"Oof, that bad?" Victoria winced.
"Yeah," Iris said solemnly, "I don't think I've seen him like that before."
They were seated cross legged on the bed in Victoria's room, which shared the same layout as Iris's except it included a window that overlooked the boardwalk. Victoria had decorated the room in her own style, adding purple drapes to the window, a large circular rug in the middle of the floor, and an alter on the dresser which included multiple candles and a stick of incense which burned with a wispy trail of smoke. Between the two women was Littletooth, who was tumbling around on the bed in a vicious battle against his rapidly deteriorating elk plushy.
Iris had confided in Victoria about the wyvern just a few days after he hatched when the pressure of the secret got too big to bear on her own. Victoria had strongly urged Iris to come clean to the rest of the party about it, but promised not to tell anyone and instead leave it up to Iris. Now, she was gracious enough not to rub in her face that it would have been better to tell Eli sooner rather than lie to him.
"Believe it or not, it's a good sign," Victoria said, "he's been trying to be a more amicable leader, and while it does sound like he's pretty mad, he's at least not mad enough that he's giving up on that goal."
"Yeah, I guess you're right. Part of me wishes he'd just get it out of the way though, you know?"
"You don't want that," Victoria said, "and neither does he. A cohesive team needs to respect amongst its members and if he keeps yelling at you for everything it's only going to cause more problems. Let him cool down so he can address this with a level head, it'll be better for everyone that way. The flip side, though, is that you really need to get your act together and stop giving him reasons to yell at you in the first place."
Iris opened her mouth to argue, but Victoria held up a hand and continued, "I know it’s not always fair, and sometimes not your fault, but be real with me here. We both know you were way out of line with this one."
Iris was still for a moment, then sighed, "so how do I make it right?"
"When he's ready to talk, be honest with him. And in the future-- honestly? Make better choices."
Iris laughed a little, but nodded in agreement, "yeah, that would probably be a good start."
Victoria picked up the elk plushy and dangled it over Littletooth's head, who hopped and flapped his wings in futile attempts to grab it with his jaws, "he is pretty damn adorable, though. He’ll be quite the killer when he’s older."
She tossed the toy across the room. Littletooth immediately darted after it, fearlessly leaping off the bed and crashing into the floor before stumbling back to his feet and chasing after it. The two women laughed together at the sight, and watched as the wyvern caught up to the plushy and began shaking it around violently, sending puffs of stuffing flying out of the many holes he'd already torn in the toy.
"Hey," Iris said after a moment, "do you want to go on a quest tomorrow?"
"What kind of quest?" Victoria asked.
"I don't know yet, I just need to get out of this tavern for a while," Iris replied, "oh! I got a new ability the other day, it's this weird spatial awareness thing where I can feel everything around me even if I can't see it. Maybe I can find something in the questing hall that'll be good practice for that."
"A perception ability?" Victoria said with appreciation, "that's a great get, a good perception ability is a cornerstone of almost any good power set."
"I'm just glad I finally have a way to get around in the dark," Iris admitted.
"Hmm, I have some errands to run in the morning," Victoria contemplated, "but I should be free in the afternoon and evening. Why don't you pick up a quest and meet me at the gates around midday?"
"That works for me," Iris shrugged, then grew more serious, "thank you."
"Of course," Victoria smiled softly.
Littletooth accidentally tossed the plushy across the room while shaking it around, and chased after it with tiny pitter-patter stomps. He failed to stop in time when he reached it and instead bumped head first into the wall. He fell away dramatically and looked back at the wall scornfully and shocked as if it had attacked him.
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As planned, Iris met Victoria just outside the Giantrock City gates. Victoria greeted her with a nod, and Iris replied with a wave as she crossed the distance between them on foot instead of blipping, internally cursing the "no abilities around the gates" rule.
"So, where are we heading?" Victoria asked as Iris reached her.
"A ways southwest," Iris responded, "we're looking for iridescent beetles. The quest calls for ten intact beetle shards. That's what they call the hard parts of the beetle's shell that protect the wings when it’s not flying, apparently."
The two women started walking, following the main road out of the city but keeping to the edges where they found the most consistent shade from the warm summer sun.
"What do we know about them?"
"Well, about that," Iris said sheepishly, "they're nocturnal."
Victoria stopped and gave her a flat look, "you realize I have a limited number of nights in my bed before I'm due back at the outpost, right?"
