Chapter 204

“I’ve never been a fan of pun-based naming conventions, Carl,” Donut said as the five of us trekked across the road toward the rocky, northern beach. Another distant crash echoed from the city. Cars no longer came from either direction on the freeway, but people still walked up and down the sidewalks. Nobody was on the rocky beach here, instead opting for the beaches much further to the east and west. “It’s cheap, and it lessens the danger of everything around us.”

“You were literally just talking about a stripper named Damascus Steel.”

“I love that guy! Strippers are supposed to have names like that. There’s Anaconda. Damascus Steel. Dong Quixote. The Author Steve Rowland. Gluteus Maxx. And a bunch of others. Have you ever gone into the Bitches room? I bet they also have names like that. And don’t forget Juice Box. But that’s different, and you know it. That’s their names, not the name of their species. Quite frankly, it’s embarrassing. Actually, that reminds me. Last time we were there, Damascus said he wanted to meet you.”

Anton kept a wary eye on us as we walked, but everything had relaxed. The more Donut yammered on, the more clear it was that she was mostly harmless. She was constantly talking smack. The sense of distrust was still there, and it would be for a while, but it appeared both sides had spent some time talking to others and getting an idea of the people we really were.

Despite them being former prisoners, my gut told me these guys were all right. I didn’t necessarily trust them, but they didn’t appear to wish us harm. Not as long as they had Sister Ines keeping them in line. Them being convicts by itself didn’t mean much to me. Half the dudes I worked with before the collapse were ex-cons.

Because there were no cars, Donut released Mongo, who jumped upon the newcomers with typical gusto. The three crawlers were all terrified at first, but they quickly warmed to the dinosaur when they saw he was like a giant dog. Mongo was fascinated not with the cat woman, but Paz, the armored Santero, which I gathered was some type of warrior cleric. Mongo pushed his face right up against the shining breastplate and looked at himself in the reflection, which pushed the large man over onto his ass with a ridiculously loud crash. The man fell like an upset turtle. I was afraid they’d be angry, but Paz howled with laughter.

Anton and I each grabbed an arm to pull him up.

Donut, seeing that Mongo “approved” of them, had also eased her suspicions. Of the two men at least. She continued to make comment after incredulous comment in chat about various parts of Sister Ines’s anatomy.

“Monk seals,” Donut muttered again. “I mean, really.”

“I don’t care if it’s a play on words,” I said. “They sound pretty awesome if we can catch one. We just need to be careful.”

“They’re a lot faster than they look,” Sister Ines said as we crossed over a small fence, leading to the rocky beach. We’d walked a quarter mile east toward a larger section of beach where the seals were more spread out. I could hear their loud shouting and fighting and barking as we approached.

Again, this was less mythological creature and more something stupid, but according to Sister Ines, these guys were tough. And intelligent. And great tanks.

“Real Caribbean monk seals are extinct,” Paz said as we approached. “They used to be everywhere, but we hunted them out. My papa told me that.”

“Was he a scientist?” Donut asked. She now sat upon Mongo’s back, who’d in turn attached himself to the side of Paz.

“No. He worked on a sugar plantation,” Paz said.

Anton, who’d done the most talking when we met, was mostly silent. The man was always watching, always looking around, always alert.

“So, what were you in for?” Donut asked Paz. The armored man clanged his way over the fence. He sounded liked a bag of pots and pans being shaken up and down as he moved. It would be impossible for him to sneak up on anybody.

He grinned at Donut, revealing a missing tooth. “Sister Ines, what’s rule number one?”

“Today is a new day,” Sister Ines said. “We don’t worry about yesterday because we can’t change the past.”

“So, a weird sex crime then?”

Paz laughed. Anton did not.

“It is considered rude to ask about one’s past,” Sister Ines said, speaking gently but firmly.

She suddenly reminded me of Miriam Dom, and an unexpected wave of sadness washed over me.

Donut was about to say something snarky to the nun, and I interrupted. “Have you guys gotten any cards yet?” I explained the utility card we’d received.

“No,” Sister Ines said. “We’ve only killed two things since we’ve gotten here, and neither had anything like that.”

I nodded. That was too bad. I was hoping the utility cards would drop with every kill.

