"What," Adam hissed. "Is that?"

Kipo looked up from petting Bipo. She almost lifted her hand from Bipo's skull, but a hard and pointy headbutt from Bipo made her reconsider. "This?" Kipo asked. "You mean Bipo? They're a Bone Dragon."

"WHAT?!"

"A bone dra-," Kipo was cut off as Adam waved a hand in her direction.

"I got that, whatever!" Adam cried. Kipo's eyes widened as he grabbed what looked like an oddly put together knife. "What's it doing here?!"

Kipo blinked, making sure to stand safely in between Adam's knife(?) and Bipo. Bipo, for their part, didn't look like they cared much for anything except how their pets were interrupted.

"Bipo is our friend," Kipo said. "Trust me, they're completely safe, you don't have to worry."

"Says the person who can change into a mega jaguar!" Adam accused. He hesitated, and then looked over to Wirt. Wirt blinked.

"H-Huh? Oh! Well..." Wirt asked, looking from Adam to Kipo nervously. "...Yeah, they won't hurt you. Unless you're a skeleton, I guess. But you're, uh, not... so..."

Adam gave Wirt a judgemental look, but, to Kipo's relief, he lowered the knife. He squinted at both of them.

"Fine," he huffed. "I won't kill it."

"Them," Kipo corrected, and then breathed a sigh of relief. "Thanks, Adam."

Adam looked surprised, right before it melted into one of annoyance. "Whatever," he mumbled. "And I'm not taking care of it-them. Surviving here is hard enough, so you better understand that before you decide to keep a pet."

Wirt and Kipo gave each other a look. Bipo had a little too much independence to ever be considered a pet.

If Adam saw the look shared between them, he didn't comment on it. "I need to go out to hunt," he said instead. "You two...three, stay here. Don't break anything."

"Stay here?" Kipo repeated. "But there's more people to feed now. Don't you need help?"

Adam gave her a suspicious look. "Not that many people. Or did they code a hunger system into you and... your pet as well."

"I... literally have no clue what you just said," Kipo said. "But me and Wirt definitely need to eat. Bipo, uh... I think they're fine."

The three humans looked over to the bone dragon, who was watching the flickering lantern light with their blackened eyes.

"D-Did they eat another dead person?" Wirt asked nervously.

"Wirt!" Kipo cried.

Wirt raised his hands in a defensive gesture. "I-I was only asking?"

"So you really aren't slightly freaked out by a pile of bones that eats dead people?" Adam dryly asked Kipo. Kipo frowned at him.

"I'm not," she said, firmly. Adam shook his head.

"Let's just go already," he said. "The weird pet isn't allowed to come."

"I don't think Bipo wanted to," Kipo noted, but Adam was long gone, finding holes and roots inside the slide to climb up with. Ah. Kipo and Wirt were wondering how they were supposed to get out of here.

Kipo nodded to the slide, smiling reassuringly at Wirt. "It'll be alright," she said. "Let's go."

Wirt only grimaced.

It took Wirt a little longer to climb out the hole than either Kipo or Adam, but before too long, they were out of the bar and starting through the forest. The pink haze swirled around the trees, wrapping itself around the three travelers in a way that reminded Kipo of Fun Gus. She shivered. She needed to get her mind off of that.

"Hey, Adam!" Kipo called. Adam flinched before turning around quickly to glare at her.

"What are you doing?!" he hissed. His hands waved around the forest around them. "Be more careful!"

"But... we were talking before and we were fine," Kipo pointed out. Adam frowned.

"We... got lucky."

Kipo blinked, but she decided to keep talking. "I was just wondering about that flower on your face," she said. "Did you put in on?"

Adam touched a hand to the pink flower on his face. It looked a little worn, so he must have been wearing it for a long time. Kipo wondered how long he's been in this world, video game, whatever.

"I didn't put it on," Adam eventually answered. "When I woke up here, it was tied around my head by someone else. I assumed somebody else did it, but I haven't seen anyone else around who could have done it."

Suddenly, Adam's eyes widened. "Wait, your flowers-."

Kipo nodded. "It's the same thing. We came from the plains, just out of this forest, but when we got in here, we passed out from the pink. When we woke up, someone had tied these flowers around our faces."

"The plains?" Adam repeated, frowning.

