“The room’s not far from the end of this maze. That’s how I got there last time. It doesn’t seem like they changed the configuration or anything like that,” Robin said. “They focused more on their goop and traps.”
Micah readjusted his helmet. Jennifer’s staff lit up in its reflection.
“Are you sure that there aren’t any more cattens hiding in the walls?” Jennifer asked.
“I’m not detecting any traps like that,” Robin said, waving his hand dismissively.
They ventured forth, stopping every so often to double check Robin’s assertions.
Telling them about a fight he once got into with an invisible flock of chickens, Micah circled around the group and kicked at the air. Jennifer assured him that the dungeon hadn’t had enough time to get invisible units. Visible chickens were the least of their worries.
What they needed to worry about was getting to the boss battle.
Jennifer’s staff glowed brighter than before. “We’ve got something coming our way.”
“Let it come to us. I’ll take it down.” Robin tapped his daggers together. “Feels good to be reunited.”
“I know. You’ve been saying that every time you start fighting.” Jennifer rolled her eyes.
A catten bounded into view. Minette’s Influence forced it to backtrack. It returned to where it came from.
Micah rubbed the bridge of his nose. “It’s the same trick all over again.”
“Don’t fall for it. We have to stay careful,” Robin said. “Slow steps the whole way. Stay vigilant.”
Micah and Jennifer allowed Robin to lead the way for them. Micah kept turning around every few steps to ensure that nothing was sneaking up on them. After what had happened, the adventurers were sharp enough to be mindful of the ceiling, as well. They were intent on making sure that nothing escaped their notice.
“I’d say that it’s kiting us, but there’s nowhere else for us to go but forward,” Jennifer said.
Micah cracked his knuckles, then shook out his hand. “I don’t like the look of this.”
“It’s not like they have any more traps up ahead. What could be so bad?” Robin asked.
Within minutes, Robin saw exactly what could be “so bad.” Unbeknownst to the adventurers, Minette had workercats stationed nearby, with walls separating them from the adventurers. Her Influence flared. From the Overview mode, Arden watched the catten from earlier turn back around to face the adventurers. As it did, Minette ordered a workercat to start digging.
The adventurers’ slow speed gave the workercat enough time to break through to the other side.
It may have been more scared than they were. The workercat shrieked, then ran-waddled past the group. Or at least, it tried. Micah’s grapple skill kept it from going anywhere. Holding it tight in his grip, Micah swung the workercat around like it was a toy before letting it go. It flew, and landed in a painful pile consisting only of itself.
Minette checked in with her pixie. “Hey, I need an update.”
“Ready on the next workercat,” Arden announced. “Bring him in.” Perched on its shoulder, she gripped the workercat’s fur for stability.
Jennifer blasted the workercat ahead of them with an electro-ball.
“Hang on,” Minette said to Arden.
Robin ran at the workercat. Before he could reach it, Arden and the workercat she was riding on burst through the wall. Arden leaped off of the workercat, then flew full-force into Robin’s nose.
She flew so hard that at first she didn’t know if it was his nose that had crunched or her body. The torrent of blood running down his face told her she got the result she wanted.
“Kill her!” he shouted around the pouring blood.
Arden dove down. She zipped around Robin’s ankles as she cast her Hallucination.
A hundred or so Ardens suddenly appeared. They buzzed around the hallway, swarming the adventurers. The real Arden disappeared among them. Micah swung his ax, the blade going through the nothingness that was the many fake Ardens. Arden concentrated on making their movement patterns unpredictable, yet realistic.
Robin vaulted, going through the Ardens in the same way. “Dammit. They’re everywhere.”
Jennifer’s staff glowed, a sign that she charging up her area of effect spell. “This should find her.”
“Backs against the wall,” Micah warned.
Arden came barreling towards the adventurers, cutting through the clusters of fakes.
It was a shame for Jennifer that she didn’t heed Micah’s warning sooner. Arden switched into her humanly Disguise, took the plain dagger out of her Inventory, and proceeded to stab her multiple times in the back.
