Saaria turned and saw Cia.
"We have no time to leave." She said. "Those people need our help, and we're stuck now, Gerald's just a head!" She yelled, motioning for Gerald as she picked up speed. They were in a part of the forest that looked perpetually trapped in Autumn. Looking around, they would see a few strange looking holes in the ground. They almost looked scratched into the earth.

@SepticGentleman @Cuccoruler

---

It'd begun to pour.

The duo, with Piper still asleep and slung over Ben's shoulder, settled down beneath an indented ledge of the ground stretching over a shallow pit of leaves and dirt. Pretty much half a cave. It was a little cramped for the saurian's size, but it would do.

Amidst the rain, Ben had gathered a few more rocks to make another pit, and set up a pile of dry leaves within it. They weren't gonna start a fire with any wet wood from outside. Thankfully however, some hefty roots were stretching downward from the trees up above, peeking through the dirt. Ben plucked a good handful of those, and they were set.

In the dimly lit dirt cave, Theresa and Ben sat beside the walls while the sleeping Piper lay on the bear skin.

"Wonder what her story is." Theresa said softly.

"Guess she'll tell us when she wakes up."

Theresa nodded. "You know..." She said, "I think I can get used to all the crazy stuff that happens here... relatively quickly. You?"

"Way ahead of you." Ben replied, with that cheeky smile of his.

And Theresa smiled back.

@UrbanEvolution
@Empour

---

---

"AH, OI'M SORRY FAIRY-RICHARD, BUT JUNGLE-RICHARD'S ROIGHT." Gerald replied, "MUCH AS THAT OFFAH SOUNDS ROIGHT DANDY, ME AN' JUNGLE-RICHARD GOT MATTAHS TO RECTIFOY. OI MEAN, WE GOTTA GET ME BONES 'FORE ANYTHIN'. PLUS WE'RE LOOKIN' FEH THAT WHOITE-HAIRED MISTRESS'S BRUV OR WHAT'S-IT, THEN WE GOTTA FOIND OUT WOT'S HAPPENIN' BACK IN THAT VILLAGE A STONE WITH THEM SHADOWY BLOKES, AN' THEN WE GOTTA FOIND OUT WOT THE MYSTERY BEHOIND THIS BLEMISH IS, AN' HOPEFULLY GET IT WASHED OFF ME NOGGIN."

Gerald sighed again. "AH PLATES' A MOIGHTY FULL, FAIRY-RICHARD. IF YEH GOTTA RELOCATE YAHSELF TO THIS, EHHH... SWEATAH MEAT COUNTRY, FOR WHATEVAH REASON PERTAININ' TO YEH HEALTH, THEN YEH SHOULD GET THAT ROIGHT DONE WITH, AN' THEN COME FOIND US AGAIN."

He could tell she was a little heartbroken over him essentially telling her to bugger off and come back later. "OI'M REALLY SORRY FAIRY-RICHARD, TRULY OI AM. BUT THIS BE FEH THE BETTEHMENT OF YEH HEALTH, AN' THE WELL-KEEPIN' A ME AN' JUNGLE-RICHARD'S. THAS' UNDAHSTANDABLE, ROIGHT?"

@luclovers
@Cuccoruler

Cia

Cia didn't really want to leave yet. For now she figured that she may be able to control it, or atleast keep the weapon pointed away from them. "I really wanna see this through too. I'm afraid I don't know much about that side of me, but I do know that it has never harmed anything with some kind of candy on it." Cia said remembering that last few times this had happened within Sweetmeat County. She gathered red dust in her hand as what seemed to be licorice appeared in her hand.

"I'm not totally sure if it will work, but it should atleast make you the last one I will go after. So for now just keep this on your person and I should stay away from you." Cia said. It wasn't a solid solution, but she couldn't go back to Sweetmeat now, she would need to wait until her next delivery of the medicine at least. Though that would take a few days. "At the very least I can protect you two better this way incase you get attacked." Cia said to them both still flying next to them.

