tinuing onward deeper into the forest, the group met several other beasts. Some were minor and didn’t put up any fight, like several rats, some twisted pnts, and even a frog. There were some who did pose a threat, however.

  Niphru stopped them due to a feeling that he was being watched, as well as an odd smell he caught when the breeze shifted. No one was able to find anything, however, despite trusting his senses. After a while, the group decided to keep going, all of them still maintainira caution.

  About five mier, the attack occurred. The first sign anything was wrong was a loud crash behind the group, revealed to be a massive cat smming into Narath’s maul. Clearly, it had inteo hit Morris, but the rea speed of Lisryn’s guardian was incredibly fast. A moment ter, as Morris threw up his own defenses, it slunk off, fur shifting colors as it attempted to blend bato the surroundings.

  Naturally, no one leased with that idea, and numerous spells flew its way. The fastest was Miana’s cutting beam of water, tearing a long furrow in the beast’s coat, the bloody gash ruining all attempts at stealth. This was then followed by a bright light from Viera surrounding the monster’s eyes. came several darts of fire from Dawn and Niphru. A moment ter, several bdes impacted it in a whirlwind as Richard’s spell reached the creature.

  Seeing that the air around the creature was already under Richard’s trol, Lisryn attempted to find something useful to do instead. After a quient of thought, she began gng around the area, keeping a for any other creatures that might try sneaking up on them.

  Thomas, meanwhile, held back along with Viera, also fog on keeping a for any other threats that may creep up on them. Seeing that the beast was now occupied, Morris let his barriers of earth crumble and joihem in keeping watch.

  After Niphru sent his foxfire out to focus on the beast’s head, the fight ended quite quickly. Apparently, having all of its focus oh and ambushi it with little durability. The three fire mages proceeded to rapidly burn the body, and they moved on once more.

  Around an hour ter, they came across an immeated pnt, vines reag outward dozens of feet from the edges of the leaves. Niphru’s sharp hearing saved the group from the worst of the following attack, a shield of force catg over three-fourths of the spray of thorns that were hurled from the main body of the pnt wheepped he vines.

  Daw a simple message through their bond, “Poison,” before she started fog on healing everyone. Hearing of the threat, Niphru threw two bolts of foxfire at the hostile foliage before ging his mind and just using fire magic to spray fire over it. His foxfire instead flew to Miana and Thomas, w te the poison withihe third being used to excim to Miana, “Si is a pnt, try to burn it; I’m going to focus on the poison!”

  Unfortunately, it appeared that the thing was resistant to fire, as an oily substance oozed from the leaves and braurning the fmes darker as it smoked. As the fire began to die, Richard sent his bdes scything through the foliage, small ks falling away as they moved deeper into the pnt. Miana followed up with ahin line of water, sshing it wildly through their enemy, leaving rge ses to fall as they were detached from the main body.

  Another wave of thorns was hurled toward the group, but with the advance warning of what it could do, Lisryn and Thomas used a burst of wind to direct all the projectiles into the ground before they could reayone. A moment ter, Mia her attack falter as she ran low on water within her on, and began refilling it. By this point, the bdes had pruned most of the leaves on their side of the pnt and begun slig into the branches, slowly disabling the ability for the thing to unch more spines.

  In response, one of the long vines slowly shifted toward the group. Thomas s the incredibly low speed and used earth magic to form a few hooks to hold it away, then turo the aed the act.

  By this point, the mild poison had been removed from everyone, so both Dawn and Niphru joihe fight, dozens of bolts of fme smming into the ter of the pnt. While it was resistant to fire, the tinued assault burned away the coating and began to ighe interior of the mass.

  It then began to shake violently, thorns falling to the ground all around it, and viwitg all around the pnt. This intensified even further as Niphru settled his foxfire atop the tral point, where the branches joiogether. Seds ter, the foliage began to droop as its movements slowed aually stopped.

  Due to the fire-resistant oil, it took several mio bur to ash, and Thomas used earth magic to pull the roots from the ground so they could be ied as well.

  Some time after dealing with the hostile foliage, they came across a pack of unmutated wolves attag a heavily mutated boar. After a moment of quiet discussion, it was decided that they would try to leave the wolves alone ahem eat their fill ohe boar was dead. If they mutated ter, they would bee targets as well.

  Having made their decision, everyone focused on the boar, and bright light appeared over its eyes, rendering it blind. Unfortunately, the wolves were already having quite a difficult time, stantly having to dart back to avoid sshes of its tusks, as well as spurts of clear liquid that hissed and spat as it nded on the ground after being expelled by small holes in the beast’s back.

  The rge ptes of bone c its sides didn’t help much, either. Due to that, Miana’s attack focused on the side of the creature’s head, causing it to squeal in pain before the sound abruptly cut off. To everyone’s shock, the siack had carved a hole into the beast’s skull before scrambling its brain.

  While they looked at each other in surprise, multiple growls disturbed them, bringing their attention to the wolf pack that was inally fighting the boar. With unspoken agreement, they all took several steps backward, which calmed the es, who then mostly turned back to the body and began slowly tearing away the ptes of bone. Two of the wolves tinued warily watg the group, however.

  Satisfied that the wolves were not going to attack them, the group sat down to wait, making sure to keep someone looking in every dire as they did so. While they had been hunting for a while already, they decided to tio the night, since Viera was able to produce light to help them see. Niphru also remarked that it would help with trying to hunt anything that was mostly active at night.

  Some time ter, the wolves rotated, the two that had been watg taking their turn to eat. Not long after, the whole pack cast wary g the group as they moved off in the opposite dire. Now that the wolves were gone, Dawn, Miana, and Niphru begaroying the remaining parts of the corpse.

  Much ter, as the sun was going down, Niphru stopped the group with a panicked expnation, “I feel illusions ahead of us; there has to be a mutant fox here!” Hearing this, the group pulled clether as both Morris and Narath joihe group on opposite sides.

  Morris then inquired, “Do you think you either deal with it on your own, or lead it to one of us and keep it occupied?”

  After a moment of ption, Niphru decided that the two of them should be able to defend everyone sihey could see through his illusions. Due to this, and his trust in his fire magic, he agreed, “If it ’t hit at a distance, I should be able to deal with it, as long as it isn’t faster than me. If not, I do my best t it to you.”

  Having shared his agreement, he put an illusion over himself to hide and slowly crept forward, fog hard on his surroundings. By feeling the mana around himself, he was able to notice the slight twist as he ehe illusion. As he spread his mana out to try to feel the area, he realized he was slowly starting to see double, the two images sing in solidity before one mostly faded away.

  A bit of testing ter, he discovered that what he could see was the true reality, with the illusion hanging foggily atop it. Pleased with this development, he tinued forward more rapidly, though still spreading out his mana to ensure he didn’t bee fooled. The illusion seemed stronger in one dire, so he began padding along toward it.