The three young students started to wander into the Seiryuu Forest. There were trees high above their heads, just like in the areas around this place, and in the Training Course. At the very least, the type of environment was familiar to them. They made their way forward, seeing a body of water in front of them. As they got there, they realized it was like a small river. The water was much darker a color than the creeks in the Training Course and the edge of the beach. It must have been fairly deep, feeding all of the creatures that lived here.

The path also split here. Taking a look around, they headed down the South branch, to see what they could find. They took their time, slowly walking through this place, remembering what Hiromi had told them. The creatures here were supposed to be quite tough. They only found one turn in this branch, which lead to a dead-end and a large Chest. On their way to the chest, however, the trees rustled and out came three huge monsters. Hovering above them, as if protecting the chest were three monsters that could only be described as some sort of dragon.

As they went into battle, the monsters just hovered in front of them. They looked like they had some form of bipedal, human-like figure, but their heads had scaly, pointed snouts and had bat-like wings along their back. They took their usual strategies and, surprisingly, the first one went down about as quickly as the monsters in the Wilderness they'd traveled through to expand Moriko's Training Course. As soon as the first went down, the other two flew straight, slashing at Hitoshi and Sei. Their armor protected them from the blow, initially, but felt some sort of electric shock running through them. Trying to fight, they moved relatively slugglish as they kept on fighting. Struggling a little, they took a few hits before finally taking the other two down.

After the battle was over, Hitoshi and Sei took off their armor, where they'd gotten hit, and tried to squeeze at it, to get whatever that shock was out of their system. Meanwhile, Tarou walked over to the chest and opened it, finding a vial of Salts, similar to the Smelling Salts they already carried. This, however, was a different variety, with a purplish color. It was called a Turbojolt Salt, and was meant to be an enhanced formula than the normal Smelling Salts. The three took a few minutes, realizing that these monsters were easily doable, but some effects might be slowing them down in this mission.

Figuring that they might as well give it a test-run, they pulled out one bottle of their Charm Cologne and sprayed each other with it. Throwing their armor back on, Hitoshi and Sei rejoined Tarou in the exploration of this forest. They were hoping this 'entity' the miko spoke of wasn't terribly far in. They weren't sure how this Cologne stuff would work, or for how long. They began to walk back towards the original fork, next to the entrance, hoping to run into as few monsters on the way as possible. They saw a surprisingly small amount of monsters on the way there, actually.

As soon as they got back to the fork, they took the North path, finding yet another fork. There was a short North path, leading to a small box. Hitoshi, seeing no harm in running up that path that was, maybe 20 or 30 feet long in it's entirety, ran up and procured a Memory Ticket from the box. On his way back, they learned how the Charm Colognes worked. As soon as he turned around, three of those same Dragon-like monsters jumped out of the trees when they heard the box being opened. Hitoshi started backing away, but one of them blocked his path. The three of them were getting extremely nervous, but they screamed as soon as they came near him to attack him. They slowly backed away and flew back into the trees, as if being repelled by some sort of force. Hitoshi blinked as he saw how quickly they'd run off. “So, that's what it does.”

Rejoining the others, they were all amazed at how the Charm Cologne worked. Had they not been wearing it, Hitoshi may have been in a bit of trouble. Heading to the West, they found yet another branch, a small one like before to the South that had a Chest at the end, and a longer one, heading to the North. Sei headed downward and procured a Quality Potion from the chest. As he came back, they headed up the North path. After heading upward, they began to feel frustration as there was, yet another branch, one fairly lengthy North path and one to the East. They all looked at each other and shook their heads.

They all headed up the North path, thinking it much too long to send one person, in case the Cologne wore off. Going up around a small corner, they found a dead end and a Chest. Upon opening it, they found a pair of thick, leather gloves that Sei fit over his gloves. Clenching his fist tight, the three of them headed back to the main path, hoping there weren't even more branches in the path, but weren't really expecting any less, given how the forest had been welcoming them thus far. The path to the East led to a small stone bridge that was set up across the river they'd seen earlier. They were now heading to another section of the forest, and what was there to greet them? Another Fork in the road!

