Karl Brunett, Merciless Reaper of the Foolish

[Quest Chain updated! Sub Quest: Home Improvement completed! All party members have earned 2.5 million XP, 250,000 UMC and one random loot item. Loot box being generated now...]

A sound like reality tearing drew everyone’s attention to where Furcas had fallen. Just as the notification had indicated a large box in the shape of an ornate chest appeared in the street, shimmering from some internal light source.

“Well, that’s different. I’ve only seen loot chests in dungeons. Never had one just appear.” I muttered to myself as I walked up to the waist high box of goodies. All I had to do was touch the front of the box and it sprung open in a fanfare of light and noise.

When the sounds of victory completed, a black tactical vest with attached shoulder guards hung above the chest. I reached out again and the armor settled into my grip for my examination. “The fuck?”

Damascus Upper Body Armor Kit (A) Uncommon

[+100 Armor rating (Chest, Back, Abdomen, Shoulders)]

[+50 Strength]

[+50 Enurance]

[+50% Kinetic/Heat/Concussion Absorption]

[1000/1000 Durability]

Keeg came up next to me and eyed the piece curiously, “Something wrong?”

“Yeah, this has better stats than my current armor but it’s only Uncommon rarity, what’s that about?”

“Ah, yes, it may be uncommon, but it’s also Advanced. Now that you are all within your Advanced classes, you will receive Advanced equipment as well. Oh, this looks like it’s for me.” The dark elf grabbed a curiously plain looking necklace, appraised it and stalked off towards the former Deer Lady’s burning domain. “I wish to see if anyone survived.”

I stepped away as everyone walked up to the chest and claimed their own rewards. Though no one seemed to feel particularly victorious considering the smoldering lot behind us. I didn’t suspect anyone had survived, considering the sex fueled Dear Lady’s head still stared into the dark sky from the side of the road.

Carly frowned at the shimmering blue skirt she held in her hands while Stephen was happily slipping his hands into black bracers decorated by gold stylized depictions of the solar system. I noticed that Albert had already slipped on a pair of generic looking Mechanix gloves. Courtney held a small silver ring up to her face, carefully scrutinizing the item before slipping it on her index finger.

With everyone having equipped their new kit or waiting for some privacy, in Carly’s case, to put their gear on, we followed Keeg as he picked through the smoldering wreckage of the former Walmart turned orgy house. All that seemed to remain of the building were melted steel support beams curling up into the air surrounded by ash. The occasional blackened skeleton of human or dark elf was found within the dark mess.

“I don’t think we are going to find anyone here. Not alive anyway.” Stephen commented absently.

Keeg didn’t respond, just continued walking through the devastation.

“If anyone made it out, they ran.” Albert added from the other side of our group.

Keeg stopped at the center of the former Walmart, clenching his fists and looking around aimlessly. “You may be... correct. We should continue our task.”

We walked back to the road, heading in the direction we had come from originally. I checked the tasks, referencing the map in my head for their locations and came up with a route that would take us along the outside of the city. “Our next stop is the Show Low Bluffs. Got a Skeleton King to kill over there. I’m thinking this will be more of a standard dungeon set up. Should be much more straight forward.”

Keeg paused at the head of our group, “You’ll find nothing within the System is ‘straight forward’.”

With that brooding and ominous statement we silently walked through a small neighborhood of wrecked houses that still managed to smolder despite assuredly having not been on fire for a long time. Behind us the dark clouds that covered the shopping district we had recently left were slowly opening up to let the blazing Arizona sun shine through. I wasn’t sure which was more preferable. The haze of the green pestilence that blanketed the city was still prevalent, though it never rose above waist height.

At some point during our travel, Keeg fell to the back of the formation and Albert somehow took point with the Heavy Plasma Machine Gun at the ready. After about an hour of marching through depressing neighborhoods and equally depressing black stump forests we crested a hill where he called a halt.

“Think we’re here.” He motioned with his free hand, the other resting casually across the top of the weapon I’d lent him.

Before me was not the Show Low Bluffs I remembered. Pre-System fuckery the area was really not worthy of the name. A brownish red gouge of rock and dirt that stretched maybe a mile. Two at most. And maybe a hundred feet deep. Now the ‘bluff’ was more like a deep canyon at that bore into the blackened earth for almost a quarter mile. The space between the ridges was a good half mile apart and it clearly extended just past the curvature of the planet. The aforementioned landscaping must have decided to go wild here.

To make matters worse, an army of skeletons had occupied the recent expanded Show Low Bluffs in force. Fortifications and thick gates of black wood stood at all convenient entrances to the encampment, manned by a variety of skeleton archers and foot soldiers. Blackwood rope bridges crisscrossed the escarpments at various points, leading into tunnels cut into the side of the red rocks. A soft orange glow coming from just out of sight at the center of the gorge suggested a large fire or even possibly exposed lava. That’d be some shit.

“Dark magic is being done here; I can feel it.” Keeg hissed beside me, his eyes never leaving a spot against the bluffs that seemed to be carved away. A green glow filtered up from this location that flickered in time to the beat of drums or feet.

