068 – Jane

The scent of sulfur hung distant on the air, like rotten eggs in a neighbor’s trashcan. Sometimes the smell was right in Jane’s face, but mostly, it was on the wind. The smell had been omnipresent for the last few weeks. It didn’t really bother Jane anymore; at least she could get away from the scent at night.

But this was not night; and thus Jane’s nose was filled with rotten eggs, and the smell of fire. With the sun probably somewhere in the thick, black clouds overhead, Jane tensed against a black boulder on the slope of a mountain, somewhere in the chain of volcanoes known as Firemaw Mountain. She glanced down at the corpse she had made of a lava elemental, ten meters away, while keeping her eyes also on the horizon; ever wary that something else might be sneaking up on her.

The corpse bubbled on the blackened ground, the dark shell of the body crumbling into the molten, still-glowing innards that Jane had scattered across the mountainside. Jane held her dark blue conjured sword tight, as it dripped molten slag. The sword suddenly cracked under the heat; the tip fractured, sending a wild break down the length the sword. The blade fell to dust and motes of light in Jane’s hand, the whole thing dispersing back into the ambient mana all around her. She did not immediately remake the weapon. Instead, she watched the corpse, waiting for it to move. But surely it was dead this time.

Lava elementals were fucking hard to kill. But as Jane watched, the glow of the body was already starting to fade, and soon enough, a Participation box appeared: 95%, the normal amount. She had gained level 59 earlier in the week after fighting a particularly large and resilient lava elemental, but this one was only level 50-something. No new level, no real change. But still, the fight was over. Jane breathed out relief as she relaxed against the boulder at her back. After a moment, she hauled her bag around to her front and took out the last of her lemon cookies. It was a bit stale and rather crumbly, but it was still good.

As she ate the cookie she looked all around her and saw only black, volcanic sand, cooled lava flows, or the blanketed sky. She looked up, trying to gauge the time according to the light in the air, though it was difficult with all the clouds, and the volcanoes around here poured enough light into the sky to make judging time difficult. A few nights of the last few weeks had been bright enough to read by, while the days had been dark as a moonless night. Currently, it might have been late afternoon, though she couldn’t really tell.

But those clouds up there were a different kind of dark than normal. As Jane watched, a nascent flash of lightning bubbled through the sky. All these clouds and shadows made zipping around with [Greater Shadowalk] rather easy, but clouds like those were a problem. Not a major one, but Jane had learned her lesson about hunting flame slimes in the exposed lava tubes that bore through the countryside all around here; it was a bad idea to do anything but a surface hunt.

Jane looked out across the land with [Ultrasight]. All she saw were three bumbling, plopping, glowing orange and yellow, beach-ball sized flame slimes, half-hidden in crevices and under overhangs, here and there. She looked up again, at the dark clouds.

Jane grumbled quiet displeasure. Clouds like those meant it was time to quit the field.

She had made the mistake of being outside for Firemaw Mountain rain, once. Once was more than enough. Acid rain was a lot more painful than Jane thought it would be, and breathing in acid rain was like sniffing razors. Acid elementals were worse than lava elementals, too

As the first drops of rain touched down next to Jane, each one caused a tiny plume of steam to hiss from the ground, and from the corpse of the lava elemental. The rain came down faster. The land began to hiss; to sound like a hundred tiny snakes had somehow snuck up on Jane and decided to threaten her with an orchestra of warning sound.

Jane took the warning to heart, this time. She wrapped herself in shadows, and vanished.

 

– – – –

 

Jane reappeared on a mountainside far away from the active volcanic range, under a star filled night sky. Three moons hung in the air, peeking out from behind tall, dark trees that had grown large from burying their roots deep into old lavaflows. Jane’s base was through the exposed roots of a tall tree, into the darkness meters away, but she did not instantly go inside. She stood on the grassy, branch-filled forest floor, and stared out into the straight-treed forest, wary for danger, but mostly worried.

She had completely missed sunset, losing track of time or losing time, but well before that, she also missed a call from her father. Maybe he just didn’t call today? That was the most reasonable answer.

Even though it was late, Jane tried him, anyway. Maybe Ophiel was close enough? A quick cast of [Telepathy] revealed what Jane had already suspected. Nothing happened. She was well out of range, no doubt. They had talked yesterday, though. Erick was doing well at Oceanside, and according to Poi, he was ‘a lot safer than they thought he would be’.

Jane briefly considered pinging Liquid to ask her to ping Poi, to then ping Erick, but there was no emergency. She’d just be upsetting a lot of people that didn’t need to be upset. Jane sighed out into the night. She was just feeling a little lonely, is all. She had been out here, eating flame slimes for a full month and progressing well enough on her [Fire Body]… But progression sure did start to feel repetitive after a while. Hunting monsters in no-man’s land gave practically zero satisfaction. The only person Jane was serving right now was herself, and that was quite an icky feeling.

Jane looked to the tangled roots at the entrance to her base, and turned away, back to the night. She frowned out into the clean, dark air, breathing in the scent of the forest—

Carrion.

She dropped into shadow, quickly searching through the surrounding forest with tendrils of darkness and eye-less sight, trying to find whatever smelled so strongly of carrion. Whatever it was, held practically the same scent as a wyrm, but it was close, and nothing was crashing through the forest. Wyrms crashed through the forest; they did not slink or sleep. But since no obvious ‘wyrm sounds’ reached Jane’s ears she had no idea what was nearby, and that was terrifying.

With eyes as distant as every shadow around her, Jane quickly found her prey.

