The sun's rays shined down on Umi and Kotori as they walked side by side, making small talk and enjoying the warmth of morning. Honoka followed about ten feet behind them, shuffling like a zombie and occasionally tripping over a log or rock in her exhausted haze. A shout from behind them caused the two in front to look back to find the third member of their party face down on the ground, apparently having tripped over her own two feet now. Umi sighed and Kotori giggled as they walked over to pick her up.

"Honoka, you know this is what happens when you don't sleep when you're supposed to," Umi chided as she lifted Honoka up. Honoka just clung to Umi and began to slowly slide back down towards the ground.

"It was the body…it made me nervous…how could you guys sleep when it was so close?" Honoka grumbled, her face pressed against Umi's hip and her arms hugging the other woman's waist. This time Kotori lifted Honoka and slung one of her arms over her shoulder.

"It was under two feet of dirt," Kotori said as she slowly inched forward while supporting Honoka. "Even if it were to reanimate, it wouldn't be able to go anywhere." Honoka yawned loudly.

"It's not about the thing coming back to life," She retorted. "It's just…it's a dead body. It creeps me out." Honoka sighed and her head slumped downward. Umi strode over and lifted it back up.

"Honoka, an adventurer shouldn't be afraid of dead bodies," Umi said, putting Honoka's other arm around her own shoulder. "Normal dead bodies can't hurt you. There are so many other things that…" Umi was interrupted by the sounds of falling trees and snapping twigs, as well as the earth-shaking footsteps of something huge. Umi and Kotori turned their heads to look behind them, towards the source of the noise. The forest shook as whatever was in the woods moved closer to them. With a loud crash the trees blocking their view were knocked aside by a huge, scaly paw. The limb came down onto the ground with a force that nearly knocked the adventurers off of their feet. They could now see what it was attached to, a gigantic horned lizard with green scales that perfectly matched the leaves of the surrounding forest. The lizard opened its enormous jaw, showing its countless teeth, each one a foot long and razor sharp. It growled, the deep, loud rumble chilling Umi and Kotori's blood and even causing the comatose Honoka to perk up her head in confusion.

"…Can," Umi finished her previous thought before looking at Kotori, whose panicked expression matched her own.

"It's a landwyrm!" Kotori said as the beast began to move toward them. "We need to run! Now!" Umi picked up Honoka, who grunted in surprise as she was slung over her shoulder, and she and Kotori took off as fast as they could, the landwyrm's long black talons barely missing them. It gave chase, ramming down the trees with its bony head as it took massive, earth-shaking bounds in pursuit of its prey. It moved quickly, and both Umi and Kotori looked back in horror to see that the beast was gaining on them.

"Kotori!" Umi yelled, trying her best to keep her pace even as she supported Honoka's weight. "See if you can distract it!" Kotori nodded before pointing her staff at the approaching monster. The tip of the staff glowed yellow before a bolt of lightning shot from the tip and hit the creature's shoulder, shocking it and causing it to stop for a moment. It roared loudly before resuming the chase, moving even faster than it had before.

"I think I just made it angry!" Kotori shouted as the landwyrm started catching up to her and Umi. With only about thirty feet between them the monster pounced at them. It landed just behind them and the impact was so great that they were both knocked off their feet, with Honoka slipping from Umi's grasp and landing a few feet in front of her. The landwyrm was close now, close enough for the adventurers to smell the monster's breath that stank like rotting meat. It approached Umi, who was closest to it, and opened its jaws in preparation to devour her. "Umi!" Kotori panicked, looking around for something she could use to get the creature's attention. Umi was paralyzed with fear and could only stare past the beast's glistening teeth and forked tongue, right down its long, dark throat.

"Hey ugly!" A woman's voice rang out from the trees behind the monster. It turned its head to find the source of the voice. It scanned the area and sniffed, but it detected nothing. It began to turn its attention back towards Umi when a knife flew out from the forest and lodged itself between the scales on its neck. The landwyrm roared and spun around to charge at the tree the knife came from. As it knocked down the tree with a single claw swipe, a black-clad figure leapt from its branches into another tree, this one much taller and larger than the last. The figure began to climb up the tree, and the beast reared up and grasped the trunk with its forepaws, only to find that in a flash of blue light they were encased in ice. It looked around for the culprit and spotted an auburn-haired woman in an embroidered white cloak holding a spellbook in one hand and pointing at it with the other. The monster attempted to use its back legs to free itself, only to find that they too had been frozen. It roared loudly and bit down on the trunk in an effort to destroy the tree and free itself. While it tried to gnaw through the thick tree the figure who had previously hid in its branches leapt out onto its back and slid down it, snatching the knife in its neck on the way down. Kotori and Umi could now get a better look at her, a small, lithe woman with short sandy-colored hair. When she reached the base of the landwyrm's tail she dove off and rolled into a crouch. She got up and turned back towards the forest.

"Go get 'em!" She shouted. Something in the forest began moving towards them. From the underbrush dashed a heavily armored woman carrying a huge broadsword. She turned towards the tree the landwyrm was still frozen to and picked up speed. She held out her sword to the side as she approached the beast from the side at a rapidly quickening pace. She let out a cry as she sliced right through the creature, and its upper half fell limply against the tree trunk as she planted her now blood-stained sword into the ground without looking back. She stood completely still and silent before turning back, her gaze on the shorter woman who had called out.

"That was a stupidly complicated plan," She said as she picked up her blade and slung it over her caped shoulder before walking towards her. The black-clad woman shrugged.

"Well, I thought it was more fun this way," She said, scratching the back of her head. The woman who had cast the ice spell stepped toward them. She waved her hand and the ice dissipated, causing the landwyrm's upper half to fall awkwardly onto its limp lower half before crashing onto the ground.

