Ride with Rose and Mina.

Mela sighs. "Must I go back inside the backpack? I suppose it cannot be helped, as I would be hardly able to ride with anybody. Oh well. I think I have stretched enough." Then after soaring up towards the ceiling, she dives down straight into Mina's pack before disappearing once more.

"Then I'll take Scar too," you say. "Vivi, Lynx, you can ride the other. No offense, Mina, but you're on the small side anyway, so I don't think it'll really be crammed."

Mina itches the side of her big, round ear. "I know..." she replies quietly.

While you don't have the experience Rose does, you still pull yourself upon the back of the giant lizard. There's just enough room, though you have to scoot up tightly against the back of Rose. You wrap your arms around her, much like two on a motorbike, and clutch your hands in front of her stomach. "How's this?" you ask.

"You'd best hold on tighter than that," she replies. "How are you two doing?"

With Vivi trying to get on first, albeit with some struggle, things have gotten chaotic as Lynx begins pushing up in attempt to aid her, though not very well. She pushes the flats of her hands directly upwards against the soft rear cheeks of the witch--body bending over, skirt falling back. The nudging makes it more difficult, getting her caught halfway up, but that only makes Lynx push harder.

"Stop it!" Vivi barks.

"Hurry up. I want to get going already," Lynx says.

"Then stop pushing. I can get up on my own." She slips down farther and farther, until she falls to the ground on her bum.

Lynx rolls her eyes and dextrously clambers up onto the lizard's back.

After standing, Vivi crosses her arms and whispers, "Mold Earth," before a perfect cube of stone and soil rises up right beneath her feet. It brings her a few feet into the air. With that, she simply steps off it and joins the rogue atop the lizard called Flick. She's **** to grapple onto her at first, but after a moment, she locks her hands together in front of her stomach.

"That's cheating," Lynx says.

"There's a list of very interesting words that have very interesting affects on you when they're said, right?"

"Y-You don't know those--"

"Do I not?"

Panicked and not wanting to risk it, Lynx turns forward. "It looks like it's time to get moving, huh?"

"You have a very interesting party, Demon King," says Rose.

You squeeze yourself up against her more tightly. "You don't know the half of it."

Mina withdraws a tool from her pack. At first, given its lengthy shape, you worry exactly what kind of invention it is, though as she holds it forward, a pale green emerald at the front illuminates with a light even brighter than a torch's flame. She points it forwards towards the tunnel, and with that, Rose tugs on the reins, and it's your lizard that begins moving first, leading the way for the other two to follow.

"So what exactly is this?" you ask as the lizard departs the sewer tunnels.

"I don't exactly know," Rose replies. "But it only appeared recently. Whatever or whoever has been digging this tunnel might have been doing so for a long time, and from wherever they came, they broke down the wall of the sewer within the week. I don't like it. Many of us use these parts to travel, to meet, and to hide. The last thing I want is my people to be eaten by subterranean monsters in the only place they feel safe."

It's a bumpy ride. You find yourself bucking lightly up against the backside of Rose. If you haven't become such a sturdy gentleman over these many months of dangerous or titillating adventures, you'd surely embarrass yourself with a big surprise poking against her, though you keep yourself composed.

"And I've heard things," she continues. "People say they've already spotted strange shadows moving about, and sounds of skittering."

"I've battled some deadly, powerful bug monsters before. Maybe it's more of them."

"This is no work of monsters," Vivi says. "Do you think burrowing bugs would put up buttresses?

Rose ponders silently for a moment. "This could go for awhile. Shall we run?"

Lynx, tugging on her reins, hesitates, but replies with a nervous, "I think I'm getting the hang of it enough."

"Then let's go!"