“That’s a lot of skeletons.” Stephen said as he eyed the closest gate.

“We going to try to be sneaky? Do the whole stealth thing?” Carly mocked exaggeratingly.

Courtney and Stephen gave her a look that said, ‘Are you serious’? Even Keeg and Albert shared a bewildered look, then everyone looked at me as if I was supposed to have an answer.

“You do know who you’re travelling with, right?”, I asked the young girl.

She just smirked with a drawn-out stretch, “Yeah, just checking, one never knows what shit you’re going to do next. And after this last day, I kinda wanna trash some shit.”

The groups silent tension finally broke at her casual quip. Which was good, because I had no intention of going the quiet route. It was always an option, but not really one of mine. “Heh. Nah, we’re gonna definitely sma- what the fuck!?”

Alyssa Nightraven has initiated an assault on an enemy city: Dilkon

“What’s going on?”, Carly asked as I read the notification.

“Yeah, Veep, the fuck is going on?”

Veep’s blue orb form bounced into being between all of us, “What do you mean, Karl?”

“What is Alyssa doing?”

She bobbed and pulsed for half a second then responded rather nonchalantly, “uh, looks like she’s going after Dilkon’s city core.”

Stephen, Carly and Courtney looked as surprised as I did at that news. Albert didn’t say anything, but his face shown that he was certainly curious, maybe even amused.

“What is Dilkon?” Keeg asked, the only one not actually from this area, or planet to be specific.

“It’s one of the largest cities on the Navajo Reservation, long story short, land that was given to the Native American population by the national government. There’s some Navajo running around out there raiding a group of refugees I gave sanctuary to. Haven’t really met them yet myself. Anyway, I tasked Alyssa with tracking down the raider leader. She did say that her kin were probably sheltering the assholes.”

“Ah, seems fairly cut and dry. They are aiding and abetting the enemy, I would assume you’d approve this course of action?” He asked while keeping an eye on the skeleton camp.

“Eh, normally, wasn’t planning for that to happen. It’s more like the population of Dilkon are simply holding the standoff position, not wanting to get involved directly. They certainly aren’t going to help us, though I didn’t really consider them a threat. I need to find out why she chose this action. Gimme a minute.”

“Yeah, I think Karl’s got the right of it. I doubt those people would get directly involved with either party.” Albert said.

“Veep, can you connect me with Alyssa?”

“Nope. We’re still locked out of the local communications hub.”

“Uh, What about our own network?”

“Jammed. Until you gain control of the city core, or destroy it, we’ll have to leave Show Low’s area of influence to restore regular communications.”

“Then how am I getting - oh fuck!”

Everyone turned to stare at me expectantly.

Alyssa Nightraven has claimed the Dilkon City Core in the name of the SooHoo Military Outpost.

“She just claimed the city core.”, the look of irritation on my face spoke volumes. No one chose to press for further information on the subject.

Alyssa Nightraven, The First Challenger

Alyssa dismounted Lulu and stalked determinedly up the highway at the edge of the city of Dilkon, Choox’il and the rest of her party close on her heels. As she passed through the seemingly peaceful town towards the tribal chief's residence, her resolve to burn the place down began to waver. A group of children kicked a soccer ball around a small park. Men and women stopped and stared at her, and her eclectic group of adventurers and aliens. None moved to engage with her or attempt to stop her. While internally she was wavering, her outward appearance was one of stoic determination.

Something is not quite right here. It’s too clean. It’s too happy. It’s... ideal. No one is armed. No one is even dirty. This place hasn’t been touched. Why not!? It has to be the Raiders. They have to be protecting them. That’s the only thing that makes sense. But from the beginning? Always? And where do the Raiders take the slaves?

Alyssa looked around, realizing she’d already made it to the center of the city. She took a deep breath to calm her nerves. Intellectually she understood she was letting the Raiders force an emotional reaction. Though she’d never been one to get overly excited about any one thing, since the System had come, she found she had much less control over her emotions. And right now, she really just wanted to cut something or someone up.

The sound of Choox’il skittering up to her brought her out of her internal thoughts. “We are here, Challenger.” The spider woman then drew her bow and knocked an arrow, “Which building should we burn first?”

Alyssa cast the woman an irritated glance. Choox’il ignored it and aimed her bow at a small general store that sat on the corner of the main street crossroads where they stood, “Shall we start with this one?”

People within the store finally responded with more than indifference as they picked up on the gist of the conversation. None dared risk their lives on whether the alien spider woman would obliterate the building she pointed her bow at if the young girl gave the order to do so. As the startled and frightened people ran out into the street away from Alyssa’s party, she turned her bow in the direction of the small park that they had just passed.

“Or this one? Let’s start with children, shall we?”

The children’s mothers dashed out from houses to scoop them up and carry them off to somewhere assumed to be safe. More people began to gather at a distance down each street. Alyssa’s frustration was growing. She knew what the woman was trying to do. She knew if she did this, and they were actually innocent... No, they aren’t completely innocent. Not a single one of them. Memories of her childhood fought back her growing conscience.

