"WHAT?!"
Ren's furious scream echoed through the pitch-black canopy of the forest, startling a flock of unseen birds into the night sky.
But apparently, her deafening outburst had also deeply disturbed the local furniture.
The large, flat 'rock' she was sitting on suddenly lurched beneath her.
Ren gasped, her arms flailing wildly as the solid stone suddenly stood up.
A low grunt rumbled from beneath her. It wasn't a rock at all. It was a massive spurred tortoise. Deeply annoyed by the loud female on its shell, the giant reptile shifted its scaly back at a steep angle, tossing Ren straight off.
She landed face-first in the dirt with a pathetic thud.
With deliberate slowness, the giant tortoise turned its wrinkled, judgmental head to give her a scathing side-eye, before slowly and heavily trotting away into the thick fern bushes.
