Chapter 94, 95, and 96 (Patreon)

Chapter 94

Time to Level Collapse: 4 Days, 9 Hours. 

Entering The Royal Palace of Princess Donut. 

“Hi Hekla! Hi Hekla’s friends!” Donut said. She jumped to my shoulder. “Look, Carl. It’s Brynhild’s Daughters!” 

“Yeah, I can see Donut.” 

Thirty pairs of eyes turned toward us. I quickly looked over the group. Hekla had risen to level 33, one higher than my 32. The rest of her crew averaged around 25, which was respectable, but a little lagging. That was the problem with staying in a big group. I’d discussed this with Mordecai a while back. He firmly believed small groups were the best for that very reason. Experience was shared, but due to the nature of the earlier floors, there was only a finite amount of experience to be had. So while the bigger groups offered a certain amount of protection, it came with diminishing returns regarding experience.

But looking over the diverse group of crawlers and classes, I could see the advantage of having such a large team. The pool of spells and skills amongst them had to be impressive. 

At level 24, Katia was no longer the odd one out. She’d fit right in. I sighed. 

Hekla and Katia pushed through the crawlers. Hekla held out her hand. She was even taller than I realized. She was about nine inches taller than me. Her muscles bulged. She kept her automatic crossbow slung over her shoulder, and the thing was huge, bigger than I realized. I hesitantly shook her hand. It practically swallowed my own. Her hand felt as if it was made of iron. I wondered what the woman’s strength stat was.  

“Carl,” she said. “Thank you. I asked you to take care of my girl, and you did. But you did more than take care of her. You helped her level and taught her how to protect herself. I am in your debt.” 

“How did you find us?” I asked. “And how are you even here?” I looked at Katia. “I didn’t realize others could come into our space.” 

Katia smiled sheepishly. “Since I have a personal space attached to the whole, I have the ability to allow groups in. I whitelisted all the daughters.” 

Hekla nodded. “We came through the employee portal thanks to your information, Carl. Sadie cast her Glass Prison spell on the Kravyad, and we all made it through. We were at substation H. We hiked up to station 60. The station was barren. Well, mostly barren. A few NPCs had gathered, looking for their families. There’s a switch there that allows you to choose which of the 12 Homeward Bound platforms to get upon. Katia said you’d come in at trainyard E, so it was easy to find you from there.” 

“Wait, really?” I said, this new information momentarily causing me to forget the potential danger of this situation. We can use Station 60 to get onto any track. I held up my hand as I sent a mass message out informing everybody of this information. And then I sent a quick, additional note to Imani and Elle, telling them what was going on with Hekla and her team.

I caught sight of a daughter with a familiar name. Eva. Katia’s friend. She stood slightly back, just behind Hekla’s right side. The green, opalescent woman was a four-armed cobra-headed creature, similar to Manasa the singer, though the coloring was different, and she did not have a naga body. Also, unlike Manasa, this woman was small, only about five-feet tall. She stood on two, regular legs, though she was covered in scales. She had two, wide sabers over her back, placed in an X formation, and she wore green, shiny leather armor that almost looked like a tracksuit. The woman glared at me, crossing both pairs of arms. I quickly examined her properties. 

Crawler #9,077,240. “Eva Sigrid.”
Level 27.
Race: Half Nagini, Half-Orc
Class: Nimblefoot Enforcer. 

The woman had one large skull and three smaller skulls over her head, indicating she had killed thirteen people. Katia had said she’d only killed one, which suggested those additional 12 skulls were a recent addition. Looking about, I didn’t see any other skulls over the crew, including over Hekla. This is the one who does her dirty work.

“This is a very impressive space,” Hekla said. “We combined two personal spaces, but we don’t have any of these upgrades.” She looked at Donut. “We can’t even whitelist visitors until we buy one more space. Your manager has proved to be very helpful. It’s too bad you lost him. When is he coming back?” 

“Two days and 18 hours,” Donut said. “Carl, maybe we can combine safe rooms with Hekla’s team! Do we have to all be in the same party for it to work?” 

Goddamnit, Donut. “Uh, I think maybe we do,” I said. “But I’m not certain.” 

Carl: Donut. Don’t say stuff like that. Let’s wait to see what Hekla wants before we all jump into bed together. 

Donut: OMG YOU SHOULD DATE HEKLA. THE AUDIENCE WOULD LOVE THAT. THINK OF THE VIEWS. 

At that moment, I had to confront something that had been at the back of my mind since the moment Odette had cautioned me about Hekla. Why hadn’t you warned Donut about what Hekla really wants? Why hadn’t you told Mordecai? 

I knew the answer, I always knew the answer, but I hadn’t admitted it to myself. 

You think she would be better off with Hekla’s team. You think Mordecai would think so, too. That’s why you never told them. It had been nagging me for a while, but I’d kept pushing it to the back of my mind. Stupid. Self-destructive. It was also par for the course. I thought of what the late Frank had said to me, about being responsible for someone else. 

You don’t understand what that responsibility means, what a weight that is on your shoulders. And when you fail, it’s like being crushed, constantly crushed, only you don’t die. And the pain never stops. It just keeps coming and coming. 

But seeing that woman, Eva, with all the skulls over her head, any thoughts I had of Donut being better off fled. For all I knew, each and every one of those skulls was someone who had deserved it. Or maybe it had been a mercy kill like with Imani. But my instincts told me, no. No, no, no. 

I could see both Hekla’s and Eva’s eyes flash, and I knew they were talking, plotting. 

Carl: Don’t let Mongo out. These guys are looking a little jumpy, and I don’t want any accidents.

Donut: WE ARE IN A SAFE ROOM. AND EVERYBODY LOVES MONGO. THESE ARE OUR FRIENDS, CARL. 

Carl: Just keep him locked up for now. If there’s a scuffle, we don’t yet know if he’ll freeze or teleport away, and this is not the place to find out. 

Hekla smiled. “Now is not the time for such discussions, little Donut. But we wanted to come by and pick up our lost little lamb, and we wanted to see what a wonderful job you and your Carl have done for her. But we are also in a hurry.” 

Donut beamed. Katia appeared to be wavering, like she wanted to say something. If Katia left and disengaged her personal space, it would severely alter the nature of the room. Mordecai would lose access to his space. We’d lose the training room. We’d spent so much time working together, it seemed like such a waste.

“I’m afraid there is little time to chat,” Hekla said. “We have an issue, and it involves some people I believe you know.”  

Here it comes, I thought. The cheese on the trap.  

“Katia is but one of our lost lambs. We have a small cluster of friends who have collected with a larger group. They are gathered at station 101 on the Vermillion line. It is a significant group of people. A thousand at least. The trains are stopped on all three lines that service the station. They are stuck. Mobs are swarming all around them, and they are fighting them off. They need our help. We are going to rescue them, and I am asking the Royal Court of Princess Donut to help us do that.”

