Where the Predators Prowl [Ch 44-46]

44: Treasure

There were far too many enemies for us to face on the field, but then again I did ask Ignis to train us well, so perhaps making us go up against impossible odds was her way of doing it.

As I attempted to think of how to potentially break up the massive student and Elemental congregation, Nessy tilted her head, her nostrils flaring as she took in several deep breaths. 

Her eyes narrowed in concentration. "Something's not right," she whispered.

"What do you mean?"

"That chest," she said, nodding toward the elevated platform. "It smells... empty. It's too obvious, too prominent."

"A decoy?" I guessed.

"Pretty sure, yeah," she confirmed. "The real treasure is..." She closed her eyes, sniffing and spinning in one spot, seeming to focus intently on something only she could perceive. When her eyes opened again—one blue, one silver—they were bright with excitement. "This way."

She tugged me back the way we'd come, then down a narrow side passage I hadn't noticed before. This new path twisted sharply downward, leading us deeper into the earth. The walls here were damp, glistening with moisture, and the air felt cooler, heavier.

"Are you sure about this?" I asked, struggling to maintain my balance on the sloping, slippery path with my stolen wolf legs.

"Absolutely," Nessy nodded. "I can smell it now. The real treasure has this... unique scent. A genuine magic artifact with mana potency to it."

The passage finally leveled out, opening into a small, unremarkable clearing. Unlike the grand space where Fern waited, this area was plain, unguarded, and seemingly insignificant—just another dead end in an underground maze.

"It's here," Nessy declared, dropping to her knees and beginning to dig at a patch of earth that looked identical to every other patch around us.

I joined her, my wolf claws making the work easier than human fingers would have. We dug in silence for several minutes.

Finally, my claws struck something solid. "I think I found it," I said, brushing away the remaining soil to reveal a small, plain lockbox made of what appeared to be ordinary steel. No runes, no elaborate decorations, no magical glow—just a simple, mundane container that could have been found in any office supply store.

"This is it?" I asked skeptically. "It looks so... normal."

"The best treasures often do," Nessy replied with a knowing smile. "It's what's inside that matters."

I was about to figure out how to open the lockbox when a deep, jovial, female voice echoed from the earthen tunnel behind us. 

"What have we here?"

We spun around to see an absolutely massive, gray and black spotted seal pradavarian emerging from what I'd assumed was a solid earth wall. She was very tall and curvy, with intelligent dark gray eyes and a far too cheerful expression that immediately put me on edge. 

Her spotted pattern defined her as a harbor seal and she wore a silver and black hexasuit, black dreadlocks swaying with gold and silver rings. She moved with that peculiar seal waddle-walk that somehow managed to look both adorably cute and intimidating, white whiskers twitching.

"Oh my!" she said brightly, clapping her gloved hands together. "Two little wolves who've found our super-secret treasure! How absolutely wonderful!" Her voice carried the kind of enthusiasm typically reserved for discovering unexpected birthday presents.

“And you are?” I asked, evaluating our titan prad of an opponent. 

I knew that some prads had gigantism, but seeing a live example of such up close was truly unnerving. I thought that Addie was tall and fit, but this woman was on a whole other level of body density.

"I'm Advanced Dungeoneering Teacher's Assistant Marlena Shashorth," the large sea lion declared with a theatrical bow, making her dreadlock rings jingle. "Level 47 Hydromancer, and today's special surprise boss encounter!" She straightened up, still beaming. "And I'm afraid you two adorable little puppies aren't getting out of here alive with the treasure! Mwa ha ha ha har arf!”

The cheerful way she delivered this death threat while looming over us was somehow more unnerving than if she'd been snarling.

"Uh," I uttered, still clutching the lockbox. “Surprise attack team - go!”

Our backpacks suddenly burst open as Adelle and Kristi exploded out in a blur of orange and emerald-violet.

"Nobody threatens my Alpha!" Adelle roared, launching herself at the seal with fists flying.

Marlena's eyes widened with delight. "Oh! Unexpected delvers inside dimensional bags! How wonderful!" She clapped her large hands together, then immediately had to dodge as Adelle's punch whistled past her snout.

What followed was possibly the most bizarre prad fight I'd ever witnessed. Marlena fought like, well, like a giant seal. She'd suddenly drop to her belly and torpedo-slide into Adelle, bowling the cheetah over, pop back up behind her with a happy bark, then dive sideways again when Kristi tried to rake her with raptor claws.

"Arf! Arf!" Marlena barked merrily as she evaded their attacks, her hexasuit-wrapped body undulating in smooth, flowing motions. "This is so much fun! You're both very good at this violence thing!"

“Stay still damn it!” Adelle growled, trying to ineffectively punch the seal. “Shadowstep!”

The TA flopped and rolled, using her powerful tail and legs to propel herself in unexpected directions, evading the cheetah's teleporting powers with ridiculous effectiveness for someone so large.

"How are you so damn slippery?!" Kristi growled as the blackjack she wielded failed to knock out the TA, simply sliding off the side of her neck.

"Natural seal advantages!" Marlena chirped, popping up behind a confused Kristi. "Plus I may have applied some hydro-slickness enchantments this morning to my suit! Always be prepared, that's my motto!"

She honked and rolled right over my packmates, her hands blasting streams of water that made the ground treacherous. The raptor and cheetah were comically crushed with indignant cries, failing to stop the illusive seal.

