The afternoon sun barely pierced the thin haze hanging low in the sky, casting a dim, dusky yellow over the endless reed beds and murky water.
The temperature had risen slightly since morning, but that only made the smell of decaying plants mixed with mud even stronger.
Fortunately, all they had to endure was the smell. The advantage of having a guide was that they hardly needed to wade through the water at all.
They traveled from one shoal to another in Hom's little boat.
Compared with the frogmen, the poisonous insects lurking in the reeds, the leeches underwater, and the unknown shadows beneath the dark surface were clearly more threatening.
"At this time of day, those lazy bums sleeping in their holes should be coming out to stretch their legs."
Hom used a long pole to push aside a clump of reeds blocking their way and spoke to the people in the boat. "They have to find food while it's still light—fish, water bugs, unlucky waterfowl... anything will do. We're heading for a spot with shallow water and thick reeds. Let's see if we can run into a few groups."
Sure enough, as the little boat ventured deeper into an area where the reeds grew thicker, the distinctive croaking began to ring out one after another.
Unlike the morning, when they had needed to carefully search for cave entrances, the afternoon hunt was much more straightforward.
Hom would use his experience and keen ears to judge where the sounds came from and roughly how far away they were, then signal the squad to approach.
Then He Xi would pick off targets precisely with Magic Missile, or Healy and Greck would move in to finish the fight quickly, while Bruce dealt with any stragglers trying to escape through the reeds.