Chapters 261, 262, 263 (Patreon)

​​

Cliffhanger alert.

Chapter 261

<Note added by Crawler Allister, 13th Edition>

The Semeru Dwarves of the ninth floor all only worship a single goddess, who inevitably makes an appearance near the end of the battles as the final teams approach the gates of the castle of Larracos. She only has a single temple in the entire dungeon. I have never seen or heard of a crawler worshiping her. I don’t know if that’s even possible.

She is also, apparently, used as a foil during the Ascendency battles as well. She is hated by both the gods and the demons, and she’s said to be forever scheming, moving nations like pieces on a chessboard. Killing and resurrecting, all in her unknown cause. I’ve heard her described as a trickster. Insane. Jealous of mortals. The dwarves call her the Downward Spiral. An Earth and Water goddess who punishes those who abuse her world and the weakest within it. In my religion, we have a T’Ghee card that represents such a figure, called The Inevitable.

Some say she is the reason for Scolopendra’s nine-tier attack. I’ve heard one dwarf say she is the daughter of the great centipede. Another say she’s the sister. Another claimed she’s the mother. I doubt any of those are true.

Outside of Larracos, she is known by another name.

She is called the Vinegar Bitch.

~

Time left in the quest: One hour, thirty minutes.

Mordecai: He said that? He called her Ysalte? Are you sure?

Donut: WHEN A GIANT DEMON IS BELTING OUT NAMES, YOU LISTEN, MORDECAI.

Mordecai: Ysalte is known by another name. The Vinegar Bitch. She kills every crawler that comes anywhere near her. She usually pops out of her temple at the end of faction wars, but not always. She didn’t appear the last two seasons, so it’s always a surprise. If she does show up, run.

Carl: Can she hide her appearance? Is that possible?

Mordecai: Anything is possible, but gods usually aren’t subtle. Even her. That jacket of yours should be telling you if she’s close. We’re missing something.

Carl: Can she be sponsored?

Mordecai: FUCK. Yes.

Carl: What?

Mordecai: I just remembered. She has been getting sponsored recently. The Nebular team has been sponsoring her.

Carl: The same ones who also sponsor Sister Ines?

Mordecai: Bingo. Be careful.

Donut: WHY DO THOSE WEIRDOS KEEP POPPING UP?

Mordecai: People have been trying to figure out what those guys are up to for hundreds of years, Donut. What they want is easy to explain, but what they do is not because their actions never make sense.

I already knew some of this, but I wanted to hear Mordecai’s explanation.

Carl: What do they want?

Mordecai: Near the center of the galaxy is a very large AI that extends a benign enhancement zone over several solar systems, and it’s where a whole lot of people live. The ‘inner system.’ This AI is the same sort of thing that runs the crawl, but it predates Syndicate society. It is stable and is without personality, and it only takes a minimal amount of fuel to remain turned on. It’s the only one like it. The Nebs worship it like it’s a god, and they think it’s blasphemy to try to replicate it. They participate in the Hunting Grounds and the Ascendency, and they really, really want to run a crawl themselves sometime, but nobody is ever going to let them because their stated goal is to shut all of this down. Hence they try to keep winning the Celestial Ascendency since one of the prizes of that is a seat at the table of the Syndicate crawl council. Outside the crawl, they’re pacifists. You could literally walk up to one and punch him in the face, and he’ll let you do it. Not so much inside the dungeon.

Carl: They want to shut the crawl down?

Mordecai: Yeah, but don’t get too excited. They preach the eradication of all the places that could host crawls, such as this planet. And all the people on it. And all other religions, too. They’re psychotic.

Carl: Preaching for genocide doesn’t exactly go along with pacifism.

Mordecai: Yeah, it doesn’t make much sense to anybody else, either.

Carl: What do they want with Sister Ines, I wonder.

Mordecai: They likely sponsored her because she’s religious, and they either want to convert her or make an example of her.

~

“I feel bad,” Chris said. The lava rock crawler had spent the floor with Li Na’s team, and I’d barely spoken with him. He looked over his shoulder at the church across the way. A demon crab rushed through the grassy area in front of the building, but it didn’t even look at us. The zombies all wandered aimlessly unless we got close, and then they’d swarm, but the demons seemed to all head straight for the FOCSA building, as if they knew their best chance at getting home was there.

The demon eviction was ongoing, but it had clearly slowed.

The crab didn’t make it. Elle pierced it from afar using an ice spell that killed it with a single shot. It died with a small cry, and the corpse turned to dust.

I turned my attention back to Chris. “Why do you feel bad? Because it’s a church?”

“No. Because it’s pretty. And it will break the key.”

“The real version of that church is already gone,” I said. “And the key will only let one of us through. I tried to get Imani to take it, and she’s refused. I’m not going to do it. The other stairwell is miles away and is covered with a lot more debris. We can protect the saferoom entrance if we do it correctly. It’s already buried at the other exit. It has to be here.”

“Okay,” Chris said. He turned and started walking back to the church where he, Zhang, and several other crawlers and strippers were going to initiate the controlled demolition of the church, followed by the construction of the channel underneath it for our escape. I lent Zhang my shrink wand, as he had a lot of experience using that particular spell.

There were two temples on the grounds of the church in separate buildings. A temple of Ibeji, whom I’d never heard of, and a temple of the ocean goddess Kuraokami, which doubled as the entrance to Club Vanquisher. This second temple was where the ram clerics and the mantaur guards had been coming out. We had to be careful not to hurt either of those buildings. The last thing we needed was another pissed-off deity like that whole clusterfuck with Diwata on the last floor.

