Jessica looked at Alex's back, it was manlier now, too bad she couldn't get a look under the armor.

They were wandering the northern area now, around where Sarah said Eian had most likely passed.

So far they hadn't encountered anything, that wasn't anything new.

'Stupid Sarah and her stupid ideas.' She sneaked a dirty look at Sarah, whom seemed to be expecting it as she glared back.

How did the group honestly expect her to suffer that horrifying pain?

At least Alex said it was actually her choice.

Though really if you're pressured into something, is it really?

Food for thought, though she shrugged and sighed, she already agreed to it and as her father said 'what's done, can't be undone'.

Still no one could blame her for being afraid of pain.

"Hisss." Monster.

"Ahhh." Jessica jolted and turned to look about.

Eian had already taken position and gouged a deep cut unto what appeared to be an anaconda-sized snake.

Sarah sent a fire-ball at it, which partially set it aflame

It swiped at Eian whom somehow partially dodged, he fell to a knee.

Jessica froze, the monster was as thick as her torso.

Focusing she noticed the muscles on it's body tensing towards her, she jumped sideways on instinct.

Seconds later she noticed it's jaws had missed, she breathed a sigh of relief.

A flash of blue passed and Jessica noticed the snake was on the floor twitching.

"Kill it Jessica." Sarah motioned to the snake with her chin, as if she were her servant.

Sighing loudly, she did.

She still felt a little useless, though hopefully as soon as her guide contacted her that would change.

Alex patted her shoulder in support and gave her a thumbs up, ever the gentleman, he brought a smile to her face.

Eian and Sarah ignored her and everyday she burned to prove herself.

One day, one day for sure she'd show them, she just needed a little time.

She was always raised to be better and she would, that was actually why she even agreed to the magic thing, fighting in the front didn't seem agree with her.

Again, anyone would agree a lady shouldn't be expect her to be good at brawling, though she thought she did alright given the circumstances.

"How long have we been searching round here?" Eian was rubbing his helmet, clearly looking bored.

"About an hour give or take." Sarah's voice was dry as ever.

Soon they stumbled into what looked like a large excavated tunnel, many large holes decorated the inside.

Though partially muddy everything looked pristine.

"I think it's a snake tunnel. They must live in the holes there." Sarah's voice was a whisper in the wind.

"What do we do?" Jessica felt herself lightheaded and her eyes kept glancing at the holes.

"Let me think." Sarah crossed her arms and glared at the pit.

There was a moment of silence and Jessica began scanning the entire forest.

'Hopefully there aren't any more about.' She scanned the shrubs and trees for any sigh of monsters.

"Alright I think I have an idea." Sarah's voice broke her out of her thoughts.

"Huh?" Jessica turned to look at Sarah.

"What is it?" Eian tilted his head.

"Simple we'll fill the entrance with flammable material and I'll burn it. The smoke should kill the monsters inside." Sarah shrugged.

"Won't monsters come out?" Alex couldn't keep the skepticism from his voice.

"Maybe, but the fire should burn them. We'll be a little back as well ensuring they don't have a clear shot at us." Sarah narrowed her eyes at Alex.

"Sounds good. Alex use your axe. I think I can bring down trees with my powers by uprooting them." Eian stepped in front of Alex and pointed at some trees.

"Ensure you don't drop overly large trees or we won't be able to pull and stack them. Jessica help Alex, I think your sword can cut some of the thinner branches. " Sarah shrugged and pointed at some thinner trees.

They kept working and stacked the wood into the entrance for hours.

Sarah kept watch over the group to not be taken surprise by the snakes, that turned out to be a good idea.

On two separate occasions a single snake came and attempted to eat them.

Sarah easily paralyzed them and told Jessica to kill them, it seemed she really wanted her to suffer and for Sarah it seemed the sooner the better.

Under their hard work they managed to fill the pit almost entirely and Sarah set it aflame.

Sarah told them to keep throwing stacks of wood into the pit.

Eventually Jessica could hear painful hissing originating from the tunnel, but with all the wood piled on nothing emerged.

She could see the burning wood shaking and moving.

The hissing grew frantic and gave Jessica goosebumps and she imagined this might give her nightmares in the future.

"Hissss!" Snake.

A burning behemoth slowly emerged from the the stacked wood and crawled it's way out.

It was fully burning and it collapsed into a pile as Sarah sent more fire towards it.

More snakes attempted to emerge, though Eian and Alex kept throwing small logs into the flaming pyre.

Jessica was placed in charge to keeping watch behind them, though she would occasionally glance at the burning pyre.

The inferno was unbearable and the boys had removed some armor from discomfort.

Sarah seemed totally fine with the blazing heat and was coolly keeping watch in case something wanted to emerge.

After everything was sad and done, a pile of crispy snakes were tangled on the entrance.

"Anyone want BBQ?" Eian smirked, Jessica almost gagged at the thought.

"You first man." Alex smiled at Eian.

"Gear up. Let's keep searching." Sarah had a condensing smile on her face as she looked at Alex, Jessica gave her an award-winning glare.

"Roger." Alex sighed and begun gearing along with Eian.

They wandered the north a while more and only encountered a small wolf den.

A group of six wolves attacked, Eian moved in almost a blur, lopping off legs on one and gutting another.

Alex killed one by blocking it's assault and stabbing it's gut.

Jessica let let her wolf impale it's face on a lunge, it was her favorite tactic.

Sarah easily set fire to the remaining two, whom ran away fully on fire.

"Too easy. Should we carry the wolves back to the base?" Eian was looking at the remains of the wolves and turned to look at Sarah.

"Good idea, we don't want to be eating rotten meat, we have no way of preserving it." Sarah nodded along with him.

"I can drag one. Alex how 'bout you?" Eian was looking at Alex.

