Chapter 28: A Sticky Situation

“Who’s the good girl?” Melissa said in a squeaky voice while dangling the boar’s innards. “You are!”

Piper, like the ravenous animal that she was, took the meat and stared at Melissa as if begging her for more.

“Awww!” The others surround Melissa as they watched her feed Piper. They even took turns petting her like kids on a petting zoo.

“I was afraid of her at first, but she’s just a big dog.” Beth said.

Don’t you just hate dogs?

I hate dogs. They’re smelly, noisy, poops a lot, and do nothing but to eat and whine. They’re also capable of tearing one’s throat if they wanted. You see, I was bitten by a dog once and it sucks. I was just eight years old when it happened.

After school, I used to play games outside with my friends; Jumping ropes, Chinese garter, jackstones, tag and hide-and-seek. Our neighbor’s mutt, Blackie, was always in chains. One afternoon, he somehow escaped those chains and chased us.

It was too late when I noticed Blackie and I was the last one to run. Unfortunately, he caught up with me and bit my wrist like he was biting a chew toy. It was the most painful moment of my life and I thought I was going to lose my hand. Luckily for me, there were adults in the area and they helped me.

I was glad when Blackie was put down. Even though he lived his life in chains, it’s a pity that he didn’t suffer enough. Call me a psychopath or whatever, but that experience was traumatic for me and I’m a type of person who knows how to hold grudges, be it a person or animal. So when I first tasted dog meat, it was delicious. A symbolic revenge to Blackie. It was redemptive.

Piper became the center of the group’s attention. Well, I don’t mind. Really. I used to be the center of attention back at college and I didn’t appreciate it. But Piper wasn’t a dog. She was a wolf And I doubted that a wild wolf can be tamed even with magic.

If it was just me though, I’d kill the animal and probably cook it. Miguel would probably agree with me because trying to take care of wild animals as pets is nearly impossible. You just can’t take the wild out of them. Piper wasn’t just any wild animal though. She was a monster.

“Sit!” Melissa commanded. “Sit!”

Piper tilted her head and looked at Melissa as if asking, “What the fuck do you mean by sit?”

See what I mean? Even if you manage to tame a wild animal, who ever said that it would automatically do tricks or follow simple commands? I think training her not to bite random people will take years though. I hoped I was wrong.

“Hey, Mel.” I said. “Is the food ready? I’m hungry.”

“Just a minute.” She said. “Piper, stay.”

Surprisingly, the dire wolf seemed to understand what ‘stay’ meant as she sat by the door. While Piper was guarding the door, Melissa instructed everyone to avoid touching Piper while she wasn’t around. With that enormous size of a wolf, no one dared to try.

Ever since we went around the forest, there was almost no trace of Miguel. We started to doubt that he went around the forest and he actually ventured inside of it. But we opted to play it safe. We can’t risk it and waste time fighting more dire wolves and other monsters in the thick forest.

That night, we were in a ruined house near the forest. Dianne found the same thing we found last night; rocks protruding on the doorway and loose ground. Richard then confirmed that it was probably Miguel’s earth magic. There were also other signs such as extinguished camp fire (poorly made and unsafe according to Mel) outside the house, empty tin cans and other garbage. Oh, and we also found a men’s magazine near the empty tin cans.

Unlike “innocent” girls, I wasn’t bothered by porn material because I like porn myself. What bothered me was that the pages of the magazine were sticky. It wasn’t dried glue obviously.

“Oooh! This is perfect!” Richard wasn’t too subtle about his intentions as he snatched the magazine from Eric’s hands and walked casually.

“Where are you going?” Eric asked.

Richard sighed and looked at us with a straight face. “My cock’s been aching for days. I need some time alone in the bathroom, if you don’t mind.”

All of us had a mouths hanging from hearing that, except for his brother. Eric seemed to have already expected this behavior from him and his face was red in embarrassment. If Richard was my brother and he said that to my friends, I would wish that the earth would split and swallow me up.

Richard was probably the most honest person I’ve ever met. Unlike his brother, Eric, he wasn’t a good looking guy. He has dwarfism and eccentric attitude on top of it. Sometimes, he was too honest that it was making all of us uncomfortable.

After his “alone time”, Richard dug a small pit just outside the house with his earth magic while the rest of us gathered some firewood in the nearby forest, so we could roast the mushroom boar.

