Chapter 19: When in doubt, sucker punch (Patreon)

Tom, Dick and Harry sat around their meager campfire staring at the flames.

“I would give my left nut for a big mac right now,” Harry said.

“I would give your left nut too.” Dick said, nodding before Harry punched him in the shoulder.

“We need to ask them if we can join,” Tom said, staring into the fire.

“What? Team up with those assholes? You want a maid outfit so you can take care of the baby while the rest of them go get more levels?” Dick said, scoffing at him. “All we have to do is get more levels, get stronger than them, and take what we want. That Casey chick’s pretty hot without the baby bump. I could get some milk straight from the tap, if you know what I mean.”

Harry chuckled appreciatively and Tom once again considered abandoning the two and heading out on his own.

‘Getting stronger’ was definitely possible. Killing creatures led to levels, which led to more power. But even with that in mind, those people were surely doing the same thing, and there were obviously more of them. Tom had made out five places to sit around the campfire.

If even the teen girl could send them packing, what hope did they have against all of them? And what if they had the person who killed Eddie? Eddie had been practically fucking untouchable. Why on earth did these idiots think the chances of that guy still being alive were negligible?

He hadn’t seen Jessica’s corpse at the old safe-zone, either. She must’ve gotten away, and she’d killed four of them, severely wounded and weaponless.

Tom had no idea where they were getting this confidence from.

Idiot confidence, perhaps.

Fuck, I never should’ve joined Eddie’s crew. As far as Tom could tell, if he wanted to survive, now was the time to swallow his pride and start kissing feet and keep kissing them until they shined.

Yeah. That’s what I’ll do. Tomorrow, I’ll ditch these guys, toss my weapons aside and go over to their camp with my hands up. Throw myself on their mercy.

Crunch!

Crunch?

There was a tickle in Tom’s throat, and he coughed a bit, a chunk of something working its way up his trachea.

I smell blood. That’s weird.

He felt a rapidly growing itch in his solar plexus, and glanced down to see a bronze spear jutting out of his chest, buried partway into the ground in front of him.

Bronze? Like that Troy movie? Tom thought, confused as his muscles grew weak, slumping him over on his side. He felt something filling his throat and he tried to cough again, sending a spray of blood out of his mouth into the dust in front of him.

He could hear noises, and shouting, but he couldn’t make out the words.

Tom’s brain experienced a sudden, horrifying realization as the world around him began to dim.

Oh god, I think I’m….

***The Mannequin***

The mannequin didn’t have a name, but that was fine. He didn’t particularly want or need one. He’d been custom built and awakened for one singular task. That was to keep Casey and by extension her daughter, as safe as possible.

Names didn’t particularly help with that goal. Everything he did was viewed through the lens of ‘how beneficial is this to Casey’s survival?’.

He didn’t need to eat or sleep. He saw just fine somehow, despite not having eyes like the humans. He’d never really stopped to consider how he knew what all these things were, or what they meant. He just knew them.

An adult level intellect and memories, imprinted wholesale on a block of wood. The How didn’t really matter, and the Why was already baked in. The mannequin was too busy to suffer from existential crises. It had Ikigai. Fucktons of Ikigai.

Right now, that meant creeping around the perimeter with his brother…or sister? Didn’t matter. They were maintaining low profiles on opposite sides of the camp, moving slug-slow, keeping watch on the darkness for anything out of the ordinary.

He would have made a ghillie suit if there had been any shrubs, but the bare mountain left them completely exposed, so unfortunately whatever they saw would see them back. Their best camouflage was to act like lifeless pieces of wood.

It worked with the three stooges.

Without warning, a bronze spear fell out of the sky and drove itself through his chest, aided by an Ability of some kind, no doubt.

The mannequin’s thoughts grew fuzzy. It was hard to think with a spear through his core. Still, even with this confusion going on, one question was raised above all others.

How can I benefit Casey’s survival?

Make noise. Waken other defenders.

The Mannequin lurched to its feet, slamming its blade against its own wooden forearm.

