5 Are all the creatures grumps?

The road down is nerve wrecking.

Madeline leaves the village behind slowly, trying not to second guess herself. She's not really planning to go far, just… far enough to see where the warriors go. Surely there is no harm in that? Still it feels like she shouldn't, like she should stay where she started from – like every other villager of Algiore, she should stay put.

She goes down instead, down the cobblestone street. It leads all the way down to the shore and to the sand, cutting through it towards a pier where small fishing boats sit on each side. There are people pier – villagers, not warriors – scurrying about getting them ready to set sail.

They've been getting ready to set sail the whole time she's been aware of them – but they've never actually left the pier.

Madeline approaches the nearest fisherman, just in case he might be… different. As he approaches him, the fisherman shields his eyes from the sun and sighs. "It'll be a great day for fishing," he says to her, rocking back and forth on the balls of his feet and then shaking his head. "If only we can get the Calcite Crabs out of the way."

"Calcite Crabs?" Madeline asks. "How are they in the way?"

He doesn't answer. After a moment the fisherman shields his eyes from the sun again. "It'll me a great day for fishing," he says again and disappointed, Madeline leaves him to his loop.

The beach itself is beautiful. The sand glows golden and warm in the sun, and the ocean stretches on forever, glittering and crystalline and absolutely gorgeous. The shoreline isn't very long, about twenty meters of sand with cliffs at each side, forming a sheltered little bay – that just makes it more beautiful. On the edges, where the sand meets the cliffs, there are bushes and gnarled little trees – some of them seem to be bearing fruit.

There are few warriors by the waterline, wading into the waves. As Madeline watches from the side, they dive into the waves and come back hauling little dark grey creatures – those would be the Calcite Crabs, she thinks. They're picking them off from under water and throwing them out to the sand, where they twitch for a moment before rolling to their backs and staying still.

So, they're helping the fishing boats, getting rid of the crabs so that the boats can set sail. Except, of course, no matter how many warriors there are working on it and how many Calcite Crabs they throw out to the sand, the ships never set sail.

Madeline watches for a moment and then, shaking her head, turns back to the road. It forks just at the edge of the sand – one trail heads up to the village, and the other heads into a rocky little valley among the cliffs, vanishing behind a cliff wall. Some warriors have already ran past her on their way there and since it's the only way out of the village, she figures it's where they all head eventually.

So, after another glance around the beach, that's where she heads off too. The valley isn't really a valley at all she soon finds – it tightens into a narrow pathway and then the cliffs close about it to form a short little cave that slants upwards – through it she climbs up from the shoreline and above it to a field of grass that opens up behind the cliffs, a bit below them. Behind her the cliffs form a sort of natural wall, Algiore hidden behind them so well it's as if it isn't even there.

What a strange place for a village.

The field in front of Madeline isn't very big – it grows into a forest just a short way from her. The trail she followed leads through the field and into the forest, into the shadows of the trees and bushes, and for a moment she stares at it curiously. She'd seen it from the Lighthouse, but she hadn't realized it was this close.

There is a group of people at the edge of the forest, hard at work hauling heavy logs from the forest. Or at least that's what it looks like they're doing – but after a while of watching Madeline sees they're hauling the same two logs over and over, and they're never really added into their wood piles.

Curious and little disappointed, she approaches them. There are warriors there, talking to some of the people – hurried interactions after which the warriors dash off without another word, heading to the forest or to the field. As Madeline watches she can see some of them digging around with shovels and unearthing something - strange looking burrowing creatures which they then fight.

"Man I hate those Field Burrowers," one of the loggers says, peering at the field. "Making all those holes all over the place – I think I've fallen into a dozen of them so far!"

"I see," Madeline answers, and ignores how after a while he repeats himself again. The other loggers talk in circles too – either about the Field Burrowers making holes in the fields, or about Wood Spiders that made it impossible to work in the forest because of all the webs everywhere.

So, this was were the things warriors sold to her came from. Field Burrower's claws and Wood Spider's fangs. It doesn't seem like this is where warriors go, though. They pass through here, or so she suspects, they fight the moles in the fields and spiders in the forest, and eventually they continue on – heading somewhere else.

After a while of watching the fields and the few leather clad warriors running about, Madeline turns and heads into the forest itself.

It's darker there, in the shadows of the trees – but not as dark as she though. Beams of sunlight screen through the leaves above, creating little islands of bright golden light in the otherwise shadowy greenery. There are flowers everywhere, growing in tufts by tree roots and she can hear the sound of water coming from somewhere nearby, a brook running through the forest maybe. The air is heavy and cool with humidity.

It's beautiful.

For a moment Madeline stands there, just enjoying this new, interesting place, so very different from anything she could've even imagined before. In the distance she can hear the sounds of fighting, warriors probably. Curious, she turns to the sound and after a moment of listening, decides to follow it.

There's a noise coming from above her, something scratching at wood bark. Startled, Madeline looks up and comes face to face with multiple red eyes, all of them staring at her. With a yelp of surprise, she stumbles back and away from it, just as the Wood Spider skitters down the tree trunk, its legs scratching violently at the tree's bark. It makes a snarling sound, mandibles gnashing, and comes right at her, fast on its eight legs.

And then it goes past her, up a gnarled tree root and then up to another tree, completely ignoring her.

A little stunned, Madeline stares up after it, and then around in the branches above. There are other spiders there, these furry, eight legged creatures with red eyes that seem to glow in the shadows. They're all enormous, bigger than her head, and yet they move nimbly about the branches – few are even hanging from the bottom of the branches. Couple of them seem to stare at her, but… none of them come at her.

