Sophia, her sister, and the wolves were still having their contests and decided to race to the other side of the mountain range they needed to cross to reach Maya’s hotown. Before starting the contest, though, Fen seed to have been up to sothing because he was behaving suspiciously, which turned out to be the case because the mont the race started, he went ahead and created a massive explosion out of nowhere.
“That should do nicely~.” Fen sounded quite happy with himself as he looked at his work while the flas, dust, and debris finally began to settle. He had decided to be a little creative on how to get to the other side of the mountain range. While the others naturally chose to climb over it, the male wolf opted for going through it.
He used almost all of his authority in a mix of fire, air, and earth magic to carve and explode a crude tunnel through the entire mountain in front of him. Thanks to the range not being overly deep and just wide, Fen was actually able to go through it in one go.
Once things had settled down enough and the wolf could sowhat make out the other side of the mountain range through the ss and destruction he had caused, Fen started sprinting to win by reaching the other side first.
“That’s so cheating!” Once she managed to clear the mountain range the regular way, by going over it, Sophia imdiately approached the wolf while pointing at the destruction he caused.
“How so, my dear?” With his voice overflowing with smugness, he looked back at the tiger while tilting his head. “The first one to reach the other side wins. I don’t rember ever talking about the how part.”
“Grr!” The blonde did not appreciate that.
“I love you so much!” Aura, on the other hand or paw, was a big fan of his work. “I should’ve co up with that myself! That was a nice idea!”
“Looks like I need to go on two training arcs in the hope of catching up!" Steph was also mostly impressed with what he did, and maybe a little envious.
“Well, it was rather impressive.” Sophia scratched her cheek. “We also indeed had no rules on how to get to the other side, so I guess this round goes to you.”
“Let’s go!” The male wolf had learned a lot from the dog-girl, as well. Mostly personality quirks, that is.
“Music to my ears!” Steph was happy about that, too.
“It’s a good thing that Ari isn’t with us, huh?” Sophia looked at the carved-out mountain and the debris that got catapulted everywhere. “How did you even do this that fast?! I was so focused on running and climbing that I only noticed when I heard the explosion!”
“The explosion was mostly to clean up things.” Fen let out a small chuckle. “And because I like explosions.”
“Fair.” All three saw no fault with that.
"I mostly applied the sa magic I use to create tunnels underground. A mix of earth and air magic to crack, erode, and compress the stone in one go. The explosive fire, thanks to your oxygen burn, imnsely sped it up, as well.”
“Ohh!” Sophia clapped her hands. “I had been wondering how you made all those tunnels under the capital so fast. It makes perfect sense for you to have perfected digging.”
“I am a bit of a digging and hole enthusiast.” Fen nodded a few tis.
“I have so much more to learn from you!” Steph, a fellow digging and hole enthusiast, looked at him with sparkling eyes. “We should create a tunnel empire in the underground of Sophia’s domain!”
“I… am not against that.” His interest was piqued.
“Sure, go wild.” The blonde smiled at them as she had nothing against that.
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“You know that you just gave the okay to the start of a completely new civilization in your domain, right?” Aura had a feeling that Sophia didn’t understand the magnitude of what she just signed off on.
“Well, you need people for a civilization, so it’s fine~.”
"Weren't you planning on maybe bringing people to your domain at so point?” The female wolf tilted her head.
“That’s a problem for future Sophia!” The blonde didn’t see the issue.
“Why do you hate future Sophia?”
“Shush!” She glared at her. “What’s your problem? You should be in favor of creating a tunnel network, right?”
“You bet I am~.” Aura energetically nodded. “I just wanted to warn you.”
“Don’t do that!” Steph and Fen didn’t appreciate her looking out for the tiger’s potential mistakes.
“I like underground stuff, so I don’t mind at all when you go wild.” Sophia shrugged. “As long as no one destroys any current bios by tunneling too close to the surface, every addition to my domain is welco.”
“We make sure to dig deep enough!” Steph gave her sister a thumbs-up.