With that underway, I turned to the rest of the group. As I watched, Imani floated up, trailed by a large group of hooting and hollering sluggalos, followed by a few of the strippers. It was Gluteus Maxx with his war gauntlets, Author Steve Rowland with his club, Splash Zone the water mage, and Dong Quixote. Dong insisted on dragging his massive lance with him, despite being on foot. The thing was basically just a spear, but it was clearly too long and unwieldly to be used effectively without being mounted.

The forty or so sluggalos were mostly level twenties and thirties, punctuated with a handful of level fifties, the strongest in the group that would do as we asked. Sort of. Most of the level forties and fifties were now safely ensconced in the upgraded barracks, which they were apparently trashing.

The things could move a lot more quickly than I was expecting. They left a shimmering trail of orange-hued slime everywhere they went.

“Everybody, gather around.” I cracked my neck. “We have to get into that building.” I pointed over my shoulder at the large, distant skyscraper. “Donut and I, along with Katia’s squad and the rest of Li Na’s squad will infiltrate the building and confront Sister Ines. The plan is to take her out, which will hopefully break the demon free of his confinement. As soon as that happens, that timer is probably going to accelerate, so we’ll need to hoof it to the roof and break him free of the Madre de Aguas snake body right away.”

“What about tossing Samantha, like you did before?” Louis asked. Samantha sat firmly upon his shoulder. She kept trying to chew on his hair, but he was pushing her away.

“I love it when you’re confident in me,” Samantha said. She reached over and bit Louis on the ear.

“Samantha, leave him alone or you’re sitting this one out,” I said.

She growled at me and threatened my mother.

I pointed at the swirling hurricane surrounding the demon. “He’s protected by a wall of demon seagulls. Samantha is invulnerable, but if we toss her, and she gets intercepted, one of the seagulls will pull her into Sheol. I’m pretty sure I can get her back, but she’ll likely bring something back with her we don’t want to fight. We’re going to use teleport to break him of the shell, but we want to keep him in the same location. The only way to do that is up through the building. This whole thing has been setup by the AI. We pretty much have to do it this way.”

I turned to Elle and Imani. “You guys are going to protect our escape, and you’re going to keep anyone from surging up behind us. I don’t know if any of the full-strength demons are left, but be on the lookout. Watch for the birds.”

Elle saluted me. “You got it, boss.”

“Good. Once the demon is free from his shell, he’s going to be a lot bigger and a lot more powerful. I don’t know if that means he’ll be pissed or happy we freed him, but either way it’s going to trigger a world quest, and we’ll need to see what the parameters are before we decide how to proceed from there. Okay, guys? We ready? No time. Let’s go.”

I turned and started jogging east toward the massive demon in the sky. I didn’t turn to see if the others were following me.

~

“Did you get Quan’s cloak?” Katia asked as we approached the building. She was in her she-hulk form, but she’d grown multiple stalks on the back of her neck containing eyeballs so she could see all around her. I remembered how she once talked about how difficult it was to get used to using more than two eyes. That didn’t seem to be a problem for her anymore. To my left, Splash Zone sent a group of duende zombies floating away with a wave attack. Donut, Louis, Britney, Tran, and Mongo took up the middle of the group. Katia, the strippers, and I took up the front. The slugs were wandering off everywhere. It was like trying to herd a group of drunk toddlers.

“I did,” I said. “I need to sit down and really examine the description. It doesn’t do what we thought it did from what I can tell. It changes based on who wears it. I’m pretty sure I’m going to give it to Donut if we can get it to fit her, but we need to have a discussion with Mordecai about it first.”

“Okay,” Katia said. She was shaking, I realized. And not just from fear. I wished we were still partied, which would allow me to look deeper in on her health.

“How are you feeling?” I asked.

“Mostly like an idiot,” she admitted. “But Imani has been helping me with some of the... after effects.”

“And Bautista?”

The tiger crawler walked near the back of the group along with Elle, who was scanning the sky for threats. It was clear their relationship had been damaged by recent events.

“He doesn’t want me to use the orchid. I was going to take it before the end of the floor, but now it looks like we won’t have a chance.”

“I don’t want you to use it, either. The more I think about it, the more scared I get it’s a death sentence.”

“Well, it’s a death sentence if I don’t use it. We jumped through a lot of hoops to get it. It’s the only way out as far as I can see.”

“Maybe there’ll be another way. I don’t want you being alone.”

She shivered. “Have I ever told you... You know what, let’s just get past this and then decide what we’re going to do.” She turned to Dong Quixote, who grunted with the effort of carrying his lance.

“Dong, that weapon is way too big for you,” she said.

The elderly stripper smiled. “My dear, it’s kind of you to compliment my weapon’s size.”

“I’m serious. You have an inventory. You can carry it in there until you need it, but I don’t think you should use it at all. It’s going to get you killed.”

I knew most NPCs had the slot-style inventory. Something like that massive lance would take up most of his space, but at least he wouldn’t have to lug it around.

He frowned. “This is the only weapon I know. At least the only weapon I know that I could find. I do miss my trusty mount.”

Katia smiled at the old man. A genuine smile. “Let me guess. Your horse’s name was Rocinante?”

“Horse?” he asked. “No. His name was Corcunda. Was a half mantaur. Was the most beautiful man, despite his physical flaws. I would ride him on stage, and the crowd loved it.”

“Wait, what?” Katia asked. “What the heck does a half mantaur look like?”

Splash Zone grunted with laughter. “Their act was a thing of legends.”

I was about to ask what he meant by “riding him on stage” but thought better of it. “What’s the other weapon you were looking for?” I asked. “I have a lot in my inventory.”

“A flail,” he said. “The one-handed variety.”

I dove into my inventory, looking at the weapons. Most were in the saferoom, but I knew he’d already had the opportunity to pick through that pile. I still had the ones I’d looted from Quan. I had several mace-like weapons, and I’d seen a few crawlers with mace-and-chain type weapons, but I didn’t have exactly what he was looking for. I knew Katia had the meteor hammer from the late Popov twins, but that thing probably weighed more than the stupid lance. A single weapon caught my attention. I hadn’t had time to read the description yet.