The mushroom boar’s leg was almost as large as Dianne and probably much heavier than Richard and it was more than enough to feed all of us. As the meat cooked, its fragrant smell permeated the air making us more ravenous than Piper. It was cooked with unfamiliar fragrant hebs and spices. After the long and agonizing wait, the meat was finally ready.

“Ahhh. It smells good.” Dianne said as she took a sniff. “It smells like dragontail flower.”

We were all excited to eat and as soon as it was served, we quickly dug in and ignored the conversation of the two. The meat was succulent and was almost melting in my mouth. It was better than chimera meat. There was a burst of flavor with every bite. One word comes to mind: Juicy.

“Yup. I also put green herbs and a touch of poison addy.”

Eric coughed and his face went pale. “Poison what? You put poison on our meat!?”

“Don’t worry. You won’t die. It’s just a small amount.” Melissa said as she patted Eric’s back.

The others sighed in relief as we continued to eat. I thought Melissa went full retard and decided that to poison us. She showed us a fragrant dark blue grass which is called poison addy.

“I see...” Dianne continued as she took a mouthful. “Won’t the green herbs make the meat bitter?”

“Not if you dried it first. It helps the dragontail flower and poison addy to remove the foul odor of the meat.”

“Dried green herbs, huh?” Dianne muttered as she gazed on the fire. “I never thought of that. I wonder if it would make my healing potion taste better.”

We were all stuffed but there were still some boar’s leg left for tomorrow.

After a delicious and satisfying dinner, Gerry, Beth, Richard, Eric, Melissa and Mark decided to play poker. Dianne and I didn’t join them, but it was fun to watch. You see, all of our money was taken by Col. Medina in exchange of our freedom. Since we left Camp Aguinaldo, the total coins we looted was only 351 copper coins. Divided evenly, we have roughly 44 copper coins for each of us.

“All in.” Gerry placed all of his copper coins on the middle as he made the bet.

“Fold.” Eric said. “Damn it.”

“What about you, Richard? Are you going to fold like the rest of them?” Gerry smirked.

“Call.” Richard said. “Sorry sir, but I’m gonna clean you up. I’ll call you on your bluff.”

“Bad move. You should’ve folded, Richard.” Mark clicked his tongue as he shook his head.

Richard shook his head. “I can’t lose with my hand.”

“I can’t lose either.” Gerry retorted. “The river, please.”

The cards on the table were 2 of hearts, spades and diamonds, 10 of spades and 7 of diamonds. As the fifth card was dealt, 8 of spades, Richard had a vicious grin on his face as he revealed his hand. A king of hearts and a king of spades.

“Full house, I win! Hahaha!”

“Good hand.” Gerry said as he revealed his, 2 of clubs and 3 of spades. “But not as good as mine.”

Richard’s eyes opened wide as he saw Gerry’s hand. “Four of a kind?!”

“Sorry kid. I win again. Hahahaha!” Gerry laughed hard as he took all the money in the pot.

“Told you so.” Mark said. “It’s like the cards are rigged for Gerry.”

“I’m not a cheater. It’s just luck.” Gerry shrugged.

“How much luck do you have anyway?” Beth asked.

“Forty-one.” He answered.

“Forty-one?!”

“Yup.” Gerry rolled a coin across his knuckles.

“Could it be that the reason we got out of Camp Aguinaldo alive is Sir Gerry’s luck?” Richard asked.

“Could be.” Eric replied. “With that insane amount of luck, you could be an immortal, Sir Gerry.”

“Now that you mentioned it, I’ve never seen him get injured. Not much of a scratch really.” Beth said.

Gerry laughed wryly as he scratched his head. “I’m not immortal. I’m just lucky.”

The others looked at each other and nodded. They seemed to have agreed on something. “Lucky.”

With that said, Gerry was kicked out of the game. With his winnings, it seemed that it was okay with him. He took his guitar and played a song while the others continued to play poker. Dianne and I were exhausted, so we went inside the house and retired early.

When I woke up the next morning, everyone was still sleeping. It was Melissa and Eric’s turn for the second shift. I found them naked and sleeping together on the living room. I didn’t care if they had sex. That’s not even the point. The others were being too complacent that they placed too much trust in Piper and let her guard the door. But I found out that she was also sleeping.

“Wake up.”

Okay, fine. I was jealous, okay? Just a little bit. You know the feeling when you already have a boyfriend, but he’s not with you and you saw a lovey-dovey couple? Yeah, that’s the feeling. It’s even worse than being a single and seeing a couple. I swear, I’m going to make Miguel regret leaving me like that.

