Heading west, one after the other, along the narrow path that continued to make its way through the tangled forest. It was barely wider than their shoulder width. Elsie led the way, followed closely behind by Ailbe, Faye, and Aelric coming up the rear. Strange animal cries and noises echo through the trees. They listened to them for twenty minutes or so as they trekked through the slightly overgrown path.

After about 30 minutes of walking, the path widened to approximately two metres across and on the edge of the path's right was a moss-covered signpost, on top of which sat a large crow. The arms of the signpost read 'north' and 'east', and the group took a few seconds to decide which way to continue

"Good afternoon," came a voice from somewhere. Ailbe, Faye, and Aelric instantly drew their weapons and stood together with Elsie, facing outwards. They'd practised this many times, although usually with more people. Elsie turned every which way, narrowing her eyes to look for any sign of movement, attempting to find the person or creature amongst the trees. Tension within the four only grew when nothing was seen.

It was a good minute before Elsie tilted her head inquisitively toward the crow, unsure but thinking that it could have only come from it; the only other living thing. "Good afternoon?" She felt quite stupid speaking to a bird. 

Once again, the crow spoke, "Where are you headed?" 

The four were all bewildered by the talking bird, having seen some strange things before but never a talking animal.

Faye stepped forward with both her blades pointed at the bird. She grew up knowing to always be on the defensive and have her wits about her, so she always carried her Daisho with her, which is a matching pair of samurai swords. "We're looking for two goblins. You know, small, sinewy creatures with brown, scaly skin. They have something-" She stopped, not wanting to give too much away.

"One Gold piece will buy my advice," the crow stated confidently, not fazed by the sudden attack on his life.

"One Gold Piece? To a talking bird? I don't think so," Faye exclaimed, still aiming her weapons at the crow. "I think I'll just choose to kill you and go east."

Ailbe nodded. "East sounds a lot better than putting our trust in a greedy, talking bird." She wasn't going to mention the killing part, nor would she partake in it. 

Not totally listening to what the girls were saying, Aelric merely narrowed his eyes up at it. "Who's to say it's worthy advice? How about you talk before payment and I'll deem it's worth?"

The Crow tilts its head at him. "Well, I saw one of the goblins you seek, all for the price of one gold piece."

Still not feeling completely comfortable talking to an animal, Elsie gulped before speaking, "How do we even know that you will give us the right information? Are you going to fly overhead and show us the way?"

The crow looked disgruntled if a crow could even look disgruntled, and it stated, "If you do not want the advice, then be on your way. Choose which path you should take, north or east?"

Aelric threw his hands up in the air. "Fine, give the damn bird the gold."

Faye spun around, now pointing one blade at Aelric and the other at Ailbe, who carried the group's gold. "Don't give it anything. We'll head east and that's that."

"No, we won't. Who put you in charge? This is a democracy, not communism," Aelric spat back.

"The three of you, when you started listening to a bird."

Aleric heard Ailbe sigh, and he shook his head in frustration. "Fine, you go off then, and we might join you IF the crow tells us to." As stupid as it sounded to him to say this, he knew he had won the argument, and couldn't help but look smug about it.

Faye didn't move, just continued to glare at him while Ailbe reached for the gold she had and took out one piece. Walking over to the post, Ailbe placed the gold atop it and stepped back. 

The crow shuffled across from its position on the top sign on the right, labelled 'north', to stand over the gold. "One of the goblins you seek still has the item, and you'll find him north."

"Well, that was useful. I suppose we head north to certain death now?!", Faye mumbled sarcastically. Not waiting for an answer, she trudged off in that direction.

"Thank you, but why does a crow need Gold Pieces?", Elsie asked.

The Crow replied, "30 pieces are needed for Yaztromo to turn me back into a human." Elsie nodded, accepting that as a satisfactory answer. As she remembered what the wizard had said about his birds giving him information. Then she bid the Crow farewell and followed Faye north, with the others behind her.

They walked along the path in silence, as Faye was still fuming over her conflict with the others. How could they have been thoughtless in giving gold to a bloody bird? Although she wasn't able to think long on this, as not too far down the northern path she heard footsteps and arguing voices ahead. Faye stopped, stopping the other three as well when they caught up.

