CWD: Sewer Skewers ~ Twenty

That night, Nacho and the Brunch Force camped on the only dry grass they could find on the edge of a swamp. The prairie had become a morass of various streams and channels hidden by long grasses, although there was one stone path traversing the bog that was frequently submerged in black water.

Thanks to its putrid feel, lack of any redeeming qualities, and general miasma of rot, they all agreed that if there was a downtown Kansas City hiding underground, it would be around here. It was hard to tell for certain, since geography was impossible to guess when alien deities tossed a mile of dirt and rock on someone’s hometown and messed up all the rivers.

Nacho figured they’d get close enough to find a dungeon entrance, then start their descent. Before then, they needed to survive in the unforgiving area for at least one night. The lack of trees and useful vegetation necessitated buying Store firewood, which gave off an unpleasant odor and was always smoky. It had an annoying way of always blowing right into the face of the person who hated it the most; in this case, that was Kristie.

Back in her old body, she’d had asthma, and she hated any kind of smoke. Eventually the exasperated Warrior gave up and went to bed, earning a few chuckles at her expense when the smoke followed in a straight horizontal line into her tent, eliciting a scream of frustration.

Nacho kept at his grill, making sure that if nothing else, his group was well-fed and ready at any moment to take on the horrors of the night. Scrubz and the Cocktail Party—the name his group of complainers had taken on in retaliation when they heard that they were the only ones without an individual group name—assumed they’d be fighting some kind of alligators or crocodiles or dinosaurs, since they were traversing wetlands central.

Nothing had crawled out of the swamp yet, but Nacho had a sinking feeling that whatever appeared would be some kind of mosquito monster. It was spring, the nights didn’t freeze, the days were warmer, and they were surrounded by a lot of stagnant water that was perfect for bug eggs. He also couldn’t stop thinking about the ruined settlement where the stone buildings had been melted into lava. There had been murders for certain, but it didn’t look like any survivors had escaped. Combining that with the melted and twisted stone? There was some kind of flame-aspected creature around and he was dreading the encounter.

“Dragon mosquitoes?” Nacho muttered softly to himself as he tried to think through the possibilities. “Wouldn’t put it past the Patrons.”

After Kristie went to bed, Brie wasn’t far behind. She and Reuben left for their Store-bought tent, while Nacho figured he’d just flop down in the dirt near his mobile kitchen. He’d leave it out to cook people breakfast, which meant that he would need to be near the first people awake in the morning. Again, nobody necessarily needed to eat, but people liked to eat, and coffee was an absolute necessity.

Taye was gathering a following, but the kid was naturally resistant to gloating or bragging. It required a number of people pressuring him—Abby the hardest—before he reluctantly showed them all the stats of his Robbin’ Hoodie armor. As soon as he spotted the Archer in his matched set, Scrubz spat out the comment Nacho had been waiting to hear. “Well now, golden boy… how much of our tax money did you use to get to Tier one?”

Taye attempted to speak, his face flushing, but Nacho cut him off. “Thirty-two hundred credits of our money paid for arrows that explode and another person that can keep all of the people on this trip alive. Stop complaining, unless you want everyone to stay the same level of weak so that we can all die together in a nice ‘fair’ way.”

That caused Scrubz to clam up, but only for as long as it took to toss aside any shame that he was feeling. Not long, in other words. Just as he went red-faced and opened his mouth, Abby coughed and waved her hands from the stink of the logs burning. With Kristie in bed, the smoke was terrorizing the big woman something fierce. She looked the irascible guild member over and questioned, “I’m wondering, what is your class?”

Scrubz hissed, “Wouldn’t you like to know. Stop distracting me; it’s not fair that we’re using our taxes to upgrade only a few players. We should all-”

“It matters because we don’t know how best to help you level or gear up,” Abby interjected, not finished with her point. “We don't know the best ways for you to contribute, which earns you extra credits, as well as our trust in your abilities.”

