She was still, surprisingly, winning, at least when it came to strength, though she was not winning overall. The monster's attacks with magic, the vines and branches and thorns, were starting to really stack up, and she had taken quite a bit of damage at this point. It had started with bruising and a few cuts, but she was now sliced up badly and had a couple cracked bones. Compared to her, the minimal damage to the monster's armor and external branches didn't look like it was slowing it down any, and it only was getting stronger, or just more irate.

They had been fighting for quite some time and, now that she was using her Presence, her stamina was starting to take a bit of a dip. Just as she was recalculating, she got a message, smiling fiercely as she renewed her assault on the creature. She pushed the monster back, though it was just a byproduct of the fierce assault, before lodging the fingers of her left hand in its vines and started to pound its face into woody pulp with her right hand. She hammered the monster over and over, striking it tens of times a second as she burned mana wantonly, her buffs running red hot while she shattered everything around them with repeated Spatial Obliterations.

It wasn't all sunshine and roses, as the monster desperately fought her off, branches emerging from its body to slam into her at high speed. Thorns blanketed the area and pierced into her flesh, Beth's healing and the flexing of her insanely powerful muscles shooting them right back out. She could feel bones cracking, and her poor armor was in less than tatters at this point, way beyond the point where it could even be repaired, but she held on.

And it was for a very specific purpose, as there was a roaring noise right behind the monster and a wave of dragonfire washed over both of them, slamming into the monster's back with great force. Sera's fire wasn't a skill but an innate ability of her species, and hers was particularly potent, causing the monster to scream in agony as it was burned. It writhed and roared, breaking free of Beth's grip before going totally wild, slamming vines thicker than her torso into both her and Sera, though its attack was still focused on Beth, thankfully. She weathered the assault, breaking as many vines as she could, including all the ones headed for Sera, though that bought the creature precious time.

Time it used…to flee? Beth was shocked at first, but then remembered that it was a monster, not a beast. She watched, mouth open, as it tore away from them, so fast it was barely a blur, which was an indication it still hadn't been using its full strength. She hadn't seen it move that fast or react like that during the whole time they had been fighting, indicating it still had yet more power to tap into.

"Beth! Catch it!" Sera called out, able to project her voice quite far in her dragon form.

"No point," Beth replied, shaking her head. "I was outmatched against it, and it wasn't even going all-out. Besides, I'm not that fast, not yet. I doubt I could keep up with it."

"Are you all right?" Sera asked, flying closer and transforming midair.

"Didn't know you could do that," Beth said, indicating her now human form.

"Yeah, it's not hard. But that's not important. Are you okay?" Sera said.

"Yeah, I'm fine, just a few broken bones," Beth replied with a shrug, wincing just a bit at the motion.

"A few broken bones isn't fine," Sera said with a sigh.

"It is for me," Beth returned with a chuckle.

"Did you call the others?" Sera asked.

"Yeah, I sent out a message to both Megoria and Baelvyr when I realized what it was," Beth replied.

"Wonder why they didn't get here sooner?" Sera mused.

"Cuz it was a good opportunity for the girlie, girlie," Baelvyr said from right behind Sera.

"Holy Shit! Don't do that," the dragon girl squeaked, jumping and whirling around to face him.

"I got here a while ago," he grunted. "I was watchin' how ya'd do. Not too bad, but ya still got a way to go."

"Hey, I'm only rebirth five," Beth said defensively, her bones starting to mend now that she was out of battle. She had been running Lordly Reconstruction the whole time, and now that she wasn't getting pummeled, it was rapidly putting her back together again.

"Should still be better'n that," he said. "Ya could've done more with yer skills, especially when ya got yer Presence out. We'll have to work on that. Ya also woulda done better had ya raised yer weaponskills higher. Monsters can get weaponskills, under some very specific circumstances, but they usually don't got 'em. It gives ya one big advantage when fighting them. If yer Unarmed were in the Master levels, at least, ya could've really given it a beatdown with yer current stats."

"Good to know, but the weaponskills have been slow, lately. I've only got one level, or one level in each, I guess, recently," Beth responded.

"Ya know what I'm gonna say," Baelvyr said.

