The energy of having finally made a decision carried Oscar through the night, but really he was just heading out to do some scouting and maybe to get a sense of the distance to this mystery-shield.

This new type of [Quest] seemed rather strange, as it did not have a deadline and the reward for fulfilling the hidden objective was–for some reason–remaining hidden as well.

Oscar followed the very same path the expedition would travel tomorrow, and indeed it seemed like the object of the strange tugging was not too far off, since each tug was getting slightly stronger.

Around midnight he finally heard the thirty metre waterfall that Livia had marked on her map, and as he walked further up he saw it was visible in its full majesty with the yellow moon being out.

Oscar felt almost obligated to stop and enjoy the sight of the loud waters cascading–yet somehow not seeming to go anywhere–despite the urgency in his legs. The pond that the water fell into was far too small for the massive volumes, and Oscar could only conclude that it must be far deeper than anybody would suspect at first glance.

Algernon came to land on Oscar’s shoulder for a while, apparently having seen no signs of danger from above, and he was not using any of the signals they had worked out beforehand while Harold was still available to fully translate.

You might have thought it would hurt, what with Algernon having such large, raptorial talons–but in a deft manipulation of wind magic, the magic beast settled with all his speed and weight and it practically felt like being gripped by marshmallows.

Interacting like this with a magic beast was a childhood dream of Oscars, as it was anyone’s who had gotten to see one of the mystical beings across a farm's fields at sunset, or any number of other equally magical ways.

It was something else, standing here and enjoying such a glimmering sight with an equally appreciative animal, just happy to be out on an adventure.

That was until the young owl turned to glare at him, making it clear he wanted them to keep searching by nodding his head for them to move along. Apparently he was not the sort to feel the romance of the open road, not even when lined by sights like this, at least not with his friends. Or is he still thinking I’m a future minion? Hah.

Oscar started walking and let the wondrous sight leave them behind, but after just a few hundred metres more he sensed how the tugging had switched directions on them; it was pointing right back towards the waterfall.

They kept searching for hints throughout the night. Or well, Oscar did.

There was plenty of time to spare after all, with the expedition expected to catch up as the sun approached noon.

When they finally showed up, a sleepy Oscar went to meet them and let them in on what he had figured out.

The ‘shield’ seemed to somehow be below ground, but there was no cave hidden behind the waterfall and no hidden holes anywhere around the rocky gully which the water was spilling from.

They settled for a lunch break, but did not set up a proper camp. Instead Oscar was given two hours to find another hint; after that he would need to catch them up if he aimed to keep searching. Livia knew it would be a loss, of both the Class they had no other sure way of getting–and the cooldown they had just spent–but they could not all keep delaying for every opportunity one of them found.

But luckily Oscar was provided some real help; from an unexpected quarter.

Hyde let Harold know he could certainly take a look deep below ground, if that was where this tugging was truly pointing. Their communication was not quite on the level of the back and forth with Algernon yet–it seemed birds had it far easier with long sentences. But Hyde had his noises too, and for Harold it translated to words, but the mosswolf definitely needed to work on it some more. It was not something that came naturally. Wolves generally used body language when something needed said, which was not that often. But mosswolves in particular relied primarily on their sense of smell.

Oscar was immensely grateful, but to Hyde it seemed like easy work. The soil around the waterfall was plenty wet after all.

The rest of the expedition knew the gist of what was going on, and so happily settled in to observe whether or not they managed to find anything.

But the mosswolf used its strange abilities to simply dig into the earth until he seemed to turn almost ethereal and start to sink down as if swimming in the moist soil.

There was not much to see really, after that.

Another hour gone and the decision for the expedition to keep moving soon was looking all the more sensible.

The mosswolf appeared a lot smarter than more common hunting dogs, but it still had very little to go on down there. ‘Find a lost shield’. In a place where it was impossible to see where you were going. The road was calling.

But Hyde was no quitter; and he understood something of what this task meant for his partner’s brother.

Deep below ground he found a strange world of insects and mud, but it was a lot different than beneath the kauri. Down here there was no room for caves or the like, a few times he ran into some dug out dwellings, but it was very hard finding a hint of anything larger.

He spent nearly another hour heading downward, but the hidden, unguarded cave full of treasure and magic gear that they’d been hoping for was nowhere to be found.

Hyde knew their time was limited and so finally decided to give it up and started turning back upward, but on a hunch he took a different route than the one he’d come down through, to cover more ground if nothing else.

That was when he finally ended up lucky, not too far from the surface, maybe a mere ten metres deep–there was a hollow that seemed to have had its walls and roof lined with hundreds of rocks, but that was no obstacle when approaching from below.