Spunky Jefferson the Enchanted Nickel Sock of the Elderly Miser.

This weapon has been upgraded twice.

This is a sapient weapon.

This is an incremental-damage weapon.

This item was originally awarded to a crawler in a Legendary You-Know-Everybody-Can-See-You-Right? Box on the fifth floor.

Almost all cultures that use money have a story about the miser. The elderly, solitary man who hoards his wealth and treats everybody around him like shit until he gets his comeuppance and then turns into a big pussy who gives all his money away.

All cultures also have the equivalent of the spunk sock that sits underneath a teenage boy’s bed.

Jefferson is the lifeforce of such a miser who pissed off the spirit who’d come to show him the errors of his ways. He was cursed to inhabit a sock once owned by a kid named Tanner. The sock itself holds several USD worth of nickels. You swing it and bonk people with it. It’s unusually effective, more so than you might think.

This weapon’s damage increases by 1.5% for every mob it kills that is no more than 10 levels below the current wielder’s level. Current upgrade: 238% damage increase.

Increases wielder’s dexterity by 10 points plus 10%

Has a 5% chance to inflict Bonked on any mob struck with this weapon.

All mobs killed with this weapon have a 20% chance to burst into a pile of gold coins upon death. The number of coins is equal to the (value of the items in their inventory)+(level x 10).

Carl: Is a sapient weapon what I think it is?

Mordecai: Oh gods. Yes. They can talk, but it’s usually only in the mind of the wielder. Though some do talk out loud. They tend to be quite annoying. Samantha-level annoying, but luckily they’re treated as objects, and you can keep them in your inventory if they won’t stop yammering. I suspect Florin’s shotgun might be sapient, but he hasn’t said one way or another.

What the hell, I thought and pulled it out of my inventory. It was a white tube sock with red and blue stripes at the very top. It sagged heavily. It was old, crusty, and splattered with blood.

“Let me know if this works,” I said, handing the sock to Dong. “This is kinda like a flail. I guess.”

“My lord, you honor me,” Dong said, taking the crusty sock reverently. His lance zapped away into his inventory. He wrapped the end of the bobbing sock in his hand and gave it a test swing. It jingled with the coins within as it swished through the air. “This is a mythical weapon.”

“What the hell is that?” Katia asked. “Why does it smell?”

“Yes. Yes. My name is Dong Quixote,” Dong said. “Yes. Yes. Jefferson? It’s nice to meet you... Yes. We are going to. I am a former adventurer turned entertainer turned mercenary.... Yes. About five gold coins per dance, but more if we moved it to the cum closet... I do not know what a mutual fund is. Why?”

“Carl, who is he talking to?” Katia asked.

“The sock,” I said as Dong wandered off to show his friends.

Donut: OKAY, I WILL BE BACK IN A MINUTE. DON’T START WITHOUT ME.

Carl: Do it fast.

Behind me, Donut, Imani, Britney, and Tran moved off to an alley to get into a quick fight in order to properly set up Donut’s deck one last time. Just in case.

Meanwhile, everybody else was in the chat, fielding questions about the plan. The fights, for the most part, had calmed down. Osvaldo and some guy named Jurgen had gotten into a card battle, but Jurgen had been forced to use a Flee card. It turned out he’d really made good on his promise to break the stairwell, and they were now working together to clear the rubble away. They were somewhere in Brazil. It was the same for everybody else. We still had four days left, but by now, pretty much everybody with keys who could, had gone down the stairs.

I received one last message from Prepotente.

Prepotente: For what it’s worth, Carl. I do hope you and Princess Donut survive this foolish endeavor. You are an oafish brute, and it’s a miracle you have made it this far, but the dungeon would not be the same without you.

Carl: Thanks, Prepotente.

Prepotente: If you are successful in the first part of this, make certain you carefully read the winning conditions of the new quest. There are quite a few crawlers in Indonesia, which is the closest landmass on the opposite side of the Earth from Havana. They will be in the most danger if you do not buff that demon enough. You will need them on the next floor if you hope to win. Speaking of, Princess Donut has been keeping me apprised of how the voting is going for Faction Wars. I understand you’re still at an impasse.

Carl: I will do my best. And yes, ever since everybody got stuck and the system AI refused to let them bounce, they’ve all been declining to vote in anything and are instead just trying to sue over and over. They’re being a bunch of pansies. Meanwhile, the NPC rebels have been sabotaging them at every turn.

Prepotente: Well, I do look forward to seeing how all that turns out. Now I will be going down the stairs.

Carl: Take care of yourself.

Prepotente: Oh, and Carl?

Carl: Yes?

Prepotente: I’ve decided to not kill you for letting my mother hurt herself. I have been contemplating it for some time now. I’ve decided you were too stupid to have done anything about it anyway. Your penance will be to assist me in exacting my revenge on the true culprits.

I blinked, rereading that last part. I tried not to let the sarcasm show in my response.

Carl: That’s a relief. Thanks, Pony.

The combat complete notification came, and a moment later, Donut landed on my shoulder. “It’s done,” she said. “Not many zombies around anymore. I think they’re all running away from the demon building.”

“Good, because we’re here,” I said, holding up my hand for everybody to stop. We came to the edge of an alley that was blocked by a pile of bicycle rickshaws that had somehow gotten all tangled up here, all with colorful awnings and handmade signs that read “Taxi.” A few were decorated with Christmas decorations. I used the pile of bicycles as a hiding spot as we peered to the right, revealing a block filled with demons. It was all manner of creatures. Crabs, seals, fish, duendes, a few of those weird human-faced dog things, and more. All were zombies turned demon. All stood, or lay on the ground, docile, staring up into the hurricane of birds, none facing our direction. It was like they were patiently waiting for a train to pull up and take them all home.

