The nearby cliff that assisted me in finding the end of my green-roofed cage was quite tricky to navigate. It was a treacherously concave wall that had a large bundle of roots spilling out of it right at the top. The fragile brown roots wouldn't hold my weight, but they managed to keep the soil near the top of the cliff together while the stone beneath it was undermined by erosion.

I was considering using mana blasts to mine my way down to where the cliff began to slope outward, but every time I started concentrating the mana into my hands it dissipated as the cocoon strapped to my back hungrily devoured it. I removeed the hard pupa from my bag and stowed the bag inside the one given to me by Carol. Setiing the coccon in my lap, I funneled my mana into the silent object to see if it had a limit or if it would drain me every time I attempted to use magic.

The voice inside hadn't spoken in my head since the time it had been within the caterpillar, but faint scratching noises could be heard as it turned within the shell to find the spot where my hands were injecting mana. Beads of sweat were dotting my forehead as I reached the limit of my power. I was panting and famished, so I stopped expermenting and had a meal of dried meat, bread, and a hard cheese.

I washed the meal down with a few gulps of water from the canteen Carol had provided me in the bag and rested until I felt my mana was full. I examined the overhanging cliff again. it was definitely too tall for my rope to reach the lower slope. A sudden cracking sound drew my attention away from the cliff.

A small thorn had protruded from the interior of the cocoon and was retreating back in as I observed it. I watched the thorn puch out in the same area a few more times. There was now a somewhat circular formation of holes near the upper cap of the ovoid cocoon. A set of black fingers poked out of the holes and clenched as if trying to break the center of the circle and pull it in.

The fingers retreated and the thorn punched a hole in the center of the circle and the fingers tried again. I wanted to help, but I stood back as I remembered that creatures that emerged from cocoons were weak and their wings wouldn't form properly if they were touched inadvertently. The small hand pulled the cocoon fragment in and chewing sounds could be heard as a large frond-like antenna appeared from the enlarged hole.

The white antenna darted around a bit before it honed in on my location. It pointed at me for a moment before slowly retreating back into the shell. An eye peeked out at me and stared intently. It was a small compound eye that was framed in a pale socket. The sky blue facets were edged in black and it seemed just as curious of me as I was about it.

The crunching noise of chewing ceased and the eye backed away from the gap in the shell. The horn once again punched through the hard cocoon and the fingers broke away another fragment for the being inside to eat. I could see the top of the head emerge and the white, pixie-cut hair was matted to the head as it widened out the hole in the cocoon it was eating.

The shell was being eaten directly and crumbs littered the ground as the head eagerly ate its calcified prison. The hole in the chrysaliis was wide enough for the dainty creature to pull its body through but it continued ingesting its shell as it maneuvered its damp fuzzy body from the shell. It had the figure of a small child, covered in white furry pads as they quickly dried in the sun. There were two black and blue knobs on its upper back that refused to dry despite the warm light.

The creature finished eating the roof of it's former container and I realized it was growing as it ate. The body had elongated and the slim muscles were becoming more pronounced as it knelt on all fours and unfurled the multicolored knobs on its back. They were still damp, but they were beautiful. The color of they wings gradually transitioned from black near the edges to white at their base, and two large navy blue dots in the center.

Her body had filled out into an adult form that could easily grace the covers of a men's magazine. Her arms and legs had a hard black carapace that resemble knee length stiletto boots and gloves that ended just over her biceps. The fur on her body portions had shed and was replaced by a silky white fringe that would barely pass as a bikini bottom and bustier combination at a distance.

The girl's head seemed normal with the exception of the eyes and ears. The eyes were small lidded compounds with long lashes I had seen earlier and she had no ears to speak of. Instead, she had two fringed antennae that swiveled about on top of her head. There had been a snall nub of a horn in the center of her forhead, but it had fallen off during her emergence from the cocoon and was replaced by a small diamond shaped azure gem.

The colors on her wings softened as they dried and she fluttered them in the warm humid air. She pouted her full pink lips and averted her gaze from me with a light blush on her cheeks. "...Sorry.." She mumbled shyly. I was about to ask why when I heard the thrumming of rapidly beating wings approaching.

I looked over the edge of the cliff again and was preparing to jump. I stepped back and got a running start, hoping that I could launch myself far enough out to reach the distant trees rather than become a pancake against the hard stone wall directly below. I sailed through the air as I jumped with all my might at the end of my sprint and thrust my hands out to increase my surface area and hopefully reach a branch with my claws.

I was praying hard that some higher power was watching over me when the moth-girl grabbed a hold of me mid-air and knocked the wind out of me. I gasped for air as we picked up speed in our jumbled dive for the lower canopy. I felt the girl's grip on my torso change slightly and I sucked in air greedily as she flapped her wings to change our trajectory and made us lift up so we wouldn't crash into any trunks or branches in our low flight.

The girl propelled us forward and kept us aloft with all her might as a crash sounded out from the trees behind us. I couldn't see what was happening, but I was sure it was bad. The buzzing was still hot on our trail and when it got closer she would perform some aerial maneuver to dodge an attack I couldn't see coming. We couldn't outrun our pusuers as I was too heavy for her to fly at her maximum speed, so I looked around at the forest for a location that would give us a tactical advantage.

I found a spot of forest where the trees thinned out and the gray mist below was especially thick. "Head that way!" I shouted while pointing at the far edge of the misty zone. We pulled into a wide barrel roll as she dodged another attack from our assailants and I felt my center of gravity suddenly shift at the apex of the stunt. My veiw went from partly cloudy sky, to rapidly approaching trees as we corkscrewed out of the end of the barrel roll and began a rapid descent that would end in the area I indicated.

What I took for mist wasn't mist at all. We crashed through the fine layers of cobweb at a rate of travel that was too difficult for my tiring protector to pull out of. The buzzing attackers followed us, but instead of simply crashing through as we were, their buzzes sputtered and were cut short as something happened to them out of my sight. Fresh strands of web were shooting up from the ground below but the moth girl's thin and sharp wings cut through them like a knife. I tumbled through the dirt on the far end up the clearing as she smacked into a low hanging branch and lost her grip on my arms.

The girl was uncontrollably heading my way, the she seemed to be out cold as I tried to catch her and was bowled through the dirt again. I checked on the state of our pursuers and was shocked at what I saw. There were people hauling the man-sized wasps to the ground using the threads that were attatched to their hard carapaces. They were humans that were living in this forest that had adapted to a home made by spiders.

I gently set the girl's head in my lap and checked her for injuries. She had a bruise forming on the side of her face, but otherwise she seemed to not have taken much damage. I made a damp compress from some clean cloth and the water in my canteen and checked my map since the people were busily dismantling the wasps. This place was mapped and was one of the places Carol suggested I go for supplies. The village was named Cobhollow. I sat with the girl and tried to make her comfortable where we were since I didn't trust myself to carry her across the uneven ground without tripping.