“What do each of your classes do?” I asked.

Ahead, a single seal sat by itself on a rock near the water. It appeared to be asleep. We cautiously approached.

“I am a poet laureate,” Sister Ines said.

Donut made a dismissive grunt. “I had the option for that once. It’s a bard class. I was a bard on the last floor. A legendary diva. I’m a master telephone psychic now.”

“It’s a bard healer,” she agreed. “Wait, you’re a what?”

“Do you even sing?” Donut asked, ignoring the question. “I sing. I had a concert recently.”

“No. I recite poems. And prayers.”

Donut: NO WONDER THESE GUYS WEREN’T IN THE TOP FIFTY. WHO WANTS TO LISTEN TO A FAKE CAT RECITE STUPID CHURCH POETRY ALL DAY?

Carl: Yeah, it’d be almost as bad as listening to a real cat sing.

Donut: THAT WAS REALLY MEAN, CARL.

“Paz is a Santero. That’s a necromancer cleric. He also has a lot of healing and protection spells.”

“Mostly I just curl up on the ground and let the bad guys hit me,” Paz said.

I looked at Anton.

Sister Ines patted the tattooed man on the shoulder affectionately. “A fugitive is a rogue class, I am told. He’s good at finding traps and escaping tough situations.”

I suspected there was much more to it than that.

“And what about that deity you guys worship? Ogun?”

Paz opened his mouth to respond, but Sister Ines interrupted him. “Only Anton and Paz worship him. I cannot bring myself to worship a false god. He has many silly rules, but he allows each of them several protection spells. He would keep the three of us safe if the princess really wanted to rip our throats out. And what about your god? This Emberus.”

Donut grunted. “He takes all of our money, but sometimes people catch on fire when Carl punches them. It doesn’t happen very often though. I have many more fire spells.”

The fact Sister Ines even knew I worshipped a god told me she had a similar ability to my own.

We crouched down and slowly approached the lone seal.

“They don’t seem to have ranged attacks that we’ve seen,” Sister Ines whispered. “But they are fast and fight dirty. We have to get close to stick the flag in. We tried affixing the flag to a crossbow bolt, but it didn’t work. You have to be physically touching it when it’s shoved into the monster. We lost the flag.”

“Hang on a second,” I said, and I pulled the Bahamas book from my inventory and started to flip through it.

I hadn’t really looked at it yet. Prepotente seemed to think there would be some overlap. I moved to the index in the back. There were a lot of ridiculous monsters listed mixed in with some that sounded terrifying. The book separated them as Common, Uncommon, Rare, Very Rare, Legendary, Mythic, and Unique. There were lots of birds and bats and fish. I didn’t see a monk seal listed. I sighed and put the book away. I’d examine it more closely later.

Sister Ines pulled a small flag from her inventory and handed it to me.

I blinked a few times, trying to figure out the image on the flag. It said Team Sister Ines on it, and it was a blue field with a black and white, embroidered blob on it. Donut audibly scoffed at the quality. It looked like the image was maybe one of those ball and chain shackles. But the metal ball had something on it. Like maybe a nun’s habit. I shook my head. The design was almost as dumb as our own flag.

“I should warn you,” Sister Ines said. “You might get a quest when you examine the seal.”

I grunted as I turned my attention to the gray, slick monster. It looked like a regular seal. We had all sorts of similar animals in the Puget Sound, from the common harbor seal to the much-larger elephant seal and the loud-ass California sea lion. This guy was pretty big, but he was nowhere near the size of a sea lion and not even close to the size of an elephant seal. He was maybe six or seven feet long and probably weighed about 400 pounds. He just sat there, passed out on the rock.

Yago. Monk Seal Picket Sentry. Level 70.

Ahh, the monk seal. They’re seals. And they’re monks. Get it? Get it?

Yeah, anyway. These guys are more enthusiastic about their jobs than a dentist with glossaphilia. In case you don’t know what that means, what I’m saying is these guys really love fighting stuff. It’s their religion.

Trained in the deadly art of Caribbean Kung Fu, the monk seal sentry’s sacred duty is to protect the coast and hunting grounds from the impending invasion of their dread enemy, the Red Maníseros Land Crabs, masters of Juego de maní.

