A week later we found our second beast and this time it was a little harder due to the fact that we were entering into a denser forested area. The trees did not allow us to keep as tight a formation as before and in addition the Beast was derived from a snake.
It easily could climb and slid tree to tree and in addition on its tail was a set of porcupine like quills with barbed ends. They not only could slice one open easily but carried a fast acting paralyzing agent sending many out of commission before we could tell where it was attacking from.
It took us two days to figure out its attack routines and patterns, the first attack was a huge failure with close to five hundred members being disabled. From cuts, bruises, broken bones to even sliced off limbs, even worst it took close to 16 hrs to find a way to reverse the paralysis.
Mean while the rest of us had split into three groups which just were keeping it running trying to gain insight while making it lose energy and power. By the time the ones paralysed could return we were at a state of exhaustion and down about another two hundred people.
In the end we boxed it into a small canyon and used fire to burn it out of the tree tops, once on the ground we had a better chance at infecting damage. Quickly we learned to take out its eyes and blast holes into its body so our solders could do real damage. Fire was it true weakness.
Still took over three hours to cause enough damage to take it out, when done it measured close to thirty five feet long and was two feet thick in the middle. It's head was close to being three feet wide with 1 1/2 foot long fangs. In the end it had taken out more then twenty five individuals from our hunting group with its fangs alone.
Once processed which took close to a week and a half it contained over 100 small gems and only one mayor gem was found. We sent about half our party to the Kings wall and dropped off our successful kills and to deliver ones who did not make it. This would be our last contact with them until we returned this way in about nine months.
Our letters would be carried back to the castle to be delivered but nothing would come our way until or if we returned. Eric and Goldy had managed to help the wounded once again so only about thirty died from our second beast attack. Now we had more experience and so did our commander so we would move inward and farther up into the hills to chase the larger ones.
If we could bring in another twenty or more of the young ones or five or so of the adults our trip would have proven very successful. Over all we needed about 1000+small stones and at least 100 medium ones just to replace what was used within the kingdoms since the last hunt.
Of coarse the kingdoms wanted as many as possible to advance our life's and the studies into destroying this threat once in for all. Lately many people just saw them being held in secret without any life improvements and it seemed that no mass attacks to take back our loss of lands were or had occurred for at least a hundred years.
Our Commander's orders were to keep on killing and processing beast for a years time or until their body count was done to about 250 people. If the situation became that bad then he was to retreat with who ever could be evacuated into the storage caves and wait for a escort to come retrieve goods and the remaining survivors.
If we were surrounded and dropped to that low a number his father warned him to leave behind any who could not retreat or their whole party would die. It had happened before once and he did not want it to happen again with his sons hunt party. No one knew of this occurance and so he alone held that fear within.
Over the next three months they continued upwards and through these hills taking down another five young beasts. All of us were very happy to arrive at our third cave encampment, however we had to actually kill a young beast that had moved in to get it back. By now we had less fatalities and were much smoother in our attacks not even waiting for orders because we were getting use to our jobs.
In addition I had made many contacts within the scouts and with the help of the natural wildlife I was able to warn them of hidden beast entrapment areas such as large sand trap spider beast and even quick marsh beast areas. These types were especially dangerous with few ways to successfully kill or even wound them due to tough hides, tenacity and unbelievable quickness.
The animals told me that more and more of the area were no longer safe to travel into and that the larger predators were almost all gone. Some even reported that the largest and oldest beasts were preying on the younger and weaker ones. Some even said some were becoming like giant people and did not know their old ways.
I reported it all to Eric but even talking it through we did not understand it all. Were the beast getting smarter and corrupting further from nature's true course. Who was doing or had done all this? Would anyone believe us if we spoke up? Goldy really wished she could talk to her mother and father about all this.
It was hard too trust the Prince after he had betrayed her what if she went and confided in him and he considered her unstable. Or even worse decided to tell his father lies that lead to her whole families deaths. No Eric and Goldy chose to hold their thought until they could talk to her parents, it was to big for them to decide.