Creature Encounter

Clearly these people need to manage their food supply better, Lia thought as she once again searched through all the cabinets, "I think you guys need to go out and get some actual bread Kaida, the ones left here are probably hard enough to send someone to meet the stars early."

The shadow mage moved towards her, looking at the bread.

Kaida merely chuckled at the thought, "Only if you throw 'em hard enough," she smirked, grabbing one of the rock-hard loafs and tossing it up in her palm.

Would definitely be possible.

"I'm kidding!" Kaida suddenly said, raising her hands up as if she was about to stop Lia from doing something. "Please don't use our old buns as a weapon."

Oh. "I wasn't—" Lia began, sounding defensive, but Kaida cut her off, "I know that look, you were thinkin' about it."

With an annoyed pout Lia decided an argument wouldn't be worth the effort, something that made Kaida huff a laugh.

Ipo floated over to them, tapping the old bread, "We'll go into town tomorrow anyway," Kaida said, "might as well get some breakfast while we're out."

"Like yesterday?" She scoffed, Ipo tuning a curious eye towards her.

Kaida seemed to catch onto the implications though, "Yeah, this time we're gonna get enough supplies for the traveling we're gonna have to do," She moved her hand towards one of the tiny spirits still appearing next to Lia, "I have a feeling you 'n Ray didn't have enough since you were gone for over a day."

"Yeah we were fortunate enough that Capricorn turned out to be as hospitable as he was," Lia began, "He gave us food and a place to sleep, I'm not sure other strangers would be so open to unannounced visitors."

Well... all strangers she's met have done so up until now–

"Hey I didn't know how far away Jay's little bird would take you, I thought it'd be closer by than a 15 uair trip through the mountains!" Kaida exclaimed rather loudly with a smile in her voice, though still mindful of her brother sleeping a little ways away.

Lia hummed, Ipo moving to twirl a strand of her hair over in its arms, "Thirty uairs in a day is still too little isn't it," Lia mused. "It worked out in the end, we still had time enough to read what we needed to."

The dragon mage smiled with a small nod, then turned to her tiny shadow companion, "Let's just hope we get a warm welcome from Sagittarius too then, right Ipo?"

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Lia had trouble sleeping that night, which honestly wasn't anything new, the last times she tried to sleep were rough as well.

This time she couldn't pinpoint why though, it just felt like she was incapable of resting her eyes long enough to calm down and sleep.

So Lia woke up tired, not knowing for how long, or rather– how short, she had actually managed to rest.

Ray and Kaida were moving about the place, grabbing bags and supplies, talking in hushed voices.

Oddly considerate.

"Good morning," Lia mumbled, letting the others know she's awake. Though she thinks they noticed already.

Ray gave her a quick nod and continued searching for stuff, while Kaida stopped in her tracks and smiled, "Mornin' Lia!"

Ipo rushed towards her, immediately playing with Lia's bedhead of long ruffled locks.

Not that she minded, "Are you guys getting ready–" she started to ask, but was interrupted by Kaida, "For the trip to Sagittarius?" she filled in nonchalantly, "Yeah, we'll be better prepared this time!"

Ray now stopped to look at her too, "Kaida told me what you thought about the journey to Capricorn. That fae threw us into some real trouble with that little paper bird of his and you were right, we were lucky we found the library when we did. With being able to eat and spend the night there as well..."

Why is he acting like it was all on Jay? "Was it really Jay's fault though?" Lia asked, a bit ticked off by Ray's tone.

But the wolf just gave her an odd look, "Of course it is, he said he knew where it was, so he must've known how long the journey would've been, right?"

Now Kaida stepped in to defend her fae friend, "Right, 'cuz Jay always remembers exactly how long something will take– he's the worst at time management Ray and he forgets so easily. You know this."

Ray scoffed but didn't go against the statement.

"Let's not start bickering over who did what wrong," Lia tried, Ipo nodding along, "Let's instead just get everything together for our next journey."

The siblings looked at each other, Kaida pushing past Ray to grab some of the bags they had packed.

Ray sighed, "Fine," he grumbled, "but I'm still gonna give that yarn-brained idiot a piece of my mind if I see him."

That just seems immature.

"I'm sure you would," his sister laughed, probably thinking the same thing.

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The walk to town felt way shorter than last time, Ipo coming along since they we're probably going to be gone for at least a few days.

They planned to visit some shops for more supplies and get a good first meal of the day– one that didn't have the ability to bash people's heads in.

