Briar's absence worries you a bit, since this is easily the longest period of time for which the two of you have been apart since you first met. On the other hand, she's a six hundred year old fairy, she's no longer on the Hellmouth - and perhaps most importantly, she's your friend, someone you trust. Briar can take care of herself; she was doing so long before you were reborn into this world.
Satisfied, you turn your attention to other options. You decide that the handful of hours you have to work with are simply not enough time to locate a worthy offering for a goddess, let alone secure it; likewise, you doubt that you could make much progress in your efforts to learn flight or teleportation in the time alloted, unless you worked at such a pace as to hinder your chances in the imminent tournament. Sleep does not appeal either, and so you finally settle yourself on the floor, assuming a meditative pose as you close your eyes, call upon your magic, and cast forth your senses.
You immediately sense what Briar was talking about earlier. Everything here feels cleaner, softer, and brighter than its respective counterpart in Sunnydale. The faint sense of pervasive, unfocused malice that has hung over you all of your life is simply gone, leaving you feeling... unthreatened. You realize that a tension which has been a part of your life for so long as to become reflex, is slowly fading. You are, for the first time in your life, well and truly starting to relax. It's a startling feeling, alien to your natural state of being, and you take a few minutes - perhaps more than a few - just to relish in it. At length, you recall your purpose, and make ready to cast some spells, to see if the absence of the Hellmouth has any impact on the workings of your magic. You begin with simple Divination, sweeping your surroundings for signs of-
"HELP!"
-your eyes flash open as you immediately sense danger. That way, outside, nature uncertain, target - Briar!
You're out of the suite so fast, it takes you a moment to realize that you jumped off the balcony, using an overpowered hybrid of Augmentation and Elemental magic and a good shot of ki to take off like a rocket, and soar along on the wings of a hastily-cast levitation spell. Extended by the not-quite "lift" of the second spell, the force of your takeoff carries you across the street from your hotel, onto the roof of a car dealership. You cross this at Augmented speed, your socked feet barely registering the rough, gravelly surface of the roof. Then you're leaping again, and then once more running along a rooftop. Your next jump clears a chain-link fence, and you land on grass and dirt, which you cross as swiftly, to enter a cluster of bushes and trees. All traces of human civilization seem to vanish behind you as the leaves whip about in the wind of your passage.
Later - seconds, minutes, hours, who knows? - you find yourself atop a low wall of rock, which slopes down to a narrow beach ringing a small, dark cove perhaps thirty feet across. There are several tiny islets rising from the water, and above one of them - nearest to the center of the cove - you can see Briar's distinctive spherical glow flitting back and forth nervously.
"Briar!" you call out, as you slide down the rocky bank to the sand. "Are you alright?"
Briar stops bobbing back and forth, and instead turns to face you. Strangely, she says nothing, and with the light of the half-full moon blocked by the trees, all you can make out is her arms waving about against the steady light of her aura.
"Briar?" you ask, taking a step towards the water. "What's wrong?"
A small stone, half-buried in the sand, is caught by your foot and kicked into the water with a dull "plop." You stop, surprised at the sound, and watch for a moment as the ripples spread - and then the water begins to ripple the other way, more strongly. Two bright blue lights appear amidst the murk of the cove's water, appearing like eyes that have just opened.
Your instincts scream DANGER, and you leap to one side just in time to avoid a sudden eruption of cold water and crushing tentacles, as something large, rubbery, and quite repulsive bursts from beneath the surface of the water. A sharp beak like that of a carnivorous parrot clicks open to release a wet, warbling cry of challenge, as the creature's huge eyes turn their lambent glare upon you.
MALICIOUS CEPHALOPOD: ARROGANTE
This overgrown squid's body is some ten feet in length, with a cluster of tentacles approaching eight feet each. Its dark body is criss-crossed by faintly luminescent patterns of electric blue, and its large eyes glow the same color. It can maneuver to reach you anywhere you stand on the beach, and the walls of the cove are high enough that you cannot climb or jump back over fast enough to avoid being swatted or grappled, unless you use magic. Arrogante is between you and the islet where Briar is trapped.