Cold wind stung his face as it rushed by. Beneath his feet, faint lights from candles flickered in the windows of the city house. Behind him, the soldiers that were chasing him from the top of the wall could only stop and stare.

They watched in stunned silence as Solomon arced gracefully up and over the city. Then, he started to fall, this was not quite as graceful as it was accompanied by a frightened yelp.

Solomon gained speed as he fell and before he knew it, the ground had rushed up to meet him. Luckily, his aim wasn't terrible and he had managed to reach his target.

With a crash, he collided with the thatch roof of a house. The thatch did little to break his fall as he promptly smashed straight through it, but it was better than nothing. Just before he hit the ground, he reflexively managed to break his fall by grabbing onto the top of a wall with his tail, slowing his fall but taking it down with him.

When he hit the ground, he felt one of his wrists break and he sprained both of his ankles. Lying there, groaning in pain, Solomon was too busy to notice the flustered lady carefully place down the clothes she had been sewing and quietly sidling to the door.

Now that he was alone in the room, Solomon ruminated over what he had just done. In the short history of his life, he had to admit that it was a grand slam of stupidity. Truly award-worthy.

Although he knew that his injuries would heal quickly, that didn't change the fact that he was currently crippled and couldn't move.

This obviously hadn't been his original intent. He just hadn't been expecting the roof to completely give out under him like that.

In the distance, he could hear the pounding of metal boots against the stone ground. "Damnit! I've been caught!" That was all he could really say in this situation. He had been hogtied by his own stupidity.

Trying to cheer himself up, he decided to file this event under 'learning experience'. In the future, he would know not to trust sketchy landing places.

In the end, all he could do was sit up and wait for the soldiers to arrive. Both his legs and one of his arms were sending head-splitting waves of pain toward his brain.

The first soldier barrelled into the room with a flushed face, clearly flustered. "Are you alright ma'am...!"

"Yeah, I'm fine. Thanks for asking." Said an unhappy Solomon.

"No! wait, why haven't you escaped yet." Asked the soldier disbelievingly.

His question was answered when Solomon gestured with his one good hand towards all his disabled limbs.

The look the soldier gave Solomon was one of bafflement. It was like he was saying, 'Why did you jump off the wall if you were just going to get crippled anyway?'

Sensing this, or perhaps he was projecting, Solomon snapped at the soldier in embarrassment, "I got caught up in the moment, ok. It was a bad call on my part. I admit that."

After Solomon said this, a strange atmosphere descended on the ruined house. The soldier wasn't sure what he should do in a situation like this and Solomon just wanted to be arrested already.

Behind the first soldier, the sound of more boots pounding on the path outside sounded out. Shortly after, a far larger group barged into the ruined house. The first thing they saw was their target sitting on the ground with his legs crossed politely.

Stumbling upon this weird atmosphere, the other soldiers ground to a stop. 'What does one do in a situation like this?' They wondered.

Behind this group of soldiers ran a big man who was caked in sweat and huffing and puffing with the strain of running. His face was bright red and the blood vessels in his forehead looked like they were primed to explode.

When he saw the scene, he laughed uproariously. "Hahaha... Serves... serves you right!" He said between deep laboured breaths.

After getting his breathing under control, he took one look at the weird atmosphere in the ruined house and yelled. "What are you idiots doing just standing there! Get some manacles on this monster!"

His voice was deep and boomed out, awakening all of the frozen soldiers from their trances. Before long, Solomon was manacled and hissed in pain when he was made to stand up.

In the end, the first soldier to arrive offered him some support as he was led out into the street. Out in the street, all the nearby house doors were open and heads were peering curiously out of windows and doors alike.

When they saw Solomon's devilish appearance, there were many sharp intakes of breath. They had never seen such a creature before and he certainly did look alien to them.

Solomon looked down in embarrassment and grumbled to himself. "Now look, you idiot! You are being treated like a circus act. This is what you get for being too impulsive."

Seemingly taking pity on him, the soldier that was helping Solomon walk tried to start a conversation with him. He racked his brain for a conversation topic and in the end, all he could do was resort to a cheap pickup line. "So... where are you from..."

Solomon looked at the man and sighed, "Hell."

"Where is that?"

"... I don't know actually. But it's really hot there."

"So it's like here then."

"I guess so."

When this half baked conversation petered out, all the soldiers escorting Solomon were disappointed. They had never seen a person like him with horns and a tail and were interested hear more about this mysterious guy.

In the end, another soldier spoke up. "Why do you have a tail though?"

"It just sort of happened a couple of weeks ago. The same thing with the horns actually." Solomon replied like it was natural.

The soldier nodded but the look on his face said that he hadn't understood. Solomon noticed that these guys weren't too bad so decided to ask them for information. His injuries were already almost healed so maybe he could learn something from them before he escaped.

"Hey, So... if, theoretically speaking, I was trying to find out more information on the Shrike, where would I have to go?" He asked casually.

After a moment of silence, one of the soldiers ended up replying thoughtfully, "The research centre probably... no, maybe the library."

"Yeah, I think the library would have more concrete stuff on them." Added another soldier.

The captain of the troop, who was still wiping sweat from his meaty brow had been putting up with their talking up until now. Honestly, he was also curious about the guy they had captured. But, now that they were leaking military secrets to some stranger, he had to step in.