"Train," they all said in unison.

Stolen novel; please report.

"That's right," Baelvyr nodded sagely.

"Okay, cool, good experience, I need to train, blah, blah, blah. Now, can you just go kill the monster?" Beth asked.

"Eh, I could, but it ain't that bigga deal," he said with a shrug. "That one ain't the problem, though it's still more than the locals can deal with. It's the other little bastard that's the problem. I can flatten either of 'em whenever, if I can catch 'em, and that one ya just fought I can ferret out real quick-like."

"Well, it seems dangerous to just leave it, but I can't tell you what to do," Beth said, glancing over as Blood joined them. "You alright?"

"Scouting," she said. When the others all looked at her, she continued, "I was sniffing around for signs of that monster in other places, or for the other monster. Didn't find anything."

"Is it a stealth monster or something?" Beth asked, glancing at Baelvyr.

"Naw, monsters are just good at hidin'. Neither of them are stealth focused or this job would be a lot more than one or two months. We'd be here a year or two, unless we called in a second Exalted to help," he explained.

"Well, that's good, I think?" Beth replied with a slight frown.

"It's always shit, girlie, don't get me wrong," he grumbled. "But this is the kinda shit yer in for with bein' a Senior. Ya want to talk the talk, well, this is the walkin' the walk part right now. Goin' to a world that don't give a shit about ya where ya gotta fight something stronger than ya for weeks to eventually kill it and get nothin' but a 'fuck off' from those same locals ya just saved. Least the pay's shit."

"You're a terrible recruiter," Sera said.

"I ain't tryin' to be a good recruiter. A good recruiter tricks yer ass into a job ya don't want and usually gets ya killed. We don't want nobody in the ranks of the Seniors that ain't serious about this and ain't in it for the long run. Ya want to be a Gold Emblem? Fine, lotta people can get to that and sit there, we always need more helpers running Halls and shit. Ya have dreams of goin' beyond that, even one step up to Platinum Emblem? Ya gotta be serious. Ya gonna flake out or not want to take on shitty missions or make a big problem when ya don't get paid for shit for puttin' yer head on the line? Don't think of goin' past Gold," he said.

"Don't gotta lecture us. We're serious," Beth replied calmly, popping a finger back into joint.

"Just lettin' ya know," he said. "Why don't ya go back and rest for a while. Ya've done a good job so far, and I've really got some of the beasts thinned out a bit. Helps in drivin' out the monsters, when their little armies are crushed, they poke their heads out and try'n get some shit started."

"We'll head back over to Megoria's ship for now. Is there somewhere else you wanted us to be?" Beth asked.

"Nah, I was gonna have ya do exactly what ya did; go to an area with a lot of beasts where it was likely the weaker of the monsters was and stir up trouble. Ya did exactly what I thought ya'd do," he said.

"Any other advice? Complaints? Insults?" Beth asked him.

"Yer too weak and ya don't practice enough," he immediately replied. "But we'll take care of that. Now, get going; I'm gonna keep watch over that plant monster thing."

"Good luck with that," Beth said, motioning to the other two and leading them a bit of a distance away. "We should take care of the bodies, first, unless you did that already?"

"No, we still need to do that," Sera said.

"Alright, let's get that done, then," Beth said.

Sera transformed into her dragon form and flew over to the battlefield with Beth on her back. Blood ran off on her own, though she stayed within the general area, not wanting to get involved in the massive fire they were about to start but not wanting to go entirely solo. Beth again jumped into the heart of the flames, controlling and shepherding them until all the corpses were burnt away. They moved away from the area and Beth deployed the airship, Blood appearing right before it was fully unfolded and leaping on even in front of Beth and Sera.

"Blood! Shower first!" Beth called after her, taking her own command to heart and moving to the captain's cabin shower, where Sera joined her in washing off. It was a long shower, a very long shower, Beth getting a status update that the ship was lifting off while the two were still in the shower.

Blood handled the ship very well, even if there wasn't anything to fly around or fight, and they made it back to Megoria's landing area in a snap. Beth folded the ship and stored it away in her necklace as Blood and Sera boarded Megoria's ship, though she caught up with them rather quickly, finding they had been waylaid by the woman herself. The shark was in the hallway, talking with Sera about something related to the monster, Blood just watching. The wolf was really not that talkative or sociable, though she didn't really mind being around people. She was often just an observer in conversations.

