◈ Chapter 87:

Consciousness returned slowly.

Rain blinked the crust from his eyes and gradually drifted from a murky half-remembered dream of his mother and father. Unfortunately, as he awoke the memory of the dream slipped through his claws like so much intangible sand and he soon found he couldn't recall any of it. Feeling a little annoyed he managed to focus and found himself in a room, a shadowy room with the curtains closed. He was laid out on a fluffy carpet in front of a low flickering fire in a fireplace. Strange, this was hardly what he expected to wake up to. He shifted and found Opal atop him, asleep. Then, more surprising, he found Lyra was slumped against him, also asleep. A long thin line of drool hung from the sheep girl’s lip and she was rather loudly snoring. Rain squinted at that, those noises did not belong on such a small girl, he could feel her rumbling snore through his body for gods sake!

After a few failed attempts he managed to struggle up, Opal rolled off him and fell on the carpet with a thump and a grunt followed up by a long noise of complaint. She wiped hair from her eyes and let out a long yawn.

“Hey, I was wondering if you were ever gonna wake. I think you kinda overdid it after- you know.”

“The-- Wait,” said Rain, suddenly panicked, “What happened? What happened to the Ranker?”

Opal scratched her neck and yawned again. “Oh he’s still there, hasn't moved or done shit, how could he, he’s near dead and he hasn't got any legs.”

“...Oh. But how do you know?”

“Red’s watching him, we’ve been taking it in shifts.”

Lyra snorted suddenly and the line of drool snapped before splatting on the carpet below.

Groggily she turned eyes on Rain. “Whassah?” she mumbled.

Rain’s eyes moved to her shoulder, it was healed, smooth blemish free skin where once had been a fairly savage injury. Potion healed he assumed. He recalled very vividly the Hellhound mauling her, he had failed her in that moment, again, so soon after being taken by the council. He couldn't say he liked that feeling.

He put a paw to his face and touched at his muzzle, he almost expected to find exposed bone, but no, there was only normal flesh and regrown teeth, it was like the damage had never happened, everything as it should be, it appeared he had been healed. That said, he didn't feel particularly great, a lot of low harsh aches seemed to fill his body.

“Mmm, I dug up a bunch more potions, fixed up everyone but I ran out when healing you. You're just too big and had too many holes in you.”

“Yeah, I can feel it, I’m still sore all over.” He stretched his arms and cracked his knuckles letting out a deep yawn of his own. “I need to see the Ranker, I really shouldn't have fallen asleep like that.”

“Asleep? You passed out and nearly died! Do you have any idea how much of a pain in the ass it was to drag you in here?”

“Uh-”

“Do you even know how much you weigh! It took all four of us to move you and that was with putting your leg in the weird bag to make you weigh less! I felt like my arms were going to fall off by the time we got you inside!”

Rain scratched his cheek with a claw, slightly abashed. “I didn't expect to fall unconscious like that, I... went too far, I was only moving by riding the rush of… whatever happened to me. You saw some of it, the paw.”

Opal let out a breath, “Yeah, that was something.” she suddenly squinted at him. “Did you… evolve? Is this an evolution thing?”

“No, at least, I don't think so, I feel like this was something being freed within me rather than an evolution, it was always there, growing, it just couldn't get out until I changed.”

“Hmm.”

Rain clambered to his feet, letting out a groan as his muscles twinged. He needed more time to recover really but he had to see the Ranker, he hated that his eyes were off him for even a moment, he didn't trust that creature in the slightest, god knows what he could get up to! He lumbered toward the door but then paused, his brow furrowing. He looked back at Opal.

“Wait, all four of you moved me? How does that work when Vash is just a skull?”

A cry of fright came from behind him and Opal raised an eyebrow.

Rain turned back to the door and found a human woman standing outside staring up at him, a woman with long black hair and a corset. It took him a moment to realise he recognised the woman, it was the person that Adlen had been dragging through the market, the low leveler he’d taken from the low leveler quarter and tried to make his own by dint of being far more powerful than her. She looked significantly better than when he had last seen her, her face no longer quite as swollen and bruised.

“You helped move me?”

The woman trembled and then made a wobbly attempt at a curtsey.

“Y-yes- I saw the others- a-and I knew them from the market, I thought it was the least I could do after what happened!”

Rain blinked, Processing what she was saying. She wanted to pay them back for removing Adlen from her life? She was grateful to him? Now that was a strange feeling. He couldn't recall ever being in a position to help strangers in any serious way in his previous life, it had just never been part of his survival, or something he could afford to do, yet now he had seemingly changed the course of this person's life. He couldn't say he hated the feeling, it wasn't bad.

