Bird song and sunlight woke Yuriko up from her fitful sleep. She sat up, yawning and rubbing her eyes, nearly bumping her head on a low lying branch as she did. Yesterday’s aches and pains, the few bruises and a couple of scratches on her hands and neck, had disappeared, not even leaving a faint line.

“Good morning!” Krystal said cheerfully, from the campfire. She had a pot hanging over the fire and was stirring the contents with a ladle. The paper wrappers of the ration bars were crumpled and piled up on one side. From the scent, she could tell Krystal had added more beef jerky she...liberated...from Orrin’s stash.

Opposite Yuriko’s and Krystal’s bedrolls, Mikel and Orrin were still snoring, wrapped snuggly in their blankets. Heron was awake, sitting near a leafy curtain and staring outside absently with his fist wrapped around his spear.

Crawling out of her bedroll, Yuriko gathered her long hair into a ponytail, securing it in place with a blue ribbon. She then grabbed a shovel, a canteen of water, a bar of soap, and a toothbrush, before heading out to hunt for a convenient bush outside of their camp to do her morning business. Her tummy felt a bit weird even after all of that but it wasn’t all that uncomfortable and she quickly dismissed it.

By the time she returned, the two boys had woken up and were in the process of pilfering their breakfast from Krystal’s pot, which she vigorously defended, exclaiming, “It’s not done yet you wolves! Hands off!”

“But, but…hungry!” Orrin whimpered with a pout, eyes as wide as they would go, while he held out a bowl.

“Feed me!” Mikel yowled.

Heron snorted, but Yuriko noticed that he was clutching his bowl, too.

The aroma coming from the pot actually was mouthwatering for a change. What did Krystal put in there?

“A few spices,” Krystal answered furtively when Yuriko put that to question. “I found some wild onions and edible mushroom when I went out earlier. Now back off! Ten more minutes!”

Yuriko sadly put down her own bowl and proceeded to pack up her bedroll and blankets.

The boys grabbed their shovels and went out, grumbling under their breaths. Yuriko, meanwhile, inspected her weapons.

As she had expected last night, her Plasma Caster was damaged enough that its firepower diminished. She would have to output more Animus than normal to match its previous performance and even then, she doubted it would have the strength to punch through another Wanderer’s Protective Field.

Even worse, she realised that, when she rolled off the outcropping and the rifle flew out of her grasp, it must have hit a particularly tough stone. The barrel was scratched along the runescript lines. The red jade studs were not damaged in any way, so the transfer of her Animus to the weapon would still be normal. The runescript was there to channel her Animus into the chamber and help shape the plasma bolt. Along the barrel, it would help stabilize and propel the projectile to its target. The affected lines were responsible for stabilization and acceleration meaning her plasma bolts wouldn’t be able to shoot as far and while retaining its potency.

“I need to fill in the scratches and reapply the runescript,” she muttered dejectedly. She also didn’t have the necessary ingredients to make the ink not on hand anyway. “This should still be lethal within a hundred paces.”

She put the rifle away and drew her side-blade. She had managed to clean the blue blood off most of it but there were some stains near the crossguard. There was a small nick on the blade halfway down its length and the edge had gotten a bit dull. She gently rubbed out the stain spots with a square cloth. After it was clean, she sharpened the edge with a whetstone. She did the same thing for the borrowed side-blade though it was a bit less beaten up. She had used her left-hand blade to deal the fatal strike and it had more bloodstains on it.

“Breakfast is ready!” Krystal cried out.

Yuriko finished cleaning her blades before having breakfast and, by the time she was done, the boys had nearly emptied the pot. Krystal filled Yuriko’s bowl before the boys could demand seconds.

A single spoonful of Krystal’s wild vegetable porridge was enough to make Yuriko squeal in pleasure. “This is sooo good!” she mumbled around her spoon.

Krystal smirked. “Well, since I didn’t bring any salt, it took a lot of beef jerky to compensate.”

“Wha--?” Orrin choked. “Is that my beef jerky?”

“Thanks, Orrin!” the rest of them said in unison.

“Bu-but! My snacks!”

“It really makes a difference,” Krystal said, grinning. “Besides, we’re already heading back to the outpost. You can easily get a replacement.”

“Those are Kadrac Plains Beef Jerky,” he said sadly, “You can’t get any of those easily.”