On my shoulder, Donut started to tremble with excitement. She worshipped Hekla, and I knew the thought of fighting alongside the shieldmaiden was a dream of hers.  

“Tell them to hike to station 102,” I said. “Go into the robot room and ride the conveyor back.” But even as I said it, I knew that wouldn’t be feasible. Not when there were a thousand people. It had taken Imani’s crew a few hours to gather enough of the rolling cages to get her team down to the trainyard. She’d said it was difficult to extract them from the conveyor tracks without breaking them. 

“They’re boxed in,” Hekla said. “There’s plenty of fighters in the group to keep the monsters back, but they keep coming. The Vermillion line is clear, for now, but they’re being inundated with mobs from the other two platforms at the station. I have the boss map from the Vermillion line, and the track is swarmed. A massive herd is making their way up the line and will be upon them soon. So the crawlers can’t just hike down the line. It’s at least 150 kilometers from 101 down to the closest stairwell at 72, and if they have to fight the whole time, they will never make it. There is a ghoul generator at stop 72, similar to the one at 12. Even Lucia could not hold the line against them. There’s also something going on at 75. And that’s all in addition to the regular mobs suffering from the DTs that are coming from the other two platforms. Any hour now we’ll be seeing whatever stage three looks like.”  

What a goddamned clusterfuck. “You said it involves people we may know,” I said. “Who?” 

“From what I understand, it’s a crew you met on a show. A man named Li Jun along with his group. Also, a few others you have in your current chat circle.”  

For fuck’s sake, how much did Hekla know about me? Was Katia just feeding her everything I did and said? How could she know who my friends were otherwise? It made me wonder if Hekla had spies strategically placed everywhere. Jesus, was that possible? Or was I being overly paranoid? I was in over my head, and I knew it.  

And even worse, I had enough wits about myself to recognize that asking me to help her was a masterful move by Hekla. How could we not help? I’d look like a cowardly idiot if I didn’t.

Plus I wanted to. A thousand people? And Li Jun and possibly his sister Li Na and friend Zhang? I’d last seen them when they’d unwittingly been dragged onto the Maestro’s show for the Death Watch segment. But they’d managed to save themselves. I didn’t really owe them anything, but if they were truly trapped, how couldn’t I help? 

But what about Bautista, all the way at the end of the line?

You can’t save them all. 

I couldn’t save anybody if I ended up dead. 

So what should I do? I had no idea how to help Bautista. I could try going back through the portal with the Nightmare, but then what? I didn’t even know if there was more than one abyss station. No, it simply didn’t make sense. 

I had to look at this logically. If Hekla’s plan was to kill or otherwise discredit me and get Donut to join up with them, so they in turn had access to Mordecai, they had to do it without Donut knowing that’s what they did. Or Mordecai. And the only way to do it would be to make it look like an accident. But how could they possibly do that when literally the entire universe was watching them at all times? It’d be easy to hide something from Donut at first, but Hekla had to know by now that people like Odette existed. Information entered the dungeon like drops through a leaky roof. 

Whatever it was, it wouldn’t happen right away. Donut worshipped Hekla, and once Donut latched onto someone, it was hard to get her to unlatch. But she didn’t know any of the other newcomers. I’d made a serious mistake by not talking about this earlier. I would have to start fixing it now.  

I glanced over at the cobra-headed Eva and met her eyes. A very slight smile curved her mouth. A smile that did not reach her eyes. 

Carl: Donut. Be careful, okay? I am getting a bad vibe from that Eva woman. Don’t trust her.

Donut: RIGHT? SHE’S SCARY. SHE KEEPS LOOKING AT YOU LIKE YOU’RE A CAN OF FANCY FEAST. 

Carl: If anything happens to me, question everything.

Donut: WHAT DO YOU MEAN?

Carl: Just watch that one, okay? And keep an eye on Hekla, too. I know you like her, and so do I, but I don’t think she likes me too much. She might let me get hurt if it will help her team.  

I quickly rummaged through my inventory and rearranged some items on my hotlist. I added that invisibility potion I’d gotten from the suitcase into one of my slots. Then I added Mordecai’s Special Brew, which would give me almost-invulnerability for about thirty seconds. I had to be careful with that one since it made it so I couldn’t take another potion for ten hours afterward. 

“Okay,” I said out loud. “We’ll help. Just don’t get me killed so you can have Donut all to yourself.” 

Eva’s mouth tightened. Hekla laughed. And at that moment, I saw it. It was just a glimmer in the normally stoic woman’s facade, but it was there. She’s having fun. She likes this. She’s as crazy as the rest of us.

“We were just looking at the map,” Katia said, indicating the large paper on the counter. “Vermillion is a colored line, but it’s different than the others. I think it’s one of the ones that Widget the gremlin was talking about when he mentioned the Terminus Direct. It starts at station H, hits the stairwell levels plus 60 and 75, then it only stops at 101, 199, 307, 401, the Terminus station at 433, and then the Kravyad station at 435. It looks like it runs the whole line in about a day.” 

“Okay,” I said. “So what are you proposing?” 

Hekla crossed her arms, suddenly all business. “We’re taking a Vermillion train down to 101, picking everybody up, and we’re taking them back by going reverse, using a second engine attached to the back. We tested it, and it works well. We’ll come back to a stairwell station where we can make a stand. We’ll hold out until the stairwells open.” 

“So you have a train? What about the wreckage on the track?” 

“There is no wreckage on the Vermillion line. And it’s one of the few with the power still turned on. We discovered the train just sitting there, ready to go when we teleported to that building near the trainyard. The engineer was out of the train, inspecting it when we showed up. I shot him, took the route map, and we took the train. It doesn’t look like this train ever ran. It has three passenger cars, but the rest are cargo containers. They are supposed to roll the ghouls onto the train and transport them to the abyss. But it never ran. And since it never ran, it never crashed. Eva stole a second engine and backed it into the train. We drove it down to stop sixty and left it on the tracks to come here.” 

I nodded appreciatively. “Is there a cowcatcher on it?” 

Hekla grimaced. “That, Carl, is the problem. It’s a subway car, and it is not designed to withstand such abuse. There are hordes of ghouls on the tracks, especially after stop 72. There is a small device at the front, but it does not work well. When we hit the few ghouls that were on the track, it was okay, but I can tell it will be a problem when we push through the heavier hordes. The track is about to get very dense, and I fear pushing through so many is going to derail it. If we go slow, we will be overwhelmed. We have to move fast, but the faster we move increases the chances of a wreck. That’s why we came here first.” 

I started mentally working on the problem. I had plenty of metal in my inventory. I’d have to go up there and measure the front of the train, as each one was a little different. “So you want me to build you something to put in front of the train?”

“Well, yes, but you’ve already built what we need.” Hekla turned to Katia, who appeared as if she was going to vomit. 

