There it lay, infront of their very eyes, The Great River! This river was called great for a reason, for it enveloped the entirety of Sylvanora. As many people often said, Sylvanora was an island, but not because it was surrounded by seas and oceans on all fours, rather by this ever flowing river, a river wider than the kingdom itself and deeper than most oceans. It's arms separated and met opposite to the ends of Sylvanora, hugging the kingdom in its cold embrace, now the 5 must take on whatever monster inhabits this river on their own.
"Ok so we've made it here, cool, but how exactly do we plan on finding this monster-o? The river is as large as Sylvanora itself! How exactly do we find this needle in a haystack?!", cried Stephen, for all his eyes showed him was hard flowing water. The flow of the water was not for the light hearted, even the toughest of ships would tremble at the surface, which is why many fish of this river chose to adapt underneath, for the surface was much too extreme.
"I'm not sure. I suppose we look for reduction in number of aquatic animals?", proposed Trent.
"I can communicate with most creatures if I meditate, I suppose we could use that to find out where exactly this creature may lie.", suggested Emma, who had many tricks up her sleeves as you'll see.
"Not a bad plan at all! And how do we capture, or kill this beast?", Stephen continued.
"Look, we know nothing about this beast, all we can do is wait for it to come out of it's hiding hole and inspect it, flee, come back with a strong plan.", said Trent, he was awfully confident (mostly because he hadn't seen it yet).
"Sounds good to me! Then, I wear it!", replied Gavin, who wasn't done stuffing a cooked rabbit down his throat.
The team then laid their tents which they brought a little far off from the banks, Emma covered the tents with an invisible enchantment as to not alarm the creature. They then laid in their tents, discussing what this thing could be like, some say it's as long as a whale but bites like a shark, while some say it's smaller than a salmon but stronger than a tiger, there really was no telling. They camped at the site and discussed memories amongst each other while Emma was floating midair in a purple bubble trying to communicate with the fish that populated the waters.
"Any news, Emms?" asked Ann.
"Not yet. The fish don't seem to know what I'm talking about.", replied Emma as she descended from the purple bubble and reached the ground.
"Do you think it's possible they've made this stuff up to get us out of the kingdom?", asked a confused Stephen.
"Stephen, for one day can you not be Stephen." growled Ann at the poor imp.
"Sticks and stones may break my bones but words hurt more, Ann!", cried Stephen.
The tents fell silent as they all napped the night off. Morning came soon, the light(as there was no sun) hit the tents and woke the team up.
"A day has gone by, and nothing! I'm telling you, we're being mislead!", cried a frustrated Stephen, his attention span was only a few seconds.
"Quiet! I'm picking something on my binoculars!", said Trent who was standing at the end of their camp, outstretched with a pair of lenses in his hands which he had made.
"What is it, Trent?", asked Gavin.
"The water seems to be awfully aggressive a few miles ahead, I reckon we'll find what we're looking for in the strongest of streams.", he said as he came back inside the tents.
"It could just be due to a rock midway.", said Ann who was enjoying baked bread for breakfast.
"Could be. No harm in checking, so off we go!", he said as he stood up with his bag on one shoulder. He wandered outside the tent and started making way towards the place he saw from his binoculars.
"We're elves and he somehow has more stamina than us! That annoying bookworm!", said Ann as she got up to follow. The others did the same, they all walked and walked for miles.
"Trent, I swear on Sylvanora if we don't find something there I will smash your head with Gavin's Crush", said Stephen who could barely walk anymore.
"I got you, pal!", Gavin exclaimed as he picked Stephen up on his shoulders.
"Almost there, Stephen. Hang tight.", said Emma mockingly.
They were, at last. The place Trent had seen with his lenses.
"Alright. Let's set a camp here and begin our investig-" he could barely finish because... Doom! Doom! Doom!
A strong rumbling shook the floor and brought all of the five to their knees on the ground, clearly this creature didn't want to be kept waiting. It had been alone for a long while and hadn't tasted human flesh, for no-one dared to examine The Great River anymore. Now that it smelled 5 fresh bodies, there simply was no waiting.
Doom! Doom! Doom! The sounds grew closer.
"UH-OH! Trent if I die, I swear I'll kill you!", said Ann who could barely keep her balance.
