Without an obvious course of action, Kaldalis was briefly paralyzed by indecision. His first instinct was to book it back towards town, but there was no way he could possibly get all the way back in time for the meeting. The obvious conclusion to draw from that was to just stay out here and keep working on the ruins. But that seemed like an irresponsible decision, as logical as it was.

The council’s approval of him, represented by the bar on the left side of his vision, was less than half full, and every inch of it had been hard earned.

How much was he about to lose?

Was there anything he could do to mitigate it?

“What’s wrong?” Myrin asked, the interruption shaking him out of his analysis paralysis.

“The council,” Kaldalis said, shaking himself to try and get his panic under control. “I just got a notification. I need to attend a meeting.”

“Okay,” Balrim said, “then get going. No offense, but we’ll be fine out here without you.”

Kaldalis laughed sharply. “Yeah, that’s not the problem. The problem is that it starts in fifteen minutes.”

“What the fuck?” Balrim let out a similar bark of laughter. “Ridiculous! When did they give you the notification? Just now?”

“Yeah.”

“Then that’s bullshit,” Balrim insisted, gesturing angrily back towards town. “That’s nowhere near enough notice. What did they expect you to do, just sit in town and wait for them? There’s questing areas farther from the town than that!”

“And what if you’d been back in Cotanaku?” Myrin added, pointing westward, vaguely in the direction of the original town. “There’s no way you’d ever make it.”

Kaldalis threw his hands up in frustration. “I know that, and so do they. But what am I supposed to do about it?”

“I don’t know why you should bother,” Balrim said, patting Kaldalis on the shoulder. “They’re obviously setting you up for failure, if they didn’t tell you when the meeting would happen.”

Myrin shook her head and smacked Balrim on the forearm, since it was the only part she could reach. “That’s a dangerous stance to take. If you don’t go, they’ll take note of that. You need to get back as fast as you can.”

“But I’ll never make it,” Kaldalis said. He could hear the whine in his voice.

“Yeah,” Myrin agreed with a nod, “but that’s not the point. If you don’t even make the attempt, they’ll take that to mean you don’t care. That will be way worse for you.”

Balrim groaned at that, but was nodding as well. “It’s corporate logic. Even if you bombed the interview, you gotta send a thank-you note.”

“This is stupid,” Kaldalis grumbled, even as he was turning towards the forest and breaking into a light jog. “This is so stupid!”

“Just because it’s stupid doesn’t mean you have a choice,” Balrim called after him.

Kaldalis couldn’t argue with that logic.

All he could do was run.

He still had his Jump cooldown rolling from the end of the fight, so he was able to make it to the treeline in just a few bounds. When he reached the edge of the forest, he was especially grateful for the buff’s long duration, as it let him sail over the thick muck left behind by the landslide that drew him out there in the first place.

The only pace he could reasonably set was a painful one. He needed to hurry, and once he got past the aftermath of the landslide, the forest floor was relatively open, due to the lack of vegetation. It meant when his Jump cooldown ended, he was able to maintain nearly a full sprint. The uneven terrain of damp mud and protruding roots made it feel dangerous to run at such a speed, but he kept his footing, in large part due to the balancing influence afforded by his tail. He was more acutely aware of it flicking around on the end of his spine than he’d ever been, owing to how close he was to falling over on his face the entire run. Every step either sank nearly an inch into the wet ground, or landed on a mud-covered root that was slick as an ice sheet.

And all the while, the quest ticked down.

He activated his Jump ability immediately whenever it came off cooldown. It didn’t increase his speed dramatically, but whenever he was in the air, he wasn’t suffering the precarious footing the forest floor offered. It wasn’t without its own inconveniences, though, as he had to watch for low branches, and keep his eyes on his landing location.

About ten minutes later, he realized he’d been entirely heedless of his surroundings. It seemed impossibly fortunate that he hadn’t slammed face-first into a treant, or leaped through the middle of a pack of Daemonraptors - or been spotted and engaged by the first Infernal Horde scout. As much as he didn’t want to push his luck, he had no choice. If he slowed down to check his surroundings, he’d be moving at a similar pace as he’d been on his way out to the ruins. It would take forever to get back to town.

“There’s no way I make it back in time for the meeting’s start,” Kaldalis said between gasps for breath, “but there’s still a chance I can make it back before it ends. They only asked for my input at the end, right? That’s my deadline, not the quest.”

With that goal in mind, he pressed on with as much breakneck speed as he could, without the slightest regard for his safety. He even got one more run at his Jump cooldown before the timer ran out.

Despite his hopes that he could still make it back in time for his part of the meeting, as the timer ticked down to zero, the quest didn’t update to display the meeting’s progress.

The quest flashed red. Briefly, a single-word message appeared beneath it.

Progress Report

Attend the second Panbu Meeting

Failed!

A moment later, the quest itself faded. Despite not actually attending the meeting, the Eyes and Hearts quest ticked up by one, which was a decent sign. It meant he wasn’t extending the amount of time he would have to be tethered to their meeting hall. But it meant he wasn’t going to have more time to make up for his failure.

