As Kaldalis crept through the treetops above the camp, he kept an eye out for Dalgaard. At first, he moved slowly and cautiously, trying to avoid notice. But within the camp there didn’t seem to be any security at all. As the raiders dispersed through the camp to return to their individual little huts and hovels, none of them looked up. They weren’t even looking around. Once Kaldalis realized he would remain entirely unobserved so long as he didn’t start screaming, he focused on the speed of his search rather than the secrecy.

He felt like he learned a lot just by scrambling through the treetops and looking around. The first thing he noticed was that this couldn’t be a proper camp. There were no centralized services. No town hall, no mess hall, no crafting center… Nothing. Just a bunch of sheds scattered around. As the raiders returned, those who started to prepare their midday meal did so as individuals, over campfires with whatever meager provisions they had in their inventories. It told Kaldalis all he needed to know about these people. They were out for themselves. A bunch of “rugged individualists” going their own way together as a group.

The second thing he noticed was where they were. The area hadn’t looked familiar due to all the alterations that it had undergone amidst the construction of this camp, but when he reached the trees in the center of the makeshift encampment, he found something easily recognizable. Onirioago’s hideout. The house that was glitched into the treetop.

It made sense, after all. Dalgaard probably had ownership of the property - or someone else in their little cabal did - and it was easily within striking distance of the Jormongumo village. Whatever “creative use of game mechanics” had let them build the house had probably been extended to the surrounding area, and used to build their shelters.

It was a clever use of resources that had likely made them comfortable enough here to keep the pressure up on the Jormongumo indefinitely. It was one thing to think you were Batman bringing vigilante justice where the corrupt local enforcement had failed, but it was probably a lot easier to keep doing it when you got to sleep comfortably every night.

Investigating the floating treetop house was a tricky prospect. Without windows, Kaldalis was forced to creep in the front door, opening a tiny crack and peeking in before sneaking in as quietly as possible. As he investigated the two-room space, he found it completely empty. That struck him as strange. Wasn’t this the perfect place for the mastermind of this operation to sit in a high-backed chair behind a big imposing desk, with steepled fingers and anime villain glasses shine?

“Maybe they’re waiting for Voker to revive and get back here,” Kaldalis muttered to himself. “Gotta have the asshole right hand standing over their shoulder.”

Kaldalis considered staying here and waiting to see if they turned up. But he had to admit that he didn’t really have a plan at this stage. The floating house also had only one exit, and if Dalgaard showed up with a handful of henchmen, the only way Kaldalis was getting out with all his teeth still in his mouth was to pull a War Weapon and commit violent murder.

As he left the floating house, Kaldalis decided he needed a proper plan. If he could find them out in the open, he could grab Dalgaard and do an Augmented Jump to extract them from the camp before anyone could react. But that wasn’t exactly the best way to open negotiations. Literally flying out of the sky like an alien abduction would disorient them at best, and alienate them at worst. Since part two of the plan had to involve opening negotiations with the Jormongumo, Kaldalis needed to start from as friendly a position as possible.

In the face of such lax security, and without other options, Kaldalis dropped down from the treetops, using Slow Fall to land lightly on the ground. A part of him hoped that an alarm might go up at the sudden appearance of an actual intruder. Every eye turning to him in open hostility would have been a great way to get Dalgaard’s attention without antagonizing them.

Instead, nothing happened. Kaldalis started to walk around openly, looking for Dalgaard, and still, nothing happened. It seemed he had free reign to explore the whole camp without issue. Nobody was paying attention at all to him. Presumably because he had the right number of arms and eyes.

“Hey,” Kaldalis called, approaching a group sitting around a campfire, taking turns heating up their lunch. “Do any of you guys know where I can find Dalgaard?”

Only three members of the group looked up, the others ignoring him. One of them was eyeing him with suspicion, but said nothing. The other two offered him friendly smiles.

“Not right now,” the first said, though he gestured to the seat next to him. “But he should be back in a bit. Off running errands to keep the place running, you know.”

“We were just talking about the aftermath of the fight,” the other smiling face said. “If you want to hang out until they show up.”

“I’ll keep hunting around,” Kaldalis said, returning their smiles. “But, uh, does Voker have to bite it every time? It seems like he’s not happy until he dies and gets his whole team killed, am I right?”

The two men laughed, and even a few of the group who were focused on their food instead of Kaldalis had a chuckle.

“I’ll ask him when he gets back,” the person who was suspicious of Kaldalis said. “Unless you’d rather say that to his face yourself.”

