Today's Earth date: May 9, 1992

We're still making our way back to Iomallach with the kids. They're doing better. Aren't talking much, but they're eating and drinking.

Right when Horcus and I were complaining about our recent slow down in XP gain, we stumbled into a horde of ratmen crossing the little shitty road that runs through the Cuts. They were just as surprised to see us I think.

Most of them ran, and we couldn't exactly go chasing them with children in our arms. Got a little XP, though.

-The Journal of Laszlo the Paladin

"Want me with you?" Armond asked, standing at the bar door.

"No, keep getting people out," Wayne answered. "We'll be on Voice if anything changes."

With barely a nod, Armond was out the door and down the street. Wayne Blitzed ahead while the rest of the party took the streets. Fergus flew above Armond and Hector, functioning like a turret for the two Zeroes moving on foot. They cut down the ratmen they encountered without slowing.

Wayne's journey was fraught with flying ratmen. When he hit the thickest part of the flock, he activated En Passant and sliced a dozen from the sky in a blink. He Blitzed on, not looking back.

Luke stood in front of the east gate, staring down denmother Scylla. Two of her eight tentacles lie on the ground. One had the smooth cut of a sword while the other had clearly been ripped from the monster's body by raw violence. The paladin stood in her acid milk spray without flinching.

Wayne used Fart to repel a swarm of flying ratmen, which gave him the idea to try cropdusting the ratman army.

Wayne Braked low and Blitzed over the heads of the wererats, blasting Chemical Spray as he went. The tear gas threw the monsters into a chorus of coughs and gags but didn't affect Wayne in the slightest. Whether the rest of his party, or Luke for that matter, was similarly immune, he wasn't sure. So he kept the spray to the rear of the army.

And followed up with Dynamite.

For a brief moment, Wayne laughed that he naturally moved to clear the adds while Luke held the boss' aggro.

As Wayne made the return trip to the east gate, he used Gra to pluck flying ratmen from the sky.

Tyris-Flare Fire Magic (3 Pots).

Regretting not turning his back to the soldiers fighting on the walls, especially since he was a man-ferret in a bikini, Wayne sent two fire spirits at denmother Scylla. The abomination hissed and glared over its shoulder. The tentacles on the backside of the monster lashed out, every missed strike cracking like a whip to fire a laser.

Easy Out kept Wayne away from most of them, but Defense Shields blocked its share.

"Luu-" Wayne coughed. "Laszlo!"

"Wayne!" Luke yelled back, his jowls flapping. "I can't get in close!"

"I'll set it up!"

"Two dozen yards north of you," Margo said. "Upsi-toss me over the tentacles."

"Call it."

Insult Duel.

"I'll leave you devastated, mutilated, and perforated!"

Wayne Blitzed around the front of denmother Scylla to draw her eyes toward the gate and away from Margo. He dodged and deflected laser after laser while staying well clear of the acid milk spray.

"2… 1…"

Margo emerged from her Hidey Hole spell and ran at the boss's back. Wayne hit her with Upsi-Toss as soon as she became visible. She soared through the air, Chosen Rogue Daggers glinting in starlight, her black panther form making her no more than a shadow in the night sky.

Denmother Scylla snapped into action, two of her tentacles catching Margo midair. Wayne knew what came next, and he smiled when he saw that Luke understood the play. Margo cast Dark, enveloping her and the denmother in an impenetrable black fog.

Luke disappeared into the darkness, and Wayne waited for Margo to call for Home Row. He trusted her to know her own limits. A small breath of relief escaped Wayne when he saw Margo roll out of the darkness and hop to her feet. She sheathed her knives and drew her bow in two smooth motions.

Kneeling, she used Arrow Arrow and Laser Rifle to fire thick bolts of red light into the black. Her hands blurred as she shot again and again.