After that came the part he had been dreading. The approval bar.

“Come on,” he grumbled as he continued to sprint, “give me a break here. A little bump for being fashionably late? Maybe?”

Naturally, there was no such luck. The bar took a huge hit immediately, losing all his progress over the last three days in seconds, and then taking a big bite out of what he’d started with, besides.

Panic filled him as he thought about what form his failure might take. What was going to happen if the bar was completely emptied?

War with Zara was his worst fear. What would that even entail? Would the NPCs in Cotanaku turn against the players? Would a Zaran naval force bombard the place until it was rubble? Would the whole town be put to the sword by the kingdom? He and the other player characters would respawn, most likely, but everyone else?

Ikzoz and the council were likely on the hook for letting Garyung come into power in the first place. If Zara came after Cotanaku, they were doomed. But the Bhogad had been elected by a fair and open vote. Everyone in town might be held accountable. Kaldalis didn’t have a lot of affection for the council, but there was a real chance his friends were in danger. Sivima, Bangen, and Heluna could die for his failure here.

In his mind’s eye, he saw their names carved into a wall just below Haldir’s.

His sudden fear for the lives of his friends gave him speed. His pace went from breakneck to suicidal for their sakes.

Thankfully, the plunging approval bar didn’t fully empty. It stopped with less than ten percent remaining. He was the barest sliver away from utter disaster. He was glad he’d listened to Myrin and started his way back to town immediately. He wasn’t sure how much he could recover, but he had to make every effort. It was possible that if he didn’t appear at all, those last few pixels of approval bar could follow the rest into oblivion, with Cotanaku soon to follow.

He’d made better time than he ever could have hoped.

It was still too late, but he was impressed despite himself when he burst through the treeline into view of the city walls barely more than thirty minutes after receiving the summons for the meeting.

Despite the burning of his lungs, he couldn’t afford to stop now. He bolted for the town gate, trying to mentally outline the fastest route to the meeting hall.

Ultimately, he was most grateful for the way his stats seemed to affect his body. As a tank, his high vigor stat had seemed to give him unnatural endurance. His heart was pounding in his chest as he ran through the town gate and into the camp, but he felt like he still had a few more miles left in him despite the incredible distance he’d been sprinting for.

Panbu was bustling with activity as he ran through it, filled with people going about the work of building the place up. It was obvious that the adventurers being temporarily rained out had led to construction work stalling, and with the suddenly influx of needed materials, everyone was working double time to avoid the whole day going to waste. They presented an obstacle for Kaldalis’s trip through town, but just for a moment before his Jump ability was active again, letting him take to the wooden rooftops of the sturdier constructions to avoid the crowd.

It was barely less than a minute from entering the town gates that he landed on top of the meeting hall. He hopped down off of the wooden roof and made it around the building to the door just as the council was leaving.

“Sorry,” Kaldalis said, gasping for breath. “I was…” He pointed out into the jungle as he struggled to get his breathing under control. “I was too far away. I ran…” He found himself leaning against the wall of the building, taking another deep breath. “I ran here as fast as I could.”

“Unfortunately,” Cerh said, giving a dismissive gesture, “the meeting has concluded. I’m glad that you made ample use of this opportunity to make your opinion of this council known.”

“Wait,” Kaldalis said, holding out a hand as the Talsar turned to walk away. He stared down at his arm, realizing for the first time that he was completely coated in a thin layer of mud, along with a number of leaves and tree branches. “Please, let me make it up to you.”

Cerh was still walking away, heedless of his plea.

Captain Kensah was looking at him like she’d just scraped him off the bottom of her boot, and Jetmorpan seemed as disinterested and unimpressed as Cerh, turning to leave without a second look. Big Mike was giving him a sad look, but the look in his eyes wasn’t apology or pity. It was disappointment.

That one hurt the worst.

He wanted to snap. Balrim had put it in Kaldalis’s head that they were setting him up to fail here, and he wanted to give voice to that. To accuse them. To call them bigots or warmongers. To point out the impossible situation they’d put him in and then punished him for.

They wanted this outcome. If they wanted it so much, why shouldn’t he give it to them? He could cuss a blue streak that would make Heluna blush, just for the satisfaction of telling these bullies to fuck off.

There was one saving grace, though.

Demriv took a step in Kaldalis’s direction, and favored him with a wan smile. Despite her resemblance to someone he considered an abuser, that moment of sympathy helped him hold his tongue.

“Now I understand,” he said, taking one more deep breath to get his lungs under control. “Now that the timetable has been made clear to me, this won’t happen again.”

He was rewarded for that with a slight uptick on his approval bar, which he assumed was from taking responsibility for his actions. It was maybe ten percent total now.

Still a hell of a loss.

The whole situation felt grossly unfair, but he had no choice but to accept what he was being given.

Kaldalis didn’t like the idea of being physically shackled to a fifteen minute walking distance to the meeting hall, but he knew it had to be done now. He couldn’t fail again.