I felt the blood drain from my face. 

~

Donut was the first to object. 

“You want to stick Katia to the front of the train?” she said, sounding outraged. “Are you kidding? That sounds like a Carl plan.” 

“Yes,” Hekla said. 

Carl: Katia. You don’t have to do this. I can build a metal one. 

Katia: It’s okay, Carl. This is what I’m for. You said it yourself. I need to learn to use my race properly. We don’t have time to build anything. 

Donut: CARL IS RIGHT. YOU ARE GOING TO GET HURT.

It was actually a brilliant idea, and I was impressed at the sheer insanity of it. But I would never let her do it if it was up to me. It was simply too dangerous. 

Carl: You’re not disposable, Katia. Hekla is treating you as if you are. I’m sorry if I didn’t make you feel welcome. You can say no. You can stay with me and Donut.  

Katia: This was my idea. I’m the one who came up with it. It’s why they’re here now. 

Carl: Your idea? 

I was so flabbergasted I didn’t know what to say. 

Katia: I altered the backpack and made it wider using your engineering table while you were gone. I have more metal in there now. I can make myself even bigger. I’ve also added rubber to the mix. If I layer it between the metal and flesh, it absorbs the impacts. I just need help with the design for the front of the train. I need to be careful of that third rail. 

Carl: I don’t like it, no matter what the design is. 

Katia: This is just like when Donut wanted to climb up the chain and turn the roundabout. You’re a… a backseat dungeon driver. You only don’t like the idea because you didn’t come up with it. 

Ouch. 

Carl: I don’t like it because you’re going to fucking die, Katia. I don’t understand. You used to be scared of fighting just regular mobs. 

Katia: You’re right. You don’t understand, Carl. They came back for me. She brought the entire team to pick me up. That is more than anyone has ever done for me.

An awkward silence hung in the room. It was clear to everyone that we were having a private conversation. Katia rubbed tears from her eyes. 

Zev: Goddamnit, Carl. You need to be having these moments out loud.

“Go fuck yourself, Zev,” I said up to the ceiling. “How’s that for talking out loud?” 

Hekla barked with laughter. “Zev sounds like our Loita.” 

Zev: I’m serious, Carl. You’re one of the most popular feeds, and half of your conversations are inaccessible to the viewers. What do you think is going to happen?  

I ignored the question. The tension in the room had eased with my outburst. “Okay, okay. If we do this, Donut and I will ride in the engineer’s car. And I would like Katia to stay in our team until we’re done. All this transferring around will take too long.” I turned to look at Katia. “As long as that’s cool with you.” 

To my surprise, she walked up to me and hugged me, long and tight. “Thank you,” she whispered in my ear. I had no idea for what. 

“That’s fine,” Hekla said after a moment, though she seemed irritated. “You can ride with me and Eva. She knows how to drive the subway cars.” 

~

When we left the personal space, I paused, confused. Before, the door led straight into the attached restaurant, but now there was a vestibule similar to the one at the Desperado Club. A second door was attached to a wall next to ours. It was a subspace portal that I couldn’t enter or screenshot. After a moment, I realized it was the entrance to Hekla’s team’s headquarters. That was how the system dealt with multiple, non-attached personal spaces being accessible when crawlers had the ability to enter into more than one. I know that this is. This is a temporary, situationally generated space. I remembered there was a note about them in my book. 

I half-expected Eva to turn and attempt to saber me in the face the moment we left the saferoom. She didn’t. We went through the trap door down onto the dark, employee line. It appeared the ghouls were leaving this track free. That was good. The Nightmare remained where we left it, happily idling. I briefly wondered what Fire Brandy did to pass the time. But then I remembered her babies, and the fact she was constantly giving birth. She probably had no time to get bored.  

“If you want to ride, your team will need to hang onto the outside of the train. There’s not enough room in the cab. There’s room on the back platform, though.” 

“We will ride,” Hekla said. Me, Donut, and Katia climbed into the cab while Hekla, Eva, and a few more daughters stood on the back platform by the door. The rest moved to the front and clutched awkwardly onto the railings, standing on either side of the Nightmare’s boiler. A few of the smaller, fairy-like daughters alighted onto the platform out front, just above the cowcatcher. I imagined we looked like a parade float with so many colorful women attached to the outside. 

“It’s too bad we can’t move this train to the Vermillion line,” I said as I flushed the brake line. This train would be perfect for clearing the track of ghouls. I stuck my head out the window. “Ladies, watch out. The boiler gets really, really hot. Only hold onto the rails. And watch the walls. We’ll go slow, but if the walls hit you, it’s game over.” 

I eased the train forward. 

“I just realized you’re the only boy here,” Donut said. “All these people, and there’s only one penis. You could start a harem. Like the guy on that Sister Wives television show.” 

I laughed. “Nobody is starting a harem.”

“No, I suppose not,” Donut said. “You couldn’t even keep one woman interested.” 

The train hissed, and we started to pick up speed. We’d be at Station 60 in just a few minutes. 

“Why does your friend have so many skulls?” Donut asked Katia as we lurched forward. 

“I don’t know,” she said. “I knew she had gained a few on the third floor, but I hadn’t realized it was that many. She says she doesn’t want to talk about it.” 

I bet. 

“How do you know her anyway?” I asked. 

“Eva? She’s an economics professor at the university. We eat lunch together sometimes. We were friends before, but not great friends. She actually knows Hekla, too. From before, I mean. Hekla has known her longer than I have. Reykjavik is a small town.” 

“Was Hekla a professor, too?”

“No,” Katia said. “She was Eva’s psychiatrist.”

~

Like Madison from human resources had predicted, A small colony of NPCs had gathered at station 60. 

We didn’t stay long at the station, which was too small already to house the group of NPCs gathered there, but as we passed through, I noted Madison sitting in the corner glaring at us sullenly. She was being berated and threatened by an angry mob of dwarves and gremlins. Rod, her ex-husband, was nowhere in sight. I wondered if he was even real. 

As we left and entered into the long, twisting hallway that led to a confusing series of portals which in turn led to additional platforms, we had to step past a dwarf huddled on the ground, his head hanging low.

According to the tag, the creature’s name was Tizquick. A conductor for the Mango line. A puddle of tears had formed underneath him. Hekla stepped over him as if he wasn’t there. Donut and I paused. I kneeled. I knew there was nothing I could do for him, but I felt compelled to acknowledge him, if just for a moment. 

“I’m sorry,” I said. “I don’t know what you’re going through, but it has to be hard. It’ll be over in four days when the level collapses.” Only to start all over again for you, I didn’t add. 

The dwarf looked at me, and it struck me, as it always did, at the life there in his eyes.  

“She was never real, was she?” the dwarf asked, tears streaming down his dirt-colored face. They left rivulets of clean skin through the grime. “My little girl was never real. I just don’t understand.” 