"Oh, right," Kipo remembered. "Before we came here, we were in a house in a large clearing. We didn't go in the forest because of the fog for a while, but then we were kind of forced... to... by the bone dragon..."

Kipo trailed off, and Adam looked at her strangely.

"Um... a... friend died," Wirt added in, helpfully. "Regal. A snake dog."

Adam's eyebrows knit together, but thankfully, he didn't push it, instead turning the conversation back to the flowers.

"Well, it'd be weird if there was another person here that haven't shown themselves, or that I haven't found in my month here," Adam noted. "So, it's more likely the game just gave it to us."

"The game?" Wirt asked. "You still think this is a game? It doesn't even look like a game..."

"It's the most likely explanation," Adam said.

"Me and Wirt had just assumed that it was a parallel universe," Kipo told him. "Also, didn't you say that if this is a video game, then I don't exist? Um... I'm pretty sure I exist."

Adam didn't answer, and Wirt and Kipo sighed.

"So... what are we going to be hunting?" Kipo asked. She'd been worried about this for a while now.

"I-Well, I guess it's a little too much to call it hunting," Adam huffed. "But, er... you'll see it when you get there."

Kipo and Wirt exchanged a look.

"W-What do you think that's supposed to mean?" Wirt whispered to her. Kipo shrugged, not having an answer for him.

The trek through the forest was mostly silent after that, with only the rustling of the trees and the sounds of the forest around them. This place was a stark difference from the plains, and it was even different from the timbercat's forest. Kipo didn't think she'd be able to climb to the top of these trees, and the animals and creatures around them were unlike anything Kipo had ever seen. She found herself getting distracted by a caterpillar moving along slowly, being used as a ride for what looked like a dragonfly, but the butterfly was standing up straight on two legs. Kipo blinked, but Wirt pulled her forward before she could see much else.

"Did you see that?" Kipo asked excitedly, but when Wirt looked back at her, it wasn't with the same curiosity she felt, but with worry. They both blinked at each other.

"I... saw it," Wirt told her slowly. "It, uh, doesn't exactly look like something I want to mess with."

Kipo nodded. "Yeah, it did look rather threatening," she agreed. "But it also looked cool, too! I hope I can find out more about it. After we find your brother, of course."

"You want to find out more about it?" Wirt repeated. "But what if it's like that other thing, the one that... you know..."

Wirt's hand fell to his side, and Kipo's eyes followed it.

"Well, that one was more of a dragonfly, while this one is a butterfly," Kipo pointed out. "But, even if they're dangerous, I still think they're worth knowing about."

Wirt opened his mouth, but before he could say anything, Adam called out to them. "Hey, we're here. This way."

Kipo and Wirt broke out of their conversation, hurrying over to where Adam was waiting. What they found was a cliff, over looking a clearing, though one much smaller than the plains. The treeline continued, just a couple meters away. When Kipo pricked up her ears, she could hear the rushing of water. So, there was a waterfall around here? Thank god.

Kipo peered over the edge of the cliffs. The height of it wasn't too tall, but then Kipo realized that she was comparing them to those larger-than-life trees. Of course, the cliffs would be small compared to the trees, but the cliff itself was still sizable. Kipo was a somewhat experienced climber, yet even she was nervous to scale these.

"Do we have to get down there?" Kipo asked. Was there a secret way to get down there, or was Adam just extremely good climber.

Thankfully, Adam shook his head. "No," he said. "Well, at least not all the way. Here."

Kipo and Wirt watched as Adam grabbed a hold of the roots sticking out of the dirt on the face of the cliff. Kipo had noticed them before, and she noted that they'd be useful for climbing, but the problem was that they didn't go all the way down. But apparently, Adam didn't need to go all the way down.

Kipo and Wirt watched as he stopped halfway down, digging into the roots to bring out something small, yellow and ovular. It was a

"Uh... what are those?" Wirt asked tentatively.

"Are those some sort of eggs?!" Kipo called. Both she and Wirt were making the same sort of disgusted and worried face. "They look like bug eggs..."

"Well, I think they are bug eggs," Adam muttered, like he was trying not to be heard. And then louder, he said: "They look better than they taste, trust me. But we'll have to cook them, they make you sick if you eat him raw."