Dark faded to reveal denmother Scylla and Luke locked in battle. The tip of Luke's sword drew a pinprick of blood from the octopus abomination, but her tentacles caught the attack before it could do any more damage. The boss's back was pocked with missing chunks of flesh, the wounds cauterized instantly by the lasers that made them.

Luke grunted as he pressed harder, the veins in his forehead and neck bulging, as tense as guitar strings.

Slyway Robber.

Wayne dumped his mana to drain every point of the denmother's strength as his mana pool would allow.

"Dig your heels!" he yelled to Luke.

Wink-Wing.

Denmother Scylla jerked forward, impaling herself on Luke's sword.

Luke twisted, squatted low, and pushed off the earth with his powerful legs, slicing upward through the boss. As his blade exited her body, it split like a stick of string cheese, and Luke effortlessly continued the motion into a backflip. When he landed, the soldiers on the wall cheered for the paladin, the tide of the battle turning as the living wererats saw their trump card die.

Wayne used Burner Max to refill his mana and looked around. This wasn't right.

Where was the fleshmancer? Surely he was nearby. Wayne scanned the darkness desperately, his eyes flicking back and forth between the world in front of him and the red dots on his map. He tried to match as many of the rats with dots as he could. If his guess was correct, then he'd eventually find…

An empty field where his HUD said the enemy should be.

Wayne Blitzed into the sky, gaining altitude as he went. He shoulder rolled a fireball and then absorbed a lightning bolt with Defense Shields.

A ratman with two sets of harpy wings hovered in the sky, watching the battle below, the span of its wings giving it a strange air of angelic majesty.

Holding a hand out, it activated a spell that smashed through Defensive Shields and sent Wayne's Metox alarm into alert. Instead of fireballs or blocks of ice or laser beams, the fleshmancer shot bullets.

Wayne's hitpoints careened toward zero under the barrage.

He didn't know how far away they were, but he called out to his two Skycats in his mind.

Fart.

Fanbi.

Resisted!

Hrglut.

Resisted!

Castling.

The bullets broke through the masonry in seconds.

Fire a Broadside.

Easy Out. Easy Out.

The moment the fleshmancer needed to avoid the cannonball gave Wayne the glimmer of a reprieve he needed to create distance. When he turned back, using Sword of Water to hurl ice at the fleshmancer, the ratman was gone. Whether it had a Stealth skill like a rogue or an invisibility spell, Wayne didn't see any sign of red on his map. He activated Righteous Cloud anyway, ethereal blades chopping down all around him but hitting nothing.

The fleshmancer was either very patient or he was very gone.

The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.

Hesitantly, Wayne took his attention back to the battlefield below.

The day was nearly won. The Defense Force chased after wererats, barking and snarling, running down the few that attempted to flee. Margo had two more to dispatch, and they too had attempted to run. Margo's bow solved that problem with the ease of brushing crumbs off of a table.

Wayne saw movement in the corner of his eye. He turned, searching for what it was.

An elf with an overstuffed bag slung over its shoulder bounded across the back half of the battlefield. That had to be the treasure elf from Golden Axe. It had to be!

Though Wayne had just been in a fight for his life and for the lives of thousands of innocents, he never Blitzed faster than when he went after that elf. He tackled it to the ground, trying to wrestle the sack free of the surprisingly strong little man.

The elf screamed, "Why are you hurting me?! Please! Have mercy!"

The cries were convincing enough that Wayne paused. When he did, the elf poked him in the eye and twisted free of his grip, still screaming about being attacked.

"What's the meaning of this?!" a Defense Force soldier with the head of a Yorkshire Terrier demanded, flanked by two bulldogs and one husky who was already beginning to wander off.

"I was trying to get home to my children, and this man assaulted me!" the elf cried.

"Wait," Wayne said, holding up his hands.

"Can't a man care for his hungry children and his sick wife? Has this world become so dark?"

"Why are you hurting him?" the soldier asked Wayne.

The elf scooped up its bag while the soldiers had their attention on Wayne. It shot Wayne a devilish victory grin and bounded into the wilderness.

