A yawn escaped from the form of the man laying atop the eight-wheeled Prowler parked just outside the quaint township of Delion as he awoke from his slumber. ”Well, that was refreshing.” he remarked, scratching the back of his head as he hopped down from the top of the vehicle. How long had he been asleep for? The sun hadn’t gone down yet, so it couldn’t have been too long. In any case, it was about time that he went to see what the rest of the mighty “Shabu Shabu Party”, a name he’d come up with while hungry, were up to. If he were lucky, there might have even been a chance that they picked up a Hunting Contract while he was asleep so he wouldn’t have to. As Rhein walked through the township of Delion, he checked his pockets to make sure that no one had taken advantage of him during his sleep, only to find that his belongings hadn’t even been touched. Breathing a sigh of relief, Rhein was glad to know he still had money on him, as his stomach had begun to growl during the check. Getting some grub would have to wait until after he checked up on everyone else, however.

As he passed by the townsfolk, Rhein noticed that people looked at him funny as he passed their field of vision. ”Huh? What the hell are they looking at me like that for? Never seen a guy with an eyepatch before?” he thought, raising an eyebrow as he caught sight of some girls stifling chuckles as they watched him pass. What the hell? Did he look funny or something? Unbeknownst to Rhein, some children had snuck up to him while he was sleeping and drew a moustache on his face and a monocle over his uncovered eye, as well as a third eye on his forehead. To cap it off, they even managed to tie his hair into some sort of topknot, which he’d somehow not managed to notice in his concern over whether or not he had any money stolen.

Scratching an itch on his cheek, the tan man frowned at the injustice being done to him at this moment. Had the others been stared at and openly laughed at in their time at the town? Somehow he didn’t think that was the case. Whatever. He was in a good mood from his nap, and he wasn’t going to let people thinking he was a dork ruin that. Hell, he was already used to that from the other members of the Hunting Party, who were a bit reluctant to refer to him as their “leader”, even after almost a year of hunting together. Then again, it wasn’t as if Rhein had often performed any leader-like duties, what with all of his napping and general nonsense. He’d probably have to work on that if he ever wanted to form a larger guild, but for now he wanted to enjoy the comparatively lax atmosphere of travelling with the two Dragnan and the Beastfolk woman. He’d gotten lucky in that they’d managed to cover all of the classical “Hunting Party” roles early on, and even managed to have another Frontliner on board, thus reducing the amount of effort that Rhein felt he would need to put in.

”Where the hell is everyone?” Rhein muttered, though it was clear he wasn’t actually looking very hard since he was kind of just wandering aimlessly through the town more than anything, mostly just hoping he’d spot some horns or furry ears, or…. other things. Unlike him, there was at least some chance that everyone else was actually doing something productive with their time. Or they’d gone off to hunt without him, which had happened a few times before, to be sure. In any case, they were more likely to find him than he was to find them. Plus, it wasn’t as if he happened to be in a rush to do any actual work, as the weather was actually quite nice, and the atmosphere of Delion was quite peaceful. In fact, Rhein was hard-pressed to believe the town had a monster problem at all.

"Okay, uh, that's a lot of monsters."

The tall Dragnan stood in a crowd, cloak over his head like a hoodie, overlooking a bulletin of missing persons and accompanying Wanted posters. Of course, technically, the missing persons were Wanted too, but probably not because they murdered anyone or anything. That, and, more than half of the Wanted posters were crudely drawn pictures, probably from hazy recalls of survivors that were still high off adrenaline. So, who knows maybe all these different guys were actually just the same monster. Wait, but would that warrant to the crew- or, uh, loosely titled "Shabu Shabu Party"- getting all the different rewards, or would they be like 'No, this isn't just one monster, you guys are liars' and they wouldn't get all that reward? Maybe they'd just have to fake like getting all these monsters for the reward. Yeah, that was a morally alright idea.

Well, Saffron decided, reaching and ripping out a poster that detailed the monster's last appearance and the best looking picture, right next to a crudely crayon scribbled one, deciding to go over to the crew and suggest looking for it, if not because he really wasn't the type to go looking for monsters alone without an incentive, and also because imagine how hilarious it would be if this very detailed picture of a monster was actually inaccurate as fuck. Knowing the Shabu Shabu Party's luck, that would probably be the case.

As he made his way through the peaceful hubbub of the town, his eyes spied blonde fur and made his way towards it immediately, faltering only when the figure turned and showed no signs of, uh, specific weaponry. Aight, so Estelle wasn't around and, lowering his hood and scratching his mess of hair, neither was Grim. Then again, the kid was small and Saffron wasn't exactly best for looking for tiny things. He did spy a funny looking guy with scribbled markings all over his face, haha, it looked like the kind of mess his party's self proclaimed leader would get himself into, what with his laziness and sleeping habit.

Oh.

Wait.

Deciding it was best not to associate with Rhein at the moment, Saff made a quick turn and walked the other way, using his nose to search for the girls. They were probably also getting in loads of trouble, but were probably less of an embarassment to be aro- "Oh dang, is that a pig?" Saff stopped and squatted at the ugly boar tied to a post, no owner seemingly in sight. He accidentally drank his last vial of ugly boar blood, and was tempted on stabbing the thing then and there. Technically that would be theft though, so he waited instead for someone to barter with to come around.

Chirp. Chirp. Chirp. Tickticktick. CHIRP. CHIRPPP!

A white cat ear twitched. Lids lazily opened to reveal pallid blue eyes. Her ear flinched again to the chirping and light tapping on the vehicle's metallic frame which ceased to halt. Hmm, I wonder... Snatching a bag of sunflower seeds, the Beastgirl slyly walked towards the top exit, making sure not to awaken anyone. It was pretty early still and she was the first one up. Estelle popped her head from the circular entrance and exit of their ghetto looking tank and swiveled her head around, her feline ears turning to zero in on the source of the racket. "Hi little birdy. You're gonna wake everyone up," she greeted the beaked creature in a soft, soothing voice. Opening up the packet of seeds, she fished out a handful and tossed a few towards the tiny bird. It cocked its head side to side, remaining weary of the neko.

"It's alright. I'm just trying to feed you," she attempted to calm the critter as she hauled her body out of the open lid, slowly and quietly lowering it back down as to not disturb the snoozers. Gasping sharply, she was surprised to see that Rhein had passed out on top of the tank and she nearly stepped on his crotch if it wasn't for her handy dandy kitty skills. Beckoning the bird over, she left a trail of sunflower seeds in her path to lead the bird away from her crew. "Hm, this should be far enough," she huffed in satisfaction. By now the bird had been so accustomed to her presence that it mistakenly perched itself onto her palm which held some more food. Then in a split second, Estelle clasped her hand shut and shoved the unknowing feathered prey into her mouth. Licking her fangs happily, she soon realized she was basically at the center of Town. "Nice time to explore," she murmured as the sun continued to rise in the sky. People were beginning to set up shop and neighborhood kids were beginning to wake, going from house to house to invite their friends out to play.

Seeing an elderly Dragnan coming back from an early market run, Estelle quickly ran to help with the heavy bags of groceries. "Here granny," the neko offered kindly as she took the load and the horned woman was more than pleased with the aid.

"Oh what a beautiful and kind young lady. Thanks sweetheart!" The Dragnan croaked with a toothless smile.

"It's no problem and thank you," she grinned back. The two shared small talk until they arrived at a petite cottage just a few blocks away from the main square. As they made their way into the doorway, granny raised her finger as a lightulb went off in her head.

"Why don't you and your crew come over for breakfast? Really I insist!" The Dragnan said firmly seeing Estelle become hesitant.