"Do... Do you know from experience or something?" Wirt asked. Adam shrugged.

"When I was half starving, the fact that the game would make me cook this didn't actually occur to me," Adam told them. He was stuffing the eggs in a satchel that Kipo had been sure was filled with tools.

"Oh," was all Wirt could say.

"How hungry are you both?" Adam asked. Kipo and Wirt shrugged.

"Kind of hungry," Kipo replied.

"A little hungry," Wirt said.

"That... really doesn't tell me any-whatever, that's probably fine." Closing his bag, Adam grasped at the roots in front of him once again, and climbed back up to Wirt and Kipo.

"So... we're going back to the bar now?" Wirt asked when Adam got up. Adam blinked at him.

"No, we need to cook them," Adam told him, as if it was obvious. Kipo supposed that it kind of was. "We can't start a fire in a tree."

"Huh?" Wirt asked. "But what about all those lanterns?"

"Those are different," Adam said, but he turned away without explaining anything, starting into the forest again. Well, Kipo and Wirt weren't going to let him get away that easily.

"W-What does that mean?!" Wirt asked him, hurrying after him. Kipo followed them.

"How are those lanterns different?" Kipo questioned. Adam shrugged. Kipo and Wirt blinked.

"You... don't know?" Wirt guessed.

"Are they fires that just... don't burn wood or something," Kipo pounded.

"What?!" Wirt gave Kipo a confused look, but before Kipo could explain herself, Adam answered.

"No," he said. "They're fires that don't burn anything. I stuck my hand in it one time."

"Why would you do that?!" Wirt cried.

"I wasn't being an idiot!" Adam yelled back. "I'd noticed that it wasn't burning the wood, so I stuck a leaf in it, too, and then my hand. It didn't burn me, though it was slightly warm. And they never go out either."

"Those almost sound like... regular lights," Wirt pointed out.

"That's what I thought as well," Adam said. "But there's no wiring... or electricity at all that I can see. But whenever I make a fire, they're just normal fires."

"...How'd you figure that out-?"

"I put a leaf in it, I did not put my hand in it!"

Kipo and Wirt snickered behind their hands and Adam sighed, though they were sure Adam wasn't as annoyed as he pretended to be. Adam rolled his eyes at them.

"It's not that funny," Adam huffed.

"Right, right," Kipo agreed, still snickering behind her hand. "We won't laugh anymore."

Despite saying that, Kipo and Wirt didn't cease their snickering. Adam gave them a look, and only then did they manage to get their amusement under control. By then, they'd arrived at their destination: a small space (a little smaller than the bar) underneath the branch of a tree.

Adam sat down next to a little circle of rocks, filled with grass and twigs. It looked like it'd burn better than Kipo and Wirt's sad little grass fires. But what surprised Kipo the most was when Adam opened a panel in the tree, like a cabinet, and brought out three plates and a pan. Kipo and Wirt did a double take.

"Dishes?" Wirt asked.

"Where'd you get those?" Kipo added. Adam looked over to them.

"I just found them here," he told them. "I was looking around, and I opened this up, and there were dishes here."

Kipo stared at the dishes. "You don't know were they came from?"

"They probably came from the game so it's easy to eat," Adam answered smoothly. "I still have to wash them after I'm done, though."

Kipo hummed as a response. She and Wirt watched as Adam started a fire, using a collection of twigs and kindling he must have previously gathered, and then took a pan, placing the three of the eggs on the pan without breaking them. As soon as they touched the pan, they began to sizzle. Kipo winced. They didn't smell very good.

Thankfully, a distraction from the awful sound come immediately. Kipo's eyes (metaphorically) pricked up.

"Hey... do you two hear that?" she asked. Wirt and Adam's heads immediately snapped up, and all three of them listened closely. It wasn't long before the sound came again, just barely distinguishable from the sizzle of the fire.

Scratch. Scratch. Scraaaatch.

Adam jumped up, though he was still bent down because even he couldn't stand up straight here. Kipo watched as he drew a knife from his satchel. She wondered how it hadn't popped the eggs, also in the satchel, yet.

Kipo gulped, slowly turning back to the where the noises were coming from. She gasped

It wasn't just one thing making those noises. About a million black, skinny legs, scratched at the bark of the tree branch, making a horrible symphony of scratching and scrabbling.