Fording a river is a much easier prospect than media would make it seem. The water barely put up a fight, moving anemically over a broad and stony section. Having a big stick to check depth certainly didn’t hurt, and Karen didn’t even soak her yoga pants above the knee. No oxen were lost. No wagon tongues were broken.

After that it was a simple thing to stalk up the bank until encountering a smaller fork that shot north. By the time that happened the sun had risen to greet the day and start to begin its work of breaking the chill that hung in the mountain air.

Slogging for miles through the mud and the moss of unknown terrain while barefoot and in a constant state of fearful alert takes a toll. When hunting something unknown – and particularly when there is no reason to be confident about doing so – every teeny innocuous noise is a threat and every flash of movement is a hidden attacker. A dull ache developed in her hand and Karen had to exert conscious effort in relaxing her white-knuckle grip. This process was repeated until the sun was well above the mountains and the ache crept all the way to the elbow.

The spirit’s sudden voice gave her a small jolt of surprise.

How can you tell?

Stab it until it stops moving. What kind of a question is that?

Karen shrugged, noticing a tightness in her neck on the right side. You get super longwinded sometimes. It’s just background noise after a while.

That wasn’t so difficult.

The spirit’s dismissal did feel like it had hung up a phone call on her, and in an ominous ‘something is going to happen to you’ fashion. She was the one who hangs up calls, not the other way around, and some five-watt incandescent without a body of its own wasn’t going to flip the script. She would have directed that thought as hard as she was able if it weren’t for the untimely external distraction.

The spirit had told her she was not yet able to feel a soul, and she wasn’t exactly sure what a soul was supposed to feel like, but the hackle raising sensation washing over her now was as good a guess as she could have managed. It was like staring through a doorway into the pitch dark and knowing that somewhere in there the darkness was staring back.

And the darkness was eager to show itself. Flooding kept the banks clear of large plants and packed with stones of all sizes, giving the area a hold-my-beer level of dangerous footing. Down by the waterline, the largest of the stones lifted up, then turned to regard her.

Outside of its large stature and blood-red horror film eyes, it looked almost ordinary. She’d been expecting something with a flaming shell and smoking maw, blasting out gouts of lava between mouthfuls of hapless villager. What she got was something that, on its worst day, was a mean looking bastard that might chase Darwin back to the Beagle then stalk the beach and hurl turtley expletives. Maybe he’d yell, “You'll regret this, and you may regret this a lot sooner than you think!” over the course of two and a half minutes.

It’s lumbering turn to face her reinforced the precocious curmudgeon image. But then it charged.

Gravel exploded behind him as he thrust forward in an amphibian peel out. Stones caught on his marginal shell were themselves marginalized, turned over, and tossed aside with scarcely any loss of momentum. His beak opened to loose a furious ‘SKREEEEEEEE,’ revealing what looked like a gateway to some fresh new hell. He was a freight train, and he had a big haul to unload at the depot on the corner of Karen and fucking die.

The skree was an extremely persuasive argument that this was dumber than all get out, and Karen made a snap decision to return to Earth and become a slave to a legion of mantis men. Her baby parts didn’t even work, how bad could it be? Those new plans were foiled as exercising the better part of valor was under difficult time constraints, and her unsteady backpedal became a lunge to the side. The tip of her spear barely registered a scuff on the knobby shell as the beast moved past, the anemic thrust delivered as an afterthought.

The beast certainly had the momentum of a freight train, but it also had the turning power of a freight train. It rumbled to a halt, stopping just short of the tree line and slinging loose stones into the greenery. His tail was pointed to her, and his movements clumsy as he tried to correct his orientation.

Karen recognized the opportunity, the visible weakness adding steel to her spine. She charged forward, managing to thrust hard into a back leg before it had made a half turn. It felt like stabbing a little pine tree, and she’d barely managed to stick a couple inches of the tip into the gray log even with her full weight behind it. The sharp beak and long neck tried to snap out, desperate though its assailant was woefully out of snapping range. The beast was a Sherman tank with the turret jammed. A stationary turn was out of the question, and it charged, curving back toward the water.

Wanting to exploit the weakness, Karen followed, stepping over the smoking blood it had left behind. The invincible charge, with the addition of an injured leg, had become a vincible limp. She stalked in that bloodstained wake, hungry for the victory it hinted at. She found it where the tortoise was attempting to reenter its lair.

Slung low with long legs extended it tried to enter the cave hidden in a ridge by the water. Rocks jutting from above hung low, forcing the monster to scrape across the ground to make the fit. That’s how Karen found it as she rounded the corner. Face down, legs wide, that’s the way it likes to slide. Before the back half could follow the front half into its turtle lair, which was probably a kick ass abandoned subway station connected to a sewer, she positioned herself to take advantage of her enemy’s exposed weakness.

Billiards had never been Karen’s game. Her husband had enjoyed it, and she would indulge him if no one else was willing and he wanted an opponent that wasn’t himself. Spending time with him, especially during his decline, was time well spent despite finding the game tedious. But being such an untalented player didn’t stop her from taking aim, lining up her cue, and throwing an absolute stunner of a hit into the exposed seven ball, sinking the spearhead far enough to hide it.

The tortoise didn’t like that. Not one bit. A direct hit to the thermal exhaust port had been known to down larger foes, and being made into an unwilling popsicle never landed anyone in the havin a good time hall of fame. An enraged SKREEE echoed against the walls of the nest. He involuntarily jumped up, or attempted to, banging his shell on the rock mouth. The claws on his feet dug scratches in the stone as it desperately tried to move himself deeper. Karen meanwhile had a death grip on her spear, relentlessly jamming it in an attempt to churn turtle butter.