Clang! Clang! Clang!

Another spear buried itself in the mannequin's chest, tearing him in half.

“Everybody Up! Who’s in the cave? sound off!” The mannequin was pleased to hear the other humans awaken before its consciousness ceased existing.

***Jebediah Trapper***

Jeb’s chest was being crushed by a thick metal beam, pressing him painfully into his hard G.I. mattress. He glanced to his side and saw Tyler’s feet behind all that collapsed debris, out in the hallway, where he’d been coming back from the head.

At least he didn’t get hurt, Jeb thought, his vision darkening as the metal beam collapsed his heart and lungs.

“FFUCK!” Tyler shouted, his left hand bleeding as he picked up a piece of jagged metal and heaved it aside.

“Hold on, man, I’m getting you out of there,” Tyler shouted, and Jeb could see the man’s hand reach down and grab the beam on his chest. The blood from Tyler’s hand dripped onto the wound, and Jeb felt…something open inside him.

No scion of mine is going to accept what something as petty as fate has decided for them. Use him.

No. No, this didn’t happen. I survived. Tyler was in the room! I SURVIVED.

Jeb tried to trace the scar on his palm, but his thumb failed to find the reassuring proof of his attempts to save Tyler.

Use his LIFE.

NO!

CLANG! CLANG! CLANG! Tyler began slamming against the beam, moving it ever so slightly off Jeb’s chest, but the damage was done. He was going to die.

No, this is wrong! This isn’t what happened!

Take everything!

Jeb lunged up, his eyes wide open, but seeing nothing. He could feel the sweat rolling down his body as he gasped in a desperate lungful of air.

Right, we’re in the cave.

When his vision adapted, he could see Casey’s elbow was digging into his chest. Probably what had started the dream. He could feel Smartass sleeping on his hair. It was starting to get unkempt from lack of scissors.

Clang! Clang! Clang!

Jeb turned cold. Am I still dreaming? He fingered the scar, finding the reassuring lump on his palm.

No! Real noise! Real noise bad!

Jeb instantly leapt up from his cubby in the corner of the hollowed out cave, startling Casey awake.

“Everybody up! Who’s in the cave? sound off!”

“Amanda.”

“Brett.”

“Casey.”

…

“Ron here,” Ron said when Jessica failed to speak.

“Where’s Jessica?”

“She was still out when I went to bed,” Ron said, yawning.

“Shit,” Jeb drew Myst out of his Core and wrapped himself in a bubble before ducking his head outside.

“She’s probably just banging on some armor out there or something,” Ron said, rubbing his eyes.

Jeb spotted the two mannequins, perforated by bronze spears and completely immobile.

Nope. Definitely not Jessica.

Jeb jerked his head back just in time for a bronze spear to break through the bubble and sink through a foot of solid stone beside him.

Okay, no way in hell bronze can do that.

If we step outside, we get perforated. If we let them approach from downslope, they’ll be able to throw straight into the cave, and our shield isn’t gonna stop throws that strong.

I might be able to fly out fast enough to avoid getting hit, but I’d be a sitting duck after that.

What we need are some disposable mooks.

Jeb glanced over at Casey, a downright vicious idea bubbling to the surface.

***Ch’goth, Master of the Hunt, level 32***

The huntmaster crept closer to the cave entrance, where the evidence of the fleshy creatures was strewn about the ground.

Their nonliving sentinels had been no challenge at all, but the creatures had already demonstrated that they were cunning and resilient, so he was not taking any chances. They were slowly advancing on the sides of the cave, spears at the ready.

The huntmaster had considered going downslope to throw directly into the cave, but he preferred to keep the high ground and slowly strangle off their ability to escape, rather than pursue that limited advantage.

No, they would throw a javelin every time one of the creatures ducked a head out, until they were mere feet away from the entrance, then they would toss in a choke-smoke bag to take the fight out of them before finishing the hunt.

Hunting was never a glorious competition between equal parties. It was brutal and unfair. And that was just the way Ch’goth preferred it.

