Dave made his way back towards camp to the agreed meeting spot when he saw a Mana Projectile shooting straight into the sky. The sign that Sarah’s group was in danger.

He immediately turned and ran towards the signal. Their clearing might’ve been small, but there were trees aplenty. So it took him a few moments longer than he was comfortable with to make his way through the forest.

A few moments in which Dave had to be careful not to stumble onto any other Nodefox group, in which his nervousness became almost unbearable.

Then he passed a tree and saw the reason for commotion. Sarah and Ryland were confronted with a small group of Nodefoxes.

Their task had been to be stationed off to the side, giving Dave support and watching out for signs of enemies entering. They were supposed to retreat at the sign of danger.

Something must’ve gone wrong though. Ryland was on the ground struggling to keep a Nodefox off of him. While Sarah was backing away from two other Nodefoxes that carefully advanced towards her.

Seeing the motionless Nodefox on the ground, plastered in scorch marks, Dave had an idea where their caution came from.

Reacting to the closest threat, Dave sprinted forward and unleashed a Spark at the Nodefox closest to him. A brief flash illuminated the shadows of the trees. The poor thing never saw it coming. It collapsed on the ground, electricity still buzzing through it. The familiar scent of charred fur made its way towards Dave’s nose but he ignored it and advanced on the other Nodefox pressuring Sarah.

“God bless you Dave!” Sarah cried out.

“Hi Dave!” The commotion had distracted Rylands foe long enough for him to win the upperhand in their struggle. Still Rylands voice sounded surprisingly cheerful for the situation he was in.

Sarah had used the distraction to pepper her other assailant with Mana Projectiles, but it casually erected shield after shield to block the assault. It had noticed Dave, but ignored him, and instead steadily moved forward towards Sarah. To Dave’s surprise there wasn’t even fear on the Nodefox face, not even after seeing its companion being grilled.

There was only annoyance as it looked briefly towards Dave. It raised its hand and a strange green energy slowly crawled out of the floor. Incorperal at first, but the more of the green stuff gathered, the more form it took. Dave watched as it became denser and denser and took on a roughly humanoid shape.

He came to a stop when the thing was suddenly two meters tall. Four massive arms sprouted from its body and instead of a human head, there was the head of a Nodefox, deeply out of proportion. Together with its acidic green color, the thing looked fearsome to say the least. It flexed its thick muscles and roared at Dave.

Whatever that thing was, it carried a dangerous energy. Dave had no time for distractions though, the casting Nodefox was still advancing towards Sarah, its conjured shields blocking every missile without fail.

Dave flexed his wrists and faced the thing with his Blades drawn. Whereas he felt calm before when facing the other squad of Nodefoxes, he felt nervousness creep up on him now..

Not only was this abomination in front of him multiple times scarier than the Nodefoxes he had faced before, now also his friends were in danger. If the casting Nodefox was able to put out such a spell so casually, Dave was seriously worried about Sarah.

Having long learned to ignore his feelings in these situations, Dave rushed forward anyway. The abomination reached forward with one of his thick arms, but it was slow, and Dave was able to duck underneath in and score a cut across its ribcage.

To Dave’s surprise it felt like cutting through sick molasses, rather than a living being. The creature didn’t even seem to mind. Just as Dave wanted to dance out of reach again, he was caught by the backhand of the other arm on this side. With enough force to break in a door, Dave was thrown off his feet and crashed into the ground a few feet away.

After a deep roar the beast followed him, pouncing towards where Dave still lay on the ground, trying to get his head back into order. In the last moment Dave before the thing landed, Dave was able to roll to the side, avoiding it barely.

He quickly got to his feet and took a few steps backwards, hopin to regain his composure. But before he could manage such a thing, the creature was upon him again.

Dave stepped back again and again, evading it as best as he could, but the thing chased him tirelessly. Dave managed to land a few small cuts here and there, but it didn’t seem to slow the creature. Even Spark was only a slight nuisance for it.

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Exhaustion slowly crept up into Dave’s limbs and he knew it would mean the end for him. After barely leaning back from another blow, Dave sent a Spark into the abomination's face. It was slowed down by it, giving Dave time to retreat again.

He needed a new strategy. Soon.

“I could still use some help!” Sarah’s voice was desperate, as she ducked behind a tree only barely avoiding a blast of green energy.

Luckily, him keeping the abomination busy seemed to irritate the caster that was closing in on Sarah. He was making slower progress then before, and staying between the covers of the forest and slowing it with her spells, Sarah still managed to elude it.

“Trying my best here!” Dave replied between breaths.

All Dave heard from Ryland were a few grunts. “As long as he grunts he’s still able to fight.” Dave thought, having experienced Rylandy tenacity himself more than once recently.