It was not a single monster. It was twelve. Maybe. No… Less than twelve? Jane briefly poked her real eyes out of a distant shadow, trying to understand what the darkness told her, for these beasts were unlike any she had ever sensed before.

She barely saw them with her real eyes. A quick shift to spider solved the problem.

Eight thin creatures, humanoid in the vaguest sense of the word, walked through the tall forest, matching the trees for their height, and barely made a sound for their travels. The stretched-out monsters were covered in silver fur, but barely visible to the naked eye.

The trees were twenty meters to the top, and the creatures were the same. Their actual body was mostly their two legs and two arms, while their tiny body on top of those 18 meter long legs was only a meter long, itself. Of their heads, Jane could see none.

They walked away from Jane, staying in the moonlight, walking with methodical, trained ease, almost invisible to the world, but not to Jane. They were hunting; they had already found success.

The bodies of four of the creatures were distended, like big bellies atop silver, furry sticks. Dark blood matted some of their silver fur, while two of them, with arms that reached all the way to the ground, each clutched their own half of a monsterized deer.

As Jane watched, one of the monsters reached down, ever so easily, and with tiny hands barely bigger than its thin, thin arms, the monster picked up another deer that just stood in their path, like it couldn’t even see the cadre of silver furred things looming above. With a grip and a rip and one final bleat before it died, the deer came apart. The monster shoved the front half of the deer into its body, eating it in one bite. Another silver monster grabbed the other half of the deer from the first one’s hand and turned, just enough, so that Jane could see its face.

Its entire torso was the face, and the head. The shaggy silver monster opened itself wide and shoved the deer parts into a gaping, tooth-filled maw. The deer disappeared inside, and the monster closed itself back up, going from sarlacc pit to furry pillow in a single second, but its torso remained distended with its meal.

Judging from its tiny belly, and the triple-size bellies of some of the others, that particular silvery creature was still several deer short of its nightly feeding goal.

And in their path, lay the offal and body parts they couldn’t be bothered to gather up and eat. These creatures were half eating to eat, and half eating to kill. If they were hungry, they would have eaten the pieces that lay scattered in their wake.

They were obviously monsters. No doubt about that. Jane’s [Eyes of Magic] revealed the rads hidden in their torso area; like drops of the sun in the center of a ribbons of light that led to all the rest of their long, long bodies. What were they called, though?

What… were… they—

Moon reachers. They were called moon reachers. They hunted in packs and only came out in the forest when the moons were out. Naturally invisible, but slow moving, they moved and ate and killed until they were full, then they wrapped their arms and legs around themselves to sleep off their hunt. Their fur was supposed to be really tough…

And that was all Jane could remember. There was something else, though. Something terribly vital, that she could not remember for the life of her.

If she chose to fight these monsters, it just might be ‘for the life of her’, too.

And anyway, these monsters stayed away from civilization. Jane didn’t need to risk a fight, because she didn’t need to kill these monsters. From the way they just picked up and ate that deer, they likely had some sort of unnatural invisibility. They weren’t a threat to anyone but other adventurers in the forests, prey animals, or other monsters. Jane decided to let them go. The next time she talked to father, she would ask him to look up ‘moon reachers’ for her; then, and only then, would she even consider fighting a monster that clearly displayed such unnatural ability to capture prey.

As Jane watched, another deer walked out of the forest, into the path of the moon reachers. This one was a buck with huge antlers that drank in the night. It looked up at the moon reachers, and did nothing. Four of the skinnier monsters grabbed the buck and ripped it apart. The buck never stood a chance. Guts and organs and even one leg rained across shaggy silver legs, but the monsters on top of those legs didn’t seem to care. They ate the pieces of deer they managed to grab, and left the rest for the scavengers. The one that got the head plucked the antlers off and tossed them aside, before plunging the head into its gaping maw.

And the group marched on, almost completely silent, their narrow legs and arms gently swaying in the moonlight, like nothing Jane had ever seen before.

Jane, as a spider and half-melded into shadows, fully melded into shadow. She left the moon reachers to their plodding, bloody march through the moonlit forest. She headed to base.

Beyond the twisted roots of a tree, down a dark, thin tunnel twenty-five meters deep, Jane touched upon a tile floor in a room she had crafted for herself out of [Stoneshape]. She had bought [Stoneshape] after seeing how useful it had been to her father to escape those hunters. Since then, she had bought all the rest of the Shaping spells, too. They had each proven themselves mighty useful. [Shadowshape] and [Greater Shadowalk] went together quite well. [Flameshape] would likely prove the same after Jane eventually got [Fire Body].

Jane cast a lightward into the air, revealing her base. She smiled a little, but it was a forlorn smile.

The room was a standard three meter by three meter box, with a level for cooking and a level for sleeping, though there was no furniture. A vent in the back of the room exited to the surface and bled off air that came in through the front tunnel. The vent up there was angled hard, both to prevent theoretical intruders, and rain. The front tunnel was the same, and only accessible with [Shadowalk] anyway. It was a good defense. Jane would add more before she went to sleep, but this was a good start.

Though some water had still gotten in to the room, somehow. A puddle lay in the dipped edge of the stone space. Jane cleaned out the puddle with a bit of [Watershape], pushing it through the stone. She used a bit more [Stoneshape] to seal up the holes. When that was done, Jane cast a wide [Cleanse] into the room, turning the air vibrant and fresh.

She breathed deep, then set to remaking the furniture.

