With James and Saliva
"Still nothing," James growled in frustration, scanning the trees again. He even lifted his chin and sniffed the air, trying to catch the scent of anything edible. Nothing.
"You found anything?"
He turned to Sylvia.
She was leaving a trail of moss unfurled beneath her bare feet. Small white flowers bloomed in her wake. She knelt, pressing her ear to the ground, then to the trunk of a tree, then brushing her fingers across leaves and bark.
"Forest… quiet." She shook her head slowly.
James exhaled sharply. "We're not going to find anything walking this way. Let's just try going this way."
He pointed off-path.
Sylvia stiffened. "No… Mira said… that way…"
"Well I'm hungry now. We're not going to find any food that way."
"Your fault… We would have eaten… You lost food." She looked at him flatly.
" Tsk.' I-I don't care. I'll go find something myself. We don't always need Miracle."
He turned to leave but thick roots burst from the earth and wrapped around his legs and torso, tightening like restraints.
"James… Mira smart… Listen." Her voice held genuine pleading
Flames ignited across his skin. The roots blackened and snapped as he burned them away.
"So what? It doesn't mean he's always right," he muttered, walking forward anyway though something in his expression had dimmed.
Mrs. Sandra had been smart too but her plan to escape had still failed.
Sylvia watched him go, torn. She wanted to listen to Miracle and stay on the safe path.
But the forest was whispering.
"Young one."
The voice slid through her mind soft, ancient, feminine.
"Forest." Sylvia smiled and pressed her ear against a tree trunk.
The fog ahead along Miracle's chosen route thinned, revealing a mountain goat grazing peacefully in the distance.
But in the direction James had gone.
The leaves began to wilted, claw marks tore into bark, the sap dark and red-tinged, oozing like blood.
The warning was clear.
Sylvia hesitated only a moment.
She thought back to Miracle who often told her to look after James whenever he briefly leaves them alone to go do his stuff, so why wouldn't now be any different. So ran after James and quickly caught up with him.
"What do you want? I thought you were following Miracle's instruction manual," James asked, annoyed when she caught up.
"Man..ual? What that?" She cutely tilted her head.
"Um. It's like… a thing that tells you how to do stuff properly. I think." He scratched his head, trying to remember Mrs. Sandra's explanation.
"Forest said not safe… Path go back." She tugged at his sleeve.
He stopped.
"Not safe? Like monsters?"
His eyes lit up.
Sylvia nodded.
"Yes! Where are they!?"
"What not safe… Mira said n…"
"I don't care what Miracle said. I want to go fight some monsters. Point the way.".
He grabbed her shoulders and lifted her into the air, making her squeal in surprise before sprinting deeper into the trees.
Sylvia squirmed in his grip. "James!"
The deeper they went, the more wrong it felt. The trees bled. The air thickened. The whispers grew frantic.
The deeper they went, the more wrong it felt. The trees bled. The air thickened. The whispers grew frantic.
She struggled harder causing them to tumble to the ground.
James stood up quickly, scanning the trees.
"There are no monsters here!" James put her down and looked around in disappointment.
"There no monsters here!" he snapped in disappointment.
"Why? It dangerous. Why are you not listening!" she shouted.
Silence.
"James!" She planted her feet, trying to glare intimidatingly. The ground vibrated faintly beneath her frustration.
Her pout ruined most of the effect.
"Because I just like to, okay!" he finally burst out, punching the tree so hard he made a dent on it.
"What…Mean?" She asked as she used her powers to fix the tree but he kept quiet. "Tell or I not take you."
"With all those things they did to me and made me do… Fighting monsters was the only thing I actually liked."
The words felt heavier than he intended.
Sylvia's expression softened.
"James what like… Mrs Sandra and Juliet?"
He blinked. "Like what were they like?"
She nodded.
He scratched the back of his head, unsure where to start.
"Mrs. Sandra was different from the others in the lab. She didn't hurt me like the others. When I got hurt, she was the one who took care of me. She was mostly sent to test my powers… but she taught me and Juliet a lot of stuff too. How to read. Write. Count. She used to tell us she'd help us escape one day."
"Juliet?"
"Juliet." For the first time a soft smile formed on his face. "She was quiet at first when we first got paired up, but she was strong and her powers were amazing. She really liked to read and the books Mrs. Sandra gave us. She was the one to come up with our names after she read some books which Mrs. Sandra gave us. She was always wanted to escape and see the outside."
"Wish… had a Mrs. Sandra and Juliet. I was always alone in white room. Only saw assholes. Make me grow stupid fruits for them." She spoke with aor venom in her voice .
James' smile faded. "You and Juliet would have liked each other if you met. And Mrs. Sandra would've really liked Miracle and those weird eyes. You see them change shape sometimes too, right? Like they change from those rings to… like stars in the sky at night. It's weird."
"Miracle eye not werid… Think really eyes pretty. " Sylvia giggled.