"Shut up! Stop telling a possible threat about classified information. For all we know, he could be here to gather information for the Shrikes. He might even be working for them."

"Nah I am here to kill all the Shrikes" Solomon added casually, "By the way... just asking but, where could I find the aforementioned library,"

"Oh, it's don't the eastern side of the city. It's a big wooden building. you can't miss it." Said a soldier before being slapped on the back of his head by his friend.

"Why are you still telling him stuff?" Hissed the other soldier.

"I don't know... He just doesn't seem all that threatening, I mean look at him... Wait, where did he go?"

The whole group whipped their heads around and found that both Solomon and the soldier who he had been leaning on for support had disappeared into the night. The only thing that remained was the manacles the prisoner had been wearing.

"Shit!" Swore the captain.

...

Solomon sprinted down alleyways at blistering speeds. In his arms, he dragged the soldier who had been holding him up. One had was covering that soldier's mouth so he couldn't alert anyone to where Solomon was.

The soldier was shocked when the hand had first covered his mouth for two reasons. The first is that this hand should have been manacled. The second was that he remembered seeing this hand had been broken.

Solomon looked down at the baffled soldier with pity, "Sorry about this but I really am about to kill the Shrikes so don't feel too bad." Then, he proceeded to choke the man out.

Leaving the unconscious soldier behind him, Solomon sped up and continued running eastwards. His feet barely made any sound as his body glided along the rough stone streets.

If an observer saw him pass at this moment, they would only see a blurred shadow pass by their window in the night.

Far off in the distance, the shouts of soldiers raising the alarm roused people from their sleep in the southern side of the city. Solomon had entered from the south of the city and those soldiers were the only ones to know of his presence so far

But that would change soon. The group of men that had captured him obviously knew where he was headed so he needed to move as quickly as possible.

As he ran, he thought back on how he had escaped. He remembered that the reason he was able to remain so calm was this: The second the manacles were put around his hands, he instinctively knew that he could take them off at any time. 'It must be my ability pertaining to my [Path]' he thought.

The winding streets of the city were like a maze and were exceedingly difficult to navigate. This resulted in Solomon quickly getting sick of having to turn back on himself when he met with a dead end.

At one particularly frustrating dead end, he gave up running through the streets altogether and leapt up onto the roof of the building that was in his way. Using his tail to balance, he landed nimbly like a cat.

With the sprawling city stretching out in front of him, he found his bearings and spied the library in the distance. It was a towering multi-story hall made of ebony and stone. It was easy to spot because it stretched up higher than the surrounding buildings.

Jumping from rooftop to rooftop, Solomon quickly reached the library. Although he may have caused some damage to the houses he landed on along the way, alls well that ends well.

Sprinting and jumping, Solomon shielded his eyes with his arms before smashing through one of the library windows feet first. He hit the ground with a roll, surrounded by flecks of shattered glass.

He sprung to his feet and ran to the nearest bookshelf. This bookshelf stretched from the floor to the ceiling and was full to the point of bursting with ancient weather-beaten tombs and leatherbound books of all shapes and sizes.

Seeing the size of this one bookshelf, Solomon lamented his impulsiveness once again. "How am I supposed to find one book in all of these? It's like looking for a needle in a haystack."

Diving into the arduous task at hand, Solomon rifled through each book looking for the one he needed. The sound of paper being flipped through filled the quiet library. After a few minutes of fruitless searching, Solomon was growing desperate. So far, all he had managed to find was a book on the history of desert monsters. Useful, but not what he needed.

He couldn't help himself and ended up complaining out loud, "How am I supposed to find one goddamn book in all of these?"

From behind him, a quiet shaky voice replied automatically, "They are sorted by date."

"Well that's stupid, Why aren't they sorted by title... wait.", He slowly turned around to find a petrified woman with her hands covering her own mouth. She was wearing a pair of spectacles and looked very bookish.

"Did you say they are sorted by date?" Asked Solomon tentatively.

Removing one of the hands clamped around her mouth she let out a squeaky reply, "Yes..."

"So you work here," Solomon continued.

The Librarian nodded in affirmation. She was cursing her own stupidity. She had been sleeping on a chair in the lobby when she was startled awake by something crashing through the window. Luckily, she managed to remain quiet and it hadn't noticed her presence. It was too preoccupied with trying to find a book.

Honestly, as a book lover herself, she could somewhat understand its desperation. There were times when she was young when she herself would sneak into her father's study to read. In the passion of youth, she would read anything she could get her hands on. In her culture, women weren't supposed to read and be educated so she often had to do it sneakily.

What stopped her from approaching the culprit was his inhuman appearance. She had read almost every book in this library and never heard of something like this person.

She had been doing an excellent job of keeping quiet until the culprit spoke out loud for the first time. When he had complained about being unable to find a book, she had replied on impulse. She would get that exact question so often that her reply was instinctual at this point.

When he turned to look at her, she was stunned to see his mostly human appearance. He looked like a young man with horns. His skin colour was much paler than hers and she certainly didn't have a tail. aside from that, he looked fairly normal.

Strangely enough, his human appearance disarmed her. His flustered expression made her feel that he wasn't all that threatening. Not only that, he was a kindred spirit that loved books as much as she had in her youth. When she looked at his disgruntled appearance, she felt that she had found a fellow book lover.

So what happened next took her by surprise.