“Where’s the Kadrac Plains?” Yuriko asked.

“South of Haveena. Kadrac City State’s signature export is their incredibly tasty drunken cattle,” Orrin said absently. “No wonder the porridge was so tasty. It wasn’t your skill, it was the ingredients!” he accused.

“Whoa there, I never said I was a chef!” Krystal answered indignantly. “And excuse you, without those onions and mushrooms, the porridge would have been too salty.”

“And how would you know that if you didn’t just dump the entire packet inside?” Orrin said snidely.

“Well, I…er, anyway. It's tasty jerky.”

“You’re right it is! Why would you even take it from my bag?”

Krystal looked at him strangely. “I asked you about it a while ago, you just pointed at your bag.”

Orrin blinked. “Really?”

“Uh-huh.”

“Well, what’s done is done,” Yuriko said with a smile. “Thank you again for the food, Orrin.”

Orrin sighed, met her gaze, and sighed some more. But he did drop the topic.

Heron and Mikel were oddly silent, Yuriko thought, until she realized that they were each taking a third bowlful and had successfully demolished the contents of the pot.

Later, Orrin expediently cleaned the dishes and the pot by exploiting his Facet while Yuriko gave her side-blades a final inspection. Heron did the same thing to his spear and he polished his small steel buckler to a mirror finish. Yuriko noticed he was favouring his left arm.

“Are you well?” Yuriko scooted over beside Heron who started at the sound of her voice.

“Uh, uhm, yes, I’m fine. Why do you ask?”

She stared pointedly at his arm.

“It’s nothing, just a little bruised. I’m not that good with Recovery yet.”

“How did that happen? You weren’t hit directly, were you?”

“No, but I have to anchor my shields, otherwise they would just get blown away.”

“Ah.” Yuriko nodded, “I didn’t thank you last night. So...thank you.”

Heron flushed but he met her gaze with a smile. “It's my duty to protect you. Just as it is yours to destroy our foes wherever they may be.”

Yuriko nodded. “Well, if you’re ready let’s go.”

When she walked past Mikel, her friend grunted. “What, no thanks for me? Or heavy concern?” He was grinning at her though and she rolled her eyes.

“You did well.”

“Of course I did.”

“At least you’ve regained your confidence. Are we ready?” she asked out loud.

Orrin and Krystal nodded. They had already put away the dishes, utensils, and pot. They spent some time trying to clear signs that they had been there, brushing back displaced leaves, restoring stones into the dirt sockets from where they were moved, and they covered the fire pit with dirt.

On the march back, Yuriko kept her rifle on her back with Krystal leading the way. Though they were only retracing their path, Krystal would make sure that they retraced the path exactly. They had wandered north and more than a little bit west the day before, went across several ravines, and then around a couple of hills and cliffsides.

At least the climate wasn’t too hot, not in here anyway. Krystal was sweating buckets, the hair framing her face sticking stubbornly to her skin and they found her brushing her hair away each time she stopped to wait for them at a forked path. The boys’ faces weren’t any different. Strangely, Yuriko didn’t feel all that sweaty, and she found the warmth of the sun against her skin pleasant.

The cicadas were singing again and, coupled with several species of bird song, it was a fine melody to march to. Every now and then, the bushes would rustle, followed by the flash of something running away. A quail, a rabbit, or a squirrel. It could be a fox too, Yuriko thought.

The babbling of a little brook soon added to the forest concerto. They hurried over since most of their drinking water had been depleted. The brook was no more than a couple of paces wide, and maybe three inches deep. Yuriko bent over to fill her canteen with the clear water, making sure to spread her golden Animus over the opening; her Intent would filter out anything undesirable in the water.

Shadows darted in the water, fingerlings curious about the trespassers. The sunlight dappled across the water, highlighting an exposed stone every so often. Yuriko capped her canteen as soon as it was full. When she stood up, she abruptly realised that, aside from the running water, the forest had gone eerily silent.

She exchanged glances with Krystal, suddenly wary. She found Krys similarly disquieted, but the boys remained unconcerned.

“You hear that?” Krystal asked in a hushed tone.

“Hear what?” Mikel asked in a painfully loud voice.

“Exactly.”

“Huh?”

“Shut up and listen.”