In minutes, her bed was back, and just because she could, it was a four poster work of magnificence, with dark wood and a padded mattress, with thick, fluffy comforters and dark black drapes. Jane filled the kitchen part of the room with stainless steel masterworks, like she would have found in any rich person’s kitchen back on Earth. They were just for show, though. Their silver exteriors were fake, their insides were hollow. Jane didn’t need to cook, or eat, because she had already eaten a lot today.

Flame slime cores did not taste very good, but she had certainly eaten enough of them.

… And she was still a spider.

Jane fixed that with a quick [Polymorph]. As she moved her body back into human-position, she moved her bag from around her thorax to around her waist, and her rings from the hooks of her spider feet, to around her fingers. [Polymorph]ing items around from human to spider and back again was not an easy thing to do. Jane had messed up more than a few times in the beginning, but she had eventually gotten the hang of it. Using her flame slime body with items was completely out of the picture, though. Jane had tested that out with scraps of cloth and wooden bands, and burned everything, every time she tried.

Her flame slime form was great. Being a flame slime let her eat other Flame Essence monsters without burning herself. But it was impossible to wear her rings or hold her bag when she was basically a ball of gelatinous fire.

But for now, she was human again. She tossed her bag onto a conjured table, then conjured a luxurious cotton nightie onto her body, then cast an air conditioning [Ward] into the room. She moved to the bed. Every muscle ached, but it was a good ache. Jane was tired, and sleeping right now was a great idea.

First things first, though. Jane conjured drapes of bells and aluminum cans across the entrance to the room, and then a tripline leading to more cans, and an [Alarm Ward]. As a final touch, she spent 3500 mana to craft an [Absorption Ward] across the whole space. She looked upon her work, and decided it was good. It was nice to have 4200 maximum mana. Her dad’s rings were certainly pulling their weight. They made her Status look rather nice, too.

 

 

The results of her Flame Essence hunting were doing alright, too.

 

 

She could move around inside fire like she could with [Shadowalk]; she just couldn’t ‘fire teleport’ yet. [Fireblend] was no [Fire Body], but it was close. Probably.

Months ago, Jane had gotten [Shadowblend] from eating the shadow spider, and after that, it took her a month of eating shadowolves in Ar’Kendrithyst to get [Shadowalk]. If [Fireblend] was the same as [Shadowblend], then it might hold to the same pattern. Jane did not want to hunt flame slimes for another full month, but she was going to hunt them for a few more days, at least. Flame slimes were much easier to eat than shadowolves; all she had to do was eat the core.

Ahh. Speaking of a core. Jane had almost forgotten…

Jane dismissed her nightie, and set her rings on a suddenly conjured night stand.

She briefly [Polymorph]ed back into a flame slime, once last time for the day, and felt around inside herself for any rads. As her orange and yellow goopy body plopped to the floor, she plucked out tiny fragments of crystallized mana from her wiggly self. The fragments were nothing even remotely dangerous, but eating cores meant eating rads, so it was better to be safe than monsterized.

Monsterfication was a process, anyway; Jane was only worried about becoming a monster in the way that one worries about breaking a bone, but Jane had broken a fair amount of bones in her time on Veird. So Jane plucked rad shards from her body, and felt better about herself. It was better to be safe, than sorry.

She [Polymorph]ed back to human then conjured another cotton nightie as she put her rings back on. With one final [Cleanse] refreshing the air and herself, Jane crawled into bed and wrapped herself in her fluffy comforters. She telekinetically shut the drapes on her four poster bed, then closed her eyes, feeling a bit safe.

Safe enough for being on the edge of a forest of monsters, anyway.

 

– – – –

 

Jane woke to a mental poke.

‘Hey, Jane!’

Jane blinked hard as she pushed her covers away. She stretched long, as she telekinetically pulled back the velvet covering of her four poster bed. Light streamed in from the room; her wardlights were still active.

She sent, ‘Hey, Dad.’

‘Did I wake you?’

Jane slipped out of bed, and decided it was time enough to get up. She dismissed her bed and her nightie, then conjured her armor. She pulled her hair back into a clasp and began to get ready for the rest of the day, as she sent, ‘Yeah. But that’s not your fault. My nights are kinda messed up. Hard to tell what’s night and what’s day recently. The clouds have gotten so thick that they block out the sun.’

Worry tainted Erick’s voice, ‘All that smoke! I know I asked you before, but are you breathing alright? Are you really okay up there?’

‘Yeah.’ Jane did a few stretches as she sent, ‘I’m breathing fine. I wear a mask and goggles. It gets bad sometimes, but I have [Greater Treat Wounds] and [Cleanse]. They’re more than enough to deal with a little bit of smoke. And besides: When I’m a flame slime, the need to breathe is non-existent.’

‘I’ll take your word for it.’

Jane changed the subject, ‘How’s Oceanside? Any changes in the past week?’

‘I’m still loving it. I told you about dungeons, but I think I like making places like this a lot more than I thought I would.’ He sent, ‘Still working on that Mana Sense, though. Calloway says that a good Mana Sense is crucial to making the best dungeons. Are you trying to get Mana Sense? It should work well with [Hunter’s Instincts]. Teressa is coming with me now to some private tutoring with Rue, and both of them already have [Hunter’s Instincts]. I’m still working on combining my own physical skills.

“But anyway. Rue confirmed my theory that the flow of battle you sense with [Hunter’s Instincts] is very similar to the flow you get in a fight with a monster with Mana Sense. Teressa is all fired up to learn the skill, and she’s already made some headway. I still can’t clear my head to save my life.’