“Choox’il.” Alyssa stated flatly, steeling her spine for what she intended to do.

“Yes, Challenger? Maybe we start here?”, She spun her bow to point directly at a short man who was about to ask them what was wrong. He’d had his hands up, licking his lips nervously, then Choox’il spinning to point her bow at his face caused him to piss his pants where he stood. The words forming on his lips never released anything more than a whimper of fear.

Alyssa was about to tell the woman to stop when the sound of shelves being knocked over followed by the furry black blur of something sprinting out the front door of the shop the man had just come from caught her attention. She heard Dany yelling at Brondwyn behind her, “HEY! That’s one of the beastmen, Brondwyn, catch ‘em!”

Alyssa’s resolve returned in an instant. Melting into the shadow world she appeared a split second later with her left arm around the terrified man’s neck and her sword edge pressed under his chin. Choox’il cocked her head at the pair of Dany and Brondwyn sprinting down a dusty alley in chase of the not-so-captive furry humanoid.

“Now, you’re going to answer my questions with the thought that your life depends on it. Because if I’m not satisfied with your answers, you will lose your life by this blade.” She turned the polished blade up so that the man could see both himself and her shadow cloaked presence behind him. While she began the questioning of the man who’d seemingly been in charge of one of the people she’d vowed to free, she sensed Choox’il move to cover her back. Off to her side the sound of Feodr drawing his sword announced he was also ready for ensuing hostilities.

“Am I clear?”

The man nodded as a fresh round of piss soaked his jeans.

“Where’s Tracy and the Raiders?”

He attempted to look behind him when he answered only to find her grip like a vice, “I- uh- I don’t know.”

She tensed her deceptively small muscles, allowing the ball shaped bicep to increase the pressure on his windpipe. “Bullshit! I know he’s protecting you people. So where is he!?!

His tugging on her arm became frantic as his oxygen supply began to dwindle. She released the tension a hair to allow him to answer her, “I swear! I don’t know! Hurk! Ack! I DON’T!”

“Then how did you get the beastman helper my friends just chased after?” she hissed venomously in his ear while simultaneously pressing the sharp edge of her blade into the soft skin beneath his chin.

“AaaaAH! They- they bring the skinwalkers in from the desert! They ask the chief what he needs, and they go. They never tell us where they camp or how to contact them.”

Alyssa’s mind began to whirl with the information the man was spilling. “How have you survived the monsters? There’s no dungeons out here or monster camps, did the Raiders clear them!?”

“Y-YES! They protected us. They always protect us!”, The man’s face was a kaleidoscope of tears and snot, some of which was beginning to pool across her blade. Fuck, I’m going to have to clean that off. Alyssa released the man to stumble away from her in a half controlled falling retreat.

She scanned the buildings looking for the city hall which she found several hundred meters down the main street. “I want you to burn down that building.”

Choox’il smiled, her bow drawn taut while muttering an incantation that infused the nocked arrow with a golden energy. When she released the arrow, it exploded with the force of an RPG into the side of the targeted building. The street facing wall collapsed and she muttered another incantation, the trio of arrows on her bow glowed a different color then flew through the gap. A moment later smoke billowed from the building, followed quickly by white hot flames. A trio of administrative type workers bolted out of the building hacking and coughing through the smoke.

Alyssa Nightraven has initiated an assault on an enemy city: Dilkon

She smiled vindictively at the notification as Dany and Brondwyn returned with the terrified beastwoman between them. She looked like a malnourished beaver, and was apparently one of the ones that stayed closer to their true animal form than others. She looked at everyone with wild eyes as Dany quietly whispered assurances to her. Her nose twitched causing her to look down the street at the burning city hall, then she scrutinized Alyssa more directly.

“T-thank you, I don’t know who you are, but thank you.” Tears wet the woman’s black animal eyes as she collapsed on the cement. “There are more. All over.”

“I’m sure, though they will have to wait.” She shrugged at Choox’il and Feodr, “Probably should have called in the cavalry before kicking over the hornets' nest.”

On the horizon in every direction, thick plumes of dust were slowly rising into the air. Tracy’s Raiders were on the way. And they apparently weren’t as far off as she had thought.

“I already did, Challenger. Before this one even revealed herself.” Choox’il smiled sheepishly and shrugged her shoulders back, “Eli was not happy, but he’s already redirected his mounted scouts and Flagstaffs team of Deputies our direction. Another dozen squads of proper cavalry are enroute, we just have to stay alive for the next hour.”

“Sounds like a challenge.” Alyssa smiled at her pun.

“Oh, the daft woman has puns now!?” Feodr barked out in laughter.

Alyssa concealed a sigh of relief. She realized deep down that she had avoided becoming a monster. She didn’t want to burn the whole town down. She didn’t want to find herself responsible for killing those kids she saw playing soccer on the way in to town. And most importantly, she didn’t want to find out if she had that kind of resolve in her. The kind she’d only seen in one man since this mess started.