Yuriko had already amplified her vision though the closely set trees hampered her efforts. The brook twisted and turned before it disappeared in the thicket only a dozen paces away.

“I don’t hear anything,” Orrin said, thankfully keeping his voice low. Heron had a similarly puzzled expression but he was still filling his canteen.

Yuriko’s hands hovered over the hilt of each side-blade, her Animus already split in four, circulating in her body.

Tsk. Thud. Swish.

For a moment, when the nearby bush rustled and Yuriko expected to see a boar emerging from the lavan berry bushes. Instead, what she saw across the stream, no more than five paces away, was a six-legged creature the size of a wolf and covered in grey carapace emerging from the bushes. The creature’s forelegs ended in needle-sharp points and its mandibles spread open as soon as it saw them, revealing an orifice filled with sharp teeth. Its beady eyes were the colour of the sky and there were five black points at the centre.

Before any of them could react, it reared back and roared, its voice was a strange confounding combination of high and low, warbling yet steady. It was as if there were two things making the sound simultaneously yet the sound came out of only one throat.

A red plasma bolt drilled into its head and it collapsed like a marionette with its strings cut. Orrin’s hands trembled and it beggared belief that he actually managed to hit that thing on the head. Motes of green light started rising from the body and it was that, more than anything else, that told Yuriko what it was.

“Swarmling.”

Her heart leapt to her throat. They were smaller and weaker than Wanderers but where there was one swarmling, there were…

The bushes burst as nearly a dozen of the things, each different than the next, sometimes wildly so, charged at them, throwing leaves, mud, pebbles, and twigs, behind them as their pointy feet churned the ground.

The side-blades left their scabbards, already coated in her golden Animus. Yuriko leapt forward, blades shimmering in the air, a single blade leading point first at the nearest swarmling.

“Cover Krystal!” she yelled to Heron mid-leap when she noticed him trying to catch up to her.

Orrin pointed his pistol at another but his shots went wild, doing nothing more than grazing their carapace. He dropped his pistol and pulled out his short spear, waving his arm to have it expand to its proper length.

Krystal was just pulling her pistol out while Mikel had his arms outstretched, his face in a rictus snarl, hands palm up as tongues of flame started dancing around him.

Snikt!

She cut the head off the lead as she stomped into the river, somehow finding purchase in the smooth pebbles and, with a splash, she jumped at the next, weapon twirling in a parry that blocked its needle-like claw from puncturing her arm. She made use of the rebounding force and slashed it across the face.

So began her dance. Somehow, she felt it when the swarmlings came to her and felt where they were aiming. She just knew what she had to do to avoid them, how to deflect their claws, how to make use of their momentum to slide past them, and to use their bodies as a shield against the others around her.

A cut, a stab, golden glowing metal scraping across a throat, blue blood spraying. Lost in the misty spray, she danced.

She kicked one as it sought to bite her, cut another before it could get past her. She spun and crouched, letting a swarmling pass above while she placed a blade tip against its belly, using its momentum to disembowel it. She was finally on solid ground when she stopped, the corpses of her foes twitching nervelessly around her.

She felt ichor dripping down her cheek and reached up to wipe it off with the back of her hand, only to smear more of it as her hand was also covered in blue blood.

“Tsk. Maybe if I deploy a Field I won’t be covered in blood next time,” she muttered.

“Yuri! Are you? No, I don’t see any red, come back here!” Krystal yelled.

Yuriko glanced back and found Orrin cradling his arm. Alarmed, Yuriko leapt over the brook, which had several bodies leaking their blue blood into the crystalline waters. Some of the bodies looked little more than charcoal though.

“What happened?”

“It almost stabbed through,” Orrin said with gritted teeth. “Some of the fabric frayed. No wound.”

“That’s good,” Yuriko breathed. None of them was gravely injured, but the forest was still silent save for the rustling of leaves as the breeze cut through them, and the babbling brook. She exchanged looks with Heron, who had a couple of bodies in front of him. He shrugged at her, telling her it was her call.

“Leave them. Let’s go.”

“But…shouldn’t we grab the dust?” Orrin protested.

“Only if we want to die here,” Yuriko said. “If there’s one swarmling, there’s more. Come on!”

They returned to the path that would hopefully lead them back, but as the brook disappeared from sight, they could all hear rustling in the bushes. And it wasn’t the breeze.