James looked at Sylvia like she was crazy not believing the sentence which came out her mouth. Every time his eyes had those rings in them something just wasn't right. Especially when he woke up in the night sometimes and he saw those spiral eyes.
"During escape… Why Mrs. Sandra Juliet not escape with us?" Her question made a scowl form on his face.
"I don't want to talk about it. Ever." He said firmly as he knew all he could hear was Juliet's screams as she was dragged away while he was too helpless to do anything while George was staring at him with a smirk which he wanted to burn off so bad.
Sylvia immediately got the message but then began to feel uneasy as the atmosphere around them began to feel all wrong and looked down seeing large footprints basically all over the ground in jumbled directions
"James…" She called out as the feeling was getting stronger.
He roughly put his finger over her mouth as he listened to familiar snarls close by. He heard them 3 days ago but whenever him and Miracle went to check it out it stopped.
Suddenly something jumped from the bushes towards them. However James intercepted this attack by blasting the thing with a fireball making a loud dog whimper as it landed on the ground.
James' lips curled into a wild smile. "Finally. Stay out of my Sylvia I've got this!"
It was 7 feet tall, had the upper body of a human male in shape but was naturally pale skin, grotesquely exaggerated corded muscle stretched across scarred skin marked with jagged tribal carvings. From the waist down, a wolf's powerful hindquarters rippled beneath dark, matted fur.
It's face was the worst part.
Red eyes set too close together, glowing with hunger, long dirty shaggy black hair, mouth split too wide open as it let out a snarl revealing elongated canine fangs slick with saliva.
It dug its feet into the ground making a little crack dash fast towards James at impressive speeds but James met it head-on.
He dodged a claw strike aimed for his neck and drove a flaming punch into the creature's ribs making it stagger but it did not fall. It answered with a back handed claws to his ribs but it did pierce his skin briefly, surprising the creature at the tough skin. James kicked it away and shot a fire blast from his mouth blasting it sending it several feet to the ground.
"That's it? Come get up!" James looked at it .
The wolf-man got up staggeringly snarled at James with its eyes glowing and muscles tensing.
James smirked and dashed for it to continue the battle.
HOWLL!!
It used all of its strength to launch a supersonic howl directly hitting James knocking back and causing his ears to bleed, the attack also landed on Sylvia knocking her sending her back. The result of the attack caused a dust cloud and knocked back a few trees.
After its attack was done it coughed out some blood and saw James getting up, and ran off fast deeper into the forest.
"Hey get back here I'm not done hitting you!" James got up sped off after leaving Syliva behind.
James was easily keeping with the man-wolf despite its incredible speed and was quickly gaining on it. He then lit his whole body, began to release a lot of steam and lit on fire getting faster, turning into a blur of blazing teal leaving a trail (that's the colour of his flames) striking its back throwing it to a tree.
He wasn't done there as he still charged straight for it, smashing through three trees and delivering a punch to its stomach sending it to the ground laying on its back. He came from the air and stumped on its back making it howl in pain.
"Hmph weak. What does the forest think of that Sylvia!" James turned around for her answer but the girl was nowhere insightful.
"Oh right."
While James scratched his cheek he didn't notice the man-wolf's expression.
"I wonder if you would tas…"
Out of nowhere three figures jumped off the bushes and a claw connected with his stomach sending off the man-wolf. Before he could register what happened he was hit multiple times from his face, stomach, ribs and legs and claws much sharper than the others sliced his cheek drawing blood and sending him to the ground.
They quickly gained on James while he was on the ground the figures proceeded to attack him and bore fangs into his arm, leg and neck. They were all man-wolf's similar to the one he was chasing.
Gritting his teeth James AND BURST into flames burning their faces making them let go of him and whimpered in pain. He got up from his position flinching at the bite marks they left though they didn't fully pierce his skin it still hurt.
"Cowards!" His began to shift to red as his rage began to build up and shot a blast of teal fire from his mouth to burn them to a crisp.
The man wolves barely managed to dodge the attack. Though the one who initially attacked them was not so lucky as the attack hit him directly burning him as well as some trees .
The other three began silently communicating with each other as they witnessed the boy's fire power. It was supposed to be an easy hunt but saw it wasn't worth it. So they quickly scattered across a round confusing James as he shot fire blasts everywhere causing the fire to spread much further.
They all shot sonic howls from each side but thick roots burst from the ground shielding James from the attack and more came out grabbing them tightly even causing their bones to start cracking. The roots also had large sharp thorns sticking out piercing their skin causing them to badly bleed.
"Hurt.." Sylvia comes from the smoke with her green eyes glowing ominously. She was roughed up from the sonic howl with her hair and clothes a mess. "You hurt him…" She slammed them to the ground and an adorable smile began to form on her face enjoying what she was doing.
The pack's eyes began to glow and their bodies began to get bigger and more muscular as they began to enter a berserk like state but multiple veins pierced through their stomachs.