Jane stretched as she listened to her father. When he was done, she sent, ‘I can’t clear my head, either. Besides, I have [Eyes of Magic] as a spider.’

‘That doesn’t let you see around corners.’

‘… True.’ Jane sent, ‘Eh. I’ll work on it. I’m working on Flame Essences right now. I got up to [Fireblend] the other day.’

‘Really! That’s great!’

Jane smiled as she walked around her room, and her father’s love trickled through their telepathic connection. She had gotten [Fireblend] a lot more than a few days ago, but she waited to tell her father about it until she needed a confidence boost. Apparently today was that day.

He sent, ‘Does that mean another full month of hunting slimes for [Fire Body]?’

Jane’s joy doubled. Her father had never really paid attention to all the make-believe magic she had loved back on Earth, but now he was focused on every nuance of real magic on Veird. He had listened to her talking about her magic, he was able to connect one piece of magic information with the other, and he had gotten over a lot of his reluctance to kill. Erick had changed a lot since the both of them fell to Veird.

They had both changed a lot…

Well. Maybe Jane hadn’t changed. Not really.

Jane smiled as she sent, ‘Maybe it’ll take a month. Maybe not. I won’t stick around for that, though. The skills are fundamentally different. Shadows don’t always reach each other, so you can’t move around a battlefield very well unless you have [Shadowalk], or you cast a [Shadoward]. But fire tends to spread. [Fireblend] is good enough for a fight in a forest of flammables.’ Jane added, ‘So it’s only a few more days of this and I’m gone to the Sovereign Cities west of the Wasteland Kingdoms. It’s Spring, and the Unicorn Hunts are starting soon.’

Worry filled the connection, as Erick sent, ‘Have you tried your flame slime against mind control effects yet? I mean the real stuff, too. Not the spells you tested with Liquid’s help.’

‘Not really. But I’ve read up on the requirements to join the Hunt, and they’re either a slime body, or the acceptance of a cut-off collar. Most people take the collar but I won’t be doing that.’

‘I’m glad you’re not taking the second option, but I still worry. I’m also proud of you, Jane.’

Jane smiled.

Erick sent, ‘Will they allow you to eat the unicorn afterward?’

Jane frowned, suddenly unsure. ‘Maybe. All I want are the heart and the brain, but I’ll be in a group and the things are so damned valuable that it might be a problem. But even if they don’t, I’ll still gain the experience fighting a unicorn that I can use to hunt down my own unicorn later.’

‘Fair enough.’ Erick paused, then suddenly said, ‘Oh! Right. I remember now what I wanted to say. Just today, I read in Hocnihai’s book on [Prismatic Ward] that he used a unicorn horn to contemplate how to connect all the pieces together.’ Erick sent, ‘I don’t know if it will help, but you should get one and see if you can get [Prismatic Ward].’ He added, ‘I’m still working on that one.’

Erick continued, ‘[Reflection] is a pretty great spell, too. I got a version I’m happy with a few hours ago. It took a few tries because I tried Hocnihai’s methods, thinking of magic as bouncy ball, and it worked well enough. But then I started to consider a dual Particle-Energy theory of magic, where mana is both particle and light. And then blam! A great version! I didn’t tell anyone about the Particle-Energy theory of mana, and it might just be my own experiences reflected upon the mana— That happens with almost all tiered magic according to Rue. Anyway. Here:’

 

 

Erick sent, ‘It’s not very useful in that I already have a [Personal Absorption Ward] active all the time, but it’s good for Ophiel. He can’t really use a [Personal Absorption Ward], anyway.’ He added, ‘And it’s a bit wonky in that it doesn’t seem to reflect all spells equally and it doesn’t work against most of the damage done by physical spells. Like— [Stone Blade] uses real stone alongside the magic that animates the stone. So [Pure Reflection Ward] will reflect the magic in the [Stone Blade], but not the actual blade itself. Kiri got [Stone Blade], by the way. We sparred with it, experimenting and what have you, and the [Stone Blade] did 0 spell damage and broke half the time —likely due to reflecting damage upon itself— but Kiri was still able to get [Strike] damage through, though that, too, was considerably less than it should have been. Probably because the weapon had lost much of its structural integrity.’

Jane had conjured a plush chair to sit in while Erick talked. She smiled a little, knowing that her father was gaining a lot of defenses. Maybe she should get [Reflection], too. Her [Personal Ward] was great, but she couldn’t recast it in the middle of combat like Erick could. All Jane was missing was [Rebound].

She had the extra points… hmm…

She sent, ‘[Melee Reflection] would also reflect the physical [Strike] damage, too, wouldn’t it?’

‘According to Hocnihai, yes.’

Jane bought [Rebound]. She was down to two extra points, now.

She sent, ‘You’ve sold me. I just bought [Rebound]. It won’t be useful outside of special circumstances, but I can see it being very useful in those special circumstances.’ She stood up, saying, ‘I’m going to try for Mana Sense and [Prismatic Ward] when I have the time, but I’m not so sure I can make them. I gotta go, though. It’s nice talking to you. I love you, Dad.’

‘Love you too, Jane. If you can’t keep safe out there, be sure to give ‘em hell!’

Jane laughed, then sent, ‘I will. Talk to you later.’

Her connection to Erick broke like the skin of a drying soap bubble; slowly, then all at once.

Jane paused in the center of her stone room. There was something else she needed to talk to her father about, wasn’t there? She thought for a moment. She almost called him back; Ophiel was likely still in range. But. Meh. Whatever. Whatever it was must not have been important.