Afterwards, the three mages and Ipo made their way to Jay and Alveena's shop to inform them of their plans to leave. Jay was already aware of course, but talking things over felt important when it's a more serious quest like this.

There was a forest and clan in danger after all.

Alveena told them not to forget to inform the guild about their unofficial quest and wished them the best of luck on the coming journey before resigning herself to her study.

Al was a very busy witch it seems, leaving Jay to manage the front of the store.

Ray took her leave as his cue to start grumbling all his complaints about their last trip to Jay, calling him out for the lack of information he gave and seemingly even deceiving them.

Which Lia thought was going a little far.

"C'mon, he did no such thing," she argued, "I'm sure he just forgot to mention or maybe didn't remember it right in the first place."

Jay kindly lifted up a hand to stop Lia from saying anything else. He gave her a subtle wink, "Oh hon, it's fine. Our little wolfie here just gets angered easily when he can bark at his favorite fire fae," Jay said, sweet and sour at the same time, teasing smirk at the ready.

Ray indeed looked very angered now, "Oh suck a—" Ray retorted, but stopped himself with an awkward cough.

The fae's smirk only got more intense, "Suck a what? Hm Ray?"

Rolling his eyes in defeat the wolf mage backed off, not wanting to respond to that.

Jay side-eyed Lia, winking once more, showing he thought he'd won, which she agreed with. Kaida had silently watched the whole exchange and didn't seem to have an ounce of pity for her brother.

His fault for complaining.

"Now that that's been dealt with, Lia–" Jay turned to her, putting a gentle hand on her shoulder, "I wish you guys the best of luck on this quest of yours, make sure to stay safe and call for backup if you need it," he instructed, then motioned his head back to Kaida and Ray, "These two never do, though that doesn't mean they always win the fight when they're in over their heads."

Stubborn to the point of stupidity it seems.

"Thanks for the warning Jay, but about that call," she grabbed the pretty crystal from her jeans pocket, "You gave me this kumiki crystal remember?"

"Komunki dearie," the fea corrected with a kind smile.

"Right," Lia smiled with a huffed laugh, "you said it was activated by a spell, but you didn't actually tell me what that spell was..."

There was a moment where realization had not yet hit the tall fae still smiling in front of her, but she could practically see the gears turning in his pretty little head.

Until finally– "Oh wow! It's 'komunki iunctus', I'm sorry I forgot... Guess I should start writing stuff down in my journals again," he laughed sheepishly, "Lately I've been having more of these forgetful spells than I'd like to admit." He fiddled with his earrings, "See, I used to keep track of everything in my journals, I'd always find out what I forgot to do or forgot to tell people when I read it back at the end of the day."


Kaida's rough voice joined in, apparently still listening too, "Yeah and then you gave most of the new ones to me since you had 'grown out of it' and 'no longer needed them' huh?" she mocked, using her fingers to make quotations in the air at Jay's past declarations.

Jay squinted his eyes at her, "No need to be like that Kaida, I know okay?" he exasperated, Ipo petted his head, tiny hand ruffling through soft curls to console him.

Kaida turned to Lia and slapped Ray on his arm, "We're heading off, we still need to stop by the guild," she said, "see you soon Jay."

He waved them off with a warm smile, "Goodluck girls, keep Ray out of trouble."

"Oh that's rich—" Ray began, but was pulled along with Kaida who quickly made her way out of the door.

The guild was near the shop, only a few buildings away, the building itself was framed by blue willows stood at the center of a three way crossroad.

It wasn't a very big or intimidating guild, yet Kaida had asked Lia to wait outside with Ray.

She wondered why, though she didn't have a lot of time to ponder over that question. Kaida was quick to return with a determined announcement, "Gumi knows where we're headed and I got a map showing the route we should take to the archer's clan, we're all set."

Ray looked sideways to give Lia a lax smile, "Let's go then shall we?"

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The three had been traveling for quite some time, passing wide open fields that slowly became more and more vegetated, until the trees were dense and reached up high to the skies.

As they walk on a nearly overgrown trail– one they argued wasn't an actual pathway– Lia noticed some rustling behind them. Something sounding like a small animal.

"You hear that?" she stopped to ask, head pointing in the direction of the noise.

Ray didn't even look back as he shrugged, "It's been following us for a while now," he stated, uncaring.

Kaida did follow Lia's gaze, regarding the bushes with suspicion despite the lack of danger emanating from the spot, "Need me to take a look? I got the fastest defense ready if it's malicious."

