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“Wha-what do you want Red for?”

Rain didn't answer, his luminous eyes dancing about the room, looking for the little Kobold. He couldn't eat Lyra or Opal, Lyra because he promised to protect her, and Opal because it was Opal, but Red? He was desperate and irrational enough that the little lizard person was in an extreme amount of danger.

A flash of red caught his eye and he looked back to Lyra. A scaly red muzzle was at her hip and it vanished into a bag at her side as he turned. What in the hell was that? Was he now so hungry that he was hallucinating things? This was bad, really bad, he needed to find something or he was actually going to go fucking insane from hunger.

“D-do you want to e-eat him!?” Squeaked Lyra. Her knees were trembling like leaves and she kept glancing nervously at the bag on her hip.

Rain narrowed his eyes and took another step toward her, the sheep girl nearly fell over as the colour drained from her face.

“Wait! Wait! Th-there has to be another way!”

Rain shook his head and advanced on her. “tEll me where,” he snarled.

“Y-you need food right! Well, what about the forest! There has to be some animals out there! Something to hunt!”

Rain raised a shaking paw and curled it into a fist, his claws digging so hard into his paw pads that it drew blood, running down his arm in streams. He stared at it, wondering if he was going to start eating himself at this rate. The forest wouldn't work, they’d walked through it for a day and seen nothing that would sate him, he couldn't wander around the woods hoping to find something, he needed something now.

“There’s NoThing in forest. THERE’S NOTHING!” he roared.

Lyra flinched back in fear.

“What about the town?” piped up Opal, “There's loads of people to eat in town!” She noticed Lyra turning to look at her with a horrified expression. “Fiiine, or pigs and sheep and horses, I saw lots of those in the leveler market thingy, pens full of them!”

Rain turned on the Goblin who looked up at him boldly, practically daring him to eat her. 

After a moment he managed to jerkily nod his head. That was true, the town was filled with food, so much food, enough to put out the fire. 

“B-but we can't get in, the barrier Opal, he can't get inside!”

Rain shook his head. “I broke it.”

Lyra blinked, then had a sudden flash of understanding. “The rune on the wall? You broke it on purpose! You knew! Yes, this can work, and with my ability it might not even be a complete disaster, just a quick run inside, grab some cattle from the market to fill you up and then we jump back outside and everything will be fine! Completely and totally fine!” said Lyra, her voice becoming a touch hysterical.

The sheep girl seized on the plan, a plan was reliable, safe, a way out, much better than being trapped in a room with a giant hungry wolf monster looking at you like you were dinner. Things would go smoothly and it would be like they had never been there, just some random market cattle disappearing in the night, the town would assume it was regular normal cattle thieves right? right?

Rain turned and looked toward the town and took a step toward the door. Lyra realised that he was about to leave without them.

“W-wait! You need to use my invisibility or you'll be seen!”

Rain took another step, ignoring her, he was too far gone to care about being seen. Not good.

Lyra not knowing what else to do grabbed hold of Opal and leapt toward Rain's back, activating her climbing Skill in the same moment, the one for saving people from ravines and cliffs. Her hands reached out knowingly and perfectly grabbed hold of his fur for maximum leverage, adrenaline overriding her fear of him, or perhaps she had just gotten more used to him, it didn't matter, she quickly scaled the wolf monster with Opal and wrapped her arm around his neck, holding on tight, her free arm holding Opal at her side, both girls atop his back.

“Okay, we're readeeeeeeeiiiEEEEE!!”

Rain moved.

The floor cratered beneath his feet and his explosive acceleration took him across the room in an instant. Lyra cried out as they headed toward the too small door, they were never going to fit! Of course, she needn’t have worried, Rain went straight through the wall.

She coughed and sputtered as a cloud of plaster dust enveloped her head and bits of wood smacked off her head. It was a good thing she could lean on her Skill to remain attached to Rain’s back, she doubted she would have stayed atop him otherwise. The room they had emerged into flashed by and Rain threw his paw wide smashing through another wall, not even slowing his pace.

That was one way to get out of the maze-like mansion quickly, make a straight line through it.

Five rooms, six rooms, then a hallway which Rain bounded down, then through another wall, and then they were in the lobby and headed toward the front doors. Rain was half running half loping by this point, it made it easier for Lyra and Opal to hang on, but it also allowed Rain to run even faster.

He barreled through the front doors of the mansion, blasting the doors off their hinges and sending them tumbling across the front carriage drive as he ran across the lawns and forested gardens toward the front gate. Rain didn't hesitate, powering down his legs as one he leapt into the air, sending his entire huge mass sailing upward as Lyra let out a scream of terror on his back, along with a cry of excitement from Opal. He thudded back down on the other side, his feet just missing the top of the gate, and slipped back into a bounding sprint.