Jennifer repelled her with her electro-shield. Not wanting to fry, Arden backed off.
Robin vaulted to get closer to her. He stuck his landing, and swung his daggers towards her face. Arden switched out of her Disguise, absorbing her weapon back into her Inventory, and reverting back into her usual pixie size. Robin let loose a string of foreign words that Arden assumed were swears in his mother tongue.
Arden flew into the crowd of Hallucinations. Robin gave chase, his arms moving like windmills to identify the fakes. Jennifer fired off blasts of electricity. Arden’s zigzag flying technique kept her from being slapped or electrified.
“Do something,” Robin snapped at their other melee fighter.
Sweat dribbled down Micah’s forehead. He’d taken on a far paler shade. The warrior stumbled, then leaned against the wall for support. His ax slipped from his fingers.
“What’s wrong with you?” Robin yelled.
“Ten million pixie flies,” Micah mumbled.
“They’re fake! And there’s not even ten million of them. What’s gotten into you? Is this because of your headache?”
“My head. My stomach. I’m burning up.” Micah fanned his sweat-drenched face. “I can’t focus, either. Something’s wrong with me.”
“Poison.” A red potion appeared in Jennifer’s hand. She chugged it with all of the grace of a seasoned adventurer. Her injuries disappeared. “Do you have a Cure on you?”
“I see colors. Many, many pretty colors.” Micah slumped to the ground.
“How could he have gotten poisoned?” Robin continued to cut through the fake Ardens. A green vial spun away from the center of his chest, a drop from his Inventory. Not breaking his stride in fighting the fake Ardens, he deftly kicked the vial over to Micah.
The vial clonked Micah in the head.
“Any of the monsters could’ve done it,” Jennifer said. She took a blue potion out of her Inventory before throwing out an electro-wave. “But something would’ve happened to us, too. We’ve fought the same monsters.”
“So it’s either a new development or… Pixie, get over here!” Robin battled his way down the hallway, attacking moving figures that did nothing to defend themselves.
Micah struggled to open the bottle, his hand shaking. He popped the cork. It ricocheted around the hallway. He tipped back the bottle over his mouth, pouring the contents inside.
“I don’t feel any different,” he said after swallowing. “There’s still lots of colors. If you saw this, you would not believe your eyes.”
Jennifer slammed the blue bottle to the ground when she finished it. “This isn’t from monster venom. This is something else. It must’ve been something he ate.”
“But then we would’ve been affected, too. I ordered the chicken for everyone!” Robin yelled over his fighting.
“We didn’t all drink the same things. Micah and Evangeline had drinks with that Smokey guy. The Kazzipurrian Special! He drugged them!”
A workercat crashed into the hallway, having dug into it according to the plan. Attention drawn to the new creature, Jennifer took aim. Robin ran for it, propelled by his sheer drive to kill. If he couldn’t find Arden, then the tubby cat creature would do in her stead.
Said tubby cat creature ran as fast as its stubby legs could take it.
Jennifer bl
asted it with her electricity skill. It shrieked in agony, convulsing as the shock overwhelmed it.
While this happened, Arden circled back. She headed straight to her next target.
“Something’s coming for me,” Micah said weakly.
“Ignore it. It’s the poison. Get up.” Robin halted before the cat creature, his daggers held out in front of him. The creature crawled towards the tunnel it once came from. “Hold on, Jennifer. I think we may have a shortcut through the maze now. They’re leading us right to the Dungeon Heart!”
“It’s coming for me!” Micah waved his arms.
“Jennifer, get over here!” Robin shouted. He whistled at her.
“I’m not your dog. I’m not going to go over there because you whistled for me. Learn some respect,” Jennifer said.
She was too busy lecturing Robin to notice the very real threat floating in front of Micah’s mouth.
“Get away from—” he started to say before Arden flew in.
It wasn’t a perfect entrance. She got a little chomped, but she made it partway inside and that was what mattered the most. Arden did her best to ignore the disgusting scent within the wet cavern that was Micah’s mouth.