"Yes, and it's totally fine if you want to back out," Iris said hurriedly, "but these things turn invisible. They're the perfect way to try out my new ability. Just one night, I promise, if we don't find any than we can call it in the morning."
Victoria didn't respond.
"Please?" Iris asked earnestly, with perhaps slightly exaggerated puppy eyes.
"Fine," Victoria rolled her eyes, "the things I do for you people."
Iris smiled and blipped ahead, "we're taking the first left, wanna race?"
Victoria smirked, already dematerializing into mist. Iris blipped again as the cloud of mist drifted after her. Iris held a strong lead that only grew, outpacing Victoria as she blipped in and out of a sprint, leaving Victoria's mist looking like a meandering cloud behind her. Iris turned left onto the smaller, less traveled side path about the time she began to tire. Though her mana constantly recharged between blips, it wasn't enough to keep up with how much she was using, and she soon found herself close to burning out with each blip. Her athleticism had significantly increased both through exercise and leveling up, but even still she found herself on the verge of being out breath.
As her sprint slowed to a jog and her blips grew further apart, the trailing cloud began to close to the gap. Soon it was meandering past her, drifting just over her shoulder and tingling her ears with mist. She grunted and forced a blip, causing a brief spike of a headache but placing her several feet ahead of the cloud. It soon passed her again, this time floating directly over her head. Iris came out of her next blip swearing and clutching her head from the mana drain, almost stumbling on the loose rocks that littered the path. The cloud drifted past her again.
"Alright," Iris gasped, stopping to double over and lean on her knees, "you win."
The cloud slowly drifted towards the ground up ahead and rematerialized into Victoria, who looked back at Iris with a satisfied smile. After a moment, Iris stood upright and started walking towards her.
"Does that not," Iris paused for a breath, "use any mana?"
"Only to transform and turn back," Victoria said proudly.
"That's so unfair," Iris sighed with indignation.
The side path grew more and more overgrown and unkempt as they traveled, and after an hour they were forced to battle their way through grass and weeds that threatened to overtake it. They decided that was a good time to split off into the woods, and Iris transitioned to blipping across the tall roots of the redwoods while Victoria drifted through the forest in mist form.
By early evening, they found themselves further south in the redwood forest than either of them had ever gone. The trees were much the same as they were used to, however there seemed to be a much higher concentration of standing pools of water and temporary creeks, which likely contributed to the much higher numbers of insects they began to encounter. There were dragonflies the size of cats that zipped through the forest with thunderous zooms, roaches the size of boots that scurried beneath overgrown brush, and dark clouds of gnats that moved like single entities. Along with the extra insects, there was no shortage of predators to feed on them. The deep bellows of large toads joined the ambience of the forest, and the occasional bird of prey swooped down to snatch up an oversized bug in its talons.
"Camping out here is gonna suck," Victoria remarked.
"Actually," Iris smiled, "Eli just splurged some of our party funds on a brand new tent."
The quest rewards the party had received since arriving in Giantrock City had been modest on their own, but living rent free in the Flopping Fish had substantially cut down on their expenses compared to most other parties. After adding in the Grand Hunt bonuses from the city for each quest, they had found themselves with a rather comfortable horde of coins. After experiencing miserable rain throughout the Matriarch expedition, the party was quick to agree with Eli when he suggested they use a portion of their funds on a tent.
"And you got his permission to use it, right?" Victoria asked with a suspicious look.
"Obviously," Iris said, unconvincingly.
Victoria laughed, "remember what I said yesterday about making better choices? You suck at that."
"No I don't, I'm just not making them yet. The better choices start tomorrow."
Once they'd traveled a decent ways into the bug infested area, they found a dry, relatively flat spot to set up camp. The tent, which Iris withdrew piece-by-piece from her bottomless bag, was built to fit three people comfortably, and up to six with less comfort. A consequence of that, it turned out, was that it seemed to be designed with the expectation that at least three people would be present to pitch it. After no small amount of struggling, ingenuity, and luck, they finally managed to get it properly erected and staked.
Though the tent wasn't tall enough to stand upright in, there was ample floor space inside with just the two of them, which Iris promptly filled with extra pillows and blankets that she seemed to pull endlessly out of her bottomless bag. Soon, the tent was beginning to look like the lavish bedroom of a spoiled princess. Victoria watched her with a bemused expression as she spread out the blankets as padding on the floor and propped up the pillows in an arrangement around the edges of the tent.
"I borrowed a lot of these from the tavern," Iris explained, "did you know there's a whole closet full of bedding?"