“You're no match for my wrestling skills, cuties!” She laughed as water dripped from her knuckles.

Adelle shadow teleported from under the seal, only to receive a tail swat to the face.

While Adelle and Kristi continued their slapstick battle with the merry seal, I noticed Nessy creeping around behind Marlena. Her figure was hard to focus on, nearly invisible. I realised that she was binding her paws to the slippery ground with flashes of silver so as not to fall over like our heavy hitters.

"Oh, this is delightful!" Marlena chortled as she somehow produced a live fish from her pocket and started juggling it with her hands while dodging Kristi's increasingly frustrated claw swipes. "I haven't had this much fun since the last time Professor Terrimoff let me design a proper water trap for my thesis!”

She laughed, swatting Kristi into a wall and swallowed the fish snack whole in one swipe of her mouth. “Did you know that if you flash-freeze someone's feet to the ground, they make the most amusing—"

The TA’s cheerful rambling was cut short as Nessy-Candace leapt at her from behind, pressing her paws to Marlena's temples.

"Bind Mobility!" Nessy commanded, silver light flaring from her hands.

"Oh my!" Marlena said. "I am paralyzed! That's quite impressive binding work! Very clean application of—"

She toppled forward, completely rigid, rolling sideways and nearly crushing Adelle.

The effort of binding such a large, high-level opponent seemed to drain something vital from Nessy. She stumbled, her body flickering like a bad hologram. The silver light that had been dancing in her left eye suddenly winked out, and she too collapsed.

I felt a sudden wrenching sensation as I was yanked back into my own human body, tumbling out of one of the no longer extra-expanded bags in a disorienting heap. 

Nessy's body hit the ground at the same moment that Candace rolled out in a tangle of limbs from the other bag. The wolf girl was expelled as well, and our supplies and extra weapons scattered everywhere like the contents of an overturned toybox.

The wolf boy came to, blinking at us with confused, wide eyes. Addie appeared behind him with a shadowstep and smacked him in the head with a fist and he toppled into the mud.

"Ow," came Candace's weak voice from where she'd landed in a pile of rope and bagged rations. "That was... definitely not how I planned to return to my body. That damn seal ate all my mana."

“I’m pretty hard to take down,” The TA agreed jovially. “I’m impressed that you managed it at all.”

I groaned, my human limbs feeling strange and awkward after hours in a wolf's body. Everything looked bigger. My body felt a bit too confining, too weak. 

Nessy sat up slowly, rubbing her temples. Her eyes were back to their normal blue and she looked dazed. "Wah. Everything hurts," she mumbled. "And I feel... empty? Like someone scooped out half my thoughts and energy."

"The binding overextended our shared mana," Candace explained, slowly untangling herself from the mess of supplies. "Forced separation. Not dangerous, just... uncomfortable. Bleh."

"Wowza!" came Marlena's cheerful voice from where she lay paralyzed on the tunnel floor, "that was absolutely lovely! Did you develop that technique yourself, Miss...?"

"Candace," the fox replied.

"Marvelous! And might I add, excellent tactical thinking. Using my focus on your companions to create an opening to bind me—textbook asymmetric warfare!" Marlena's wholesome enthusiasm was undimmed by her complete inability to move. "Professor Fern will be ever so pleased with your performance! She did warn me that you guys would be devious but I didn't expect so much advanced magic use from students!”

Adelle walked over to the seal and sat directly on Marlena's back like she was a particularly comfortable bench.

"So," the cheetah said, making herself comfortable, "you're just gonna lie there and be chill about us paralyzing you?"

"Oh absolutely!" Marlena replied brightly. "This is exactly the sort of creative problem-solving we're trying to encourage! I'm actually quite proud of you all. Though I should mention—" her tone became a touch more serious, "—you still have to make it back out of the maze. My job was just to guard the treasure, not necessarily stop you from finding it."

Kristi, who was busy collecting stuff the bags expunged into a single pile, glanced at the TA. 

Nessy, still looking shaky and lost from the forced separation, managed to pull some sandwiches from our scattered supplies. "Anyone hungry?" she asked. "I feel like we should eat something before... we start heading back."

The girls and I nodded in agreement. Candace found a bottle of muddy mana-restoring wine, wiped the top and chugged it, passing the rest to Nessy. Nessy sipped the wine slowly and offered Marlena bites of sandwich, which the seal accepted graciously.

"This is quite good!" Marlena commented after chewing thoughtfully. "Is that herb-crusted turkey? Lovely! You know, most students would probably just leave me paralyzed and rush off. It's refreshing to encounter such polite young delvers."

"You're taking this pretty well for someone who's been defeated," I observed.

"Oh psh, defeated is such a strong word!" Marlena bark-laughed. "I prefer 'tactically repositioned.'"

We were just finishing our impromptu meal when one of the earth walls beside us simply... parted. Soil and roots shifted aside like a curtain being drawn, revealing Professor Fern standing in the newly created opening. Her burning eye surveyed our little scene—the paralyzed seal inhabited by Adelle, the pair of knocked out wolves and us nomming on sandwiches and sharing wine.

“A job well done, delvers,” she said. “As it is twelve PM, the simulation is paused for lunch!”

I nodded, wary of trickery.

An earth Elemental flowed behind her, its massive form barely fitting in the tunnel opening it had created.

"Hello, Professor!" Marlena called out cheerfully from beneath Adelle. "These students have been absolutely wonderful! Very creative problem-solving, excellent teamwork, and they shared their sandwiches!"