"But where's this even coming from?! Emma, do something, try and find out the source of this!", exclaimed Trent
"You got it!", she said as she closed her eyes and sharpened her senses.
"Everybody run away from the bank now!", she screamed dragging Stephen and Ann along. Trent and Gavin ran for their lives off shore, and they were glad they did, for a fish had just missed biting Gavin's heel.
"What's this?" said Stephen approaching the fish that was flopping on the ground hungry for air, "This is the monster? I can eat this for breakf-", he was about to finish mocking the creature until hundreds more of the same leapt out from the river and nosedived onto the five.
"EMMA!", screamed Stephen panting and scared.
"Hang on!", said Emma as a purple bubble surrounded them. The fish were hundreds, if not thousands, biting at the purple shield Emma had created, nearly breaking it.
"What do we do?!", cried Ann, "There's just way too many of them, they're aggressive, we can't counter attack until they calm down!", she said gripping Gavin's arm.
"I don't know. They're fish after all, let's wait for them to run out of air, until then Emma will keep us protected.", said a trembling Trent.
Sure enough the fish were out of air, they all flopped back to the waters. Emma removed the bubble and dropped to the ground, for the attack had taken a toll on her body.
"Holy shit! I'm so sorry I made fun of that stupid fish. I may have just killed us all.", cried Stephen, who surprisingly was sincere for once.
"Don't be, it's not your fault. This is the monster King Omair told us about. It's not one, but many. Those who believe it to be a 'Salmon size' were right afterall.", said Trent as he gasped for air himself.
"We must go offshore, they will be attacking soon enough again" said Emma as she weakly stood up.
They all followed each other to the nearest shelter they could find, far away from the shore where they set up their tents again, the invisibility spell was useless now because the fish had already smelt them.
"We're up against a thousand fishes more ferocious than Gavin. How do we win?!", asked Stephen irritatingly
"I don't have answers to all your questions Stephen! Either put up, or shut up! We're all stressed, you're not the only one for heaven's sake!", said Trent as he glared Stephen in the eye. Stephen was taken aback a foot as he curled into a ball. He was much stronger than Trent, but he'd never seen him lash out.
"I'm sorry.", said Trent as he sat beside him, "I didn't mean to hurt you. Let's all just take a good night's rest and we'll deal with this in the morning.", said Trent as he laid down.
"Amen to that!", said Ann as she dropped on top of Trent.
"I'm joining in!", with that, Stephen too laid on top of Ann, who herself rested her belly on Trent.
"Off me! Off me! You're fat and heavy, off me!", Trent yelled gasping for air. The chuckles of Ann and Stephen faded away as the night grew colder and the team was once again asleep. Morning came shortly, for it was near summer, the team had to be up and running again.
"Alright, so now we know this thing's main drawback. It can't survive minutes out the River.", said Trent as he laid down a map he'd been working on in the night which was a sketch of the river surrounding Sylvanora.
"Precisely. So all we have to do is dig it out of it's hiding hole.", stood up Emma.
"The thing has a combined bite force of a dragon. How exactly do we get it out before it sheds us all to bones?", said Stephen, he had trouble being positive.
"I suppose we could use an olide but goodie, bait. Let's stick Gavin near the shore and wait for the fish to leap at him, when they do, Emma will imprison them and drop them far away. Easy peasy.", said Ann who was just finishing her breakfast.
"Is anyone going to ask me if I'm okay with it?", said Gavin, who surprisingly was shaking.
"Thats not a solution, Ann. Additionally I won't be able to capture those many at once, there's too much collateral damage at stake with that plan.", said Emma scratching her hair.
"I say we just go in the waters and clock em'", said Gavin, his sledge hadn't tasted blood for a while.
"Okay, no. No baits, no jump-scares, and definitively no clocks", replied Emma.
"I have a plan-" Stephen was about to lay what he thought was genius,
"NO!", yelled four voices together at him.
"Just hear me out, what if we do what it least expects? Let's go with Gavin's plan, let's actually hit the waters together as a team and face it one on one. We'll go in pairs first, send the more durable ones in the waters first and get them to gather as many fishes as possible while surrounded by Emma's bubble. Then we'll send in all our mages, bring the pair out, use fire to rise the temperature of the stream and boil them alive!", said Stephen as he boldly stood up.