Jane wrapped herself in shadow, and zipped through her base’s tunnel, past mossy silver boulders nestled against the roots of the tree that hid her sanctuary, into the afternoon forest, where the sun came in sideways and light barely penetrated the canopy.

Zip, zip, zip, and Jane stood under the dark clouds common to the volcanoes, with nary a tree in sight. She would have built her base at the volcano itself, but this place was full of monsters, and lava. The lava wasn’t that bad, but lava elementals were. There weren’t that many monsters in the nearby forest, anyway. Something was probably eating them all; likely wyrms.

 

– – – –

 

With a two-meter wide [Cooling Ward] attached to her hair-clip and a two-meter wide [Weather Ward] attached to a [Conjure Item] bracelet, as well as a facial wrap and goggles, Jane was protected from the worst of the heat and ash that felt from everpresent, sky-choking clouds. Lightning flickered tiny sparks inside those clouds, but the rains of yesterday had long since fallen. Ash filled the air, now, and not much else. Occasionally Jane flashed a [Cleanse Aura] out, but mostly, she hunted.

Jane moved like certain death across a dark land of exposed lava pools, unstable footing, and monsters. Flame slimes gathered in the myriad of hot spaces. Where a lava tube had cracked and red glows filled the air. Where dips in the land that should have gathered rain, instead gathered tumbling, oozing balls of bright yellow goo, that could not get out of the pit. The slimes grew on the ridges of the main volcano calderas, where bursts of lava knocked them loose, and they came tumbling down the mountainside like incandescent snowballs.

Mostly, Jane extracted cores. With some well practiced [Stoneshape], she sliced away the goo, revealing the glowing white core. Each of the slimes were worth almost no experience at all, but Jane wasn’t after experience anyway. She took their freed cores, and when she got three or four, she [Shadowalk]ed to a central location, where she dumped the cores, for now.

A lava elemental interrupted Jane’s circuit through Firemaw Mountain when she was only a third of the way through. She dropped the cores to the ground as the lava elemental began to move like liquid steel; heavy and dangerous. It attacked, suddenly, with balls of lava that slammed into the ground where Jane had been, as both of them moved across the blackened sands. Jane avoided the attack, only for those balls of lava to get right back up and follow her every movement. Jane [Blink]ed to the main body, attacking the glowing lava with a conjured greathammer, [Strike]ing with all her might. The lava elemental hardened as her [Strike] hit; its red-orange-yellow body turning completely black at the point of contact.

Obsidian flecks smashed away from the lava elemental as Jane’s greathammer bounced against the creature. Jane would have splattered the monster across the land, but it had reacted too fast. It didn’t seem to care of the little damage Jane had done, as it just melted again, attempting to flow over Jane.

Jane melded into shadows, escaping as she simultaneously lifted spears of darkness from the land around her, [Shadowshape]ing them into deadly things that pierced the lava elemental. The lava elemental cared a bit more this time, as torrents of its own glowing body scattered across the land. It melted away from the shadow spears; melting itself, and the spears, as it began to run.

The battle turned. Jane pursued the lava elemental, harrying it with shadow spears and her own conjured greathammer, stabbing and slamming when she found an opening. If she didn’t kill it, it would track her and attack. Jane had made the mistake of letting one go the last time she had been here; never again.

The fight took her ten more minutes, but she killed the damn thing. These lava elementals were the reason she didn’t hunt for flame slimes as a flame slime herself. Sure, she could sneak around that way, if she didn’t come into direct contact with a lava elemental; the lava elementals liked to eat flame slimes, too. But as soon as she came into contact with a lava elemental it took a lot longer to kill one without the extra Stats of her rings. 20 more Strength and Willpower made her [Strike]s with a greathammer and her shadowy spears much, much more effective than anything else Jane had tried.

Jane went back to the start of the fight. She gathered up her dropped flame slime cores then went to her central location, where she stored the slimes in a depression in the ground alongside with the rest. She looked down at the two dozen cores she had gathered. Some of them were beginning to fade from white to yellow, ever so slightly. She needed to eat them, and soon.

Now was as good a time as any.

Jane dismissed her clothes. Her rings and her bag went into an organized pile nearby.

She quickly transformed into a tumbly, bumbly, pile of yellow-orange goo. Being a flame slime was okay. Jane had hoped that it would be a nicer experience after leveling her Flame Essence skill a dozen times, but the only thing that had really improved had been her eyesight.

Or rather ‘eyesight’.

Jane could now see her nearby surroundings with a normal sort of vision. It wasn’t exactly like normal; she had no actual eyes. But she could ‘see’ everything with perfect clarity out to maybe ten meters. Past that things got a bit fuzzy, though Jane could extend her vision out to a hundred meters with [Ultrasight], or [Hunter’s Instincts].

Jane took a moment to look all around herself with 360 degree vision, making sure that there were no monsters nearby before she decided to get her meal. She rolled over and down the slope, into the depression that held the dozen cores, rolling right over the orbs. The cores popped into her gelatinous body as fast as she could eat them, which, as it turns out, was a dozen at a time. She relaxed around the cores, bursting them with fire, drawing out the essence inside. She felt and watched as a flaming spot of reality soaked into herself with each burst core.

Consuming a dozen cores only took a minute.

When that was done, Jane turned back into herself and dressed her human body in dark blue [Conjure Armor]. She slipped her rings back onto her fingers, and continued the hunt.

She ate three hundred more slimes that day. And then, because a quick jaunt home revealed the noon-time sun, Jane went back to the mountain and gathered up another hundred slime cores.

