The Everglade Circle (3)

"Sounds like a plan. It shouldn't be too deep." Lukas said.

"We can try it with a rock?" Chaerin picked up a pebble. "See how much it sinks–"

"No!" Ursa suddenly said. "Stay out of the water!"

Lukas who had been prepared to swim across suddenly halted. There was a terror in her voice that didn't fit the dominating figure of the woman–and it showed as she completely pulled Chaerin and Theodore back as well.

"What's the situation…?" Lukas didn't understand at all.

But for someone like Ursa, it was just like yesterday when a younger her had disturbed the waters and the snakes all came out. Demihumans, exactly like them but compared to Nievu and his siblings, they were far more venomous.

It wasn't them being part of the forest at all–they were their own entities.

Lukas watched Ursa paralyzed in fear, unable to say a word and he clutched his dagger tighter in his hand. What was it? Lukas thought that the moonlight reflecting off the clear waters was lovely.