He felt a pulse of Myst from something beside his foot, and time slowed down.

SHHHH!

Blades of Myst manifested all around him, whipping toward him from both directions at an obscene speed.

In that fraction of a second, Ch’goth’s mind was able to map the trajectory of all of the blades. Using his spear as leverage, Ch’goth jumped, tucking his arms and legs into the tiny pocket of safety as best he could.

The sound of tearing flesh filled Ch’goth’s ears as those around him too slow to react were torn into large chunks of quivering flesh, their natural armor shredded.

He fell to the ground, burning pain spreading from his right foot. His prized spear toppled to the ground beside him in pieces.

Ch’goth gave a trumpet of pain as he realized he hadn’t been able to tuck all of his foot inside the pocket of safety.

He pushed himself up and glanced backwards. No less than thirty warriors had been lost to the vicious trap.

“Run, NOW!” Ch’goth shouted through the pain. His warriors nodded and began running without hesitation. He was proud of their training.

A thought occurred to Ch’goth, and he looked at where he had felt the pulse of Myst. There was an unnaturally round glass marble made of crude opaque glass.

“Beware!” Ch’goth shouted, picking up the marble and tossing it to his warriors. The rearmost S’ketchan turned back and snatched the marble out of the air with a nod before rejoining the pack, leaving Ch’goth alone with the corpses of his hunters.

He turned back to the cave and spotted a brilliant light emerge from the front, rising into the air in a spectacular display.

“Haha! Look at my Glory and despair, heathens!”

S’ketchan couldn’t understand what the creature was saying. It was a garbled mess of guttural noises.

It looked vaguely S’ketchan, with two arms and two legs, but it lacked the smooth, attractive natural copper armor. Its muscles were clearly on display, reminding him of some kind of skinned corpse that moved.

It also had some kind of strange wings on its back, and a fiery length of burning metal in its hand.

It was so bright and attention-grabbing, that Ch’goth didn’t notice the dark little marbles streaming out of the cave, moving under their own power.

****Jeb****

Jeb took a chance and ducked his head out while Mike acted as a flare.

The creatures were….retreating. There was a semicircular swath of chunked corpses near the edge of the camp, where he’d tossed the betties the night before.

Huh. I guess my evil plan wasn’t necessary.

Still gonna do it, though.

“They’re running away!” Amanda said, poking her head out from behind Jeb. “One of them’s hurt!”

“Amanda, what the hell are you –“Jeb tried to put a hand in front of her to keep her inside the safety of the cave, but she was a lot stronger than him.

The healer broke out into the open and Jeb began spinning up the old Myst engine. He needed to be able to ward off a spear and pull her out of the way if necessary.

“Brett!?” Jeb demanded as the soldier sprinted past him, carrying the heavy shield they kept to seal the cave entrance.

“I know!” Brett shouted with a grin. “Why do you think I married her?”

Damnit, Jeb thought, running out after them, slowed by his pegleg

He ran out into the field through the jagged rocky terrain wearing nothing but his briefs. Brett ran up to where Amanda was approaching the wounded copper-skinned insect creature and interposed himself and the heavy shield between her and the retreating creatures

The coppery monster hissed and spit at her, trying to hop up to one foot and take a swipe when she got close.

Amanda rushed forward and physically overpowered the creature, pressing it to the ground as a spark of white Myst leapt between them.

The creature’s wound immediately sealed itself off, and its struggle intensified, biting Amanda in the process.

The healer pushed herself away from the monster, running a hand over the bite mark, the wound disappearing as she did.

The creature hopped away from her, before it’s head cocked in obvious confusion. It glanced down at its leg, then over to Amanda.

Amanda held her hands up in a placating gesture, slowly backing away from it.

“It’s okay,” She said. “I don’t want to hurt you. We don’t have to fight.”

It studied her for a moment, before glancing around, noticing Jeb and Brett facing it.

It gave a soft hiss, and slowly bent down to pick up a nearby spear that hadn’t been shredded.

