Beast's Burrow

"That's another one dead!" Valentina stood proudly after smashing an Iron Boar with her hammer.

Cadell walked up to the corpse and cut off it's tusk. He threw it over to Ouida who put it in her bag.

The bag was filled with tusks of Iron Boars and fangs of Feral Rabbits.

"Wow! We've gathered a lot now, we'll win the competition for sure!" Ouida's eyes sparkled.

"We still have some time left, let's go a bit deeper and return before night falls." Cadell spoke calmly.

The competition started at noon, after the cadets finished listening to some boring speeches and had lunch.

Everyone had formed a group of 4 and entered the forest to hunt for wild beasts. The goal of the competition was to hunt as many beasts as they could as a team. They had to bring back proof from the beasts they hunted.

Odis had left the group as soon as they entered the forest. But even though they had only 3 members, they had a far easier time hunting the beasts due to someone from their group.

'I can't believe she was even injured yesterday.' Cadell looked at Valentina, who was pacing through the forest as if it were her garden.

The Iron Boars and Feral Rabbits would give the cadets a hard time even though they were in a group. But for this group, due to Valentina's uncommon choice of weapon and her unnatural strength, they could easily kill the beasts.

Cadell would act as the decoy for the beasts, distracting them. While they were distracted, Valentina would surprise attack the beasts with her hammer, smashing them in one hit.

After walking for a while, they found a forking path.

"Hmm.. Where should we go?" Ouida tilted her head.

"Val, you choose. I trust your senses, your brother used to take you hunting after all." Cadell looked at Valentina.

"Huh... Let's go left! I have a good feeling about this one!" Valentina joyfully strolled towards the left path. Cadell and Ouida looked at each other for a moment and followed her.

They killed two more beasts on the path but they still continued. As it was only evening, they had a lot of time.

After walking for a while, they reached the end of the path.

"Woah... Should we go in?" Valentina looked back towards her teammates.

Cadell examined the big hole on the ground. "Seems to be a domain of a beast. There's a path inside."

"Maybe we should return.. I don't think it'd be safe for us to go in some unknown beast's burrow." Cadell looked at the other two, but he found them making strange faces.

"What?"

"Return? Don't you want to see what's inside? Aren't you curious?" Valentina's eyes sparkled.

"Haah.. What about you Ouida?" Cadell asked her.

"Umm... Maybe we should just take a peek?" Ouida fiddled with her fingers, her face red.

"...Alright, but if there seems to be any danger, we'll escape immediately. Okay?"

---

After walking for a while through the dark and spacious burrow, they finally reached an open space inside.

"Woah... Whats this?" Valentina looked around the underground cave. It was filled with decaying earthworms and skeletons of snakes. The top of the cave had spikes forming on them.

Cadell looked around the corpses of rabbits, snakes and other beasts. "This must be a burrow of some beast.. We better return quickly." he turned towards the entrance they came from and stopped.

"....Hey...guys?" He called nervously with sweat forming on his forehead.

The entrance was blocked by a big badger with red stripes.

Cadell leapt to the side as the badger's huge claw came swiping towards him.

His uniform damaged due to leaping on the ground, he barely succeeded in dodging the claw.

He quickly looked at the badger, who was gnarling through it's sharp fangs, still looking at him on the ground.

Relieved that it's focus was still on him, he got up from the ground and charged towards the badger with his short-sword. "Val, smash him!"

He parried the incoming claw and slashed his sword on the paw of the badger.

*Roarrr* The badger screamed in pain. Using this opportunity, Valentina swung her heavy hammer towards the badger's huge body.

*Slam* The hammer made contact with the badger's body. Smiling at her successful hit, Valentina looked towards the badger's face, only to find it staring at her intensely.

"....Uh.. Cadell... I don't think it worked." She dodged to the side.

A bloody paw striked the ground where she was just standing.

"Dammit! Find a way to kill it, I'll distract it! Ouida! Help me!" Cadell roared as he charged towards the badger again, shifting it's attention towards it.

Ouida also took out her whip and swung it towards the badger. Like this, Cadell stuck close to the badger and attacked, while Ouida supported him by wrapping the whip around the badger's claw and slowing it down.

During the few exchanges between them, Valentina had looked around the cave to see what she could use. After looking at the top of the cave, she started climbing the walls of the cave. The top had a small cliff she could stand on. She looked down from the cliff to find her teammates barely hanging on.

"Guys! Bring the badger towards here and try to stop it in that spot!" She pointed towards a spot on the ground.

With no time to question her, Cadell slowly backed away while dodging and defending, with the badger following him. After the badger neared the spot, he ducked down, grabbed some rocks and threw them towards the badger's face.

With the rocks striking the badger's face and eyes, it closed it's eyes and roared.

"Ouida! Bring it down!" he screamed.

Ouida quickly swung her whip towards the open mouth of the badger, wrapping it on the it's fang and then she pulled down hard on it.

The badger's gaping mouth quickly dropped towards the ground, and when it did, Cadell dashed forward and stabbed his sword through the mouth of the badger towards the ground, locking it in place. "NOW!" he screamed.

Valentina jumped from the cliff with her hammer on her hands. She then swung her hammer towards the spikes on the top of the cave.

The spikes fell together with Valentina, right on top of the badger. Some spikes bounced off it's body while some barely penetrated it.

Valentina fell on top of the badger's body and looked ahead. A huge spike had fallen right into the badger's neck, penetrating it a little. She quickly dashed towards it while the badger was struggling to free itself.

She swung down her hammer hard on the top of the spike, sending it deep inside the badger's throat. After hitting her hammer a few more times, the badger finally stopped moving.