They moved through the air for some time, where Grogar, Hiroko, and Sherry stared out at the area as they focused on the Rotten Vale, searching for a good area to set down and begin their search for the fragment of Zorah Magdaros, or find out where the Elder Dragon was resting. In the end Hiroko let out a light chuckle as both Grogar and Sherry spotted what looked like a good first campsite near the highest point of the Vale, or at least the highest point they had access to, and pulled out an urn with a metallic rod, one that produced a sound that caused the ship to lower. It was all he needed to know, the rest of the crew had been told what to do whenever she did this, meaning her vessel would be moving into position before they sent the trio down, causing Grogar and Sherry to get ready. Based on what they knew they would be sending a modified anchor down into the depths, with a standing area that held their supplies and camping gear so they could set up camp in no time, and once that was done it would be up to Grogar and Patches to track down their target.
Once all three of them were ready to go, and they were sure of it, Grogar, Sherry, and Patches descended into the depths of the Rotten Vale, where Grogar found that it was simply massive, just like all of the regions he had seen so far, and, unless he was seeing things, it looked like a massive snake monster had died in this location. The bladed sections of the bone he saw confirmed the monster in a matter of seconds, it was a Dalamadur, a powerful Elder Dragon, and it looked like there was more than one skull belonging to the monster in question. It came as a surprise to him, as based on his research the Elder Dragons were supposed to be the strongest monsters in this world, to the point where many considered them immortal and that simply beating them put them to sleep for years, to prevent their destructive might from being unleashed, yet it was so weird to see the corpse of a few Dalamadur. It made him wonder what else was lurking in the depths of the New World, not just the Rotten Vale, and suspected that whatever they discovered down here would be an important piece of the puzzle, in fact it might help them solve the Elder Crossing entirely.
With that in mind he focused on what was below them and found the area Sherry was interested in, where the body of a fallen Tzitzi-Ya-Ku was surrounded by black scaled monsters with yellow markings on the back of their heads, only there was one large one and several smaller ones. Surrounding them was this odd fog, or maybe natural gas that was made by whatever was down here, and none of the monsters seemed to be bothered by all of it, meaning they were either immune or this level was weak enough to do nothing to them. Fortunately none of the monsters had seen their anchor yet, which came to a stop somewhat above the camp area, though based on what they were seeing it looked like a simple fire might be the key to driving off the monsters, which reminded him of the Jagras of the Ancient Forest, so one was a lesser version of the 'Great' version. In that moment Grogar held a hand out, to stop Sherry from doing something stupid, based on what he had seen since he started traveling with her in this land, before summoning several Fireballs and sent them down at all of his targets, blasting the black scaled monsters out of the way and scaring them off.
After that was done Grogar stepped forward and floated down to the campsite, while making sure Sherry, Patches, and all of their supplies had the same treatment, that way Sherry could float them down to him and he could move them into the areas they were supposed to rest in, before he set up a pair of floating stones to form an area that would keep the fog out, all so they could breath without worry.
"Well, you know what they say: when in doubt... burn them out!" Sherry remarked, as this just confirmed that Grogar was a good ally to have nearby at all times, because his magic was incredibly strong and when he encountered new obstacles it grew even more, explosively at that based on what she had seen so far, meaning he should be able to deal with all sorts of monsters and keep himself safe.
"Right. Well then, I should track down that monster and study it, as well as check out the rest of the Vale," Grogar said, as he didn't care much for Sherry's remark on the matter, in fact he thought it was a stupid thing to say, before he focused on their mission and the fact that this place looked like Zorah Magdaros had avoided it, or at least it had so far, since he was sure the Elder Dragon was slowing down, "I should be able to figure out a few things, and maybe discover more about the monsters that call this place home."
