Welcome to Gaia! ::

Time in the Barrens seemed to drag on, endlessly. Putting on foot in front of another became almost impossible drudgery. But Fulsome knew it would be worth it. Finally, Mistfruit Forest was breaking over the horizon. As hot and tiring as this all was, soon Fulsome would be in a place presumably nearly undisturbed since the others departed. The thought of all the artifacts that were there for the finding was utterly thrilling! Thrilling enough for him to quicken his pace. Davvyd was already slightly ahead of him. The other buck was far more used to adventures, Fulsome supposed. He counted himself lucky to have Davvyd's friendship, the outgoing buck always had interesting things going on. Fulsome mostly had studying. And working. But times like this were a welcome distraction.

He quickly caught up to his friend. "Just ahead. How careful do you think we need to be?" Fulsome looked up at the taller buck, wondering exactly how much he knew about this place.

Davvyd just shrugged. "Can't be all that bad if Wanderlust is sending adventurers out. Wouldn't be a good look having a bunch of dead explorers on their hooves."

This caused Fulsome to side eye Davvyd, but he hoped his friend was just making a joke. They walked forward together in a companionable silence.

---

A few more hours of walking down, the trio reached the edge of Mistfruit. "I think I was expecting it to be more ... alive." The plants were just as dead as everywhere that wasn't Homewood, as far as Fulsome could tell. Davvyd just shrugged, taking it all in. "I guess I should be surprised. The others were here too, after all." Davvyd just nodded.

Each step took them deeper into the strange place. Despite it being day, Fulsome noticed that mist was already starting to cling to lower hollows. "Strange..." He walked on, through the seemingly ever present other based destruction. The mist seemed to even cling to his legs. And the land began to roll into a dip, and in the distance it rose again, into a gentle hill. "So different from the Barrens ..." Davvyd nodded. Distantly Fulsome could hear water. His ears perked. That could only mean one thing, the dam.

His pace picked up again, now leading Davvyd. Despite decreasing visibility, Fulsome walked faster and faster, breaking into a trot. He could hear Davvyd following behind at a slower pace, but Fulsome couldn't simply slow, he needed to reach the water as fast as possible. All was well until his foot contacted a slimy fallen log. He went down with a shrill scream, pain nearly blinding him.

One second things had been going just fine, and then he'd been on the ground reeling in pain. Good thing for Davvyd. At the edge of exhaustion himself he looked around, wondering where they could shelter for the night. There was a nearby tree. Dead, of course, but it still had some branches on it. Good enough, as far as Fulsome was concerned. He staggered back to his feet and lurched over to it, before flopping down again. He shrugged out of his bag of supplies, and the water gourds he was carrying.

Davvyd followed him over, flopping down near him, leaning his back against the dead tree. Davvyd close his eyes, not even bothering to remove his packs. Golyath flitted down to his side, pulling open a supply bag and rooting around for something. It looked like a piece of dried fruit.

As Fulsome watched Golyath munch on the fruit as he struggled to get the cork free from the water gourd. He tipped it over, dumping it into the ground. Neither of his companions batted an eye. They were accustomed to his particular gift. He closed his eyes and easily reached for his magic. The water he poured out coursed through the ground, forming a little up welling, bubbling peacefully. "That'll taste much better than water that's been sitting in a gourd ..." He leaned forward and had a sip. Fulsome was now entirely too exhausted to do anything else. His eyes closed and he drifted off to an immediate sleep, dreaming about what they would find in this mysterious misty place tomorrow.