The voices grew louder and they had to make a quick decision. Without speaking a word, they exchanged glances with one another; Aelric, Faye, Elsie, and... that was it. Ailbe had disappeared. They looked around them but couldn't see her. Ailbe had chosen in that split-second of hearing the voices, to carefully hide behind the bushes, and was surprised that no one had joined her. She didn't want to risk any danger these noisy things might put them in.

However, the three stood waiting, with their weapons at the ready. Waiting for... the two tall, spindly creatures, clad in tattered cloth, over which they wore chainmail jackets to come into view. If memory served Faye correctly, they are called HobGoblins. When they saw the three of them standing there, they stopped arguing and drew swords to attack.

Aelric was first in for the attack, not even considering the two women beside him could have been thinking about starting. He swung his glaive at the first creature's head but he had to leap out of the way of the creature's sword at the last minute and only cut its arm. Elsie thrust her sword at the second creature, who didn't have time to react and struck his shoulder. Faye had been planning to keep up the defence and watch their backs, but she enjoyed bloodshed too much. When her "friends" were out of the way slightly, she spun with both blades facing out, partially to show off, but also to slice through both HobGoblins. The creatures weren't ready for this, they weren't the smartest, and she left two parallel gashes in each one's side.

Aelric and Elsie lunged again while the HobGoblins' attention was on their sides and the pair pierced the creatures' abdomens simultaneously. As they pulled their blades out, Faye, still being cocky, knelt on one knee and stretched her arms out to either side of her. Her blades sliced through the back of their knees and the HobGoblins crumpled to the ground.

With the thud of each HobGoblin, Ailbe rejoined the fighting trio from her place of hiding. Aelric wiped his sword of blood and teased, "Glad you could finally join us after all the hard work is done." Ailbe threw him a look that could kill and he fell silent.

"It was good to watch you all working as a team. Although Faye, next time try not to be so dramatic," Ailbe advised, kneeling over the HobGoblin's skeletal frames, patting them down. She found three gold pieces, a tiny brass flute, and two maggoted-ridden biscuits. As well as a necklace made of mouse skulls around the first one's neck. She took the lot and packed it all away in her backpack.

"Why do you get the loot?", Faye asked as she stood up and watched Ailbe. Confused why she shouldn't be the one to have the first pick instead."

Ailbe shrugged. "I was the only one smart enough to check for it." 

"But you hid behind a tree," Faye demanded as if that were reason enough to give the others the loot. Least of all, it should convince the other two to back her up. But Elsie wanted none of it, inadequate loot nor this tiresome argument, and Aelric was more interested in cleaning and sheathing his sword.  

"Yes, and you were acting, not fighting." Ailbe patted Faye on the shoulder as she walked past to start north again, with Elsie in tow. Faye turned to follow behind, but not before heaving a giant defeated sigh. Then eventually Aelric followed, knowing he'd soon catch them up.

The group continued in an unspeaking single file down the northern path. It had narrowed again to the width of their shoulders, the occasional branch prodding them as they passed by. To the left of the path, Elsie noticed a large hole in the ground with a diameter of some three metres. She halted, unwilling to go much further. Unless one of the goblins they seek were down there. "Guys, should we check this out?"

Walking closer to the hole than Elsie was, Faye and Ailbe noticed it was sloping down into the darkened depths of the Earth. The pair looked down into the hole, wondering what could be down there. Each had their own thoughts but were both thinking that part of the hammer could be down there. Elsie spoke up again since no one had answered her, "Do you think we should go down there?"

"Yes, of course," Faye said without hesitation.

Ailbe pursed her lips to the side, still giving it thought. "I don't think anything good can be down there, but I'm curious. So if we can all perform as a team, like the three of you did back there, with whatever created this hole, then I'm all for going in."

"All right," Elsie said. "Aelric, what are your thoughts?" All three heads turned to where Aelric had stood at the back, but he was no longer standing behind them. Instead, Elsie had noticed that he was already heading down into the hole. "Aelric, we were discussing this first," she called after him. ... It was useless, he was out of sight now.

They all rushed in after him.