Chapter 123: Laetus Forest

Swallowing back his laughter, Xinya watched as Melting Snow rushes out of the kitchen, his white fluffy tail wagging behind him as he left. Biting his lip, to keep from smiling at the adorable sight, Xinya began to tidy up the kitchen.

The process was quite fast unlike when he does it in real life, all he had to do was wipe down everything with the game's kitchen cloth and in a matter of seconds, all the dirt and grime around him faded away. Before he knew it the kitchen looked sparkly clean like it was completely new.

Putting down the green cloth, Xinya left the kitchen, preparing to go find Melting Snow and the rest of his party. Seeing that they weren't inside the houseboat, he went out onto the deck, only to be hit by a passing breeze of saltwater that was in the air.

Walking over to the railing of the ship, Xinya looked down to see a couple of large pinkish fish with purple specks, playfully swimming around in the beautiful clear water. How he wished he had time to relax and go fishing, he bet that he would catch some very unique fish.

While Xinya was in the midst of staring at the interesting looking fish, that was swimming below, he heard the pitter-patter of feet coming towards him. Xinya turned away from the water to see who was approaching, only to catch sight of Melting Snow running up to him as Wei and Wandering Sound followed behind.

"Drifting Cloud, guess what?!" Melting Snow asked when he was in front of him. "Wandering Sound says that we are about to arrive."

Xinya looked over Melting Snow's head to Wandering Sound, seeing the man nod in agreement, Xinya said, "I guess it's time to begin our treasure hunt than."

~

Walking into Laetus forest was like walking into another type of game, or so Xinya thought. It was completely different from the other forests that Xinya been inside. For one thing, it didn't look like a normal forest, but something that came out of a four-year-old's imagination.

The forest was a hodgepodge of enormous, radiant, and brightly colored fir trees. Coiling glowing plants, were wrapped around many of the trees, thus lightening up the space and a variety of flowers, which glittery shined were found hanging on different parts of each tree-like ornaments, it was like something out of a fairytale.

The colors of the trees are what most stood out to Xinya, with them being a very dazzling shade of canary yellow, bubblegum pink, and sky blue. These three colors were spread across the forest as far as his eye could see. The vividness of the colors of the trees was difficult for Xinya to stomach.

"My eyes!!" Melting Snow said he felt blinded by how horrendously bright the forest was. "How could the devs make something like this."

"What's wrong with it, I think it's very pretty," Wei said, looking around in awe, at the beautiful looking trees.

Rolling his eyes at her, Melting Snow said, "Of course you would think so."

"What are you trying to say?" Wei asked, defensively.

"Nothing, nothing." Melting Snow said, holding up his hands in surrender. He knew better than to start an argument with a girl. That would be more trouble than it was worth.

"He's saying that this place looks like a unicorn ate a rainbow and threw it up on this forest." Xinya honestly told her.

Melting Snow looked at Xinya in awe, wondering how he knew what he was thinking, while Wandering Sound silently agreed from behind Wei's back. Xinya, on the other hand, was worried about Wei's eyesight and was considering taking her to get them checked.

"Come on, individually these colors are really pretty," Wei said, trying to get him to agree with her.

"The keyword is individual," Xinya said while looking at her. "If you ever buy something for our apartment, please run it by me first."

Wandering Sound snorted once Xinya said that, causing Wei to elbow him in the side. Melting Snow didn't care at all and just started laughing full out. Wei was a little miffed at the three guys, she will get them to see the brilliance of this color scheme one day.

"So, which way do we go from here?" Wandering Sound asked Xinya.

Opening his interface, Xinya opened his world map, after adjusting it so it showed Laetus forest, he went to the map settings and connected the treasure map. After it was connected, all Xinya had to do was follow the path that would lead him and party to the treasure dungeon.

"Follow me," Xinya tells them, before following the map, that would lead them through the eastern part of the forest.

"Do you think we should take our weapons out, just in case?" Wei asked while looking around.

Glancing back at Wei, Melting Snow asked, "You didn't have them out already?"

"Well, with the monster's all going over to Errinisworth to attack it, I wasn't sure they are needed right now," she explained.

"I think the monster's that are attacking Errinishworth aren't from the surrounding forests," Xinya told her. "It is best if you had your guns out and ready."

"I'm still trying to imagine what type of monsters, would be living in this forest," Wandering Sound said.

Tilting his head to the side, Melting Snow said, "Me too! What do you think they would look like Drifting Cloud?"

"I have no idea, but from looking at the map, it seems that we are about to find out. Well if you want, we could also just steer clear of them." Xinya said.

"I want to see how the monster looks, but I don't think we should waste any time trying to fight it." Wandering Sound said. Wei and Melting Snow also agreed with his statement, they felt that it would just prolong their journey to the dungeon.

Seeing that everyone agreed with Wandering Sound, Xinya said, "That's fine, I can get us close to the monster without aggroing it."

~

As they walked further into the woods they could see the monster that Xinya was talking about. The appearance it had was just as weird and brightly colored as the forest it lived in. The monster was a neon green caterpillar, with the head of a hamster and instead of legs, it had ten tiny orange wheels connected to it.

"Wow," Was all Melting Snow could say as he looked at it. He thought he had already seen a lot of weird stuff in this game, Drifting Cloud fighting with giant cutlery to name one, but this takes the actual cake.

Everyone besides Melting Snow was at a loss for words, this monster felt like it was something out of a mad man's fevered dream. Xinya took a picture of it, so he would have proof if someone ever asks him about the craziest looking monster in the game.

Melting Snow must have the same idea, because he said, "I'm going to send a picture of that monster to my cousin. I bet he gets a kick out of it."

"I bet he would," Xinya said while looking at the sky, "We should hurry and find the dungeon before it gets dark. We can set up camp by it, and go inside when it's daylight."

The rest of the party gave a sign of agreement, before once again continuing their journey through Laetus forest.