I couldn’t even see Amayon anymore through the mass of birds. Even as I watched, more demon birds flew in from all directions. It wasn’t just birds, I realized, but bats as well. The cone of fire continued to spout into the sky out the center of the tornado. It was so hot it was hard to breathe.

It dawned on me that I hadn’t heard from Sister Ines in a while. I checked, and she was still there, still near the top but within the building. The system said she was still alive, but she clearly hadn’t moved, which was unnerving.

I noted none of the demons said they were minions of Sister Ines, either. Only Amayon was under her control.

The front side of the green and tan, Y-shaped building loomed.

This was it.

Chapter 262

We had one hour. I lowered my voice to a whisper. “Donut, get your headset on and get ready to cast your spell. Samantha. I need you to enhance it if you can. Everybody going in the front door, get your invisibility potions ready, but not yet. Donut is casting two spells, and the first one is going to take five minutes to fully cast. As soon as she’s done, I’m going to toss smoke bombs, and then we’ll Puddle Jump to the entrance and make our way inside.”

Donut had to position herself so she could actually see the group, and she plopped herself at the very edge of the alley, inside the basket of one of the taxi bikes, lowering herself so only her eyes would be noticeable. Mordecai said the spell would make her glow, so being invisible wouldn’t work. If one of those demons turned and looked, they’d see her.

Imani floated up. She, too, could enhance spells.

“Is this really going to work?” Elle whispered, peering out at the mass of demons. There were thousands of them. “You said it only works on intelligent mobs, and zombies ain’t too smart.”

“It’s demon zombies. They’re intelligent,” I said. I reached over and scratched Donut. “Donut seems to think the regular zombies are steering clear of this whole neighborhood. Okay, everybody. This spell takes five minutes to cast, so stay low. Ready, Donut?”

“Oh, wow,” Donut said after a moment. “With my Charisma boosts, I can select the whole group out there! Even some of the birds! And the casting is only four minutes now. I wish I still had that tiara.”

“That’s okay. You’re good,” I said. “Go.”

Donut glowed as she cast Minion Army. We’d received the book near the end of the first floor. She had yet to cast it because it was so dangerous to use. It was a spell designed for war, and the moment she cast it, she’d be frozen and vulnerable for four minutes straight.

The spell was only level one, before the boost. It turned two percent of the enemy in the casting area against their comrades. With both Imani and Samantha enhancing the spell, that two percent should turn to about five percent. That number still seemed low to me, but both Mordecai and Doctor Bones had insisted it would create utter chaos.

A countdown timer appeared over her. Rooted in Place appeared. Mongo made an uncertain peep.

“It’s okay,” I said to the dinosaur. “She’s fine.”

The shimmering, golden glow around Donut increased in intensity with each passing second.

I continued to peer at the demons who remained unmoving and raised my whisper up a little. “Okay guys. As soon as it casts, all hell is going to break loose, and the assault team will move. As soon as we say the word, the rest of you need to get to work. We need you to keep them from coming up behind us, but only wade in there if it’s absolutely necessary. Ranged attacks only. I’m counting on you, Splash Zone, to help keep them safe.” I turned to look over my shoulder. “Also, the sluggalos... Goddamnit. Where the fuck are the sluggalos?”

“Chop, chop, bitches!” came a deafening battle cry from one street over as the entire squad of forty, hatchet-wielding, idiot slugs poured into the group of demons.

“Oh shit,” Louis said. “They’re doing a Leeroy...”

“Don’t even say it,” I growled. “Goddamnit.”

“Who could’ve predicted that?” Imani said drily.

Combat Started.

Donut had three minutes left.

If the demons didn’t kill them, I was going to do it myself. “Everyone. Protect Donut until she’s done with her spell!”

The line of forty slugs slammed into the group of demons like a calvary charge. It was like watching a fast forward video of a tidal wave of snot storming a beachhead.

The demons appeared to be in a sort of stupor. None were reacting until they were actually struck by one of the slugs. If the blow didn’t outright kill them, only then would they start to respond. The larger demons, like the seals, would flip back, knocking over several of their friends, who in turn would start to wake up as well. The slugs were cutting through them like a wheat thresher.

That advantage wasn’t going to last long.

For now, however, it was oddly fascinating to watch. The slugs weren’t all that great at fighting or killing, but they made up for it with over-the-top enthusiasm.

“At least they came from the other street,” Elle said, floating next to me, watching as the others all came to stare.

“Wow, look how fast they’re going,” Tran said. One of the smaller slugs leaped through the air and bit directly onto the neck of a seal, but it didn’t appear to actually do anything. The seal slowly started to react, like it had been asleep. Before it could do anything further, several more slugs fell on it, screaming and whooping, their hatchets slamming up and down.

“How are they even swinging those axes?” Britney asked, fascinated. “They don’t even have arms.”

“I’ve learned not to think about that sort of thing too much, and it makes everything so much easier,” Elle said.

Not all of them even had weapons, but the ones that did indeed mostly wielded deadly-looking hatchets that kind of floated to the right or left of their long necks, and they’d swing up and down, like they were on a swivel. A few had other weapons, too, like knives and baseball bats covered in barbed wire. One had a cylindrical, metal mace thing attached to the end of his body, and he was spinning like a spasming dog chasing his own tail. He was hitting more of his own people than demons. It was goddamn weird.

“If we get a few thousand more of these guys, we could win the war on the first day,” Louis said. “Imagine a whole battalion of those things paratrooping behind enemy lines.”

Imani chuckled without humor. “Be careful what you wish for. Don’t forget how Carl makes these.”