She really didn't want to leave their side yet. She only hoped that they wouldn't push her away because of this.

@Luclovers
@SepticGentleman

Saaria took the band, pausing in the air briefly. She hesitated, and then wrapped the band around her wrist apprehensively.
"Fairies..." She mumbled. She had remembered something. Her entire childhood was obscure in her mind, she couldn't remember much beyond the cell, but the word fairy seemed to bring something back... Something negative. Saaria shook her head free of the flashbacks, and took a look around.
"Can you still...feel your other half?" Saaria asked Gerald, as she looked around trying to see anything reminiscent of the Taken.

@SepticGentleman @Cuccoruler @Doc Doctor

@SepticGentleman@UrbanEvolution

Very Uncomfortable Bed

Piper stared. Snake. There was a snake on the ground below her. A trickle of fear ran through her.
She couldn’t quite tell where the snake ended- she couldn’t see anything below the hard fabric she was on. The snake looked like it was asleep, which was a relief. Sleeping snakes wouldn’t bite her. There was a smoky smell. Fire? She couldn’t recall how she’d come to be on a terribly uncomfortable bed with a fire nearby and a snake under it. She tried to move, but it hurt. It felt as though she was bruised everywhere but her head. She’d packed something for this, though. A restorative potion, she just needed to reach in her hat and-

Wait, where was the hat? She didn’t feel anything at all. It wasn’t there. Where had it gone? She turned her head a bit. She was in some sort of cave, with a dying fire nearby. The outside could be seen, it was raining. Raining. Rain was nice. Rain made her feel relaxed, and helped her heal faster and better. One of the perks of being a water witch.
Try as she might, though, she couldn’t find her hat. It wasn’t on the ground near her. Perhaps the snake had eaten it. She hoped not. She rather liked Hatty. He was useful.

“Hatty? Where are you?” she squeaked out. Her voice was a little higher than usual. Maybe it was from being underwater so long. Something shifted behind her. Was Hatty back there? She couldn’t tell, she wouldn’t be able to move that much until she got that restorative out and activated it. Speaking of-

Hang on, her wand was gone, too! The entire holster was missing. She stared at her unusually blank arm. Where had it gone? Had it been ripped out in the watery spinning nonsense she’d been subjected to?
She froze. The snake had moved, and her bed shifted a bit too. Was the snake so big that it could move her bed all on its own? Oh no. A snake that big could outright eat her. Dying by poison was preferable to being eaten alive. She knew this. She’d asked a few ghosts before.

“Oh no...” she said, almost a whisper. She didn’t want the snake to hear her. Where was the person that had brought her here? Maybe they could protect her. Wait, had the snake already eaten them, too? Maybe that was why the fire was dying. She was defenseless without her wand and hat, too.

@Cuccoruler

After paying for a room Jordan left the inn and starting walking around the town. Glancing at the weird warehouse every now and then he could help but have a weird feeling about that building. As they were walking around town Sven was not far from them. It wasn't that Sven was following them but the other way around. As Jordan was looking at some wares he heard Sven call out to him. Walking over he listened to what the strange pink guy had to say. "We also noticed some weird things." He said while keeping his voice low. It seemed that where Jordan was the fox and Yig were not to far off as they were examining the weird statue. "Have you notice that no young or old people seem to live in this town?"

---

Theresa turned her head at the then-sleeping Piper by the fire, picking up her voice. "Oh. Hey." She said, seeing the young lady looking quite frightened, which was understandable given her present company. Theresa's eyes scanned her a bit, noticing Ben's tail was awfully close to her sleeping arrangement.

"Ben. Your tail." Theresa said, turning her head.

"What?"

"Your tail. It's right next to her, move it away!"

He did so, seemingly unwilling to. He was probably getting a kick out of scaring her half to death. Theresa shook her head, before realizing something. She turned to her left and picked up the hat from off the ground, stood up, and cautiously approached Piper. "It's okay, it's okay." She said, setting the hat down beside her, away from the fire.