Swallowing, Madeline stands up straighter, brushing her hands over her dress to straighten it up. It doesn't seem like they're interested on attacking her. That is a relief – she has no notion of what she'd do if they did attack her. She has no weapons after all and wouldn't really know how to use them anyway.

"You guys just… stay up there," she mutters to the spiders. "And I'll stay down here and we leave each other alone."

The spiders ignore her and with an uneasy little sigh and shake of her head, she continues on.

A little further away, there is a warrior fighting the spiders. It's a man with short white hair and pale skin, dressed in leathers of course. As Madeline watches from the shadows, he whacks at one of the spiders over and over with the flat of his sword - she has a vague impression that that is not how to use a sword correctly - until the spider stumbles back and falls over. It doesn't get up again.

"And that's twenty. Alright," the warrior mutters to himself and kneels by the spider, prodding at it with his sword until something falls from it – a Wood Spider Fang, worth five copper. The warrior collects it from the ground and then stands up, putting his sword away. Moments later, he's dashing off, leaping over fallen tree trunks and high tree roots. Soon after, he's out of sight, even the sound of his foot falls disappearing into the forest.

Madeline hesitates in the shadows of the trees for a moment before approaching the dead spider lying on the mossy forest floor. It looks smaller than the living ones do, lying there on its furry back with its eight legs curled in towards its belly. It looks… a little pitiful, actually.

"Hello, little thing," Madeline murmurs, crouching down beside the spider. Then, hesitant, she reaches out to poke the spider. It's softer than she assumed, it's fur a little prickly but thick. As she reaches out to pick the spider up, her fingers almost sink into the black hair on the spider's sides.

It's surprisingly light – she can pick it up and turn it around without any trouble at all. As she sets the spider down, it wobbles little but stays where she sets it, listing slightly to the side. It looks no less pitiful the right way around, though. It looks small. It's eight eyes, formerly so startling, have gone dark.

For a moment Madeline stares at it, a little unsure what to do about it. Above her, there are more spiders, living ones, that skitter along the branches, occasionally coming down the just to climb up again. They ignore her – she's pretty sure they're no danger to her. Maybe it's different with warriors. Maybe it's like with the villagers – sometimes, villagers reacted differently to warriors. Maybe the spiders don't ignore warriors – maybe they attack them.

That doesn't make the dead spider any less sorry, sitting there, all crunched up.

"I wonder…" Madeline mutters and then opens her transfer screen. She runs a hand over it and then grasps one of the bottles displayed there by the neck, pulling it out of the screen. As the transfer screen closes, Madeline is left holding the potion phial, its contents glowing golden in the shadows of the forest.

-

[Blessed Revival Potion x1]

[Instantly revives a dead player with full health.]

[Resell Value 10 Gold]

-

She's wondered if the potion really works the way it says it does. Time to test it.

Picking the spider up again, Madeline nestles it on her lap so that its head is up. Figuring out how its mouth worked is… interesting, but she eventually manages get past the furry mandibles and at the actual mouth part. Then, taking the diamond stopper off the bottle she pours it into the spider's jaws.

The effect is instantaneous – the spider jerks in her lap, it's crooked legs twitching. Moment later it's flailing wildly and squirming away from her, spinning right way around and back to its feet. Holding the empty bottle, Madeline watches the spider skitter around uncertainty, making jerky, confused starts, back and forth and from side to side. It's a little wobbly, but … it's definitely alive.

"Well," Madeline says and lowers the bottle. "At least now I know it really works."

The spider makes an aborted move to climb up a near tree and then stops. It turns to her, mandibles gnashing furiously – and then makes a start at her, front legs flailing in the air as if it's intending to hit her. Before Madeline can even really startle, though, it draws back again, curling into itself a little. It snarls and hisses at her, and it sounds confused.

"Is it weird, being alive again? I've never died and been resurrected, so I wouldn't know," Madeline says and stands up, brushing her apron as she does. "I guess it must be at least a little strange. Still. I'm glad you're not dead anymore."

Looking at the empty potion phial in her hand, Madeline opens the transfer screen again and pushes the empty bottle in. When she pulls her hand back, there's something sitting in her palm in place of the bottle – a handful of copper coins. It surprises so much that she doesn't even notice the spider skittering closer until it's by her foot, biting at her boot.

"Huh?" she asks it and then crouches back down, making the spider skitter away a little in fright. "Look at this," she says and shows the coins to it, making it snarl at her. "I just sold myself a bottle and paid myself, uh," she stops and separates the coins on her palm to count them. "I paid myself ten copper for a bottle I sold to myself. I'm pretty sure it's not supposed to work like that."

The spider peers at her hand suspiciously and then leans over – and snags one of the coins form her palm with its mandibles. Madeline stares at it, stunned, as the coin disappears in its mouth. The spider gnashes it's mandibles for a moment and then makes a weird little jerk and spits the coin out again. It snarls at the coin and bristles, affronted.

Madeline blinks at it and then grins. "Well, that's what you get for trying to eat it," she laughs and picks the coin up again. After moment of considering the coins in her palm, she drops them in the pocket of her apron and stands up. Maybe she'll figure out what to do with them later. "Well then," she says. "I think I'll look around a bit more. It's been fun, little spider. Take care now."

As Madeline heads off to see what else she can find in the forest, the spider she resurrected hesitates for a moment – and then it skitters after her. She gives it a curious look and it snarls at hers, gnashing its mandibles.

"Well, if you really want to, you can come along," she says, shrugging her shoulders and then frowns. "No biting, though."

It bites the heel of her boot in answer.