Once Hyde clambered inside there was no light at all to see by, but the dank air was giving the mosswolf a feel for the room. He started touching all around carefully–more and more convinced there was no danger, and then slowly started discovering the strange rock-covered walls–then his paw suddenly hit something and he yelped.

That hurt even more than hard rock should. They’d been hoping for a cavern with enough light to search by, but in a hollow like this just feeling around had to be good enough, and it was–as long as you avoided jamming your toe right into a large hunk of metal.

Although smelling closer, the bulky thing seemed to also hold a hint of treated wood.

Hyde had to conclude that this was either it–or else they were just unlikely to find the thing in one lone day of looking.

Oscar had been waiting up above, eager but feeling the pressure slowly rising as well.

When the expedition ended up leaving him behind, with only Algernon for company to fly up and make sure the area stayed safe–Oscar started feeling abandoned, but he realised that was what he preferred.

Failure or success, he would rather have either without them all staring holes in his neck as he tried to work all this out.

On reflection it seemed that the nature of this [Quest] was quite different, rather than challenging you and making sure you were prepared to level your Class further; it seemed to be trying to teach something.

But what did that mean for the hidden objective, did he need to learn something extra from the experience besides how to obtain the objective? Maybe I have to figure out how to best teach Livia how she’s gonna use her shield? Damn, there not being a deadline really stretches the possibilities. But then again, it is supposed to reward me with a Class. It can’t be meant to take too long, surely.

As he was waiting a commotion from above suddenly interrupted his thoughts, and he looked up to notice it was Algernon; but he was getting attacked by what looked like some other bird of prey. The thing had a brown body but emerald-green wings, and even seemed to be sporting a laurel crown of sorts.

Not having seen what happened, Oscar had to guess that the beast had tried to launch an attack from above, only to have the wind-attuned owl sense their approach and dodge at the last second.

Now the two were going at it, but despite the wild tumble of wings and talons fighting for position and leverage, they seemed to barely be touching each other. Blood had been drawn; by Algernon–but the attacking beast seemed more focused on trying to throw some type of spore from its wings in his face; but gusts kept getting in the way and leaving the owl clean.

Oscar looked around desperately for a way to help, but even if he’d taken his bow off the carts earlier it would have been impossible to get a clean shot with the way they were almost fencing in all four dimensions. He considered chucking a rock, but Algernon looked to be gaining the upper hand so he held off on taking the risk.

If he had to guess then the spores must be some sort of paralytic that was meant to leave the other bird defenceless, but as long as it was not touching him then the agility of Algernon seemed to be winning over.

When the owl drew blood for the fourth time it seemed the strange, enlarged shrike grew too offended to stand further humiliation; it gave a last outraged shriek and then it was gone… But not before Algernon expertly lifted the laurel crown it had been sporting.

Apparently he liked the look, because he deftly manipulated it onto his own head before landing on Oscar again; fully unscathed.

Oscar couldn’t help but be impressed by the display; that’s the law of the forest right there, it seems. But he still had to give the bird a questioning look.

Algernon managed to convey how that was the bird who thought he was the king around here, and that he’d accepted Algernon passing through originally–but now grew irate when they had decided to stop. Leading to the owl needing to establish that he moved along at his own pace, and not on some stuck up, overgrown flock-bird’s beck and call.

Now they just needed for Hyde to show back up with good news before something else happened.

Livia was feeling a bit of guilt over leaving their youngest member behind, after being the one encouraging him to take on the challenge. But at least Harold seemed surprisingly fine with it, he trusted his brother to accomplish the challenge, or at least to make it out safe.

In fact Roldy told her his first thought when learning of Oscar getting his shot at a new form of [Quest], even on his first day of being eligible for the System was that it was well-deserved after all his waiting and helping them all with their Classes for so long, and he also understood why Oscar preferred to go at it mostly alone.

Livia took encouragement from that and focused on how as long as they reached their mark by tonight then by tomorrow evening they would definitely be reaching civilization–even if just in the form of some smaller village. That was for sure something every one of them craved badly after such an extended journey.

Oscar would simply find out more, and if they happened to need to buy shovels and send a few people back to accomplish the task then so be it; but then the rest of them could at least stay around some other people and even let their guest travellers carry on their trip without them.

They trudged along, many of them looking over their shoulders and clearly speculating over how Oscar was doing; but when they reached their proposed campsite there was still no word.

There was not much else to it than getting set up and hopefully they would see either him or Algernon arrive during the night with some further word. Hopefully of success, or at least some danger we can manage.