In the middle of the forest, not too far from the town which she took the job, Vesta was starting to regret accepting it, as she could find no traces of the specified beast. With a sigh, she scanned the surroundings once again for any indication of her target. 

She had been searching fruitlessly for a while now, this forest was commonly used by the villagers for hunting, as it was usually populated by much less dangerous beasts. 

After investigating for what felt like an eternity, Vesta finally managed to find some traces of 'taint' left by the beast, leftover bones of wild animals, picked clean. Judging by the little she could find, the thing seemed to indeed be a canidae variant.

As vesta Followed the faint trail of taint left by the 'wolf', the sound of the passing wind enters her ears, and she quickly gained awareness of how eerily quiet the forest became. 

'Strange, even if a tainted beast were to be roaming around, it wouldn't cause the forest to go quiet like this. Even more so, one that has only recently occupied the place'. The dark haired maiden's rumination was quickly interrupted as the rustling leaves were the only warning she had, barely managing to turn around in time and deflect the attack as sparks flew in the quiet forest.

With the silver sword in hand ready to strike, Vesta's amber eyes quickly darted around in search of the attacker. 'This may take a while' pondered the girl, feeling the tingling in her hand pass as she deflected another strike.

Finally, after focusing on the rustling leaves for a while, Vesta managed to predict where the next attack came from with perfect accuracy, not wanting to loose this opportunity, lest she remains in this forest for who knows how long. Vesta immediately took the initiative, facing the direction of the attack and charging.

As the beast came into view, Vesta was about to preemptively dodge the beast's claws and strike it's legs. But as she was about to put the fight in her favor, Vesta felt a chill running down across her spine, freezing her in place. Panicking for a moment, before noticing she was not the only one in this predicament.

Just a meter ahead of her, stood on it's hind legs, with claws ready to tear her apart, a two and a half meter tall 'wolf', it's anatomy resembling man more than animal. It's dark as night fur standing all over it's trembling body, frozen in place with terror stricken eyes.

Perhaps, despite being tainted, it's beastly instincts were not weakened, but strengthened. Vesta could only imagine what it sensed, as it's eyes remained locked in one direction, almost unaware of her presence. 

Being the first to recover, Vesta quickly rushed at the beast, her silver sword leaving a beautiful arc of amber flames as the wolf's head flew in the air.

For the first time in her life, Vesta was thankful for her terrible sensing abilities as she gazed onto the decapitated head, It's neck seared from the flames, yet the eyes remained frozen in the same terror filled expression.

Vesta sighed as she looked in the direction which the beast was fixated on, considering at least checking it out. After all, whatever caused the abnormal reaction on the wolf, may be the source of the taint. If not dealt with, it could mean that a mere wolf would be the least of the remote village's problems.

After a long tense walk, Vesta finally came to face with a medium sized old temple. It's walls had moss creeping on them, the stairway up to the double doors had multiple cracks with weed and grass growing through.

'Creepy temple in the middle of the forest, of course nothing bad would come out of it, right?' Pondered Vesta as her hopeful thoughts were interrupted by the creaking temple door.

Readying her sword, Vesta immediately vowed to never be a good samaritan ever again. Knowing that even if she ran away now, the thing coming out would most certainly be better than her at sensing things and likely much faster as well.

As the temple doors slowly opened, what could only be described as a 'beauty' silently stood there, gazing at her with an equally surprised expression, with silky verdant hair, cascading down to her waist much like her own and soothing cyan eyes vast as the empyrean sky. 

'Is this it? no great monster, just a beauty?' Vesta was unsure if she should be disappointed or relieved, happy that she wouldn't have to fight for her life, or annoyed at having panicked for nothing.

"Although I'm happy that someone else is here to greet me, it would be appreciated if it was with cookies and coffee, rather than sword and aggression. Mind starting with names?"

For a second, Vesta almost thought she was hearing a foreign language and it would have made sense given the strange clothes worn by the beauty. However, her doubtful thoughts were soon discarded, as a tiny rainbow eyed snake was snugly resting amidst the verdant hair near the woman's neck, curiously staring at her.

'Well, if they meant to harm me, I doubt I would be still standing here.' The dark haired girl considered as she put away her sword before responding, "Vesta."

Her curt response response creating a smile on Celyn's face as he speaks "Hmm, Vesta is it, I like it." His eyes fixated on hers for a moment before continuing, "mine is Celyn" introducing himself as he walked closer.

Now, Vesta was by no means short, however she couldn't help feeling perplexed, as she tilted her head upwards, looking at the green haired beauty a full head taller than her. Admitting internally that Celyn's height perfectly fit her temperament, accentuating her charm.

Though a quick glance at Celyn's chest immediately filled her eyes with pity, 'how unfortunate, being so tall and beautiful, yet lacking so much where it matters.' Fortunately, Vesta's internal conflict was soon interrupted by Celyn's somewhat confused voice.

"Umm, I'm really glad someone showed up, since I was lost in this forest. I was wondering if you don't mind me tagging along for a while." Vesta easily agreed, thinking it was the least she could do, 'does she have ulterior motives or is she truly lost?' ruminated Vesta, her eyes fixated on Celyn's chest.

"All right, there is a village a little further from the forest, just follow me closely." Though the tainted wolf pointed the direction of this temple, Vesta did not consider the verdant haired woman to be the culprit. Reason being, it was a single wolf, although she did not know how it was tainted or where it came from, she was certain it was not from this forest. And regarding whatever cased her and the wolf to freeze in fear, well, she was sure of one thing: she could not beat it, hence it was not her problem.

After the duo, well, trio followed the path where Vesta came from, they soon passed by the wolf's body. "Ooh, that's a pretty big wolf, did you kill it Vesta?" "uhun" Confirmed Vesta with a hum, as she surreptitiously observed Celyn's expression.

Despite the strenuous circumstances in which they met, Vesta was strangely, somewhat enjoying Celyn's silent company as they walked through the now, vividly sonorous forest.