Be careful. You don’t want to get involved in that impossible conflict.

Crabs. Scratching, pinching crabs. The rats of the sea. I hated crabs.

A moment of silence passed, but I could sense the electricity in the air.

New Quest. The Chowder War.

Oh, you’re getting involved whether you like it or not.

The Monk Seals. The Red Maníseros Land Crabs.

War is brewing, as it often does in these parts. Every season, the land crabs emerge from their forests to attend their sex parties in the oceans surrounding these lands. The Monk Seals hold the ocean sacred, and the very act of spilling so much crab chowder into their holy waters is considered a sacrilege most foul. This is no minor inconvenience. And it’s not just a few little clouds of the batter, either. There are a lot of these crabs. Like, a lot. And when they let go... man. It’s like a category 5 jizz storm down there. Fish die. The food becomes scarce. The baby monk seals and their food supplies are literally getting bukkaked to death with gallons of weird, chunky crab splooge.

And no, that’s not a sentence even I thought I’d ever utter.

Would you want that for your own children? Nope. I didn’t think so. It’s disgusting, and it must be stopped at all costs.

For the Red Maníseros Land Crabs, it’s a matter of survival. It’s not their fault they can only have babies in the ocean. It’s not their fault they’ve had to wait a whole year to let go. They don’t want to do it there. They can barely swim. Water is a terrible lubricant. And to make matters worse, these psychotic seals are always losing their minds every time they get anywhere near the coastline. So as a method of self-defense, they’ve learned the deadly art of Juego de maní.

Choose a side. Put an end to this conflict, one way or another.

Reward: You will receive a Platinum Quest Box.

“Are you kidding me?” I asked. “Caribbean kung fu? Is that even a real thing?”

“I don’t know about that, but Juego de maní is a Cuban fighting style,” Paz said. “It is very real.”

Donut did a little karate kick on my shoulder and made her wachow! noise. “Carl, this is like one of those kung fu theater movies you used to watch. Sort of. I don’t know if any of them involve stopping crabs from jerking off all over baby seals. But it’s like one of those movies where two schools are fighting each other! But what does that have to do with Cuban culture?”

“Nothing,” I said. “Absolutely nothing. It’s complete bullshit.”

She gasped. “Aren’t baby seals all white and fluffy? Oh my god, they’re so cute! We should see if we can find one!”

“That’s a different type of seal,” I said. “I’m more curious about these crabs.”

“The land crabs migrate every year,” Paz said. “It’s a tourist attraction. But it’s not here. It’s on the other side of the island into the Bay of Pigs. They live in the forest and move to the water to lay their eggs. It’s millions of them, and I’m pretty sure only the females go into the water. It also happens in the spring, not Christmastime. All of this with clouds of crab spooge is just made up.”

“The dungeon is making crap up? I’m shocked,” I said. “Baby seals live on the beach, too, not the ocean. How big are these crab things?”

Paz shrugged. His armor clanged. “The real ones are small. Maybe the size of my hand, but I haven’t seen this world’s version yet.”

“Wait,” Donut said. “Crabs live in the forest? That’s a real thing? That sounds made up. Everyone knows crabs live underwater.”

“Yeah, it’s real,” Paz said. “Though I think they spend their days in the wetlands. That whole area is a little swampy. They’re everywhere on the roads during the migration. You should see it. They get squished by the cars. It ruins people’s tires. It stinks, and then the birds come in and eat them all.”

“You can eat them?” Donut asked.

“They are dangerous for people to eat,” Paz said. “At least the real ones. Some people eat them anyway, especially the crab eggs, but for medicine, not food.”

“We can worry about the crab spooge quest later,” I said, refocusing my attention on Yago, the oblivious seal, who remained passed out. “Let’s get this card.”

~

The plan was straightforward. Sister Ines, Donut, and Anton would attack the monster from afar while Paz and I approached from the sides. Paz would draw the seal’s aggro and tank the attacks while I stuck it with the flag. I didn’t like the idea of separating from Donut, but we had multiple contingencies in place if things went south. And I made sure Donut had some space between her and the other two. I made Mongo stay back with her.