Jeb tensed, prepared to turn the creature into swiss cheese, but it simply rested its weight on the shaft of the spear, studying them.

Slowly, the creature reached into the pouch on its waist and retrieved something small and shiny.

It was a strange-looking tool, composed of a bronze handle that widened out to a wide, flat knob at the base, that narrowed down to where a crimson red gemstone was set at the tip.

It looked like a chisel with a ruby set at the tip.

Actually, I think that might be exactly what it is.

The creature tossed the strange tool to Amanda before turning away, using his spear as a crutch.

“Did you just Ghibli-Princess a monster?” Ron asked from the entrance of the cave.

“See?” Amanda said, turning to Jeb, the ruby-studded needle in her hand. “They can be reasoned with. If we can start up some kind of dialogue, we shouldn’t have to kill them.”

“Huh…” Jeb said, crossing his arms. “I probably shouldn’t have made all those killbots, then.”

“You did what now?”

***

***

This is bop betty leader to bop betty squadron, I have a visual.

The thumb-sized marble wiggled its air bubble at the others, the only way of communicating that they had. They’d figured out a language fast enough, though.

Their line of sight was typically awful, being as low to the ground as they were, it was rare that they were able to make visual contact with their prey. In this case though, Bop Betty leader was on top of a small swell of ston, no bigger than a man’s foot. it afforded him a better view of the surroundings than the fifty-four marbles rolling around him.

The enormous entrance to the cavern was looming in front of the bop-betty, approximately fifty feet away. Standing guard at the entrance were two creatures that had tried a night raid on Casey.

That was unacceptable.

Bop Betty leader, confirm visual. Sending in Bop Betty five four.

This is Bop Betty fifty-four, starting my approach.

The glassy marble began rolling forward, nearly undetectable in the dim light. Their stealth mission was guaranteed to succeed due to their small size and the poor ambient light.

Or so they thought.

Once Bop Betty fifty four was within fifteen feet of the creatures, they noticed, reacting violently, throwing spears at fifty-four.

I’m getting a lot of enemy fire here! Fifty-four signed as he hopped from side to side, sprays of stone shrapnel peppering his sides as spears missed him by inches.

Bop Betty leader watched the marble put himself into high gear now that the stealth aspect was blown. They couldn’t afford to let these creatures report to the rest of their ilk.

Fifty-four spun rapidly and blasted forward, popped up into the air at the two and a half foot mark, bubble pointing straight up as he sailed through the air.

FOR CASEY!!!

A fraction of a second later, the delicate spellwork inside the marble keeping fifty-four alive fizzled out as the powerful Mystic trigger erupted out of him.

Massive telekinetic blades manifested above him and turned the two enemy guards to quivering chunks. Large gouges were dug out of the wall where the blades impacted the stone face of the mountain.

The marble clinked to the ground, lifeless. There simply hadn’t been enough time and body mass in the marbles to imbue them with resilient life like the golem guards, and as a result, the enchantment keeping each of them alive and moving was whisper-thin.

None of them railed against the cruel fate of such a limited existence, though. They were proud to be doing what had to be done to keep Casey safe: striking back before the enemy organized a defense.

A brave man. A moment of silence for twenty-four. Salute!

The bop bettys turned their bubbles toward the motionless marble in the midst of the carnage. They held this pose for a solid five seconds.

All right, you marbles, we know this is a one way trip now! Sear every moment into your SOUL and take as many of these bastards to hell with you as you can! They tried to hunt our mother!

The Betties cheered and streamed forward into the enormous entrance, ignoring the sweltering heat of the dungeon as they tracked the strange copper creatures back to their source.

***

“This is horrible…”  Amanda gasped, scanning the scene of the slaughter. Shelters made of carefully melted together stone dotted the new cavern, creating a circle of stone igloos, at least a hundred.

The stone huts were torn to shreds, toppled to the ground without exception, huge gouges taken out of their sides.

