Chapter Fifty-Eight

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Harmony shot out of bed, waking herself with the mixture of [Cold Touch] and [Renew Spirit] that Hyacinth despised to add some alacrity to her half-dozed state and donned Night. Grabbing one of her spider lights, she stepped out of the shelter and tossed the creation into the air using [Manipulate Dead] to detonate it in a loud and colorful display. That was the signal for an emergency meeting, but she hoped that notification would be enough to drive people to the perpetual stew pot.

She was the first one there. Tyler and Loap were the next arrivals, a few moments later. "Don't any of them know how serious this is?" Harmony asked after a minute had passed, and no one had yet to show up.

"They didn't experience what we did. They've had so much time listening to the hunters brag about killing mimics of Kenny, sure, it is a challenge, but not one they are lighting a fire under themselves to deal with," Tyler reasoned.

"They're being hopping idiots," Loap grumbled.

"Don't let them overhear you? I'm sure they'll show up soon." Tyler added with a sigh.

There was that fake innocence that grated on Tyler. The beast kin leaning into being innocent of the world with her, "Oh, poor me, I don't know better," and "Clothes? What are those?" was not something he was in the mood to put up with after waking up to this emergency.

"Let's get everyone gathered up first and then worry about how serious this problem will be."

Harmony took one of the spider lights set around the meeting place and launched it into the sky for another booming burst of light.

Even with that additional call for action, it took a depressingly long time to get people to the meeting. When the idea of practice drills first came up, Eric and his crew complained about the disadvantages, how it would cut into sleep and readiness. Even in elimination, he showed up to be a pain in her bones.

Most people arrived grumpy about the wake-up call, armed as though it were an emergency, choosing that over speed. As everyone slowly acclimated to the late-night meeting, the silence from outside the meeting place echoed in; it was clear that a person was missing.

"Where's Billy?" Owlsley asked, finally breaking the growing unease with the question.

The butcher and emergency healer was usually quick to respond. The emergency signal should have had him be one of the first ones to the camp, even without practice. The second one would have made him book it quickly.

"He probably found a place to relieve himself." Benny joked.

It fell flat.

A few small side conversations started about the challenge of fighting mimics. Harmony caught someone lamenting the fact that Eric wasn't here for this. His crew took all of the mimic jobs once they figured out the Kenny trick.

The conversations didn't change the fact that one of their most important healers with his [Preserve Meat] skill was clearly not arriving.

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"That means he's the mimic, right?" Malick asked as it turned uncomfortable.

"Oh, no, it probably means the mimic ate him and is now here with the group." Brin chuckled darkly, holding his small lizard to his chest.

The kid's dark sense of humor almost made Harmony pick him as one of the ten to go to the last competition. But unlike the others, he was a good worker and only periodically hung out with Eric's crew.

"Don't say that. The mimic is probably a tree or a rock in the woods that Billy stumbled into." Malick mumbled.

"It could be one of our shelters, inviting us to walk inside it." Brin pressed.

No one wanted to think of that. Harmony stepped up. "The contest said an imposter, and with the tendencies of those in the wild to copy attackers, the Mimic has most likely taken the form of one of us. Even without Billy here, now is the perfect time for all of us to use our inspection-type skills and see if we notice anything." Harmony offered up the idea to stop that little brewing argument.

No one panicked at that idea. Either the mimic wasn't here, or it was confident it could get past such things. [Analyze], [Keen Investigative Awareness], [Mana Rotation], soul sight, True sight from [Eternal Fable's Heart], and [Poise and Bearing] with [Recall] to check for any out-of-place reactions. Then there were her good old necromantic senses. That was an awful lot of inspection, evaluation, and peeling back levels of awareness to use. Had she invested a tad too much into such things, especially when it came up dry on solid proof?

It's not like there weren't changes, suspicions, and oddities. Milo now had a new quasi-skill built or formed from the astral energy that remained in his soul's container after his healing. Kenny's half-step body flashed randomly with blue streaks only visible under true sight. The level of variety in everyone she saw was impressive, but nothing screamed mimic.

Not everyone agreed.

"Kenny is suspicious. How can we be sure that after all those hunting trips we didn't bring back the wrong one? As our dear leader said, our hunting crew was not exactly competent." Benny dug in.

"Hey!" Kenny protested feebly, the gloom that took him when he contemplated his bad luck plain on his face.

"With this challenge, some of the obelisk warnings make more sense. We need to not jump to conclusions. Here is a relevant quote: "Until you see the thing act, your eyes, ears, and senses will deceive you." Loap started.

"Well, Pappi can vouch for me. Not all of us have bonds that can do that." Milo interjected.

"I think it would make sense to focus on those without sapient bonds acting as protection." Owlsley agreed from the arms of her giant sloth.

This direction would quickly get out of hand. Half the tribe didn't have those kinds of bonds. Then there were the fringe companions, and people would argue around Horatio's sassy bubble communications. It would quickly turn into a battle of the haves vs the have-nots.

Solutions needed to be provided. Quick ones.

"We can't get at each other's throats over this. We need an expedition to capture a fully transformed mimic so we can test ways to figure out who the mimic is at camp."

"That sounds like a great idea. Split the tribe. I'm sure everyone wants to join a group in the dark woods through masses of spiders in the dark of night with the risk of a mimic in their party ready to betray them at any moment." Brin started with more than a hint of sarcasm.

Malick loomed over the young man. "Why are you trying to get us to not do the one idea we've had so far that has merit? Are you the imposter?"

"And she wants to split the group into easily taken apart groups!"

[Shadowed Graves] stretched out, focused on freezing the conversation in its tracks. "I will go and get the mimic and will happily take any volunteers who want to come with me. Everyone else can wait here until we come back, and stay calm until we do."

No one was happy, but they didn't protest verbally. Harmony probed for volunteers and worked on making this the most workable splitting of the team she could. Even if this was a cleanly defeated challenge, cracks are forming in the bones of this group. Soon, they'd find it painful to move as a unit. At the end of this, would she remain the leader of the red tribe?

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