Turtle butter, unfortunately, was not fated to be on the menu. The demon yelled out a final time, now sounding weak and desperate. Seconds later it poofed. Woosh. Gone. Karen almost dropped her spear in shock as it fell through a cloud of vapor instead of mixing more demon innards. The cloud spread over the ground like the graveyard from thriller and, faster than it takes Michael to turn into a weird werecat thing, dispersed.

“Fuck me.” Karen said breathily. Her heart was hammering but her nerves felt steady, at least until the sudden icy rush washed over her more intensely than it ever had. She did drop her spear then, but it went unnoticed as she braced against the sensation.

“Fuck me.” This time it was more surprised and less resigned. The frozen feeling quickly fled leaving her thanksgiving full.

After consideration, she actually had. Even if accidental, it was more or less what it had told her to do. As irksome as the thing was, it sometimes knew what it was on about.

As if I could lose to a turtle. Pathetic.

What is that? Killing the thing wasn’t enough? The shine on Karen’s bravado tarnished a bit. She had already felt the satisfaction of a job well done and was not eager for a second attempt.

A dissatisfied groan interrupted the spirit.

Ok, where do I find a core then? Did the mist… turn into one? I don’t see anything around here.

There wasn’t anything around, not even a drop of blood from where the monster had been. Even the spearhead was as clean as the day she found it in that sad looking barrel, and It was the only thing remaining under that lip of rock that didn’t look like nature put it there.

Let me get this straight, you want me to crawl into the turtle hole and root around until I find some monster’s garbage? Thanks, no thanks.

The energizing cold from turtlemurder had put a spring in her step and Karen was already walking away, spear in hand, before she’d finished thought-speaking.

Like I give a fuck. I can join another elf Costco. Or they can send someone who wants to climb into a stinking hole now that I’ve done all the heavy lifting.

Then they should bring a spear.

This stopped her dead in her tracks. Though she’d already considered that, hearing it thought out loud really brought that issue to the fore. Would it really be that much of a waste? A visible battle of emotions played out as she worked through her Sophie’s choice. Doing something she’d decided not to do or leave money on the table. Turtle hole. Money. Turtle hole… money? Money.

The walk back was sulky and short. Also, it was conspicuously silent with the spirit being keen enough to know gloating would push Karen over the edge and buy her a one-way ticket back to the COPWAPTDT.

For the second time that day Karen got down on her knees in front of the little cave and eyed a stinking hole. What am I looking for exactly? A core? I thought turtles would just eat the whole apple.

Wait, there might be another one in there? Karen’s resolve was beginning to waver.

Right. Showing her level of trust for her bond, Karen immediately materialized the knife from her ring and, finding it was difficult to crawl with it in her hand, placed it in her teeth like a pirate. You can’t spell pirate without irate.

The stink, already powerful on the outside, only got worse as she moved deeper. The ceiling opened up a bit after a few feet, with the low hanging stone giving way to gnawed roots, and the extra space made it feel less like a deathtrap. The whole chamber was large enough to sleep two Karens comfortably, if those two Karens were somehow able to ignore the filth on the floor and the powerful, moist disgustingness.

It took only a few seconds of rooting around in the dark to find the core. It was nestled in a little niche in the cave wall, held almost like a statue in a church alcove. She snatched it and stored it away, opting to attempt the speedrun record for cave exiting rather than inspect the goods. Someone must have bribed the customs officer, because the goods continued to go uninspected as she rushed out into the stream. Cleaning the reeking filth away was the highest priority, and Karen gagged as she pulled tiny fish bones from the fabric of her pants.

“Not worth it. Not worth it. Not worth it.” Karen chanted her newfound mantra as she continued to scrub.

Whatever had been living in that hole before a Juvenile Demon Tortoise moved in was not something Karen wanted to meet. It had to be some kind of filth monster. Something that preyed on peace and joy and sprayed its excretions to make the entire world unclean. Her sweat still stank horribly from whatever changes source was wreaking, but this was on an entirely new level. A pervasive, hateful level. Maybe it was trying to reek her to death. If it would make the stink go away, maybe she would let it.

---

Teehee that was so fast you must be a talented hunter heehee I’m so pretty. The heady feeling of being stuffed with fresh source combined with a windfall payday can only go so far in blunting a long practiced pettiness. Remembering the attendant’s kind remarks and fastidious service really ground Karen’s gears, the same way she’d like to grind the woman’s beautiful, smug face into a delicate powder then sell it as some kind of fancy spice to the baker.

But the money… the money was burning a hole in her pocket. Or her ring. Magic is weird. The herbalist had a number of things that could improve her potion making, or so the spirit claimed. She’d be able to work with new techniques, use new ingredients, create things with new effects or improve the existing one. It was all very tempting.

Also, alchemy was the only thing she liked in this new world. Training was painful. Fighting was terrifying. The accommodations were lacking. The food was boring. The people were rude and standoffish, and that’s not even counting the absolutely dreadful looking Mrax with whom she’d yet to really meet. Alchemy was the only thing she liked. It was so much like cooking in a way, but instead of a good meal she’d get something so powerful and impossible it would have gone for millions back on Earth.

Yet her feet still found their way to somewhere she hadn’t been before. Like most everything else in the village, it was one of a kind and entirely without competition.

‘Clothing crafted from fine textiles of the greater empire.’

I wish they would go away with words.

The spirit responded with a single grunted chuckle, a first as far as Karen had noticed. It had to have a sense of humor; the thing said its personality was based on hers. This sparked a sudden realization that she hadn’t laughed, not once, since she ran over the dog thing in her car.

She loved to laugh. It was literally the first thing on her dating profile, right up there with going on adventures and loving to travel. Here she was doing the second two without doing the first. Why was that? It was a sobering thought, and this was the longest she’d been sober in years.

Buying clothing always cheers her up. She pushed the door and walked in.