Hunt

Fitting with my expectations, the cafeteria was filled with loitering toughs and mooks of all sorts. Most of them appeared to be human (if with more wildly varying heights and colour palettes than you’d see back home), but more than a few were completely and obviously inhuman. I saw a group of reptilian humanoids with scales the colour of rust huddled in a particularly dimly lit corner that seemed to be discussing the finer points of different oils for their knives, occasionally pulling different blades and vials from their rugged looking brown cloaks. My gaze drifted over a hulking humanoid crocodile eating what appeared to be an entire roast pig, a creature that appeared to be little more than a cloud of smoke in a cloak similar to mine that lurked around one of the fire pits and seemed to drink in the smoke wafting out from then, and that writhing mass of maggots in a dress I had seen during my initiation that set the flies under my skin into an agitated fervor.

I decided to stay far away from that last one, given I could feel my stomach literally churning from the angry maggots within.

This was far from the first time I had seen any of these creatures here, nor even the first time I had Observed them, yet it was the first time I was required to actually interact with any of them. What little Observe told me about them hardly made me any more inclined towards them, though even if it told me they ate clouds and shat rainbows I wouldn’t be any more trusting of them. Most of them had titles that came in various shades of “Burnpike Thug” and inoffensive main traits of little concern; mostly different flavours of drug addictions, a few had some minor martial trait, and only a small number of them had some vaguely noteworthy titles denoting mildly remarkable martial achievement or particular sadism.

Given the consequence of the last time I trusted Observe were currently buzzing through the air around me, I was rather disinclined to take it at its word.

My eyes flicked over the vaguely humanoid mass of squirming maggots, Observing them out of a combination of instinct and habit as I walked into the center of the room. I read over their information as I cleared my throat, preparing to be at the center of a large and dangerous group’s attention; a place I'd generally prefer to be very far away from, if given a choice.

Name: Moralyne Dryss

Race: Humbaba

Main Title: The Worm Witch

Level: 37

HP: 25703/25703

MP: 2023/2137

SP: 200/200

Main Trait: Whisperer In The Swarm: Her voice reaches all things that scuttle and writhe, forcing them to listen and obey should their will prove less than hers. Her presence is impossible to locate amidst a swarm of flying insects or squirming larvae.

While her main Trait sent a wave of shuddering maggots down my spine, I was more concerned with her abnormal arrangement of stats, especially her Health and Stamina. Her Stamina was not just low but an even two hundred, which by itself stood out as odd and out of place given what I’d see of others, but put next to her (by comparison) absurdly high health and (plausibly, my sample size wasn’t large enough yet to get a proper average, if such a thing could even be said to exist here) above average mana and it painted a very strange picture. I also noticed that she subtly moved further away from me when I entered the room, though she hadn't so much as glanced in my direction (although, given her nature, I supposed it might be hard to tell where she was and wasn't looking). My eyes didn't quite narrow, nor did I overtly stare at the vaguely feminine mass of maggots; I simply marked her down as a potentially high threat of unknown capability, and moved on… for now.

I reached the center of the room without anyone overtly paying attention, though I did note a few who glanced at me or angled their heads such that I could be seen in their peripherals; I approved of the caution, though I wasn't familiar enough with this nation's culture to recognize if this was a form of disrespect or not. Regardless, I cleared my throat as noticeably as I was able before speaking as loudly as I could without outright shouting, "Alright gentlemen, the Boss wants me to lead a bunch of you to search an alley."

People turned to look at me, murmuring amongst themselves but mostly with only mild interest. For a moment, I hesitated to explain the exact reason the alley needed to be searched; I wasn't entirely sure Markus wanted the rank and file to know we might be heading into a full blown war. I quickly realized that I didn't care if Markus wanted to keep this quiet, especially considering that spreading the idea that a war might be coming could very well increase the odds of such a conflict actually coming to fruition. A gang war would be a lovely opportunity to get back at Markus for his painfully “warm” welcome but even if he didn’t wind up dead or vulnerable, a small-scale war like this would provide plenty of opportunities to get experience… though I was rather concerned about exactly how dangerous such a conflict would be.

"A lieutenant of the Eight Points Gang was discovered operating on our territory, and we are being sent to go investigate what he was up to and try to find the bastard." The mildly interested murmurs exploded into outraged shouting. The previously neutral crowd erupted into an angry mob, disparate voices screaming over each other to voice increasingly extreme calls for violence and retaliation. I waited a moment, watching the crowd seeth before raising my hands, "Indeed, we’ll make those bastards pay for daring to step foot on our territory; but first, we need to find them and figure out what they were trying to do lest we fall into some sort of trap."

I could see a few were less than enthused at the prospect of being denied instant gratification, but most simply nodded along. One of the rust coloured lizards spoke up, "Aye, the bastards could be tryin' to trick us into striking "first" so they can get support from the other gangs."

I nodded as several people voiced agreement and anger over the "cowardly" potential tactic. "Alright, anyone with sharp senses and the willingness to dig through a burnt out build to find something that might hurt these bastards, follow me." I got far more volunteers than I probably needed (or Markus intended) but I didn't care, having more meat shields is only ever a good thing.