Ryland seemed to thrill under the face of danger. He was too tough for his own good, sometimes taking hits because he knew he could retaliate harder in return.

Suddenly Dave had an idea. As he carefully sidestepped another attack, he began backing away towards Sarah. He had tried ignoring the beast and attacking the casting Nodefox before, but the abomination had always seemed well aware of his plans and intercepted him.

Now was no different, as Dave got closer towards its master, the thing pounced forward, trying to land on top of Dave. He rolled backwards but was still hit with the shockwave that thing created by landing. He stumbled a step or two and barely managed to avoid a hook to his head that would’ve been game over.

In retaliation Dave stabbed its arm and was rewarded with an angry howl. He took another step backwards towards the Nodefox, still a good bit away, but the abomination didn’t let him. It grew even more furious, swinging and kicking at Dave wildy. At one point even tried to bite him.

Dave evaded attack after attack, not trusting himself to block the immense power. The task was made more difficult by the fact that he was only able to dodge back in a straight line, or else he would be circling out again, away from the Nodefox.

The thing seemed to notice his tactic and wanted to punish him for his too lateral dodging. It winded up and drew back for a heavy punch.

That was exactly what Dave waited for though. Instead of retreating as expected, he stepped forward into the punch, surprising the abomination. By shortening the distance Dave didn’t give the thing enough space to generate a proper amount of power. He managed to raise his arms in front of his torso just in time to at least semi block the attack.

Still the fist thundered into him and he was thrown multiple meters backwards, flying through the air. That was just what he wanted though. He ended up sprawled out on the ground only a short distance away from the casting Nodefox.

It turned around in surprise at the sound. Its eyes wide in shock at seeing Dave being so close to it.

Dave’s ribs were aching, he had to fight to draw in a breath. His left arm was definitely broken. But he still managed to barely righten himself on the ground. Before the Nodefox could react to the sudden appearance of Dave, he had raised his arm and released a Spark at it.

It wasn’t prepared and so the shock hit it. A quick spasm went through it and a patch of fur started smoking, but it was tougher than expected and kept standing. The Nodefox made an angry screech and the abomination mirrored it with a deep growl loud enough to send birds flying from the treetops, fleeing for safety.

But before the caster could do another thing, a Mana Projectile drilled a hole into its head, and it collapsed on the ground. With barely enough energy to turn his head, Dave checked and saw that the abomination was gone as well.

Then he followed suit and let himself fall flat on the ground. He wasn’t sure what happened then, he must’ve passed out for a while, because he only remembered staring up into the sky and the next moment Ryland and Sarah stood above him. Concern in their eyes.

“I’m fine really.” Dave said taking Rylands hand and slowly getting to his feet.

“Yeah me too.” Ryland said. After Dave stood he really saw Ryland for the first time. He was completely smeared in blood. Dave saw only a few scratches on him but he looked like he came fresh from his shift in the slaughterhouse.

He and Dave both looked at each other, than glanced down themselves and burst out laughing. After two laughs, Dave’s ribs hurt and his laughing turned into coughing. He spat a bit of blood.

“You two are idiots.” Sarah said. “We have to get you to Sam quickly.”

“What happened here?” Dave asked.

“We’re not sure. After you finished your squad, we were on the retreat, taking the long way around to the back of the camp, so as not to run into trouble.” Sarah explained. “But trouble seemed to have found us.”

They hadn’t planned for Ryland and Sarah to get attacked, they were meant to function as a back up and warning system only. Bixby had estimated the Nodefoxes would split into roughly three groups of five to six, the usual count for scouting squads. The plan was for Dave to handle one squad together with Sarah and Ryland. Then they were supposed to head back to the camp to help them prepare for the final squads.

“At least we’ve already gotten rid of two squads now.” Ryland said. “So we’re ahead of schedule right?”

Dave looked over the clearing again, he counted four dead bodies. “Yes but this squad seemed to have been on the smaller side as well.”

“Less Nodefoxes means less Nodefoxes.” Ryland shrugged.

Sarah’s eyes grew wide as she realized something. “The camp!”

“What?” Dave asked, confused.

“The others are in danger! Think about it, we both only found smaller groups, and they were moving faster than expected. We haven’t even noticed this one. What if the other Nodefoxes have already found the camp? There would still be too many left for them to fight.”

Realization dawned on Dave’s face. “And we’re already later than expected.”

With this they took off towards the camp. To call it running would be generous. Dave and Ryland were not in the condition to run at full speed. Dave’s whole body ached and his ribs were sending waves of pain through his body with every breath. So instead of running, it was more of a fast hobbling.

It only took them a minute before they heard the first sounds of battle. Upping their pace they saw the scenery a moment later.