[Skill gained: Rock Throw]

  [0.5 Magic added]

  “Ow,” Vel said, blinking as the pebble bounced off her forehead. Nearly blending into the cavern wall were three gray stones stacked upon one another. However, instead of the largest on the bottom, it sat as the elemental’s head with the smallest of the three stones making up the center. Two crystal eyes stared up at Vel, and the thing flung two floating pebbles around it, looking agitatedly adorable.

  Crouching, Vel poked its head, to which it threw another pebble at her, sacrificing an “arm” to do so. It picked another up from the ground, a smile stretching across Vel’s face.

  “It's so cute,” she said.

  “It’s a baby,” Sigurd noted. “A fully grown elemental won’t be cute.”

  “Can I keep it?”

  “No.”

  “But who’s going to take care of it?”

  “They’re self sufficient. Elementals don’t exactly need parents like we do. It’s more likely that a bigger elemental pooped this one out.”

  “Aren’t human babies sort of pooped out in a way too?” Vel argued.

  “I am definitely not going to have that conversation with you,” Sigurd said, moving along the stream.

  With one last look, and taking one final stone, Vel finally stood, and followed after the hunter. It was hard, she found, to get over how adorable the earth elemental had been, and couldn’t imagine that it could ever be dangerous at all.

  Oma was a baby once, Vel thought, grimacing at the idea. It was true, the woman who raised her probably would have been cute, only to turn into someone to raise and help kill the [sacrifice]. What a wicked cycle.

  As the tunnel grew darker, the lit crystals in the cavern behind them receding, Vel placed a hand on the wall. It was more to keep from accidentally slipping into the stream beside them, but at some point in the darkness, she reached forward, her hand grasping at air. Sigurd was still there, wasn’t he? She swiped towards him, taking a bigger step forward.

  “Sigurd?” she asked, listening to hear his breathing, or even a huff or sigh, but the trickle of the water drowned out any such audible nuances. While the moment of his silence wasn’t long, it was long enough to make Vel worry. Not so much that he’d abandon her as maybe the earth ate him.

  Then she felt his hand on her arm. “Shh,” he whispered.

  “Why?” she responded in kind.

  The stony wall her hand was on rumbled, then slowly rolled beneath her hand. Vel recoiled, stepping away. What was Sigurd saying about a bigger elemental pooping babies earlier? She swallowed hard, hearing the wall grind and crack, then settle again, almost like the stones in it rolled over, back into a silent slumber.

  Sigurd pulled on her hand, pulling her close. “Follow,” he said, his voice barely above the trickling water.

  Clutching tightly to his hand, Vel remained close to the tall hunter, the dark eerie, like a mesh over her eyes, like . . .

  This is what I would have seen, she thought, considering the veil she would have covered her face with. While she’d been prepared for that day, the day to give it all away, she hadn’t truly understood everything she’d have felt. Led through darkness, holding the hand of a person she was supposed to trust, all the way to the stony altar that sat in the temple courtyard. And unknown number of witnesses━crowds, she’d been told━to stand and watch her concede to the dark. A deep fear sunk into Vel’s heart, and she sucked in a sharp breath, reaching a hand out to grab at Sigurd’s arm, as if the act alone would comfort her from a reality she’d been fortunate to have escaped.

  There were few things in the long, dark tunnel that drew her from the fear. The running water, the small, stumbling stones that moved away from her every foot step, and the two, blue gems that shined at her, lightning the small space near her. Blue gems, staring, sparkling, like the one she wore around her neck. The gems grew closer, their light piercing the darkness and her eyes adjusting.

  Behind them, a shadow formed on the cavern wall, growing as the gems lifted. Sigurd yanked Vel away from the gems, a gasp escaping her. He placed a hand over her mouth, holding her tight. A small, sharp grinding sound echoed above the water as the blue gems shifted, looking at Vel.

  Oh no, she thought, feeling dumb. She’d been so entranced by her own fears, then by their light that she hadn’t realized the real danger that lay beside her, the one that stared at her for far too long. They shifted, moving slowly towards her, stones creaking upon one another.

