//------------------------------// // Chapter 3 - From the Ground Up // Story: Monster Hunter Pie // by BronyArmitage //------------------------------// It had been upwards of two weeks since the miserable failure that was her last hunt. Pinkie had decided that it would be best not to push herself to a speedy recovery, but she was starting to get stir-crazy. She found herself pacing the village more often than not, and even that was starting to become boring. Without her doing any work, she found that the villagers had less and less to do. There was no steady flow of resources, as everyone was too scared to leave the village. She shook her head, feeling guiltier and guiltier as time went on. Finally, she lost her ability to be patient, which was, admittedly, not her best personality trait. "Lyraaaaaa!" she draped herself over the counter, giving the liaison the 'wide-eye' treatment. "I can't sit around like this!" Lyra lowered the book she was reading, eyebrows raised. "Hmmm...Let's try and think about why you can't do anything right now...Oh, that's right! Because you didn't listen to me!" she said through clenched teeth. She looked furious, but her expression softened when she saw tears in the Hunter's eyes. "Ugh...Alright, look. We have yet to build the minimum required facilities to allow the Guild to assign us missions. You seem to be moving around just fine, why not go gather materials?" "But that's so booooring!" Pinkie thudded her forehead against the counter. Lyra's anger returned. "Fine! Sit there! Be miserable! Just remember, I tried to help! Twice!" she raised her book up and went back to reading, ignoring the Hunter, now. Pinkie looked defeated. She really couldn't do much else, and she was getting a little atrophied with all this not being able to hunt business. She turned and skulked away, going over to Rarity's shop. "Wonderful to see you on your feet, darling. You had me dreadfully worried there for a bit." Rarity said, smiling sadly at the Hunter. "Oh my. What seems to be the problem?" Pinkie drew in a deep breath and launched into a rant. "I tried to go get some real work done. That almost got me killed. I've been holed up in this village for almost two weeks! I can't even go hunt any small things because I'm still at high risk of re-injuring myself. And, worst of all, Lyra's mad at me!" Pinkie had almost started crying at the end of it all. Rarity rested a gentle hand on her shoulder. "There, there darling. It will get better." she pulled Pinkie into a gentle embrace, careful to keep the Hunter's potentially bloody side away from her clothes. "I am sure that Lyra is just frustrated that you ignored her. I have a splendid idea. Listen to the liaison and go do some gathering. As boring as it is, it is still a very important part of your job here in Moga." Pinkie wiped her eyes, thought for a moment, then nodded. She knew the shopkeeper was right, and she knew Lyra had been right, too. "That's the spirit!" Rarity smiled, and she loaned Pinkie some gathering equipment("My treat, dear!"), and sent the Hunter on her way. Pinkie could not wear the gloves of her armor set. It would have scraped against her burns and opened them. She made her way across the bridge, thinking about how little she had explored of the hunting grounds. She's only been to two of the areas that made it up. Instead of going down the right slope, she took a left and descended down into an area that had a few bee hives and a couple of areas where she noticed a plentiful collection of bugs. A pair of Aptonoth were munching lazily on a mushroom-bearing stump. Tearing the tips of the mushrooms off before raising their head as they chewed, staying alert to their surroundings. The large, gray herbivores spotted Pinkie, but clearly did not see her as a threat, resuming their eating. Pinkie kept an eye on them as she made her way over to one of the hives. She knelt down and dug around the base, finding honey and insect husks on the ground. She heard faint buzzing above her, but she assumed it was just the bees. As she stood up, her face came level with the massive stinger of an airborne insect. She ducked immediately as the stinger pierced the air where her head has been not moments ago. She cursed herself for not bringing some manner of weapon to defend herself with. "This has not been my best week." she patted herself down, pulling her carving knife out. Not ideal, but it would have to suffice. She took the basic 'Sword and Shield' stance as the oversized bug made large arcing dives, attempting to close in with a sting. Pinkie back stepped as it thrust the stinger towards her again and stabbed it in the exposed abdomen. The buzzing grew louder, then ceased as it dropped to the ground like a stone. She stared at it for a moment, noticing a fluid leaking from the hole she'd made. She pulled an empty bottle from her pouch and filled it, putting the cork in. She examined it, noticing how blue it was. It almost seemed to glow. She stowed the bottle away and made her way deeper into the area. After scrounging through bushes for some bugs, finding a few really rare ones, she made her way to the mouth of a cave. She leaned a bit closer, tilting her head left and right, trying to get a glimpse of anything that could be in there. No such luck, it was too dark to see more than ten feet in. She grabbed what looked like a egg from inside her pouch, digging through her bug collection and pulling out a vibrant yellow insect with a abdomen that resembled a lightbulb. She opened the egg shaped container and put the bug inside, shaking it a few times before belting it into the cave. Upon impact with whatever was at the end of its trajectory, it burst, sending a bright flash that seemed to illuminate the cave for quite some time. Pinkie wasn't able to see anything more than twenty feet in. There appeared to be no manner of creature in the cave. "Luck's finally on your side, Pinkie Pie." she smiled and walked into the cave. Once her eyes adjusted to the dark, the few beams of natural light made it possible to navigate. What it didn't help her with was the sharp drop off that threw her about fifteen feet onto cold, hard stone. A pained squeak escaped her as she felt some of her wounds tear open. It was too late to whine and go home now, though. Her resource gathering had been quite successful so far. She wasn't going to let this little snag stop her. She pushed herself onto her feet and hopped off the second ledge. It was a considerably shorter fall. Maybe three feet, and she hugged the wall, feeling along to find her way. Pinkie pushed down into the deepest part of the cave and, oddly enough, found lit torches. She wondered who could have possibly been there aside