"It was also messy," The magic-user said, watching as the ground beneath where the two halves of the landwyrm lay became slowly more saturated with blood.

"Oh, come on, it's not like they don't do this kind of thing to each other when they fight," The black-clad woman defended. The girl with the broadsword sighed.

"I'm a Champion, I could've taken it by myself," She said. "I would've made a clean kill. Clean kills are good, there's less risk of damaging organs. Speaking of which," She said before walking over to the creature's upper half and making an incision in its chest with her sword. As she began to dissect the beast's remains, the remaining two turned their attention to the other trio of adventurers, who were still lying on the ground in stunned silence. Well, except for Honoka, who was still asleep.

"Hey!" The one in black shouted as she and the magic-user walked towards them. "Are you okay?" She looked down at Honoka. "Is she okay?"

"We're fine, and she's just sleeping," Kotori replied, getting up and bowing. "Thank you for saving us, by the way. My name is Kotori, the one in the armor is Umi, and the sleeping girl is Honoka."

"It's not a problem," The one in black said. "My name's Tsubasa," She said, indicating towards herself, "this is Anju," She gestured to the woman next to her, "and the one over there is Erena," She pointed to the woman who was currently busy digging around it the landwyrm's chest.

"Why is she sleeping?" Anju asked, kneeling down by Honoka and placing a hand on her forehead. "Is she sick?"

"She's not sick," Umi said while glaring over at Honoka. "She just didn't sleep last night when she was supposed to, so now she's too tired to do anything." Anju gave a 'hmm' before placing her hands on both sides of Honoka's face. A white light emanated from her hands for a moment before she removed them, and Honoka shot bolt upright.

"Guys, guys, I just had the weirdest dream! We were being chased by this big lizard, and then it tried to eat Umi, and then some other people came along and…" Honoka stopped talking when she spotted Tsubasa. "Wait! You were one of the people in my dream!" She said and pointed.

"That wasn't a dream, Honoka, that actually happened," Umi said. She turned her attention to Anju. "What did you do to her?"

"It's just a little spell to wake you up a bit if you haven't gotten enough sleep," Anju responded, smiling sweetly. "It's something Wizards like myself use to stay awake when studying. It wears off in about six hours though, so you should keep an eye out for a place to stay." Honoka nodded before getting up and stretching.

"Hey Tsubasa," Erena called over from the landwyrm's corpse. She held up a huge dark red organ with blood vessels sticking out of it, the monster's heart. "How much do you think this is worth?"

"Sixty-six hundred gold pieces," Before Tsubasa could speak, Honoka had answered the question. "Something in that area." All eyes were on Honoka now. "What? Am I wrong?" She asked defensively.

"No, actually, you were pretty close," Tsubasa said, a smile spreading across her face. "The heart's value is six-thousand six-hundred and eighteen gold pieces." She extended a black-gloved hand to Honoka. "It's nice to meet another rogue."

"Honoka, Tsubasa, what's going on? How do you know the value of the heart?" Kotori asked, watching as Honoka enthusiastically shook Tsubasa's hand.

"I'm a Thief, so I can make a good estimate about the value of an object just by looking at it," Honoka cheerfully answered as she let go of Tsubasa's hand.

"And as a Larcener, I can tell the exact value of an object just by looking at it," Tsubasa responded and folded her arms. Honoka nodded before her eyes widened and she started digging around in her pack.

"You can tell the exact value of an object, right?" Honoka asked Tsubasa, who nodded in response. "Then can you tell me how much this is worth?" She pulled out the amulet she had snatched the night before and dangled it in Tsubasa's face. Tsubasa just stared at it with a shocked expression before grabbing it away from Honoka.

"Where did you find this?" She asked, her tone becoming suddenly very serious.

"There was a man trying to steal from our campsite," Umi began, a drop of sweat running down the side of her face. "She took it off of him." Tsubasa turned the amulet over in her hands.

"What did he look like?" Anju asked them, her voice also gaining a noticeable edge.

"He was bald and pale and had a lot of weird markings all over his body," Kotori answered, trembling slightly. "Why are you asking?"

"What happened to him?" Tsubasa asked, ignoring Kotori's question. Her eyes narrowed as she stared at the anulet.

"The mark on his head changed color and he just kind of…died," Honoka responded, glancing around nervously. "It was really freaky."

"He must have activated his Killing Seal," Anju muttered to Tsubasa. Tsubasa just shoved the amulet into her pocket before focusing her attention back onto the other three adventurers.

"This is something extremely dangerous, something you shouldn't be involved in," Tsubasa said in a grave voice. "Something terrible is happening, and it would be best if you stayed out of it. We'll handle things, you just go on with your lives." She turned to Erena, who was stuffing some of the landwyrm's organs into a large sack. "Erena! We're leaving! There's been a change of plans!" She called out. Erena got up and slung the sack over her shoulder. She followed Tsubasa and Anju as they retreated deeper into the forest, until only Honoka, Kotori, and Umi were left, along with the remains of the landwyrm. Honoka blinked in confusion.

"What was that about?" She asked frantically. "Why were they so bothered by the amulet?" She turned to Umi, then to Kotori.

"Who knows," Kotori said with a sigh. "But we shouldn't dwell on it too much. We need to keep moving." The three of them dusted themselves off and once again set off on a westward path through the thickening forest.

"Do you think we'll see them again?" Umi asked as they pushed through the underbrush. Kotori looked up at the sky through a tiny gap in the forest's canopy.

"I don't know, but I'd like to see them," She answered wistfully. "I kind of liked them."

"Hey!" Honoka shouted in sudden realization. "They took the amulet! And they didn't even tell me what it was worth!"