Siderius returned to the last location he had encountered the Night Panther.
It was the exact place that he had stopped to look at the map with a water stream where Red had drunk from.
Siderius stopped the horse right at the footprint of the panther. He jumped down from Red and examined the footprint closer.
The footprint was slightly distorted and the edge was smeared without a defined line. Siderius placed his hand on the footprint.
The front pad of the panther was almost twice the size of Siderius' palm.
"It is that panther's footprint alright. Its skin was that dense black oil. Its footprint should be smeared like this instead of the usual defined shape."
Siderius grabbed his hunter's knife and plunged it down the dirt inside the footprint. He dug up the ground to see if the footprint could show more clues to where the panther usually went.
"What is this?"
Siderius grabbed a tiny little pebble that was mixed within the dirt. It was hard and had a gray color.
