Hiccup accepted the help gladly, though he was a bit embarrassed. He took the torch and held it so the light shone on their attacker, making sure to give it an accusatory glare. "Definitely an eight." Toothless made a noise that sounded kind of like laughter. "Don't even start," he mumbled, and dusted himself off as best as he could.

"That was a nice... clean... decapitation there. He sure is dead two times over. Good job." Astrid was way better at these things than Hiccup could ever hope to be. He was lucky if he could swing an axe on a good day, let alone actually hit anything without falling over first. He felt better having her as his travel buddy.

It wasn't that he didn't like the other teens in the village. It was more like... they weren't terribly dependable. Ever. Astrid was always there, though, and always willing to deal with the others and round them up if something happened to Hiccup. She was also willing to decapitate creepy zombie skeletons, so that was a plus. Oh, and she was really cute.

He finished gathering up the pieces of his dignity and started forward again, this time making sure he had his sword drawn against any other uninvited party-crashers. As they sneaked deeper into the cave, it didn't get any smaller, but it did get shinier. There were small puddles of water on the ground, tiny little bugs that flickered in strange colors. The lit up the cave in pieces, like a fractal. Every stone surface looked to have been carved by some god's hand to a beautiful crystalline surface.

"Wow," he whispered, unable to keep his comments to himself.