it home when she was little and said it was a jelly beetle."
"Hey, brown, come on, and go home."
"You better wake Unana up," Yueret suggested.
The youngest of the "bear cubs" lay on her side with her eyes closed and still hugging the pillow.
"You should go first," Timnichan said. "You're the eldest bear cub."
"I'm not a bear cub at all, but okay."
Yueret approached the exit of the "carriage" and saw a wooden bench with a canopy next to a moat filled with water.
"So that's the rail this thing was traveling on," Yueret looked at the smooth, light-blue surface and imagined it shaking and changing shape. "I hope this creature is non-living."
Yueret stepped out of the "train" and looked around. The moat continued down the slope and merged into a narrow river hidden behind a coniferous forest.
"Are we now... on the other side of the mountain?" Yueret called up the map and realized his guess had been confirmed.
Two blue dots were on another slope of the mountain range, also covered in forests marked with icons depicting spiky conifers.
"My brother, you're so slow, like a bear after hibernation," something warm wrapped around Yueret's neck, and then something heavy jumped onto his back.
"Unana."
Yueret managed to reach the bench and throw off the load. It was indeed his little sister. Unana's eyes were still closed, but her mouth was moving and making sounds.
"Unana, we're already here. Wake up, or that lizard will eat your sawdust cake."
"What?" Unana said in a low voice.
The girl's eyes opened. The first thing she saw was a moat filled with water, replacing the rail.
"She doesn't have the password to the fridge?" This was the hungry little sister's first question.
"Yup, but the plush bears might have a password. They might be able to get out of their cells themselves..."
Suddenly Yueret was overcome with horror. He called up his inventory, found the slot with fridge, and then moved it into the real world.
"The sawdust cake is still there," Unana looked inside the fridge, which was half as tall as she was.
"The bags of squirrels, tree needle juice, and some other bags are still there," Yueret continued. "These creatures probably don't feed on our food."
"They feed on our brains," Unana looked at her brother seriously.
Yueret didn't answer. He hadn't previously believed in the existence of animal girls, but now he accepted that plush bears with glowing eyes could eat the food of living creatures.
"Hey, bear cubs, let's go home," Timnichan jumped out of the "train" onto the ground. "It's not far. Your paws need some exercise, or they've turned into toys after hibernation."
"Did your creator tell you that too?" Yueret asked.
"No," the lizard girl answered. "It doesn't matter. The first creator told us not to pay attention to the little things, because they distract us from something important."
"For some reason, I think she doesn't even understand what she said," Yueret said, looking at his younger sister's headphones.
The "slug train" continued along the "rail" and disappeared behind the trees. Now the mountain ridge was no longer covered by anything, and the "bear cubs" were able to see it in its entirety.
The steep slopes were covered with coniferous forests, but winter lingered here longer. White patches began a few dozen steps from the tunnel, and in numerous gullies, the snow lingered even lower, where it gradually flowed into streams.
"We're heading that way," Timnichan said, pointing downward.
Yueret looked down the slope from the mountains, almost completely covered in snow-covered forests. Among the pointed tops of the coniferous trees, something strange stood out against the fog.
"There's something there," Yueret said, pointing to a sharp blue-green object peeking out from behind a tree.
"As the first creator said, 'the bear cubs know their home right away,'" Timnichan explained. "Let's go there. Your food is already waiting for you."
"Is it warm?" Unana continued to stare at the mini-fridge, even though it was already closed.
"Uh..." Timnichan seemed at a loss for an answer for the first time.
"The food in the fridge is cold," Unana explained. "Cold food is fine if it's cake, but if it's a squirrel, it's bad."
"There's a fire in there," Timnichan said.
"You're not lying?" Yueret moved the mini-fridge into his inventory. "Last time, you mentioned fire, too."
"No," Timnichan pointed at a strange object in the forest. "There's smoke coming from there. The first creator said that smoke comes from fire, and you can fry squirrels on fire."
Yueret took a closer look at that strange blue-green object and soon spotted barely visible gray clouds above the treetops, almost blending in with the fog.
"That's the roof," Yueret said, stepping forward.
"The bear cubs remember their home," Timnichan closed her eyes, placed her hands on her breast, and then swayed from side to side a few times.
"Daddy, why…" Unana thought, and accidentally glanced at the lizard girl, and just as accidentally felt awkward.
"Let's go, bear cubs," Timnichan ran forward and almost fell into the water. "There's only a little bit left. You'll be fed, petted, and have your fur washed."
"That's good, but..." Yueret looked at the conifer forest that formed a wall outside the "station."
"What is it?" Timnichan leaned forward, while her hands remained behind her back.
"How are we supposed to get there?" Yueret asked. "There's no road here."
"Ahh..." Timnichan looked at the forest, opened her mouth, and released her personal vehicle.