The ground was covered in the bodies of copper-skinned creatures in various states of dismemberment. Some of the luckier ones only seemed to be missing an arm or a leg, while others were horrifically carved into chunks.

In the center of most of these piles of dead bodies was a single black marble with a bubble facing up.

“Is this what you meant!?” Amanda demanded, rounding on Jeb. She pointed at an obvious child, its body was over a foot shorter than the other bipedal creatures, its form split in two. “They’re people!”

“They tried to kill us. Twice.” Jessica retorted. “Now they’re not.”

Ron and Brett looked uncomfortable.

“The decision was made in a cave under threat of death,” Jeb said, stepping between the two of them, facing Amanda. “I didn’t know it would be this effective, and I’d do it differently if I could, but we can’t undo this.” he motioned to the carnage.

Jess snorted behind him.

Amanda glared at him, her eyes burning behind her visor.

“You created autonomous drones capable of finding and killing people with no human involvement. You can’t tell me you didn’t know that was a war crime.”

“It wasn’t war,” Jeb muttered, scanning the desolate village. “It was hunting.” He glanced back up to Amanda. “They weren’t trying to capture us, interrogate us or anything of that nature. They were hunting us. Plain and simple.”

Jeb pointed to a corner of the village, where one of Eddie’s men sat, half-butchered.

Amanda stared at the corpse, jaw hanging open.

“It’s never gonna be easy,” Brett said, gently pulling his wife closer before her back started shaking.

Jeb heard a quiet groan behind him and spotted Jess rolling her eyes,

Damnit, this group is hanging on by a thread. I need to defuse the situation and separate Amanda from the glaring reality, give her some time to cool down. I should talk to Jess about not antagonizing the healer, too.

“Let’s push on,” Jeb said. “Hanging out here isn’t doing anyone any good.”

Beyond the ruined village was a tunnel winding down deeper into the mountain. They were experts at bypassing the murderholes by now, and Jeb had enough trapped rocks to keep the lava squids at bay.

With Ron’s zombies made from native ingredients, they were able to withstand the heat and act as a buffer between the worst the dungeon had to offer and themselves.

Ron’s Mystic Taxidermist Class was a C rank class that he chose because it gave him the ability to repair and redesign corpses at will, in exchange for Myst. In short, the synergy with his Core was well worth taking the lower Rank class.

He’d floated the idea of stitching the useful parts of the copper-skinned villagers to his giant caterpillar zombies, but Jeb had quietly taken him aside and explained the need to avoid Amanda losing her shit and abandoning them.

If Amanda left, Brett would obviously go too, then they would be down a frontliner and a healer.

Jeb also found time while Brett and Amanda were holding against a line of slow golems up front to single Jess out for a little talk. The Assassin was standoffish, but Jeb pointed out that if she was cold enough to kill people without remorse, she should at least be cold enough to pretend she wasn’t into it, if it gave her an advantage.

In this case, less friction with the group and access to life-saving treatment.

She seemed to be considering it before Jeb ducked back to the others.

They dispatched the fire golems and worked their way down to the bottom of the dungeon, where the boss was waiting for them.

They stepped into a large cavern, not quite as big as the first one in the entrance, but big enough to hold a prom in.

The chamber was round, with flat tiled stones with jagged edges composing the floor, lines of bright red showed at seams where hot magma peered through.

In the center of the chamber was a crystalline heart, with black stone underneath the semi-transparent quartz. Massive crystal tubes rose up into the ceiling and floor.

Wrapped around the heart was…something that didn’t belong.

It looked like one of the lamprey-dragons that came out of the World tortoise by the thousands, except much, much, bigger and scalier looking, as though they were looking at an adult, and the others were babies.

Its jaws were clamped around the base of one of the oversized veins, seemingly content to greedily suck on the quartz. As they approached, a single orange eye as big as a melon slid open, peering at them from twenty feet above.

It watched them stop in place, but didn’t move.

“The fuck is that?” Ron muttered.

“Before we get started…Anybody wanna try to solo that thing for the Accolade?” Jeb asked out of politeness.