The first thrum of a hell portal opening echoed. It reverberated across the battlefield like a plucked bass string. Followed by a second. The majority of the demons remained unmoving, and I was starting to wonder if we should’ve attempted a different technique to approach the building. It was too late now.

Within thirty seconds, half the slugs were gone. The demons who’d woken up were now surging toward the attackers, who seemed oblivious or uncaring about the changing tide of battle.

“Sluggalos, retreat!” came the bellow from the largest one. A level 52 slug with green clown makeup and a stained ruffle around his neck.

“No,” I shouted, not bothering to hide ourselves anymore. “No retreat!”

The remaining handful of slugs finally decided they wanted to save themselves and started slithering away, screaming expletives at the demons behind them, who all rushed to pursue.

They surged directly toward us.

“Not in this direction you idiots!”

They trailed their orange slime along with a healthy smear of blood as the seals, crabs, fish, and mix of other demons finally spied us all there in the alley.

Donut had just under a minute left. Her entire form glowed, the light shining off her like a star.

“I guess it’s my turn,” Elle said, grumbling. “Everybody stand back. This spell has a one week cooldown, but I guess I gotta use it now. Don’t know if this is going to make things better or worse.”

The earth and ice fairy floated into the air. Her hands glowed blue.

“Coming in!” the lead slug cried as he slurped toward us, weaving back and forth, like a snake surging through water. The thing was almost as big as me, and I had no idea which stripper he came out of or how it had been born of a single boil. And there were some that were an even higher level. This one’s name was Rampageous.

He smashed through the rampart made of bicycles, sending them flying. I reached to grab the bike Donut was hiding within, but I missed. The bike went tumbling, the back passenger department smashing through Donut like she was made of steel. She remained in place, now floating a foot off the ground, but she’d taken some damage. Mongo roared in outrage.

The slug paused, looking up at Imani. “Oh, hey 313. Did you see that shit? Fucking epic!” He resumed his retreat.

I turned to face the demons as the remaining slugs, maybe six or seven of them, surged past in their hasty retreat, revealing a mass of about seventy or eighty demons moving in. Behind them, the rest remained frozen in place, undisturbed.

Elle cast Graupel.

“Oh shit, oh shit,” Elle shouted as the blue glow around her increased in intensity. “Guys, it says it’s casting more powerful than usual. Holy shit, head’s up!”

A thunderclap knocked us all back as sheets of hail poured from the sky. Elle had received the spell in a lootbox after our first fight with the Maestro in Grull form, way back at the end of the fourth floor. She’d only cast it once before, and that was to defeat the air quadrant in their bubble on the fifth.

Mordecai had warned that this was a war spell, meant only to be cast outside. I could now see why.

Death rained from above in a wide area in front of us. Fist-sized chunks of ice pelted down from the heavens, temporarily blocking out the burning sky. Steam and smoke filled the entire area as the storm rolled through. The black asphalt in front of the alley started to explode with each impact. Behind the approaching demons, more cries rose, but they were quickly drowned out. The ground rumbled like an earthquake.

Elle remained in place as level notifications pinged over and over above her head, settling her onto level 72. She’d risen six levels at once. It’d been a while since I’d seen something like that happen.

“It cast!” Donut cried, coming unfrozen. She hissed as she dropped to the ground. “It...” she paused, looking into the steam as the deafening hailstorm eased off. I couldn’t see a damn thing, but almost all the red dots on my map had turned to X’s.

Combat Complete. Deck has been reset.

“Carl, what did you do?”

“Wow,” Louis said, looking up at Elle. “We should’ve done that in the first place.”

Elle appeared to be in a daze. “What the hell? That spell is strong, but it’s not usually that strong. It’s only level five. It said it cast at level 16. I just got a bunch of achievements. Holy hell, look at my level.”

“Samantha,” I asked, looking for the doll head. She was just floating there, six feet off the ground. She, too, glowed with a bluish white light. “Did you do that?”

For the first time, perhaps ever, Samantha looked equally confused and concerned. She was mumbling to herself, spinning in circles. “Elle is part earth, part water mage,” she said, floating past, talking to herself as she continued to rotate. “She’s on the four seasons path. I... but how did that happen? I am stronger too. I didn’t do that. It’s the tree, I think. Or maybe. It’s all there. He’s opening a path through the river, the water, and the tree, the earth. It’s good she’s not fire yet, but maybe the prince’s spell enhanced her. No. No. Gotta kill her. No, not Elle. Her mother. No, not her mother.” She shook her head like a dog. She turned to look at me. “What just happened? Carl, did you roofie me again?”

“Again?” I asked. “Samantha, what were you just saying?”

“You need to stop gaslighting me, Carl.”

Elle grunted. “Whatever the hell that was, I think it solved part of our problem. Look.”

The steam had started to ease as water rushed into the alley. There was a knee-high pile of rapidly-melting ice between us and the building, and mixed in with all that ice was a field filled with the mangled corpses of demons as far as I could see. The front of the building appeared for a moment, and it looked as if it had been spared by the assault.

“Wait, so I cast that giant spell for nothing?” Donut asked. “Elle, you stole my experience!”

“I don’t think so,” Elle said, pointing upward. “Look!”

Donut gasped. “You’re right! I just got experience for something. And again!”

The tornado of demon birds and bats remained circling the top of the building, high above. They’d apparently been out of range of the Graupel spell. Donut’s spell had included the lower area of the bird formation, and it was clear several of them were now fighting each other. Bodies started to hail down from the sky.

We had forty minutes left.

“Don’t bother with Puddle Jump,” I said, turning to run through the ice field of death. “Assault team, go!”

We turned toward the building, and we ran.

~

We waded through rapidly-melting slush and demon gore as we reached the front entrance to the FOCSA building, which to my surprise was actually an open air mall of some sort. Multiple businesses spread out, filled with unaware memory ghosts as they moved in and out of grocery stores and electronics shops and bakeries, all of which ringed the outer perimeter.