  Sigurd pulled her back, his movements slow, and his breath shaky. He slowly shifted her further and further from the eyes that examined her, the danger not passing until they were hidden by the dark, stony head that turned away. The hunter dropped his hand from over her lips, but still held her body with a firm arm until his hand could find her wrist, grasping it.

  When he prompted her along, Vel followed, stepping over rocks in the darkness, some of them moving. Occasionally, she spotted two dimly lit blue eyes looking up at her. Dozens of rock babies were littered across the ground, she realized. How many babies could earth elementals poop out? Were they all from just one, or . . .?

  Vel refrained from putting her hand back on the wall, trusting Sigurd to guide her through the darkness. It wasn’t until a light appeared at the end of the tunnel that she gathered the number of earth elementals they’d been walking beside the entire time. Or rather, that the left cavern wall wasn’t a cavern wall at all. Stones were stacked upon one another, some shifting by an invisible magical bond, trying to move further into the herd that made up the entirety of the wall.

  She looked up, half expecting the ceiling to be made up of the same things, but instead saw bats. Hundreds of them. They clung to the ceiling, and most of the movement from the bats occurred towards the light, the slightest squeak sounding.

  The baby elementals thinned towards the light, and the left cavern wall normalized, the bigger elementals clinging to the dark. Finally, Vel and Sigurd emerged into another wide, cavernous space.

  It bore more light than the last space they’d been in, blue crystal veins lining the walls, all the way up to the stalactite that hung from the high ceiling. Sigurd guided Vel up towards the cavern floor, moving over stones that looked to have been discarded from above in some sort of miniature rockslide. Upon reaching the top, Vel was amazed to see the amount of greenery along the stream that crossed the space, fed by water trickling in from the ceiling.

  Grass, more vibrant than she’d seen, jutted out from the stream’s edge, decorated by large, white flowers with three, glowing petals each.

  “Don’t touch the flowers,” Sigurd said. “Actually, don’t touch the grass either.”

  “Why not?” Vel asked, her voice quiet as she glanced back towards the tunnel they emerged from, still wary of the earth elementals.

  “The flowers have poison, and that’s strangling grass. Stand in it long enough, and it’ll eat you. Literally.”

  “Oh,” Vel said, raising her brow. Right. just don’t touch the grass that littered the path forward, cutting them off from the other end of the cavern. “So how do we cross it then?” she asked.

  Sigurd hummed, looking around the cavern. “Cover it in rocks,” he said, “or cut it. But if we touch those flowers, we’ll be dealing with a poison I can’t save us from.”

  “I’d rather not,” Vel said. While her last poisoning wasn’t terrible, another one didn’t particularly sound exciting. She moved along the sparkling wall, looking for anything that they could use as a bridge for both the grass and the stream. There wasn’t exactly anything useful on this side of the stream, save for rocks. On the other side, however, there were a few old crates and some wooden wheelbarrows. They weren’t in great shape, but at least they could be salvaged for something useful.

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  Sigurd must have had a similar idea, because he said, “I could throw you across the grass.”

  “What? Throw me?” Vel asked, then looked at the distance. Sigurd was strong, but was he really that strong? The grass stretched wide around the stream, along with the flowers.

  “Might hurt when you land on the other side, and . . .” Sigurd grimaced, looking over her. “You’re already not in great shape.”

  “Maybe,” Vel said, stroking at her braid as she considered it. “If you can manage to get me to the other side, I do have [feather fall].”

  “Well. If you land in the grass on the other side, you have to get out of it as fast as possible. It’ll try to grapple you,” Sigurd warned, “make you immovable before eating you.”

  “That sounds terrible,” Vel said, shaking her head. “What if I burned the grass with [fireball] instead?”

  “We might risk the poison of the flowers in the fumes.”

  “Of course, because this can’t just be easy!” Vel huffed, flicking her braid back over her shoulder. “Purple Fairy, can you show me my skills please?”