Close to snarling, Scrubz leaned forward menacingly and ground out. “What does it matter? I am saying that I don’t think it’s fair that Taye-”

“Fair is where you eat cotton candy. It means nothing out here.” Nacho stepped into the conversation, voice deadly dangerous and pitched for everyone in the camp to hear clearly. “You think that being fair is going to keep us alive? Will bringing a hundred people to level five allow us to kill a single Tier one monster? No! We’re doing what needs to be done to keep your ungrateful rear alive, and you continually repay that with hostility and plotting.”

Nacho drew closer, looming over the revolutionary with a warning gleam in his cold eyes. “Knock it off, or I’ll boot you from the guild, no matter how useful you claim to be. Look around, Scrubz. Whatever destroyed that entire town back there might hit us tonight. Are you suggesting that Taye doing five damage with an arrow gives us the best chance at success? Who does that help, exactly?”

Scrubz didn’t answer right away, completely put on the spot. After a moment of silent spluttering, he tried to change the subject. “I thought you were upgrading Brie? That would have made more sense.”

“I thought so too,” Taye muttered quietly, not meeting the eyes of anyone around him.

“We did the math while trying to find the best path to surviving. Until we can find her a replacement weapon, it isn’t worth spending the credits. But, yes, once we do find one, we’re going to be spending anything needed to get her there. Because she’s a proven asset.” Nacho tried to meet as many eyes as possible with that statement, wanting everyone to know that they were willing to spend guild money on any team member if they were close to leveling. “You know who we will not spend the credits on? People that set low personal standards for themselves and even then consistently fail to meet them.”

“Is Scrubz having grand delusions of adequacy again?” Reuben called from his tent, getting a round of laughter for his efforts.

Nacho took over once more, wanting to drive the point home without driving the group toward sabotage or malicious compliance. “Look, we can’t leave our credits gathering dust. We need to use them to optimize people’s talents, which will keep people alive, as well as allowing us to make more credits faster. In this case, it made the most sense to invest in Taye. Brie is already doing a crazy amount of damage with her hammer. When you, or anyone else, shows us that we can rely on them—especially in combat—we will gladly put in the effort and investment to bring you up with us.”

“How many damage points counts as a crazy amount?” Scrubz seemed relieved that he wasn’t in the hot seat anymore.

“Let me look at the conversion chart!” Reuben took the opportunity to shout a joke over. “Looks like there’s a stupid amount of pounds in a crazy amount of damage? Shoot, this is the wrong chart! Quick! Someone call the British!”

“Wait. I know this one. There’s an unbelievable number of ounces in a stupid amount of pounds.” Brie’s dry amusement rose from their tent, even though Nacho had been expecting her to shush her husband instead. “I’m not telling you the exact numbers; there might be someone listening in.”

As the situation devolved into poking fun and everyone started to relax, Scrubz seemed to be a little shamefaced, and the Cocktail Party didn’t split off. Eduardo, a guild member Nacho hadn’t interacted with yet who seemed to have taken the role of tank for Scrubz’ party, was even in a good mood and started in on Scrubz with jokes of his own.

Nacho wasn’t ready to be happy yet. He had trouble keeping in his darker emotions, and he decided that he needed a small walk to clear his head. Once he was far enough from the camp to feel alone, he tried to spit out his vitriol quietly. “They survived another day in the Juxtaposition. They should’ve just been grateful we even bothered to help them live up to this point.”

By the time he wandered back, nice and calmed down, Scrubz had volunteered for a watch, as had some of the other insomniacs. Nacho didn’t like that very much, and he felt glad he was sleeping out in the open so he could spring awake and into action if anything happened. Meanwhile his looking-on-the-bright side was telling him that Scrubz was taking his words to heart and was trying to prove his usefulness.

Somehow, the night passed quickly and peacefully. Nacho was soon up out of the damp grass, rolling up his mat and stowing away his sleeping bag. He started the coffee and breakfast first—Uncommon oatmeal, if his plan went the way he hoped it would. He put in the extra effort to pan-toast some raisins and nuts, splurged for Uncommon M&Ms, and tried to make the otherwise unappetizing meal as appealing as possible.