Professor Fern stepped fully into our tunnel, her gaze moving between each of us before settling on the lockbox in Kristi's hands.

"You found the real treasure," she stated. It wasn't a question.

"Yes ma'am," I replied, uncertain where this was heading.

"And defeated my TA," she continued, nodding toward Marlena.

"We did," Kristi confirmed.

Professor Fern was quiet for a long moment, her burning eye seeming to look through us rather than at us. When she spoke again, her voice carried a weight that made the air feel heavier.

"Very well. I'm going to give you a choice," she said finally. "One that will determine not just your grade for today, but your future as delvers."

She gestured to the tunnel opening behind her.

"Option one: You can come with me now. I'll escort you safely back to the gymnasium. You'll receive full marks for the simulation, praise for your creativity and teamwork, and continue your education in Advanced Delving with more simulated dungeoneering."

Her burning eye fixed on mine with uncomfortable intensity.

"Option two: You attempt to escape on your own. Fight your way past the remaining monsters, evade the Elementals, navigate the maze, and reach the gymnasium under your own power." She paused. "If you choose this path and if even one of you is 'killed' in the simulation—you all fail the class."

"And if we succeed?" I asked.

Professor Fern's scarred beak curved into what might have been a smile. "If you succeed... I will recommend you for immediate advancement to Practical Dungeoneering. Real dungeons. Real dangers. Real rewards. Tickets to the Infinite Superstore courtesy of the school administration.”

She stepped closer. "Know this—the path you choose here will echo through everything that comes after. Safe passage with guaranteed success, or risk everything for the chance at something greater."

The tunnel fell silent except for Marlena's cheerful humming. 

I looked at my packmates—Candace looking half asleep, Nessy chewing her sandwich, Kristi clutching the treasure box with a frazzled look of wet, muddy feathers, and Adelle sitting atop our captured TA like she owned the place.

Then I looked at Ignis. “Time limit?”

“You have till 3:30 to escape this labyrinth.” She said. 

“Are you going to throw everyone at us?” I asked.

“Naturally,” she answered.

“When?”

“After lunch,” she grinned with sharp raptor teeth.

“Very well,” I said. “We accept.”

45: Laurel Heart

"What'd we just accepted?" Adelle asked from atop the paralyzed Marlena. "The guaranteed A or the fighting-for-our-lives option?"

"The fighting, obviously," I replied. "We're going to escape on our own."

“Aight,” the cheetah stretched, striped tail wagging. “I approve.”

"Of course," Candace sighed. "Because why take the easy path when there's a more dangerous one available? And here I thought that I would have an easier time with a smol human captain who isn’t into punching everything.”

“Sux to be you,” Adelle laughed.

Professor Fern smiled at me. "A bold choice, Mr. Foster. I expected nothing less." 

“Can we keep the treasure?” I asked.

“Naturally,” Ignis answered. “This is just like a real dungeon with a real reward to keep.”

She turned to address all of us. "The rules are simple: reach the gymnasium with your team intact and the treasure in your possession. The simulation ends precisely at 3:30 PM. If any of you aren't inside the gym by then, you will be considered forevermore sealed inside the dungeon and therefore dead.”

She checked her watch. "It is now 12:06. You have three hours and twenty four minutes. I suggest you use this time wisely."

With that advice, she stepped back into the tunnel opening. "Oh, and one more thing," she added, pausing at the threshold. "I've informed all the 'monsters' that Team Foster has obtained the treasure. They will be... highly motivated to stop you so as not to get a failing grade."

The earth closed behind her, sealing the tunnel entrance as if it had never existed.

Kristi attempted to pry the treasure box open and failed. The rest of my team looked tired and sullen.

"Come on!" I said. "We can do this. We've got the advantage of surprise—they don't know where we are yet."

"Actually," came Marlena's friendly voice from beneath Adelle, "I should probably mention that Professor Fern is totally tracking that treasure. She will know exactly where you are at all times, and she will share that information live with the ‘monsters’ via Voicecast. The students and Elementals will all swarm towards you at 1 PM!"

We all stared at the paralyzed seal TA.

"Shouldn't you be, I don't know, less helpful to us?" Kristi asked.

"Oh heavens no!" Marlena laughed. "I'm a teaching assistant, emphasis on 'teaching.' My job is to facilitate learning, not to make things artificially difficult. Besides," she added with a wink, "I rather like you a lot. You fed me and the cheetah lass is keeping me warm and cozy!”

Adelle chortled.

“And what if we run to the gym now?” I asked.

“If you run, that means you are done luncheoning and the enemy students outside will attack you,” the TA clarified. “See, many of the old dungeons like the Superstore are reactive and orderly, following very specific rules–if you sit down to rest in a dark alcove, the monsters won't harass you. If you run with a stolen item, you will get chased and become chowdah.”

"So, Marlena, how long until you can move again?" I asked.

"The binding should wear off in about… Ten minutes? Give or take," Marlena estimated. "Oh, and when it does, I'll be obligated to try and stop you. Not right away though. At 1PM! I'll just lounge here till then or till you start running. Enjoy your lunch and rest for now. Just as a heads up! Nothing personal, of course."

. . .

I motioned for Candace, Nessy, and Kristi to follow me further into the tunnel, away from where Marlena could overhear our conversation. Adelle remained sprawled across the seal's wide back, contentedly working her way through what appeared to be her fourth sandwich.

