The female in the cloak had a good point. It would be better to travel by water for a bit to throw the demons off their trail. The human man with the injured foot decided to propose traveling upriver, which would be even more difficult.<br/><br/><span style="color: #40FF00">"Are you sure you would have the strength and stamina required for that, human?"</span>the hooded person responded.<br/><br/>That reminded him: this one had a wounded foot. And he was only human. The defect demon analysed the man's frame, now wondering himself if he was able. ... Come to think of it, how many of them were? Garash had strength and stamina aplenty, but this would be his first time taking a stab at this whole "swimming" thing.<br/><br/>Other than him, there was a blue person (who seemed to be water-oriented), a half elf of ice, a whore of fire, an elf of complicated language, a human with an injured foot, and a cloak with a bow.<br/><br/><span style="color: #FF0000"><span style="font-style: italic">Are we screwed?</span></span>Garash wondered. There was all of that and...<br/><br/>"Our destination is the "hollow root." Up or down river doesn't matter for that, right? And we will have to fight again, so wasting stamina is bad."<br/><br/>He bent down and picked up a decent-sized rock. Using his needle-like teeth, he bit his own hand, smearing black blood on the rock, but making sure none of it dropped on the ground. The wound sealed quickly, and he pulled his arm back to hurl the rock upriver. It went quite far, but the scent on it would be strong. They would find it.<br/><br/>"Even when they figure out it is a diversion, they will know our destination. They will wait somewhere ahead to ambush us. Meanwhile, we will have more time to rest. After smelling that, they will not be able to focus on smaller smells." With that, he started wading into the river. "If we just do whatever I would hate, it's fine."