We sent Cold Snap on his way all healed up and still terrified out of his mind. Luckily he had a second mask on him, so he was able to straighten himself up and come off as someone who hadn't gotten the living shit kicked out of him. He washed his pants off in a nearby stream, and rinsed out his boots, both of which were coated in dirt from Sucking Mud, and finally with what might have been a glare he cut off before it got started he turned and stormed off into the forest. It was hard not to laugh at him, but I managed somehow.

Jessie came to stand next to us, looking at Callie. "You sure he's not going to turn on us? He doesn't strike me as someone we can trust with...well, anything. I'm getting a real scorpion and the frog vibe here." She looked dubious about letting him go, not that she wanted to kill him, just that I knew she was worried about what was coming. I knew Jessie was a badass, but she was only newly G rank. Expecting her to just be completely fine with inviting a murder cult siege was definitely a bit much.

Callie, luckily, saw that as well as I did. She knew our teammate needed a bit of reassurance. "He'll come through. We don't trust him, but we believe in his self preservation instincts. The puppet master is clearly a brutal and unforgiving person, we saw that when he blew up all those sleepers in the G district. He doesn't allow problems or loose ends. Knowing that, there's no way he's going to let Cold Snap get away with ratting on him and just let him walk away. Smacks of sloppiness."

The reassurance that the plan was logical and could work calmed her down a bit, but she still looked worried. "Still, bringing everyone here is risky. I know it's the only real way we can get the handler to come to us, but are we sure we can handle everything they've got?" As we talked we headed back to the hatchery. Jessie kept the ravens circling us now to keep an eye out for anyone approaching. The last thing we needed was to get ambushed before the Heartrippers even got here.

As the towering structure came into view I could almost feel Jessie relax slightly. I clapped her on the shoulder. "It's fine. We have advance warning, both long term from knowing they're coming and short term from the ravens. I can set up traps, around here with enchanting. Nothing long term with low level materials but we don't need the stuff to work more than once or twice and that gives me some options." I wished I could string together enchantments on multiple items into an array, but I wasn't even close to good enough to do that, plus it required at least Intermediate Enchanting.

Seeing our apparent lack of worry she finally relaxed completely. "You're right. We have way more going for us than them. A bunch of G rankers, this awesome building, and time to get ready." I could see her resolve firming as she accepted that we could do this, and felt slightly bad because I was WAY more worried than I let on. But in the end what was important was keeping up morale. I would be the one fighting up front anyway. Between her crowd control and the ravens, not to mention healing, Jessie was going to be a back lines fighter at best. We weren't risking her.

That didn't mean she couldn't help though. "Can you help some of the trees get closer together? Or maybe grow something between them? Anything to funnel them into a tighter group when they hit us or slow them down without it being noticeable that we did it." Jessie's ability with plants was noted, but it was also MUCH stronger now than it had been before. There was no way they would associate her minor ability to use vines with obviously fully grown trees or shrubs blocking their path. They could probably punch through them too, but it would be noisy and they were trying to ambush us.

I expected excitement or enthusiasm, but she just bit her lip. "Maybe. The thing is I'd need to either grow the trees out wide enough to make a wall against them or put new ones in between. The first would take way too much power, and the second would probably kill the trees long term. Not enough room for the overlapping root systems or nutrients in the soil. I can force them to grow, but once my life energy fades it would devastate the local ecosystem." She looked genuinely upset at the thought.

I could understand what she meant. The trees were the main element in the local biome, if they died, even a few dozen of them, it would displace all the animals in the trees themselves and the ones who relied on them, overburdening the surrounding flora and potentially causing conflict between animal groups. That wasn't really a high priority for me, but as someone who could actually interface with plants and animals and would have to do so to make this happen I could understand her hesitance to do it.

It did leave other options though. "What about a bush or something? Just a way to block the space?" If not I couldn't think of anything else except maybe some kind of golem, but those would make it obvious that we knew they were coming. We wanted to keep them out and make it seem natural so we could funnel them into using a few entrances. It would make setting traps so much more effective than of I had to figure out how to lay down enchantments over the entire border.

