A short while later, they emerged from the forested area into the open grasslands zone of the dungeon. They had come across a few monsters that they chose to avoid to save time, and avoiding them had worked well. At one point they had found a lone lidok sleeping in a tree and had swiftly dealt with it before it could alert any friends.

  From their vantage point at the edge of the grassland, Anika could see several stands of trees like the ones they had been fighting giant squirrels in the previous day. The squirrels themselves wouldn’t be as hard to deal with as the lidoks. Even though they moved much faster than the sedentary lidoks, they were highly susceptible to damage. With all the spells and weapons at their disposal today, they would be able to kill any squirrel packs quickly even without Philip’s area damage spells.

  While they were moving, the three lidok-turned-capybaras who had been with them had despawned, suddenly collapsing into a pool of goo and dissipating into the forest floor. They had found out the first time this happened that they still received experience for defeating them when they dissipated. Now the party was three smaller though, so Lily would have to polymorph the first group of squirrels they came across to restore the experience buff.

  “Let’s head over to that close stand of trees and Lily can start checking for any big dots that might indicate a mini-boss.” Anika said, indicating a stand of trees about 200 meters away.

  ”Okay,” Philip patted Epona’s neck in agreement with the plan and Epona began walking in the direction of the closest trees.

  While they moved across the grassland, Anika kept an eye out for any other monsters they might fight. They were still further north than they had been the previous day, and she wasn’t one hundred percent sure that the monsters in the area would still be the giant squirrels or if there would be a different kind of monster entirely. This low level dungeon seemed to be segmented into zones, as they hadn’t run into anything but lidoks in the forest, but she didn’t want to make an assumption that would cause them to be caught off guard by some mutant cheetah or other hunting animal that could sneak up on them.

  At the edge of the tree line, Lily crept forward and shook her head, “we aren’t close enough to see all the way in. I have to go closer.”

  ”Well, you’re pretty small, so if you move slowly you should be able to see them on your map before they can see you. We were able to sneak up on them pretty easily, so I don’t think they have any way to sense you coming if you stay hidden. If you get into trouble, just run back to us!”

  ”Okay! I will go look.” Lily walked into the trees, keeping close to some of the smaller underbrush until she disappeared from Anika’s sight.

  A minute later, Lily reappeared. “I only saw small dots, so there is no mini-boss here!”

  ”Okay, let’s keep moving to another stand of trees. The squirrels would be easy to kill, but we won’t get nearly as much experience from them as the Scurry Captain.

  The group moved off in the direction of the next stand of trees, angling a little bit south and planning to make a zigzag motion between the trees. Each time they reached a new stand of trees, Lily would move forward to scout for a boss. Meanwhile, Anika stayed alert for any new monsters in the grasslands around the trees. Philip, on the other hand, just sat on Epona’s back, idly patting her neck and eating some snacks out of a pouch on his belt.

  Anika was starting to get hungry herself but hadn’t thought to bring any snacks with her. She was sure Philip would share, but she didn’t want to get distracted. If they could find one or two Scurry Captains, they would get a bunch of experience before heading back to the temple for a hearty dinner. She checked her time card, seeing that it was nearing 6:00. She didn’t have a way to tell time yesterday, but based on the location of the sun, she thought it was about the same time they left the dungeon yesterday.

  While scouting the fifth stand of trees, Lily’s voice suddenly entered Anika’s mind, *I found a big dot!*

  ”Philip, Lily says she found something. Let’s go in after her.” Anika pulled an arrow from her quiver to prepare and started moving forward.

  Philip latched his pouch shut, “Okay, I’ll get ready.” He jumped off Epona’s back, prepared for battle. He grabbed his giant trident and shield off his back and started into the trees, Epona close behind.

  About 10 meters into the stand of trees, Anika found Lily hiding in some underbrush. From there, she could see that there was a clearing up ahead, though she couldn’t quite see into it yet. She gestured for Lily, Philip, and Epona to follow and crept forward.

  The clearing came into view and Anika assessed the situation. There was, indeed, a Scurry Captain in the center of the clearing, surrounded by around eight giant squirrels. Anika moved back a little so that she was out of view again and whispered to the group.