Nobody stepped up. Jess looked tempted, but she seemingly measured the length of her sword against the depth of the creature’s scales and thought better of it.

“Normally I’m a thrill seeker,” Bret said, waving a hand. “But that thing could use me to pick its teeth. It’s all yours.”

“Alright,” Jeb said, rolling up his sleeves. “Time to kick this thing’s ass…in a half hour or so.”

Jeb sat down cross-legged on the stone floor and opened his bag of untrapped marbles and started prepping for the fight.

It’s not a ‘fight’, it’s hunting. If the creature didn’t wanna leave its perch and come to them immediately, it only had itself to blame when Jeb used his big monkey brain to tip the odds in his favor.

He took the marbles and gave them packets of telekinetic force that would spear upward if the monster were directly above them –and Jeb wasn’t –, then a moment later, tug it back down and hold it to the ground as tightly as possible.

He mixed them up, making some into grabbers, some into blades, and other into spears. He had no idea which ones would work, if any of them. That creature’s scales looked tough.

In addition to the traps on the marbles, he put extra triggers on his own body:

1.       If he was over 50% surrounded by mouth, then he would explode while forming a protective bubble.

2.       If he was in a stomach of any kind, he would explode.

3.       If he lost consciousness, a bail-out would occur that flung him in the general direction of the entrance.

4.       With the creature’s hard scales in mind, Jeb created and bound several ‘penetrator’ fingergun shots to both index fingers. It worked by battering several dozen shots in the same spot within milliseconds of each other. Simple. They were labeled ‘Pen 1’ through ‘Pen 10’. Sadly no Pen15.

5.       Jeb re-upped all of his previous triggers. His Core had grown since the first list of triggers, and they were nowhere near what he could do now.

Very carefully, Jeb pried his second cleaning wand apart and removed the Annihilation Lens, pocketing the filter.

There’s gotta be a better way of using this than just blowing it up.

The lens was tiny, and only capable of using the smallest amount of Myst before it was overloaded.

In addition, the shape of the lens was heavily concave, scattering all the Myst that came through to the four winds. It made it really hard to use it as a weapon.

Which is the point, I suppose. Wait a minute.

Jeb opened the lid on his fire-fly lantern and inspected the grain-sized three-layer lens sandwiches and compared them to the annihilation lens about as big as the tip of his pinky.

Muahahahahahah! Jeb swallowed the maniacal laughter as another genocidal idea bubbled to the surface.

“I’ve got an idea.” Jeb said, musing. “Can we sit down in the tunnel for an hour or so? We might not even need to fight this thing.”

Over the course of half an hour, Jeb performed surgery on the lantern and annihilation lens, being very careful not to get any Myst near it while he was working on it. He swapped out the Fire lens in the Fire/Fly/Control sandwich for a tiny, grain sized slice of annihilation lens carved off of the pinky-tip chunk.

It was delicate, cramp-inducing work, and the heat of the cave system made his ass swampy as all hell, but Jeb was confident it would be worth it in the end.

Jeb delicately lowered the myst lens sandwiches back into their slots and carefully closed the casing overtop them, making damn sure the tiny Myst capacitor was in exactly the right spot and nothing was out of place as he did so. If this thing blew up, he’d lose a hand…if he was lucky.

The brass lid of the lantern squeaked into place, and everything looked like it was back to normal.

“Stand back a minute,” Jeb said, reaching out and touching the handle with his least-favorite hand.

Nothing happened.

A moment later, the capacitor clicked and three beautiful black butterflies with fluorescent blue in their wings manifested inside the lantern.

Jeb carefully opened the door of the lantern and directed the butterflies out.

Responding to his desires, the beautiful creatures fluttered out into the air and hovered far away, near the ceiling.

“Public safety announcement,” Jeb said, staring at the three fluttering creatures. “Do not touch the butterflies.”

“What are they supposed to do?” Jess asked, a brow raised.

“Well, the previous ones blew themselves up and lit stuff on fire…so I assume these will…make things not exist anymore? Let’s test it.”