“Mel. Eric.” I shook them up as I tried to wake them. “Wake up.”

“Is it morning already?” Melissa yawned as she rubbed her eyes.

“It is.” I responded. “You two should get dressed. You don’t want the others to see you like that.”

Melissa and Eric quickly stood up and panicked when they realized that they were naked as the day they were born. I had to say that Melissa’s naked figure was impressive. Though her nipples were dark and looked like it was sucked by a hundred babies, it somehow turned me on. Weird, I know.

She’s at least 34B and as a 34D myself, I envy those women with smaller boobs because one, they’re heavy and often the main culprit of my back aches. Two, I can’t go for a run outside without them bouncing and men always love to see it and three, it’s hard to find a comfortable push-up bra.

Eric, on the otherhand, has a seemingly muscular body build. I never noticed it before when he was wearing clothes. Moreover, his penis was... Well, let me put it this way: It’s much larger than Miguel’s and how Melissa survived without dying from impalement was beyond me, but it made me wonder; Why do all penises look ugly? I mean, whether flaccid or erect, especially when erect, It looks - weird as if I’m seeing a veiny mushroom.

The thing is, the sight of penises never turned me on. Even when I was watching porn, I was focused on women and the act itself rather than the men. Despite that, I’m not a lesbian, but for me, there’s nothing impressive about men’s body. It’s just that a woman’s body is more pleasing to look at.

I turned my back and went outside to give them a little privacy as they get dressed. I went outside for some fresh air. The sun hasn’t risen yet and it was quite a peaceful and quiet morning. I took out my long sword to practice the Six Strikes and blocking techniques.

After a few hours, the others started to wake up and we had our breakfast. We didn’t have anything to discuss that morning, so we skipped the meeting and decided to continue on. As we left the ruined house, Melissa hopped on to Piper’s back and rode her.

“Can we make a cart that Piper can pull?” Beth asked.

“Piper’s not a horse.” Melissa immediately opposed the idea.

“Come on, Mel. I’m sure Piper can manage. You should tame more and we can make a carriage or something.” I said.

“Sorry. But I won’t let my Piper do that.” Melissa said. “Besides, I can only tame one beast at a time.”

It was a good suggestion as Piper was nothing but another mouth to feed. However, Melissa was adamant that Piper won’t pull carts. A fucking hypocrite if you ask me. She was riding the darn wolf like a horse. One thing I learned in school was that hypocrisy can’t be cured.

Anyway, we stopped trying to convince Melissa. I don’t think she will change her mind. Pity. My feet were starting to sore and I could very well use a foot massage to ease the pain. God, how I missed the old world.

[Guys, I found something!] – Dianne

As soon as we heard the message, we sprinted towards Dianne and we saw a tall tower made of out of rocks in the distance. Besides the tower was a wall of rock.

“I think I recognize this one. Didn’t Miguel use this one on Eric back when we were ambushed by the gnolls?” Dianne said.

“Look, there’s blood.” I pointed at the ground around the rock. “Maybe Piper can track him with his scent.”

“Let me try.”

As Piper sniffed at the blood on the ground, she looked at Melissa with a blank look. “Follow the scent, Piper. Come on, girl.”

“Maybe the blood doesn’t belong to him.” Dianne said.

“Perhaps the track’s gone cold.” Melissa said. “It was raining hard yesterday, right?”

Or maybe Piper was just a fucking useless animal. What good is a dog who can’t track? Obviously, I didn’t say that out loud because I didn’t want to hurt Melissa’s feelings.

“So what did Miguel call this spell?” Richard asked.

“Probably something like [Earth Dragon Lance Crasher Technique].” Eric replied. “He even has a spell called [Chain Hellfire].”

“I didn’t know Miguel was an Evil Eye Chuunibyou.”

“Evil eye what?” Beth asked.

“Let’s go guys.” I said to them.

We have no luck at getting Piper to track Miguel’s scent. Even though we knew where Miguel would go, the reason I wanted Piper to track him down was that it would be faster and we would catch up on him. It would be better if we could get to him earlier as soon as possible. He could probably survive on his own with his magic, but ever since he left, I had a feeling that something bad will happen to him. Or maybe it already happened. I hoped not.