I put my hand on his shoulder, and I leaned in. “No, I suppose you don’t. And that really sucks.” I thought of Frank Q killing people so his daughter could have a chance. I thought of my own mother, and what she did. This is my birthday present to you. I am giving you a chance at life. I’m sorry it took me so long.  

Both of them had failed miserably. But this guy had it even worse. He’d been tricked into believing something that just wasn’t real. He never even had the opportunity to screw it up. 

Before this was done, people like him would kill people like me by the thousands. And people like me would cleave through his kind, wreaking even more damage. All the while the real culprits sat back and watched and laughed.

“One day, this pain you’re feeling right now will matter,” I said. The conductor looked up at me, eyes sparkling with confusion. 

I straightened, and I left the man on the floor.

Hekla remained there at the edge of the portal. She’d watched the exchange. 

“You are going to give yourself an ulcer,” she said. “Focus on what you can accomplish, not that which is beyond your control.” 

I grinned. “How much do people normally have to pay for that advice?”  

She just looked at me. “We need to hurry. The main horde of ghouls will be upon them soon, and they’re starting to see mobs suffering from the third stage.” 

Chapter 95

“For a while, the horde of ghouls coming from 72 were stopped right at station 75,” Hekla said as we watched Katia form in front of the subway car. I nervously kept an eye on the third rail, just nine inches from the lower left of her plow shape. She’d consulted with me and one of the daughters, an architect, on the design. I’d had her place her new rubber layer between herself and the front of the train, along with a coating all along the left and bottom side of the scoop. That way if she did touch the rail, she wouldn’t—in theory—complete the circuit. But the last thing we wanted was to test it. 

“But they just kept coming and coming,” Hekla continued, “and they broke through whatever barrier there is, and now they’re moving quickly up the track. There are hundreds of corpses on the tracks already. They mostly avoid the electrified line, but there are so many of them. Every once in a while one of them hits it, and the ghoul kills all the ones around him. There are just piles of dead bodies up there.” 

The engine car of the Vermillion line was like most of the subway cars. It had a flat, window-covered front section. The controls were simple, especially compared to the Nightmare. It was a simple throttle switch and an emergency brake, along with a few lights indicating electrical connection status and an indicator telling the driver that all the cars were still attached. I briefly inspected the second engine car, attached backward at the end of the train. It had a slave mode where it added power to the train, even though it was facing the wrong direction. It would be more efficient if it was right behind the first engine, but this worked, too. 

As long as we didn’t get into an accident.  

The stock “cowcatcher” attached to the front of the subway car was just a metal shield welded underneath the front, designed to push debris away. It looked like a forward-facing trailer hitch. It’d work fine for a few bodies here and there, but it was clear we needed something much more robust. 

After some discussion, we decided a traditional, wedge cowcatcher design wouldn’t be enough. Katia had to make something that combined the low, forward comb with a bulldozer-like scoop. 

“A plow is an easy design,” I said. “The problem is the train fits so tightly in the tunnel that there’s nowhere for the debris to go. It’s not like the Nightmare line where there’s a thin channel between the train and the ceiling and the sidewalls. These trains are packed in tight, otherwise we’d go with a wedge design. Even with just the scoop, the tunnel will get clogged like a drain.” 

“That is a concern,” Hekla said. 

“That’s why we came up with the kebab plan.” 

“Katia,” I said as I watched her form. I couldn’t even see where her head was. “Extend the lower scoop a little further. Yeah. Damn, I wish I’d had time to make train wheels to stabilize it. You’ll need to be careful not to clip the ground. If you do, don’t let it pull you off the train. They’re going to be heavy.” 

Katia: I know, Carl. I’m anchored to the top.  

We’d broken out the windows in the engine car so Katia could reach inside. This is where most of her biological flesh would remain, though I worried that this was the wrong design. Nobody in the group was an engineer, and that was a problem. She’d built herself almost like a toggle bolt, affixing herself to the flat front of the subway car, reaching in through the window and then making a small, vertical hunk of Katia that was bigger than the window hole and pulled flush against the wall. It’d work well, I hoped, but if she gathered too much weight onto her scoop, I feared she’d rip the front of the train off. I cushioned the top and bottom of the metal parts where she attached with a pair of yoga mats to make it more comfortable and to help with insulation—both for herself and those of us in the cab. None of that would matter if she gathered too much weight. If the bolt pulled free, she’d get dragged down, hit the track, be ripped off the front of the train, and then run over. She’d be splattered all over the tunnel along with everyone in the engine car.    

After the scoop was formed came the spikes. Multiple, thick, sharp, and metal spikes protruded out from the scoop, like a sea anemone, or one of the street urchin mobs from the third floor. We kept these mostly at about chest level and above. This was a gamble. We expected the spikes to break if they hit armor or ghoul mobs with tough skin. But the faster we went, the higher Katia’s constitution, so it was crucial if we wanted to maintain speed. The moment a mob was impaled on the spike, or caught in the scoop, Katia would start the process of sticking the body into her inventory. That would only work if the monster was truly dead, however, so Donut and Hekla would stand at the windows and would—carefully—shoot anything caught in the spikes or scoop.

With the spikes, we hoped they’d die more quickly, especially if the train moved as fast as Eva said it could go.  

Katia finally finished forming. I marveled at how much area her body took. But that also worried me, as I knew the larger she was, the thinner the metal, the weaker the joints. She was literally stretched thin. A pair of eyes and mouth sat in a little divot, looking out near the top of the scoop. I’d wanted her to face inside the cab, but she still didn’t trust her ability to grow new eyes.  

“Last chance to back out,” I called as we climbed onto the train.

She didn’t answer. 

The engine car was much roomier than the Nightmare engine. This was an entire train car with an apartment attached to it. It was meant to house a ManTauR engineer. Eva stood on the right side at the controls. Hekla stood next to her, crossbow ready to fire through the missing windshield. Donut and I stood on the port side. Katia’s body snaked in through both of the two windows, and she’d formed a thick, metal plate there, bolting herself to the front of the cab. If it wasn’t flesh colored, she’d look like a feature of the train. I put my hand against it before I realized what I was doing, and I could feel her heartbeat, fast as a jackrabbit. Until that moment I hadn’t realized she even had a heart. I quickly pulled my hand away. 

Katia: That tickled.

One more of the daughters rode up front with us. A level-25 Wisteria Fairy named Silfa. She was a “Holistic Healer.” I hoped her healing abilities were more effective here in the dungeon than the holistic, snake-oil stuff from the real world. The plump woman appeared to be about fifty years old and was half the size of Donut. She quietly hung back. 

“Speeding up,” Eva said, pushing the throttle.

This was the first time I’d heard the cobra-headed woman speak. I was a little taken aback at how normal she sounded. A little tongue flicked out.  

