The sea serpent was a wild animal taking orders from Tavras. Val was a demigoddess with all of the intelligence of a human. Since she lacked the strength to blow the sea serpent out of the water, both figuratively and literally speaking, she would have to settle for outwitting it.

First of all, the sea serpent had no reason to come out of the lake if it saw no threat in the area.

“Stay,” Val told Foofy.

He laid down beside her.

Meanwhile, Val got onto her knees at a height similar to him. She crawled towards the cliff’s edge. As she drew nearer, to the point where she could see the dark water on the far side of the lake, Val pressed herself flat against the ground. Her lower profile meant that she could not see the lake anymore.

So long as she did not have sights on the water, the sea serpent could not have sights on her. It would never know of her approach until she had already reached the pearl.

Val took her sweet time in approaching the cliff. Her movement needed to be quiet, and once she inevitably came back into view of the lake, slow to not attract attention. This brought her to laying within arm’s length of the pearl.

Peering down below, a horrendous black coil encircled the lake. Indeed, Val had been right about the sea serpent.

A hard gulp slid down her throat. Sometimes, she would not mind being wrong every once in a while.

She laid there for a moment in hesitation. All she had to do was make a quick grab for the pearl. For some reason, she felt like an explorer in one of those adventure movies. As soon as she would grab the pearl, the trap would spring. The sea serpent lying in wait would lunge forth from the lake and try to stop her from getting away with the pearl.

In all senses and purposes, she seemed to be in a losing situation. Val had one trick up her sleeve, a good, reliable friend who would love to have a big, shiny ball like this.

With a deep breath, Val leaped up and grabbed the pearl.

Water exploded from the lake below, but she ignored this to shout over the roar.

“Foofy, fetch!” The pearl hurled from her hands into the forest beyond.

Just as she had hoped, Foofy bounded away to get it. He reappeared at the edge of the forest, ready to bring it back to her, as a proper game of fetch goes.

“No!” she shouted. “Get away!”

The sea serpent had risen all of the way up from the lake in a snaking column of thick scales and massive fins. It hovered there in front of her with a swimming motion to keep itself above the cliff. Then, the thick of its body struck against the cliff side. At the weight of its impact, the very ground shuddered under the strength of the sea serpent. Its fins locked onto the cliff side, giving it a place to stay close to land. At the same time, its jaws parted to let out one of those horrendous shrieks.

Val winced at her splitting ears, but soon, everything would hurt far worse if she stayed within range of the lake. She started running away in a desperate sprint, waving her arms at Foofy. “Get away!”

Foofy still stood there, looking like he wanted to fetch up the pearl. Even after the sea serpent had surfaced and shrieked, he still had not run away out of fear alone. This dumb Dobie, while undeniably a good and loyal dog, needed to be a bit more cowardly for her goals tonight.

“Get away!” Val yelled yet again.

On that final command, Foofy turned and ran at last.

Some relief flooded through her. At the very least, they had obtained the pearl. At least Foofy would be safe. Now, only Val needed to escape, and then they would be home free.

A thick wall of fish meat slammed into her side.

Val’s body went flying back towards the lake, closer in range to the sea serpent. From where she sat on her butt from being knocked to the ground, Val blinked at the head of the sea serpent.

Its head and neck lay across dry ground. For a moment, the sea serpent might be vulnerable in a position like that, but before she could capitalize on the opportunity, its yellow, slitted eye reopened to stare at her. The sea serpent rose up to tower over her once more.

Val flipped herself over and started running the other way. She was closer to the forest, going in this direction now. Before she managed to take a grand total of three steps, the sea serpent descended upon her.

Its face lowered immediately in front of her, blocking her path. Its mouth split open with a viscous whistle. Both of its eyes trained on her.

“Dang it.” Val reeled back the other way and started running again. This was not working. She would need some kind of tactic to get away.

Based on the way that the sea serpent dangled its head in front of her, its whole neck and body appeared impossibly strong with its curves through the air. At the edge of the cliff, she noticed that it actually used the ledge as its support. The sea serpent had picked a part of its body with fins to lodge these into the ground and form a critical base for it.

A good swipe or a shove there, and the whole sea serpent should go crashing back into the lake, at least until it would recover.

A few good seconds were all that Val needed to flee. So, she centered herself and called upon her abilities. Divine Judgement would be a hard ability to use right now because this sea serpent had not actually done anything wrong.

Sure, it was being a nuisance, but only because Tavras was being a nuisance by requiring this trial. The sea serpent was just following orders from Tavras: protect the grand king pearl. In fact, it was being a good sea serpent in obeying the Sea Itself.

If anything, Val was the one committing a crime by stealing a pearl that did not belong to her. No power was available in which to use Divine Judgement. This was the major detractor behind using an ability which derived its power based on morality. Hence, she was entirely reliant upon the weaker ability of Mind Blast instead.

From her head, she let the impulse expand outward. Some pieces of moss blew up from the rocks and smaller pebbles blasted into the lake below. The energy traveled until it hit the base of the sea serpent’s support with the cliff.

With a shrieking roar, the sea serpent recoiled back, but its fins did not slip from the cliff edge. As its neck slunk through the air in its recover, its eyes blazed now that it had been annoyed.

Helpless, she swore. “Crap.” Val had done little more than poke at it.

The sea serpent fell upon her with its jaws so that the next stage of their struggle would ensue.