When we got out of the forest, the traces were gone again. In fact, there was nothing in the streets. Except for cars, rubbles, trash and puddles from the rain last night. Unlike when we encountered plague rats, there were human skeletons and burnt remains of rats. The thing that made me worry was that there were no corpses to be found at all.

“Stay alert. There could be zombies in this area.” I said to them as I unsheathed my sword.

“Zombies? How did you know?” Mark asked as he readied his mace.

“There are no corpses.” Dianne replied.

“So they do exist after all. I only heard rumors back in Camp Aguinaldo.” Richard said. “Are they fast or slow?”

“Does it matter?” Eric asked. “The ones we encountered back in the university were the slow ones though.”

“Corpses or no corpses. Isn’t it strange that there isn’t even a single drop of blood?” Gerry asked.

“Or ashes.” Beth said. “If there were zombies here, Miguel would’ve burned them to ashes. The rain yesterday won’t wash away those ashes that easily.”

“Just stay alert and stay close.” I said. “Dianne, climb to a roof and tell us what you see. I want to see what we’re against before we go.”

“On it.” Dianne said as she hopped and climbed on a wall.

We decided to stay for a moment as we waited for Dianne. One thing I’ve learned from Miguel was that you should always take a knee and assess the situation before making a move. Obviously, you shouldn’t be afraid of the enemy that you know and the enemy that you don’t know is the one you should be afraid of.

A few moments later, Dianne came back as she jumped off the building. I didn’t know if physics in this world was broken since the apocalypse, but she jumped off of a four storey building and landed without so much of a scratch. I wondered if I could do that too, but I was afraid of heights. Anyway, it was amazing to see.

“What did you see?” I asked.

“Nothing.” Dianne shrugged. “There are no monsters in the area.”

“Can you try and look again?”

“I checked three times and I’m sure of it. There’s really nothing.”

“Nothing’s wrong except nothing’s wrong. Remember?”

“You’re too pananoid, Claire.” Eric said. “Maybe there’s really nothing wrong.”

“Fine. “ I said. “Just stay alert. Dianne, stay close to us. I don’t want you out of our sight.”

“But that’s not our formation. How can I scout ahe-“

“Just stay close, okay? I don’t know how to explain this, but there’s something off.”

With that said, we continued walking with our weapons unsheathed. The others were not as serious as I was and they even made fun of me, saying that Miguel rubbed off his paranoia in me. Maybe it’s for the better. It was Miguel’s extreme paranoia that kept us alive.

However, that day, I thought they were right. I was just being too paranoid. We’ve never encountered a single monster that day. Bummer. My alertness was all for naught and we’ve made it through without a single arrow fired or a single swing of a sword.

“This is where he stayed.” Dianne said. “Should we make camp?”

“No. It’s still early in the afternoon.” I said.

“My feet’s killing me. Can we at least take a break?” Beth complained.

“We only have a couple of hours till sundown. We keep moving.”

With that said, we all kept moving. A few moments later, Melissa suddenly stopped walking.

“What was that?” Melissa asked as she cautiously looked around. “Can you hear that?”

“Hear what?” I asked.

We listened to the sound and scanned the area as we readied our weapons. There was nothing. Except for growling of Melissa’s stomach. That broke our seriousness and we all burst out in laughter.

“Very funny, Mel.” Eric said.

“No! Just listen!” Melissa cried. “I think it’s coming from the ground.”

“It’s nothing. Come on, let’s keep moving.” I said.

Perhaps, it was one of the biggest mistakes I’ve ever made. We were exhausted from walking and I was getting complacent and rushed things, hoping that we can catch up to Miguel. Exhaustion made me careless.

Suddenly, we all heard a cracking sound. A crack in the road crawled fast throughout the road and the ground shook violently. Whatever was coming was something big and it was coming from below.

[Form up!] –Claire

We ran towards each other and got into formation. I used [Berserker’s Howl] while Gerry used his skill, [War Drums]. Melissa fell to the ground when Piper suddenly ran away from us. So much for her loyalty.

“PIPER!” Melissa shouted. “COME BACK! PIPER!”

The ground stopped shaking. When we thought it was over, a giant monster suddenly burst from the ground.

Slime King [Boss] Lvl. 45

The monster stood for at least 20 feet and its body was made out of a clear and sticky liquid substance. The sheer size of it made our jaw hanging and eyes widened in disbelief.