His tongue undulated, an attempt at swallowing her whole.
Arden switched into her workercat Disguise. The transformation ripped Micah’s head apart. He split open, exploding like a sack of offal. Gore splattered onto the walls. Arden fell onto his headless body.
What remained of Micah exploded into glittery dust. His items, including his helmet and ax, spun in a flurry. His golden skull plopped to the ground.
The fake Ardens disappeared.
“Pixie! I will rip the wings from your body. Come over here!” Despite his request, Robin stomped his way towards her. She let go of her workercat Disguise, then flew upwards.
“Maybe you will if you can catch me,” she taunted.
What she didn’t account for was a less than fair fight when Jennifer got involved. A torrent of electro-blast came her way. Arden moved in a spiral pattern, doing what she could to avoid the blasts. Sadly, what she could do wasn’t quite good enough. Arden took a hit, and a bad one at that. It sent her spinning out, only to be hit with a second blast.
Robin threw a dagger at her.
It pierced her, going straight through her body and out the other side.
As she fell, Arden remembered vaguely noticing the other half her body falling as well.
[ALERT!
Sorry. You’re dead.]
Chapter 23
Arden woke to a pair of entirely too close eyes staring into hers. Minette was in her Projection form, the one with the pretty face and the adorable cat ears to match. The last time Arden had seen her like that, they were in the middle of a simulated “boss battle.” Arden whipped her head around to see if Robin and Jennifer had reached them yet.
To her relief, they were the only ones present in the Dungeon Heart room.
That relief dropped when she realized that they were lacking some much-needed defense.
“Defense, defense, yeah, we’ve got to have defense,” Arden repeated until her words stopped slurring. She shook out the jitters accumulating in her body. “Where are the rest of our units?”
“I sent them to slow down the adventurers’ advance. They’ve been taking shortcuts.”
“Where are they?”
“They’ll be here any minute now. And just to let you know, the workercats have been too freaked out to work so we’re pretty much bankrupt at the moment. Fantastic place to be, really.”
“So it’s the two of us against the two of them. And you can’t fight because you don’t have a real body.”
“That seems to sum it up nicely, yeah.”
“Lovely.”
“I did hold back two cattens just in case. They’re right outside the room.”
Arden narrowed her eyes. Had Minette mentioned that first, her anxiety wouldn’t have skyrocketed. With those cattens, they’d have a three plus a bunch of pyrotechnics on two battle. Their odds were better that way.
“Pull them back in here,” Arden said.
“Will do. Wave to them when they pass by. Their Morale scores are tanking.”
The cattens dragged their feet as they retreated to Minette’s orb. They lifted their heads slightly, their eyes mostly listless as they acknowledged Arden’s half-hearted wave.
Minette floated in the center of the room, her Projection able to move however she pleased. Her tall and imposing figure made Arden feel like a mini-pixie. She buzzed around Minette, trying to figure out the best arrangement. The initial moment of an adventurer entering into a boss battle had to be epic.
A terrible first impression would deflate everything. The epicness would leak out of the scene like a sad balloon. The right staging was important. The lighting, the music, the overall vibe and intensity, and their appearance factored. What Arden and Minette needed to land was their “zoom-in” moment.
At the Fuzzy Dungeon, the final boss’ pose involved an adorable head tilt and a demure expression. Those big shiny black button eyes were as misleading as they were deadly.
The Hellion Dungeon loved blast beats for background music, orange fire, blood dripping from its walls, and demon women chained up in the background. It suited their aesthetic. And the Snake Dungeon liked to have its trio of final bosses slithering from the floor to the ceiling before striking a hiss and some show-and-tell with their forked tongues.
It occurred to Arden that she hadn’t spoken to Minette about this crucial part of dungeon keeping. Minette seemed keen to keep the Dungeon Heart room the same way it was since the last time Robin visited.
