Altair felt uneasy under the gaze of the bubble thing. She wanted to flee immediately but decided against it. She knew that predators would chase things that ran from them after they saw each other. But there was a meal that awaited the bubble thing right before it so it should put most of its attention to that instead of her if she ran. Still, she didn't want to risk it. She figured it would be better if she slowly backed away instead.

There was just a big problem with that idea though. She was halfway up a tree so there was nowhere to back away to. Dropping down from the tree might cause a sprain, which would be a disaster in her current situation. She couldn't afford to have any kind of injury that could slow her down when such a large beast was staring at her. With the hook grass on the ground it was already going to be hard to run from it if she had to.

She might be able to take it down but the risk would be extremely high. The thing had a breath attack that seemed to be some kind of poison or acid. Just touching it could be deadly and her options were limited on how to defend against it. She would rather run than waste her time with it.

The bubble thing pulled a couple of its legs under itself. Altair's instincts screamed for her to prepare herself, that it was coming. She then realized that it was probably going to stand up soon. That was a terrible sign. It felt like it was telling her it was about to attack.

Seeing its movements, Altair didn't delay any longer and turned her back to it. She then planted her arm around the trunk and swung herself around it, out of view of the bubble thing, and quickly started to descend. She wouldn't be able to flee effectively through the trees without spending Mana and she didn't believe she had enough of that to actually escape with. So, she chose to run through the undergrowth, even though it meant her skirt would probably take a thrashing.

She didn't think she had moved into the forest too far. All she would need to do was escape through the door she came in through. There was little chance that such a creature would be able to follow her beyond it, or so she hoped. Since she had seen how low it could actually get to the ground she was a little anxious about it somehow squeezing into the hallway through the door.

Altair returned to the ground and, just as she turned around to start to run, the tree behind her was pierced through by one of the bubble thing's legs. It slammed into the ground less than two meters before her, causing a puny tremor to pass through her legs.

The sight of it caused Altair's heart to jump into her throat. There had been no sound at all from its movements until it already pierced through the tree. This caught Altair completely off guard. The creature was so large and yet it was so sneaky.. It would dangerous to lose sight of it, but she couldn't escape without losing sight of it. This thing was even harder to deal with than she thought.

Altair looked up when she heard a cracking sound and saw a web of cracks breaking out all over the tree, centered on the leg that had gone through it. Altair's eyes widened into saucers as she saw what she believed was impossible.

She pushed off the tree and roughly grabbed a hook grass as she ran past, breaking it off as she went. She wanted to gain any extra information on the creature she could as she fled and, since the creature was so nice as to offer a leg for her to attack, she would take it up on its offer!

She ran past the leg while swinging the hook grass, point first, with all her strength at the black appendage. As soon as the hook hit the leg, a shattering sound echoed in the area and Altair completed her swing without stopping. She ran through the grass field and pulled up the hook grass to see if she did anything to the creature and saw that the grass in her hand was no longer than her palm. She turned back and saw that the rest of it was shattered on the ground and her expression darkened.

'Shit.'

Before she could turn away another leg pierced through the tree and landed slightly ahead of the other leg. Then, the legs pulled apart, causing a loud cracking sound that echoed throughout the area as the tree split in two and fell to the ground. It didn't bend even when it fell.

Altair scrunched up her brows and ducked behind a tree out of sight before continuing to flee. 'This doesn't make any sense! Why is everything suddenly breaking to that creature when they're so soft and stretchy before?! This isn't fair!'

Since she was out of sight of the creature she decided to stealthily retreat. It would be best if she could escape this way instead of running all out because she wasn't sure she could actually outrun that creature. She couldn't hide amongst the green hook grass and act like a chameleon though, because the dress she was wearing today was bright red. She would stick out like a sore thumb and probably be skewered the moment that thing got within range.

Still, she was able to slink along silently through the grass. But so could the bubble thing.

They were effectively in a game of cat and mouse, with Altair being the mouse.

Altair ran along in a half crouch to keep herself as close to the ground as possible. She didn't know if she was concealed by the tree from the bubble thing or not but she couldn't stay in one spot. The hook grass was catching somewhat on her clothes but it wasn't cutting into them yet, thankfully.

After advancing in almost total silence for several minutes, she ducked behind another tree and kneeled down, breathing heavily through her hands to muffle the sounds. She didn't have any reflection rocks or a mirror so she was unable to look around the tree behind her to see the movements of the bubble thing. She was really annoyed that she couldn't use her Magic to deal with that thing. While she was used to sneaking away once a job was done she still had to find the ingredients she needed.

That damn bubble thing was really getting the way of her freedom from that cursed poison!

After slightly catching her breath, Altair made her escape from the shadow of the tree. She continued to crouch run in the direction she remembered coming from. If he judgment was correct, she should soon see the door she came through then she would be safe. She could always return later to look around again once the bubble thing had left. It wouldn't be a problem.

She continued sneaking and sneaking for an indeterminate amount of time. When she rested again with her back to a tree, her brows had furrowed in concern about her situation. 'Shouldn't I have found the door by now? Even if I couldn't find the door there should have at least been a wall. What is with this place, it seems endless.'

She looked up at the overcast sky through the canopy and saw that it was starting to redden. That told her that dusk was coming. She didn't come prepared to stay here for that long and started to wonder what she should do about food and the night air. The Magic she used to keep herself warm would only last for, at most, seven hours. Once that time was up she wouldn't have regained enough Mana to use that Magic again. Since it was already so cold during the day, she would probably end up freezing to death at night without it.

She had also yet to find any plants different from the ever-endless plains of hook grass and strange, orange trees. She was beginning to think that this place only had these two plants and that her being here was a complete waste of time in terms of looking for antidote ingredients.

She took a deep breath and was prepared to stand up and start moving again when she heard the swaying of grass. There was no wind that followed the noise which prompted Altair to immediately become alert.

She stood up and rested the flat of her back against the tree. She then leaned as much as she could onto the rough bark and tried to look around the side of the tree as discretely as she could. It was like she was trying to become one with the tree

As she was leaning to the side she caught sight of a single foot that was the same as the bubble thing she was running from. This caused her brows to furrow as she quickly pulled herself back up and start to quietly shimmy around the tree.

'That thing is so persistent,' she complained to herself. She didn't know how it had followed her this far. She didn't know how good its sense of smell was but she was sure that she didn't leave any tracks for the damn thing to follow.

She inched her way around the tree trunk, determined to get away without being noticed. She made almost no sound as she moved. If she kept this up, she was sure she would be free of its pursuit soon-

*riiiiip*

Altair nearly froze at the sound of her skirt tearing. She looked down at the same time she heard that strange, rolling cry behind the tree. A hook grass had pierced through her skirt as she suspected when she heard the noise. Her expression darkened.

She hoped that the bubble thing wouldn't come and investigate but contrary to what she wanted, she heard it give out a high pitched screech. The moment she heard that noise she cursed inwardly as she knew she had been discovered.

She pushed herself off the tree and bolted as fast as she could, her skirts tearing even more as she freed herself from the hook grass. Now that it had come to this, she could only run away while trying to figure out exactly how she was going to escape.