“There!” Li Na called, pointing at a locked, glass door. It was an entrance for the residents above the mall. I kicked it in and rushed into a brightly painted lobby, looking for the stairs. They were right there, just past an empty reception desk and a bank of elevators.

It was me, Donut, Mongo, Katia, Louis, Bautista, Li Na, Li Jun, and Samantha. Everybody else including the strippers remained outside, but they would soon come into this same lobby on my direction. They would remain here and protect our exit, in the unlikely event we took the stairs back down to get out. Tran and Britney, who were both on Katia’s squad, would also follow, but remain in the stairwell in case anybody got past them.

The sluggalos were all gone, having run back into the city. I knew if this was during the real Faction Wars, I could go into my warlord menu and force them back into line. That was something Priestly and several other cookbook authors who came before me didn’t know about the Conscript spell.

Outside, the demon birds and bats continued to hail like rain. Donut was getting experience for each one that died, whether it was a charmed bird or not.

We pushed past the lobby toward the stairwell.

“We have to climb the stairs?” Donut asked, pointing at an open elevator. “Why don’t we take the elevator?” The walls shook. “Mongo is scared of stairs.”

“Are you crazy?” Katia asked.

“Well, you’re crazy if you think I’m going to run up 30-something floors.”

“Donut, we’re taking the stairs,” I said. “Everybody be on the lookout for mobs and traps.”

I kicked the door to the stairwell in, and it went flying. All of this stuff was locked, and I briefly wondered how Sister Ines had gotten in here.

Everything was so hot. It was a miracle the entire place wasn’t already in flames. The teal-colored paint was bubbling in some places.

“We need Elle with us,” Donut grumbled. “She has that mist spell that keeps everything cool.”

The demon continued to shout. The walls rumbled. The timer ticked down and down.

~

With about a half hour left, we reached the door to the 32nd floor. The heat rose the further we went up. A few of us were starting to take environmental damage. Sister Ines was here, through the main door and down the hallway. This was the top floor of the regular residences. There was a service door behind us that led to another hallway and stairwell that wasn’t normally used by the tenants. Everything above here was through a separate stairwell and consisted of expensive, penthouse apartments. It was on top of this block where the demon stood.

“Everyone stay here,” I said. I kicked in the service door and went down the hallway in the opposite direction of Sister Ines, coming to the separate stairwell up past the penthouses and to the roof. I pulled my last automaton out of my inventory and went up this last flights of stairs. I put the small robot on the floor in front of the door to the outside. The spider automaton had both sides of a teleport trap upon it. It would walk up to the snake and bump into it, setting off the trap, but the receiver end of the trap was atop the back of the robotic spider, so the snake wouldn’t actually go anywhere. We needed it to remain in place, though it would still technically teleport. This would immediately break the demon from the shell of the snake city boss, allowing the demon to take its true form.

It would also break it out of control of Sister Ines if we absolutely had to do it this way, though in order to do this properly, we needed to kill the nun first. Both Mordecai and I feared if we didn’t kill her before the demon was freed, the first thing the full-powered demon would do would be to seek revenge and torch the entire building with us still inside. If he knew she was dead, and we were the ones who did it, he would hopefully at least pause before killing us.

I held my breath and kicked out the door to the roof, revealing the snake standing right there, still as vertical as a flagpole launching fire upward. The cacophony of the birds and bats swirled all around me. Nothing acknowledged me. That was good.

“Okay,” I shouted at the automaton. I had a remote control clicker in my inventory. “You stay here. As soon as I click, you go out there and bump into it! Understand?”

The tiny robot did a little hop.

I turned and returned to the others to find Li Na leaning with her head against the door.

“Robot is set,” I said. “I’ll send it out there the moment she’s dead.”

“I can hear her,” Li Na said. “She’s chanting.”

“More poetry,” Donut spit.

“Poetry sucks,” Louis added.

“Okay,” I whispered, cutting Samantha off before she professed even more love for Louis. “Me, Louis, Li Jun, and Bautista are going to go in. The rest of you stay here unless we need you.”

“Why just the boys?” Donut demanded.

“Because we’re the deckmasters,” Li Na replied, pulling back from the door. “She’s down the hallway. He’s trying to finish the fight without forcing a card battle.”

“Huh,” Donut said, looking around. “Aren’t the deckmasters the strongest ones in the party? Funny how that worked out.”

“Everybody remember the finger-breaking trick in case she charms you,” Katia added.

“I don’t have any cards,” Samantha grumbled. “Why do I have to stay here?”

“Because you agreed to do what I said. Now everyone shush.”

I leaned against the door. In any other circumstance, I’d just toss a stick of dynamite in and be done with it, but not with a deity in the body of a city boss over our heads and thirty plus floors of building underneath us.

“She’s at the end of the hall, and she hasn’t moved in hours. Be ready for anything. Here we go.”

I pulled my new Nighty-Night wand. I opened the door to reveal a glowing Sister Ines, running full tilt down the hallway directly at us, screaming “Sinner!” at the top of her lungs. She was already too close.

“Gah!” I zapped my wand, and she instantly went unconscious. She dropped and slid, coming to a stop at my feet. A two minute timer appeared above her.

Combat Started.

The notification came, but she was out. I exchanged a look with the others. Li Jun shrugged.

“I think I just shit myself,” Louis said, panting. “Did you see the look in her eyes? What was that notification over her head?”

“Well, that was easy,” I said. I hadn’t seen the marker. Whatever it was, it was gone now. “I guess we gotta kill her.”