"Alright," I said once we were out of earshot, "I have a crazy plan."

"More crazy than soul-fusing the fox with a husky?" Kristi asked. "Color me intrigued."

"C, can you bind my soul into the seal's body?" I asked.

Candace blinked at me. "You were a mediocre wolf at best, dude. How exactly do you plan to be an effective seal femme when you could barely walk on four legs without face-planting?"

"I'm not planning to escape using her body," I clarified. "I want to use the TA as a trap."

“Explain,” Kristi said leaning in closer.

"Think about it," I said, gesturing back toward where Marlena lay paralyzed. "Fern said they're all tracking the treasure, right? They'll come swarming here expecting to find us. But what if they find what appears to be just the TA, seemingly recovering from being bound?"

Nessy's tail began to wag as she caught on. "And meanwhile, the real treasure and most of our team will be somewhere else entirely, right?"

"Exactly. If I'm in Marlena's body, I can feed false information to the monsters, send them in the wrong direction, distract them, buy us time to actually escape." I looked at Candace. "How long would that binding last?"

"With a Level 47 seal host body with us being far enough away to escape? Maybe ten minutes before your consciousness snaps back," she replied thoughtfully. "But that could work. Especially if..."

She trailed off, her gray eyes taking on that distant look that meant she was seeing connections in the Astral.

"If what?" Kristi prompted.

"If the treasure box is magically tagged for tracking, I can unbind that tag from the box and rebind it to Marlena's body," Candace said, her voice gaining excitement. "Make them think the treasure is wherever she is!”

"That's perfect," I said. "But first, we should probably see what's actually in this thing."

Kristi held up the plain steel lockbox. "It's sealed tight. No visible lock, no keyhole. Can't physically pry it open."

"Leave that to me," Candace grinned, flexing her fingers as silver light began to dance between them. "Unbind lock, unbind security, unbind tracker tag… Bind tracker tag to my paw..."

She placed her glowing hands on the box, muttering under her breath. There was a soft click, and the lid popped open slightly.

"Ta-da!" she announced. "One unlocked treasure box, as ordered."

I carefully lifted the lid, not sure what to expect. 

Inside, nestled in black velvet, was a small crystal sphere about the size of an orange. It was covered in a network of black, bone-like material shaped almost like fractal hexagons. The sphere pulsed with a soft, warm light that seemed to shift through the entire spectrum as I watched.

"What is it?" Nessy asked, peering over my shoulder.

“A little dragonheart!” Candace breathed out. “Perfect! This solves our mana problem.”

“How?” I asked.

“I can leech mana outta the heart,” Candace explained. “In fact everyone can, all I have to do is bind myself and the others to it as Kobolds.”

“We have a mana problem?” Nessy asked.

“Obviously we do,” Candace huffed. “That damn thikk seal is a pain in my ass to bind. If I shove Alec into her body, I’ll run outta mana again and be dead weight, unable to do fuck all after and we still need to upscale at least one of the bags, right?”

“You know,” I said. “Something like this would have been great to have earlier.”

“Yeah,” Candace nodded. “But they don't sell these on the open market. It's a rare, incredibly valuable raw material. Corpos buy them out before anyone else gets a chance.”

“Right. That’s a raw heart, yeah?” I asked. 

Candace nodded.

“Then, I can use Syntropic Fusion to fuse it with… something, reshape it, make it into a proper artifact, and reinforce its effect. The question is - with what?”

I looked around at our scattered supplies, then at my packmates. "What materials do we have that could enhance a dragonheart's mana distribution?"

"The box itself is enchanted," Candace said, tapping the steel container. "It's got preservation and containment bindings and magisteel runes woven into the metal. That could work as a base."

"What else?" I asked.

“If we are distributing mana from it to each of us, then a piece of us infused with our mana could function as the artifact binding link,” Candace replied.

Kristi suddenly dropped to one knee before me with unexpected formality. "My Alpha," she said, plucking a large feather from her elbow. "Accept this token of my loyalty and dedication to your cause as your knight."

She held the emerald-violet plume in both hands, closing her eyes in concentration. I watched as she channeled her mana into the feather, the magical energy making it glow like a torch in the dim tunnel. When she opened her eyes and offered it to me, the feather practically hummed with power.

"Thank you, Kristi," I said, accepting the charged feather with the gravity her gesture deserved.

Nessy immediately followed suit. She picked up a spilled knife and snipped off a tuft of black and white hair. "For our pack," she said simply, her paws glowing as she poured her own mana into her hair until it sparkled like starlight.

"Adelle!" Candace called out to the cheetah still lounging on Marlena. "Get over here, we need a contribution from you too!"

"What kind of contribution?" Adelle yelled back, reluctantly climbing off the paralyzed seal and flashing with shadowstep to our side.

"Give me some of your hair with your mana infused into it," I explained. 

"This is pack artificing—everyone needs to give their essence willingly,” Candace nodded.

“Aight.” The cheetah snipped off some of her red hair with a sharp claw then cupped them in her palms. I could see her concentrating as her mana flowed into the strands, making them glow like embers. "There."

"And we'll all need to contribute blood," Candace added, taking the knife, cutting off and igniting some pure white hair and giving it to me. "But not just any blood—mana-charged blood. Pour your power into each drop."

We each pricked our fingers in turn with the knife. I went first, letting several drops fall onto the dragonheart while channeling my mana into them. The red drops hit the crystal surface and immediately sank in like water into sand, leaving trails of silver light.