A flash of red caught his eye and he looked past the extremely nervous woman into the room beyond, or what remained of it. Most of the walls had fallen down leaving it exposed to the air. It was light out and he quickly recognised where he was. It was one of the buildings that rimmed the square, or at least part of the building; it had had a second floor at one point but that was gone now. He found the red that had caught his eye, it was Red, sitting upon a piece of wall, his tail waving gently back and forth below him.

He passed by the wide eyed woman and stepped up behind the Kobold. The cowardly Kobold? The slave Kobold? Food?

Somehow none of that seemed to fit anymore. It hadn't really fit for a while, but now, after what the Kobold did, he couldn't make it fit in his head at all. Red put his life on the line for them, saving Opal and Lyra and allowing him to fight and eventually beat the Ranker.

He paused to organize his thoughts. “You… don’t have to stay if you wish Red. I won’t go after you or anything if you leave. You don't wear a collar or chain anymore and I won't put you in one… Thank you for what you did.”

The Kobold remained silent, his tail swaying. Then he turned and gave Rain a sour look.

“How am I supposed to leave and just leave behind all the gold? That’s so not worth it.”

Rain felt a little bemused by that reaction. The Kobold had wanted to escape for a long time but now it seemed his greedy avarice was acting like his own personal golden ball and chain. He wasn’t against working with that, he could think of a compromise.

“Then become my treasurer, Red the Kobold Treasurer. You look after all the gold, count it, keep it, care for it.”

The Kobold’s tail wagged a little faster.

“What does that mean? Can I sleep in the gold?”

“As much as you want, and any more gold we get goes to your care. We seem to stumble upon the stuff everywhere we go so I imagine the pile will increase significantly over time.”

The tail wagged even faster.

“Filling the hoard bag? To the brim?!?”

“Uuhh, Yes?”

Rain suspected the Kobold’s tail was going to detach and go flying off into the air if it wagged much faster.

“Fine, you drive a hard bargain, but I can see a reasonable deal when it is offered. I reluctantly accept. Very reluctantly.”

It was difficult to take the Kobold’s words seriously as every other word was punctuated with the happy fwapping of his tail against stone.

“Good, now tell me what the Ranker has been doing.”

The tail paused and he glanced outside, Rain turned. Lynthia, the town, was truly a ruin, every building taking at least some damage, mostly a lot of damage, the taller ones especially. The streets were shattered, cobble torn up, and oftentimes great pits where the earth had split apart.

Rain followed Red’s gaze over the square to the remaining stubbed base of the belltower. They were close by.

The Ranker was there, exactly as Rain had left him, slumped against the wall, his message carved into the wall above. In retrospect the message might have been a little overdramatic, but he had been in a terrible place mentally.

To his surprise people were in the square, just a few, picking their way amongst the rubble.

“He’s done nothing,” said Red. “Just made noises and be levelerish.”

Rain wasn't exactly sure what being ‘levelerish’ meant but he didn't bother to ask for clarification. Instead he watched, his eyes laser focused as a woman in a dirty dress carefully passed by, making her way around the debris and holes in the ground. She glanced up as the Ranker suddenly moved his head, gabbling at her, trying to make words and failing due to his lack of tongue. She blinked and looked over his injuries, a little pity entering her eyes, clearly not recognizing him due to his greatly changed state and assuming he was just a victim. She reached for a wicker basket hanging from her arm and pulled half a loaf of bread free. She lifted it, but then she caught sight of the writing above the Ranker’s head. Her lips moved as she slowly read through it, her jaw going slack, the blood draining from her face. She quickly stuffed the loaf back in the basket and fled as fast as her legs would carry her.

The Ranker slumped back against the wall, complete and utter defeat in his body language, reduced to being a beggar, no, below a beggar, even a beggar had better prospects.

Rain’s paw curled as a sense of satisfaction rose in him. Somewhere deep inside a young Human version of himself was cheering, fisting the air.

It was everything he had ever wanted.

He ignored Red who was giving him a peculiar look. He didn't care, this moment was-

The Hellhound blinked into existence near the Ranker. Rain froze up, his eyes going wide, the Ranker’s dog, his loyal companion, his obedient Hellhound. He stepped forward, about to charge from the building and attack, his dark sets of wolf teeth instantly moving from the shadows around the Ranker, even shifting behind the Ranker’s back where they had been hiding. Myriad deathly fangs stealthily hovering up against the man’s flesh, the back of his neck, his spine, one tiny fractional motion and the Ranker would instantly die.