"Hmm.. alright. If you say so Ms. Sagsalot," the cat-eared girl agreed. "I'll return soon!"

~~~~~~

Retracing her steps towards the square and back to the tank, she bit her bottom lip and rested her chin atop her propped up fist, "Now where could they be?" Rhein wasn't there for sure and she caught that fact from a distance and Saffron wasn't inside either. Climbing back out, she strolled along the streets hoping to spot anyone from the Shabu Shabu Party. Hearing fits of repressed laughter erupt from around her, a slight red hue began to form on her cheeks, thinking it was her, but upon surveying her surroundings, she realized it was some pranked fellow with an eyepat- "Rhein! Oh Rhein!" She called in a concerned motherly tone as she ran towards her team member upon studying the artistry on his face. "What have they done to you?!" Estelle cried as she pulled the male into an embrace, suffocating him in between her large breasts. Her initial instinct was to lick the marker off his face since that's how cats groomed, but she'd learned over the year that her partners didn't appreciate that so she opted for grabbing the hem of her shirt and vigorously rubbing it all over his face.

"Come, come. We must look for the others. A really nice old grandma invited us over for breakfast!" She beamed as she finished wiping the drawings from his facial features. His skin had turned a light crimson and dark smudges dotted random spots here and there, but aside from that, he looked decent enough.

Carrying on with her walk, she made sure to tow Rhein along with her. This went on for a few short minutes until she spotted Saff crouched beside a hideous pig. "Ugh I can't believe you drink blood from that," she paused for the right word, but eventually settled, "Thing!"

Suddenly, a butcher saw the forming crowd by his ugly boar and wiped his hands on his apron before coming outside. "Ay! Whatcha want with me boar?" He asked with a heavy accent.

---

---

Grímhilðr had found herself early awakened by Estelle, whom saw fit to feed a bird, for some reason that Grímhilðr could not process on her own. Who gave a shit about those flying poop machines. She'd spent more than a day once washing the shit of a giant eagle off the windscreens once. Never again. She merely turned around and continued sleeping, pulling the covers further over her head. Snores were quick to follow as she fell back into her slumber, and slowly the soft, endearing snores turned into full blown snoring as she rolled back over onto her back. Her mouth was open wide and slowly some drool escaped her mouth, too, And so she kept up with her minimum of twelve hours of sleep, until finally she awoke and found the prowler to be devoid of life.

Her arm swung back behind her head as she scratched the back of her head while a yawn escaped her mouth. Promptly she got up, looking lively as ever, and grabbed her shirt, pulling it over her head in a comical fashion, the horns holding back the shirt a bit before she finally forced it to go over her head. To finish off her already rather enticing appearance, she grabbed a black oversized baseball cap from her personal shelves above her bed, and fitted it over her head. Next up was her sunglasses - they were classic. All in all, if you disregarded her rather traditional shirt (incluis shoulder pauldrons) she might've looked like some big guild operator-gunner type. Instead, she just looked like what she was. A fuckboy.

The baseball cap fitted perfectly between her two horns, which were adorned with various linen wraps, which hung down and had beads on them. They were red and thus, matched rather well with her warpaint on her face, the thin red line with 'drips' downwards, and the single line below her lips. All in all she would've looked mighty ferocious if it weren't for the fuckboy apparel she donned. And even then, compared to some Dragnan, her horns weren't even that big, in fact they were sort of small. Hehe. But the rest of the crew didn't know that. In fact, if anything, those of Grímhilðr were very large compared to the only other Dragnan in the crew, Saffron. Then again Saffron was a mage, and mages were known to be, well, pussies. 'twouldn't be the first time Grímhilðr gave him shit for that.

With a large jump, the 5'0 girl launched herself out of the prowler and she landed somewhere out in front of the village that they were currently camping out at. Would be a good time to go explore, she supposed. She strutted down the streets, looking fly as ever, glancing at people left and right. When finally she spotted some of the crew, she spotted, well, most of them all at once. Holy shit. Was that a pig!? “HOLY FUCKING SHIT IT'S A PIG!!” she yelled out so loud that most of the people stopped dead in their tracks to stare at the girl. But Grímhilðr had no time to stop and apologize for being loud. She started sprinting towards the pig and once she got close enough, jumped high into the air. It was worth wondering how that tiny girl managed to get so much airtime, since she was only 5'0 and didn't look particularly strong.

As she launched herself, she landed on the pigs back, disrupting the scene entirely, scaring the pig with her sudden tackle. As expected, the pig tried to run away, but was held back by the rope that was attached to some pin in the ground. Grímhilðr knew how to fix that however, and reached back. WHAPSH! was the sound of her hand firmly slapping the pig on it's ass, and that was enough to send the pig in a insane dash, ripping the pin out of the ground and heading straight for the market. “YEEHAW!” was the last thing the Shabu Shabu Crew would hear before Grímhilðr lost control of the pig entirely, and the pig barrelled through the nearby market stalls, the pin dragging behind it and swinging left and right.

Hm. Well. That might be a problem financially? “Rhein will pay for that!” Oh, well. Maybe it wouldn't be a problem.

Just as Saffron and the boar were doing some Hardcore Major Brotherly Bonding, the Dragnan spied out the corner of his eye two of his party mates ambling over. Estelle said some pretty damning things about his new best friend, Saffron wrapping a defensive arm over the boar as he hushed it assuringly. "Uh, don't be vulgar," he scolded her in his monotone voice, rising from his squat and reaching into the back of his cloak, about to grab a dagger, already making a firm decision to cut the rope. Clearly his party was assembling, and clearly no one was stepping forward to claim the boar, and clearly the town had a monster problem, so if the thing disappeared they could just pin the blame on the monst-

"Ay! Watcha want with me boar!"

Fuck.

"I want his blood."
Shit, he didn't mean to say that out loud. Before he could make up an excuse, the final piece of the Shabu Shabu Puzzle literally fell into place, disappearing in a blink with his ex-new-Best Friend. "Grímhilðr!" he shouted after the runt, watching as she headed straight for the market. The number of funds and town hate immediately calculated in the Dragnan's mind, and he turned to Rhein- oh, the scribbles were poorly taken care of- his brows in a slight frown. "Is it too late to officially quit this group yet."

Having recovered from the shock, the butcher suddenly shouted in frustration, Saffron, jumping and turning, an automatic, "_{Okay damn, I won't quit,}" leaving his lips at a barely audible level, overpowered by the butcher's louder scolding. "YOU TOOK ME DAMN BOAR!! ONE OF YA'S BETTER PAY UP O-" CRACK. Handy for magic tricks as it was, Saffron's stave also served as a handy club, serving a solid whack on the butcher man's head and knocking him out. Thankfully the crowd was too busy screaming "Boar!" and scrabbling about to notice Saffron's lucky strike, the Dragnan squatting and offering a peace sign, as though posing for a picture, next to the body.

Directing his attention to Rhein, and waiting a beat to let the background screaming and clattering really settle, he finally said, "Uh, as leader, you should probably take care of that."

---

---

As Rhein’s aimless strolling continued, the strength of the growls of his stomach grew stronger. ”This suuuckks. I should just go eat without ‘em. Snooze ya lose, right?” he thought, failing to take into the account the fact that he’d been napping not too long ago. Just as he was about to make good on his new plan to just go and fill his stomach, he heard a familiar voice calling his name, prompting him to look in the direction of where it came from, only to see the buxom beastgirl. Estelle. ”Huh? What are talking ab-mmmfph” Rhein’s question was cut short when the feline-eared woman grabbed him and basically shoved his face into her chest, a remarkable feat considering his height. ”So…. Soft.” he mused, enjoying the situation until it had become hard to breathe, at which point Estelle had already begun to pull away and start rubbing his face rather roughly with her shirt. It was situations like this that reminded him of, and reinforced, his goal to have his extravagant mansion of similarly buxom beauties.