"Is that... all you had with you?"

Piper shook her head.

Theresa looked over at Ben and called out, "Ben, what'd you take?"

"She had a stick in a leather sheath. Was going to recycle the leather." The saurian replied.

"Hand it over."

"The leather or the stick?"

"Ben."

"Ugh, alright." He reached into his coat and pulled out the wand and its sheath, tossing them over to Theresa, who aptly caught them. "Anything else?" She asked, staring him down.

"Nope. Nothing."

"Ben, I swear."

Ben sighed, and the movement of his eyes suggested he was rolling them. "Three copper." He said, making no other movements or notions.

"Well? Give them back."

"It's literally just three copper!"

"That's not the point, Ben!"

"She came out of a geyser and we saved her from any- wandering jungle beasts!"

"BEN."

Ben groaned, realizing the futility of arguing with her. He took the three copper pieces from out of his coat and deposited them in Theresa's hand. She, in turn, went and set the items down on the brim of Piper's hat, and said to her, "There. Hope that's everything. I'm sorry he robbed you, he just..."

She searched for the words.

"Are you... okay?" She asked.

@UrbanEvolution
@Empour

---

---

"JUST, EHHH..." Gerald replied in regards to the licorice, "TUCK IT IN BETWIXT ME CIRCLET AN' ME HEADBAND. IF YEH PUT IT IN ME JAW IT MOIGHT FALL OUT AN' GET EATEN BOY ANOTHAH JUNGLE BEAST."

Cia did so, tucking the licorice on the side of Gerald's head. Saaria then asked him about whether or not he could still feel his other parts.

"EHHH... MMMM..." Gerald replied, trying to focus. "OI, UH... OI CAN, A LITTLE... NOTHING FROM ME CHEST A BACK... BUT ME ARMS FEEL LOIKE... LOIKE THEY GETTIN' REARRANGED, SOME... OHHH, OI DREAD THE THOUGHT A ME LIMBS BEIN' USED FEH RECREATIONAL ACTIVITIES OF A MANNAH MOST UNSAVORY... WE BETTAH FOIND 'EM QUICK, RICHARDS."

@luclovers
@Cuccoruler

Cia

Cia was happy that the others would let her travel with them. At the very least she could provide some kind of protection for Gerald and Saaria. At this point Cia finally realized something, Saaria's english was much better. "How did you get so much better at english?" Cia asked forgetting to compliment first.

After her answer from Saaria Cia turned to Gerald. "Do you think it would be in a cave or something then? Does it feel moist, dry?" Cia asked going about her many questions again. She really did like her questions.

@Luclovers
@SepticGentleman

_______________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Sven

Sven turned to look around the square. He saw no children, or elderly. "That is a bit strange isn't it?" Sven said looking around. He then turned Jordan and gave him a smile. His axe still on his back, easily in view. "I should probably introduce myself, I'm Sven, guard of Sweetmeat County." Sven said remembering that he had not given his name to the man.

"Anyways, as much as I needed a map, I can't exactly help but want to investigate this place. Heard a few rumors that you can hear a ritual at night around here. You wanna join me?" Sven asked Jordan. Sven did not like to go about these sort of things on his own. His need to investigate such a thing most likely came from his lack of acting upon the factory within Sweetmeat County.

@Trevor1001

Saaria raised her hands, ceasing CIA's questions and Gerald's rambling. She sensed something. She floated down to the ground, and as soon as her feet hit the ground, she felt it. Vibrations. She looked to the tunnel nearby, suddenly noticing it. Looking around, there were many of them, seemingly scratched into the ground. But none of them had seen them before. They weren't there one second, and now here they were.
"We have to go down there." Saaria told them, pointing to the hole. A strange echo seemed to be pulsing through the ground.