The Hellhound approached its master and the dark teeth began biting down, killing the Ranker as Rain had previously instructed. It took a moment for the Ranker to notice the Hellhound was there… The reaction caused Rain to come to a grinding halt and signal his wolf teeth to pause.

The Ranker was scared, no, not just scared, terrified out of his mind. The Ranker made a hissing desperate scream and flopped onto the ground desperately trying to get away from the hound, wiggling himself, making bare progress.

The Hellhound trotted up to him, sniffing curiously, inspecting the Ranker’s body.

Then, like a pet dog trapped in the home of its dead owner, it began to eat its master's face.

The screams were horrific, serrated teeth biting down, ripping, tearing. The Ranker’s nose disappeared down the dog’s throat, then the Ranker’s eyeball burst leaving him entirely blind. The Hellhound didn't even pause, hungrily eating its way through its owner's face, the Ranker’s torso convulsing as he died. Then the Hellhound was eating into its master’s brain, and then the Ranker was simply dead.

Rain slowly unfroze. He took a step forward, unsure what to do, or if he should do anything. But the Hellhound didn't give him the option, the Hellhound was there, and then it was gone, blinking away, impossible to follow.

Shocked, dismayed, he felt a twisted mix of emotion. But then, maybe this was the karma that the Ranker had for so long evaded, killed by his own creation. His shoulders slowly eased. The Ranker was dead, he was fucking dead!

“It’s... over…” he murmured, struggling to comprehend it.

A comforting hand patted his leg and he looked down to see Opal.

“Turns out I was totally one hundred percent completely correct to get him to come from the dungeon. Yup.”

Behind them Lyra made a strangled cry of very strong disagreement.

Rain sighed and turned. He needed- He wasn't sure what he needed, some time to decompress and to untangle the knotted mess of his thoughts and emotions. He needed to be somewhere safe, not in a destroyed town that the Inquisitor would be coming back to.

His gaze fell on the woman once more and he furrowed his brow. Where did he know her from?

“Who are you?”

“R-really I-I’m nobody!”

“No, you are not. Be specific.”

“I’m just- I just worked in the lower levelers district, I’ve never done anything! I’m just a low leveler!”

“And what was it exactly that you worked as?... What is your name?”

“I- I was known as Neia, th-that is, while I was a l-lady of the n-night…” she went a little pink.

“In the…” Rain at last realised where he knew her from, she was one of the ones who had been at the whorehouse he had lived behind, he had seen her in his previous life at times. She had been kind to him, sometimes sneaking him food at night, if very very scared to be seen near him. He furrowed his brow, that didn't explain why she was here. “Aren't you afraid of the succubus? Why didn't you leave with the rest?”

She bit her lip. “It’s not something everyone can do, it takes savings to just get up and go stay in the city, we- we knew of a cave in the woods and decided to hide there, to try and wait it out. But then yesterday there was an earthquake and we were forced to flee, and then we found the town like this, everything is just- gone! Our home is, it’s… rubble now, there's nothing left...”

Rain felt a little bad, but then he did have a solution, and why not? They had been one of the very very few willing to help, if only by mostly forgetting he lived there.

He turned to Red.

“Treasurer, we have some expenses to pay.”

Red blinked up at him. “Expense-what-now?”

The next few minutes played out like a tragedy, with much Kobold wailing and gnashing of teeth, and floods of tears and frantic pleas for mercy, as some of the gold was removed from the Dimensional Bag and dumped into a sack the woman held. She wasn't faring much better and seemed to be on the verge of having a heart attack, tears streaming down her face as she sobbed. Rain wasn’t surprised, he’d just given her more gold than a low leveler could normally imagine.

“Take this and use it to help the others, move somewhere else. Lynthia is done for.”

“It won't be forever,” butted in Lyra, “The Queen isn't very likely to let a dungeon remain without a standing town for long.”

Rain waved a paw. “Sure, just get out of town, find some place else to go. Make sure to share,” He lifted his lip baring his teeth and leaned down, the woman cowered, “Don't make me regret this.”

Neia nodded furiously, quickly backing away. Rain watched her go. If he knew the low levelers of Lynthia, which he did, he thought they would do well, he hadn't been the only one to be a survivor.

He sighed and then turned to the others.

“Our goal is simple now: Find me a damned bath.”