Alice yawned, gncing around. It was getting te in the afternoon, and they had been continuing to roam north through the mountains for most of the day. They had taken out another pack of earth elementals, fighting their way through the sentient rock creatures. Bridgette and Colin had truly enjoyed bashing the giant rocks into smaller rocks, but Alice grew weary of them. Elementals were dangerous, sure, but they were a very bnd monster in comparison to some of their other foes. They had also fought another wyvern and pack of giant goats. It had been a long day.

  As they descended back into the treeline, headed down the slope to the cave where they had made camp the night before, Bridgette froze and pointed. An enormous wolf stood, exposed in a gap between trees, about a half mile away and staring directly at them. The wolf had a variety of unusual markings on it that definitely didn't appear natural, and it raised its hackles and growled at the trio. Before they could recover, the wolf slipped into the trees and was gone, as if it had never been there to begin with.

  "Did you see that fucking thing?" Bridgette turned to the other two, "It had to have been something like ten feet tall at the shoulder."

  Alice nodded in agreement, "It was huge. I've never seen a wolf that big before or with those markings. Hopefully we can avoid it, or else that won't be a fun fight, especially since wolves are normally pack animals."

  A few minutes ter, the trio stepped into their cave, quickly checking to make sure that no wild animals had decided to move in while they were out adventuring. Colin stooped down, finding a piece of paper tucked under a small stone near the ashes of their camp fire. "Hey guys, I think we've got a problem." He gnced over the paper, reading the message within a few times, before turning it over to the girls.

  "These are not your mountains. Begone, trespassers. -D" Alice read aloud, gncing at the paper and at Bridgette.

  "Oh, and this." Colin handed over the small stone that had weighed down the paper. In fact, it was not a stone, but a carved arrowhead with jagged edges.

  "Natives sure are friendly," Bridgette quipped. "But I don't know. This area is great for hunting, I'm not sure if I want to leave just because someone left us a note and an arrowhead. Colin, how far have we got in leveling?"

  "In the st week, we've gained another 40%, so we're getting pretty close to leveling. If we push it, we can probably hit level 8 before we need to head back home in two weeks."

  Alice sighed, gncing at the arrowhead again. "I don't want to be rude to whoever lives in this area, because they obviously must be strong if they're roaming around this mountain with the elementals and beasts, but yea - I don't think we leave based on this. If they want to talk, then they can come talk to us. We can be reasonable, but we're not going to be scared away by an anonymous note."

  Colin stroked his chin, musing. "Any chance that the D person could be Daniel? I mean, not everyone who has a name that starts with the letter D is going to be our mysterious missing asshole, but it could be."

  "I fucking hope not," Alice replied. "But I have to think that if it was him, he'd be a lot more abusive or angry instead of just leaving a note. This was never his style," she gestured at the paper. Colin nodded his agreement, not finding any fws in Alice's reasoning.

  "Sounds good," Bridgette remarked. "Let's just make sure we pay close attention tonight just in case, now that we know there's other people out here, and they don't want us around."

  The night passed uneventfully, with no sign of the mysterious D or any monsters. Around three in the morning, Bridgette heard the howl of a wolf, but it sounded far enough away that it was unlikely to be a threat, so she didn't wake the others. In the morning, they had a quick breakfast of muffins and bacon pulled out of storage rings, before cleaning up their camp and exiting the cave.

  As they stepped out of the cave, they came to a sudden halt, bodies jostling together in their haste to stop. On the other side of the clearing, approximately forty feet away, was the giant wolf from the day before. Its jaw hung open, giant teeth glinting in the morning light, as its breath steamed in the chill morning air and saliva dripped freely to the rocky floor below. It was covered in what looked like faintly glowing primal markings, giving it an otherworldly appearance. Standing next to the wolf was a short woman, dressed in dappled green and brown leather, with a bow on her shoulder and camoufge paint markings across her face, helping her to blend into the trees she stood before. An angry expression was fixed on her face as she stared at the three friends. She stood in the shadow of a rge tree so it was hard to make out more details, and Alice could feel her gaze continuing to slip off the woman, almost as if some skill was actively trying to hide her.

  "You are not welcome in my mountains," she said. "Leave."

  "Uh, hey, wait." Alice started, stepping forward half a pace before stopping as both the wolf and the woman turned their heads in unison, fixing her with a baleful gre. "Okay, these are your mountains? Hi, I'm Alice. Who are you? Are you the person who wrote us the note, D?"

  "Yes."

  "Ahem, okay, well, nice to meet you. Is there any way you'd be willing to talk about this? We're three friends from Iowa, we've been adventuring together for most of this year, and are trying to find new challenges and ways to get stronger. The creatures in this mountain are much stronger than where we're from, so it's been great experience for us to test ourselves here. Obviously we want to respect your area and don't want to intrude, but is there any way we could hunt through part of the region?" Alice stopped, looking hopefully at the mysterious woman.

  "No."

  "Really?" Bridgette crossed her arms under breasts and scowled. "Look, dy, we're trying to be friendly. You really can't share?"

  "No."

  Alice sighed, putting her arm on Bridgette's elbow. "Okay, fine. We don't want to fight other people, we'll leave. Just to be clear, so we don't offend you in the future, how much of this terrain do you cim? If we go three peaks to the south, is that still yours?"

  The woman thought for a few seconds, gncing to the south, her face in profile to the trio as she did. "The Winds are mine. Go further." She had long brown hair, tied back into a simple ponytail, which ran down her back. And pointy ears. Colin leaped forward, striding ahead of Alice, bouncing on his feet with an enormous grin on his face.

  "Are you an ELF?" His voice cracked in excitement as his arms waved by his side, unsure of how to act. In reaction, the wolf leaped forward, pcing itself between the woman and Colin, snarling furiously. Colin panicked and stepped backwards, tripping and nding on his butt, in the middle of the clearing. Through the wolf's legs, he could see the woman staring at him, a curious expression on her face.

  "Yes," she said, as she slipped behind a nearby tree. The wolf snarled again, gncing between Colin and the two girls, and spun around and bounced back into the trees. In seconds, the forest returned to its normal noises as birds resumed chirping, the predator having departed.

  "Guys! She was an elf!" Colin turned back to the girls, an excited grin on his face as he stood up. "Another elf!" He blushed, "And she was cute."