Robin thought “close!” at the box, and it went away. It seemed pretty instantaneous to bring the box up and to dismiss it. He tried it again a few more times just to be sure. He blinked rapidly to clear the after-image it left behind after being summoned so rapidly. It suddenly occurred to Robin that his head was no longer bleeding, which was unusual. Head wounds don’t stop bleeding so quickly. Unless… the mantis was doing something to him? Was it drinking his blood? A quick glance upward told him that the mantis was still sitting on his head, though it was no longer looking at him. It was staring down at the Grapeflies, some of which were beginning to climb the tables and walls. Thankfully, they remained flightless, like the fruit flies had been.

Robin steeled himself to move his head enough to look around. Please don’t move…!

He twisted his head to look more around the room. The mantis adjusted grip almost instantly, keeping oriented towards the center of the room.

“Please don’t attack me, Mister Mantis. I’m going to look around a little, okay?” Robin belatedly remembered that this mantis was a female, but he didn’t think it minded. It... didn’t seem to react to his voice at all, actually. That seemed promising. He slowly twisted his eyes, trying not to move his head. The room didn’t have much, just the tables, the shelves, and a fire extinguisher.

A fire extinguisher! Robin started towards it, but quickly slowed as the mantis atop his head tightened its claws, sending another small fresh stream of blood down four spots on his head. In an attempt to distract himself from the sudden pain, Robin brought the box up again.

STR 9 0 + AGI 11 0 + CON 10 0 + BODY 9/10 0 + INT 14 0 + WILL 10 0 + AURA 10 0 + LOOKS 10 0 + PHYSDEF 2 0 + MENTDEF 0 0 + ENERDDEF 1 0 + SPEED 3 0 + RECOV 5 0 + REGEN 0 0 + PHYSTAM 40 0 + MENSTAM 44/48 0 + MANA 0 0 + RUN 6 0 + SWIM 2 0 + LEAP 2 0 +

His body was reduced by one! Was that from the mantis claws digging into his scalp? And crap, what he assumed was his Mental Stamina was down 4 points! That was probably because of the panicking. Robin slowed his breathing and repeated the Solar Savior Silver theme song to himself. He felt confident that he knew Japanese well enough to sing it in the original form. After all, the best way to learn a new language was to watch their cartoons. Adults were generally unwilling to accept that, though. The box labeled “MENSTAM” slowly ticked back up to 48, the maximum. The box labeled “BODY” only rose after a few moments. Crap, he should have been paying attention to how long it took, he thought. Robin felt sufficiently calmed, and closed the box. He took a slow, deep breath, and slowly starting edging towards the fire extinguisher. The mantis adjusted grip twice, but Robin gritted his teeth and slowly made it to the red metal cylinder.

It took him a moment of fumbling with the latch, but he slowly lifted the extinguisher out of the plastic wall-mounted case it sat in. It was heavier than he expected. As he brought it up to his chest, the dust on top of it flew directly into his nose with an inhalation, and Robin coughed.

At the same moment as Robin coughed, the mantis wobbled forward, almost like it was going to fall off of Robin’s head, and suddenly lashed forward with both of its pink foreclaws, snagging a Grapefly that had reached head height on the wall. It quickly leaned back and began to devour the still-living insect, satisfied with its perch on his head. Robin clutched the fire extinguisher to his chest, eyes closed, grinding his teeth, trying not to scream at the pain from the sudden movement of the orchid mantis. He heard some plastic clunking behind him. It sounded like feeding cups or mantis deli-style enclosure cups hitting the floor. Great, he thought. The Grapeflies have gotten up high enough that they are knocking the other cups off. I hope they don’t accidentally knock over any of the other enclosures and let out any of the...other...mantises…

Robin slowly turned around, his mind desperately trying to remember what other mantises were kept in the Tropical Forest Mantid room. Orchid mantises, Giant Rainforest Mantis, and … Oh no. Idolomantis diabolica, the Giant Devil’s Flower Mantis. Thank Yoshi that the Dragon Mantises weren’t kept in here, Robin thought almost manicly as he completed his turn.

There were too many limbs from terrifyingly massive mantises, at least a dozen, if not more. Several of them were fighting, an almost silent struggle for lethal supremacy, but the rest seemed strangely unconcerned about the presence of other mantids and were happily snatching up Grapeflies. Robin’s mind snapped, and he ran screaming from the room.

He tried to, anyway. Robin forgot he was on a table, and crashed into the ground, hard. The fire extinguisher impacted his solar plexus, driving the air from his lungs, and he thought he was going to puke. He tried to vomit a little, in the hopes that it would make him feel better, but he couldn’t. He couldn’t breathe at all, he was realizing. He onto the floor on his back, still clutching the extinguisher to his chest. The cold stone felt good, and he could breathe a little stretched out. He looked down at the metal object and saw the orchid mantis climbing from where it had jumped to his side to the top of the extinguisher. He felt minor scrapes as it climbed his side, a little bit like having a kitten climb your pants with its claws. He sighed in relief as the mantis clambered onto the top of the red can still doing its odd little dance, weaving back and forth with each step. Robin abruptly realized what had happened before he got the wind knocked out of him and hurriedly got to his feet, holding the extinguisher tightly to himself, the mantis ignoring his movements and staring at the other mantids.

Robin began backing towards the door. The biggest of the other mantids were staring at him. That large female Giant Devil’s Flower Mantis. It… it hadn’t been that big a moment ago. It had looked about the size of a golden retriever… and now it was the size of a mastiff. They were scary mantises when they were small. They looked like a normal mantis, if the mantis was trying to imitate a dead leaf that was also poisonous. They spines it had were much more pronounced than they were when it had been smaller, as well. Luckily, they were usually fairly timid as far as mantises went, not nearly as much trouble to feed as Orchids.

It took a tentative step towards Robin, red eyes glittering. Its foreclaws flexed outwards briefly, almost like a child reaching for something on a shelf far too high.

Robin ran screaming from the room, bursting through the strangely heavy wooden door and sprinting to the restroom, which thankfully still had a glowing sign. The hallway was different than he remembered, unfamiliar, but his fear had given him tunnel-vision again, and he didn’t stop to consider the differences. Robin bulled through the door, turning around immediately once inside the rest room. He slammed the again strangely-heavy wooden door shut behind him with one arm, the mantis swaying in front of him. A text box appeared in front of him, and he froze while he quickly read it. Robin felt himself smirking despite his fear and adrenaline. Who named this stuff?

You have entered a Rest Room! Monsters may not enter a Rest Room. SP may not be gained in a Rest Room for defeating monsters, although they may be gained from other sources and spent. While in a Rest Room, gain +500% Healing, REGEN, and RECOV.