Sister Ines’s main melee attack was with her trident, but she mostly fought like Imani did. She buffed everyone around her and hit the mobs with afflictions. Paz was also a healer, and a necromancer, too, but the armored cleric was able to absorb a lot of damage. He had a Turtle ability, which gave him a temporary, powerful shield while he drew the monster’s aggro. I’d seen the ability in action before, and I knew it also rooted him in place and made him unable to attack or move. It was a dangerous ability because once cast, it couldn’t be stopped until the timer ran out. If the shield was breached before that, the caster was free, but he’d still suffer the excess damage of the attack that broke through the shield.

The plan was for him to walk up on the seal, draw its attention and get attacked while the others poured fire into it. I’d also approach, invisible. Once the health reached the five percent threshold, I’d swoop in with the flag.

The last time they’d tried this, the seal had overwhelmed Paz’s defenses too quickly, making it so Anton had to take it out with a “one-shot.” I wasn’t certain what that was, but I assumed it was a powerful, magic-enhanced bolt.

As we prepared, I could sense how fluid of a team the other three were. I wondered how it was I’d never seen them before on the recap. I felt a little jealous, honestly, of their relative anonymity. Sister Ines said they’d gone on programs before, so they weren’t completely under the radar. I wondered if that route, just quietly making one’s way through the dungeon, was actually better than the path we’d found ourselves upon, not that I could change that now.

Our fame, I realized, was contagious. Whether these three liked it or not, they now had a lot of eyes on them. They weren’t dumb. They had to know it, too. That was probably a bigger concern than that obvious bullshit with what Donut had said.

Paz clanged loudly as he walked. Yago the seal woke up while we were about thirty feet away. I downed the invisibility potion and dashed off to the side.

“Hey! Hey!” Yago the seal yelled at Paz, turning to face him. “What the fuck you think you doing? You challenging me?” He had a thick, Cuban accent. Paz said nothing as he got closer. “Oh, oh, you wanna fight? Is that it? I’ll fuck you up!”

The seal then started making some weird, Bruce Lee noises. “Weeeeyaaaaw! Keeechaaaa!”

Combat Started.

The seal suddenly reared up, balancing on its tail, its little flippers waving back and forth while he made more kung fu sounds.

I watched, fascinated. I’d seen elephant seals smash into each other before, and they would beat the shit out of each other, but this was something completely different. This dude reared up much higher than it should, going completely upright, balancing solely on its back, Y-shaped flipper.

The thing did not have the anatomy for this type of fighting. The trained ones you would see doing tricks at amusement parks were usually sea lions, which had much longer flippers.

Nevertheless, this thing reared up like a giant slug and screamed. A constant stream of nonsensical kung-fu-esque noises emanated from it. It flipped to the side. It did a complete circle in the air, landing back on its flippers with a wet splotch. The movement was quick, and smooth. Oh shit, I thought.

“Eeeeyahh!” It flipped through the air just as Paz fell forward, transforming into a giant, metal shell. The seal slammed down onto the shell, hitting so hard the entire beach rocked.

An Unsteady debuff flashed and was negated as the ground rocked. Holy hell, I thought. He’d slammed down on him with enough force to crush a goddamned car. The seal flipped back, just as quickly, screaming at the round, metal form of Paz.

“Coward,” he shouted. “Fight me you metal bitch! Eiiiyaaaahhhh!”

A shield health bar had formed, and it was almost halfway down. The seal flipped sideways, pinwheeling in a circle around Paz. With each flip, the seal shrieked his own sound effects.

Donut: CARL, I’M PRETTY SURE THIS IS REALLY RACIST.

But just as Yago the seal moved to attack again, he was hit with three bolts at the same time. A full-powered magic missile, a crackling crossbow bolt, and a yellow bolt of magic. The debuff Disoriented appeared over him as he tumbled back, rolling toward me. He sat up, swaying and swearing. His health had barely gone down. He shook his head and swore again.

I, still invisible, took the opportunity to activate Talon Strike and kicked him several times in the side. Thwap, thwap, thwap. He grunted in pain. Another magic missile hit him as two more crossbow bolts stuck into his neck. Another magical bolt hit, this one a poison debuff.

