Serenity wasn’t the only one covered in blood, but Kerr and Sillon were both also otherwise unhurt beyond some strained muscles that Blaze took care of; he didn’t want them to be hurting if something else was attracted by the commotion and smell of blood.
The spear disappeared moments after Kerr took her hands off it. She frowned, but didn’t say anything. Serenity assumed that meant there was some sort of downside to the Skill, but he was too polite to ask.
It was clearly some sort of a Skill; a good one, whether it was simply automatically storing the weapon so it couldn’t be used or actually manifesting a temporary weapon that couldn’t be taken away from her. It had to be a Tier Four Skill if it were a manifestation, and given how absolutely perfect it was for the fight. A weapon manifestation Skill that good might well have a significant downside, though it could well be as simple as a high Stamina and Mana cost to manifest or not being able to use the Skill for a long period of time afterwards without risking damaging it.
The second option was unusual but seemed more likely with Kerr’s reaction to the weapon’s disappearance, so Serenity knew he couldn’t count on Kerr coming up with exactly the right weapon at the right time again any time soon.
Serenity conjured as much water as he could manage quickly to rinse some of the blood off of the three melee combatants. It was still cold and they couldn’t take the time to actually get clean, but a quick rinse would help. “Are we all ready?”
“Yeah,” Blaze answered without waiting for anyone else. “We need to get away from here before anything else comes to see what happened.”
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They weren’t lucky enough to get away without any other monsters appearing, but they were fortunate that no people showed up - at least, not openly. Serenity knew it was entirely possible that there were people hiding in the rubble, trying to make their lives work.
As cruel as he knew the thought was, Serenity didn’t care about them unless they made themselves obvious. They weren’t a threat; they weren’t likely to talk to anyone in authority about anything they saw. If they were still living in a destroyed area, the priests didn’t care about them and they knew it.
The monsters that did appear were mostly what Serenity would have classed as scavengers if they were animals: monsters that were cautious and careful, attacking only when they were certain they had the advantage and perfectly willing to drive another monster off a kill to eat it themselves. They were less common in dungeons, but where they existed they tended to be among the most difficult to eradicate after a dungeon break. Only monsters that could increase in numbers outside the dungeon, such as the undead in the Dead Swamp and whatever demon outbreak led to the situation around Mornmot, were worse.
The dead swamp might eventually be manageable, but it should have been handled far earlier. Mornmot had been forever changed; getting rid of the demons would be as difficult as any native species eradication effort.
The first scavengers were cautious about the six-person group; they seemed to know that despite the blood scent, it was from a kill rather than an injury. The earliest group was small furred creatures Serenity couldn’t identify; they were clearly a pack animal. Serenity was only able to be certain about twelve of them, but he suspected there were more like twenty. They watched for a while, then one found the blood trail leading back the way the group came from and squeaked out a call that brought all of the others after it. They disappeared along the trail, clearly heading towards the dead boar.
Shortly after that, Serenity started seeing glimpses of movement, but it always stilled when he turned to look. It was enough to make him paranoid, but not enough to stop them. They started keeping to areas with more sturdy and semi-intact rubble as much as possible, so that they couldn’t be attacked from all sides at once.
The attack, when it came, was unexpected: nothing had been moving on the overhang before they got to it. The first thing Serenity noticed was something flying at him. It was fast, but Serenity was on edge and he was also fast; the snake had the advantage of surprise and coiled muscles, but that wasn’t quite enough and the giant python actually missed Serenity. Its teeth closed on air as he dodged, only able to get far enough to be out of its mouth.
The side of the python’s head smacked against Serenity’s shoulder as he reached for his ax, but everyone else was just as on edge as he was. The first attack in response was a flaming bolt that scorched the snake’s nose and mouth while glancing off Serenity’s armor-self’s scales. It hit even before the python’s tail slapped Serenity and tried to wrap around him. The rest of the attacks weren’t far behind, and by the time Serenity managed to get his ax ready, the snake was already dead.
Blaze insisted on checking Serenity, even though he knew Serenity’s healing was positively incredible. He seemed surprised that there was no damage from his firebolt; as he explained, he’d reacted without thinking and thrown a stronger attack than he usually used.
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Serenity told him not to worry about it. If he could heal from the godfire of even a weak Sun deity, he didn’t think Blaze’s fire would cause lasting issues.
Blaze simply stared at Serenity for a moment after that.