As Sherry nodded Grogar used his magic to pull the Tzitzi-Ya-Ku's body to the side and jumped down to the slanted path that was near the wall their campsite was built on, allowing him to find an open area that he deposited the corpse in, and sure enough he spotted the Odogaron moments later, claiming another monster for food. With that done he headed up the path he had spotted, to avoid being seen by the Blood Wolf, and found another area that was open, only this one was more like some ground and some odd webbing that held things together, before finding both the ground and ceiling were made out of bone. It meant the Dalamadur corpses must have collapsed in a way to make almost natural looking areas for people to walk on and explore, while at the same time he found that dark coral was growing out of the bodies, which had to be what Hiroko was talking about earlier, though it only made him think about things even more than before. One thing he noticed was all of the open locations, where the Odogaron climbed through and where the bodies of weakened or even ill monsters fell down to their deaths, entering a massive realm of death.
That was what the Rotten Vale was, it was a valley of death, built off of dead monsters and even Elder Dragons, the latter still being impossible in his mind when he thought about the species, but he hadn't figured out it's connection to the Elder Crossing, which might become clear in the very near future.
As he studied the area in question his Scoutflies surged forward and studied a set of bones that had some black substance to them, which likely belonged to the last monster of the Rotten Vale, since there were normally three monsters in each of the regions, but some had more than others, so he was expecting one more in addition to the Odogaron and the black lizard monster. After that thought crossed his mind he felt the ground shake for a moment, causing some of the pieces of bone that were barely hanging onto the ribs above him to break off and stab the around around him, which he avoided to the best of his ability. His movement was perfectly timed as a large black monster rolled up the path he had used earlier and moved into this part of the Vale, who seemed to have used some sort of black substance, identical to the one that was on the other bones, to attach a number of bones to it's body, a defensive mechanism. For a moment he wondered if this monster might simply roll away after revealing itself to him, like most of the other ones he had seen so far, but this time around it roared before rolling at him once more, causing Grogar to go on the defensive as he summoned a barrier, one that was twice as strong as his normal barriers.
Sure enough it smashed into the front of his barrier and dug into it, where his secondary spell activated and repelled the monster, Bone Roller until he learned it's true name from Cindy or Hiroko later, sending it right into the wall and caused a bit of bone to shake, but no more damage had been done as he readied himself for battle. One of the things he had taken a bit more time to research was that there were four natural elements the monsters were weak to, those being fire, water, thunder, and ice, while dragon was a fifth element and he wasn't sure what to make of that one, so his own training had been to master spells from those four types. The problem with this was that he had no idea which element a monster was weak to, not without research, so he prepared four small spheres and made sure one was of each type, all while his foe regained itself and faced both him and Patches, even though his Felyne was thinking of hanging off on the side, away from the upcoming battle. Grogar focused and hurled a larger Fireball through the air, blasting the Bone Roller in the face, but as the smoke cleared he found that while it did some damage to the monster it didn't seem to be a weakness, causing him to switch to a large Water Bullet and a Lightning Bolt.
Again neither spell seemed to have much of an effect on the monster, rather it only made it angry as it rolled around the area and smashed into everything as it tried to hit him for invading it's territory, and when it came at him again he used the ice sphere as some Ice Spikes that emerged from the ground, stabbing it multiple times before it could reach him, but it gave him all he needed to know. The Bone Roller, based on how it reacted to his attacks, was weak to ice attacks, which was followed by Grogar channeling frost around his arms as he readied several other spells he knew, showing that he was capable of understanding the situation and reacting accordingly. His foe, on the other hand, froze for a moment while it stared at him, clearly debating what to do next, once more confirming that most monsters were capable of thinking about things like humans did, hence why Grogar held his ground, waiting for the next attack to come. In the end the Bone Roller started to spin once more and headed down another path that lead into this area, leaving him and Patches to their own devices, meaning it must have thought twice about this fight and departed before he took it down, causing him to sigh for a moment as the ice disappeared.