”Ugh… Thanks, I guess? Might’ve been a good idea to explain what was wrong first before ya try rubbing my face off.” he remarked before perking up at the prospect of free food.
”Well, lead the way.”

It wasn’t long before the two found Saffron squatting over a pig. Knowing him, he was probably going to try and collect its blood for whatever the hell purpose he collected random blood for. After a short exchange between the Dragnan and the Beastgirl, Saffron had already pulled out a knife and gotten ready to cut the rope before the owner of the boar stepped out, looking visibly angry about what looked to be a group of strangers attempting to steal the damned thing. Please don’t say what you’re d-Fuck” Rhein pinched the bridge of his nose when Saffron let on that he was going to bleed the man’s animal, especially since there was no context for it. Was this guy gonna think they were all part of some kind of bizarre cult? Before Rhein could even recover from Saffron’s blunder, he heard another familiar voice shout.
“HOLY FUCKING SHIT IT'S A PIG!!”
A look of horror crossed his face as the tiny, dark-haired Dragnan girl known as Grimhildr entered the stage, escalating the situation even further by leaping atop the boar and, even worse, riding it off into the distance. A few beats had passed, but soon enough, the boar’s owner had begun to shout some nonsense about having them pay for the boar, no doubt spurred by the fact that Grimhildr made it obvious that she was one of their associates. Annoyed, Rhein was about to speak up, only to be further thrown for a loop when Saffron cracked the butcher on the head with his staff, knocking him out cold.
”Honestly, I’m thinking about quitting myself now.” Rhein grumbled before propping the unconscious butcher against the wall of the building he’d exited to confront them. With that done, he proceeded in the direction of where Grimhildr had gone, the destruction left in the boar’s wake serving as the perfect trail of breadcrumbs by which to follow the Dragnan and her unruly steed.

Rather than sprint after them, Rhein chose to walk, scoffing at Saffron’s suggestion. It seemed Rhein only got to be the “leader” when everyone else was getting in some kind of trouble. ”Eh, maybe going back home wouldn’t be such a bad idea?” he thought, only to quickly put the idea out of his mind. Not an option. Though, if things like this kept happening, the Shabu Shabu Party’s rep was gonna go down the drain. Not that their reputation was particularly stellar to begin with.
”Geez, this thing really went for maximum damage.” he remarked, coming to an enclosure of stalls that the boar, with Grimhildr in tow, happened to be running around in circles between after having put a hurting on quite a few of them. At this point, it just looked like the boar was trying to shake Grimhildr off, but once it spotted Rhein, it made a mad dash in his direction.
”Uhhh….” Rhein raised an eyebrow as the boar made its charge, determination in the animal’s eyes as it charged toward’s the tan-skinned individual. As soon as the boar was within reasonable melee distance, it would receive quite a surprise. Without any real hint of hesitation, Rhein punched the boar in the face, spiking its head into the ground and knocking it out instantly and probably launching Grimhildr from the abruptness of the stop. Perhaps they could just bring the boar back and pretend nothing ever happened? Well, that’d be pretty hard considering the mess they made. Rhein found it hard to believe that being in a Hunting Party would be this stressful for everybody. Or, if it were, the stress was probably relegated solely to the actual hunting portion of everyday life rather than the shenanigans that were going on with the Shabu Shabu Party. Had he just gotten unlucky and recruited a bunch of troublemakers? Was he that desperate?

Estelle was just about ready to utilize her charms to acquire the pig at low cost, if not for free, until Grimhildr decided to make her appearance. Cringing and stumbling back, the petite figure launched herself atop the boar and road it like a horse into town square. All the neko could do was blink in surprise and shock and just when she was about to turn around and apologize to the butcher, Saff decided that knocking out the man was the next best idea. Hissing in annoyance, she rubbed her temples in an attempt to sooth the threatening headache bubbling in the back of her skull. It is way too early for this. She thought as she inhaled deeply, trying to regain her sanity. It was really a wonder why she decided to settle on sticking with this ridiculous group. Maybe because she thought they were in dire need of someone sane and civilized. Or maybe it was just her motherly instincts kicking in at the sight of a bunch of immature brats banning together.

Making a shooing motion to Rhein, coaxing him to go after the two, she took it upon herself to care for the unconscious butcher. She made herself comfortable by his side and gently placed the man's head upon her lap. "You poor, poor fellow. All because of that hideous pig. You didn't deserve this," the cat-eared Beastwoman cooed as she lightly tapped his cheek. Luckily the blow wasn't fatal, just hit a critical nerve. Focusing some of her Ki into the palm of her hand, she placed it on the back of his head where a large bump had begun to arise. A pink glow seeped into the injury, causing the swelling to decrease significantly and eventually the man's eyelids fluttered open to an underside view of Estelle's breasts.

"There, there. You're ok now," she said helping the disoriented man up onto his feet. Immediately, the butcher brought a hand to the back side of his neck, wincing slightly.

"I healed your wound the best I could. I sincerely apologize for my crew members. How much is the pig if I may ask?" Her voice was one of concern and sincere dismay.

The butcher brought a stubby finger up to his chin, "Well since ye healed me wound and all. I guess ye can have thee pig fer free. He's an old one aneeway." A grin spread across his face. Well isn't she just the prettiest lil ladee.

"Oh my! Thank you so much sir!" Estelle hopped once on her spot, her bosom bouncing with her gleeful gesture. Hugging the guy lightly around the neck, she skipped off after the battered trail Grim had left behind on her wild pig ride. Finally spotting them in a sort of enclosure, it looked like a rodeo show with the boar flailing vigorously to try and rip the Dragnan off its back. Sighing, she approached cautiously, still observing the commotion. Seeing Rhein literally deck the poor creature in the face as it charged at him, she bit her bottom lip as her eyes widened into the size of discs. Eventually, she arrived at the now knocked out ugly beast with Rhein crouching by its side. Grimhildr was propelled elsewhere, but in near proximity.

"Good news," she huffed patting her thighs, "We scored that thing for free thanks to me. Now Saff can have ugly pig blood galore. And I guess we can eat it too." On the bright side, everyone was now present and they could go have some breakfast at Grandma Sagsalot's house.

---

---

Grímhilðr was riding the boar around, cheering it on with frequent slaps on the ass to speed it up as her other hand was burled into the beast's manes to hold on. Finally, Rhein appeared on the scene, and for a moment she figured he might join in with the fun. But of course, the beast had other ideas, and charged straight for the man. “Wait, no, don't go to him!” she yelled out at the boar, knowing full well what the man was about to do. She braced herself and closed her eyes for the inescapable fate she was about to meet. But since the man punched the boar rather.. straight on, it was only logical that when she flew over from the sudden stop, she would fly towards the man.

She collided with Rhein, grabbing his shoulders as she felt herself being pressed against him, and they would tumble back together in a mess of dusty clouds. When the dust settled, it was revealed that Grímhilðr was already up on her feet again - her nimble and short stature had allowed her to more or less avoid falling on to Rhein. Maybe that sounded good to him, but it was about to get worse. She raised her fist into the air and descended it onto his head, which if it hit would produce a loud thump. After that she would clap her hands together twice as a manner of dusting them off. “Don't do that again! I nearly lost my sunglasses.” she said sternly, as if she had somehow suddenly become more serious.

Her serious gaze at Rhein would last only two or so seconds before she suddenly gave him a shit-eating grin with a twinkle in her pearl-white teeth. She rapidly grabbed her sides and then started laughing uncontrollably. “JUST KIDDING! That was fun! We should go punch some more boars when we have a chance!!”