“Good~.” Sophia smiled back at her. “Alright, now that we crossed the mountain range, in one way or another, let’s keep going!” She glanced at Fen’s tunnel before continuing. “I want to get there as soon as possible, after all! Wait, how much further away is it, actually?”
“Seven, maybe 800 kiloters from here.” Fen looked around for a bit. “The mountains actually gave a good reference to rember because it has been a while since I last was in this area.”
“Hmm.” The tiger scratched her cheek again. “That’s a lot closer than I had thought!”
“Well, we were already quite close to the monster country from the place where we started earlier today, so there wasn’t much traveling left.” The wolf had an easy explanation for it.
“Okay, let’s get there by evening!” The blonde raised her arm high in the air. “Let’s have so more contests along the way while skipping the boring parts!”
“I like everything about that!” Steph was a big supporter of the suggestion.
“Yes!” Fen energetically nodded. “I need to make up so points!”
“Why?” Sophia tilted her head. “You’re already in the lead, after all.”
“How?” He looked confused. “I only won this one, though?” He gestured at the mountain range behind them.
“And you got three extra style points for the way how you did it.”
“Exactly.” Steph and Aura agreed with the blonde.
“I’m not sure how I feel about that.”
“Anyway, let’s keep going!” The tiger had had enough.
----------------
“Forsaken Maze Dungeon?” A couple of hours passed, and the group had a few more challenges where Sophia and Aura returned to dominating the other two. While having a break and leisurely walking alongside a path they found, Steph stopped at a random weathered and unmaintained-looking sign that piqued her interest. “There are actual regular dungeons in this world?! Like dungeon dungeons?! WE REALLY NEED TO HAVE A TALK ON HOW NO ONE EVER TELLS ABOUT THESE KIND OF THINGS!"
“Forsaken Maze?” Sophia ignored her sister and looked at the sign herself. “Why does that sound vaguely familiar?”
“That’s Canir’s joke dungeon we explored together with Maya shortly after she joined us back then.” Fen paused for a second. “It looks like we got a little bit off course.”
“Ohh.” The tiger’s expression changed. “I hated that place.”
“I rember.” The male wolf just nodded.
“You explored a real dungeon and never told about it?! You didn’t take there, either?!” Steph only got even more upset.
“Not only did we explore it, but our dear tiger also completely blew it up and almost killed us while doing so.” Fen added so valuable detail to the story.
“I was upset, okay?” The blonde looked a little awkward. “If you were there, you would’ve done the sa!”
“I want to see it!” The dog-girl got curious.
“There isn’t much left to see.” Fen shook his head. “Sophia turned it into a crater with a diater of multiple kiloters.”
“I think it was the first ti that I used basically all of my magic at once.”
“I want to see it even more now!” Steph's excitent rose even more.
“Well, it is near Maya’s ho, so it definitely won’t hurt.” The tiger wasn’t against the plan. “I’m actually also a little curious about how it's looking now. Yeah, let’s go there first!”
“Yay!” The dog-girl happily clapped her hands. “Oh, should we get the others for that, too? I’m sure Chloe and Anna would love to see it, as well! I’m not entirely sure about Ari, as I presu the crater isn’t on fire, but she might still be curious regardless~.”
“We could always turn it into a fire pit to get our jaguar interested in it.” Aura nodded a few tis.
“Wouldn’t it be better if she set it on fire?" Fen tilted his head. "I thought she liked setting things ablaze and not watching things burn?"
"I love you all so much!" Sophia was touched by how deeply they cared about Ari.
“Hehe.” They knew exactly what she really ant.
“Alright, how about a final race for today where we get right to it before returning to my domain, get so food, and collect the others to explore the remains of Canir’s joke dungeon?”
“Let’s go!” The trio liked the suggestion.
Doing just that afterward, the group had another short sprint before they found a different sign, which told them that the Forsaken Maze was 15 kiloters away from their position. Rembering just how much Sophia had blown it up back then, Fen was sure they'd reach the outer edge of the crater soon enough, so the tiger decided to stop there for the ti being to not spoil the surprise for the others.
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