"Thats actually not a terrible idea. However, owing to what Emma said, it's much too risky for those who go in first, Emma can heal us but not if we're charred to bone. We can't revive the dead, Stephen, merely heal them.", said Trent, who too now was confused.
"Any other ideas that doesn't involve me facing a million hungry fishes?", whispered Gavin who was getting anxious.
"I can't believe I'm saying this, but I think Stephen is right. We know what the monster looks like now, that gives us a huge advantage. It's lost the element of surprise, but we still have it! Let's strike the hammer while the iron is hot! In its flurry it couldn't bother to see what we're capable of, with enchanted arrows that can resist drags of any water, with mages from all lands, and with your pistols and weapons, I'm sure we stand a reasonable chance against those gruesome fishes!" exclaimed an excited Emma as she fisted the table.
"Bare minimum chance of success, no upside, and certainty of death. Alright, let's do this!", said Trent as he pulled his pistol from his trenchcoat.
"Gavin is in!" said Gavin, obviously.
"Me too!", Ann and Stephen yelled together.
They waited for the light to strike noon, at midday the fishes would dehydrate faster and raising the water temperature would be easier, once the light was at its brightest, the team left the tent and once again decided to take on that horrific entity. They had literally just walked on the shore and... Doom! Doom! Doom! In came those terrible sounds, again!
"Gavin, go go go!", yelled Emma as she surrounded Ann and Gavin in her purple bubble and launched them into The Great River.
"And so it begins", said Trent who cocked his pistol and loaded it, ready to take aim and fire. Emma started levitating, this was the most focused she had been for a while. Stephen had all his spells ready, under his own breath he whispered, "emalf, emalf, emalf" as sparks flew from his fingers.
Doom! Doom! Doom! The voices grew ever closer. Gavin and Ann gazed around, the river was near pitch black inside, almost no light would enter nor escape. After a minutes' wait in came the terrible voices, the fishes had come raging their wrath upon them. They bit and slashed at the bubble with all their force, it begun to crack but Emma remade it every time.
"When do we boil the water?!", yelled Stephen.
"Not now! There aren't even half of them. Emma hold on, keep the bubbles intact, we need atleast two thirds of the fishes vaporized so we can manually deal with the rest.", replied Trent.
As he said this, more and more fishes begun to collect, all biting at the bubbles nearly breaking them, but Emma regenerated them every time(bless her heart). The crowding increased ten folds, more and more from all across the River collected, nearly all of them were at the site, determined to burst open this evil barrier to their daily meal.
"Now?!" cried Stephen again.
"Now!", said Trent as he went aback.
"EMALF!" yelled Stephen as loudly as he could, a raging fire leapt into the River and evaporated the top layer of the running water. Emma herself got down back to the ground and pointed her fingers directly at the water surface, which now exposed the fishes, credit Stephen.
"Take this!" she yelled as an entire gust of mist forced it's way into the water, Gavin and Ann were protected from Emma's intact bubble, but the fish were not! (Or so they thought)
The embers died out, and steam filled the entire basin.
"Did we do it? Gavin? Ann? Anyone?" Stephen's voice echoed into the abyss.
"I think we did!", said Trent coughing, "Is everyone okay?"
Gavin and Ann made their way to the shore where they met a dusted Trent, a weary Stephen, and an unconscious Emma.
"Holy shit! That was sick dud-" Stephen was about to finish his short lived victory until,
Brakadoom! A loud thunder like noise was heard from deep within the River. The four heroes now turned back in despair, for what they saw they couldn't believe. The fish that were supposed to be steam were unharmed, and worse than unharmed, for they had all combined their bodies to create a creature so evil, so monstrous and so gigantic it could pale a dragon underwater. Now they realised what the affairs were as hope left their eyes, the people and knights who thought of the fish as whales too were right, for these mystical creatures could morph into one at will! Gazing into their hopeless eyes from the dark waters underneath, a big blue fish the size of a mountain, with teeth sharper than all daggers. The fish had all come together and neutralized the embers with their body heat, Trent's master plan crumbled before his eyes as the creature grinned and leapt out of the water, into the sky, meters high it went and nosedived into the five, they were all left counting starts for they still couldn't comprehend what had happened, yet the creature's jaws grew ever closer to their bodies.