Kristi followed, her blood glowing emerald as it joined mine. Nessy's drops sparkled blue, Adelle's burned violet, and finally Candace's silver drops completed the pattern. The dragonheart pulsed with a rainbow of our combined essences.

"This is going to take some time," I warned, settling into a comfortable position with the materials spread before me. “Perhaps thirty or forty minutes.”

"I'll keep watch," Kristi volunteered, positioning herself near the tunnel entrance.

“I’ll go back guarding the seal,” the cheetah yawned and flashed away.

“Is she just going to shadow step everywhere?” I glanced at her.

“Her skill mana will burn out after a while,” Candace commented. “She does get too lazy to walk properly after eating. Effin’ cat.”

I nodded.

"N’ways. Let’s get to it. I’ll help with the binding," Candace said, wrapping herself around me from behind.

Nessy knelt on the ground ,in front of us, ready to provide her musical support. "Ready when you are, guys."

"Nessy, I need you to sing something that focuses on unity, connection, shared strength. Something about us. But keep it going—this is going to be a long process,” I said.

The husky nodded and began to hum, her claws tapping on her armor to produce a catchy tune. Then she opened her mouth and my mind drowned in her song.

"I sing with voice both strong and true,
My deepest dreams to carry us through,
Black and white but never gray,
I guide us forward, show the way.

Alec stands with branches spreading,
Human heart but soul transcending,
Tree of strength through storm and trial,
Leading us through every mile.

Kristi soars on emerald wings,
Pride and fury that she brings,
Raptor claws and noble heart,
Sworn to never drift apart."

The drumming of her claws accelerated, tail wagging. She rubbed the knife against the edge of her armored shoulder somehow producing a deep, buzz-like background riff to add to the tapping tones.

“Candace weaves the silver thread,
Binding souls though heart has bled,
Fox of chaos, fox of light,
Makes the wrong things turn out right.

Adelle strikes with fists of fire,
Shadow-steps when stakes grow higher,
Orange blur of loyal rage,
Writes our legend, page by page.

Five as one we stand together,
Bound through any storm or weather,
Pack united, strong and free,
Growing like our Alpha's tree."

As Nessy sang, Candace placed her hands over mine, silver light flowing from her fingers to assist my Syntropic Fusion. I could feel her mana joining with mine, amplifying my usually limited magical capabilities.

"Syntropic Fusion," I murmured, channeling everything I had into reshaping the dragonheart.

The process was gradual and methodical. Accompanied by Nessy's music, the crystal began to slowly change under my guidance. The process was much more complex than magic grass weaving, requiring constant attention and adjustment. The steel box melted and reformed bit by bit, wrapping around the heart like liquid metal before solidifying into an intricate framework.

Kristi's mana-charged feather took nearly five minutes to fully dissolve into emerald-violet light that spiraled around the structure. Nessy's supercharged fur became threads of black and white energy that wove through the metal. Adelle's glowing orange hair and Candace’s white hair transformed into flowing patterns that danced across the surface, each strand requiring individual attention to properly integrate.

Our combined, mana-infused blood continued to pulse through the crystal core over the course of several minutes, and I felt something fundamental shift—not just in the artifact, but in my connection to my packmates. The Dagaz binding Candace had placed on us seemed to resonate with the fusion, strengthening and clarifying our bond.

"How much longer?" Kristi asked quietly, glancing at her watch. 

"Almost done," I replied, sweat beading on my forehead from the sustained magical effort. "Just need to stabilize the entire thing some more..."

When the light finally faded and Syntropic Fusion dropped to zero, I held something entirely new. It was a circlet or laurel crown of sorts, made of the transformed steel with the dragonheart somehow stretched across it as five colorful gems. Delicate metallic branches extended from the heart, resembling a laurel wreath, with small crystalline leaves that shimmered with the combined colors of our pack—emerald, violet, silver, orange, black, and white.

[Congratulations! You have created: Packbound Dragonheart Laurel (High Quality)]

[Effect: Pulls mana currently stored within into the wearer: 587/587. Regenerates 50 mana per hour. Amplifies cooperative magical abilities by 33.75% when working with bound pack members while worn by the pack Alpha. Duration: Permanent.]

[Warning: Artifact is soul-bonded to your pack. Its destruction may result in severe psychological trauma to all bound members.]

46: Arf!

"Ohhh, this is some professional-grade artificing," Candace breathed into my neck, staring at the laurel. "Steady mana regen and boosts to teamwork!"

I slipped the laurel onto my head, the metal cool against my skin but somehow comforting. 

"You look regal," Nessy said, her tail wagging as she looked at me. "Like an actual pack leader."

"More importantly," Kristi added pragmatically, "how's the mana regeneration feeling?"

"It's slowly regenerating,” I replied, watching as Syntropic Fusion ticked up to 1 then 2%.

“Quality musicating my dawg,” Candace let go of me, standing up and turning to Nessy. “Snappy lyrics. Mmmm… branches spreading. I’d like Alec to spread something else of yours though, if you kno’ what I mean.” She wiggled her white eyebrows at the husky.

Nessy let out an embarrassed choking noise.

“You should give his neck a big lick while he’s not paying attention,” Candace encouraged. “You know you want to. I’ve been… inside you.”

“Slayer, staaaaaph,” Nessy shoved the fox away.

You know I can hear you, right?" I commented, shaking my head at Candace's relentless commentary.

