After breakfast, Scarlet and Keera continued to move, Scarlet dragging a little, due to her lack of sleep. Not that she would have admitted it, so she did her utmost to keep her head up and her senses sharp, even if she wanted nothing more than curl up somewhere and sleep for a while. They kept themselves near the water, staying on the grassy, solid strip between the waterline and the forest, ready to react to any threat coming from either area. At the same time, both of them were carefully looking for crystal monsters, knowing that every monster they killed was an extra crystal in their pouches and a little more power for their monsters.

The first shift of hunting was left for Keera and her badgy, even if Scarlet kept an eye open and Cyca’s crystal at the ready, just in case badgy got in over its head, fighting the monsters lurking in the depth of the lake. Scarlet had formed a few theories regarding the habitats of crystal monsters and the influence of habitat to abilities, even if they were rather rough and limited. The few examples she had seen so far hinted that monsters like badgy had problems with monsters living in water, partially because one of badgy’s biggest strengths was to use the ground against his foe, tripping them or using his control to create small earth-spikes. In addition, it seemed as if the badger was not a huge fan of water in general, so, after about an hour, they decided to have Crysna out to deal with monsters in the water and Badgy would deal with those in the forest.

Shortly after Crysna was let out and wrapped himself around Scarlet’s arn, head resting on her shoulder, Scarlet felt that he wanted to take to the water. She allowed it, his hunting drive keying her in that there was a monster in the water. A short moment after Crysna leapt into the water with a soft splash, a second,larger splash occurred and Crysna and his prey landed on the shore. It was a strange, fat carp-like crystal monster that instantly started to flop around, apparently trying to get back into the water. Not that it had a chance, Crysna was following right on its fins, instantly wrapping around the fish, stopping its ineffectual struggles and starting to viciously bite into its projected body. Just seconds later, it was over, the carp starting to flicker, allowing Crysna to get the final blow and he started to gorge himself on the precious energy, strengthening his own core.

“I think Crysna would like to stay in the area.” Keera remakred with a smirk, as the snake was slithering back towards Scarlet, obviously planning to take up his accustomed position on her shoulder, carrying the crystal of its vanquished foe in his mouth.

“I agree.he seems rather happy.” Scarlet agreed, even as she got used as a towel by Crysna wrapping around her leg to slither up her body. Still, he had done a good job, so, after he had dropped the crystal into her hand like a dutiful dog, he gently stroked his head, just like he seemed to enjoy it.

“We’ll have to see if it is worth it. While I would love for him to get stronger, the same goes for Cyca and Badgy. Maybe we could fashion a fishing-rod from some wood.” Scarlet continued, laughing at her own joke.

“Yeah, right.” Keera joined in, obviously happy that the tension from the morning had been dispelled by a bit of walking.

They continued on, Crysna taking to the water three more times, each time landing, wrapping and destroying a fish-crystal monster in short order. During the same time, Keera and Badgy managed to take down a single rat-like crystal monster that she had spotted in the forest.

The two of them found a nice spot, large, clean rocks facing the sun, to have their lunch. It was a spot that made one want to linger, to enjoy the sun and its warmth. After they had taken out and eaten the rest of their breakfast and some of the foodstuff they had gathered over the days, Scarlet leaned back against one of the rocks, closing her eyes and enjoying the sun. Both, Cyca and Crysna were had taken up position next to her, enjoying the rays and getting petted at the same time. To Scarlet, it was paradise, the warmth of the sun on one side, the heated rock on the other and a sense of security, thanks to her two monsters next to her.

Nearby, Keera decided to emulate Scarlet, finding a good spot to catch some rays while bonding closer with her monster. As she did, she thought about the time she had spent alone in Albertina and what people had told her. Nobody had mentioned anything about bonding with their crystal monsters but it seemed such an obvious idea. Everyone she had talked to had referred to them as monsters, talking about them as if they were tools, weapons, not living beings. Maybe that idea came from the fact that they turned into rocks when they were defeated, making their existence something fundamentally different compared to humans and similar living beings. Part of her wanted to ask Scarlet but when looking at the other, she couldn’t do it. Scarlet looked so uncharacteristically relaxed, only a small trace of vigilance on her face, almost as if she was asleep. Instead, she pushed her question away, focusing on the smooth, almost carapace-like surface of Badgy. He seemed to enjoy the treatment just like Scarlet’s monsters did. Maybe that was the reason why Scarlet’s monsters seemed to be easier to control, that they wanted to work with their master.

Softly, so that she wouldn’t disturb Scarlet, she started to talk with her Badgy.

“Hey little guy, do you like this?” she asked, as she gently stroked his back. Through their bond, she felt something that she thought was acceptance and enjoyment, similar to earlier. Emboldened by the apparent communication, she continued.

“Do you think you could behave better? If I don’t need to focus so much on you, to keep you in line, I would be able to control a second monster, that way, we all would be safer, including you.” she asked but the content feeling she was getting from her monster didn’t change. Still, she didn’t feel discouraged, continuing to softly speak with him while stroking his back.

