Beth felt refreshed and energized. Clearly taking a break was just what the doctor ordered and being away from the others had allowed her to get back to her peak and restored both her physical and mental energy. She even felt she'd be able to deal with listening to the others playing 'I don't spy again'. Not that she was about the test that theory and suggest it. The others seemed similarly refreshed. The effects the statues appeared to have had on the other two appeared to have worn off but they were in good spirits regardless. Nate appeared especially happy to be moving on from the village and to be back on the treetops. Pauline was looking perky too and had a definite spring in her step as they travelled from tree to tree. From the sound of it she had made lots of good notes while exploring the caverns and she was suddenly more knowledgeable about the area than even Nate was able to pick up from the surroundings. She gave a little smirk every time she pointed out a small mark that directed towards the village or the best route to the mountain. To his credit Nate didn't seem to mind in the slightest and was content to let Pauline have her moment in the sun, going slower than he was capable of to let her take the lead.

The three continued to travel at a faster rate thanks to the routes Pauline suggested. Logically you would assume given they were travelling over the treetops in more or less a straight line there would be no shortcuts. But the fact Pauline knew where to stop without having to constantly check for volisear as well as knowing when to start moving to avoid the larger clearings that would only slow them down did allow for their speed to increase not insignificantly. As she was focused more on navigation Nate and Beth naturally fell into conversation as a pair. It was a huge sign of how far they'd come to see how easily they chatted about both personally and irrelevant things given that a few weeks ago Nate had seemingly been ready to leave Beth for dead if she said the wrong thing. Now that image of Beth as a noble tourist was clearly laughable as they had sweat and fought together.

The distance to Naia was hard to discern it felt like every time they looked towards it it changed slightly occurring almost in waves across the mountain like a ripple was going across changing everything as it passed over it. Sometimes they looked up and the mountain looked like it would be barely a days travel away other times it was like they had made no progress at all. This only got worse the closer they got. They never managed to actually see the changes occur and they weren't at any noticeable regularity. Just every once in a while when they weren't paying attention or stopped focussing for a second the mountain would shift a little. Sometimes they couldn't even be sure a change had occurred and were just assuming based off the previous times. But despite the shifts that seemed to be going underway eventually after several days travel they reached the mountain.

This mountain was different to the previous one almost immediately. For one there was no clear route or map to help guide them. The shifting nature of the mountain was known and as such no attempt to map it had been successful. There had been several attempts under the assumption that it might be cycling through designs but all these projects had been given up before baring fruit.

Fortunately the path started reasonably enough while relatively steep it didn't require they to use the ropes for their safety. However this came to an end rather quickly when in all being momentarily distracted the path ahead shifted to resemble the result of a landslide. With a large mound of loose earth that started giving way the minute they began to attempt to climb over it. As such they elected to go around. This happened three more times before it became too much for Pauline.

"I can't deal with this anymore. It just makes no sense." She shouted throwing her notebook to the ground.

Despite it never previously being mapped Pauline had been attempting to map the mountain anyway an attempt that was clearly misguided. She quickly picked up the notebook and brushed it off pulling a face seeing the damage she had done to the thing. Beth suggested they took a small break here as Pauline was clearly in no mood to keep going. They sat with their backs to the landslide and chatted. Well Nate and Beth chatted. Pauline meditated and made notes in her notebook. Nate and Beth kept sharing worried looks but weren't sure what the best next step was in regards to both the mountain and calming Pauline down. Eventually though after she took a final deep breath Pauline looked back up and was ready to set off again.

Turning back towards the landslide they were relieved to see it had vanished again.

"Oh thank the Goddesses!" Nate said looking to the sky as he said so. Beth couldn't help but agree.

They ended up taking several such breaks. Pauline really struggled with dealing with the changing nature of the mountain and required more breaks than their fitness level at that point would allow. But Pauline seemed to almost take personal offence when the mountain changed. These breaks weren't completely without merit as they often coincided with large roadblocks. Beth was aware they could possibly have been dealt with fast by just looking away and back again but that wasn't a guarantee. In fact attempting to do so seemed to almost lock the blockades in place for a time slowing down the trip further. This meant they had to climb over several obstacles that they felt should have simply vanished given enough time but refused to.

Beth was pleasantly surprised by any climbing, mostly because she had some success in distributing her weight on her feet so she wasn't pressing it all down in one place meaning the ground was much much less likely to give way under her feet allowing her to remain grounded even when the way ahead was extremely unsure. In areas where the rock face had to be directly scaled Nate would go first his experience climbing trees proving extremely invaluable. Beth would then get up mostly of her own volition with Pauline bringing up the rear frequently getting hoisted by the other two to help her ascend.

Fortunately while the mountain did seem to shift and the height they'd reached fluctuated they still appeared to be making steady progress. At one point Pauline looked down and it appeared they had only climbed up to just above the top of the treeline and the group had had to pause for multiple hours due to the affect this had on her.

When they were roughly half a day's further climbing from the peak of the mountain, assuming the mountain was the same height as the previous one. Beth's patience was beyond wearing out. Yes it was annoying that the mountain kept shifting and she understood how horrible it was to not feel you could trust your own eyes but on the other hand the journey could have been done in almost a whole day less travelling if they'd kept at pace instead of stopping and starting over and over. It wasn't like it was a continued surprise when the mountain shifted. IT had been shifting the whole time. Yet Nate once again seemed understanding of these issues and was the one who had prompted all the stops whenever it was clear, to him at least, that Pauline was being overwhelmed. Beth had appreciated this reaction a lot more when it was for her benefit but still felt she owed the pair for saving her on the last mountain so didn't make too many comments. She was however, always the one who insisted they set back off again. Sometimes before Pauline was ready to do so resulting in the journey taking even longer. Eventually though after almost a full days further travel they reached the peak.