“Please do,” Kaldalis shot back quickly. “And I’ll do it myself if I see him first. Someone’s gotta tell him to knock it the fuck off, or else he’s gonna bite off more than he can chew when someone nearby can’t afford the mistake.”

Kaldalis and the suspicious person shared a glare back and forth. They were a Talsar wearing a bucket helm that obscured most of their face, so he couldn’t exactly tell who they were. Did they know him? He wasn’t in any sort of disguise. He was honestly surprised nobody recognized him yet, given how he’d been at the center of every bit of bullshit that had happened on the island since the Persimmon had been torn apart by that kraken monster.

“Maybe you’re right,” the talsar said at last, looking away first. “But I’m not telling him. He’ll go out of his way to make sure I go down with him next time.”

“I’ll take the heat,” Kaldalis said with a grin. “I can roll with a punch pretty well.”

“You got full aplomb, then?” one of the others asked. “Because if you’re starting beef with one of the tanks, you’re gonna need it.”

“Don’t worry about me,” Kaldalis said, gesturing dismissively. “But I should get back to my search. Dalgaard isn’t going to find themselves, you know.”

Kaldalis was surprised he was able to walk away from the group without anyone stopping him. It was a bit of a hit to his ego that nobody recognized him, but he couldn’t be upset when it was working to his advantage. It helped that there were no guards. Nobody was patrolling. There were a few folks perched atop their shacks’ rooftops peering out into the jungle, but they looked like volunteers. When one of them hopped down to attend to some other task, no one took their place in an adequate rotation to protect the barricade.

These really were just a bunch of assholes gathered in the jungle, thinking they were each an individual commando only responsible for themselves. No wonder nobody wanted to confront Voker about his irresponsibility. They’d have to face their own self-interest at the same time.

There was a commotion near one of the edges of the camp, and Kaldalis found himself moving in that direction. Dalgaard had gone out on an errand, so perhaps any kind of fuss was a signal of their return. He still didn’t know what to do when he found them, but finding them was the first step. Improvisation was a natural part of any good lack-of-a-plan.

Instead of Dalgaard, though, it was more adventurers. The return of the raiders who had fallen in the fight. It surprised Kaldalis to see them. It meant that he’d been slinking around the camp for over thirty minutes and gone unchallenged.

Kaldalis was tempted to melt back into the camp, backing away from the returning adventurers. But ultimately he needed to do something. He wasn’t accomplishing anything just milling around waiting for his target to blunder into his sights. If he was going to get to Dalgaard, he had to make them come to him. There was a status quo at work here, and if Kaldalis wanted their leader’s attention, he was going to have to shake something up.

After all, he had a date tonight, and the sooner he could get this whole matter resolved, the less likely it was that Heluna was going to slap Garyung in the face again and demand that the entire camp march into the jungle on a rescue operation.

It was easy to find his new target. Voker was walking into the camp like he owned the place, despite the fact that he kept dying like a bitch and the whole camp was laughing behind his back about it.

“Voker,” Kaldalis called, moving quickly towards the man in black plate armor. “Voker, buddy, can I have a quick second?”

“What?” Voker asked, his confident expression turning sour at the interruption. Though the second he turned to look at Kaldalis, the recognition was clear on his face. “You? How did you-”

Kaldalis couldn’t help himself. He wanted to ask where Dalgaard was. Or to say something about how Voker was fighting like an idiot and getting people killed. But as soon as he heard the man’s stupid fucking voice and saw his stupid fucking face - both within arm’s reach - he couldn’t stop. He thought of Haldir and his vision went red.

He punched Voker in the mouth so hard that the man stayed down when he hit the ground. Kaldalis suspected that the man’s low Aplomb had translated into a glass jaw. Just the same, it was intensely satisfying. Even if it immediately raised a huge commotion.

“Whoa!” someone cried out. “What the fuck?”

“‘Bout time,” someone else grumbled.

“Kaldalis?” someone asked near at hand. He quickly recognized Yosini. “You’re… You’re not supposed to be here!”

“Intruder?” someone yelled immediately after. “Intruder!”

Three people immediately tried to tackle Kaldalis at once with no coordination whatsoever. If he had wanted to escape, a quick Jump could have gotten him clear of things with ease. But he allowed himself to be captured. Now the ball was in Dalgaard’s court to come to him. This was all part of the plan.

Of course, the satisfaction of knocking Voker out cold first was a nice bonus.