“I wish you’d let me take Mongo out,” Donut said. “He’d love this.”

“It’s too dangerous for him right now,” I said. “I’m pretty sure we’ll need him soon. Besides, he’d eat that fairy lady right out of the air.”

“That’s not true, Carl. It only takes him a minute to get used to people. And then he’ll love them for life.” 

That was the problem. I wanted to keep Mongo away from them as much as possible in case something happened. If we had to fight, I didn’t want Mongo stopping to roll over for a belly rub from Hekla.  

I eyed Silfa the healer nervously. Since I’d never fought with her before, I didn’t trust her. I had eight scrolls of healing ready to go, and Donut had another six. 

My stomach dropped as the train picked up speed, barreling down the tunnel. The sickly headlamp wasn’t nearly as bright as the light on the Nightmare. 

“Donut.” 

“On it,” she said, reading my mind. She cast Torch, setting it to travel ahead of us. It lit the tunnel brightly, revealing the uneven, rocky walls. 

A group of red dots appeared on the map. It was just three of them. I barely had time to bark a warning before we mowed them over. 

There wasn’t even a thump or an audible splat. Only a small spray of blood over Hekla and Eva’s faces. I tried not to laugh. There wasn’t even a body. It was like we’d hit a bug with the windshield. We’d completely liquified the mobs, and the train was still accelerating. 

Katia: Hey, I got experience for that. 

Carl: Did it hurt?

Katia: It was like a little bee sting. No big deal. There was a head on my spike, but I pulled it into my inventory. Also blood. It lets me add liquid to my inventory if it’s in my scoop. There’s a new tab called “Gross shit.” 

My mind started to race with the implications and possibilities of that. 

“Coming up on 72,” Eva called. 

“Faster,” Hekla said. “Speed it up.” She had to shout the words now. The wind whistled through the two open windows of the subway car.  

Katia: Whoa. I just got a fan box! It’s for having the most new followers in a 30-hour period. I can’t believe it. 

Donut: CONGRATULATIONS. 

That wasn’t necessarily a good thing, but I wasn’t about to say that now. I swallowed, seeing the wall of the red dots rushing toward us like missiles descending on a target. 

There was a constant stream of ghouls coming off the platform. Most were traveling up the line, but a handful were turned toward us. Most of the mobs were now sticking to the right side of the tunnel. They were running, too, running fast. Terrifyingly fast. There was a pile of X’s along the track where the ghouls had barbequed themselves on the third rail. I was worried that the pile of electrified bodies would still be intact enough to give Katia a shock as we plowed through. Hopefully her self-insulation would be enough. 

“Here we go,” I said, bracing myself. 

~

“Jesus fuck,” I cried, raising an arm to block the shower of blood. Gore and bits of bone and hair blasted into the engine like it was being sprayed at us through a firehose. A hundred mini, fleeting shocks rocked me, giving me a small amount of damage. The train shuddered, but it didn’t slow as we plowed through the screaming mass of ghouls. We cut through the bodies like a goddamned wheat thresher.  

“Katia,” I cried, getting a mouthful of guts.

She’d been fine, but she was suddenly unconscious, and her health was at about 50% and dropping. I put my hand against her flesh and felt a tingle of electricity. She was getting shocked by something. Probably a body part wedged between her and the line. 

“Faster,” I yelled at Eva, who was choking on a splatter of guts. Where the hell was that healer? I cast my heal scroll on Katia, and her health returned to the top, though she remained unconscious, and it continued to drop. 

Something in the cab hissed, and I turned in time to see a monster head on the floor, growling. It was an almost-human head with green, rotting skin, pulled tight over the skull. I stomped it down with my foot.

There was another, a torso with a head attached. It growled as it reached for Silfa, who had buzzed to the top of the cab, screaming for Hekla to help her. These were different than the festering ghouls. These were the monsters being generated at stop number 72. I quickly examined the creature before I crushed its head with my foot. 

Blister Ghoul – Level 20

The thing with the Blister Ghoul is that it is so damn tenacious. This undead creature is created and unleashed into the dungeon using a device called a Ghoul Generator. There are multiple types of ghouls and generators out there, but the bad boy that spits these suckers out is top of the line. 

For every non-undead mob that dies within this floor, one of the soul crystal-powered ghoul generators will birth a single Blister Ghoul.  

It’s rather unfortunate, then, that every mob on the entire floor is suffering from something that will eventually kill them. 

Soul crystals. Goddamn soul crystals. That’s what they’d used to power the swordsmen guards on the third floor, and it’s what Miss Quill had been using to cast her spell. The soul crystal had become overwhelmed and turned itself into a massive bomb. That bomb—now dubbed Carl’s Doomsday Scenario—still sat in my inventory. I hadn’t even dared take it out at my sapper’s table yet. These things were always bad news. 

The chaos of this entire floor was starting to form into something a little more cohesive than I’d originally suspected. This wasn’t just a maze. It was an almost-perpetual engine. In the next day, these things were going to be everywhere. 

“That group was small compared to the main horde approaching stop 101,” Hekla said. “It has many times more ghouls.”  

The mobs had thinned out, but we were still hitting a handful every few seconds. Katia had a dozen heads and other body parts attached to the spikes. Some of the body pieces were still alive. The gore was starting to fill up her scoop. Donut was carefully shooting them through the window while Hekla did the same. Donut was soaked in dripping, steaming guts. Absolutely soaked. Her massive sunglasses protected her eyes, but she had to keep washing the blood away.  

Katia’s health continued to move downward. She hadn’t once been healed by the so-called healer. 

“Heals, goddamnit!” I yelled at the fairy, who remained at the ceiling, looking down at the blister ghoul’s corpse. I kicked it. “It’s dead. Come on!” 

“I’m supposed to wait until she’s at 25%.” 

“You will heal her now. And can you wake her up?” 

The fairy looked at Hekla, who nodded. The fairy had over two dozen boss kills by her name, but she acted as if this was her first foray into action. 

Katia glowed, and the unconscious debuff faded just as she hit another group of ghouls. More blood splattered into the train, soaking Silfa, who shrieked. 

Katia: Ow. That hurt. It’s okay now, but I was shocked really bad.

Carl: Be careful of things getting wedged under there. 

Katia: Not much I can do about them now. 

I watched as the massive pile of body parts lowered, zipping away into her inventory. She did it again. And again. All that was left was a pile of chattering heads. Donut and Hekla went to work. 

Eva sputtered as more gore splattered across her face. “Coming up on 75,” she cried out. 

Corpses dotted the tracks here, including a pile of bodies on the platform. As we rushed past, I caught sight of several dead hobgoblins and jackal-faced gnolls. Multiple tracks spread out from the main line here, too, with a long line of small cars sitting idle, ready to hop onto the main track. These were tiny platforms, each about the size of a Mini Cooper. A long group of portals and switches remained here, too. 