There were already large rats eating the dead snake before they were more than twenty feet past it. Serenity had to wonder if they were actually monsters from a dungeon break or not; while they might well be from an animal dungeon like the snake, it was also entirely possible that they lived in the city normally and had simply emerged to take advantage of the new bounty.
There was only one more attack on the way to their target, when a small flock of six oversized sparrows large enough to cooperatively carry a person aimed for Kerr, who was bringing up the rear. The first one managed a clean hit on her head, but fortunately missed her eye. She yelled and dropped to the ground, then kicked up at the bird she’d just wrenched herself away from.
Sillon turned quickly and stabbed the attacker with his sword. The hit was clean; the sparrow didn’t seem to understand what had just happened to it. The other sparrows scattered, leaving the group to recover their composure after the sudden attack.
“That’s why you always wear head protection.” Sillon tapped the mail coif that formed the outer layer of his headgear. “Birds aren’t the only thing that’ll attack you by surprise; if you don’t know it’s coming, you can’t get out of the way.” He leaned over and offered Kerr a hand.
Kerr accepted; once she was on her feet, she punched Sillon in the shoulder without saying anything.
He chuckled. “I probably deserve that.”
Serenity grinned. “No one likes people who say I told you so.” Sillon had, after all, told everyone they should wear something on their heads before they left, but he and Blaze were the only ones who did.
Serenity would have been willing, but they couldn’t find anything that would both fit his head and not make his horns even more obvious. Ita was in a similar situation, with nothing that would fit available, but her head already had some protection in the form of a chitin outer layer. Ekari had made the point that she had to be dressed in a priest’s formal wear for the plan, which didn’t include armor.
That left Kerr as the only one who was really a target for Sillon’s recommendation. She felt singled out and wasn’t at all happy about it. It was clear she hadn’t gotten over it enough to let him tease her about it when she was attacked, but she also didn’t seem particularly upset after Sillon took her punch without complaint.
Blaze spent several minutes healing the damage to Kerr’s scalp. She tried to tell him to take care of it later, but he wasn’t about to let her get away with that. “Be glad it didn’t get your eye. Healing eyes is difficult; I can heal this now, but you wouldn’t have an eye again for days at a minimum and it might be a few days after that before I can get it adjusted properly for good vision. Eyes are tricky.”
Serenity knew enough about healing to know that the fact that Blaze could replace a destroyed eye at all was impressive. Most healers couldn’t; of those that could, a fair number weren’t skilled enough to actually give the eye good vision. It had something to do with shape and something to do with pressure, but Serenity couldn’t remember the details.
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It was only about five minutes’ walk from there to their destination: a building that still stood essentially intact, several times larger than any of the surrounding buildings.
Once upon a time, it was probably impressive. Below the damage, Serenity could see that it was made of large marble stones, fitted together without the aid of mortar. The entrance was marble as well; it probably shone brightly in sunlight. It was built to the same plan as the other Eternal Churches Serenity had seen, even if the material was different, but the material had a significant impact.
That impact was severely altered by the scratches, chips, burn marks, and general damage the exterior of the structure had suffered over the past few months. It now looked less “stately and impressive” and more “sadly damaged”. None of the damage looked like it was deliberately aimed at the building; instead, it looked like the incidental results of combat.
Ekari cleared her throat. “How do I look? Is there anything I need to fix?” She slowly turned around, giving everyone a chance to check her outfit.
It was a plain black robe without any obvious trim, but at the edges it was possible to see the deep burgundy of the clothing she wore under the robe. It didn’t match any priestly attire Serenity had yet seen on Lyka, but Rourke had assured them all that it was the perfect outfit for the role they were going to play: investigators. He’d pulled Ekari away for some specific instructions on how to act.
While the others checked Ekari’s attire, Serenity opened his Rift and removed five black outer coats. They’d decided not to wear them on the way over; one black robe wasn’t too obvious, but an entire group in black, including someone most people would identify as an attack animal, was very obvious. Ekari had too many layers in her outfit to easily change, but that wasn’t true for the rest of them.
Rourke had explained it without going into much detail, but apparently the plain black robe over red inner clothing was the mark of a Priest-Investigator, while the black outer coat meant that the person wearing it was only temporarily assigned to his group. Rourke hadn’t ever openly stated that he was the head of the Priest-Investigators, but from context it was easy enough to conclude that he was at least high ranking in the group.
The real flag came when he said that they didn’t need to worry about Ekari being unmasked, because she was already listed as holding the rank she needed. With the black coats, no one else needed to be added to the list.