@SepticGentleman @Cuccoruler @Doc Doctor

@Cuccoruler

"Hello Sven. My name is Jordan and that..." He pointed at the red fox. "is Jasmine and the big green one is Blake." Upon hear their names Jasmine and Blake made their way by Jordan's side. The animals gave a slight nod as a greeting as they took in more of candy guys appearance. "He smells sweet. Do you think he would mind if I lick him?" Blake shook his head and place his right front paw on Jasmine and pushed her into the ground. "I don't know and you don't need to start licking people to see what they taste like." As Jasmine tried to comically make her way out from under the paw Jordan sighed with his hand on forehead. "Sure I will help you out but I've been wondering. Are you made of sugar or something?"

Cliffside Alcove

The red-haired nice voice was a pleasant bit of sanity, given recent events. Piper wasn’t used to being alone for so long. It was also a relief to know that not only had the giant snake not eaten her, but that it was her servant, or pet or something. It could talk, too. Was he a magical snake? He had to be, if he managed to get her wand off of her. Thank goodness it wasn’t broken. She didn’t trust some idiot snake that would steal something from her at a moment’s notice not to break it. It was reinforced by means she knew not, but it was still irreplaceably valuable.
Piper reached into the hat, when it stopped hugging her face. Out popped a little green flask, and a cup of matching color. She poured the fluid within the flask into the cup, and laborously swirled it with her wand. The color of the potion within soon changed from a dull brown to a vibrant red, at which point she withdrew the wand and drank the cup in one gulp.

The drink burnt a little at first, but the feeling was soon replaced with an incredibly pleasant feeling of cool, wonderful relief. She could feel the pain from the bruises wash away within seconds, and soon she was able to sit up. She stored the flask and cup back in Hatty, and returned him to her head. Then, she looked around.

Before her sat an absolutely titanic humanoid dragon monster in ragged clothes, and a much more reasonably sized young woman with brilliant red hair and well-kept, warm looking armored clothes. It was obvious who was in charge here. They were sitting in a shallow cave, huddled around a fire that was barely clinging to life.

Piper looked at the woman, taking her time to answer her. Was she okay? She certainly felt okay after that restorative, but she was alone in an unknown cave with a competent-looking warrior of some sort, and her thieving dragon brute of a servant. She looked around a bit more, now having regained full use of her head-moving abilities. She was still in the pajamas from last night, which were filthy with mud at this point and rather ragged. She’d left all of her other clothes back at the camp before the monsters had attacked, alongside her sword and skillet. She was okay, but she wouldn’t last long running around without the stuff back at the camp.

“Um, yeah, I’m okay now. Thank you for getting my things,” She said, “What’s your name? I’m Piper, the stor- er, Piper,” She’d almost introduced herself as she did when together with Chumi, which was practically all the time. She didn’t like being without him.
@SepticGentleman @UrbanEvolution

Cia

Cia looked closer at the cave then flew into it herself. Since she was small she would be harder to hit if something were to attack her. "So what's so special about this cave?" Cia asked looking up at Saaria. Cia tried to keep her voice down as to not awaken anything that may slumber within the cave. At this point Cia had formed small brown sugar claws on her fingers. They weren't as strong as the black sugar but would still do a good amount of damage.

@Luclovers
@SepticGentleman

___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Sven

Sven gave them all a nervous smile. He had never met a talking fox and whatever the other one was before. "Right the smell, I'm from a place called Sweetmeat County. It's a nation where everything is made out of sugar or sweets, including its citizens." Sven said scratching the back of his head. "Maybe we should ask around about this songstress first before we go any deeper. I think having a bit more knowledge about it may be of use to us." Sven said looking back over at the statue of the girl.

@Trevor1001

@Cuccoruler

Jordan thought about that for a little bit. "That kind of sounds like an interesting place to go to." He looked up at the statue before agreeing. "It might be the best option we have right now. Where should we start?" Blake lift his paw and Jasmine jumped onto Jordan's head to avoid being squished again.