Lia had a strong feeling it wasn't, but gestured for Kaida to move towards it nonetheless, stepping aside to let her pass.

The dragon mage carefully approached the moving leaves, but before she could move some out of the way– A cute little salamander-like head popped out of the foliage.

Upon seeing Kaida's face up so close it decided to do something very malicious indeed.

Kindly licking the tip of her nose, before making a happy 'merp'-sound.

Kaida gasped in offense, the blue creature had managed to simultaneously stoke Kaida's anger, confuse Ray and charm Lia.

The serpent girl cooed, "That's adorable! Look at its cute lil' eyes." She quickly made her way over to the creature, Ipo following suit.

The blue creature jumped out of their bush, revealing a chubby salamander body with cute harmless claws and a floofy end of it's tail. It was big enough to cover her lap if it were to lay down on her, which it may do with the starry look he gave Lia upon seeing her come into view next to a frozen Kaida.

Lia reached out her hand, gently wiggling her fingers as an invitation.

The small creature didn't even sniff her hands first, instead it dumped its head against her hand and made a weird purring noise.

"They like me," Lia muttered in slight disbelief.

"Smells like this one's a little man" Ray cut in, "He's a denkyr, though I've never seen a blue one before..."

Denkyr huh?

Lia looked into the happy guy's black eyes, his tongue just poking out from his zigzag mouth. "I like him, I'll call you Denki."

"You're naming that little cretin?" Kaida all but shouted, finally coming back to herself.

Lia looked at her with the most pathetic eyes she could muster, "I can't?"

"You plan to just take it with you?" Ray asked, not looking too keen on the idea, "It's a wild creature, not a pet."

Lia huffed, "Fine." She retracted her hand, Denki tilting his head in confusion.

She waved at the kind creature, Ipo mirroring her, before they all continued their track down the trail. Leaving Denki behind.

The denkyr however, had other plans. Jumping into one puddle and jumping out another to follow closely.

"Guys, Denki is following us," Lia informed the others, trying to hide the smile in her voice.

Kaida sighed sharply, "No shit, it's even using his magic to keep up!" she turned around to glare at Denki, who just stuck out his tongue at the mage and waddled closer to them.

Lia didn't say anything, she just stared at the other two expectantly.

It didn't take long for Kaida to look at Ray, the boy shrugged and Kaida let out a frustrated groan.

"Okay have it your way! If it likes you enough to follow you everywhere you can vlekim take care of it yourself, I don't care," she growled out.

Lia smiled so happily at the two they were actually startled by her reaction, she then scooped up Denki from the ground and settled him on her shoulders for a ride.

"Mine now."

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After a long while they come across a dark and eerie spot near the forest of their destination.

"Is that..." Lia trailed off.

"A blight," Kaida concluded, giving the area a dirty look, "If we're lucky it hasn't affected any spirit-creatures yet."

Right, corruption.

Lia looked at the purring creature on her shoulders, "Is Denki a spirit creature?"

Ray glanced over at them, "No, he's not, it's just a magical creature. Spirit-creatures are a little different," he began explaining, "While some creatures or animals are able to use magic, like Denki here, spirit-creatures are closer to being the magic themselves, they're higher beings with greater power."

"More dangerous too," Kaida chimed in, "normally they aren't violent, if not provoked, but with the blights..."

Lia knew the end of that one, "Once they get tainted, they become corrupted and destructive forces of nature."

So it wasn't just tales from an old book after all.

Suddenly a piercing screech sounded from the blight's direction, followed by rumbling that made Lia stumble with Denki throwing off her balance.

"Like that one," Kaida breathed worriedly, the air tensing.

In the distance a massive being of light could be spotted, slowly being overtaken by black shadows. It struggled and screamed, trying to flee the toxic clutches of the blight.

Lia felt terrible just watching the scene unfold from where they stood, "Should we do something?" she turned to the others.

Ray looked at Kaida for an answer, "We could kill it now, it may be reborn without the blight," Kaida suggested, "But that won't be easy, it's fighting for its life and will put us in considerable danger."

Jay's words echoed in Lia's head. 

That doesn't mean they always win the fight when they're in over their heads.

Lia held Denki tight, "It's in pain, will it die when the blight..."

"No," Ray said, "it'll be corrupt and set out to destroy, bringing the spirit great grief and agony."

But it felt like something was pulling her towards the danger, asking for help...

"Let's put it out of its misery while we still can."