His attention remained focused on Paz. His health was down to about thirty percent.

I moved to kick him again.

Oof. I was hit in the chin with his hind flippers as he flipped forward in the air, lighting quick.

“Yip! Yip! Yip!” he shouted as he flipped.

His blow on my chin had been glancing, but it had rattled my teeth. I stumbled back.

The monk seal slammed once again into Paz’s shell. The rocks all around him shattered into dust. Paz’s shield held only the smallest sliver of health.

Paz: Uh, guys?

Yago rolled to the side and started yelling some more. The seal suddenly started to glow, just as more bolts tried to slam into him. They didn’t hit. Donut cast another magic missile, and it sizzled against the new shield. It was a protection spell of some sort. The debuffs over him all went away.

Anton: My bolts aren’t getting through! This is something new. The last seal didn’t cast this spell!

Sister Ines: He’s protected himself from ranged attacks. I can’t get in, either!

Paz: I can’t move for another ten seconds!

Damnit, I thought. I shoved the flag in my mouth, and I rushed forward, forming a fist. The seal moved to slam down on Paz one last time. This would probably kill the guy. I rushed up, my gauntlet forming just as my invisibility faded.

I punched the seal right in the side of the head. He roared indignantly as he rolled away.

“Oh! Oh! Another little bitch. You gonna punch me in the face?” the seal shouted, finally moving his attention onto me. He hopped up and down a few times. He did a backflip then danced to the side. He made more kung fu noises. “Watch this!”

Fuck. I dove to the right just as he slammed down upon where I’d been standing. The damn thig was fast. Paz jumped to his feet the moment the Turtle ran out. A ridiculously huge mace formed in his hands. The thing was twice as long as he was with a diamond-shaped head the size of beer keg.

“Watch out,” he cried. He swung, and I hit the ground as the giant mace swung from behind. It slammed into the head of the recovering seal, who grunted and then fell, landing atop me.

Oof. I wheezed as the heavy, wet form slammed into me.

The seal’s health suddenly started to blink. It took me a second to realize what that meant.

“Flag,” someone shouted. It was Sister Ines. All of them, Donut included, were running up on us. Mongo’s cry screeched in the air.

I struggled to free my arm. I took the flag from my mouth, and I stabbed it right into the side of the head of the seal.

Pling! The digital noise echoed loudly through the beach.

The seal disappeared in a puff of blue smoke.

Combat Complete. Deck has been reset.

Shit, I thought. And that wasn’t even a boss battle.

I still held something in my hand.

A card.

I examined it as the others ran up.

Warning: this card is owned by Team Sister Ines. It has not yet been activated. You may not collect or trade totem cards until they have been activated. This card may only be activated by that team’s Squad Leader.

The back was the same as the utility card we’d collected earlier. The front featured a stylized, screaming version of Yago drawn in a comic book style. The seal now had a blue headband for some reason. Several symbols dotted the card, including a green 70 in the top corner, which I knew was the mob’s level. There was also a clock with a 60 and a heart with a 125. A little symbol featuring a wave of water was emblazoned on the side with a fist under it and a shield under that. A whole row of other symbols ran across the bottom of the rigid card.

T’Ghee Card. Uncommon.

Totem Card.

Yago. Monk Seal Picket Sentry.

“You wanna fight me? You sure about that?”

Level: 70.

Origin: Cuba

Summoning duration: 60 seconds.

Constitution: 125.

This is an aquatic mob.

This is a melee mob.

This is a tank mob.

Notable attacks:

Kung Fu Master.

Body slam.

Earthquake.

Deflector.

+5 additional skills and spells.

Examine in the squad details tab of your interface for full stats and skills and spells.

Warning: You have empty slots in your squad. Collecting this card will automatically activate and place this totem into your squad. You may not remove or trade squad members until your squad is full. If you wish to remove a card before your squad is full, you will have to tear the card.

We definitely wanted to get one of these guys.

“Carl, there’s another seal coming,” Donut said as I handed the card off to Sister Ines. This new seal moved rapidly across the beach, headed straight for us, shouting. As it got closer, I noted this guy was the exact same level, but this one’s name was Geraldo.

“So, you want to do it again?” I asked.