Slowly she walked over to Saffron and Estelle, before turning around to face Rhein again. She added to her previous line, smiling at him again. She looked more minuscule than she actually was compared to the two standing next to her, which only gave her an even more childish look. “Did you get a new contract for us yet, though..? .. partyleader Rhein?”

The last bit was meant to give Rhein some feeling of superiority and perhaps a sense of duty, even though everyone including the old geezer that gave them the pig probably had noticed that Rhein was not much of a leader. Grímhilðr didn't listen to Rhein long enough to hear his answer, swiftly turning to Estelle. “Hey, 'stelle!!” The name was shortened a bit to sound a bit more 'street' than it actually was. Never the less, Grímhilðr had quickly become accustomed to the woman. Namely because she just liked to nap on her cushions.

“I'm taking a nap later, do you mind if I lay on you again? Cool!” Well there wasn't much chance for a reaction from the poor woman, but she didn't object the last few times that Grímhilðr forcibly laid on the womans breasts to take a quick nap. Now that shit had quieted down she rapidly got bored again, and audibly let everyone know by yawning like a wild cat. “WHEN ARE WE GOING HUNTING?”

---

---

Rhein hadn’t really thought about the fact that, with the sudden, forced halting of the boar’s charge, the only direction Grimhildr would likely be launched was towards him. Knocked to the ground from the force of Grim flying into him, Rhein sighed as he took a moment to look up at the blue sky, catching sight of a large, winged figure flying up ahead. Probably a Roc, from the looks of it. The eyepatched man moved his head to the side as Grimhildr’s fist came down, letting it hit the ground next to him. ”Whoa, that actually looked like a pretty hard punch. Is that anyway to treat your leader?” he grumbled as he got back to his feet. Once Estelle gave her update on the boar situation, Rhein breathed a sigh of relief. While the situation with the stalls was out of their hands, at least the butcher wouldn’t be quite so mad. ”You hear that, Saff? Our master negotiator managed to get us a free meal and a free boar. You could learn a thing or two.” or get a pair of big, soft, juicy--

“Did you get a new contract for us yet, though..? .. partyleader Rhein?”
Shit. Had everyone else been goofing off too? The Shabu Shabu Party’s leader shook his head and gave a thumbs up, the actions obviously contradicting each other. ”Nope. I was hoping you guys would’ve picked something up.” he replied, completely matter-of-fact. Rhein, the Great Leader, in action. The man’s eyebrow twitched as he watched Grimhildr essentially reserve her napping place for the day. Considering the fact that he’d been napping atop their Prowler, Grimhildr’s use of Estelle’s special pillows made him a little--no, incredibly jealous. ”First, the little shit tries to punch me in the head, and now she’s just gonna rub this in my face?” he thought, internally boiling. Perhaps that was the tradeoff. Grim herself was a flat-chested runt, so perhaps the gods had blessed her with the ability to sleep on any boobs she wanted. Either that, or Estelle was easily swayed by Grimhildr’s charms. Regardless, this was yet another sign that Rhein would need to step his game up.
”I’m starving anyway, so how about we just have a bite at the old lady’s place. Then, your handsome and daring leader can get us a fat, juicy Hunting Contract.” he suggested, perfectly fine with putting off a hunt for a little longer, and even more fine with complimenting himself when no one else would. Motioning towards Estelle, he gave the nekomimi a nod.
”Lead the way.”

---

---

”Eh, why the hell did it have to be one of these?” Rhein muttered, frowning as he scanned the page of his Monster Encyclopedia. Apparently, while the group had been eating at “Sagsalot’s”, a Giga Slime had appeared. Where the hell it’d actually come from was honestly a mystery, but a Slime of that size was going to be a pretty gross encounter. A sticky situation, if you will. Frankly, the weirdest thing to Rhein was the artist rendition of the Giga Slime as what appeared to be a mass of gelatin in the shape of an absurdly muscular, headless male human body. Rhein himself had yet to encounter a Giga Slime, but the idea of any Slime taking such a shape seemed pretty weird. Unfortunately for them, it seemed like there were other Hunting Parties in Delion that were on their way to take on the creature. ”Game faces, guys. This is a big one, so we’re gonna have some competition.” he remarked, standing up from his cross-legged sitting position atop the rusty, tank-like Prowler. Handing the encyclopedia down the entry hatch, he pointed to the rather large, bladed shield in the corner. ”Hey, Saffron. Make yourself useful and bring that over here.” he requested, entirely deadpan as he hung down into the vehicle. The weight of the Fragarach’s combined sword and shield would probably be a little too much for the Mage, but Rhein took that as a satisfactory punishment for the Mage after being the catalyst for the day’s earlier mishaps.

At the sound of other vehicles approaching, Rhein lifted himself back out of the Prowler to observe two others. Unlike their eight-wheeled, stryker-like Prowler, the two were a mite smaller, being four-wheeled vehicles with round hulls. Though, what caught Rhein’s eye was the fact that they were actually armed with mounted guns. More importantly, however, both of them were painted with the same logo of a bear with a human skull in its mouth. An odd image, but the primary worry was the fact that it was clear that these guys were noticeably better-equipped. ”Aww, geez. I thought that there would only be small-fry here, but we might be competing with a guild already.” he thought, frowning as both of the vehicles let off shots from their main cannons, prompting Rhein to look at exactly what they were firing at.

”Well, say it ain’t so.” Rhein whistled as he looked up at the colossal creature, which indeed was a massive, muscular gelatin man. As the shells from the two vehicles made impact with the Giga Slime’s blue gelatin body, the headless creature flexed as the shells exploded, only to come out entirely unharmed. This was gonna be a durable Slime, but it wouldn’t be a problem as long as they could at least get the core, which was easily visible due to the creature’s translucent body. It was just a matter of whether or not they could get to it before these other guys did.

---

---

The self proclaimed leader of the crew's comment regarding Estelle's handiness earned him a face and a finger from Saffron, though obviously only when his back had been turned, because the fun in making faces was in part doing it behind someone's back. A lot of things happened, mainly involving Estelle's secret weapons, Grímhilðr being a bitch, and Rhein being Rhein-- basically, one's standard day with the Shabu² Party. Saffron made mocking gagging noises as the party leader complimented himself in a way probably no one else in the group would bother to, albeit following behind the crew as they made their way to lunch. It was a miracle, honestly, how the foursome managed to still be alive and still be together despite nearing almost a year, though perhaps it was in their own rather, uh... intolerable traits that kept them together.

He took to waking up the ugly boar with a knock on it's head, the thing stunned momentarily by confusion, Saffron taking the time to undo the rope wrapped around the pin, instead taking hold of it. He and his ex-ex-new best friend were now reunited, and their rekindled friendship showed in the elongated eye contact they shared during the walk to the old lady-- though, halfway, Saffron started getting a bit creepy and his hand started twitching for his knife. Thankfully, to the boar's luck, he wasn't for lunch nor was he for blood letting, in fact surviving until afterwards, sitting under Saffron's legs, who was chillaxing on the Prowler as Rhein did his thing.

"Hey, Saffron. Make yourself useful and bring that over here."
The Dragnan glanced up from ignoring Rhein, then to the combo sword and shield, before his gaze wandered back, a solid 'Are You Fucking With Me' stare bleeding from his deadpan eyes. They both knew that thing weighted a ton, and, in case Rhein hadn't noticed, Saffron was busy saving his energy for a healthy death in a century's time. Not like he'd get anything in return, anyways. He instead retorted the best way he knew how-- pushing the problem to someone else.

"Aw c'mon, you know I can't," he started, sighing as he shrugged, "It's way too heavy. No one could pick it up-- not even Grímhilðr." The last part was said a little bit loudly, to catch the prideful child's attention, his simple baits and her brutish taunts often putting the two at a clash. Not like she was anything important anyway, her horns weren't even that big. Then, just to egg her on a little more he added, "Then again, she's not that strong, so. She definitely wouldn't be able to pick it up and hand it to you."