People complained at first about having simple oatmeal, but Nacho decided to remind them of the reality of the world they were in now. “I don’t know why you don’t understand that things don't need to taste good. It’s food. This is to fuel your body and Skills, not your desires. With your Juxtaposition bodies, there’s no difference between ice cream and fried chicken. It’s all either quarter portion, half portion, or full portion. End of story. Suck it up or put the food down; I’ll serve it again at lunch.”

Between his glare and the surprisingly great taste, it didn’t take long for Nacho to win over his customers. Soon they were all raving about the oatmeal, which was imbued with his Cooking Magic. Nacho made extra so the Brunch Force Delta—what they were secretly calling the most powerful and helpful members of the raid group—could store a few bowls of leftover oatmeal in their Storage Slots.

They finished breakfast, then went tromping across the muck-smeared stones of the path and pushing through the marshy grasses, ready for anything to attack them either from the ground or air. In the distance, to the east, smoke drifted into the sky, but they were too far away to smell it or see the source. Reuben asked about it quietly, but all Nacho could do was shrug. “It’s probably another settlement. Humans, for the most part, clustered together. People are social animals after all.”

As the march progressed, an order slowly continued to form. Brie and Abby took point, with Scrubz not far behind. He kept his short sword ready, as well as some cheap Costco armor. Reuben pointed out his new position near the front, whispering to Nacho, “He’s been suspiciously quiet about his class and level. What’s his deal? Do you think he’s a spy or something?”

“Hope not,” was all Nacho could say on the subject. He wore his Wok of Blocking and his Skillet of Turtling, since he was expecting an ambush at some point. Unfortunately, with the sun beating down and the humidity of the area, it was already too hot for all his armor. By mid-morning, the day was even more humid, but what really added to the discomfort was the boiling swamp water around them. They could only assume they’d stumbled across a hot spring, but with the Juxtaposition being magical, that may or may not have been the case.

It was another good hour of walking until they found a path leading up out of the marsh and across a ridge. Unfortunately, it was disconcertingly narrow and was bordered on both sides by boiling black water. Brie stopped and waited until everyone had gathered into a small crowd before waving into the distance and speaking quietly. “Do you guys hear that?”

Nacho listened carefully, but all he could hear was what could potentially be the sound of a waterfall. The group cautiously followed her lead to locate the sound until they encountered a circle of stones… with a spiral staircase in the center. Water rushed in a torrent down one side of the circling steps, and the other sides were just tall enough to hold the swampwater back. But, judging from the lapping waves… who knew for how much longer?

“Well, I think we’ll want to check out this dungeon, right? Those steps are going to be slippery… and we’re going to get wet.” Scrubz pushed forward and peered down, holding up a hand and nodding after a long moment. “Yup. This is a dungeon, alright.”

“What? No way!” Reuben quipped with an eye roll and a light punch at Scrubz’s arm as Nacho, Brie, and the rest of the team all crowded around the staircase. The glistening walls were covered in moss, as well as long strands of various grasses. Water splashed onto the steps, but then kept on falling, with no indication of how deep the spiral staircase descended.

Taye cocked an ear. “Wait. There’s something… do you guys hear that?”

“Yeah, Taye, that’s what a waterfall sounds like.” Scrubz spit into the black water, adding to the impending overflow.

“No… not that.” The kid started rolling an arrow around his fingers as his eyes scanned the distance. Nacho picked up the sound next, as his senses were heightened to the highest level in the group. He could only assume that Taye had a bonus or a perception Skill, since he could hear the buzzing sounds that rapidly filled the air before the cook did. Overhead, a shadow passed over the grasses, blocking out the sun. The threat wasn’t crocodiles coming out of the boiling water. “Airborne monsters!”

Nacho pulled his pot helmet and oven mitt gloves out of his Storage Slot, along with his Pauldrons of Frying. “We’re about to be dive bombed, people! Eat your extra oatmeal and prepare for combat! We’ll need to form a skirmish line to create a protected retreat for the people running down those stairs; we’re not going to be able to fight all of these things.”

“Who got extra oatmeal?” Scrubz called in confusion. No one answered.