She bit her lip again consideringly. "I'll go take a look. I might be able to come up with something. I'll have to let you know. I'm sure I can figure out a way to at least make it inconvenient to go certain ways. I'll have Celine help. She's an elf and had tons of knowledge about trees and forests. I bet she has more than a few good ideas that I wouldn't have even considered." She finally seemed cheered by her ability to contribute and set off to find the elven noble, seeming much more sure of herself than she had been before.

I turned to Callie after she left. "She's going to be out of the way in all this right? G ranked or not I can't imagine sending our healer into a mob of evil cultists is anything remotely like a good idea. Not that she isn't suited for it with her Might stat, but we can't afford to lose her, especially considering she can recharge us when we get tired on top of healing actual wounds."

That drew a sigh from our team leader. "Yeah, she's going to be with the H rankers. I figure that's two birds with one stone, because she can keep an eye on them and it'll keep her out of the main fight. Still, I'm...worried. This is going to be a much different fight than last time. Forget having more people around, I'm more worried about the enhanced functionality the puppet master could have when he's here watching in person. He's limited to the viewpoints of one of the sleepers I think, at least based on what they did in the fight down in G district. But that won't be a thing here."

I exhaled loudly, rubbing my temples to the sides of my mask. "I know. He'll have full line of sight on all of the sleepers here, they'll be even more cohesive and he'll be able to react better to our moves. Depending how many he brings this could be a legitimate threat even more than the rat king. Especially since he could have more than one or two G rankers to control in concert." I could tell from her tone she was as worried about this as I was.

I put my hand on her shoulder and squeezed. "Hey, it's fine. We're completely ready. But if you're that worried I still have today's wishes. I bet we can come up with some interesting ways to use them to make sure we make it through this with minimal damage." I'd never considered using wishes to affect a situation like that before, but I was betting there was a way to do it. Probably not something big like wishing we would win the fight, but I was better there were other things we could try. Hell we could try that, I was just pretty sure it would be way too expensive.

Her face lit up under her mask. "That's a great idea! What could we try? Maybe something luck based? Or wishing for certain weather conditions? Or maybe wish they would come from a specific direction? What are the limits of your wishes anyway? Like how do they work. I know they're based on stats, but can we wish for anything as long as you can pay for it? How would they even make someone show up from a different direction?" The idea seemed to have energized her, and it was nice to see her looking as upbeat as Jessie had been when she left.

It was a completely crazy idea to use my power for battlefield control, but at the same time it made sense. I'd already had the same idea about enchantments. My ability could do more than just transfer stats. Granted that was its most valuable function, since it was basically impossible to do by other means past a certain point and it was literally how you progressed, as well as the defining feature of how the power itself worked, but there was versatility there I hadn't been tapping into.

I shook off the thoughts, turning to Callie, who was waiting impatiently. "Anything. They can do anything I can pay for. From what I've seen Wish is kind of like a power emulator. You wish for something and my power creates a special ability specifically for the purpose of granting it. Your power is Shadow Embodiment for instance. If you wished for a turkey sandwich my ability would make a Turkey Sandwich ability, and then use it. I think that's where the three times modifier comes from. The abilities are so perfectly suited that the efficiency of stat use is multiple times higher than normal."

That last bit was just a theory on my part, but it kind of fit, and it explained why altering the ability would get rid of it. It would essentially be changing the emulator from optimal settings. "Anyway I don't actually know what it could do in battlefield conditions But we can always see. Payment would probably be an issue, but maybe you can pay with a certain number of enemies defeated or something? That seems like it would be a solid contract to make. As long as we can map out how many enemies are coming beforehand."

Callie was nearly bouncing with enthusiasm. "This is going to be great. Jessie is with the others, so we can leave her out of it, but I want to bring Benny into this. He's been wishing for things longer than I have and he's clever. He might see something I miss. I assume you can't be too much help with brainstorming?" She was chattering rapidly, her voice increasing in pace as she got more excited.

I laughed. "No. Sorry to say I can't have any input on what you decide to wish for or it might not count as being your wish. Still the two of you should be able to come up with something good. I'll go grab him and meet you on the top floor of the hatchery." I left her to her planning and took off to find my best friend. If this worked it would represent a huge chance in the way I used my abilities, I could be a legitimate strategic resource. I was absolutely enthralled by the possibilities. Time to see what I could really do.