  [Skills ]

  [Bow Proficiency Rank 1  Level 1 ]

  [Dagger Slash  Rank 1  Level 1 ]

  [Dagger Stab   Rank 1  Level 1 ]

  [Dagger Throw  Rank 1  Level 30]

  [Feather Fall   Rank 1  Level 26]

  [Fireball     Rank 1  Level 4 ]

  [Headbutt     Rank 1  Level 1 ]

  [Metal Claw    Rank 1  Level 8 ]

  [Poison Stinger  Rank 1  Level 1 ]

  [Rock Throw    Rank 1  Level 1 ]

  [Scent Memory   Rank 1  Level 1 ]

  [Tough Hide    Rank 1  Level 5 ]

  [Unarmed Punch  Rank 1  Level 1 ]

  “This list is getting really long,” Vel said, eyes scanning down it.

  “What do you have?” Sigurd asked.

  Vel listed the skills for him, Sigurd’s eyebrow raised by the end of it. He pointed, and asked, “When you use [rock throw], where do you pull the rock from? Can you pull it directly out of the ground?”

  “I don’t know,” Vel said. “Are you thinking I can uproot the grass from afar?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Guess I’ll try,” she said, then held a hand out towards the grass. Now, how did magic work again? [Fireball] practically had her focusing all her body’s heat in one location, which didn’t make much sense for ripping a rock from the ground. But if her body’s natural function was a part of [fireball], then it made sense to her that the same would be true for [rock throw].

  Maybe, just imagine lifting the ground, or something? she thought, narrowing her eyes as she considered the idea. What she felt in response wasn’t exactly what she expected. The idea seemed right, in the sense that she first had to leverage her weight. Overall, she felt heavier, both sturdy and stuck in her location. The ground beneath the grass shifted, and . . . That was it. Nothing more. Well, she moved something, she was sure.

  “You did something,” Sigurd noted, watching the grass writhe. “Not sure what, though. Grass looks irritated.”

  “Can grass be irritated?” Vel asked.

  “Sure.”

  “How do you even know this is strangling grass anyways?”

  “It’s too shiny.”

  “Shiny? It could be wet, how about that?”

  “If you want to test it, go ahead.”

  “No thanks, I’ll just try again,” Vel said quickly, holding both hands out this time.

  Come on, stupid ground, work, she thought. Leveraging her weight again, Vel found herself leaning back, further and further. It was enough that the hunter moved to catch her, worried she was going to fall. Finally, she pulled something free, half a pace’s length rising from ground level. Then the skill ended, and Vel yelped, actually falling backwards, straight into Sigurd’s readied hand. He pushed her back upright.

  [Rock Throw level 2]

  “This is going to take forever,” Vel grumbled, the grass moving unnaturally as it writhed back and forth. She’d maybe only touched hardly even a tenth of the space they had to cross. “We don’t have time for this.”

  “So, what do you want to do?” Sigurd asked.

  “Fine,” Vel said, sighing, “Throw me.”

  A grin stretched across Sigurd’s lips, almost like he’d been waiting for this exact moment. He leaned over, cupping his hands for her to step on. “I’m going to launch you. You need to prepare to jump at the apex. Combining both our strengths, you should clear the space.”

  “And if I don’t?” Vel asked.

  “Run.”

  “Great. Amazing plan,” Vel said sarcastically, then placed a hand on his shoulder to steady herself as she lifted a foot into his hands.

  “Ready?” Sigurd asked.

  She looked out over the grass, flowers, and stream, taking a deep breath. A hand gripped Sigurd's shoulder, feeling the muscle there shift, a reminder that he was strong as he was tall. Yet the doubt slipped into her mind. Velmira wasn’t a particularly short girl, taller than average, yet not the tallest around.

  “Are you sure about this?” Vel asked, looking back at the hunter’s face. Even he looked doubtful.

  “I’m sure you’ll be fine,” he said, his face growing firm. He believed in that, she could see.

  Looking forward, she said, “Ready.”