Jane was ‘full’ after her first meal of a dozen cores, which would have been a problem if she wasn’t a slime. As a slime, this was no problem at all. Whenever she felt too ‘full’ —which was a strange enough concept to have as a plop of slime— all Jane had to do was leave behind some goo she gained, and she was back to feeling ‘not that full’.

This was a much nicer process than what she had to go through with the shadow spider.

 

– – – –

 

Jane made it back to base just as the sun was setting. As the moons crested the canopy, the forest lay dark with shadow. It would have been a nice night, if not for an obvious problem.

Something had come through the forest just outside of her base, like a miniature tornado had ripped across the land. The tree and its covering roots had been yanked away, completely. Other nearby trees had been uprooted. Rocks had been torn from the ground. Jane smelled the air with [Scent Tracker] and carrion came to her. It was not an immediately worrying scent, for the smell was distant, old.

A wyrm had probably come through and torn up the place for whatever reason.

Jane looked all around, at the thin, shaggy silver trees of the forest. Maybe she should go hunt the wyrm? She needed to investigate her base, first.

She dropped into shadows as a breeze filled the glade.

The inside of her base was dark. All but one of her wardlights were gone, save for a single corner glow that cast the room in deep shadows. The tiny glow was enough to show that something very wrong had happened here while Jane had been away. The floor, the roof, the walls, everything had been scratched up, like daggers had been drawn across the hard stone edges of the boxy space. Something had clawed around, searching.

A lot of somethings had clawed around, searching.

A cold fear crept up Jane’s backside. She flared [Hunter’s Instincts] and dropped into the shadows. She hid. She wasn’t sure why she hid. But she knew, utterly and completely, that if she didn’t hide, she would be dead. It was an instinct simultaneously her own, and not her own. The deep dread coiling around Jane’s mind did not come from [Hunter’s Instincts], but from the shadow spider, and it told her to hide if she wanted to live.

As she hid there in the dark, something scrambled across the stone. Fingers, or nails, or something else, sharp and grasping and wanting to kill, touched the shadows all around Jane, pulling at the darkness, but unable to grab hold.

Jane shifted inside the shadows, becoming a shadow spider, fully immersing herself in a body that knew how to deal with the dark things of the world. As her uncontrolled shift completed, her rings and her bag dropped into reality; like baubles and wreckage surfacing from a wrecked ship, bubbling up from a pool of darkness. She had no time for any of that, though.

Because now she could see them, and whatever they were, snakes or feelers, they couldn’t hide from Jane’s [Eyes of Magic]. Whatever mind control the hands possessed, the natural resistance of the spider finally allowed Jane to realize a pall had been drawn around her sense of her surroundings.

Long, shaggy silver arms, reached across her room, digging at her shadows. Eight arms in total. Seven of them came from the front entrance, while the eighth clawed down from the vent in the back of the room. Tiny hands pulled and prodded at the darkness, searching, but finding nothing.

One hand grabbed Jane’s bag and rushed backward, taking its prize with it.

One hand managed to brush against one of Jane’s rings. It paused, then grabbed the ring, ever so daintily. It slipped the ring on a finger. Jane’s ring joined a dozen other gold, or silver, or iron rings. All of the hands had rings all over every finger.

Jane moved to the top of the room and exposed herself just enough to [Stoneshape] the tunnel shut. She had set up a collapse expecting some sort of monster, but she never expected this. As tons and tons of stone collapsed on the monsters, trapping six of the seven on the floor of the entrance to her room, they squirmed and they shuffled, but did not seem to care. No blood came, no bones broke.

All seven of the shaggy arms had sensed Jane peeking out of the shadows. They reached up for the darkness containing Jane, but none of them found purchase, for she ducked back into the shadows too fast for them to grab. Jane used the distraction to grab the second ring resting on the floor and put it on a foot-claw. The silver arms and tiny hands sensed her brief exposure. They tried to grab her, but failed; again.

If tons of stone didn’t stop them, how the fuck was she going to kill them?

Jane briefly exposed herself just long enough to use a spell she rarely ever used, a [Health Drain Ward].

Dark blue light flashed into the collapsed tunnel, covering six of the seven arms as they all reached for her. They found nothing but slippery shadow. Jane had never used a [Health Drain Ward] offensively. They were primarily used for doctor work, to strip away the Health barrier so that they could cut on the body. [Drain Ward] did no damage at all, but it felt like pure itching hell if anyone except a doctor used it, and Jane was certainly no doctor.

Jane touched a leg into her own [Drain Ward], and quickly pulled back. Yup. Itching hell, for sure. But the shaggy silver arms didn’t seem to care. They stayed in the [Drain Ward], reaching for Jane, but finding nothing.

Jane peeked out on the very back of the room, instantly casting a modified [Conjure Weapon], and testing for responsiveness, before ducking back into shadow. The arms slammed into where she had been. Jane whipped around the room, taking out her weapon, and taking aim at the gathered arms, under the stone that did nothing to trap them, but certainly helped to keep them stable in one position.

Jane ripped a giant-sized meat cleaver from the shadows above, powering a [Strike] with all her might, guiding her blow with darkness. She brought down an edge of Force that would have cracked a boulder in half; it had in all the testing she had done, anyway.

The cleaver slammed through six arms, as seven tried to reach for her. The seventh grabbed a back leg. It yanked, pulling Jane to the back of the room, pulling her leg off. Black blood spurted over the stone. Jane dropped her cleaver.

