At first, anger had carried Dante forward like a gale, tireless and unstoppable. His little epiphany had hit him and his sense of reason hard, and all he could think of as he plunged deeper and deeper into the woods was getting back what they’d taken from him- what they’d taken from his [i]sister[/i]- and giving those two pink sons of bitches every piece of his mind. 

That had been the case at first, at least. But whilst Dante was in good shape, he was not a storm crashing through the trees: and whilst he was certainly furious, as people tend to be when their one line in the sand is crossed, he couldn’t sustain that fury indefinitely. After a few fruitless minutes of moving deeper and deeper into the woods after the two retreating Digimon, he found his breath getting shorter and shorter, a stitch etching through his side as he became conscious of how dehydrated and disoriented he had felt just moments before. And as he became conscious of that, he became conscious of his whole situation once more. 

He would have swore, but words didn’t come easily as he grabbed a nearby tree branch to stop himself from falling over. Anger throbbed in and out of his head, refusing to give up just yet, but soon found itself beaten back into an emotional coalition between anxiety, fear and self-frustration.

He’d fucked up. He’d really fucked up. He’d lost his cool, lost his sister’s belongings to those things, and gotten himself lost altogether in this godforsaken place. Only the remaining fragments of his anger stopped him from crying out of sheer frustration. Not that it helped him clear his mind at all, as he sat there with his mind going a mile a minute trying to figure out what the hell to do. 

The clearing couldn’t have been too far back: maybe he could make his way back there before it was too late. He hadn’t seen anything on the way over, and with the head start the blobs had gotten, it didn’t seem likely he’d catch up to them now anyway. 

“God damn it.” That very fact rankled at him, feeding back into his guilt and frustration. Only the gritting of his teeth and series of deep, angry breaths beat back the moisture collecting at the corner of his eyes. He’d get the 3DS back soon as he could. He’d be sure of that. 

So, sighing and shaking his head, he turned to look back the way he came-

And the soft breeze drifting along through the woods carried a repulsive smell of burning matter straight into his face. 

Moisture began to collect in his eyes again, this time his body’s instant reaction to the acrid smell being swept into it. Blinking them quickly shut, he quickly covered his nose: he wasn’t a stranger to the smell of burning wood, not by any stretch of the imagination. But there was another smell mixed in with it, one that almost turned his already-agitated stomach. 

Countless horrible thoughts sprung into his head in an attempt to figure out the origin of this smell: and for a few moments, he stayed where he was, letting them envelop him. But a moment later, he shooed them away. He could still get back. He just had to be quick, and take a different route. 

And so he decided to head further into the side of the path he’d came, going slowly and carefully with his hand still over his mouth and nose. If he was lucky, he’d miss whatever the hell was causing that smell entirely.

The smell, however, only intensified as Dante walked. No smoke seemed to rise anywhere over the treetops to warn Dante from where the smoke came, only the increasing stench of charred grass, burnt wood, and scorched meat (hopefully just meat). The bare trees began to thin, and Dante passed a fallen trunk - separated from its base by a peculiar round gap with charcoal edges. Ahead was a glimpse of a tree trunk, far more massive than anything seen in the forest; perhaps far more massive than any tree back on Earth. There seemed to be some colors strewn about, barely visible between the trees ahead. A bit of black, some red, a touch of violet-

[i]Pink[/i].

He froze. Thoughts of self-preservation and safe return found themselves challenged by a renewed desire to catch up to the creatures that had stolen from him and his sister: but as he removed his hand from his mouth-

“...!” No words came as the stench of scorched earth, wood and flesh came full-on into his face, and instead he quickly returned his mouth to his hand and nose. His mind reeled, but one thought now managed to beat all the others out.

Whatever was up ahead, it had to be the source of the awful smell. And with the awful sensation lingering in his mind and nose, that fact was enough to tip the balance. Self-preservation won this round. The thought of the two Digimon up ahead with his sister’s 3DS made him feel almost as sick as the stench did: but after the horror and soul-searching frustration of the last few minutes, this time Dante thought better of it. 

[i]It was time to get out of here.[/i]

The atmosphere changed once Dante retched. There was still something barely audible, incoherent coming from the new clearing, but it was as if Dante had pierced some invisible balloon, and it was the second before the air rushed out with a loud [i]bang[/i].
Indeed, it seemed like his involuntary reaction to the foul stench in the air had disturbed the very world around him. With the exception of the bizarre noise from up ahead, all other sounds began to slowly fade out to nothing: like the chords of the last song on the album declining into a faint mumble before being replaced with the whirring of the stereo’s mechanisms. Dante didn’t make much of this at first, the way the beating of his blood through his ears already drowned out much of the sound around him. But as the eerie quiet grew to an oppressive silence, he picked up his pace. 

And then he stopped entirely. 