"That's the point, tree-boy," Candace grinned wickedly. "Gotta plant those romantic seeds somewhere. Speaking of planting n’ plowing—"

"Nope," I cut her off before she could finish what was undoubtedly going to be another over-the-top innuendo. I pulled the laurel crown from my head and placed it firmly on hers instead. "Here. Go knock out the TA again."

"Ooh, crowning me your queen?" Candace purred, adjusting the circlet with theatrical flair. "I accept this most regal position. I promise to rule with a magisteel paw and a silver tongue. Both of which I'm very good at using on—"

"Candace," I warned.

"Fine, fine," she laughed, practically skipping toward where Marlena lounged.

I watched as she approached the no longer paralyzed but extremely chill sea lion, who perked up immediately upon seeing her.

"Oh, hello again, dear!" Marlena said cheerfully. "Come to chat? I do enjoy a good conversation! Just a reminder—you’ve about ten minutes until I start slapping you into walls."

"Mhmm," Candace replied sweetly, kneeling beside the TA. Her hands began to glow silver as she placed them on either side of Marlena's head. "Bind sleep!"

"Oh my, are you sure you have enough mana for that? I am prrrre—" Marlena's words cut off mid-sentence as her eyes fluttered closed.

"There we go," Candace announced, standing and dusting off her knees, swaying slightly. "One unconscious seal, as ordered."

She returned to us.

“Go amplify one of the bags so all of us can fit in it,” I ordered. The fox immediately set to work expanding the nearest dimensional bag with binding magic. 

"Bag space increased by approximately 400%," she reported with satisfaction in about five minutes. "Should fit everyone now."

We quickly packed our scattered supplies into the enlarged bag. Kristi climbed in first, followed by Nessy, who paused at the opening.

"Be careful," she said to me. "And try not to do anything too crazy while you're... you know, being a seal."

"Uh-huh, sure," I agreed.

Once they were both inside, I removed the laurel from Candace's head and placed it on Adelle instead. The cheetah's eyes widened as the artifact's power flowed through her.

"Whoa," she breathed. "Mana! I can shadowstep way longer with this."

"That's exactly what I'm counting on," I said, taking off my pouch and tying it to the passed out TA’s elbow. Then I climbed into the bag myself.

The moment I was inside, I found myself sandwiched between Nessy and Kristi in the expanded, but still tight spherical space. Nessy immediately nuzzled into me from one side while Kristi did the same from the other side, the pair practically smothering me in fur and feathers.

"This is nice," Nessy murmured contentedly against my shoulder.

"Speak for yourself," Kristi grumbled. "I can barely breathe with all this dog fur in my face."

I checked my watch in the dim light filtering through the bag's opening. 12:53 PM. Almost time.

"Candace," I called out. "Bind me to the TA now! And transfer the treasure-tracking tag to her body."

"On it, boss," came her reply. "This might feel a bit weird."

"Weirder than being a wolf?"

"Much weirder! Seals have very different sensory apparatus."

She reached out into the bag with her left hand, grabbing my forehead. I felt the familiar pulling sensation as my consciousness was drawn away from my body, but this time it was accompanied by a strange shift in perspective that made me slightly nauseous. When I opened my eyes as Marlena, everything looked different. 

Colors were even more muted now, but I could see perfectly across the entire dim tunnel and sensed vibrations through the ground that I'd never noticed before.

More immediately apparent was the sheer size difference. Marlena was significantly larger than the wolf I'd inhabited, and her body felt alien in ways I hadn't expected. Everything was oriented differently, the perspective way off, my hands too big, webbed skin stretching between fingers, large breasts feeling like an unnecessary weight on my chest, the sensation of the massive seal tail stretching out from my spine at odds with my balance. I slowly sat up with the fox’s assistance.

"How do you feel?" Candace asked, leaning over me.

"Like a very confused marine mammal," I replied, my voice coming out in Marlena's deep, feminine tone. "Did you transfer the tracking?"

"Yep. As far as any magical sensors are concerned, you're carrying the dragonheart now." She handed me a collection of flashbang grenades from our supplies, rapidly weaving a rope through all of the pins. "For when things get exciting."

I awkwardly accepted the flashbangs with Marlena's large fingers, trying not to fumble them and pulled the second bag over my lap to hide the grenades.

"Adelle," I called out. "Time to go. Shadowstep us out of here."

The cheetah grinned, the laurel crown glinting on her head between orange-red curls. "Hold tight, everyone. Loops, quit foxing aroun’ n’ get in."

Candace quickly dove into the bag, somehow managing to squeeze herself in with the others. I heard muffled complaints about overcrowding and someone's tail being in someone else's face.

"Ready?" Adelle asked, shouldering the bag.

"Yep," I confirmed. “See ya!”

One moment the orange cheetah was standing in the tunnel beside my borrowed seal body, the next she was gone with Shadowstep, leaving me alone as Marlena.

The ground around me shook as earth Elementals began tunneling their way towards me. 

I smiled, digging into my hand pouch with seal fingers.

. . .

Soil erupted from multiple directions as passages opened like the spokes of a wheel, and suddenly I was surrounded by what felt like a quarter of the school's student body.

Katherine Strand was the first to rush in, her emerald-violet feathers bristling with excitement as she spotted me sitting there. Behind her came a parade of pradavarians—wolves, cats, more raptors, a few foxes, and even what looked like a polar bear. Above us, dozens of Elementals swirled in preparation for battle.

