Long Distance Charges!?

1st September, Weather: Fine

Today's Companions Jetsam (Hume Thief) AKA Jet Today's Lunch Rolanberry Pie

With barely a moment to recover from the Sunbreeze Festival, the M.H.M.U. had announced a new special event! This event was called "Blitz Buffalo," and reportedly involved the teleportation of buffalo to the areas adjacent to each city. The animals being transported were massive wild cows that made their home in the Uleguerand Range. I had never seen one of the beasts, but they were said to be notoriously vicious and bad-tempered. If the purpose of the event was merely to dispatch the unruly creatures, then I'm sure I would have been up to the task. Festivals sponsored by the M.H.M.U. were never that straightforward, however…

I decided to invite Jet along with me today to take advantage of his miraculous information-gathering skills. The location: Batallia Downs. According to my roguish companion, the buffalo could be found near any of the major cities. Jet came prepared with ranger as his support job and within ten minutes he had one of the beasts on Wide Scan.

"I've got a 'Toro' in range… This must be it."

We tracked the creature on our chocobos and soon had the buffalo in sight… From a distance it appeared as nothing more than a great mass of black, but as we moved closer we were able to make out the menacing horns and ominous, bloodshot eyes.

"Whoa…I bet that thing would drop a ton of meat and skins!"

Jet had fought the beasts in their native Uleguerand Range, and assured me that buffalo steaks were well worth the effort of taking the enormous creatures down. The thought of a delicious barbecue dinner banished any fear I might have had in challenging the intimidating creature.

Hardening my resolve, I dismounted my chocobo, fully expecting the buffalo to charge. It completely ignored me. Taken somewhat aback, I nevertheless pulled my weapon and struck a mighty blow. I was immediately answered with a deafening roar and the sight of several tons of angry buffalo bearing down upon me. I was knocked backwards with terrific force, and when my head stopped spinning I found myself in…Windurst?

"What just happened!?" "What in the world!?"

Jet had been flung all the way to San d'Oria, he said. We acted just as any seasoned adventurers would. We panicked. Had these buffalo somehow been endowed with teleportation magic when the moogles transported them here?

"This certainly puts a twist in the day's event," I murmured.

After a brief rethinking of our strategies, we decided to take the airship back to Jeuno and relocate our home points to Upper Jeuno for easy access to Batallia Downs. We also changed our support jobs to black mage so we could quickly warp back to Jeuno should we be teleported to the other side of Vana'diel by the horns of that beast!

After returning to Batallia Downs, we discovered that the buffalo had not wandered far from where we first encountered it. The damage I had inflicted was still visible. It seemed that if we were prepared for sudden trips to all corners of the world, we might stand a chance of defeating the buffalo.

"Right, let's drag this overgrown cow nearer to Jeuno so we don't have as far to go when we get teleported. I'll lead it on with Flee, and you take over if I get warped to Castle Zvahl or someplace," Jet said, only half joking.

We somehow managed to entice the buffalo to the gates of the city, but once again became victims to those reality-defying horns. This time I ended up in Bastok, while Jet only went as far as Upper Jeuno. It seemed the destinations were limited to your home point, or one of the three major nations.

After I used Warp for a swift return, we found that the buffalo had begun to wander back to its original spot. We repeated the process of pulling the beast back to the gates and then being flung to the far reaches of the land, and by doing this several times we eventually reduced a fair amount of its stamina.

As we continued to battle the behemoth, a summoner joined us in our efforts. We discovered to our joy that avatars were immune to the buffalo's teleporting effect! Now that we had Carbuncle to pin the beast in one place, returning to the battle took no time at all. Before we knew it, our little buffalo-blitzing party had swelled to ten members. With renewed enthusiasm, we slowly chipped away at the leviathan's strength, until finally it crashed to the ground, defeated.

"Hey, I found a '???' mark!" "Smells like treasure to me!"

Something lay under the bested buffalo's body. It was a bright red sash that you could wear around your waist. Apparently this piece of equipment increased enmity for the wearer. Jet gleefully wrapped the sash around his body and quipped, "This color suits me. I bet you would have preferred a big slab of buffalo meat though, hey Aly?"

He read my mind! I really wanted to try one of those buffalo steaks…

"Well, we can always go find more of them up north!"

I think my next adventure will take me to the Uleguerand Range…