The soldier was berated Wayne for being so vile as to attack an innocent man in the midst of an invasion, but the Zero Hero wasn't paying attention.

"Anyone opposed to Home Row?" Wayne asked.

"Hang on," Armond replied. "Okay, clear now."

When no one else protested, Wayne activated the ability, bringing all of the party back to the bar.

The battle hadn't spared this establishment. The front window was shattered, and the door was kicked in. Some of the stock and a few pieces of furniture survived. As far as enduring during a siege, the bar fared better than a lot of shops and homes in town. In the distance, Wayne heard people chanting Laszlo's name.

Goods Storage.

"Hector, Margo: Go see what the wounded need and help Armond with anything else," Wayne said. "Fergus: Start making a list of everyone with us, kids first. People will be desperate to find loved ones. I'm going to go run down a hunch."

Wayne waited a moment, letting the Zeroes jump through the portal before turning to Armond.

"How bad is it?" Wayne asked.

"Surprisingly tame, actually," Armond reported. "Lots of folks weren't as lucky as the ones we found, but the casualties are really low for a siege like this. Buying out all of the healing potions in Vientuls this morning was a good call. We're nearly through our stock already."

"Need me to find more?"

Armond shook his head. "Perris knows some healing magic, apparently. Between him, Sammy, and Vanilli, we've stayed pretty well on top of this thing."

"It's amazing talking to you as a walrus."

"At least I'm not a smelly ferret."

"I'm not smelly," Wayne said, sniffing his furry armpits.

"Ferrets always smell," Armond said. "My sister had two when we were kids. The house always smelled like ferret."

"How about you go heal some people instead of harassing me." Wayne pointed at the gate.

Armond laughed and gave Wayne a salute, returning to his duties right after.

Wayne walked along the roof of the arena. He inspected the pit first and then looked over the street for anything that might explain why the rats avoided this part of the city specifically.

Nothing immediately caught his eye. This neighborhood looked as torn up as any other.

A few blocks away at an intersection, Wayne spotted the mouth of a ratman tunnel, one of the surprise entrances the rats used to ambush Iomallach from within.

The rats dug their tunnels to accommodate their own running on all four legs, which meant Wayne had to crawl. He didn't particularly enjoy that part of the process, and being a walking ferret was surprisingly unhelpful, but he went underground anyway, watching his HUD map as he went.

The tunnels weren't organized in any way that made sense to Wayne, so he turned and bent and snaked several times while always trying to head vaguely in the direction of the arena. Without his HUD to orient him, he would have been hopelessly lost.

He found it. This tunnel went directly to the center of the arena and stopped in a chamber the rats had hollowed out. At the center of the chamber was a pedestal like Wayne had seen in the basements of incomplete dungeons, and a Diagnostic Cube sat on top. What was most unusual, other than seeing a pedestal outside of a dungeon, was the Spawner attached to it.

The pedestal was only partially inserted into the top of the Spawner, and all of the other cube slots were empty. The Spawner itself glitched and flickered and blurred.

"I found something I need to translate," Wayne said. "But it can wait if you need my help with something."

"We're all set," Armond replied.

That was good enough for Wayne.

After translating countless words of dwarvish thus far, Wayne was getting much faster with that process, learning more of the language by sight with each little project. The top face of the Diagnostic Cube atop the pedestal was the only object with dwarvish in the chamber. When Wayne finished translating it, his document read:

Effect: Were-Virus

Target: Region

Active: True

"They used a dwarf Spawner rig to give everyone in the region the were-virus," Wayne shared with his party. "The Spawner itself is glitched, so I'm hesitant to start poking at this thing without some serious thought. That's all we need is to make this problem worse, somehow."

"That's wise," Fergus agreed. "I imagine finding a cure for this will be the next priority after caring for the wounded. Might be easier if the crime scene isn't disturbed."