She was in pain?

… What was she doing again? She looked all around. She took stock of the moment.

She briefly saw a black spider leg vanish up the vent in the back off the room.

Something was very fucking wrong. What the fuck was going on? What the fuck were these silver shaggy arms? Where was her other ring? Why was she only wearing—

Where the fuck was her leg!

Jane spat into the air through her fang-filled mouth, “Fuck fuck—”

Jane sunk into shadow. She took the shaggy arms with her; all of them had rings on the fingers of their tiny hands, and each of them were as light as feathers. What did they belong to? Were they attacking her? They had to be what happened, right?

Okay. Okay. Jane had a plan for this sort of situation. She had drilled it into herself a few times. What was it?

… Always have a plan…

In case of unknown attackers and strange situations—

This was a mental attack! It wasn’t a unicorn, right? Unicorns didn’t have shaggy arms, did they? No. Unicorns were horses and nightmare made flesh. This was something else. And whatever it was, was not in Jane’s memory.

Retreat.

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Jane secured the shaggy arms and [Greater Shadowalk]ed the fuck out of there.

She reappeared under the ashy sky, alone on the dark, volcanic fields. She stayed there, as a spider, for a minute, gently bleeding out from her ripped leg, watching all around herself in every direction at once, making sure no strange magics held on the horizon. She breathed hard. But soon enough, she calmed. Jane morphed back to human and conjured clothes. She secured the bendy, shaggy arms in a conjured bag. Her own bags with all her normal stuff were back at her base, but there was no fucking way she was going back in there unprepared.

Even now, as she looked all around her, she wondered what she was doing. Shouldn’t she be in bed? She was going that direction. But then she looked at the severed shaggy arms at her feet, and terror crawled across her skin to settle in her chest.

Jane opened a channel to Liquid, all the way back in Spur. ‘Team Leader Jane Flatt requesting permission to inquire about something weird.’

Jane stood there on the volcanic sand, breathing out a terror coiling around her heart.

After a minute, Liquid sent, ‘Report.’

‘What do these belong to?’ Jane sent along an image of the arms. ‘I can’t remember—’

‘Come to Spur immediately, Jane. You’re in danger. Come to the Courthouse right now! My office!’

Jane and her cargo of six shaggy silver monster arms left the field in a blip of dark blue.

She was already freaked out; didn’t have to tell her twice to leave the scene.

 

– – – –

 

Three quick [Teleport]s landed Jane in Liquid’s office. The matte-grey wrought stood next to her, alongside Guildmaster Mog and a priest. Pure worry crinkled Liquid’s dragonkin face, but at Jane’s appearance, and at the dropping of six shaggy arms into her office, Liquid put on her business face.

Jane said, “Hello. I’m not sure what I’m doing here. Uh.” She looked around. “Hello, Guildmaster.”

Mog nodded at Jane, but it was not a happy nod. It was a look of worry and concern.

Liquid pointed to a chair. “Sit, Jane. That’s an order.”

Jane’s eyebrows went up, but she sat down in the chair, as ordered.

Mog looked down at the arms. She said, “They really are reacher arms, aren’t they?”

“It appears so.” Liquid stepped over the arms to stand next to Jane.

The priest moved with Liquid to stand next to Jane. She muttered about checking Jane over, so Jane let her. The priest asked Jane to stand and shuck her clothes, so Jane did as she was asked. The priest began poking around at Jane’s body, looking for something.

Liquid frowned. “Nothing? No wounds?”

Jane almost said something, but Liquid interrupted her with a stern look. Mog conjured heavy metal gauntlets then began setting the arms across the floor into orderly lines, instead of in a pile.

The priest spoke with practiced authority, “She was definitely touched. No doubt there. But it’s mostly gone, now.”

Liquid asked, “Anything else?”

The priest stepped back from Jane, saying, “The wound was suffered in a different form, and not treated. Probably her spider form.” She pointed to Jane’s side, near her hip. “A leg was torn off.”

Jane looked to her side. Her skin swirled on her hip, like an old wound. Her eyes went wide. “What the fuck.”

“You’re okay now, Jane,” Liquid said, her grey eyes turning softer.

The priest said, “You can put your clothes back on, now.”

Jane conjured dark blue cloth armor around her body. It might have been a bit more sturdy than normal, but that was only because Jane was feeling a bit more vulnerable than normal.

Mog pointed to one of the tiny hands on the shaggy arms, saying, “This is one of Erick’s rings.”

A small panic filled Jane’s head. She touched her fingers. “One of my rings is gone.” She looked up. “What happened?” She tried to remember… “I’m not sure where I was.”

Mog stood tall, saying, “You were attacked by moon reachers. They’re one of the monsters in the Wyrmridge mountains that people are warned against. There’s no way you didn’t know about them, so don’t think that this was a matter of going off unprepared. You were prepared. But moon reachers have the ability to make you forget the important details about them.” She said, “They relentlessly track down any people they find. The only way to survive them is to run at first glance, and to not stop until you’re back in a city. The only way to fight them is with a lot of mental defenses, and an uncommonly strong attack.” She gestured to the arms, “How did you manage that?”

The priest said, “She was touched, Guildmaster. She doesn’t know.”

Liquid said, “Thank you, Sister. You can go, now.”

The priest did a small curtsy and left the room.

Mog watched the priest go, then turned to Jane, “You have no idea how you survived, do you, Jane?”