By then Rhein had already lifted himself back out the Prowler-- not that it mattered, this bit was meant for someone else's ears anyways. Hearing sounds outside, Saffron glanced out the window briefly, noting the well-equipped Other Guys and the-- "Haha, uh, holy shit," he interrupted his thoughts, glancing out the window to the large muscular gelatin man. Oddly enough, the accompanying doodle from one of the earlier Wanted posters was a pretty good match, which made Saffron one part impressed with the artist's rendering, and two parts confused as to the detail put into it. The whole thing sort of didn't matter though, considering it was crunch time and Saffron's motivation was at an All Time Low-- the Giga Slime was obviously gelatinous, and there was no blood there for the blood mage to find any interest in.

But he had to at least look the part he decided, in which his hands unsheathed one of his stab daggers and attacked his new best friend-- as of now dubbed Squeaky given the noise it made upon infliction-- the swiftness of it out of pure habit and less of motivation though understandably a surprise to those who saw Saff as an uninterested freeloading leech (both literally and metaphorically). No blood leaked out, because Saffron was a pro at stabbing despite everything else, and the boar seemed to barely notice it had a knife in it's side. Only thing left to do was get closer to the Slime, or let the rest of his team handle it while he pretended to back em up-- like Estelle. Estelle had her shit together.
"Rhein," he called up as he leaned out the stripped window of the Prowler, the Other Guys roaring up beside them, the urgency in his usually monotone voice both a warning and an unspoken ask for permission to attack the Other Guys.

Ears perking up upon hearing a variation of her name pop out of the petite Dragnan's mouth, Estelle was about to respond to the proposal, but Grim practically cut her off and invited herself. Pursing her lips, she just kept her mouth shut and let out a silent giggle. When Rhein complimented her on obtaining the boar free of charge, she grinned, quite proud of her achievement. Once they all agreed to finally go have breakfast, she nodded and recalled the way to Ms. Sagsalot's cottage.

An hour later...

"Alright you munchkins! Feel free to stop by here anytime you're in town!" The elder croaked happily waving the Shabu Shabu Party off.

"For sure granny! See you again!" Estelle shouted back as they got farther and farther off.

According to Rhein, their next mission was to take down some slime monster. Sounded pretty disgusting. A cringe formed across her lips just thinking about it. She took a peek at the drawing and bit her lip. Nice six pack for a glob monster. She thought kind of impressed.

As the crew took to teasing one another about who would get Rhein's sword and shield, she spent her time putting on her gear. Pulling her beloved gun out of its casing, she flicked the cute charms lightly with a smile as she slid in a loaded mag. Estelle daintily grabbed her belt adorned with candy designed bombs and clipped it securely around her hips. Glancing out the window, she caught sight of the two smaller tanks and the corners of her mouth curved into an amused smile. Looks like we've got company.

"Alright shorty, let's go for the slime monster," she beckoned Grimhildr to come after her as she climbed up the ladder to the circular exit. Head peeking out, she saw the two competitor tanks fire at the creature only for it to come out unharmed. "Hmm impressive. We'll need to damage it from the inside." Saffron looked to be targeting the other tanks. Good. He could distract them while Rhein, Grim, and herself tackled the main beast. Hopping down from the prowler, she licked her fangs and held her gun in position. Let's have some fun.

---

---

Grímhilðr had spent most her time driving that damn oversized prowler. The machine was her baby - to a degree - and the large amount of childish and fuckboy-esque decals plastered on the machine were a testament to that. While the prowler itself was a group effort and everyone had in some way or form contributed to obtaining it, nobody could deny that the prowler was Grímhilðr's child. And despite the things size, it was still a smaller prowler than most models out there. They were just a party of four, that didn't have a homebase to return to. Naturally they slept and ate aboard the prowler. For the other guilds, their mobile bases were.. gigantic. Cities within their own right.

However that didn't make the Shabu Shabu's prowler any less cool. Sure, the camo had rusted off in most places, sure, it took twenty minutes to start the engine, sure, it sometimes would shake for no apparent reason giving everyone within the prowler a bout of carsickness, sure, it was a piece of junk. But it was their piece of junk. Until a giant eagle shat on the windshields again, then suddenly it was Grímhilðr's piece of junk as everyone else suddenly said it was her prowler and so she would have to clean it.

When Saffron started giving Grímhilðr shit, she looked over her shoulder towards the back cabin. Due to the fact that they were driving well over 120 kilometers an hour, she started swerving slightly. For those inside the prowler, it wouldn't be that noticeable, since the prowler was equipped with some stabilizers. Naturally they were old (as most of the prowler was) so some swerving was expected. For Rhein, however, atop the prowler, he'd probably get carsick. Blame Saffron for that.

“SHUT UP! Can't you see I'm driving! 'sides.. I can lift you AND that damn shield at the same time and throw you off a cliff so shut the hell up..”

She was about to say something else when Grímhilðr looked to the right and noticed the two cars, too. They fired some shells at the gelatinous creature, which was stupid, but supposedly it was worth testing out to see if they could blow some chunks of that thing off.. That wasn't what was on Grím's mind though. No, she formed a rather devilish grin. “Eh, Saffron, let's fight later, for now let's focus on showing them what's what.”

While Estelle, Rhein and Saffron were probably expecting to drive up to the slime monster carefully and slowly, then get out and assess the situation with the other two cars involved. Maybe they could split the bounty for the monster? Maybe they would decide who got to take the contract? No.

No.

Grímhilðr was a very nice and kind person, but she didn't see any reason to cut these other guys a piece of the cake. They weren't invited to her birthday party, so they didn't get cake! Simple as that. “Better hold on to something guys!” she suddenly yelled while pulling the steering wheel to the left as hard as she could. The machine roared as she stepped on the pedal, and the prowler started shaking violently as a result of the engine being pushed to it's limit.

For a brief moment, the prowler rode on four wheels as opposed to the eight wheels it was supposed to ride on. Then the prowler cut back onto all wheels again as they closed the distance with the two cars. Closed the distance rather quickly.. actually. This was getting pretty dangerous. “GET OUT OF HERE!” Grímhilðr yelled as she rode alongside one of the two cars. Suddenly she steered right again, ramming the other car with the prowler. “OUR CONTRACT. GET.”

Then Estelle called her over, saying to get out of the car. “Hmph. Fine.” She pulled some levers and pushed a button, before getting up and running to the back, grabbing her giant musical club and strapping it to her back. The prowler kept riding on automatic, however it would slow down eventually and stop driving.

Grímhilðr's eyes looked at Saffron with his pig, slightly confused about why she stabbed it. “When you're ready Saffron, come and help us. You're a fucking weirdo.” Then she promptly grinned at Saffron and raised her fist in the air, as if she was trying to motivate him. “Yo, let's do this!” And then, as quickly as she had spoken, she disappeared out the hatch again, jumping up top the prowler.

Almost immediately she swung her giant music-club around and then smashed it against the car that was still driving alongside them. TWANGGGGGG! The chord wasn't particularly nice to hear but it was certainly loud. The car's side-door windowshield cracked under the hit, causing some confused screams from inside to be heard. “HEY! WE'RE JUST HUNTING THIS MONSTER, YOU'RE NOT SUPPOSED TO BE HITTING US! THAT'S ILLEGAL!”

“Oops.” she answered the two guys inside, raising her hand to her mouth as if she was embarrassed by what she'd done. “I really really don't care.”

---

---

