Even after the small taste of hope following their discussion, it was obvious they weren’t going anywhere right away. The only thing they could do against a living carpet of ravagers was die. Rescue would need to wait. So the group drank, Sar and Keana in particular.

As the night wore on, Val and Pepper found themselves alone in the corner, watching Keana dance on a counter as Sar and a growing group of men raptly looked on. Val asked, “do you think we should stop her?” Pepper shook her head. “Last thing on my mind. LOOK at her. Ignore the tits and ass. She is doing some kind of children’s dance. Third different one I think. She isn’t making them up, but nothing I’ve ever seen.” Baffled, Val asked, “you think her life story is made up just because of a children’s dance? Her mother was a dancer, maybe she collected odd little children’s dances and they loved doing them together.” Pepper snorted. “Of course her life story is made up. Girl supposedly kills someone at ten, and then a bunch of slavers a couple years later, but now she is afraid of blood. One minute she is telling a sob story about her dead mother, and the next she jokes her mother was supposed to take her to the carnival, but its ok because now Arn is her stuffed bear. Claimed her mother taught her to love dancing, but not specific dances, yet those are actual children's dances for certain. And that tattoo on her ankle, that's a skull with crossed daggers through the eyes. Never seen that before, but it's not any kind of random thing, that’s for sure. It all adds up to something, I just ain’t got any idea what.”

Val watched Keana dance, admitting “this may shock you, but I wasn’t looking at her ankles. Maybe you’re right. I’m more worried about Sar though.” Pepper nodded. “Sar’s crazy for certain, and dangerous in the eventually, but there ain’t no mystery there. Keana, Keana is something else. Mark my words, she is going to bite us in the ass.” Val smirked, noting “I can imagine worse things.”

The next morning, Val and Pepper ran separate errands in the morning, and rejoined Keana and Sar for a late lunch when they finally dragged themselves down to the main room. Keana groaned, “I don’t think I can eat. How could you let me drink that much!” Pepper smirked asking “it’s the drinking that has you worried? Not the dancing on the counter? But back on track, the Mayor is having lunch in the corner. Perhaps you can work your charms and get us permission to leave. Don’t get too close to him though. Not unless you want to run up and bathe real quick.” “I’ll go too,” Sar added.

Keana and Sar headed over Mayor Stillwater’s table and asked if they could join him. He grunted “no. Don’t do business while eating.” Keana immediately sat down anyway and got right into it. “We want permission to head out to rescue our teammate Arn.” The Mayor wiped his mouth with a napkin and asked “the same one you told me blew himself up?”

“Arn would never die to fire!” Sar exclaimed. “He has high fire resistance, and natural regeneration that gets stronger the worse off he is. Does his best work nearly dead,” Keana explained.

The Mayor sighed. “Look, I get it. You heard me mention the tree bit and figure he climbed, yes? Sorry I wasn’t clear. True enough that stuff like the blade apes are safe. But when this all clears up, there will be plenty of trees with scratch marks going twenty feet up, and a few with massive bones at the base. Ravagers can climb when they want too. Your friend is gone. Even if he wasn’t, nothing you can do today unless you have twenty or thirty gold to hire someone. We have about four elites that could maybe bring someone out. I can let you go tomorrow afternoon if you are quiet about it. You may not get all the way there, but the swarm should have thinned enough that if you’re careful you won’t die.” The Mayor turned back to his chicken wing and waved them away dismissively.

* * *

Early that evening, Arn sat in a tree. Two hours ago, an ever-so-slightly smoking piece of bark and unlock of Flame Mana had been a cause of joy. However, even with the Focus skill one can only stare at a piece of bark so long. In the two hours since the unlock, Arn had tried taunting ravagers. Arn had tried daydreaming about Keana dancing with Liara and, wonder of wonders, had not fallen out of the tree. He was thoroughly sick of sitting in a tree and wanted – needed – to get flipping down.

Down was starting to look possible, as the ravagers were definitely thinning out. Hit and run baby, hit and run. Regeneration, it turns out, is not a complete cure for sitting on your ass for thirty-six hours, and Arn was SORE. He was, however, incredibly happy to be moving, and reached the ground in less than a minute. Under the forest canopy, it was already getting dark, but with the underbrush cleared out by the ravagers, Arn could see well enough. There were still ravagers scuttling here and there . . . but they ignored him.

Arn shouted. “I’m the flipping Phoenix Titan! Come get some!” The ravagers . . . continued scuttling as though Arn wasn’t there. What the heck? Are they in scavenger mode at this point? Realization struck Arn. I’m covered in ravager bits. They aren’t stupid.

And so it came to pass that the self-named Phoenix Titan began chasing ravagers, which, despite short legs, are surprisingly nimble. The forest rang with curses, and, from time to time, insectile screams. As early evening turned to early night, Arn kept at his task, feeling a sort of mad joy at hunting the “little bastards,” and hoping for a level-up. Arn tripped over roots several times as the darkness slowly grew, but the moon was nearly full, and Arn could see well enough.

Although every bit as useful as Elder Dannis claimed, the passive skill Focus has a clear and well known (although not yet known to Arn) downside – Focus makes it very easy to get lost in a task. Arn rushed after scurrying ravagers for hours; swerving, lunging, thrusting, diving, tripping and picking himself back up. Thanks to Focus, Arn was a hunting machine – that didn’t stop to think.

Arn snapped back to the moment when he stumbled across a large beast skeleton. Arn was momentarily overjoyed to notice a small gem heart on the ground between the rib bones, but on looking around realized that he had no idea where the trail was. Well damn, that’s not good. Still, I head north and I should be fine. Lets see . . . the moon rises in the east and sets in the west . . . but how many hours ago did the moon rise and is it rising or setting? Damn it!

Arn considered making camp, but spending the night alone in the forest covered in ravager guts wasn’t appealing. Arn reasoned that he hadn’t seen any living beasts aside from ravagers, and that, worst case, he mistakenly headed south until he hit the trail known as “The Edge of Madness” and simply turned around. The thought of more gem hearts just lying on the ground was also a powerful lure.

Arn took his best guess at north, and headed out more carefully, ignoring the ravagers scuttling around in the distance. More alert to his surroundings, and with the underbrush cleared out by the ravagers, Arn quickly came across a patch of oddly shaped fuzzy mushrooms in the lee of a large tree. Arn didn’t recognize them, or care to try his guidebook by moonlight, but figured anything the ravagers wouldn’t eat was interesting enough to take. Arn had enough herbalism training to suspect poison, but didn’t want to fuss with the herbalism kit or properly digging up the roots. Instead, Arn took the gemheart out of his smaller sack, slipped it over a mushroom and simply pinched and pulled. The procedure worked well enough, and Arn quickly extracted six of the strange mushrooms, nearly filling his small sack. Arn was about to go for the seventh and final mushroom when he noticed a few spores floating in the moonlight and decided to call it, rapidly backing off. High constitution or not, Arn knew that some of the jungle mushrooms were incredibly toxic or hallucinogenic. With his luck, he’d come to naked in the swamp with something snacking on him. No thanks.

Shortly after midnight, Arn was able to get oriented and correct his course. After heading north for about an hour, Arn came across a small clearing littered with skeletons. Arn boggled at the scene for a moment, then realized that a herd or pack of something-or-others had made a stand, fighting back to back. Arn wondered what was smart enough and loyal enough to do that in the face of the ravager swarm, but was too tired to care. Reckoning that the bones would make for an alarm system of sorts, Arn cleared an area in the center of the bones, used his pack for a pillow and was out like a light.