In his attempt to move away from the clearing that the smell was emerging from, something caught his attention out of the corner of his eye. Though they were a distance away, as was the mouth of that clearing that ominously sat amidst the thick trees it served as a breach into, he could see a collection of figures. At his present range of vision, he could barely make anything out about them: but in this bizarre situation, those minute, irrelevant details and their familiarity was all he needed. 

Dante didn’t dare call out to the others. Cautious uncertainty tempered any sense of relief he felt at the thought of catching back up to them: but more than that, he didn’t dare break the silence that had crept up on him. So instead, he began to approach, beginning to angle around carefully in an arc-

His caution was wise, but came too late. Though it had taken its time, the consequence of his involuntary actions chose that moment to strike.

The air rushed out with a silent [i]bang[/i] - or, rather, a shaky gasp of air that seemed to come from somewhere behind Dante’s head despite nobody being there. Everything had at last gone deadly silent, and the minute twitches of the figures stopped entirely. Then, the gap to the clearing was filled by a mix of colors, concentrated into the form of a small humanoid. Its blank - face? Whatever was in the head area, a stark white compared to the vivid colors covering the rest of its form - stared at Dante, pinning him with a gaze. Dante didn’t even have to blink before the humanoid closed the gap without movement, not even a meter away now. The face looked like a mask, unable to show emotion or react, but Dante could get the impression this [i]creature[/i] was [i]grinning[/i] at him.

There was no extended thought process this time. Like Dante’s moment of epiphany in the clearing, the sudden appearance of the figure in front of him brought his thoughts to a crashing halt: only, this time, his movement came to a halt too as he flinched and wordlessly jumped back. 

A few moments passed in silence. Dante stared at the figure, blinking once or twice as colour slowly returned to his face and ice-cold tension left his body. Though the creature was too close for comfort, it didn’t seem horribly intimidating at first: second impressions, however, made short work of that. Though it was so much shorter than him- bigger than the other two, certainly, but that wasn’t saying much- whatever comfort his height might have afforded him dwindled to just about nothing with how it floated over half a meter off the ground to stare into his face. 

The face, in fact, was just the other thing. Their clothes were unassuming, if strange. The mask, on the other hand, and the demeanour that crept out from behind it, was deeply disconcerting. 

“... Hello there?” It was a long shot among long shots, but as Dante finally found his voice, he just hoped this one was more friendly than the other two had been. With how it was floating before him, the view of the others a (now much shorter) distance away disappeared behind it: and the presence of mind remained to suggest trying to sneak a peek around it would [i]not[/i] be a good idea. 

“[color=fdc68a]Hi there![/color]” The humanoid was shorter than Dante, and he - judging by the voice - sounded just like a child. “[color=fdc68a]It’s our turn to play, right?[/color]” The head tilted. It was if this being hadn’t just left a scene of potential carnage, scaring Dante with a sudden teleportation trick, and now was uncomfortably close in his personal space. But, on the other hand, he didn’t sound quite as rude as the little round pink creature, nor as evasive as the more willowy pink creature. Just, very interested.

Dante didn’t respond right away. The creature sounded friendly, but he knew full well how little that could actually mean. Pre-emptively, he took another step back: going carefully to not offend him. “Sure, I guess?” Maybe the ‘child’ was from one of the villages the blobs had mentioned? Maybe this was just normal behaviour for this place. “Do you think you could help me?” As he watched the figure at their new distance, his eyes darted about, scanning the forest around them for any possible escape route. “I’m-”

He didn’t finish. Dante realized only too late that he’d slipped up: his eyes had wandered to behind the ‘child’ as he looked around for an exit. First, creeping horror filled him as he realized what he’d done. 

Then another kind of horror filled him as he felt pressure fill the air around him.

“[color=fdc68a]We’re gonna play![/color]” Dante’s movement was abruptly arrested by something he couldn’t see, yet it grasped him around the upper arms and chest like a vice. The ‘child’ giggled. “[color=fdc68a]Us and your friends![/color]” He glanced behind Dante. “[color=fdc68a]Where are they anyways?[/color]” He [i]knew[/i]. He [i]knew[/i] Dante wasn’t alone. “[color=fdc68a]I dunno if I’m up for another game of hide and seek.[/color]” The pout was almost audible. “[color=fdc68a]And I don’t wanna keep playing that. Gets boring. But I think I know how to find them.[/color]” 

The child digimon giggled as he hoisted Dante higher into the air. Right below the human’s chest, a long, jagged, violet crystal materialized, its point aimed at his chest. Colour drained back out of the boy’s face as he watched it hover mere inches before him: his wide eyes, meanwhile, fell upon the others that he could now clearly see, and his expression was blank with the trauma of realization. 

“[color=fdc68a]Oh guuuys! I know you’re here too, I know he didn’t come here alone! So why you don’t come out and play before he [b]slips[/b]?[/color]”