  ”There is a Scurry Captain there and eight other squirrels. We will do a similar strategy to yesterday. We will move around the clearing a little so that when Philip runs in to attack, the Captain doesn’t see us. This time though, Lily, you are going to turn three of them into capybaras first. Philip, as soon as you see them turn into capybaras, run out and attack the Captain while you drop your Distortion. Focus on the Scurry Captain after that - if there are any of the regular squirrels left Epona will finish them off with her air attacks. Once they are clear, I will start shooting arrows at the boss squirrel and Lily, you can start attacking as well. If there are rocks in the clearing you can throw those at him, or you can take arrows out of my quiver.”

  Anika was running low on arrows, but she had been able to reclaim some of the arrows throughout the day when they were shot into the lidoks’ eyes. The arrows had pulled easily out of the eye sockets and not needed any repair. Some of the arrows that had hit other lidoks and remained sticking out had taken extra damage and were unusable without repairs, or needed to be replaced all together. Most of the arrow heads were still fine, and Anika had collected them in her bag. No reason to waste resources!

  ”Okay that sounds good Anika!” Lily hopped a little in excitement, as Philip and Epona just nodded their agreement.

  Anika nodded back and led Lily and Epona about 90 degrees around the clearing away from Philip. She made sure Epona was a bit further back and hidden from view while Lily found a small bush on the side of the clearing to hide in to cast her ability. Once everyone was in position, Anika gave Lily a mental signal to start the attack.

  Three giant squirrels in the clearing - all with red auras, as they had been sure to update their strategies since the first encounter of the day - suddenly morphed into capybaras. Philip was prompt, and immediately moved into the clearing, shouting, as he cast his Distortion on the group of giant squirrels. None of the squirrels looked in the direction of Anika and the companions with the louder and more visible threat of Philip and his trident and shield.

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  Once all the squirrels were moving toward Philip and looking away, Anika began to move out of the trees, readying an arrow. She waited for the Scurry Captain to engage Philip, the creature clawing with his right paw in an attempt to hit Philip in the head, which Philip was able to easily block with his trident. He twisted the trident to angle it back towards the monsters after the block, swiping at its side.

  Anika fired the arrow at the creature’s body. She figured the head was likely more protected than the fat, fleshy back of the creature, and she had a much higher chance of the attack landing when aiming for a large target. The arrow landed in the creature’s mid back on the right side, a little below where Philip had hit it with the trident.

  The mini-boss screamed at the double hit, not expecting the attack from behind. A few of the now half-dead giant squirrels paused in their running at the scream of their boss, looking around. Three turned to head back to Anika, which unfortunately was not in their best interests. They still had to run back out through Philip’s Distortion cube, and they had already crossed more than halfway through. Anika knew they would die. The last two were approaching Philip when a gust of wind knocked one of them into the other, the one moving taking enough damage to die before ramming itself into the second, bowling it over like a pin.

  An arrow removed itself from Anika’s quiver and sailed through the air to finish off the squirrel now on its back in the Distortion field. Anika was fairly confident it would have died anyway, but Lily deciding to finish it off wasn’t necessarily a bad choice. The three headed their direction would definitely die, so Anika focused all her attention on the Captain.

  ”Focus on the Captain, these last three will die to the Distortion. If it spawns more monsters like it did last time, Philip can use Gravity Well and Warp Earth to keep them grouped up!” Anika grabbed another arrow from her quiver as she issued the commands, swiftly pulling it back on the bow and firing it at the same side she targeted before.

  At the same time, Philip cast his Dirt Discs, pounding the Scurry Captain backwards, which allowed him to follow up with a stab forward with his trident. The Scurry Captain managed to avoid getting skewered by dropping to all fours and twisting to the side, resulting in a glancing blow to his head. It launched forward in response, trying to catch Philip off balance with a biting attack to his midsection. Philip easily blocked with the shield in his left hand as he withdrew the trident.

  An arrow from Lily flew into the Scurry Captains right side, but the monster had a thicker hide than the small squirrels and a stronger layer of fat, so the force of Lily’s arrow wasn’t enough to penetrate deeply into the side like Anika’s arrow had. She sat back on her haunches, cocking her head as if she was thinking. Anika pulled another arrow, deciding she didn’t need to micromanage Lily. She would think of another way to damage the larger monster or just cast her Telekinetic Squeeze, which was more than they had last time for damage.

  The monster reared back on its hind quarters, this time swiping with both claws as Philip parried. The right claw met his shield and as Philip batted away the left claw with the staff of his trident. The monster pressed forward with its weight against Philip’s shield, attempting to bite his head with its abnormally large squirrel jaws while Philip’s trident was out of position. Anika fired another arrow, this one hitting the monster closer to its left hind quarter - definitely not where she had been aiming - and causing minor damage. The monster did not seem to notice.

