"It... it ate him!"
"Where did it go!? It was just there!"
"Run!"
If there was one thing the man that was just suddenly eaten by the camouflaging giant lizard, it was that it would be better not to separate — as they say, there was strength in numbers. But alas, putting untrained and unsupervised civilians in a situation like this always leads to one thing, mass death.
It was a repeat of what happened to Rhys on his first days in the corps; this time, however, Rhys seemed completely out of it and not even caring about the chaos as he remained crouching on the ground. His eyes were wide open, and his mouth was the same as he breathed in and out of them as if there was something stuck between his throat.
While the other examinees were panicking from a hiding predator, Rhys was just being attacked by panic itself as he grasped his hair tight and covered his face; if he still had his other hand, it would probably be clasping his drumming chest.
[Do not separate. Absolutely do not separate!]
Another voice, not Hannah's, reverberated in the air,
[Help will be coming soon. There is a safety bunker 750 meters away from—]
"!!!"
Everyone let out a collective yelp as the voice speaking from them from the Surface was suddenly cut off. How could they not, when they saw the very same gigantic lizard that ate their fellow Examinee do the same to the large speaker? This time, however, they were even more terrified as the beast was able to chew on the large rod bars that were caging the speaker.
That cage was supposed to protect the speaker from the monsters in the testing hall... and yet that lizard was able to just gnaw on it without even any sign of resistance. And perhaps the worst thing about all of this...
...is that they couldn't see the monster again as its camouflage truly made it seem completely invisible.
"That... I know what that is now!" And while everyone was busy doing nothing and being frozen in fear, one of the examinees raised his voice and started flipping a book he was carrying, "E... everyone, it's this! It's a Fog Kamelos. It's—"
"Give me that!"
And before the man could even start explaining, one of the other more muscular examinees suddenly snatched the book from his hand.
"W...what are you doing!?" The owner of the book tried to grab his book back, but the thug refused to let go and even started pushing his face away.
Due to their size difference, with the owner of the book almost being literally half his aggressor's size, the scrawny man could really only try and shake his head... and when he found he couldn't reach the book no matter what, he bit the muscular man's hand; his flesh almost like rock due to all the calluses.
While the others were fawning and starting to surround Jenny and her scrawny brother, they were completely isolated from the rest and seemed more interested... in Rhys.
They were glancing at him, subtly but aggressively at the same time.
"Hey, old man. I don't recognize those 5," Hannah then obnoxiously grabbed the head of the person closest to him, forcefully facing it toward the monitor she was looking at, "Can you bring up their file?"
"That—we have better things to do! We're cleaning up your mess, Ms. Hannah!" The man quickly pulled his head away, only for it to return straight into Hannah's palm like a yo-yo, hard, "T...I'll look into it!"
"Go," Hannah rolled her eyes as she waved her hand; her eyes, staring back and forth between Rhys and the group as a small smile very slowly crawled on her face,
"Maybe this is a good way to waste my time aft—"
"Don't do anything, don't do anything."
And before Hannah could finish whispering to herself, she noticed a man beside her anxiously biting his nails.
"...Aren't you the GM of the Laughing Bronze? What are you doing here?"
"Ah, Ms. Hannah. Long time no see..." Kenneth only glanced at her while monotonously greeting her before turning his focus on the monitor showing Rhys; repeating the same words over and over again —
"Don't do anything... don't stand out."
Fortunately for Kenneth, Rhys truly was not doing anything even after several minutes had passed. He was no longer breathing heavily, but his head was still down; his eyes, now finally scanning the area. He wasn't scanning for the hiding lizard, however, but he was scanning for the cameras scattered and hidden around them.
The cameras were more of a threat to him than an overgrown chameleon.
"Everyone! The Fog Kamelos is a Level 2 monster, but we could easily defeat it if we work together since it's a territorial monster! It doesn't hunt in a pack," the scrawny man raised his voice. And with Jenny standing beside him, no one really dared to say anything else. But why would they? This scrawny man seems to be their way to survival,
"The man that died earlier is right — we stick together, we survive. The Fog Kamelos has a small appetite, and once it is full, it won't feed for an entire day."
"Does... does that mean we are safe!?"
"No," The scrawny man shook his head, "In order for it to be full, it needs to eat... an entire cow. The person it ate is definitely not enough. So we need to be vigi—"
"I have a suggestion!" And all of a sudden, one of the members of the group that kept themselves isolated raised their hand,
"...What about we feed it the Lowborn?"