from her. Then, she remembered, the elder's son came out here. Maybe he was gathering some materials while she was out of commission. The torchlight shone off the damp rock walls, and it cast a warm glow throughout this area of the cave. Something caught her eye, though. Something shiny. She moved in closer and saw a fault in the wall with what appeared to be chunks of ore jutting from it. "Oooooohhhh..." the sparkle reflected in her eyes as she drew a small pick axe from inside her pouch. She leaned in closer and took a swing, chunking off a piece of ore. She continued to gather, smiling. Then she heard something. A loud 'splat'. She stopped mining and looked around. Not finding the source of the noise, she assumed she was just hearing things. She turned back to mining before hearing another noise a few moments later. Now, it sounded like something dragging itself through the thin puddle of water that sat on the cave floor. "Hello?" she was trying not to sound scared. When she spoke, the noise stopped. Then she heard a small screech and looked down just in time to see a small, white, leech-like creature throwing itself at her. She let out a scream of terror and took off for the cave mouth, the thing latching onto her arm. She swatted at it, but it wouldn't give up. Breaking out into the sunlight, she threw herself on the ground and started rolling as if she was on fire. "Getitoffgetitoffgetitofffff!!!!" she could feel the creature draining her blood, and it was doing a fantastic job, because she was already feeling light headed. In an act of sheer desperation, she grabbed her carving knife and rammed it into the leech's torso. It screeched again, as its blood and her own splashed over her arm. It slumped to the ground, twitching helplessly before death claimed it. She was panting, still recovering from her panic attack. Almost unconsciously, she carved a layer of the creatures velvety underbelly off. She went to put it into her pouch, then noticed that there was no room. Grabbing a few of the insect husks and chucking them to the side, she made room for the hide. Pinkie was exhausted after that last outburst, and she began to make her way back home. She passed the bee hive, and descended into the area at the base of the cliff she'd tumbled from. She was going to start up towards the top of the cliff until she saw something large crest over the top of it. It was bipedal, and looked much like a Jaggi, but it was much, much larger. "Geez! For realsies?!" she pressed her back against the cliff wall, trying to make herself as small as possible. She heard its heavy footsteps as it passed above her and reached the bottom of the hill. It stood up to its full height and looked left and right. It was looking for the pack's next meal. Pinkie, back still pressed right along the cliff, moved slowly away from the beast. A trickle of sweat ran down her face as she moved. She was done for if this thing found her. What she failed to notice, her eyes having been focused solely on the massive Jaggi, was that one of the females of the pack had been watching her. It let out a hissing noise as she got within ten feet if it, and the larger one heard it. It turned its gaze onto the female, and then Pinkie, who had frozen in terror. The Great Jaggi puffed its chest and let out a call, summoning the rest of the pack and Pinkie took off at a flat-out sprint. Her feet, still sore from her earlier fall, beat hard against the ground. She was kicking up small clouds of dust as she ran, and she could feel them starting to close in on her. The next few seconds felt like they lasted a lifetime. She could feel the Great Jaggi's breath on her neck, diving out of the way as it took a snap at her, its fangs gnashing through the air. As she pushed herself up, her stomach now scraped from diving through rocks, she heard a very familiar roar. The new addition to the battle took the Jaggi pack's attention off the Hunter completely, as well as drawing her attention to the sky. She watched as a wyvern flew over the top of the cliff and made a nosedive for the pack that was about to make a meal of the mostly defenseless girl. A hailstorm of fireballs showered the pack, killing a few on impact and sending the rest running in terror. The one that hit the ground close to Pinkie actually hurled her through the air after impacting with the ground. The heat wave singeing some of her hair off. She was thrown into the nearby waterfall, and effectively tossed into a cave obscured by it. This took care of the burning, but didn't alleviate the situation. The Great Jaggi squared itself, ready to face the considerably larger predator. Pinkie had assumed that it was a Rathian's roar, but was proven incorrect as she observed the red scaled wyvern through a veil of water. A Rathalos. King of the skies. The two monsters circled each other, sizing one another up. As soon as they moved in to strike, Pinkie dashed out. Skirting wide of the distracted monsters and sprinting hard for the hill leading up the cliff side. She had made it to the top when she decided it would be safe to slow down. She glanced over the edge and watched as the Rathalos bit down on the Great Jaggi's torso and flung I through the air. The Jaggi let out a pained shriek as it collided with the ground, laying broken but breathing. The Rathalos moved slowly towards its fallen prey, and Pinkie decided to stop watching. If she was going to get away with her life, she had to leave while the larger wyvern was eating. As she made her way across the bridge, she heard the monster let out a triumphant roar. One that shook the heavens. /) (\ Pinkie was talking with the elder's son, turning in her hunting report and the materials she'd gathered. "A Bhahabara and a Giggi? That's it?" the elder's son asked, staring at the girl in surprise. "I'm lucky I was able to do that. I don't have enough of my strength back to swing that axe around." she jerked her thumb towards her house. "Do you know how many times I almost died today?!" her eyes were wide and she was flailing her arms. She stopped when she felt a hand on her shoulder. She turned around, seeing Lyra standing there. The liaison had tears in her eyes, and she threw her arms around the Hunter. "Ack!" "Oh, Pinkie! I'm so proud of you!" Lyra said, hugging her. "You did it! You really did it!" "Did what?" Pinkie inquired, raising an eyebrow. "I just took catalog of what you brought and told the Guild. They said we'll have a set of official quests within a week!" both girls grinned and clapped, Pinkie stopping first. "Wait! I just got back. How were you able to communicate so quickly?" she raised an eyebrow. Lyra smirked and gave her a wink. "A liaison never reveals her secrets."