The lighting dimmed. Operatic singers from nowhere filled the room with their haunted and tortured wails. A bass drum kicked a foreboding tempo. While it bordered on generic, Arden appreciated Minette’s efforts. They didn’t exactly fit their cat theme, but it was a worthy start.
Better to start with something than nothing at all. That kind of felt like the Trash Tier Dungeon’s motto. It was like molding clay. How hard was it to mold dry, crusty clay that hadn’t been manipulated in the slightest? The answer to that was very difficult. But if that clay has been handled and was wet and moist—
Arden stopped her train of thought right there.
The word “moist” tended to have that effect on people. It was a thought stopper.
The adventurers’ arrival had the opposite effect. Life flared and a huge buzz rose within Arden as soon as she saw them. Her insides screamed at her to “go, go and kill these people.”
Jennifer and Robin looked a little worse for wear. Of course, Robin’s hair was pretty much invulnerable to movement given the cement that he used as hair gel. There was a distinct layer of dirt to him, black soot on his fingers and cheeks.
Had Jennifer been a doll, she would’ve been one of those fraying ones with loose threads and seams rips. Pretty but no longer perfect, and in need of a sew job. She tipped her hat to fix the angle at which it sat on her head. Her left sleeve had a line of black muck going down it.
They must’ve survived an explosion from a spell or scroll Arden didn’t know about.
Out of the corner of her mouth, Arden said, “Strike a pose.”
Minette turned her feet slightly inward. She flexed her right arm, keeping her fist near her hip. With her left arm bent at the elbow, she brought her hand up to her face and spread her fingers out while glaring through the gaps between them.
Arden served Robin and Jennifer a left-facing profile. She bent her arm and held her hands in loose fists, her back mostly to the pair. Her shoulders leaned back and she slouched her right arm behind her.
Funky keyboard music began to play. Glorious colors exploded, acting as a backdrop behind them.
[-FINAL BOSS BATTLE-
Minette Ashes Max Felixia
Organic Feline Beast Dungeon Heart
AKA The Trash Tier Dungeon Heart
Health: Immeasurable.
; Mana: Enough mana to crush you fools with.
And…
Arden the Endless Terror
Organic Feline Beast Dungeon Pixie
AKA The Trash Tier Dungeon Pixie
Health: It’s rude to ask for a woman’s health points.
Mana: Overwhelming.]
The cattens circled Minette’s orb, her green Influence keeping them from leaving their defensive positions.
“You guys don’t look so good.” Arden smirked. “Where’s your false bravado now?”
“Piss off,” Robin growled. “This is all that matters.”
“Sounds like someone doesn’t want to acknowledge the fact that three of his friends are dead,” Arden said in a baby voice. She pouted.
Jennifer raised her staff towards the ceiling. Electricity gathered and sparked along the top of it. Its intensity grew, like the fattening of worms–nasty electrical worms that loved to zap people, that is.
Arden lifted her hand, casting a Hallucination of a flat stone disc floating over it. It rotated, spinning like a top.
“Let’s rock,” she said.
“We already know your tricks, idiot,” Jennifer said.
“But do you know mine?” Minette asked. She teleported behind Jennifer.
In reality, she turned off her Projection and recast it in the space behind Jennifer. But for all intents and purposes, she teleported behind the mage. Jennifer’s eyes flew open wide. She turned around, then let loose the spell she was charging.
A constellation of electricity shot out of her staff. It covered the room, zapping Minette’s orb, the cattens, Arden, and Minette’s Projection in a fake way. Minette’s Projection didn’t need to act out her cry of agony. Her Projection naturally convulsed the same way that Arden and the rest of the units did.
Robin’s flying dagger missed the majority of Arden. It wound up slicing past her, opening her arm and wings. Arden switched into her human Disguise, her fake stone disc now forgotten.
She drew Robin’s old dagger, the weapon he’d paralyzed her with.
They met in a clash, her blade against his. Their parry had them so close that Arden could smell Robin’s breath. Her eyes watered.
The Trash Tier Dungeon Page 26