"Well, that didn't turn out the way I thought it would." Grogar remarked, where Patches nodded his head for a moment, to show that he agreed with what he was saying, before he sighed as he started walking once more, as there was more for them to see before returning to the camp, "Oh well, let's see if we can't find that black scaled monster again, and maybe the Odogaron's nest."
As it turned out the Rotten Vale seemed to be, at a quick glance, a combination of the Coral Highlands and Ancient Forest, or at least pieces of both locations, as he found vines that allowed one to move up and down as they wanted, where he made notes about everything he saw and discovered, building a good map for later. Another thing Grogar found was that there was an area that seemed to be the divider between the bone section of the Vale and the natural section, the latter being where all sorts of monsters fell through when they died, like the land created a bunch of funnels to deposit food in this dark region. Patches followed him as he headed down the main path and found that the twisted gas got thicker as he went further down, at least a little bit for the time being, meaning the lowest sections had to be overflowing with this and the others would have information on it to share with him. It didn't take him long to find the monster he was looking for, as the large black scaled lizard monster was munching on something as the smaller ones did the same with the rest of the monsters, no doubt getting something to eat before another monster showed up, since there was no telling whether or not an Odogaron would show up to stop them.
With that done, and finding that his path was blocked by some bodies that the black scaled monster was moving, Grogar decided to return to the camp and found that Sherry was happy to see that he was safe, though once he made sure the camp was safe they climbed back onto the anchor and he sent up a flare, allowing Hiroko and the others to pull them back up to where the airship was resting.
"So, what have you discovered?" Hiroko asked, speaking as soon as Grogar, Sherry, and Patches returned to the inside of the ship, as while she liked to stand on the balcony she much preferred sitting on her seat, though she was more eager to hear what Grogar had to say about the Rotten Vale.
"The Rotten Vale is a place of death, where the monsters are likely fighting each other to survive," Grogar replied, where he took a few moments to arrange his thoughts on the matter before speaking his mind, while Sherry stood off to the side as she talked with Johnson, no doubt about supplies for future camps, "and we know that the Odogaron is down here, but I also encountered a large black, or maybe dark gray, skinned monster that rolls around and uses bones as it's armor, as well as some black scaled monsters that have yellow markings on the back of their heads, which look like lizards and come in two sizes."
"Ah yes, the Radobaan, the bone monster, and the Great Girros, with a pack of Girros," Hiroko said, confirming that Cindy, or someone else, had come up with the names for these monsters and now Grogar knew what to call them, though at the same time she considered something that hadn't been said, "Any sign of Zorah Magdaros?"
"Not in the upper reaches, but we were unable to go deeper due to a pile of monster bodies... which I'm sure will be taken away by one of them in due time," Grogar answered, as his current plan was to rest for an hour or two, give the monsters some time to move around and do whatever it was that they did on a normal day, before heading down and seeing if the way was clear for him to head deeper into the Vale, "We also found this odd gas, maybe a vapor of some kind, that was in the area we set our camp in, so I set up some crystals to keep the camp clean, and it seems to be getting thicker as one pushes deeper into the Rotten Vale."
"Effluvium. Had I known you would have encountered it so soon, I would have warned you." Hiroko stated, which told him that she must have been expecting him to simply stay in the upper reaches and then report back to the airship, but she wasn't annoyed with him, rather she was pleased to see that he was safe and that he came back with information that all of them could use, "We know it is some sort of bacteria that causes dead tissue to rot at a rapid pace, which explains the smell and why the monsters are so quick to claim the bodies that fall down there, otherwise a potential food source will disappear, and we're certain there are safe locations deeper in the Vale, otherwise the Odogaron, Great Girros, and all of the smaller Girros wouldn't be able to live down there."
Grogar sighed as he thought about that, especially since he had no idea why Zorah Magdaros would head to a place that was as dangerous as this, but he knew that it would become known to him in time, as he would be heading back down into the Vale to see what else he could learn about it and it's connection to the mysterious Elder Crossing.