The cook remembered rumors he’d heard in the Probability Vision about strange fiery monsters on the east side of the AKC, and nodded sharply at the fact that some of his knowledge was still ringing true. These had to be the same creatures that had destroyed the settlement they’d passed through, and he appreciated that. Otherwise, if his concerns about cannibalism had been accurate, he would have been forced to burn the place to the ground himself.

He shouted to their newly raised Tier one archer. “Taye, keep your ice arrows ready, but use explosive arrows first to take them out in clusters. I know it might feel like a waste, but it is probably for the best to use them up instead of trying to hold them for another situation.”

“Positive Vibes, people!” Reuben had his gauntlets, helm, and chainmail on and in position. He was already slurping down his portion of leftover oatmeal from a Juxtaposition container, finishing and tossing the bowl to the side just as Nacho turned to him. Reuben raised his gloves, and they glowed with a brilliant sheen that was soon reflected by the others in the Brunch Force.

Scrubz started down the stairs, likely because he knew that he wasn’t getting any additional buffs. “I’ll run recon in the dungeon to make sure we aren’t fighting a battle on two fronts. You just hold off whatever those things are.”

Somehow Reuben got the first look at the monsters, and he decided to share that information with the rest of the group. “Uh… what are ‘Succ’n’blows’? They look like giant mosquitoes. Tier one, though they can’t have that much health, right? They’re about the size of poodles.”

That was all the warning they got before the swarm hit them. It turned out that Succ’n’blows were giant mosquitoes that sucked in blood with one end and… released… fire from the other. They didn’t seem terribly dangerous; more concerning was their numbers, all the way until one of them broke rank and flashed toward the group.

Nacho felt a proboscis hit his arm in the same instant—it was like having a skewer shoved into his flesh. Before he could chop into the bug monster with his cleaver, it had turned away and blasted off by letting out a squeak of flaming gas.

Health remaining: 42/50! You’ve been stabbed and cooked, which is ironic, given your class. Flame damage ignored, thanks to your armor, or that woulda been a critical hit against you!

“Seriously? They deal one point more damage than my Mana barrier can ignore?” Another Succ’n’blow *buzzed* past him, letting out a stream of fire, and Nacho took the flames on his skillet shield. The message had reminded him that at least he had some protection from the terrifying heat these things generated.

Taye fired an arrow above them, and the explosion threw pieces of bug across the swamp—though it also ignited a firestorm that rained down onto the grasses, setting a nearby hill aflame. Luckily, there was plenty of water around, or there would have been a chance that they’d be trapped by the fire for who knew how long.

One of the Succ’n’blows squeaked near Brie and hit her straight on with the swamp-gas flame, earning a scream of pain from the Berserker as she swung her hammer and squashed the bug into flaming goo.

“It’s like fighting vampires stuffed full of napalm!” Reuben bellowed at the group as he grabbed Nacho, hugging a heal into him. “Don’t kill them too close to your body, or they’ll do damage when they go down!”

“We get it; just heal us!” Brie yelled as she used her Defensive Whirl to block five of the mosquito creatures at once, sending them tumbling to the ground from the unexpected resistance.

Reuben grumbled lightly as he healed her of the terrible burns that had appeared on her skin. “Spoken like a true DPS. Don’t you know better than to run away from your Healer? I will chase you, and then we’ll both die.”

Abby was using her Slippery Block ability to its utmost potential, which also helped her to take less damage, so she worked hard to draw fire as the lower-level Cocktail Party followed Scrubz down the steps. The Succ’n’blows seemed to be instinctively drawn to the lower-leveled people, and they dove down the hole without hesitation, though the waterfall helped to dampen the damage their flames could cause. The mosquito creatures also had a harder time flying in enclosed spaces. Just like their mundane counterparts, they weren’t good fliers by any stretch of the imagination.

Reuben grabbed Kristie and gave her a tight squeeze. She’d been impaled and burned, and the pressure helped keep the blood in as his spell cleaned up the damage. He called over to Nacho. “‘Succ’n’blows’ is pretty bad as a name. What about tootsquitos?”

Kristie panted in pain for a moment, then managed a joke as she was healed. “Skeeter Shooters?”