But the station passed quickly, and I’d only gotten a quick glance. Hobgoblins meant this was where the crash interdiction teams were stationed. They’d been overrun by the ghouls. I knew that gnolls were often used as security. I wondered if they were the transit security forces Madison had been babbling about.

After that, the stations were much further apart. Ghouls remained on the tracks, always jogging forward. We also started seeing other mobs, but only in ones and twos. They shouldn’t be on this track at all since this line only stopped at transit stations. But nevertheless, they were here, all mobs suffering from the DTs. They came and died so quickly I never got a chance to examine them. 

But some of these single mobs were bigger and armored, and Katia started losing spikes. We passed through a pair of rhino-sized, metal-clad troll creatures, and her spikes were left all broken and bent. The train bucked, and I thought for certain we’d derail. But we remained on the tracks. Katia fixed her spikes the best she could, but she needed the metal to maintain the scoop’s integrity. Thankfully the monsters died instantly upon impact.

A moment later we hit a small group of ghouls mixed in with some fist-sized fairies who exploded. When we hit the flying creatures, they detonated in a mix of sparkles that covered the front of the scoop with rainbow-colored luminescence. 

Hekla leaned back from the window, rubbing the blood and gore from her face. She suddenly grinned big and said, “There are many wonders in a cow’s head.” 

“Indeed,” Eva said. 

I had no idea what the hell that meant. 

~

For the next hour and a half we zoomed up the tunnel, moving toward station 101. Hekla tried talking to Donut, but I kept myself between them. I tried to strike up a conversation with Eva, but she just grunted at me. I could tell everybody in the room was talking to one another via chat. Just a few minutes before we got there, I received a message from Elle. 

Elle: Hey, good news. 

Donut: HI ELLE. HI IMANI!

Carl: Oh yeah, what’s that? 

Elle: We now know what happens when too many of the festering ghouls get together. 

Carl: You’re being sarcastic, aren’t you?

Imani: She is. It looks like this type of ghoul’s goal is to get to stop 48. We used that stop 60 to move to your line. It took us a minute to find the right portal, but we found your train sitting there. We ranged downward to the stairwell at 48 and found it full of the festering ghouls. We watched them transform. These worm things come out of them, and then they pull themselves tightly together, making a giant frankenmonster. It’s too big to leave the room, but it fills it completely. It’s a province boss, Carl. We all got achievements just for discovering it. Thankfully it let us get the hell out of there. 

Elle: It’s really gross, too. It makes a slurping noise when it moves, and it’s covered with mouths that are always screaming.   

Holy shit. 

Carl: That sounds like the shambling berserkers from the last floor. But bigger.  

Donut: THOSE GUYS WERE REALLY SCARY.

Imani: I didn’t see those, but the monster has completely filled stop 48. And the wrath ghouls are stopping at station 36. Who knows what they’re going to do. All the ghouls coming from the trainyards are that kind now. They’re going to do the same thing. Or worse. 

Carl: Okay, we have jikininki ghouls at stop 12, nothing yet at 24, the wrath ghouls at 36, the province bosses at 48, and these blister ghouls at 72. It sounds like we need to pick one. Assuming whatever ends up happening at 24 is going to be awful, The jikininki and the blisters are probably the easiest to kill, but they both have generators, which means they continuously spawn. 

Elle: Can’t you just pull a Carl and blow the shit out of the room? That was one of Mistress Tiatha’s suggestions. 

Carl: I keep forgetting you guys have a manager, too. I think that’s what they want me to do. The generators are run by soul crystals, and they don’t take too kindly to being blown up. Station 12 still might be our best bet, but we’ll have to do it the old-fashioned way. 

Elle: Miss T isn’t all that helpful. She spends most of her day drinking and smoking blitz sticks. Then she cries about her space pony or whatever it was when she was in the dungeon. She was really excited to be our manager, but she’s treating it like it’s a spring break. She’ll throw a suggestion out every once in a while, but mostly she steals gold from me to buy more booze. 

Imani: We’re going to post up at 36 and kill the wrath ghouls as they come in. If we kill enough, maybe we can stop them from doing whatever they’re going to do. There are no soul crystals in that room. We could really use some of your boom jugs. 

Carl: That’s a great idea. Once we rescue these folks, we’ll have a lot more people to hold the line. I’ll meet you there as soon as I can.   

Elle: Okay. Stay frosty. 

Donut: IS THAT YOUR NEW CATCHPHRASE? I LOVE IT.

Elle: Yeah, I’m throwing a few out there to see what sticks. 

“Coming up on the main horde,” Eva said. “Look at all of them.” 

“Speed up,” both Hekla and I said at the same time. 

I turned to the healer. “Heal her about five seconds after we hit the crowd. I don’t care what her health is. Just do it. How many times can you cast before you run out of mana?” 

“Five times. But I got mana potions.”

“What’s your potion cooldown?” 

“Twenty seconds.” 

We rocketed down the tunnel. The line of dots appeared at the edge of my map, closing fast. 

“Okay, good,” I said. “I want you to heal Katia, count to five and heal her again. Keep doing it until we say stop. Keep an eye on her for any other conditions. Do you understand?” 

Silfa looked at Hekla, who nodded. 

“Okay,” she said. 

“We’re just in time,” Eva said. “The horde is going to hit 101 in a few minutes.” 

“How does the track look behind us?” I asked Hekla. I knew since she had the route map, she could see down the entire line.  

She frowned. “Not bad yet. Hopefully it’ll stay clear for our ride home.”

“Here they come!” Eva called. 

Smack. Smack, smack, smack. We plowed through the first few ghouls. The train shuddered. And then we were in it. The train bucked and lurched. The tight tunnel was actually keeping us on the track, I realized, as ghoul pieces showered into the cab. I went to work killing everything that continued to move. I smashed at a gnashing head with my fist, and it exploded. More came, one of them chomping painfully onto my leg. I pushed it down. My kneepads activated, the spikes killing it. 

The train whined ominously as we plowed through. We noticeably slowed. A few notifications appeared. Donut was screaming and slicing with her claws as more and more living ghoul bits showered into the cab. In moments, we were waist-deep in body parts, more than should be possible, and a lot of it was still alive. Something bit me. Then something else. I had to step back from the window. The pile of gore reminded me of the piles of chum dumped by boats by the docks. It angled down from the window, reaching halfway through the car and growing by the moment. The actual liquid was up to my knees. Holy shit, this was a bad idea. Donut was suddenly on my shoulder. She had a severed hand clutched tight on her tail. 

Katia: Help! 

I looked up to see Katia’s health at about 10% even as my own health started to plummet. Where was the fucking fairy? My damage reflect was doing a good job at hurting the monsters when they attacked, but there were so many. I slammed my Heal scroll, topping off Katia, and then I had to heal myself with a spell.