Rhein probably should’ve expected Saffron to try and make excuses for why he couldn’t bring him the Fragarach. Odd how he specifically chose Grimhildr, since the Dragnan girl was, well, driving the Prowler. He winced as he watched Saffron stab the boar, a process which he was consistently surprised by as far as how quick the Dragnan was about it. ”If you’re gonna try and disrupt ‘em, I’d prefer you were a bit subtle about it. Don’t need anyone thinking we’re a pack of wild animals.” he stated, giving Saffron permission to mess with their competition, albeit with the caveat that they needed to at least break even as far as their reputation went.
The Prowler began to swerve when Grimhildr decided to give Saffron a piece of her mind, causing Rhein to almost fall off. In retrospect, it was probably a bad idea to have Grimhildr driving, but the diminutive Dragnan insisted. Just as Rhein was about to warn her about her handling, Grimhildr shouted to the others that it’d be a good idea to hang onto something. ”Whoa, whoa, wait a m---” suddenly, the rickety eight-wheeler was rolling on four wheels, and the Shabu Shabu Party’s leader was clutching onto the hull the whole time, breathing a sigh of relief as the Prowler came back down onto all eight.
”Did you just forget I was up here?!” Rhein barked, teeth clenched as he hopped down the hatch. At this point, it was pretty clear that he’d have to get the Fragarach himself, since Estelle and Grimhildr were already going to engage the Giga Slime. Muttering to himself, Rhein casually picked up the heavy Accel Blade and strapped it to his right arm.

Frankly, due to everything that had happened so far, Rhein was pretty content to let everyone else handle most of the work like he usually did. As he climbed back out of the Prowler, he watched as Grimhildr pretty obviously assaulted one of the other crew’s vehicles. ”I said to be subtle, Grim.” he remarked. Now enraged by the attack from the other crew’s Prowlers, the Giga Slime began to move into action. Reeling one of its gargantuan arms back, the Giga Slime swung it down towards the Shabu Shabu Party’s Prowler, the gelatinous limb elongating as it flew towards the group. At the same time, the Slime actually fired its other hand like a rocket at the other two Prowlers.
”Somehow, I feel like we’re getting the tougher end.” Rhein remarked, whistling as the whip-like arm rushed towards the Party. The arm was actually about as thick as the Prowler itself. Annoyed that he was going to have to actually put in work this early, Rhein grasped the handle of the Fragarach’s sword. Once the arm was within a few feet, the Hunter clicked the trigger, causing steam-like jets of mana to erupt from the shield as the blade was released from within, the arc of Rhein’s swing leaving a trail of similar steam as he cleaved down the middle of the arm, splitting it into two halves that fell to the sides of the Shabu-Shabu Party’s Prowler. At the same time, the hatch of one of the other Prowlers opened up and a red-headed, moustached Horvin popped his head up, adjusting the wide-brimmed hat he wore upon his head before pointing a metallic wand with a diamond-shaped protrusion on the end. A Casting Device. The moustachioed Horvin took aim for a moment before a blast of wind tore the gelatinous rocket fist to pieces.

”It looks like the Slime’s body gets weaker when it stretches or detaches from the main body.” Rhein called to the rest of the Shabu Shabu Party, flicking slime off of the Fragarach’s rectangular blade and inserting it back into the shield. He said “weaker”, but the tendril of goo had some real weight behind it, and the fist it had launched at the other Party was probably pretty similar. “Weak” wasn’t really an accurate way to put it. More like “easier to deal with”. Which meant that the main body, or the unstretched limbs would be an even bigger pain in the ass. How the hell could a Slime become such a troublesome monster? The Slime’s damaged limbs reformed themselves and it reeled back for another attack, this time going for a sweeping attack to try and take out both crews at once. As the crews got closer, they would notice bones and lumber floating inside of the Giga Slime’s body, remnants of its prior conquests.

---

---

The older Dragnan honestly expected Grim to put the ride on auto, but when she only shouted back, Saff replied with sticking out his tongue. The appearance of the other rival party seemed to create an unspoken truce between the two, however, Rhein's added permission only getting him a little more motivated. Honestly, the best thing to do was just go with the motions and pretend to be helping out, but overall outputting the least amount of energy as possible. Pulling out his throwing dagger, he pet Squeaky gently, the hubbub of the situation seeming not to affect the ugly boar even in the slightest. Almost as if he'd been drugged which, ha ha, totally didn't happen, because as stated many times before, he and Saff were Tight Bros.

The crystal embedded throwing dagger was a glitchy magic imbued blade that Saffron got for a great deal in the Southern Deserts. It was supposed to be a transporter blade that could cut through the time-space fabric and teleport people, but whoever did work on it did a piss poor job. It ended up not being able to do any of that cool shit, and instead it had only like, two handy uses. The first was-- Saffron took hold of the stab dagger in Squeaky's side, both blades in his hands vibrating as they flickered and switched out. If you held another blade of the same brand-- even accidentally, it would switch out. It was handy for cases such as so, when he meant to stab the boar with the throwing knife instead of the stabby one. Most of the time it was a headache to deal with though, just like Saffron as a person.

Pocketing the stab dagger, Saffron reached once more for the throwing blade, ripping it out of the boar, an excess of blood coating it to the hilt, the stave handcuffed to his wrist warming hot. Leaning out the window and muttering a quick spell he aimed as far away from the rival group as possible, hoping that is poor aim would luck out and he'd somehow hit th- “Better hold on to something guys!”

Just as the dagger left the tips of his fingers, Grímhilðr did her fucking thing, Saffron grabbing the sides as he hissed a, "Little Shit!" to express his chagrin. Squeaky slid down, leaving a trail of blood, which released another curse from the tall Dragnan. The dagger seemed to have taken Saffron's piss poor aim along with Grímhilðr's wild driving as two negatives that equaled to a positive, hitting true towards one of the rides and exploding with blood on impact. Not damaging, but blinding and gross as fuck. As soon as the Prowler landed back on all eight wheels with a grunt, the hand that last held the throwing knife was suddenly full of it again. That was it's second decent ability-- returning to it's official owner after being away for too long. See, that didn't come with the receipt though, Saff had a solid month of leaving his knives in their containers only to have a fist full of knife while trying to have a decent conversation.

Everything went to shit pretty quickly, and Saffron straightened himself, pocketing his knife as he made his way to Squeaky, the blood trail it'd left behind latching onto his stave-- truly, a handy housekeeper in cases of murder. He should do that instead of Hunting-- probably a way less stressful job. Digging the end of his stave inside the boar's open wound, the stave turned a dark crimson and continued to get warm, the pig itself shriveling dry. It was gross and graphic, but it came with the title. Picking up the carcass with ease, Saffron headed out the Prowler as well, a thin layer of blood left over laced with explosive spell, blood already starting to boil.

Glancing to his side, he caught sight of some Horvin's casting device, brow furrowing instantly. Casting Devices tended to mean mages that went to school, and Saffron didn't really have a good history with the guys. Okay, at least he had a reason to outdo these guys now. Pig bomb on his shoulder, he alerted Rhein, "Uh, this one's hot-- mind drop kicking it towards Jumbo."
It was a more reasonable option than wasting a big explosion the other guys, and Rhein had a much more solid control of Ki and general physical strength than he did. It was necessary given the thing was threatening to blow in two turns-- which was probably in world slang for any fucking second. Just as the second wave started to sweep over, Saffron's stave went back to it's wooden state, blood gushing from below in hazy squiggle shapes that arched over a side of the Prowler, not stopping the attack but enough to redirect the attack but at least getting away with just tipping them a little over, whole thing coming down in a crash, Saffron stumbling as he realized he probably didn't think that through whoops. That's what he gets for trying, unbelievable.

---

---

Grímhilðr shot Rhein a berating glance as he lectured her. He was really not in any position to speak since he barely pulled his own weight to begin with. “I don't know what subtle means.” she replied, looking back at the gigantic slime. Hm, okay. So how exactly did Estelle expect to take down this thing? She called Grím to go outside and fight it, but as far as Grímhilðr could see, they had to actually get close to smack it around a bit.