I heard (and to an extent, watched through Paranoia) as a large percentage of the crowd followed after me, forming a wrathful wake of armed and angry gang members trailing behind me. Most of them were probably more than capable of walking faster than me given my body was shorter than the average thug's legs, but nonetheless they matched my pace with ease that could only come from training. A small part of me found it amusing to make larger creatures move at my pace, though I dismissed the thought out of hand; I had little interest in the pale imitation of true power such pageantry offered.

The glowing eyed gatekeeper laughed as he saw my posse approaching, "I's be guessing you's got ah reason fer gatherin' dis here mob?"

I smiled as politely as my jagged maw could manage, taking some pleasure at the filthy creatures' visible discomfort with the flies crawling between my teeth. "Markus has ordered me to gather some men and search the last known location of one Olixander Merthoux."

The motion was nearly buried beneath the creature's oily rags, but my Paranoia caught its eyebrow rising. "Dat's quite tha claim. Fort-for- luckily, I don' party-qul-airily care why you's be comin' and goin' so long as it's not bringin' no trouble to da gang. Yous lot keeps ya knives in ya panties and don't go startin' no fires and we's not be havin' no problems." The shit eating grin on the little gremlin's face as he met my eyes at the mention of starting fires let me know he was very much aware of my last outing's results. The fact that he shouldn't have had any way of knowing that was me unsettled me slightly, but I shrugged it off and slotted it into my worryingly expansive list of "future problems I can't do anything about currently". Though I was very tempted to murder him, I decided getting away with it at present was unlikely.

My left eye twitched slightly before I swallowed the annoyance the slimy cretin evoked in me. If I allowed myself to be fair, some incredulity was to be expected if he hadn't been informed, which I wouldn't expect him to be. Deciding that getting into a verbal sparring match with the little garbage homunculus wasn't worth the effort, I merely grunted and walked past him.

It took significantly more effort to ignore his gurgling laughter as he skittered out of my small horde's path.

I stood outside the building for a moment, gazing at the dilapidated buildings around us for a moment while maintaining a stern expression; I didn't want the mooks to realize I was desperately trying to dredge up where exactly that damn collapsed building was. I hadn't exactly taken down an address while I was sprinting away and I didn't entirely remember the exact route I had taken to get here from there, but a quick scan of the grainy grey skyline made it far easier to get a general sense. It's not hard to guess where I need to go when I can see the massive cloud of smoke pouring into the sky.

I gestured for the men to follow me as I confidently strode towards a random alleyway leading vaguely in the right direction, paying slight attention to their mutterings in case they turned mutinous or expressed confusion at my directions (these people had lived here likely all of their lives, they would doubtlessly know more about how to navigate than me). I heard more than a few men quietly question our path as I led them through the labyrinthine streets and alleys, but I managed to find the correct collapsed building before anyone got riled up enough to make their concerns known.

Fortunately, despite wandering not quite randomly through the city, the only people we saw were the occasional wastrel with a needle in their veins and no thought behind their eyes. I kept an eye on them anyway, just in case they were acting as spies or simply suffered from a bout of suicidal overconfidence and aggression addicts often seem to have, but none of them moved from their mouldering hovels. A large part of me wanted to kill them all just in case (and for the experience they'd give), but given none of the gangsters following me seemed upset at their presence I figured they were likely our customer base.

The building was actually rather less difficult to spot than I had expected, most collapsed and smoldering buildings look rather similar but it very quickly became clear we had found the right place when we found a man impaled on a spike and burnt to a crisp. He was piked just outside the wreckage of what I could tell was a formerly rather tall building, surrounded by a small puddle of no longer fully melted fat mixed with ash and blood. The man's face had evidently been cut off and nailed to the ashen remains of the door, though after the fire it was little more than an unrecognizable lump of burnt meat.

I frowned at the sight, noting whoever had done this used a broken off pipe to impale the victim rather than the wooden poles the Burnpikes seemed to prefer. "Well, I'm guessing we didn't do this; it looks too sloppy and ad hoc." I didn't turn my head, using my Paranoia to see the men around me nodding as mutters of agreement met my ears. "So this is definitely a set up, and a sloppy one at that. If I had to bet, I'd say it's very likely this guy was a member of a third gang planted here to piss them off." My frown grew more pronounced, "Which would only work if they were tipped off to come here, so we either got here first or there are some very hostile scouts in that building." I was finding it very hard to keep from grinning as I took in the situation.

This was very obviously a trap, and I knew damn well leading my men in there was likely going to end in a catastrophe. I affixed a form scowl on my face even as my eyes glittered with malice, "Destroy everything. Search that wreck from top to bottom and make sure every fucking speck of planted evidence is destroyed before it ever sees the light of day. If you find trespassing outsiders in there, then make sure they never leave and don't report back to their boss. What their higher ups don't know, won't hurt us."

I chuckled maliciously alongside the thugs around me, knowing full well I was leading them to their deaths. Why would I want to stop such a lovely disaster?