"Oi, TA!" Katherine barked, rushing toward me. "Where's the fucking human and his posse?"

I smiled at her, trying to channel the TA's perpetually upbeat demeanor. "Under my butt!"

Katherine halted in front of me mid-stride, her head tilting sideways like a confused parrot. Her gold eyes blinked rapidly as she processed my words. "Under your... what now?"

"My butt, Kat!" I repeated cheerfully, patting the ground beneath me. "They're all right under my magnificent seal posterior!"

"That's… What?" The raptor girl stared at me as she tried to work through the logistics of my comment. "How exactly did you fit five people under your butt? Are they... flat now? Did you pancake them?"

"Oh, you know how it is with water magic!" I laughed as more students rushed into the underground space joining the raptor girl. The prads that moments ago were eager for delver-pummeling action looked at me with confusion—they clearly didn't know how it goes. Neither did I, as I was simply stalling.

One of the raptors behind Katherine whom I recognized as Scarlet whispered loudly, "Do seals normally sit on their enemies?"

"Is that a seal thing?" a dog student asked. 

The gathered “monsters” packed tightly into the underground space looked at each other uncertainly. A few of the wolves and dogs sniffed the air, their expressions confused.

"Something smells off," one of them muttered. “The cheetah’s trail is leading away from here.”

“Ah ye, the orange cheetah girl got away,” I commented. “But it doesn't matter! The rest are trapped under me in a bubble of air and water I carved out with hydromancy, floating with their precious treasure!” I laughed jovially. “Poor dears were no match for a TA!”

Professor Fern emerged from the largest tunnel, her burning eye immediately fixing on me with suspicious intensity, her hair burning bright.

"You've... captured them?" she asked, her tone carrying a note of disbelief and sharp dissatisfaction of my failure. "Really? You got four of them? Did you… attack them during lunch?"

"Yep! They tried to run off, choosing not to rest!" I chirped enthusiastically. "A big mistake because I simply plowed through them and cut off their escape route! It was quite the exciting battle! The fox tried her binding magic on me again but she was much too low on mana, the poor darling! Then the cheetah attempted to punch me, but have you ever tried to punch a wet seal? Utterly futile! Mwah Ha Ha Har Arf!" I produced the seal’s jolly laugh.

I could see Professor Fern's eye narrowing as she studied me more closely. She was too experienced, too clever. I needed to act fast before she figured out that I wasn’t her TA.

"The human was particularly amusing," I continued, reaching for the flashbang grenades under the extradimensional bag on my lap as if adjusting my position. "Kept trying to give me orders like I was one of his pack members! The audacity of the kid!" As I roared out my declaration, my fingers pulled on the rope to extract the pins from every single flashbang grenade.

"Let them out!" Katherine demanded, stepping closer, feathers fluttering up. "I want to see Foster's face when he realizes he failed!"

"Of course, dear!" I replied sweetly, counting down mentally. "Though I should warn you—they're a bit... disheveled from being drowned."

Katherine made a face. "Whatever.”

"I’ll let 'em out on the count of three!" I announced cheerfully, closing my eyes tight. "One... two..."

Professor Fern moved closer, her burning eye fixed on me with laser-like intensity. “Wait… something is…”

Instead of reaching three, I yanked the bag off my lap and immediately flopped backward while simultaneously dumping the grenades across the tunnel. I covered my ears and tried to bury my face in the wet mud

Forty flashbang grenades tumbled out in a glorious cascade of imminent chaos.

The first detonation was blinding. The second was deafening. By the fortieth, I was pretty sure I'd achieved something close to a small-scale apocalypse in the confines of the underground chamber.

Through the seal’s sensory apparatus, the combined effect was overwhelming. Light exploded in every direction, turning the world into a stark white void while sound hammered at my eardrums like the anger of wrathful gods.

I had closed my eyes as tightly as I could, plugging my ears with my fingers and still went 90% blind and deaf. It was awful. 

To top off everyone’s suffering I dug into my pouch and turned on the anti-pradavarian high-frequency emitter keychain. The noise it made was absolutely horrendous and made me curl into myself, shudder and want to claw out my ears.

The pradavarians around me howled in agony, their enhanced senses making the assault far more devastating than it would have been to a human. I heard Katherine shriek out curses, while other voices devolved into confused barks, yowls, and other distressed prad noises.

I slowly opened my eyes, blinking seal tears and pulled out a large plastic container of pepper from my pouch. I flung the contents in a wide arc around myself. The fine powder caught in the air currents created by the air elementals, flailing wolves and fluttering raptors, creating a spicy cloud of pradavarian misery. Students all around me began frantically sneezing and howling as pepper went into their eyes.

"ACHIEVEMENT UNLOCKED: SEAL OF DESTRUCTION!" I shouted over the din, though I doubted that anyone could hear me due to the grenade detonation and the high-frequency noise emitter.

"SURPRISE STEAMROLLER SEAL ATTACK!" I declared, flinging my entire body forward and sideways.

The first victim of my large, steamroller seal body sounded and looked like a blurry Katherine. The raptor shrieked as she was crushed under me, her claws trying to stop me but failing spectacularly to penetrate my thick posterior and slippery hexamesh suit.

A few more students crunched under me with yelps of misery and then I heard Ignis cry out as I rolled right over her.

"Marlena!" Professor Fern howled, her voice barely perceptible against the ‘Eeeeeeeeeeee!’ of my awful keychain noisemaker. "What in the name of the Slayer are you doing?!"