  The last three squirrels died near the edge of Philip’s Distortion, and Epona moved forward to use her powerful hooves on the Scurry Captain, an effective move in the other day’s battle. As she moved in, her Gust spell ruffled the fur of the creature, but wasn’t powerful enough to cause it to lose balance as it had the smaller squirrels.

  Epona managed to attack the creature once with her hooves, timing it to line up with another claw attack on Philip’s shield. The creature sat back on its hind quarters, a loud piercing squeal joining the dust cloud starting to spawn around the creature.

  “More squirrels are coming, get ready to take them out!” Anika called as she readied an arrow and scanned the treeline.

  Lily turned to face away from where Philip had entered the clearing, “Most of them are on this side but there are a few more all around the clearing. I see seven total.”

  Anika turned to face the area the majority of the squirrels were coming from as Epona broke away from the Scurry Captain to take the side of the clearing away from Anika and Lily. Lily turned back to where they had entered, ready to attack a squirrel.

  They entered the clearing together, four of them loosely grouped on the side Anika was facing. She immediately fired at one of them, relieved to see she actually managed to hit it. It didn’t quite kill it, but it drastically slowed its motion as the arrow stuck out of its side near its back legs. It continued to crawl forward using only its front paws, but she wasn’t worried. She grabbed another arrow and aimed at the second squirrel. Behind her, she could hear Epona stomping down on, Anika assumed, the body of the squirrel on her side. Anika hoped that, behind her, Philip and Lily would be able to dispatch their small squirrels as efficiently as Epona. She did not think she would be able to handle all four squirrels before they got to her, as they moved across the clearing startlingly fast.

  Anika managed to score a better hit on the second squirrel and it fell over dead, the vicious hunting arrow flying with enough force to pierce its skull as it ran headlong towards her. Of the two squirrels left, one of them looked like it was running towards Epona. The second was closing in on Anika. She wasn’t sure she had time to aim and fire another arrow before it leapt at her, so she took a few steps backwards as she pulled her knife from her belt with her right hand, dropping into what she hoped was a defensive stance. She adjusted her grip on the bow, hoping it was strong enough to be used defensively to bat away the squirrel if needed.

  As she expected, the squirrel reached her just as she hit her defensive stance, leaping for her face with its sharp teeth. She brought the bow in front of her face, keeping it close to her, while she swung out with the knife. She didn’t get a good hit on the squirrel with the knife; the blade glanced across its back. But the open jaw connected with the shaft of the bow instead of Anika’s face, so that was a win.

  She swung down with the bow as gravity helped her drop the squirrel to the ground and tried again to stab down with the knife. She managed to catch more of the creature this time, gouging its side near its left shoulder. She then remembered she also had a spell she could cast, and immediately cast Splash on the monster with her right hand. She had discovered while practicing that she didn’t need to have an open hand or any specific hand shape as long as she directed the magic with her will, she just had to have her hand close enough to the mob, a range which was about as long as her knife.

  The spell hit the monster and she raised her arm up, preparing to stab at it again. The monster tried to swipe with its claws, but they weren’t as long or dangerous as the larger Scurry Captain’s claws, and they were unable to pierce the armor on her lower legs, the only area the squirrel could reach from its current position.

  Before she could stab back down, a Gust sent the squirrel tumbling away from her, killing it and freeing Anika. She quickly stood and shouted a ‘thanks’ to Epona. As she turned back towards Philip, she saw a second trampled squirrel, indicating Epona had taken out the second squirrel on her side before helping Anika. A second arrow was in the first squirrel Anika had hit. She hadn’t even noticed Lily using her magic to remove it from her quiver and hit the squirrel.

  She pulled another arrow from her quiver, readying it to fire at the mini-boss, just in time to see Philip skewer it with his trident in similar fashion to how he had killed the first boss. A bit disappointed that she hadn’t gotten to attack it again, Anika returned the arrow to her quiver as they grouped up around the now dead boss.

  ”That was a lot cleaner than last time,” Anika said excitedly, the thrill of being significantly less useless in this battle giving her renewed energy.

  Leka suddenly appeared out of the trees and Anika waved and shouted at her, “Wasn’t that exciting?”