"My thoughts exactly. But umm… I think those elixirs we got from the Charybdis fight might cure this."

"How many do we have?"

"Eight… Could we make more of it, somehow?"

"Reverse engineering alchemical concoctions is an incredibly difficult endeavor, one that even master alchemists avoid. And those elixirs may not even follow the rules of what we understand alchemy to be. We can't assume anything if they're dwarven-made."

"Then we'll keep their existence to ourselves for now."

Wayne noted on his map where the glitched Spawner was located and used Rise to appear in the middle of the arena. Seeing it without people in the stands was strange, and he half-expected Three Deaths to saunter out of the gate.

But the arena was dead quiet save for the sounds of the recovery efforts happening elsewhere in the city.

Board.

The train had a few people lingering against the walls, sitting with their heads between their knees, but the vast majority of the refugees passed through and exited out the Vientuls Quick Gate.

The storefront and the surrounding street was filled with frightened citizens from Iomallach–all actively afflicted with the were-virus–and the mood was tense, but there was far less blood than Wayne expected, even with Armond's optimistic report.

Wayne tried not to stare at a husband and wife giraffe couple and held up his hands to get everyone's attention.

"The battle is over," he announced. "I know all of you want to get home as soon as you can, but we're going to wait for the Defense Force to give us the all clear before we start shipping people back. So hang tight for a bit longer."

A capybara moving through the crowd distributing cookies distracted Wayne for a moment. Sammy had spent all night cooking and baking in preparation for this very scenario. He made good use of the large kitchen at the Blackwell residence.

Tulip's voice brought Wayne's attention back to the matter at hand.

"Can I speak with you for a minute?" she said softly but with urgency in her eyes.

"Of course. What is it?"

"Let's speak in private."

Tulip led Wayne up the stairs to her apartment. Luke sat inside on the love seat, scratching behind his golden ears.

"Wait," Wayne said to Tulip. "How do you know who I am?"

"I recognize your sword, and you seem like someone who would be a ferret."

"I seem like I would be a ferret?"

"Can you help my boy?" Tulip asked. "Can you reverse this?"

"It's a were-virus, and if it works like the other were-viruses we've seen, he'll be human by day, weredog by night. We're not sure if there's a cure just yet, but we have some leads."

"There's nothing you can do?"

Wayne thought. "We found an elixir in our research that might work, but that's more of a guess based on some weird logic from my world, which is to say the theory isn't strong, scientifically speaking."

"I'll take it," Luke said. His ears twitched forward and backward. He must be nervous, Wayne thought.

"Excuse me a moment, then."

Wayne went back downstairs and boarded the train through the Vientuls Quick Gate, accessing the party's locked Goods Storage car. In the midst of all this planning, Wayne had dug into the menu for the train engine more deeply and found a fairly robust system for setting permissions on the various doors of the train. He could assign different permission levels to control who could go where. Currently, there were unassigned people, like the refugees, and then a role for Friends and another role for the Party.

When Wayne returned, he gave Luke one of the elixirs.

Luke quaffed it immediately.

His were-transformation reversed, as if the dog version of Luke collapsed in on itself to make him human again.

"Thank you again, Wayne," Luke said, gently touching his face to confirm he no longer had a wet dog nose. "I'm going to sneak out of here when I get the chance, so I wanted to make sure I said that now."

"If you can wait a bit longer, I have two favors to ask."

"Name them."

"We're supporting a free clinic, and it would be helpful if we could have the body of the boss monster. It's hard to-"

Luke held up a hand. "Laszlo will graciously request that the city give you the monster as a personal favor to him. What's the second thing?"

"There's an old friend of your father's here. Before you get your hopes up, he doesn't know where Laszlo is, but I still think you should talk to him. Up to you, though."

"Yeah, I'll wait."

"Good," Wayne said. "Well, I saw a yak and a beaver getting into an argument when I was on my way back, and I think I hear them now. I'm going to go break that up, but I promise I'll be back later."

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