I activated Talon Strike and cast Bang Bro and waded back toward the window. I started smashing the heads all around us. It was like trying to fight while buried in oatmeal. The gore continued to shower into the train. Hekla had a physical shield spell around herself. Eva had one of her four hands on the throttle while she sliced down with her sabers. She was up to her chest. 

Body parts just kept coming and coming. The parts were getting bigger and bigger as we slowed, including full, living ghouls who weren’t quite dead. I ducked as a fully intact ghoul flew into the car. The green-skinned monstrosity got up and charged at me. Donut blasted it with a missile. 

The exterior of the train was completely covered with crawling and moaning and scrabbling monsters. The whole, front cab groaned ominously. Katia was spiking them mercilessly, clearing the gore by pulling the bodies into her inventory. But there was just so many, and she wasn’t moving fast enough. 

“Station coming up!” Eva cried. “I’m going to slow down!” 

“Not until Katia is healed again,” I yelled. “Where the fuck is Silfa? Is she down?” 

“She ran,” Donut said, breathless. She’d raised a pair of clockwork ghouls to fight for us, but Hekla killed them both in the confusion. “She ran away into the apartment!” 

Katia: Carl. Where am I? Why isn’t Eva answering me?  

I whirled back to Katia. Fucking hell. How was her health so low? 

We’d almost pushed through the horde, and only a few ghouls remained on the exterior. I dodged and swung, punching over and over, killing monsters while keeping an eye on Katia's constantly dwindling health. Was she getting shocked again? There was so much gore and bodies out there, surely she was getting blasted. But it was going down even faster than before, and I didn’t feel anything. It was like she’d been hit with a debuff, but it didn’t show on her status. I read another heal scroll, then another. I’d soon be out. 

Donut: Carl! Carl! Hekla shot Katia with an invisible arrow! I saw it with my sunglasses! She did it earlier, and I thought it was a mistake but she did it again. It was mixed in with her regular arrows. It went into her scoop. The arrows are still stuck in her! I think she did it on purpose! 

Carl: Katia! Disengage! Lose your mass! Now! Now!  

The train continued to slow, the brakes screaming. We were free of the crowd. Eva was also screaming. She’d been injured, blood spewing from one of her four hands. Hekla continued to kill the ghouls in the cab. She’d fallen back from the window, standing, thankfully out of reach. She’d slung her crossbow and had a short, curved blade in each hand and was twirling about, slicing and killing. Her shield was gone, and she now had Enraged flashing over her head. The tall woman screamed as she fought. While this subway car was a little wider than usual, it wasn’t that big, and I had to duck several times to avoid her frenzied slashes. I stayed back the best I could. 

The scoop at the front of the train vanished. Blood and guts showered onto the track. A lump of flesh plopped onto the floor of the cab, disappearing into the gore. A moment passed, and Katia reappeared, her health still plummeting. She popped up gasping. She started to collapse again, and I grasped her with my arm, pulling her up. Unconscious reappeared over her. 

“The arrows are still there! They’re sticking out of her shoulder!” Donut cried. “Pull them out!” 

There was no visible wound on Katia’s shoulder. She appeared to be wearing her regular, red leather outfit. I unsummoned my gauntlet and reached over, scrabbling until my hand grabbed onto something invisible. 

“That’s it! Pull it! Pull it!” 

I yanked, and Katia screamed in her sleep. Only then did the hole in her leather appear. Donut healed her. I pulled the invisible bolt into my inventory and grasped until I found the second one. I could feel that the shaft was splintered. I yanked. I quickly examined it. 

Dirty Little Phased Bolt.

This item is broken. It must be repaired before you may use it. 

This is a Phased item. It is invisible. It will hide its entry point and will only be discovered if it is physically touched. 

The perfect ammunition for the discerning crossbow assassin. This item will cast both Temporary Amnesia and Suffering Bleed onto its victim, draining them of health until they are at 10%. A second bolt will lower the victim’s health to 1%. Victims who subsequently perish will be listed as dying from an alternate source. You will not get credit or experience for the kill. Nor will you get one of those nasty skulls by your name if you happen to kill a fellow Crawler. Wink, wink, nudge, nudge. 

What the actual fuck? Why was she trying to kill Katia? 

Out on the platform, a mass of crawlers surged toward the now-stopped train. On the periphery of my map, I saw what had to be 500 red dots pushing the mass of blue dots back.  

Hekla finally looked up from the gore. The Enraged buff blinked a few times and disappeared. She had a wild look to her eyes. She focused on the still-unconscious Katia hanging on my arm. She frowned. It was as if she hadn’t even noticed that we’d saved her until that moment. Eva had healed herself, but she had lost a hand. She stared at it stupidly, as if she was surprised it hadn’t grown back. 

I stomped down on one last ghoul head.  

Everyone just looked at each other, not sure what to do next. 

Carl: Donut, be cool. This doesn’t have to turn into a fight. She was trying something, and whatever it was, it didn’t work. We don’t want to fight her. 

“You tried to kill Katia you fucking bitch!” Donut cried. She blasted a full-strength Magic Missile right at Hekla’s head. 

Chapter 96

Hekla flew back, eyes registering shock as she slammed into the sidewall of the car. At the same moment, Eva flew at me—or Donut, who was perched on my shoulder—swords swirling in the air. The back of the cab opened, and two more daughters rushed in, hands glowing. Silfa rushed from the apartment, eyes wide as she took in the scene. 

I dropped Katia and dodged back as I re-formed my gauntlet. My feet scrambled through the slippery muck, and my back slammed against the train wall. I caught a vicious slice of the saber with my armored hand. I need more fucking armor. I kicked up into Eva’s stomach, and she rocketed back. I cast Wisp Armor on myself just as a magic missile and an electrical bolt slammed into me, one each from the two newcomers. 

“Hold!” Hekla cried, pulling herself to her feet. She’d been fully healed by Silfa. “Everybody hold! Cease!”

I’d dropped Katia, but her health had stabilized. Her head remained above the line of body parts and gore, like she was treading water. She remained unconscious. She’d awaken on her own in thirty seconds. Eva stood and hissed and lunged at me and Donut. Hekla held her back. Then she grabbed Eva’s wrist and pulled it up, eyes going wide at the injury. 

“Did I do that?” Hekla asked. 

“Yes, you did,” Eva growled. “I have three more hands. That little bitch shot you. Let me kill her.” 

“You tried to kill Katia,” Donut yelled. “I saw it! You used invisible arrows! I thought she was your friend! We don’t shoot our friends!” 

“Bolts,” Hekla said. “They’re called bolts when they’re from a crossbow, Donut.” 

Donut spit and growled. Her claws dug into my shoulder. I was painfully aware of how small this train really was. 