Jeb sent the now-six butterflies to the opposite end of the hall, instructing them to do their thing on the wall.

The creatures landed deceptively gently against the surface of the wall, then the light around them warped for a fraction of a second before they vanished, leaving a divot about the size of a golf ball in the wall.

Six golf-ball sized holes in solid stone. No muss, no fuss.

Very interesting.

“That’s it?” Ron asked, seemingly a little disappointed.

“This thing can make thousands of them,” Jeb said, holding up the lantern to show Ron the next batch had already spawned, gently fluttering their wings inside the lantern.

“Oh, shit.” Ron said, eyes widening.

Jeb tried to read the description on the lantern, but he got nothing. Maybe it hasn’t been named yet.

“Anybody wanna do the honors and name this thing?” Jeb asked. “I’m terrible with names. I keep thinking ‘death butterfly’ but it sounds like a women’s metal band.”

“Beautiful Revenge.” Jess said with a smile.

“Oh come on, that seems like it would be on the cover of a-“

Name accepted.

Beautiful Revenge (Rare)

The second original by the Human Mystic Trapsmith, Jebediah

Trapper, this adaptation of a quaint Krokker design is a testament to the malicious ingenuity of Humans, converting household objects into weapons.

The Beautiful Revenge drains 5 Nitsu of Myst every four seconds, creating three Void Butterflies under control of the user. The lantern can hold fifteen of these creatures before it stops drawing Myst.

The strength of this design is the rock-bottom Myst requirement, as well as the damage that bypasses Body and resistances. The weakness is that butterflies aren’t particularly fast, so it will struggle against speedier enemies.

“You know how you can make an I.E.D. out of fertilizer? The same concept applies.” –Jebediah Trapper

This is perfect.

“Let’s hunt.” Jeb said, directing the six butterflies up into the air.

“Alright,” Jess said, rolling up her sleeves.

“Oh, no, not right now,” Jeb said, directing the next three to join the growing swarm. “We need some time to make an entrance.”

***Lagross, the Suppressor***

The tiny creatures ducked their heads in and gazed in awe upon Lagross. They must have decided to keep their pitiful lives, because less than a minute later they scurried away.

They were of no concern to Lagross. Only feeding mattered. It still remembered that distant time long ago, when its brethren charged through titan’s halls, dying in droves.

Lagross had been slippery, and clever, flying above the battle, slipping through cracks in the rock until it finally came upon the heart. After that, Lagross did what came naturally: He feasted.

That was…So many years ago. Lagross hadn’t even been particularly conscious back then. Even now, he was dominated by his base instincts: Feed, and Protect. Despite having grown in intelligence, he didn’t feel unsatisfied with his simple task.

He was doing as he was meant to do.

He would drain the Titan, keep it asleep, and he would not allow any of the fiery ones to approach his feeding spot. They had long since stopped trying.

Lagross closed his colossal eye, going back to sleep as he nursed upon the titan’s nourishing lifeblood. It’s sense of time began to stretch into a sleep-state, spinning faster and faster as his consciousness waned.

Ow.

Ow.

OW!?

Lagross opened his eye and spotted a fluttering black…something, an instant before a chunk was hollowed out of his pupil.

PAIN!

***Jeb***

The void butterflies were silent and nearly weightless, able to crowd around the monstrous creature and stand upon its thick scales without waking it.

Thousands upon thousands of butterflies swarmed around the creature, looking for a place to land and deliver their payload of annihilation Myst. At first, the creature didn’t even wake up, unable to feel the holes cut out of its thick scales.

Eventually that changed when they began carving away flesh.

The creature’s eyes snapped open, only to be blinded by the butterflies crowding its face.

It gave a honk like a fifty-ton goose and unwrapped itself from the heart, thrashing around violently, gnashing its bleeding gums at the enemy attacking it from every direction.

“Heyo!” Jeb shouted, flinging his bag of trapped marbles out into the room, scattering them all across the open area.

