“YOU SAID THERE WOULDN’T BE MONSTERS HERE!”

Erika dived backwards as the argument went on around her, these were only wargs so it wasn't quite as irresponsible but still.

“I SAID THERE SHOULD BE, IT’S A SMALL CAVE DEEP IN THE… ON YOUR LEFT!”

Bjorn kicked hard and swung his heavy one-handed axe, Erika still couldn’t give him his hand back but he’d adapted well, Erika thought he might actually be better with the axe.

“WHY IS THIS ONE FOLLOWING ME!?”

Across from him was Katlin, running back and forth desperately away from a warg pup and waving her arms around. It turns out Alf’s are physically much worse than a human, weaker and more easily tired at least, something about sweat Katlin had said? Katlin had missed her opening shot in the tight confines of the tunnel and was now using her rune covered bow as a stick to jab the pup back whenever it got to close.

“RUN RUN FOR YOUR LIVEEEES!”

Bjorn swatted the tiny thing hard into the wall, Erika could hear its bones breaking as she hurled a pair of [Acid Arrow]’s down the tunnel, burning the faces off the last two adults. Bjorn had been right, this deep in the Wold wargs were practically snacks, but they bred fast enough that some stuck around.

“TAKE THIS BEASTS!!!!”

Barely managing to dodge as a flaming arrow the size of a tree Erika sighed deeply, that was a third step divine art which is a waste AND the warg was nearly dead already! The damn thing was missing an arm!

“Don’t worry… its probably dead! Should I shoot it again?”

“NO.” Chorused Bjorn and Erika together.

Katlin pouted then perked up a bit. “AH right I should get back to the others right and warn them?”

“Warn them?”

“About the terrible peril!”

Bjorn sighed and slung an arm around Katlin’s narrow shoulders. “Kat, it was five wargs including the pup, that isn't peril.”

“They could have been! What if one was the last chosen of Loki! Or they were all Twilight blooded?”

“A WARG CHOSEN ARE YOU CRAZY?!?!”

“THEY COULD HAVE TWILIGHT-BLOOD THOUGH!”

Erika blocked out the bickering and began to loot with her little money-grubbing hands, she had never really had a chance before but she’d discovered after the lotting spree in the city that she liked to gather things, to take all the shiny gold and valuable items and hoard them. Obviously wargs don’t have much to loot on them but a few wore bandoliers and belt pouches. Erika opened them cautiously with the end of a long knife and kicked the contents around rather than touching it, Aesir alone knows how dirty all of it was.

A few flawed gems and shiny rocks later Erika wandered over to the argument and kicked the ground loudly. As the other two finally looked around at her she showed them her loot and nodded at the cave. “Nothing else here, right? Like wargs or treasure?”

Bjorn smiled and looked around for a moment, Erika saw a glimmer in his eye as he activated a divine art of the first circle. A few moments later he shook his head. “Got them all Erika… Katlin you ready to go back?”

Before he could finish that sentence, Katlin had scrambled up and out of the cave mumbling something about fungus traps and tripwires as Bjorn helped Erika climb out, despite only having one hand a veteran ranger was still a veteran and levered the vitki up and out without fuss.

Erika patted herself down, thanked Bjorn and then split the loot with him as Katlin kept jogging away from them.

The Wold didn’t seem as bad as she’d been told really.