When the slime reared its arm back Grímhilðr readied herself to get hit, since nobody seemed to be taking care of it. Well, Rhein was, but she didn't really have faith in that kid. He was nice and all, and he indulged in her antics from time to time, but he hadn't really shown himself to be a leader.

In reality Rhein was quite effective when it came to stopping the slime. “Wow. That was actually pre- ho, wait!” She took a running start towards the front of the prowler, which was still driving, by the way. Once she reached the edge she quickly jumped off, using her tremendous jumping power to head towards the slimes arm. She used one hand to hold on to her musical club, the other frantically flailing around in the air to stabilize herself slightly as she flew towards it. When she got closer she suddenly noticed the left over bones inside.

Wait.

It didn't have a head, so it .. how did it eat?

Well fuck.

She deduced that landing on that arm would be a very, very bad idea at that point. She moved quickly to push the musical club in between the slime and herself, and when she finally landed on the slime, she managed to not get eaten by using her club as a sort of vaulting pole to avoid touching that thing.

Then, she pushed herself away and swung the club around harshly, swinging it around and then overhead before sending it down on the remnants of the slimes arm. The hit was quite hard, and Grímhilðr used whatever mastery of Ki she had to further the hit. However she lacked proper Ki control and so, it didn't really amount to much. The slimes' arm seemed to burst slightly, with splats of slime coming loose and landing on the ground around the slime. Some of it landed on Grímhilðr's arms and hands, which was to be expected since she was, after all, smacking the slime from up close. What followed the hit was a deafening chord from her musical club, which played a small tune akin to an arcade-game style beat. It quickly subsided however, since the club needed subsequent hits to be able to play a full song.

Now the fall to earth began again, as she tumbled to the earth again. When she landed she bent through her knees lightly and looked up at the destruction she had caused, bits of slime still falling down around her. Her hand moved up to her face, and wiped some sweat from her brow, inadvertently also smearing out a bit of the slime all over her forehead. “That'll teach it! Sorta!”

Seeing Grim go berserk on the competitors tank, she rolled her eyes and cringed a bit while clutching her ears when she played a particularly inharmonious note. Meanwhile, the Giga slime looked to be making an attack-- at the others thankfully. A mustached figure popped out and obliterated the hand into glob pieces, causing the goop to scatter every which way. Yelping, she dodged a large droplet of the stuff, cringing in disgust. It seemed like Rhein had made a a good observation and she took the fact to heart.

Watching Grim finally making a mad dash on the thing, she shot at its torso to distract it from the little girl closing in and frowned as the bullets bounced off its chest like pebbles. Estelle remembered reading something in the monster encyclopedia about the top area where a neck and head were supposed to be being the most vulnerable part of the beast. Not allowing any time for the Giga slime to recover from Grimhildr's attack, she dashed towards it and jumped onto a sizable boulder before launching herself over the things body. Aiming her gun at its neck region, she shot a couple rounds only to find that the bullets lodged themselves into the thick goop of its body before slowly but surely sinking into the center.

Landing on her feet, she pursed her lips and eyed her pinks bullets through its translucent body. Unlike the rest of it, the very top part of the monster was literally like jello. She figured if she were to hop onto that thing, her legs would sink into it like quick sand. Sprinting back to the prowler just as the slime grew another limb to try and whack her, the neko brewed up a plan to defeat it. "Alright, looks like the headless region is how it eats. It has no defense from up there. Did you see my bullets go into that thing?" She fished out another mag and clipped it into her gun. "If I can get a crap load of these bombs in through the top, we can blow that thing from the inside," she continued laying out her idea.

"I have to get near it though without being attacked since these bombs are sensitive once active," she gulped, hoping they'd take kindly to what she was about to say. "I need y'all to play bait and lure the arms as far away from me as possible so I can do it." Finding a roll of duct-tape, she carefully arranged her candy explosives into a ring with the pins sticking out before securing them all together. Setting up another unit of bombs, she taped those to the previous to a total of 12 bombs. If she managed to infuse her Ki into it before they set off, then the 12 would do damage as at least a bundle of 20.

---

---

It seemed like Rhein’s request for subtlety had fallen on deaf ears, as Saffron worked a pretty obvious display of blood magic with his knife. As blood splattered on the surface of one of the Prowlers, it stopped in its tracks, the hatch opening up and revealing an Eldrin man with glasses, his eyes stern as he glared at the Blood Mage. “Do you have a problem with us, asshole? I’ll settle it right here if you want!” he barked. For someone who looked like a bookworm, he sure talked a big game. Rhein ignored him, deciding that the other guys were Saffron’s problem. After all, Rhein hadn’t done anything wrong. Except, well, not rein Grim and Saffron in. As the slime arm crashed into the blood shield Saffron had erected, Rhein sighed as their Prowler began to tip and the slime from the appendage splashed over the top of the barrier. Annoyed that he would have to do any further work, Rhein braced himself before rushing towards the barrier at high speed, breaking through the blood barrier and bashing the gelatinous limb away with a shield check. ”Aww, gross.” he grumbled, noting that he’d managed to get some blue slime in his hair. Turning back to Saffron, Rhein cringed when the Dragnan offered him the shriveled carcass of what was once the boar that they picked up in Delion.
”Are you serious right now?” he remarked, genuinely creeped out by the prospect of launching a pig corpse as explosive ammunition. Having seen the blood bomb Saffron made with the knife, Rhein wasn’t really willing to let a whole boar explode right in his face. Snatching the shriveled Squeaky out of Saffron’s clutches, Rhein had already taken the Fragarach’s sword and shield off of his arm, grasping the sword’s handle with one hand.

Rhein tossed the boar into the air and then promptly swung the combined sword and shield at it as it fell, the flat end of the shield slamming into the boar and sending it barreling towards the Giga Slime. ”Let’s just hope I never have to do that again.”, though, knowing Saffron, he was probably going to have to hit homeruns with more corpsebombs in the future. As Estelle’s bullets, the boar and Grimhildr herself were all launched towards the Giga Slime, Rhein made note of the fact that the occupants of the other Prowlers began to come out to engage, approximately three individuals wielding melee weapons ranging from long spears and hammers, and three gunners from each vehicle. The Horvin man dipped back into the Prowler and closed the hatch as it began to circle around the side of the huge Slime, with the other Prowler circling around the opposite side. If nothing else, they’d serve as a pretty decent distraction and a nice little additional factor in whittling away at the Slime’s defenses.

Estelle had come back after her own assault, and she had a plan. While Rhein felt like it’d work, he couldn’t help but think it’d actually require some effort on his part. As he went to speak up, Rhein’s attention was grabbed by the sound of the boar exploding. The Giga Slime had actually grown arms out of its chest in an attempt to grab the boar, only to have the corpse violently explode in the smaller arms, blowing them off and damaging the creature’s torso, causing a rain of slime to come down. The creature stumbled backwards, the combination of Grimhildr’s attacks and the explosion seemingly overwhelming it for a moment. Sighing, Rhein scratched the back of his head as he hopped off of the top of the Prowler. ”Alright. I’ll go along with your plan…,” he began, walking towards the Giga Slime, “If you let me use your lap as a pillow later.” he finished, totally serious as he unsheathed the Fragarach’s blade. He was gonna have to start things off small before he could work his way up to Grimhildr’s level. The Giga Slime’s arms split into four tentacles each, slowly beginning to remind Rhein more of a run-of-the-mill Slime. The appendages whipped about in every direction, though they were notably less thick than the gigantic arms it had earlier. To their credit, however, they were pretty quick. Rhein swung the Fragarach at the high-speed whip, cleaving through it as it passed, although he was quickly caught off guard by the fact that the gooey tentacle regrew itself and whipped him in the back of the head, spiking his face into the dirt.