"Teaching!" I replied, making sure to keep her pinned down halfway under me. "Isn't this educational? I'm just demonstrating the effectiveness of asymmetric warfare combined with tactical deception, Ignis!"

“What?! You aren’t…” Ignis growled, realizing that she’s been had. Her engine body ignited with flames, the water puddles around us hissing.

I approximated the position of her head and swung my large seal fist down with as much strength as I could muster. “Sorry! Have a nap!”

The Elementals filling the cavern went wild as Ignis was knocked out, attacking everyone nearby. 

Prads screamed and flailed, trampling over each other in their desperation to escape the rampaging Elementals. Through my blurry, aching seal eyes, I watched Katherine struggling to crawl out from under a writhing mass of her own teammates while an earth Elemental bulldozed through the tunnel wall, sending debris raining down on everyone.

I couldn't help but laugh—a deep, barking seal laugh that echoed through the mayhem, watching a wind Elemental spin three wolves into a tornado of fur and panic.

A fire Elemental whooshed past my head, singeing the whiskers of a fox who was trying to climb over Kira to reach one of the tunnel exits. The poor pradavarian girl yelped and tumbled backward into two other students, creating a domino effect of more blindly flailing limbs and desperate curses.

As I reveled in the beautiful mayhem I'd created, I felt a strange tightness building in my chest—like a rubber band being stretched to its breaking point. The sensation grew stronger, more insistent, until finally...

SNAP

The world lurched sideways, colors bleeding away as my consciousness was yanked elsewhere with the force of a slingshot. I tumbled through endless, cold darkness, my sense of self doing infinite backflips before finally—

I opened my eyes with a gasp to find myself staring up at Candace's silver-gray face. She was perched directly on top of me, holding tightly onto my shoulders, her white ears twitching with anxiety as she studied my expression.

"Did it work?" she asked as I blinked at her. "Please tell me you slowed them down and we're not about to get our asses kicked by a swarm of Elementals."

I couldn't help but grin. "Oh, it worked better than expected! I may have turned the entire underground chamber into a war zone, and traumatized the delver student body with flashbang grenades, ultrasound and pepper."

"You… did?" Nessy's happy voice came from my right, followed by the sound of her tail beating against the bag wall.

"Yep. I steamrollered Katherine Strand and Co," I continued, my grin widening. "And I crushed Fern with my unstoppable seal body and bonked her on the head. It was glorious. Also, Slayer, those ultrasound key fobs are awful, it’s no wonder that prads hate ‘em so much."

Adelle's laughter exploded from somewhere above us through the bag’s covered top, "Holy shit! You actually used that oversized TA as a weapon? That's the most badass thing I've ever heard!"

"Yep. Knocking out Fern caused the Elementals to go completely berserk,” I added. “Last I saw, they were attacking everything that moved."

Candace let out a giggle of delight. "You beautiful, crazy human!"

"We just got to the gym, by the way," Adelle announced from outside the bag. "They had a few students guarding the gym entrance but I plowed right through them with my fists, as the Elementals hovering above them went ham. Weaklings!”

I tried to sit up, but found myself thoroughly pinned by not just Candace, but also Nessy’s hands hugging me tightly. Kristi's scaled hand was resting possessively on my arm, her feathers tickling my face as she leaned into me.

"Guys," I said, though I wasn't putting much effort into escaping, "we should probably get out of this bag and...."

"Mmmm… in a minute," Nessy said firmly, licking my cheek with a grin. "First, celebration cuddles!"

"Celebration cuddles, hum?" I repeated.

"You just pulled off the most whack diversionary tactic in the history of Ferguson High," Candace declared, planting a quick kiss on my forehead and pulling my face into her curvy chest. "You deserve all the smothering n’ cuddlage now, my dude!"

Kristi, not to be outdone, leaned down and gave me a quick kiss on the other cheek, flashing violet. "That was genuinely brilliant strategy from start to finish," she admitted. "Completely unhinged, but brilliant!"

“Nobody expects the seal steamroller!” I chortled.

"I can't believe you knocked out Professor Fern," Nessy giggled as she licked me again, with more confidence, nuzzling her wet nose into my neck. "She's going to be soooo mad when she wakes up."

“Maybe not,” I shrugged. “She believed in me.”

Adelle's voice drifted in from outside. "Are you coming out of there?”

“Nu, we’re celebrating! Join the bag cuddle pile!” Candace laughed, pulling my face up to kiss me softly. I didn’t resist her this time, didn’t push her away.

All of my packmates seemed to take this as encouragement to paw, smoosh and smooch me even more thoroughly. Nessy’s warm breath tickled my ear as she whispered, "My hero."

Even Kristi, normally the most reserved of the group, seemed caught up in the celebratory mood, clawed hands kneading my back as she kissed me with her elongated snout-face.

I looked around at the faces surrounding me—Candace with her silver-gray shining eyes and mischievous grin, Nessy with her warm, adoring expression, and Kristi with her proud, confident smile. Despite the cramped confines of the dimensional bag, despite the dungeon sim we'd just escaped, despite everything that had happened over the past few days, I felt... content.

More than content. I felt like I was exactly where I belonged.

Adelle suddenly squeezed herself in from above. “My turn!” She declared. 

Shoving Candice to the side, she engulfed my mouth in a fierce, upside down kiss, cheetah whiskers tickling my cheeks.