Critters and Color - D-tier [job/solo]

Spoiler:

Lexiara clutched the journal to her chest as she made her way through the barren desert. She paid careful attention to the map she had been given, the sparse number of landmarks increasing the possibilities of getting lost. The directions were supposed to lead her to one of the larger oasis areas outside of the main city, full of all manner of critters and plant life, but thus far, she had yet to see any sign of the lush green area. She twisted the map in her hands and finally found the large rock crudely shown on the paper.

“Great, I was going the wrong way. Oh well, shouldn’t take too much longer.”

She turned at the rock, aiming for another small ledge of rocks in the shifting sands. She made frequent use of her water skin, not wanting to become dehydrated in the arid desert. It took another two hours for her to reach the oasis, the sun high in the sky and punishing all life with its heat. No sight had been more welcome to her since she had first came off the boat from Balbadd. The blonde teenager hurried for the shade and cool of the palm trees, the fronds blocking the worst of the sun’s rays. Her time in Heliohapt had tinted her fair skin to a darker shade, the markings on her face becoming ever-more apparent. With a sigh of relief, she sat beside the steam running through the miniature paradise and splashed water on her face and refilling her water skin.

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She wasted very little time in opening the journal to a blank page and tugging free the writing chalk she had been given. A small, curious fish had swam up the creek to nibble at her toes and she giggled before doing a rudimentary sketch of it. Her drawing skills were not overly fantastic, but it got the job done and the drawing was recognizable. She made note of the way it was swimming up the stream and of the stripes down the side of its scales. As she drew, a snake had slithered down from one of the palm trees, dangling off a branch mere inches from the surface of the water. She turned her attention to the snake, doing another simple sketch while mentally praying the snake was not poisonous. In a blink, the snake struck at the fish with lightning-fast reflexes, snapping it up out of the water.

She made careful notes of the ordeal, scribbling away at the markings on the snake and the way it hunted. The slender girl tilted her head to the side, noting with curiosity that the fish had ceased to struggle once it had been bitten and she added ‘possibly poisonous’ to the description of the snake. Her interest piqued further as an idea rolled across her mind, thinking of the poison arrows she occasionally used. She might be able to use the venom of the snake to blend a new poison for her arrow tips.

Lexi focused back on her task, sketching out some of the more unusual plants near the water, making sure to include details such as how far from the stream it was and how tall it stood. She pushed herself off the rock to examine deeper into the oasis, carefully gathering some of the fruits she found and writing down which plants each came from. The small journal was quickly filling with all of the information she had managed to gather, no critter or plant escaping her careful gaze. The lush oasis had such a variety of things to see, a stark contrast to the sandy desert it was surrounded by. Spiders, birds, and insects of all sorts were scurrying about and making a chorus of noises.

When she had filled the last page with a sketch of a frighteningly large spider, she shut the cover and tucked it carefully into her pack. She learned more of this area with every day she spent in the area and her mental library of facts was quickly growing, to her delight. Considering the task a success, she pulled the map out again, having no desire to be lost in the desert after dark.


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[exit]