FMH: Everything ~ Forty

As the rest of the team began the descent into Murder World, following the nice, clean, safe, green path that Andre had made for them, Luke instead followed along beside them, clearing his own way. Every once in a while, the scraps of his kills would be flung toward the path, but he wasn't overly concerned about their wellbeing, now that Andre had a chunk of plants under his control.

There was always some kind of wooden shield, leafy barricade, or thorny obstacle that was able to intercept small shrapnel, and they completely disregarded the  Sentinels’ actual attacks. With both Zed as well as Taylor having managed to copy Luke's new Skill, all they needed to do in order to protect the Druid was stand on either side of him. To Luke, it looked like the man had a overpowered honor guard, and their stroll looked boring as the Abyss.

“Yahh!” He screamed in pure joy as he connected Cookie with the faceplate of the synthetic, towering monster. The Murderhobo was unable to contain himself, and he accidentally used Shockwave Cleave, blasting himself backwards as well as sending out a wave of destruction that took out hundreds of the Ossified Sentinels.

Luke landed on the path that Andre had designed, and even as he healed up, the Druid worked to move him along. The grass itself flowed as if a strong wind was blowing across it. Before he had even managed to get back to full health, he was traveling alongside his friends. “Knock that off!”

“If you can't move, I'm not going to leave you all dazed and pathetic on the ground while monsters try to kill you.” Andre calmly explained to his friend, ignoring the fact that the grass was now poking Luke painfully in several places. At least, it was trying and failing to penetrate his armor. In fact, to the Murderhobo’s delight, he could look up the path and see that his armor had shredded every single one of the weeds that had touched him to this point.

“No wonder your greens are all grouchy with me.” Luke chuckled as he flexed his stomach muscles and launched himself to his feet, charging forward off the path as soon as his feet touched down once more. Then, he continued his rampage, easily managing to keep up with the slow pace his friends were setting.

By all metrics, they should have been moving much faster than a slow walking pace. But there seemed to be something in this world that was resisting the intrusion of Andre’s grass, so even though it grew extremely fast, the farther away from his body the plants were, the slower they would react to his commands or the input of his Abilities.

When he had simply flung seeds forward and ordered them to grow, they didn’t spread out to make a nice, cohesive carpet that allowed for easy travel. They made little patches, which he then needed to connect. All in all, it was just less frustrating for him to grow them at close range.

Remaining on the grass was an absolute requirement for them. Along the edges of the green path were the strangely mutated thorn bushes that Andre had decided upon for destroying the Sentinels. As the machines came after them at their slow pace, the thorns would pull them to the ground and tear them apart.

That was extremely effective, and it seemed to be remaining in place the entire slope they had so far managed to traverse. Not only was the Druid creating a road for them that would remain for who knows how long, he was continually earning kills. Even as he got farther away, since the plant life was in a cohesive, bound manner, the Potentia would be transferred along to him.

Luke could tell that Andre was extremely smug about that fact, and he couldn't blame the man. While Taylor had exceedingly effective long-range Spells for destroying enemies quickly, the Druid could set up enormous defensive layouts that would work as long as they weren’t destroyed.

That gave him a tactical advantage over time, and he was guaranteed to get far more kills than even Taylor had managed to amass with her Thunder Beast’s Eye continuously blasting. That was partially why Luke was so adamant about earning as many kills for himself as he could: half of his party was better at killing things in Murder World than he was.

Completely unacceptable.

On the third day of walking at a slow pace—relatively speaking, and only in relation to how fast they knew that they could move—Zed's eyes rolled up into the back of his head, and he collapsed. Andre caught the fallen Bard with a look of confusion on his face, “Zed! What happened? Are you all right?”

“He's unconscious, Andre. Not dead. Try to see if he got attacked or something.” Taylor's advice came smoothly and easily, even though she tried to show that she was concerned for this party member. She had a rocky relationship with the Bard, but Luke didn’t draw attention to that fact. Cookie was having far too much fun smashing individual legs off the towering Sentinels.

Before Andre could do anything too drastic, Zed sat up suddenly, his eyes rolling back into position and slowly focusing on the Druid’s face. “Whoo! What a rush!”

“Rush?” Andre squinted suspiciously at Zed. “Did you just pass out from leveling up?”

“Yes! Guys, I just hit level eleven! I am officially the highest-level Bard in living memory!” Zed crowed with excitement. “This was the first time I ever put points into Fitness and Resistance, and I wanted to get it over with all at once. Didn't realize it would make me pass out like that; my bad!”