"Sure man." Alex smiled and nodded.

"Then me and Jessica will be look outs." Sarah was looking at the forest.

They trudged forward as the boys each dragged a wolf back to camp.

Eian had taken the largest, but was still struggling less than Alex, not that Alex asked for help.

Soon they arrived and dumped the carcasses into the hole.

They took a break, it was visibly past mid-day, if that was even a thing when there were two suns.

"Alright people. I think we're close to securing the area, just east from where we came is left. I think it's the safest area, but we can't be too sure." Sarah stated the obvious almost making Jessica want to roll her eyes.

'I just want to bathe with shampoo and I wish I could sleep as well. Ugh.' Jessica looked miserably at their cave, her hair was forming knots.

They explored the east slowly encountering little, though the did run into the body of the bird that they had fought.

Eian mumbled something about unfairness.

Soon enough they only found a dug out warren in the ground, it was plenty big enough for all of them to fit comfy.

It had nothing but chewed animal bones within and large foot prints.

"What lives here?" Jessica got close to Alex, his presence helped her stay calm.

"Who knows. Let's get out and try to kill it. It's definitely big and dangerous." Sarah had her brows furrowed and took a deep breathe.

As they got out they the noticed the prints went everywhere.

"Any chance you could track it with your power?" Sarah turned to look at her, she shook her head.

Sarah shrugged and got back to inspecting the prints.

"Well. Let's check around. We can't have this thing living near our base." Sarah was scanning the surrounding woods.

Wandering about they found nothing for a while.

Maybe prints littered the area and several trees seemed to be missing limbs in the area.

Signs of struggle could also be seen on the ground, torn bushes, broken trees and even the occasional animal bones.

"GROOOO!!!!" Monster.

"Ah!" Jessica turned towards the sound of the beast.

A twelve-foot grey-skinned hairless ape was charging them suddenly, it held a branch the size of a four-by-four and as long as her great sword.

"Shit!" Eian got in front of the monster.

Sarah sent two fire-balls at the beast, it swatted them out of the air, though it's branch caught fire.

Dodging it's swing Eian then slice at it's leg, the beast roared but barreled into Alex, whom attempted to block.

Alex went spinning to the right and she was almost face to face with the beast.

Another fire-ball impacted the monster, but it's hide refused to catch fire easily.

It braced itself to swing at Jessica and her heart seized, last minute she threw herself haphazardly to the left.

It's swing never came, when she looked up Eian had cleaved the beasts side with his sword, she caught when the beast back-handed Eian sending him staggering backwards.

Another fire-ball impacted the beasts face.

"GROOOOO!!!!" The monster almost unhinged it's lower jaw howling.

It charged Sarah whom channeled lightning to the monster, it shrugged off the lightning and was about to lay into her with a branch-swing.

Alex jumped and hugged the branch to restrain it, it tried to dislodge Alex, but he stubbornly held on.

Jessica saw a chance and charged, she swung her sword at it's branch-wielding-hand.

The sword barely dug in and the monster howled at her, it's other hand stretched forth to grab her and she retreated.

Swinging she caught it's stretching hand, which it quickly retracted, it also let go of the branch.

Channeling fire Sarah's attempt at burning the monster was inadequate.

"GROOOOO!!!" It protected itself with it's arm and backed away.

Sarah kept approaching channeling fire, suddenly it lunged at her and punched her hard.

Sarah went flying a few paces and the stream of fire went out.

The beast howled and looked only slightly burnt.

It charged them and then a large stone collided into it.

The beast went down in a tumble and the stone grappled with it.

'Is that Eian?' She stared at the large stone golem wrestling with the monster.

"Jess wait here. Be careful I'll just patch up Sarah real quick. Then we'll go help Eian." Alex had only his long-sword and no shield.

"Yeah." Jessica stared as the struggling duo.

Sparing a glance she noticed Sarah was sitting up and cradling her arm, Alex quickly did a rough patch.

They then ran over to the struggling pair and sent cuts at the monsters flesh.

It's skin was thick and unyeilding, but bit by bit they tore at it like vultures, Jessica managed to gouge out an eye, eliciting a howl.

The golem did most the work and soon it splattered the beast's skull.

She breathed a sigh of relief.

The stone crumbled and reveal that it was indeed Eian within.

"How's Sarah?" Eian was breathing heavily and turned to look.

"Relax, I'll finish healing her now." Alex and the other two ran over to Sarah.

He healed her some more and Jess could clearly hear Sarah berating Alex for tarrying.

"Sorry Sarah, I thought Eian needed help killing the monster." Alex was focusing on her previously broken shoulder and arm.

"Yeah at least he made sure you weren't dead." Jessica couldn't believe how ungrateful she was.

"I could have had internal bleeding! Ughhhh... Never mind. Set up a life-link next time and then rush off to help Eian." Sarah was glaring murderously at Alex.

"Sorry I forgot." Alex coughed nervously and looked at the ground.

"YOU FORGOT? FORGOT!" Sarah scoffed.

"Hey this isn't the place for this." Eian got between Alex and Sarah.

"She should stop going on like this!" Jessica was fed up of Sarah's crap.

"SHUT UP! BOTH OF YOU!" Eian was probably glaring at Jessica then at Sarah, though they couldn't see under the visor.

"Hey man. What's up?" Alex sounded vexed, but lifted his palms trying to placate Eian.

"Monsters could be coming. Let's go, you can both tear out each others hair when we get to base." Eian stretched his hand indignantly at Sarah, whom took it, got up with the help, and snorted then looked away.

"Fine. You're right." Sarah breathed in deeply, exhaled, then began marching back to base.

"Come on Jess." Alex patted her shoulder encouragingly.

They made their way back to base, their first objective to secure the area was complete.