The weakened, pitted armor of the titanic lamprey was unable to stop the spears of telekinetic force as they slammed into the creature, then pulled it down to the ground, cinching it in place. Every time it moved, it triggered more of the traps, until the entire creature was held to the ground by a hundred barbed spears.

It was locked down in a vision of contorted agony, breathing heavily and bleeding from hundreds of tiny wounds where the butterflies had chewed through its armor.

The butterflies had blown their wad and disappeared. Now it was time for Jeb to do the dirty work himself.

He siphoned out Myst and picked himself up, rushing over to the creature faster than he ever could have run by himself.

Its head reminded him of a blue whale skull he’d seen one time in a museum. Absolutely enormous.

“Apologies,” Jeb said, holding out his palm to face the creature’s wounded eye. “Alpha strike.”

Hundreds of barbed Lances of telekinetic force shot outward all at once, grinding past each other with the intention of creating as much damage to a living organism as possible.

Dozens were stopped by the thing’s tough armor and bone, but even more made it through the eye socket and began bouncing around the creature’s brain.

The giant gave a pitiful shudder as it died, and Jeb drew himself backwards, not interested in getting squished by its death-throes.

Congratulations! You have Beaten Lagross the Suppressor in a one-on-one duel. Your Power is beyond reproach!

Lagross’s Power Accolade Granted!

+5 Body +5 Myst +5 Nerve

That’s a lot.

“Holy shit, dude.” Ron said as Jeb landed next to them. “You sucker-punched the shit out of it.”

“What was I supposed to do?” Jeb glanced at him curiously. “Take it out to dinner first?”

“You get an accolade?” Jess asked.

“Yeah, five Body,” Jeb gave her a half-truth, trying to ease the persistent cramps out of his muscles. For the Nerve sickness, he simply avoided looking at anyone pretty and focused on the pain.

The headache from his Myst sickness was negligible.

Jeb was stretching his cramping jaw and shoulders when he heard the sound.

Ding!

Your party has cleared the Grave of the Titan! Please take your

rewards.

Ron and Jeb grimaced as five identical sphincters appeared in the sky and shat out their prizes.

“Get ba-“ For an instant, Jeb thought he could hear someone’s voice coming from one of the sphincters.

One of the chests clattered to the ground awkwardly. The wood sported a jagged cut along the side and a spatter of blood on it.

What the hell?

Ron and Jeb studied the spot where the unusual magic sphincter faded into nothing, frowning. The others weren’t quite high enough on their Myst to see the damn thing except Amanda, and she was more focused on the chests.

“What happened to this one?” Amanda asked, running a finger across the jagged cut

“Maybe the people sending the prize got in trouble?” Brett said with a shrug.

Sending the prize? Jeb had always thought the prize had been manufactured on the spot by the sphincter. That bore more thinking about.

“Nothing we can do about it here,” Jeb said with a shrug. “Pick a chest.”

Jeb’s chest had an ebony pen with actual gold inlay, creating a brilliant, looping design along the sides. Ron’s chest had a fancy–looking bow, Jess drew a milky-white potion of Myst, Brett got a Body one, and Amanda pulled out another Slave collar.

Jeb was turning the pen over in his hand, about to inspect it, when he heard another sound. This one was much deeper, resonating through the entire room.

Thump.

Frowning, Jeb and company glanced up, looking for the source of the noise. Their attention was attracted to the crystal heart in the center of the cavern when it convulsed.

Thump.

The black stone inside the quartz began to heat up, turning cherry red, then orange hot.

Thump.

“Aw shit,” Jeb muttered as he watched the molten rock begin to travel up the building-sized artery.

A nearby lava trap began bubbling, oozing liquid stone out onto the floor.

The heat in the room went up in an instant, from sweltering to scalding.

If this is happening everywhere…

“RUN!” Jeb shouted, pointing toward the entrance to the boss room.

“Shouldn’t we try to -” Ron protested.

“Run, you piece of shit!” Brett shouted, throwing the skinny necromancer over his shoulder and hauling ass.