About a hundred thoughts swirled in Jane’s mind as she sat on the chair in Liquid’s office, while Mog stood over six shaggy silver arms and Liquid stared at her. All of those thoughts were at odds with each other, but the one that came out of Jane’s mouth was, “I don’t even know why I’m here.”

Liquid sighed.

Mog turned directly to Jane, and spoke in a low, calm voice. “Your short term memory has been afflicted by a skill called [Thought Fog]. Moon reachers passively emit the skill. Mostly, it just makes their victims docile as they can’t see the monster for what it is. Most people never survive their first encounter. [Thought Fog] has a compounding effect, and because they hunt in groups it can get pretty bad. If they touch you, that’s even worse. Most survivors report that they didn’t even realize they were missing limbs. If a victim doesn’t get away after the first touch, they probably aren’t ever getting away. Moon reachers like to taunt their prey until their prey can’t even move, for all their thoughts are dust and air. Then they kill their victim, and take trophies from the corpse.” She looked down to the arms on the floor. “There are about a hundred rings here, and I doubt you got all their arms, meaning this pack has killed at least a few hundred people.”

Liquid added, “I’m guessing 500 victims, at least.”

Jane looked around the room. Her thoughts seemed cloudy. “… What?”

Mog spoke to Liquid, “It’s going to get worse before it gets better.”

Liquid nodded, saying, “I know.”

Mog turned to Jane. “When you’re cognizant, ask your father to [Withering] the area where you were. They might still be there.”

Jane paused. “… What?”

Mog turned to Liquid, saying, “She’s vulnerable right now.”

“I know.” Liquid said, “She’ll be staying here at the Courthouse for the night with me.”

“… What?”

 

– – – –

 

Jane woke on a cot, facing a wall of books and knickknacks. A small spike of red-purple kendrithyst caught her eye; it sat in a glass holder, and there were no characteristic shadows inside the glittering mass of stone.

Memories of last night came to Jane like hazy clouds as she rolled over, tossing off her covers. She sat up. She paused as she saw Liquid, sitting behind her desk, in her office, working on papers.

“Good morning,” Liquid said, as she scratched a quill across paperwork, not lifting her face to look at Jane. “Do you need to use the facilities again?”

“What happened to—”

“I’m not answering that question. If you can’t remember, then you’re not ready for the answer.”

“… Is there a way to [Dispel] [Thought Fog]? [Cleanse]? Does that work?”

Liquid’s quill stopped. She set the feather into her inkpot, then lifted her head to look at Jane. “You’re back.”

“I think so.” Jane got out of bed. She tugged her conjured clothes back into place, saying, “Moon reachers. I managed to slice through six arms.” Jane looked to a nightstand next to her cot; her other ring laid there. She said, “Mog took the rings, and with Felair’s help, she’s trying to connect them to whatever living people they can connect them to, but they don’t expect any results.” She grabbed her own ring and put it back on her finger. It was still plus-10 All Stats. “That feels better.”

Liquid asked, “Are you going to go back there?”

“Yes.” Jane said, “Now that I know what—”

“Jane.” Liquid stared at her, saying, “Felair came in here while you were sleeping, and at both the discretion of myself, Killzone, and Silverite, you were [Witness]ed.” She said, “You knew what the moon reachers were the first time you saw them. You saw the rings on their fingers. You realized what it meant. You saw these reachers multiple times. But something held you back. That ‘something’ was their [Thought Fog]. You were immune to most of it, most of the time, thanks to being either a spider or a slime every time you went out investigating the scent of carrion on the air.” She said, “But you got sloppy as their Fog began to accumulate. You even used a [Drain Ward] against them.” She frowned. “That’s sloppy.”

Jane took Liquid’s complaints with poise and calm, though inwardly she panicked, as memories of the past two weeks began to surface.

She had seen the moon reachers multiple times. She instantly recognized their long, shaggy silver bodies. They were a major threat to anyone traveling anywhere near the Wyrmridge. If crafting a base in the volcanic grounds of Firemaw Mountain was possible, Jane would not have camped in the woods.

But she did camp out in the woods, and she took every possible precaution to make her base as safe as possible. In the end, it didn’t work. They tracked her down, and they almost caught her. She had even used a [Drain Ward] against them! All that did was drain one percent of Health per second or less. That was practically nothing.

Cold sweat trickled down Jane’s neck.

And then cold anger welled in her heart. Those monsters needed to die.

“I can see you have made a decision.”

“Yes, Ma’am.” Jane said, “I’m going to go back and kill them all.”

Liquid nodded, saying, “Then you must prepare. Rest in town for at least another day; you’re still suffering from [Thought Fog]. You’ve been under their influence for at least 15 days, Team Leader. Then, when you go back, you must remain in a non-human form at all times. We’ve set their severed arms aside in a [Preservation Ward] in case you decided to do this. All you need to do is scatter the arms around your last base. The Reachers will smell their arms and they will come to you.” She stressed, “If they touch you, even the resistances of your shadow spider form won’t protect you. If you are successful and you decide to take one of them as a [Polymorph] form, be aware that [Thought Fog] is a result of their diet, in a way similar to the anti-spellcasting venom of the shadow spider. You won’t get [Thought Fog] unless you’re constantly eating people brains in a moon reacher’s body.”

Jane stood straight. “Yes, Ma’am. Thank you for watching over me, Ma’am.”

Liquid said, “Oddly enough, the reachers didn’t seem to react to a [Drain Ward]. This isn’t usually a valid tactic, but some monsters are so unclean that a mundane [Drain Ward] feels normal.”

Jane already had that idea, but she kept her mouth shut.