“I’ll do it,” Louis said, pushing me aside. “I already have five player skulls and none of you guys do. Trust me. You want to put that off as long as possible.” Before I could object, he pulled a dagger from his inventory. “Sorry cat lady. I never met you, but you need to go if we want to save everybody else.” He took the knife and plunged it directly into her chest.

Sister Ines Quiteria, The Reaper of Havana, finally died.

A symbol appeared over Louis’s head. I immediately recognized it. It was a god’s marked for death indicator. It came in the form of a spinning squiggle, almost like that of a tornado.

We all just stared at the symbol as my heart sank.

“Uh-oh,” Louis said as music started to play.

The death of the bard has angered her celestial Patron. She is coming to seek revenge.

The Goddess Ysalte has entered the realm.

Chapter 263

You are in the presence of a deity. The Scavenger’s Daughter’s eyes remain open. She fills with even more power.

Temporary effect from Ysalte: All potions you quaff or physically handle outside your inventory will turn to vinegar. They will return to a more powerful version of themselves upon her banishment.

I barely registered the notification as the music, which was strangely slow and symphonic, rose in volume. We all backed into the stairwell chamber as the corpse of Sister Ines dissolved and turned into that of the level-250 goddess.

Goddess of Hopelessness and Insanity Ysalte. Level 250.

This goddess is sponsored by Pontifex Shine of the Nebular Balance.

Warning: This sponsor is not currently inhabiting the shell of this deity. She will speak and react as per her regular nature. Considering who this is, that’s some bad fucking news for you guys.

Warning: This is a deity. She is invulnerable on this floor.

This goddess has been temporarily summoned to this location due to a special boss battle event and will return to the Ascendency upon completion of the event.

The earliest citizens of Larracos always worshipped Ysalte, which is fitting. She hasn’t always been considered the Goddess of Hopelessness and Insanity. First it was of the Dirt. Then it was of Tears. It’s a recent thing that they started calling her something else. The Downward Spiral. The Vinegar Bitch.

Her downfall mirrors that of the citizens of Larracos, who have embraced the deity in all her forms.

That’s what happens when everything you know is upended, and everything is taken from you. First they vilify you. Then they separate you. Then they blame you for what they’re doing to you. Then they hunt you. It’s the step after that which is important.

The one where they start to fear you.

Ysalte has a special place in her heart for the outcasts, for those whose minds are being devoured by the world around them. She takes no new worshippers, beyond the citizens of Larracos. But she is known to be a great patron of the arts and is one of the few deities who will sponsor a bard or a performer. She asks nothing in return, though occasionally her gifts are more than what they seem, and some may even carry a curse.

The story of this goddess, like that of many of her kind, is long and a little sad. At this point, how it began isn’t nearly as important as how it will end. She  is half-sister and niece to her former lover, Taranis. Threatened with the Nothing by Apito, she fled to Sheol. She has since returned to the Halls of Ascendency, where she is feared and reviled by all.

She is not considered someone who wishes to lead, which makes her a dangerous and cunning contender for the Ascendent throne.

The deity appeared in the form of a regular sized, young-faced, female dwarf carrying a pickaxe, which was not what I was expecting from someone with such a name. She smiled upon us, almost gently. She wore a helmet with a candle atop it, but the candle sparked, like that of a dynamite stick, reminding me of the goblin bomb bards. Her face occasionally flickered, like a bad television screen. And in those moments of static, her mouth turned to that of a scream, though no such sound came out.

She turned her attention to Louis, who still held the knife in his hand. He stupidly dropped it to the floor and held up his hands like it was a stick up.

“You killed my bard,” she said to him. Her voice was soft, sweet, musical. She did not have the Scottish lilt of most of the dwarves we’d met so far. This was more French than anything. As she spoke, she clinked her pickaxe gently against the floor. Cracks started to form. A memory ghost walked out of one of the apartments and strolled past, oblivious.

“She was asleep, and you killed her. Her mind is finally at ease, which is a blessing, but I was not done with her yet, and for that you must suffer.”

Samantha appeared, floating between Ysalte and Louis, who’d backed all the way to the wall of the stairwell. Her voice was filled with fake cheer. “Ysalte! Honey! We haven’t seen each other in so long! How are you? What’s new? I must invite you to my bachelorette party. How’s the child?”

Samantha: LOUIS YOU GOTTA RUN BECAUSE THIS BITCH IS GONNA MELT YOUR BEAUTIFUL ASS INTO BUBBLING AND STICKY OATMEAL.

“Ysalte!” came the cry from above. “Release me!”

“Psamathe, is that you?” Ysalte asked, ignoring the demon above us. “You dare show yourself to me after what you did?”

Carl: Louis, do what she says. Get the fuck out of here. Run.

The music remained unchanged, but it was starting to get punctuated by a distant chug-chug of a distorted guitar. Wide-eyed Louis started to slowly descend down the stairs, his hands still up.

“Uh, what did I do?” Samantha asked, suddenly defensive. “Wait, are you still mad about the thing with the reverse hedgehog? Because that was like a really long time ago. And everyone else at the party thought it was funny. Well, except the hedgehog I guess. And you, apparently. But it’s not my fault if you can’t take a joke about how ugly your child is.”

The goddess roared and swung her pickaxe directly at Samantha’s face.

Even a pickaxe swung by a god was not enough to injure the sex doll’s head. It bounced right off her like she’d tried to pierce an impenetrable kick ball. The look on the goddess’s face was one of utter surprise as she started to fly backward, feet up in the air.

At that moment, everything froze. I froze. Samantha froze. The Vinegar Bitch froze, floating off the ground.

The ceiling at the end of the hall collapsed, and the coils of the Madre de Agua snake slurped into the hall from above, suddenly and violently. It was like it had tipped off the main roof and landed above us.