”I’m alright.” he grumbled, propping himself back off of the ground with his sword.
”Let’s get a move on, ‘Stelle!”

Fighting off the tentacle as it came back around, Rhein rushed forward, fending off the tentacles that weren’t being distracted by Grimhildr and the other Party’s fighters. It seemed like he was a man possessed, motivated by the potential for a “reward” that he hadn’t even given Estelle time to agree to. And that wasn’t even taking into account the fact that he would have to argue with Grim over space. Technically, she’d called dibs, although over the more prized position of the beastlady’s chest. But Rhein was the leader, so it was only fair, right? Little did anyone know that these were the thoughts running through the head of the man’s head as he fought against the gargantuan creature’s limbs.

---

---

Hearing someone call for him, Saffron replied only with an offensive finger, along with sticking his tongue out, his priorities focused on much more important things. "Uh, yeah," he replied, turning back to Rhein who questioned his intent, though obviously rhetoric as the eyepatched leader continued to take the pig off of his hands. Saffron took a moment to watch as Squeaky made his way over towards the Giga, folding his hands momentarily in a late and inappropriately timed prayer for the dead. Not that he had much time to spare, shit getting quite deep as Estelle came over to tell the two least motivated people in the group that they had to do stuff.

Rhein was easy enough to convince, and though he walked too far ahead for Saffron to hear what he demanded in return, it probably had something to do with Estelle's god given gifts. Meanwhile, the Blood Mage himself found no reason to participate, seeing as three out of four people attacking was a majority if he'd ever heard one, and he'd already done quite a bit more than usual, if he had a say into it. Wiping slime off of himself, he decided to calmly collect the leftover blood after Rhein's blow, the rest being left behind in the Prowler's wake before seating himself on the edge.

If anything, all Saff really wanted to do was kill the other team's mage, he mused to himself, swinging his feet against the side of the Prowler as it continued to drive unmanned, already slightly starting to slow down as it got closer to the Giga. But, he paused, stopping himself just as he started to grab his throwing knife, Rhein might get mad if he killed someone all willy nilly, and besides, Blood Mages already had a lot of stigma on their hands what with the whole blood thing. He grabbed a stab dagger instead, twirling it aimlessly as he enjoyed the feel of the wind over his messy curls, the sound fighting shouts and destruction and commands and explosions a calming backdrop to his current state of Not Doing A Goddamn Thing.

---

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Grímhilðr had a brief moment to gaze at what the rest was doing. Estelle seemed to be planning something but she was not speaking hard enough for Grím to understand what she wanted exactly. Rhein was.. charging in. Thankfully, someone else decided to do something. Saffron was being a dick and sitting around on the prowler. Fun. “Saffron! Get your arrogant ass up and do something!” She shook her head before she swung the musical club around and let it sit on her shoulder again. “If he strokes his own ego any more, his hands might swell up..”

A shadow seemed to approach her rather quickly, and when she did look up, she noticed a giant flailing arm of slime settling down upon her. Didn't she just smash that same arm? Moving rapidly she lunged forwards and at the last moment let herself fall forwards in a rolling motion, rolling out of the way. As she landed on her feet again she slid forwards, holding the club on her shoulder with a firm look in her eyes. Holy shit, did someone capture that move on video? She grinned to herself realizing how awesome she must've looked doing that. Slowly she got up and quickly continued sprinting to the right, letting the club fall off her shoulder and drag behind her on the floor, kicking up dust. She ran towards Rhein, letting her club bounce up twice to play a small chord as she passed him. “Yo, we should finish this thing off already! C'mon! If Estelle can give me a bomb or 10, then you can launch me to the core, and I'll blow that fucker to bits!”

And by then she was already past Rhein again, running in a circular motion around the slime. What was the other team even doing? Her eyes scanned the area and quickly noticed the cars driving around, taking note at their strategy. Seemed like a shit one because so far it was just team Shabu Shabu that had done the most damage. She let a 'tsk' escape her mouth as she berated them mentally for not helping. Then, she faced back towards the slime and thought of a credible way to deal with the slime. If only she'd heard Estelle's plan.. however, perhaps she had inadvertently managed to confuse the slime by running past Rhein, though whether that was true or not remained to be seen.

Looping the ring of bombs around her arm and up to her shoulder, she was glad to know at least two of her companions was willing to comply to her request. The other two prowlers were already keeping the Giga slime busy and helping her out unintentionally. She caught sight of Saff's boar, which was now just a pile of skin and bones... and blood, slamming into the slime's chest only to detonate into a shower of crimson. Estelle couldn't help but gag a little. Out of all the mages. We had to acquire one that specializes in blood. The skin on her face obtained a paler hue, but she snapped out of it once Rhein spoke. His request threw her off guard for a moment and she could only blink in surprise. As she began to open her mouth to respond, the eye-patched man had already begun charging, encouraging her to make her move.

As she dashed the opposing way into the forest, she planned to sneak up on it while it was occupied with the others. Coming up from behind would also mean she didn't have to go sprinting out into a field of explosives and bullets and risk getting shot dead on sight... or even worse. Observing the brawl, she noticed Saff just relaxing on the prowler and she cringed in dismay. Tsk. Useless. A petite blur rounded the monster and she smiled. It was Grim and she seemed to be doing a good job of throwing the creature's focus.

Protracting her claws, she found the tallest tree closest to the slime and began to climb it. Once she reached the top, she waited for them to back it up close enough so she could launch herself onto the thing and set her plan into motion. The competing prowlers seemed to be getting impatient as they started to load up their more high end weaponry, the explosions becoming more and more violent. It was perfect. They were barraging the thing to the point that it had no choice but to retreat towards the forest. As if on cue, it took one more step back, aligning itself to where she was perched. Estelle utilized her legs to push off the trunk, propelling herself atop the Giga slime's shoulder. Digging her claws into its arm, her body was vigorously flung around as it continued to take hits.

Hissing, she yanked herself up, her arm sinking into its goopy headless region which earned a mortified expression. She attempted to reel her arm out, but it seemed to be stuck. A string of cuss words escaped her lips until she finally gave up and unhooked the ring of explosives from her free shoulder. Forcefully shoving the bombs directly into its center, she now had two arms buried deep towards its core. Closing her eyes, she concentrated on her Ki and lit up the bomb wicks. Its worth the sacrifice I guess. Within mere seconds, the device activated and exploded into a beautiful array of colorful lights and humongous chunks of blue slime that flew every which way. Its once lively limbs squirmed violently for a few seconds before going limp as their main controller shattered into a disarray of globs.

A scorching fire licked at her hands causing 2nd and some 3rd degree burns as Estelle's body was sent soaring at least 20 feet up towards the sky before plummeting down back to Dunamis. At this point she was unconscious and was lucky enough not to feel the collision with the hard ground... Except it wasn't the ground. She was lucky enough to plunge straight into a sizable pile of goo which managed to cushion her fall, preventing her skull from splitting open.