James finished them off by shooting large fireballs at each of them charring their bodies.
"That was…" He paused as he looked at Sylvia's annoyed face.
"Asshole." She huffed, turning away from him.
"What did I do?" He moved to the direction she turned but she continued to turn away from him.
"Didn't listen… Got us hurt... Left me alone… Hurting forset… Forest angry!" She frantically pointed at the still spreading fire.
He looked at the spreading wild fire. "Can't you ask the forest to put it out?"
Sylvia placed her head on the ground. "Forest says we stop it… Lead us back and get food."
"Uh." James looked at the spreading wildfire.
Back with Miracle
Having woken up from his nap and not seeing James and Sylvia around Miracle decided to use the time for some training.
First he decided to do the good old gravity training for a couple of minutes with Tinashe carefully selecting the amount of Gs on his body, mixed with him doing some basic exercises like ruining, push ups, sit ups and using a log as a weight. After being done with that he decided to practice his flying for a little bit.
"Wow this place has a lot more Islands than I thought." He continued to analyse and switched it off as the phone was on really low batteries. He was glad that old phones' batteries lasted longer than smart phones.
"Looks like you're in one of the further ones and need to cross the waters to advance. But at least your flying is coming along nicely."
"Hey speaking of those two I'm starting to think sending them alone in the forest was not the best idea especially with more of those things running around." He gestured at the dead Otter-Man.
"Miracle why haven't you gotten rid of that thing yet. Please don't tell me how to eat it."
Miracle gagged at that statement. "Gross no I still have some standards. I wanted to…" Miracled paused as he felt Sylvia and James' signatures close by.
'Well it's about time.'
Sylvia and James had reached the site. Sylvia was carrying large apples and berries in hand and James was carrying two healthy goats which the 'forest' showed Sylvia earlier.
"Looks like you guys had a good time."
James turned around and spotted the green spiraling eyes staring back at him making the dragon boy jump in fright.
"Oh stop being so dramatic." Miracle rolled his eyes and looked at the moose than their appearance plus they reeked of smoke and ash. His spiral eyes looked blankly at them "So it looks like you guys didn't take my advice on not going or fighting anything weird."
"JAMES FAULT!" Sylvia folded and immediately threw him under the bus.
"HEY!" James looked betrayed.
"Didn't want to fight… Wanted to stick to path… James didn't listen and went on his own."
"Well you… You didn't stop me. So it's your fault not mine." He poorly defended himself.
Miracle rubbed his eyes as the two continued to argue.
"Zisilu." He mumbled under his breath. "Alright so what did you guys fight out there?"
"Adlet." Slyvia answered.
"Huh." The boys asked her.
"Forest said… It name…Adlet."
"And what did it look like?"
"It was half man at the top and dog on the bottom. It also had red eyes."
Miracle actually looked amused. "Wait your telling me a man dog did all that to you. I thought you were strongest in the lab James"
James' face turned red with steam coming from his head. "There was more than one! I was about to kill it but it's friends attacked me."
'Oh he jumped makes sense.' He looked at their clothes. "Did they also have fire powers or something?"
"James made fire. Forest was hurt and angry." Sylvia continued to snitch.
"What is wrong with you!" James covered her mouth.
"I got attacked while you guys were gone too." Miracle spoke, gaining their attention as he telekinetically pulled the Otter-man's corpse.
"Eww." Sylvia covered her nose.
"Yeah, I know it's gross. And James remembers when you said you heard Juliet's voice earlier. Well it was this thing copying her voice to lure away to eat you."
James' anger raised as this thing dared to mimic Juliet's voice. "Hmph I would have burned it to a crisp if it tried."He shot a fire ball at it.
"Listen, we don't know how many weird supernatural monsters are out there stalking us. We're going to have to be extra careful from now on. Also I think it would be great if we start a little training." The two flinched at those words. "No, nothing like what they were doing to us. It's just to help us grow stronger to handle the situations we might have."
"I don't need to train, I'm already strong now!" objected James.
"You are but from the way you look now I can tell those uh Adlet got you good and Sylvia had to save you." His statement made the natural girl puffed in pride and playfully blow a raspberry at James.
"I-I would have handled it."
Miracle was deep in thought while looking at the two's injuries. 'We don't really have enough medical supplies despite all of us healing fast. It's only a matter of time before we run into something really bad. The one punch man always stated how Tatsumaki has the potential to do more with her powers but just chooses her telekinesis style. If I remember correctly Tsubaki could use her powers to support type ways and if she could do that Tatsumaki can do it better.'
"Yeah you would have but with more injuries." Miracle's eyes softened. "But both of you did a good job catching our food and coming back alive."
Sylvia smiled brightly and James had a small smile on his face.
"Alright go clean yourselves up while I get this goat ready."
"Okay!"
They both ran to the river bank leaving Miracle to start to focus on the goat.