"Beth! My little junior, you got into a fight with a monster and lived to tell the tale! It's a big moment!" Megoria said, grabbing Beth and pulling her into a fierce hug before twisting her around, keeping an arm around her waist. Seeing the much more senior shark lady hanging on Beth, Sera wiggled her eyebrows at her lover while Blood rolled her eyes, and Beth just shrugged a bit. "What's up with you three?"

"Every even slightly older woman Beth meets is into her," Blood growled with another eye roll.

"Oh, sorry, am I being too forward?" Megoria asked.

"Oh no, not at all," Beth quickly assured her, wrapping an arm around muscular woman's shoulders.

"Oh, good, I didn't want to cause any problems. You two are together, right?" Megoria asked, pointing between Beth and Sera.

"Yeah, we're married," Beth immediately replied.

"We're still just lovers right now, Beth. We haven't even gotten engaged. Yet," Sera said.

"Oh, but you are getting closer together?" Megoria asked, clearly eager for all the gossip from her tone and body language.

"Of course. Sera's the only one for me," Beth said firmly.

"Well, I don't want to get in the middle," Megoria said.

"Oh, I wouldn't mind you getting in the middle, if you know what I mean," Sera said, wiggling her eyebrows again.

"Ah, you two are into stuff like that, huh?" Megoria asked, showing a very large number of huge teeth in a broad grin.

"Ahem," Blood coughed, getting their attention. "Maybe before the three of you, uh, do whatever it is you do, you could go over the monster fight?"

"Ah, yeah, that's a good idea actually," Megoria said, blushing a little. Her skin had a bit of a gray cast to it, and it stood out a bit more when she blushed and her cheeks darkened.

"I like when you blush, it makes how pretty your skin is stand out," Beth said, causing the blush to deepen.

"Blech," Blood made a gagging noise, and Beth lashed out a kick at her in response that the wolf easily dodged.

"Right, come on, it would be good to have some firsthand knowledge on these guys," Megoria said, turning and guiding the three of them to the rec room, her arm still around Beth's waist.

"So, it was a plant-type monster, from what I could gather…" Beth started explaining, continuing as they sat down. She quickly recapped the monster's looks, how it had tried to ambush her, how the fight went, its combat style, and how it had fled when Sera's dragonfire did a combination of scare and slightly hurt it.

"A plant-type at that level, huh?" Megoria said, rubbing her chin. "It likely was carried here by the other as a seed. You see that happen sometimes with monsters. Either another monster carries them somewhere or they rely on a comet or something, usually one that's been accelerated in some way, to reach a different planet. It actually means that it's unlikely that the other monster is a plant type, as they wouldn't want to compete for resources, as well as a few other salient points. I could flatten that one like a bug, but if the big guy's got it, then I think I'll let it alone for now. I'm still in the middle of tracking the stronger one."

"Sounds like a plan," Beth said.

"Good. I'm leaving," Blood grumbled, getting up and disappearing out of the room.

"I think we should head to bed," Sera said, continuing before Megoria could say anything, addressing the shark woman, "You can come with us if you want."

"That sounds rather nice," Megoria said, many teeth showing as she got up and moved to the room she had lent the two of them.

"I know you're with a dragon, but you ever been with a megalodon before?" Megoria asked Beth as they entered the room.

"Uh, no, sorry, my experience is still pretty, uh, lacking. I've been with humans, dragons, greater demonesses, and angels. That's about as far as I've gone," Beth answered, moving to the edge of the bed and sitting down. Megoria joined her while Sera climbed in behind the, draping an arm over each of them and nuzzling against Beth. "She's had a lot more experience, though."

"I worked at the Royal Rose for four years," Sera added brightly, giving Megoria a kiss on the cheek before going back to Beth.

"Really?! How did that happen?" Megoria asked, running a hand over each of the others and starting to pull at their clothes.

"Well, it's a long story…" Sera started, helping Megoria with her efforts.

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