  Sigurd heaved, propelling Vel into the air. “Jump!” he said, and she did, though it felt awkward to push out of his hand. She soured, every moment as excruciatingly terrifying as the next. The grass below her was quickly approaching, her flight already falling short. While her heart skipped a beat, Vel’s mind jumped ahead, a thought lurching into her mind.

  With one push of [rock throw] against the ground beneath her, momentum already driving forward, Vel felt her weight respond to the force. The ground━her rock━had nowhere to go, but Vel was free in the air. She flew. Quite literally flew! Like a second jump, she soured over the remainder of grass, then arched back towards the ground.

  After a semi-soft descent with the use of [feather fall], Vel grunted, landing facedown.

  [Rock Throw level 3]

  [Feather Fall level 27]

  “How did you do that?” Sigurd asked, Vel pushing herself up to her feet.

  A smile spread across her face at her triumph, and a giggle escaped her. “You wouldn’t believe me,” she said, “[Rock throw].”

  “[Rock throw]?”

  “It utilizes my own weight!” she said, pumping her fists in the air.

  “Huh. Damned magic classes, always getting the fun stuff,” Sigurd said, then pointed to the wheelbarrow and crates. “Start building a bridge for me.”

  Vel turned, moving to a wheelbarrow. She tipped it, dumping out the bit of coal that was left in it. Inspecting it, she found that the underside was solid, but one of the handles was missing, as were a few boards on the side. “Could you have chosen a magic class?” she asked.

  “Probably,” Sigurd said. “But the amount of time it takes to learn magic is best left to the nobility, and some people pick it up better than others. Gaining magic skills is harder too.”

  Awkwardly wheeling the barrow to the grass, Vel flipped it over onto the strangling weeds. She watched as the grass curiously ran over its edges, examining it, but then ultimately left it alone. Perhaps it liked its prey to be living.

  “Why did you choose to be a hunter?” Vel returned to the crate pile, picking the sturdiest one up. It was hefty, but she managed, bringing it over and carefully stepping on the underside of the wheelbarrow to put it on the other side.

  “Steady income and the ability to live entirely on my own, if I wanted. A lot of hunters get hired for odd jobs too.”

  “Like killing people in the woods?” Vel couldn’t help the question from fleeing her mouth, and she could see the dismayed look across Sigurd’s face. It wasn’t until she was placing a third crate that he finally answered.

  “I’ve mostly dealt with criminals for the church. It’s ugly work.”

  “Why did you work for them?” Vel asked, awkwardly wheeling a barrow across the grass as she jumped across the makeshift stepping stones. She took it slow, not wanting to fall into the grass. By this point, she’d reached the stream, and with a grunt, she tossed it over the narrow stream, the thing awkwardly landing on its side.

  From the other side, Sigurd managed to collect a few large stones, rolling the heavy things across the ground and towards the grass. “Because I believed my circumstances required it,” Sigurd answered curtly, looking up from the stones to Vel with a suffering gaze. It was no guess that it wasn’t something he wanted to talk about. Anything, she’d found, linking back to his late wife, was a sore topic. So, she moved on. Once his stones were settled, she offered a hand out to him.

  “Vel,” he said, “You’re too skinny. If I fell, you’d just go down with me.”

  She pulled her hand back, then moved back across to the other side. Turning, she watched him nervously cross, stepping from one questionable spot to the next. When he made it to the last wheelbarrow, his foot fell through the wood with a loud crack, and Vel launched towards him, grabbing his hand.

  While he might have been bigger than him, she was determined to prove the hunter wrong! With a push from across the cavern wall using [rock throw], and a death grip upon his hand, she yanked him right out of the wheelbarrow! Then she yelped.

  Sigurd, landing on top of her, indeed proved that he was quite a bit heavier.

  [Rock Throw level 4]

  Grunting, he pushed himself off her, then sat and looked back at the grass. “The magical touch was unnecessary,” he muttered.

  “I had to prove a point when you keep making me out to be weak,” Vel huffed.

  Her stomach growled.

  “Well, you can keep improving it by catching us something to eat, then.”

  “Unfair!”