"...Jumino are gremlins that feast on anything that moves. The other wildlife in Aldariana have been suffering because of it, and we've been totally separated from all civilization in the east. They're dangerous little creatures in numbers. Are you seriously going out there?"

Jenso got a confident grin on his face. "Yeah, I gotta go through. But if the situation is as bad as you say it is, maybe I should deal with this problem first!" Jenso said in a serious tone. "Is there any reason why they're this agressive, and do those gremlins have a leader or something?" He asked.

"They're like locusts. We don't know why there are so many now, but there's no reasoning with the little purple bastards. We don't even know where they come from."

Jenso frowned. "Looks like I'll have to get to the bottom of that then.." He responded, with a determined look on his face. "I'm gonna try to take care of them...can you open the gate?" Jenso asked in a friendly tone.

The guard rose and eyebrow and shrugged. "Your funeral, bub. Hey! Louise! Open the gate!"

"Opening the gate!"

With a loud series of clanks, the wooden gate rose to allow Jenso passed. "Be safe out there... Well, as safe you can be. Those things don't give any warnings before they strike. If too many find you, don't try and fight them," He warned Jenso, leading him through to the other side.

The fields of Aldariana sprawled far and wide, covered in lush green grass and mountainous landscape. In the far distance, a giant mountain stood near the center of the plains, surrounded by dark circular clouds. Was that that temple of the elementals? Jenso, with his new bottomless bag in Tow, was allowed to step into the dangerous terrain, where the Jumino lurked. Little did he know, somebody was watching him from afar.

---

Jenso followed the main path the best he could as it sprawled up and down, curving side to side through the hills. He saw deer, strange fox-like creatures, and the occasional bird, but no Jumino. He didn't even know what they looked like, but based on what the guard said, they were small, plentiful, and... Purple.

About an hour down the road, Jenso found himself rounding a small mountain on his left. He heard something behind it, but the bumpy landscape full of bushes and trees on his right was silent.

Jenso enjoyed the green landscape as he travelled. It was quite the beautiful sight, despite the dark clouds that surrounded the huge mountain up ahead. He started slowing down a bit as he heard the noise. He slowly walked over to the small mountain as quietly as he could, and peeked around the corner to see what was making the noise.

As Jenso walked further with his body pressed against the mountain's side, he noticed four little purple imp-looking creatures with pointy noses and long, thin limbs. The one imp that faced in his direction didn't notice him yet, but Jenso could see that his eyes were purple as well, and had no pupils. They were tearing into the corpse of a small deer, but they weren't eating it. As Jenso mad one more step forward, something cracked, and the four imps rose their triangular heads and spun towards him. A series of hisses rang out, and they darted after Jenso with their little clawed hands at the ready, jumping when in range to slash at different parts of his body, namely, all four of his limbs.

They were much smaller than one might expect, about the size of a small dog, but they were quick and chaotic little monsters with a strange smokey aura that became visible when their rage was triggered.

Jenso glared at the gremlins as they charged at him. As they attacked in unison, he quickly jumped further back to avoid the claws and get some distance between him and the beasts. He followed up with a quick horizontal kick with his left foot at the group of Jumino, using his size to his advantage to keep the smaller creatures on a distance.

Jenso's sweeping kick knocked two of the little creatures aside, but the higher of the two landed on his shoulders and bit into them with their sharp little teeth and clawed at his upper back. Their attacks were barely enough to break through his shirt, dealing minimal damage, but they kept at it, trying to tear as much flesh off as possible. The other two Jumino disappeared in a puff of purple smoke upon hitting a nearby tree trunk.

Jenso attempted to pull the creatures off his shoulders and throw them into more trees on his right. 'Shit...they're fast!' He thought.

Jenso latched on to each imp with his hands, and tossed them effortlessly into the tree, dispersing them in a cloud of smoke once more. They didn't seem very strong in such small groups, but from what he knew, there were many more of them.

From atop the hill, an entity remained hidden and glanced at Jenso through a wall of rock. "Ohoho! What do we have here?" She whispered to herself, holding her slender body in anticipation. "Another tasty Morsel? Ohoho"

---

As Jenso made his way further, he could see the Mountain that housed the elementals getting closer with each step. He would have to scale the mountain, and find passage into the shrine that hit above the darkened clouds. But were those clouds normal? Pharie didn't mention anything about them. Something was fishy, and it almost felt like somebody kept watching every one of his moves.

