"Felicia Allspark here. I'm reporting live from the internecine conflict roiling within a local [Necromancer] enclave. I'm joining a vigil being headed by some of the living to honor their fallen comrades."

"I lost my brother today in combat. Who will join me to avenge his death?"

"You have my sword."

"And my bow."

"And my axe."

"And your brother."

...

"...what?"

"I just raised him. He's standing over there. Wave hi Carl!"

"You just... raised my brother as a zombie?"

"Don't look at me like that. I was told that everybody needed to fight."

--Felicia Allspark, Lenorian Herald. AC 237.

"You want to WHAT?!?!"

I raise my claws, trying to calm Luna down. "Look! Look! All I'm trying to say is that, if we get a bag... you can detach your arms ahead of time. Then, before we head out you can recover and be ready to go."

She sputters, barely coherent, voice rising in reply, "And just what? I carry a bag of arms around? That... this... that sounds absurd! Obscene! Horrid! Grotesque! Probably a bunch of other words I can't think of right now!"

I try to acknowledge her point, "Yes... but then you'd have all the ammunition you'd need right?"

She starts ranting again, "And what about if we meet someone? I can just IMAGINE how that would go..." She adopts a mocking tone, "Oh, hey Luna. Nice bag you have there... what's in it? Well I'm happy you asked Bob, I'm just carrying around a bag full of arms!"

"TODD."

"Oh no! Don't you start too! I don't care if I don't meet anyone in the dungeon, it's the principle of the thing."

I scratch my head with my claw. I don't really understand why she's getting so upset about it. Hmm... maybe another approach? "I thought... I thought girls liked arm bags?"

"ARM BAGS!!! NOT BAGS FULL OF ARMS!!! ARGH!!!" Throwing up her limbs in frustration, she storms out of the room. I turn to Todd and shrug. He says,

"TODD."

"Yeah... I don't get it either. It'd just be the one bag. I don't think we could carry two."

I let Luna cool down for a bit as I get some food. While she's doing that, I review the gains from the previous battle.

'ding'

Your party has defeated level 11 [Undead Starfish - Crusher]!

Experience is awarded for your actions.

[Coast III] - 3 is now level 4!!

[Slice III] - 1 is now level 3!

[Water Manipulation II] - 2 is now level 4.

You have leveled up!

You have leveled up!

You are now level 9.

You gain +2 to all stats from the level up.

You gain +2 to all stats from the level up.

Hmm... It's not immediately clear, but so far it seems as if fighting boss monsters at least four levels higher will allow me to gain two levels each time? Or maybe it's because I almost keep dying each time... It's also possible the dungeon is purposefully making the monsters higher level? I dismiss my musings for the moment and stand up. I walk out of the small room I'm in and go to find Luna.

She's standing in the carving chamber, looking around at the etchings engraved on the walls. As I enter, she looks at me before standing fully up and walking over. As she steps in front of me she says with confidence,

"Before... before we try the bag idea, can we talk about your skills and how they work? I'd like to get a better understanding of you as well."

We sit down and I talk about each of my skills, going over how I've used them in the past. As I finish, we fall into silence before Luna says,

"Let's go outside, I want to try something."

As we exit the hollow and enter the reef she lays on the ground and covers her limbs in sand. Standing up, the particulates stay attached to her skin and present a raggedy appearance. She says,

"Alright, here's what I want you to do. I want you to try throwing me over there, while using [Earth] and [Water Manipulation] to enhance the speed and strength of the throw. Don't forget to use [Coast] as well for the faster actions where water and earth meet."

This time it's my turn to be flabbergasted. "Throw you? But... what will that do? I don't get it..."

"I don't have to use [LEG SUBSTITUTION] to position into place if you can manage to get me there. That will save at least one leg for me to use."

I nod and nervously *snip* my claws. "Uhm, how do you want to do this?"

She seems just as nervous as she says, "I'm just going to lay down on the ground and you can try. I've never done this before either so I guess whatever feels natural?"

She lays on the sand and I grasp two of her adjacent arms in each of my claws. I try to move her from my standing position and realize I don't have enough leverage. She's deceptively heavy. Instinctually recognizing that I shouldn't tell her that, I say, "Alright! Here we go!"

I plant my three front right legs into the ground but don't use [Earth Manipulation] to lock them in place. I still want to be able to pivot on that point, but I don't want to float away from the force of my throw. My left side moves back and I [coast] forward, my entire body swinging on a pendulum as I hurl her in front of me. As I release my claws, I activate [Earth Manipulation] to impart a spinning motion, then [Water Manipulation] to decrease the friction her body is making as she *zooms* through the water.

She races in front of me, actually rising in the water as she leaves the area that is under my control. She flies off into the distance, lifting above the surrounding coral and I'm left there standing with my mouth open, claws empty and Luna nowhere in sight.

'ding'

[Coast III] - 4 is now level 5!!

[Water Manipulation II] - 4 is now level 5!

[Earth Manipulation II] - 6 is now level 7.

I close my notifications and hurry after her, calling all the while,

"Luna? Luna! Are you okay?"

As I finally reach her, she woozily lifts up from the ground. She lifts an arm and says joyfully,

"That was awesome! Let's do it again!"

We spend hours practicing and once we become tired, decide to call it a day. My aiming improved and Luna was able to practice detaching her leg upon arrival to the target. As we re-entered the hollow and passed through the carving area Luna says,

"I think this will be a good strategy Crabby. It will definitely save on ammunition when we're under attack." She appears a bit hesitant but finally lowers her voice a little and murmurs, "and I guess we can find a bag..."

"What's that?" I say joyfully, pretending not to have heard her.

She silver stripes darken in a blush and she almost yells at me, "I SAID! I guess we can find a bag!"

I give her two claws up as we enter the smaller room. As we do, I see Todd sitting on a table. He says to us,

"TODD."

And I'm confounded as usual. Luna immediately begins responding, "No! No, I couldn't ask that of you! It's your prized possession."

"TODD."

"Are you sure? We can figure something else out. A bag isn't so bad."

"TODD."

"Well, I guess we can borrow it then. I'll return it as soon as we can okay?"

"TODD."

"No, thank you! This will make things so much easier!" She turns to me, "So what do you think?"

I shrug and respond, "I think TODD I guess." She playfully slaps my claw and giggles, "There's no reason to be vulgar about it." I stand motionless, unsure of what's going on. My confusion is broken by a light slowly growing from Todd. As the light fades, a spine is detached from his body and gently floats over to Luna. It curves in a band around her core before flashing once and disappearing. All that is left is a new black striation wrapping around her center. I say,

"What just happened?"

Luna responds, "Oh, I thought you were following all that. Umm... Todd is letting me borrow his spatial ring. It's a rare dungeon drop and he's the only one of us to have received one. I can store my arms in here and we won't have to worry about the logistics of carrying an... arm bag." She says the last with a hint of distaste.

As we settle in, she detaches her twelve arms. They simply vanish from sight and I stare, shellshocked at the rings ability. Before getting some rest I ask her,

"So, what about these others you've been talking about? I still haven't met them."

Her voice grows a little quieter as she says, "I don't know Crabby. That's something else I've been worried about. They should be here by now. Get some sleep, and we'll look for them in the morning." We both lay down and fall to slumber.