“What’re we doing?” I called. “I don’t know what the hell is going on, but everyone needs to calm the fuck down. This is bullshit. We’re all on the same goddamn side.”

Hekla turned to the two mages. “Out. You too, Silfa.” 

They started to protest. “Out!” she yelled. The three crawlers reluctantly fled. They remained right outside the door. It was me, Donut, Katia, Hekla, and Eva.     

Outside, the crawlers continued to swarm onto the train. They didn’t all fit into the passenger cars, so they were moving to the cargo containers. A group of crawlers were at the top of the stairs to the platform, making a stand, protecting everybody else’s escape. We didn’t have much time. An ungodly roar filled the platform. A group of five blue dots at the top of the stairs turned to Xs. 

“I made a mistake,” Hekla said once the others were gone. She shrugged, as if it was nothing. “I can’t take it back, but there’s no reason for it to snowball. We need a pause and a reset. We can discuss this after we get out of here. We need to work together.” 

“Never!” Donut cried. She was shaking with rage. “I’ll never team up with you! Traitor!”

“Donut,” Hekla said, calm as can be. “We need to be practical. There’s no time for this. You need to breathe.”

But Donut would not stop shaking. “I used to think you were awesome, Hekla. But you’re just like all the rest! You pretend to be good, but you’re not! It was a lie, all a lie. Why? Why can’t we trust anyone? You told Katia you wanted her. You made her feel special and loved, but you just wanted to use her and trade her in.” 

Katia finally awakened. She sat up, eyes wide. She took in the room. “Carl? Eva? What’s happening?” 

“Hekla tried to murder you, that’s what’s happening!” Donut yelled. “We don’t even know why. You didn’t do anything wrong.” 

“Control your fucking animal, or I will shut her up,” Eva growled. 

I put my hand on the side of Donut’s head in an attempt to calm her. It was starting to dawn on me why Donut was having such a visceral reaction to this. The monumental revelation hit me like a goddamned truck, but we didn’t have time to deal with it now. “We need to stay calm, okay?” 

“She didn’t do anything wrong, Carl. She did her best. It’s not fair.” 

“I know, Donut.” 

“Guys, please,” Katia said. She stood on wobbly legs. “What is going on? I can’t remember…” She trailed off. “Everything hurts.” 

Hekla sighed and leaned up against the wall of the train. Her knives disappeared into her inventory. She pulled a pack of cigarettes, popped one into her mouth, and lit it. “Well this backfired. God, I need a shower. Anybody want a cigarette?” 

At that exact second, that exact moment, I wanted nothing more in the universe than to take her up on that. But Donut remained on my shoulder, and I didn’t dare move closer.

“Look, we’re all adults here,” Hekla said. “We need to get to the other engine. The track is clear. So you three can hang back, if you want. Or just take this engine and go the other way. I don’t care. It’s over. What is the American phrase? No harm, no foul? But you’re right, Carl, we don’t need this. It was a stupid risk.” 

“I don’t know what ‘this’ is,” I said. “I thought for sure you were going to try to kill me. But Katia? Why?” 

Katia, eyes still huge, was looking back and forth between us. “Eva?” she asked. 

“It’s nothing. Go outside, Katia. The others are waiting for you.” 

“Don’t do it,” Donut said. “They tried to hurt you, Katia. You can stay with us. We’ll get out of here. Okay? We won’t ever abandon you. And we won’t be filthy liars, either.” 

“Can we just take this down a notch,” Katia said. “For god’s sake. I don’t know what’s happening. Why don’t I remember?” 

“Because Hekla shot you with a scary arrow that was going to kill you.” 

Hekla laughed, and it sounded unhinged. “Bolt, Donut. It was a bolt.” 

“No,” Katia said. “You were both shooting. You hit me with a magic missile, Donut. You were aiming at the ghouls. I remember. It was an accident. That’s okay.” 

“We don’t have time for this,” Hekla said. She flicked her cigarette away and pushed herself from the wall. “Come on, Eva. We need to hurry.”  

“No, wait,” Katia said. “Please. We can’t…”  

“Damnit, Katia,” Eva said. “Quit being stupid. Come with us. You’re always fucking like this. Just do what I say.”

“I’m just trying to figure this out. Hekla, you hurt me on purpose? Why? Did I do something?”  

Eva growled. “You were always saying you felt useless, Katia. You were being useful. We weren’t really going to kill you. We just wanted Carl’s famous temper to flare. Now shut the hell up and come.” 

“I… what?” Katia asked. “You used me? For what?” 

“Oh, Katia,” Eva said, voice dripping with mock concern. She impersonated Katia’s voice. “For what? For what?” 

“Eva,” Hekla said. “Drop it. Remember your anger. Let’s go. It’s done.” 

Eva did not drop it. She continued to mock Katia. “What? Fannar left me for one of his students? What? They’re not going to let me adopt. Why me? Boo hoo. For fuck’s sake, Katia. Open your goddamn eyes. Quit being so naïve. Look where we are. Look at what we need to do to survive. This is why I left you behind on the third floor. This is why you’re such a damn fuck up. This is why nobody likes you. Because you’re so damn confused all the fucking time. Now for once in your pitiful life do the right thing and get away from those two.” 

Katia had a special ability she didn’t like to use very often. 

Rush, it was called. It turned her body into a battering ram. When activated, she blasted forward, shattering everything in her path. She could only use it once a day, and when she did use it, it knocked all the wind out of her, even if she didn’t actually hit anything. As a result, I knew she abhorred the skill, despite Mordecai’s insistence that she use it as often as possible. 

Also, the skill wasn’t predictable. Sometimes when she used Rush, her body flew forward five feet. Sometimes it flew forward twenty, and there didn’t seem to be any sort of rhyme or reason to the discrepancy.  

In addition, the angle in which she rushed forward wasn’t always perfectly straight. Mostly her body dashed straight forward in the direction she was pointing, but sometimes, every once in a while, she flew slightly off-center.

And that’s what happened this time. She was aiming at her former friend Eva. She missed her by inches. 

Instead, she inadvertently became the first crawler on this season of Dungeon Crawler World to kill one of the top 10 and claim a bounty. 

In this case it was Hekla the Amazonian Shieldmaiden, the current number two in the game, whom she splattered against the interior wall of the train, thus earning herself a bounty of 500,000 gold. 

And in that moment, just before all hell broke loose all over again, I finally noticed Katia’s level. She’d been level 24 when she’d formed herself into a cowcatcher at the front of the train. When she fell back from the wall, skull forming over her head—a special, golden skull—I saw that she was now level 37.

***
Whew. That last chapter is a little short, but I figured you guys wouldn't like it too much if I left it hanging on the previous one. I am probably going to leave it hanging there for the RR folks when we get there. Haha.  

I am going to post a poll for Katia's fan box later today if I get a chance. The poll's existence is a bit of a spoiler, so I want to give it a bit before I post.