“Or what about Flatu-flighters?” Taye used another explosive arrow, and the air was filled with smoke, a red mist, and monster mosquito ichor. “I admit, I’m not as good with the jokes.”

Brie swirled around, defending herself, but this battle turned out to be one of those times that her single strike attacks weren’t that effective. It was Taye’s arrows that were really doing the trick. With a base damage of ten, coupled with the buffs from breakfast, his new bow, and Reuben’s Positive Vibes, the incendiary projectiles exploded in a fifteen-foot radius for fifteen points of damage. Taking advantage of every loophole he could, he tied that together with Eagle Aim to send the arrows to the perfect location so the damage was doubled.

With every draw, he was taking out clouds of the creatures. Nacho could literally see the credits rolling in. Kristie broke out from Reuben’s healing embrace with a grunt. “You guys get below. I’ll Death Blossom and jump!”

Reuben instantly refused. “I’m not going anywhere. I’m full of stink, so I’ve been taking some damage, but my Ring of Cheese is still absorbing it just fine. Nacho, get the others down there. I’ll make sure Kristie doesn’t get overwhelmed.”

Nacho swung his skillet and banged a Succ’n’blow right in the proboscis.

Damage dealt: 15/30!

“Still got it,” he muttered as the *clang* rang out. The mosquito monster released a surprised toot-flame, but he managed to fully dodge it at the last second. The flier buzzed angrily and was abruptly joined by a whole host of the noisy insectoid murder-swarm.

“Kristie’s plan is good; time to take this meal to go!” Nacho tried to herd the others down the steps, but Brie paused to smash one of the mosquito creatures with her hammer, and Abby had to kill another one with her ironbound staff before they would submit to leaving the field of battle.

Above them, the air *boomed* with a pink magical explosion. Any of the wounded Succ’n’blows were killed, as well as leaving behind a bunch more wounded. Most importantly, moments after the detonation of pink Warlock power, Nacho was relieved to see a very scorched, utterly stench-ridden Reuben half-carrying Kristie down the steps.

Taye had become a machine-gun of arrows, and Hazel was endlessly hurling exploding purple grenades into the air above the dungeon entrance. Between the two, they kept more of the mosquito monsters from coming down until the last of the team walked underneath the hot water tumbling from the entrance. Once they were obscured by the falling liquid , it seemed as though the Succ’n’blows couldn’t see them anymore. Nacho scanned his group anxiously, finding all of them heaving for air with wild eyes. “That was too close.”

“Why do you think they gave up?” Reuben voiced the question all of them were thinking. “Maybe it was because of the hot mist in the air?”

“You think Tier one monsters are going to be stopped because of a little water?” Scrubz spat, still wiping the foul fluid from his face. “Most likely, they can’t enter the dungeon. A territory dispute or something.”

Either way, soaking wet, wounded, hungry and thirsty from the use of Skills and Spells, Nacho and the Brunch Force descended about a hundred feet down the spiral staircase. The water continued to act like normal water and kept on pouring down into that deep, dark pit. Above the entrance, the Succ’n’blows swarmed around angrily, lines of fire erupting from their black bodies. They had filled the pit opening shortly after the team had descended further into the cistern, but the angry insects weren’t flying any lower.

“Looks like the only way out is to wait until they get bored, or to clear the dungeon and hope there’s a new way out.” Nacho realized that Active Combat was over, and he paused for a few minutes to let his resources get topped off. It was only as he was squinting around in the gloom that he noticed another significant issue. “It’s dark as the abyss in here.”

Kristie had her Bracelets of Brightness, but few other people had light sources. Nacho knew that it was his time to shine, so he pulled out his Firefly Potstickers and let all ten of the winged potstickers fly into the air and illuminate the spiral staircase around him as he waited for the System to give them a ‘Welcome to the Dungeon’ message.

Instead, they were met only with silence, which Scrubz noticed and decided to comment on. “Maybe this isn’t a dungeon. Maybe… this is just the long entrance to the UnderFun?”

With how deep those stairs seemed to go, Nacho could only hope that the curmudgeon-in-waiting might be right.