The wildwood

John didn’t hesitate. If Matilda had vanished as a non-Abyssal, that Quest could only mean one thing. Holding his hand up, he activated Barrier Transfer and dropped into the natural barrier they’d clearly stumbled upon. Darkness engulfed him - not total darkness, thankfully, as he blinked and tried to reconcile the difference in light from the bright sunny day they’d just been enjoying, but the darkness of heavy tree cover in the deep woods.

Glancing around as his eyesight adjusted, to his horror John realised that he was alone. He’d not taken more than a second or two to shift across - so where was Matilda? Even if she’d wandered, she should have been close by… unless the way she had transferred hadn’t led to her emerging in the same place she’d been standing in the normal world. With a sinking feeling in his stomach, John began to investigate his surroundings.

It was hard to see in the gloom, but the pale mushroom circle was clear on this side of the barrier as well; taking that as a starting point and circling outward, occasionally stopping to double check, he surveyed the ground carefully despite his rising panic until he finally found a footprint some distance from where he’d crossed over. With that, more became visible - a hasty trail heading up the hill. If this had been the normal world, it’d have led back towards the clearing and where Matilda had stashed her bag. Pausing briefly to pull his staff from his Inventory, John began to walk in the direction she’d gone, but only made it a few feet before a muffled scream made him break into a sprint.

As he ran, he slid a hand down the wood of his weapon. It would probably be the best idea to invoke Gaia at this point, he knew; the fire-like glow of her blessing would solve a lot of his difficulty seeing, and if there was anything living here, it would almost certainly be afraid of fire - but he hesitated before invoking her. Firstly, he had no guarantee that she’d answer - she’d implied that she usually wouldn’t respond to people’s calls when he’d blessed Rebecca’s weapon the previous day. The second thing that made him hesitate was the aftermath of that previous invocation. Who knew what a blessing that made women randomly horny would do to him, and he needed his wits about him right now.

Malal it was, then. “Mal, I really, really need your help. My… date, she’s stumbled into a barrier. Gaia only knows how,” John panted under his breath. “Natural barrier, edge of town, will buy you a bottle of the best stuff I can afford if you help me get both of us out of this alive.”

The prayer was **** and barely made sense as he skidded around a tree and paused on the edge of the clearing - but it was enough. Malal’s voice echoed through his head as his staff began to glow silver once again, “Kid, if ya got a gal in trouble, ya better get her out of it. Never mind the drink right now, ya don’t let a dame get iced by the mooks that haunt those woods. There’s good folk out there, but I saw that Quest the boss gave ya, and I doubt you’ll be lucky enough to run into any of ‘em. Good luck, kid!”

John barely took in the information that there were friendly people out here as well as hostiles, because he’d spotted something on Matilda’s trail. On the far side of the clearing, part of the light jacket she had been wearing was snagged on a bush. What was more worrying than the fact that she’d managed to tear her jacket was the way the ground was disturbed nearby - as if a lot of feet had been moving around.

Crossing the clearing as quickly as he dared, John bent and inspected the marks. Observe was no good - an experimental one didn’t give him any information on the tracks, only that he was looking at dirt. He wasn’t much of a boy scout, but he could just about figure out what had happened, considering the scream and looking at the trail. Matilda’s footprints had crossed the clearing, entered the woods here - then paused, turning around. From the bushes, other tracks emerged. Non-human ones, judging by the claw marks at the tips of the imprints. Then there had been a scuffle - he guessed that was when Matilda’s jacket had gotten torn. But where was she now?

Broken twigs and more footprints gave him a path to follow; there was no sign of his maybe-girlfriend, but her attackers all moved off in one direction, their feet sinking deeper into the earth of the forest floor as they went. That meant they were carrying more weight, if John remembered correctly. With a sinking feeling in his gut, he ducked under a branch and followed.

The trail was winding; John guessed that whatever he was following was avoiding threats as they wound through the undergrowth, and he contemplated whether some of those threats might be the good folk Malal had mentioned and whether he should branch off to try and find help - but equally, they could just be only-Gaia-knew-what kind of stronger monsters. Sticking to the trail was also the sensible option for another reason - if he lost it, he wasn’t sure he’d be able to find it again.

Down and around, over dried up streambeds and past trees, John followed his quarry. The good news was that they’d not stopped, and also he hadn’t seen any sign of injury on Matilda’s part - no blood trails. The bad news was that he had no idea how much longer it’d be before he caught up. Checking his Status as he paused before crossing yet another creek, John noted the slow trickle down of his mana from the blessing. He’d not taken the time to check before - but it was clearly eating fractionally more than his wisdom let him regenerate. Not enough to make it worth turning off and losing the glow from the tip of his staff in the dark woods, but enough that he should double check before combat.

Pressing on, John ducked through a particularly thorny group of bramble-coated trees and halted. Up ahead, the mouth of a cave loomed on the side of a hill - and in front of it stood a vicious looking fur covered creature. Making sure his staff was held back behind him so that its glow wouldn’t give away his position, he risked a quick Observe.

Leaving aside the implications that there were foxgirls and other beastfolk out there for a moment, John was less than happy at the fact that his hopefully-girlfriend was presumably inside that cave. The single vulpinion he could see standing outside seemed to be some kind of sentry of sorts; if he could take it down, then maybe…

His thoughts were cut short by the reappearance of Matilda, emerging from the cave at a flat run. Her jacket was gone, and her t-shirt torn with scratch-marks all up both arms - but she was alive at least! The vulpinion guarding the entrance turned at her arrival, pouncing on her before John could move and dropping her to the floor, sharp teeth snapping in her face.

John reacted on autopilot at that point - no way he could watch her get dragged back into the cave by that thing. Springing from his hiding spot, he had a guiding bolt formed before he was halfway to where the pair were struggling in the dirt. The gleaming missile struck the back of the Vulpinion a fraction of a second before John’s staff did, the wood making a satisfyingly heavy sound as it connected with the base of the creature’s skull.

Dazed at this sudden attack, the fox monster fell away from Matilda, turning and staggering up onto all fours as it did so. John didn’t hesitate - he was already jabbing forward, a second strike catching it down the edge of its muzzle. Matilda meanwhile managed to get herself more or less sat upright and hastily scrambled back behind him as he called up another guiding bolt, the light half-blinding his foe before his staff cracked down again.

Calming slightly as he adjusted his grip on his staff, John took in the full nature of the thing he was fighting. This was no anime foxboy; it was capable of bipedal movement, yes, but covered in thick bristly fur. Looking more like a werewolf than an actual fox, it was also not done with the fight - long clawed fingers thrust towards John’s shins as he backpedaled hastily.

Another blow, then another - John was hesitant to use too many guiding bolts, in case there were more of these things out there. Even without the use of his spell, it wasn’t too hard to hit the mostly prone creature, but the beast was tough for a level three monster. Eventually, one final jab into its side did the trick. To John’s immense relief the vulpinion exploded into the familiar cloud of sparkling dust.

Leaning on his staff and panting, he turned to Matilda who unsurprisingly sat with a look of shock on her face. No time for that now, however… the Observe had said these things had a pack mentality. “Others?” he panted, gesturing at where his foe had been.

Matilda shook her head, managing to **** words out, “They’d tied my hands and feet and dragged me back here, then threw me in the cave and left. I don’t think they thought I’d be able to get free, but there was a jagged rock and they’d just used vines or something to tie me up so I cut them and… John, what’s going on?! What are those things?”