Hitoshi headed up the short, North path and procured an Onion from a Chest. Quickly rushing back to the others, they headed east, across another bridge and went North-East through a set of zig-zagged trees. As the top of this new path, they realized that their Colognes had finally worn off. Two monsters jumped out in front of them and ran in for an assault. Gripping their weapons, they prepared themselves for the new encounter. These two were also very lizard-like. They had pale-green skin, ran on all fours, and had another pointed snouts. They went into battle, using the same strategies as before. These things went down as quickly as the 'dragons' from before and, thankfully, when one had managed to run itself into Hitoshi, no electrical shock after-effect took place.

They made their way across the top of this part of the forest, running into two more packs of these four-legged lizard enemies, getting worn down quite a bit in the process. As soon as they reached a corner in the path, they found two stone pillars with a rock-like tablet at the front of it. Tarou and Sei each leaned against the pillars, each drinking a Mana Water, and Tarou casting a quick Cure II spell to heal them all up. Hitoshi, however, leaned against the tablet as he drank his. His feet stumbled and he fell, the small Silver Orb he'd obtained during the Backpack Returning from earlier fell out of his pocket. Clenching it, he began to pull himself up. As he came up, he leaned his hand, and the Orb, into the Tablet. Unknowingly, the Orb slipped right into a circular indentation and the tablet shook, quickly moving into the ground. Hitoshi fell again, tumbling into a hidden room.

As Hitoshi picked himself up, again, Sei and Tarou joined him in this new area. The room was void of monsters, housing a small pond in the middle, and also held four large, silver-plated chests around the edges of the trees. The three of them looked around, unsure of what they'd just stumbled upon. They walked up to the chest on the far left, procuring a large sword from it that read “Ogre's Edge” on the handle. Exchanging his sword for it, he swung it through the air, swiftly, smiling that he'd found something new to use. In the next chest was a long, silverish Staff with a pointed, circular formation at the top, which replaced Tarou's Brass Staff.

They then moved onto the other two chests. In the first was a Quality Potion, which Hitoshi added to their inventory, and in the other was a Swallow Sword, which was two large knives pointing in opposite directions, a hand combining them. Sei grabbed onto it and let it replace his Main Gauche. Once they'd gotten their new equipment, they headed back into the main area of the forest, aiming to go onward. Realizing that the battles were weighing on them, they decided to play it safe and use another Charm Cologne. They didn't know how much further this forest went, so the less beatings they took, the better.

After running south for a few moments, the path turned to the West when the path met the river. Across the river, they saw another path, which had their friendly, neighborhood Crystal hovering around it. They all grinned, realizing that they'd be able to heal up with that soon enough. Continuing left, they found another small North path. With the Cologne still in effect, Hitoshi ran up this path, procured a Quality Potion from a chest, and then returned. They could understand why the shop never had these Colognes in stock. They worked wonders for exploring areas and doing as little fighting as possible. They continued down the West path, only to find another fork.

There were two paths, one to the East, which looked like a main path, and one to the West, which headed North to a box, and South a little ways. Together, they went through the West path, quickly picking up a Memory Ticket from the box and headed downwards to find two Chests. Splitting up, they procured two new pieces of equipment from the Chests. One was a pointed, green hat, which Tarou slipped on his head and the other was a Mythril-plated Shield, which Hitoshi took and carried with him. They returned to the main path and continued onward.

Er a few twists and turns, and a few battls with more of the four-legged lizard enemies, they came to another stone bridge with a chest on one side and the Crystal from earlier on the other. They procured a Mana Water from the chest and then stopped at the Crystal, to think about what they'd been doing thus far in this place. As it's light rained down on them, taking away all of their bruises and aches, they realized that this place was already digging into their supplies. Had they not been using those two Charm Colognes, they might have been in a bit of trouble. Looking at one another, they decided to use this Crystal to their advantage. Heading around the bridge, they weilded their weapons and spent about an hour, fighting off monsters.