The cave was more of a tunnel, Cia realized now. A steep 80 degree drop would've claimed anyone who stepped in. Cia could hear a strange shuffling sound, almost like clicking, echoing from beneath.
"Gerald's body." Saaria said. "It's down there."
She then leaped into the cave, shooting down the tunnel like at wa a garbage shoot, narrowly missing Cia on her way down. The tunnel got thinner and thinner as it went down, and Saaria began to be reminded of the cell, anxiety overtaking her as the sides of the tunnel eventually scraped her wings. It got so tight she thought she would be trapped forever. And then she fell. Landing in a pile of dust, Gerald's head flew off of Saaria's horns, rolling down the dust pile, and laying on the ground a few meters away. The clicking sound was louder now. Saaria's eyes could see in this dark, they were in a wide room with a pile of chalky dust that didn't stick to Saaria's clothes, and there was another tunnel on the side of the room opposite Gerald's head.
@SepticGentleman @Cuccoruler

---

"AHHH!" Gerald called out, as he landed on the ground at the dust pile's base. "FEH..."

He wanted right about now to be able to at least move his skull a bit. Maybe if he had some of his spine left, he'd be able to shake off some of the dust. Got into his eye sockets. Very unfavorable.

"RICHARDS?" Gerald called out, "OI CANNY SEE A BLASTED THING! JUNGLE-RICHARD, LOIGHT SOMETHIN' ON FOIAH MAYBE, ILLUMINATE THIS HOLE!"

@luclovers
@Cuccoruler

Saaria heeded Gerald's advice, picking up the white dust in her palm and trying to ignite it. She gave up after a few moments. She could tell this stuff would need a lot more heat to ignite. What was it even? She opened her mouth to call out to Gerald, but accidentally breathed in some of the dust, sneezing instead.

Down at the foot of the mound, a clawed hand picked Gerald up. A indigo eyed Taken was dusting him off, completely unaware he was sentient. The thing then attempted to smash Gerald against the wall, apparently intending to shaman him into smaller pieces. It grunted as it scraped Gerald across the hard stone wall.

@SepticGentleman @Cuccoruler

Cia

Cia followed them down into the cave. She looked around the cave trying to see. After Gerald demanded light Cia decided to oblige them both by lifting up a hand to the air gathering golden dust. It coated her skin this time making her light up like a lantern and illuminate the whole room.

When Cia saw the large Taken she quickly got into a defensive stance. She switched to her larger form again this time with the yellow claws of sugar already on her hands. She leaped towards the creature attempting to slash at its arm in order to free Gerald.
@Luclovers
@SepticGentleman

Sven

Sven looked around and saw a woman outside of her house sitting and sewing. She didn't look like she would be too bothered by the question. He approached the woman with a kind smile. "Hi there, I was wondering if you could tell us about that statue in the middle of town." Sven asked the woman.

JoyVille

The woman gave a kind smile back. "Oh you mean the Songstress Goddess Mai? Our town believes that she was the one who founded this town. There was a story about her as well. In this story it was said that she freed slaves who were being forced to work in mines. Their captors were terrible demons that would eat the children of the slaves as well as the elderly." The woman had put down her sewing materials at this point.

"The Songtress Goddess heard the pleas of the slaves and came to free them. When the Demons heard her song they all fell asleep allowing the slaves to escape. Once everyone was out they collapsed the mine and killed the Demons. After that she helped the former slaves to found Joyville a place where no one would have to worry about pain ever again." The woman was very pleased with what she had said so far. Of course there was far more to this story than met the ear. "Is there anything else I can help you two with?" The woman asked looking at Jordan.

@Trevor1001

@Cuccoruler

Not really one to bet around the bush Jordan leads up with his most important question. "I was wondering why there are no young or old people in this village? If that is the case for this settlement that story must of happened a long time ago." Jordan kept his gaze on her hoping she could provide some answers. Blake and Jasmine were keeping an eye on the nearby people just in case Jordan's bluntness got them in trouble with the locals...again.