'Try this on for size, you little brute..!'

Suddenly, Jenso found himself walking along a heightened row of land, with trenches on either side of him. It went on for quite some time, but within seconds of traversing the small bridge of dirt, quite a few Jumino darted up the hillsides towards Jenso from both directions, quickly surrounding him. There had to be hundreds of them! Jenso had to act quickly...

As Jenso moved onward, he thought about his encounter with the Jumino. The way they died was quite unusual, and it seemed like magic had something to do with this. As the Jumino came from all sides, he kneeled down. He placed a hand on either side of him, and created flames in his hands. The flames were rather small to avoid draining too much energy. He attempted to light the grass from the threnches on fire on both sides.

He wasn't sure if the fire would spread fast, but he believed that the Jemino from the left and right sides would take a longer time to reach him due to needing to run upwards. A surge of power rushed through him as he dashed forward at top speeds, aiming to weave past the first Jemino that rushed at him, followed up by a low-sweeping kick at those behind them. He needed to avoid being cornered from all sides and tried to break through.

Jenso's flames stopped a large chunk of the Jumino in their tracks, and then they began to spread, albeit at a slow pace. Several Jumino couldn't stop their momentum, and dove into the flames before poofing into a few clouds of purple smoke. As Jenso dashed forwards, several Jumino lunged at him, but ended up striking air as the speedy golden-boy weaved past them. Several more lunged at him from behind, but were met with Jenso's foot, promptly poofing into smoke on impact. He continued further, but the horde chasing him began to grow in size, and speed. Eventually, the trenches became more shallow as he reached the end of the bridge-like path, but not before even more Jumino blocked his path, pooling into his way from behind two equally large boulders on either side of the pathway, mere minutes before the base of the mountain where the elementals lived.

Far off, in the smaller mountain from earlier, a woman watched eagerly, biting her thumb. "Yes yes, oh yes! Smash my little imps, golden-boy! Show me what you're made of! Ohohohaho such finesse~"

Jenso's eyes widened as he found his path blocked by even more Jumino. "What the heck...this is crazy!" He shouted, getting in a combat stance. He needed to break through, or he would be overwhelmed. The group of Jumino that had been chasing him was closing in fast from behind him. 'I need to figure out who or what's creating these things, and fast!' He thought. He dashed towards the group of Jumino in front of him, trying to weave past them. He leaped into the air towards one of the large boulders, and attempted to climb it while prepared to kick at any of the Jumino that would try to latch onto him.

Jenso found his arms under attack as he moved towards the boulder. Three.. No, four Jumino clung to his pants and bit into his lower leg muscles like little piranha. As he climbed the rock and kicked them off, as well as any others who approached him, they were flung into the side of the mountain and turned into smoke, as well as a small chunk of the attackers. But they just kept coming and coming. If Jenso couldn't escape, or find some way to dispatch them all quickly, he was doomed. But the mountain had no caves, and his abilities wouldn't allow it.

Looking closely however, it seemed that the Jumino had trouble climbing the vertical rock face of the boulder he had just mounted. Were they terrible as climbing? It seemed too strange to be true, but right now, it was all he had to go based on...

As Jenso got on top of the boulder, he began to move from side to side in order to kick the Jumino that climbed up and were the closest near the top of the rock. He waited until many of them were trying to climb the boulder, and quickly leaped off to land a good distance away. As he landed on the ground, he quickly dashed towards the base of the mountain, trying to weave past any more Jumino in his path. He leaped upwards, and attempted to climb the mountain of the elementals while kicking below him every now and then in an attempt to hold the Jumino off. He hoped that if he were to climb up high, he would be able to escape them.

Jumino went flying into puffs of smoke left and right until Jenso leaped to safety, several yards away, onto the face of Mount Aldri. The Jumino continued after him, using their stubby little claws to keep up, but one after another, they fell from the wall, and to their inevitable demise. Jenso continued to scale the mountain until every last Jumino fell, or was kicked from its grip.

"Oh poo! My poor little imps couldn't keep up... What a wretched little creature- Ah, but this yellow boy.. Why does he seem so... Enthralling? Ahohoho~"

---

Further up the mountain, Jenso eventually reached a small plateau, just below the swirling dark clouds. It was large enough to fit a house, but there was nothing here, nothing except more mountainous wall to climb on the far end..