The forest rushed past in a dark shadowy blur, the night sky above providing scarce illumination through the treetops. Lyra had a difficult time of it, small branches kept whipping against her head and she had to duck down with Opal to avoid getting swept off by the larger ones. She spat out a leaf that had somehow found its way into her mouth as they burst free from the tree line, Lynthia’s huge heavy stone outer walls shining under the many coloured moon above.

“Not the front gate?” said Opal looking around. It was true, the gate they had entered the town through previously was nowhere to be seen, only the long curving wall.

“Uhm, I think this is where he fought Adlen,” said Lyra, squinting into the distance and trying to judge their position.

Rain remained silent, running up toward the towering stone wall and then slapping his paw up against it. 

This was the spot, a life spent in Lynthia meant he just knew.

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He curled his paw and his claws dug into the stone causing fissures and cracks to run along the block. His other paw came up and he heaved his weight and then his feet lifted and scrabbled at the wall and soon he was making quick progress swiftly climbing upward, claws digging in and dragging down faster and faster.

Lyra suddenly realised that this was the moment she was supposed to be doing her part and cast her invisibility over them. Rain, Opal, and herself dematerialised from view.

She tensed up as they drew near the top, expecting some bloom of magic, perhaps to be thrown from the wall, an alarm going up, or maybe even being incinerated by a fireball trap.

Instead, nothing happened, and Rain slipped over the top of the crenelations and dropped down several stories to the street below, his feet leaving two spots of crushed cobble beneath where he landed. 

Lyra’s invisibility instantly fizzled and died. 

Y-you moved too fast, I can't hide it n-now, they'll see where you, uhm, landed.”

“It doesn't matter sheepy, look.”

Lyra turned to where Opal was pointing and realised they were standing exactly where Rain had fought Adlen, the bottom of the wall had been heavily damaged, masonry torn free and scattered across the already heavily damaged cobble. Rain had taken them across the wall at the exact spot where he had fought the leveler. 

“Er, right, well just let me, h-hangon!”

It was too late however, Rain was already moving and Lyra’s desperate attempts to turn them invisible were not going well. One moment Rain was invisible, then Lyra’s skill overloaded with the speed he was moving at and he appeared once more. Luckily, despite Lyra’s misfiring attempts to hide Rain, they were not seen. The market at night was deserted and Rain was able to slip through town out of sight, a massive shadow that flowed from street to street until it suddenly stopped outside a warehouse.

The sound of pigs came from inside, grunting, squealing, gruffing. Rain placed a massive paw on the double doors and pushed. With the sound of metal snapping the chains on the door pulled apart and the doors swung wide.

The pigs inside froze up, dozens of them. A single unified thought wending through their piggy minds: Why was the door to their pens open, and what was that very large dark thing standing in the doorway? It took a step forward, looming, and some ancient primaeval warning sounded in their heads. This was a thing that piggys were supposed to be scared off. That warning would prove to be a wise one as Rain fell on them, his jaws swiftly biting down, tearing into the pigs as they wailed in fear.

Lyra desperately tried to keep her Skill going, every time it flickered off Rain appeared ripping through another pig before she managed to bring it back making them invisible once more. Rain became as a reaper, blinking between the pigs, a shadowy creature of piggy death. 

“This isn't ideal,” groaned Lyra as she managed to bring the skill back online for the umpeenth time, exhaustion from overusing it starting to catch up to her.

“Then why keep doing it?” said Opal beside her.

“It- it dampens the sound of the pigs, and hides most- some of the blood.”

Opal gave her a sceptical look as the last of the pigs disappeared down Rain’s maw

“Is- is it enough?”

“More. MORE!” he snarled.

“Yes, more!” shouted Opal happily

The pen full of goats in the building next door stood no chance at all, then the next pen of boars, another four full of pigs, two herds of sheep (to Lyra’s especial disturbance), more goats, a donkey, and seven full size ox, Rain just didn't stop and Lyra was being strained to her limit trying her best to hide the wolf monster’s rampaging feasting.

The problem was that it just wasn't enough, each time Rain ate another animal he just came away hungrier, the burning fire stoked ever higher.

Rain tore through the last of a pig pen and looked around desperately, blood still pouring from his jaws. There needed to be more, more more more!

“I th-think you ate everything in the market, I don't know where else they would keep more!”

Rain froze up, no that couldn't be could it? But he was still so so hungry, it hurt, it hurt so bad and he needed to eat.

“So he's just gotta eat the levelers now, makes sense,” said Opal, nodding her head wisely, she was always the most rational one, of course.

“No! W-wait! Uhm, the- the horses!”

Rain turned his head and looked up at the sheep girl out of the corner of his eye.

“The town horses! I saw lots going past in the street, surely there must be somewhere they are kept at night!”

Rain considered this. She was right of course. Lynthia not only had horses but it kept them all together in one huge and extensive stable owned by one of the higher levelers. 

He was already moving as he finished the thought, bounding eagerly toward the town’s stable.

 

 

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