“That's strange… I think the only time I've ever passed out from leveling up was when I put too many points into Physical Reaction at once.” Taylor sounded relieved that her companion had been revived without her having to do anything about it. To Luke's ears, it sounded like she was now trying to ‘commiserate’ with him. Luke felt proud about that thought—he had read that word in the book Viscount Woodswright had given him. “I lost access to all of my senses for a moment as they were altered, and the sudden shock of it made me unconscious. I think. It was hard to tell, because you know, I couldn't sense anything at all.”

“Yeah, that sounds rough. Anyway.” Zed hopped to his feet and started moving to see if he could feel a difference. “Whoa! Look at that, I can jump so high now!”

Luke started smashing his way closer to the group, and when he was in easy earshot for the Bard, he barked, “You should try punching someone in the face. That's the best way to tell how strong you've gotten.”

Zed held up a finger and opened his mouth as if you were going to say something, stopped himself and merely smiled at his friend. “Thank you for the advice, Luke. I don't know if I will get a chance to try it out, or if I will want to, since I like not being thrown in jail… but I appreciate you giving me your best advice!”

That earned him a nod from the Murderhobo as he turned his attention back to the ongoing, constant onslaught.

It took them a full week to finally reach the end of the Zone, with hundreds of thousands of kills between them. There was an unbroken trail of greenery from start to finish, and their resident Druid cheerfully reported that he was still earning constant and consistent Potentia. Taylor countered with how much Potentia she had already earned, while Zed just seemed happy to be there.

Luke didn't care about that at all. No, what he was excited about was the slight shimmer in the air that indicated the end of the Zone. It had been unending months since he had started his attempt at breaking through this Zone, and he was excited to finally reach the point where he could have a new exit from Murder World. As they came in range, he reached out and placed his hand against the strange energy barrier.

Happily, it didn't inform him of an exit requirement. Instead, the shimmer coalesced into a more concrete form, leaving a distortion in the air that he could use to leave this world at any time. He laughed at that thought. “Not anytime soon.”

Then the Murderhobo sneaked a look at Taylor, his eyes suspicious. She could see this distortion as well; they all could. Luke bent down and casually scooped up a chunk of mud, palming it just in case she tried to tell them that they should all leave. Then he would clap his hand over her mouth and force the mud inside so she couldn't get the words out.

Luke nodded to himself. It was a good plan.

“Well, this is exciting! What does it mean for us, Luke? Are we going to take a break and actually get a good night's sleep for—wah!” The Bard slipped, his feet shooting out from under him as he fell to his back. He wheezed, the wind knocked out of him.

When he saw why the Bard had fallen, Luke didn't bother to try and help him out. Instead, he let out a happy noise, which—based on the expressions of his companions—they had never heard from him before. The world was on a downward slope. Even though it curved to the side, round objects tended to roll. Along the entire edge of the Zone, he could see thousands upon thousands of Skill Pearls shining, trapped against a small ledge. They had been unable to collect the Skill Pearls from the vast majority of the defeated monsters, as they had been destroying them at range.

“Do you want all of those, Luke?” Andre's question was answered for him as Luke dove headfirst into the pile, trying to scoop all of the pearls up in his arms and instead sending them scattering everywhere. “Just wait a moment, let me… yeah, I can grow some grass around this area and have it send all of the pearls to a central collection space. Where do you want them?”

The Murderhobo went deadly silent as his mind rapidly flipped through all three of his emotions. Sucking in a breath through his teeth, he indicated a spot on the ground. Then he lifted Cookie up, slamming her down, over and over, until he had a four-foot trench. Then, standing to the side, he pointed at it. “Put them all in there.”

“Yeah, I figured that one out,” Andre muttered with great annoyance, pulling his hands off of his ears. “Maybe a little warning before you start going crazy and beating up the ground next time?”

“No promises.”

Now all Luke needed was to find a large enough source of liquid mana to fill that hole, and he would be able to combine all of the Skill Pearls into their best, highest form. He hadn’t seen any liquid mana running through this Zone, which meant his best option was going to be finding it in Zone twenty-one.

That worked out perfectly for him, because backtracking was the absolute worst. “You work on that; I’ll go check out the next Zone.”

“Wait, Luke!” Taylor called out. “It's not safe; you should wait until we can all go together.”

“Safe, Taylor? You haven't figured it out yet?” He shook his head, his lip curling in a light sneer. “Nothing in this world is safe. Might as well get used to it now.”