What Keera didn’t know was that Cyca had very sharp ears and in Scarlet’s relaxed state, she had opened her mind to her monsters, using their connection to exchange sensations. It was a bit of an experiment on Scarlet’s part, she wanted her monsters to know each other, to learn that the other was a partner in combat, not a prey to be devoured. If she could get them to understand that simple concept, their battle-power would go up by a lot.

Amusement flickered through their bond, Scarlet listening to Keera’s soft voice but at the end of the day, she was doing the same, just their methods were different.

“You neglected your lessons yesterday.” Scarlet mentioned, not opening her eyes, simply reminding Keera that she had something else to do.

“I’ll take care of protecting us in the afternoon, so push yourself.” she continued and, even without any psionic power, she would have been able to feel the hesitation emanating from Keera. She could even understand it, the psionic exercises were difficult and painful but at the same time, they were the fastest way to strengthen Keera’s powers, if Keera put in the effort. And Scarlet was making sure that she was.

A moment later, Scarlet opened her eyes, looking over to Keera. Seeing that the other had pushed her monster back into his crystal and was submerging herself in the exercise, Scarlet nodded in acceptance. Keera was mostly accustomed to following orders, taking Scarlet as a higher authority than her own mind. That was the right was to condition her and it was coming along nicely. She watched as Keera started to sweat, knowing that the exercises were scaling in intensity and it wouldn’t take long for her to keel over. She contemplated for a moment and decided that a bit of kindness would help in driving the lesson that obeying her was the right thing to do so Scarlet got up, readying herself to catch Keera when she eventually finished.

A minute or two later, she heard a soft grunt from Keera and the other started to sack, unconscious. Mentally, Scarlet made a note to scold Keera later, telling her off for taking the risk of banging her heads on the rocks as she quickly moved, catching her before that happened. It didn’t take long for Keera to regain consciousness and when she did, she found herself on her back, with a bit of cloth under her head.

“You shouldn’t do those exercises on rock, you almost cracked open your head.” Scarlet gently reprimanded her, as soon as Keera sat back up.

“Come, let us continue on our way. It will give you something to think about, besides the headache.” Scarlet continued, offering Keera a hand-up.

For the afternoon, Scarlet decided to let Cyca take up the role of the protector and for a few hours, they continued on their way without much luck when it came to finding monsters. Cyca managed to use her lightning powers to strike one of the bird-like monsters from the sky, but that was it. It got to the point that Scarlet considered letting Crysna out, hoping to find monsters in the water, when she felt a surge of fear coming from Cyca. It was strong enough to make Scarlet stumble and, caught unprepared, she was pressed to keep control over Cyca, to prevent her monster from simply darting into the forest.

“Run!” she managed to gasp, knowing that the panic from Cyca most likely had a good reason, she started towards the forest when a shadow in the water caught her attention. Both, Scarlet and Keera were running when a shadow caught up to them, large and looming, big enough that Scarlet took a glance over her shoulder and what she saw almost caused her knees to buckle.

Intellectually, she had known that Crystal Monsters could become big, huge even. She had already seen a strange plant-creature the size of a small house, but the monster that was raising its head from the water was eclipsing it, both in size and intimidation-factor.

It looked like a massive snake, the head shaped different from Crysna’s and strangely, the head had whiskers. Her mind was managing to take in the small details, like the shape of the head or the way the sun was glinting on the scales but trying to conceptualize the entire creature only made her shudder in fear. Just the looming head was easily three meters in size, sitting on ten meters of body above the water. She had no idea how much body was hidden in the dark waters and she didn't’ really want to know, she just wanted to get away.

When she heard a strange, hissing noise, Scarlet decided that she needed to improve their chances. The noise sounded like Crysna when he used his water-attack, only dialed up a few orders of magnitude and Scarlet had no desire to find out how much that would hurt. With pure, mental strength, she forced Cyca to take the last spot, mentally commanding her monster to use the booming flash they had used when faced with the sounder of wild hogs. It might not help against the massive monster behind them, but Scarlet wasn’t willing to force her monster to use anything else, it would have to be enough.

The next moment, two things happened at once, the colours in front of Scarlet were washed out for a split second, thanks to the intense light coming from behind while a thunderclap boomed behind her, thanks to Cyca. However, at the same time, Scarlet felt the ground shaking and tumbled to the side as the massive jet of water coming from the monster dug a trench where she had been running just moments earlier. She felt a sharp pain coming over her link with Cyca and knew that her monster had taken some damage. Following the link, she spotted the cat tumbling over the ground, her body flickering due to the massive damage.

Not leaving her monster behind, she sprinted over, grabbing the cat, while the monster seemed to be a little disoriented from the flash. It allowed Scarlet to flee while pushing Cyca into her Crystal, carrying it with her, while running after Keera.