[Shoot that thing down!] –Claire

[Shouldn’t we run?! It’s a fucking boss monster!] – Eric

[No. We can do this. Richard, use your magic. The rest of you, stay close.] – Claire

[W-what element?] – Richard

[Anything!] – Claire

Melissa and Dianne shoot their arrows while Richard used his magic to lift a boulder from the ground and threw it to the monster.

-0 HP!

-0 HP!

-0 HP!

I wasn’t thinking clear at that moment. It should’ve been obvious that the monster was way beyond our league and arrows and rocks won’t do jack shit with its liquid body. Richard lifted another boulder and covered it in flames.

-30 HP!

Target is Burning!

-30 HP!

Fire seemed to be effective as the slime monster’s body engulfed in flames. We moved back a little to let it burn, but the monster expanded and snuffed out the flames just like how you snuff out a candle with a bucket of water. The enraged monster fired its slimy arm towards us and fortunately for us, we’ve managed to dodge it.

We realized the danger we were in when Eric caught a drop of slime in his shield. It was just a tiny drop, but it left a hole the size of a tennis ball in his shield. As Richard desperately threw fire balls continuously, the ground erupted and spawned hundreds of slimes.

Slime Lvl. 28

[Run!] – Claire

With that said, all of us ran towards the opposite direction of the Slime King. As we ran throughout the road, hundreds more erupted from the ground and came at us like a tidal wave. I looked back to see how far we were from the boss monster, but even with its gigantic size, it was fast and it was giving us a chase. In the end, geysers of slime erupted from all directions and the slimes surrounded us.

“What now?!” Eric screamed.

“I’m out of ideas.” Richard sighed as he stopped casting his magic. “I’m out of mana too.”

“This is it, huh?” Melissa said.

Dianne held my hand and frowned. “I’m sorry if I dragged you into this.”

At that moment, I was prepared to die. I was hoping that afterlife existed and I would meet my family there. I held Dianne’s hand tightly as the slimes got us surrounded in a circle.

“I wonder what’s down below.” Richard said calmly tapped the ground with his staff.

“Sewers?” Gerry answered. “Probably.”

That’s it! The sewers! It was our only chance of survival. “Dig, Richard! Go!”

“But we’re not even sure what’s down there.” He said.

“We’re gonna fucking die! Just dig!” Beth shouted.

“But I’m out of mana!”

Dianne’s eyebrow twitched as she took her hand back and pulled a bottle of potion from her inventory.

“Drink this!” Dianne threw a bottle of potion to Richard.

“BLEHHH! It’s bitter!” Richard shrugged as he drank the potion.

“Just fucking do it!” I shouted. “HURRY UP!”

“Shut up! I’m trying to concentrate here!” He complained as he pointed his staff on the ground.

I felt a small tremor as Richard cast his magic. As soon as Richard made a manhole, we all jumped in it one by one. I was the last one to jump into the hole and one of the slimes almost caught me. The earth made a grumbling sound as the hole was closed. Wherever we were, the surrounding was pitch black and we couldn’t see a thing.

“I can’t see.” Beth said. “Who grabbed my ass?!”

“Is that you, Beth?” Eric asked. “Sorry.”

“Aww! Who punched me?” Mark asked.

“Sorry!” Melissa said.

“Hold on.” Richard said. “Let there be light.”

The blue light was coming from a rock on top of Richard’s staff. The light was strong enough that we could see a few meters away.

“What’s that?” I pointed at Richard’s staff.

“Rock bulb.” Richard replied. “Or at least, that’s what they called it in Camp Aguinaldo. It’s just a regular rock with runes in it. This will only last for a day.”

“Can’t you make more?” Dianne asked.

“Nope.” He said. “I tried to copy the runes, but I think you need a skill to activate it.”

“Where are we anyway?” I asked as I looked around. “This doesn’t look like sewers to me.”

“This isn’t the sewers.” Mark said.

“It’s a tomb?”

“Shut up, Richard. You’re not funny.” Eric said.

The ground we were stepping on was flooded with water. Well, not that flooded. The water was only up to our shin. Sure, sewers were supposed to be wet, but there were stalactites and stalagmites all around the place. The tunnels were rough and it looked like it was formed naturally.

“I think I know where we are.” Richard said.

“Where?”

“This is a dungeon.”

*DING!*

You have entered [Bloodfall Cavern]

You are the first to discover [Bloodfall Cavern]

Reward(s): 20% more EXP and item drop rate for a week inside the dungeon