Ysalte’s pickaxe was stopped in midair, in the process of flying from the goddess’s hands. Behind her, the snake continued to cascade into the hallway, despite being wider than the hall itself. Concrete and metal vaporized as the city boss slammed into the floor. The ceiling over our heads collapsed, but fell to the sides, as if it was being peeled like a banana, miraculously not hitting anybody. After just a few seconds, the ceiling above us was just gone. The walls all around us also fell away, revealing multiple memory ghosts in their apartments without walls, going about their lives.

Everything but the floor beneath our feet was suddenly gone, almost like we’d been transferred to the roof.

Elle: Holy hell, what’s going on up there?

We were now outside, yet we remained frozen. The swirl of demon birds and bats continued to spin, now all around us. The gout of flame was gone. My heart sank at the sight of it.

The collapsing snake had temporarily stopped on our floor-turned-roof, coming to a halt right behind the frozen goddess. The city boss had multiple notifications over its massive head, including Enslaved. It paused before its distant tail started slipping over the far edge, sliding away like an anchor chain, yanking the whole snake off the side. The demon hissed as it was pulled away.

I caught movement just above the snake, rapidly catching up. It was the little automaton I’d set up atop the stairs, also falling, shining like a shooting star. The small robot, which should have been destroyed along with the rest of the top floor, spun through the air as it “miraculously” landed atop the falling snake.

Oh, come on. I thought as the whole thing blinked and reappeared in a quick teleportation.

Ysalte had been summoned while we were in a regular hallway, and because of that, she entered this world as a regular-sized dwarf. When Amayon dropped the shell of the snake, he was exposed to the open air.

As a result, he took on a much larger size than that of the dwarf.

The whole world stuttered as if we were in a car crash. It was the sound of the demon’s four feet slamming to the ground far below.

The full-power version of Amayon stood to his full height, feet on the street, standing before the building with the lopped-off top, facing us.

We stood upon the 32nd floor-turned-roof of the building, and we were about equal with the chest of the demon who now glared down at us.

His body appeared to be that of a centaur-like quadruped, but I couldn’t see the legs from our position. His humanoid chest rose above our platform, cleaving through the round of birds and bats, which moved back to let him within.

From the waist up, he had a similar appearance to that of the Pleasure demons, but his red skin bubbled like it was made of lava with black, swirling patches. He looked similar to Emberus in that way, though his head was that of a massive, demonic deer-like creature with four, steaming horns. Two that rose straight up, piercing the clouds, and two that curved downward like tusks. His mouth was beaked at the very end, almost dinosaur like. He roared, and the interior of his beak was nothing but teeth and fire.

The Enslaved marker remained over his head.

Fuck.

He had not been freed from Ysalte’s grip by the teleportation. We’d only managed to make him more powerful.

The moment he finished his scream, he too, froze, leaving everyone in the area motionless as the heavy metal chugga-chugga took over the symphonic music and rose in volume. Imani, from way down on the first floor of the building, sent a panicked message.

Imani: Oh shit, we’ve been frozen also. We’ve been added to the battle!

For a moment, nothing changed, as if the AI was trying to figure out what to do next.

The timer blinked and whiffed out. A new timer appeared. It was at ten minutes.

Quest Complete. Falling Up.

Please wait...

New Quest. The Missing Piece.

This is a hybrid world quest. All crawlers who are dumb enough to still be stuck on the eighth floor have been added to this quest.

Every remaining crawler within the region of Cuba has been designated as host of this quest.

This quest contains two parts. Only those in the Cuba region may participate in part one. If they are successful, part two will initiate and will include everyone else. In the meantime, this upcoming battle will air on all screens throughout the dungeon for those outside the Cuba region.

The demon Amayon, prince of Sheol, is stuck in this world, banished here by one of his three brothers.

Ysalte, his former girlfriend and mother of his child, has also stepped into the realm, and she has seized control of the demon, just as he once seized her when she tried to flee their relationship.

He wants to go home.

She wants to keep him under her control and bring him with her to the Ascendency, where he will act as her retainer until the Ascendency battles are complete. While all the other gods have been waking up long-forgotten deities to assist them, the Vinegar Bitch knows having a prince of hell at her side will help ensure her claim to the throne.

She will return to the realm in ten minutes. If Amayon remains fully under her control when that timer is complete, they will both teleport away to the Ascendency.

If that happens, everyone without keys is dead. There will be no more chances.

In order to break free from Ysalte’s grip, Amayon must begin the casting of his spell to return home. In order to do that, he must be strong enough to cast it. How will he be given strength? Maybe you should ask him.

If he has broken free from her control by the time the timer runs out, then she will leave, and he will remain and will eventually travel home.

The stronger he is by the time the timer runs out, the bigger the spell will have to be. If he is at full power, that spell will cover the entire world, and everyone within it will have hope to make it to the next floor.

Oh, and one last thing.

This is the eighth floor after all.

Clank, clank, clank, clank.

Four cards appeared in front of the still-frozen, still-flying-backwards dwarf. Each one slammed into place like the blow of a hammer.

“What the hell. Really?” I said. “Fucking really?”

Clank, clank, clank, clank.

Four more appeared in front of the giant demon. Each of these cards was the size of a garage door.

Amayon has short deck with six... unique totems. He will play each totem as they appear. He won’t even begin to attempt to flee until all his totems are dead. As for Ysalte? She is armed with a slightly enhanced version of the deck of the late Sister Ines. You can’t kill the god, so you have to hold out.

The world unfroze, and the goddess continued to fly back. She hit the ground and skid. She pulled herself to her feet about 100 feet away and tried to cast a spell at us, but nothing happened. She growled in frustration before her eyes finally focused on the cards floating before her.

Let the final card battle of the floor begin.

~~~~~~~~

Wow. I hope nothing bad or weird or unexpected happens during this upcoming battle.

Just two or three chapters left. Thanks everybody.