Chapter 25 - Billy the Memeslayer68because69was-taken
“Mark message as priority. Authorisation code: memeslayer68because69was-taken. Forward message to Eagle’s Nest, Rubber Ducky Lucky Guppy, Orden, Tower 5, A-G, Network. Send message.”
Scrap Heap, having successfully delivered his message, returned to his newfound friends. They were chatting amiably and gazing around the forest in the opposite direction of where he had been hiding. Mission remains uncompromised.
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Roland stood next to Rhinus, both of them trying to hide the looks of surprise on their faces by facing the part of the forest away from Scrap Heap. That clearly wasn’t any normal message. The scout had to have been using an advanced form of messaging magic to send messages of that complexity to so many recipients. That, or he was sending a single message to a relay station. Either way, the scope of the organization he was clearly working for was bothersome. Roland would have to report it to Montgomery just in case.
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Billy wandered around the area where Scrappy had killed all of the beetles, looking for any clues of their origin. His Gift was pointing him roughly south, where he thought the outpost was, but he wasn’t sure what he was supposed to be looking at. The ground seemed to have been churned up in a relatively straight line, clumps of dirt and moss ripped to shreds or thrown about along the path. He jumped as he heard a voice behind him.
“Shall we proceed with the mission?” Ah, it was just Scrappy. Billy hadn’t heard him approach after he had disappeared so suddenly.
“Yeah, I guess. Apparently they came from this way.” Billy gestured to the path of churned dirt, unsure why or how it went towards the outpost.
“Indeed. North is the most logical direction. Shall we proceed?” Scrap Heap asked.
“Of course,” Roland said.
When Rhinus accepted as well, Billy set off down the path. He wasn’t going to tell the party that they had their directions mixed. That was their problem. Well, it wasn’t really a problem at all. It wasn’t long until Scrap Heap stopped the group.
“Additional life forms detected,” he said, coming to a halt and unsheathing his two swords in a flash.
Roland fished out some vials from his bag as Rhinus stood protectively next to him, hammer raised.
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Billy, in true guide fashion, stepped out in front of the party, shield and wand raised. Then, there it was. Click. Click, click. Click, click, clack, snap.
A veritable tidal wave of beetles rushed in from the forest around them.
“Hold,” Billy yelled out.
The beetles rushed in, clamoring to reach the flesh sacks first. Scrap Heap twirled about on one side of Roland, a scimitar blender of doom. Any beetles that came remotely close were ripped to shreds in moments. Billy, for his part, sent out gouts of flame, momentarily stalling the closest beetles as they cringed away from the fire.
Just as the beetles were starting to climb over one another to get to the adventurers, Billy called out the signal.
“The signal!” He yelled.
Rhinus, having heard the signal, smashed his hammer down and conjured his aggro wall. This time, the wood from the tree roots underfoot shot up to form the glowing barrier, right in the middle of the defenders. The bugs absolutely swarmed over the wall, scraping and snapping to tear it down. There were so many beetles that they completely covered the wall in seconds.
And then it was Roland’s 6 seconds of glory. He uncorked a vial of icky green goo and sprayed it onto the wall with his Diffuse I skill. The acid tore through the beetles, but also dug into the wall. Rhinus fell to a knee as he took an influx of damage straight to his mana pool.
“Down!” Billy shouted. The wall disappeared instantly. As the beetles fell to the ground, Roland sprayed a different, inky substance onto the beetles, focusing on spreading as much as the liquid as possible onto as many monsters as possible.
The beetles, no longer taunted by the wall, surged once again toward the party. Billy bathed the hoard in a torrent of flames. The oil ignited. The beetles caught fire. They caught it with their faces. Billy started to worry as a tidal wave of flaming beetles screeched towards him. He shoved more mana into his wand as he backed away quickly. Then, beetles started burbling into disgusting puddles, one after another. Scrap Heap professionally dispatched any beetles that survived the scorched earth tactic.
“Gotta love a barbecue, babies!” Billy excitedly ran around and inspected the loot from their battle. Man, it felt good to be OP. He even found two dark gray monster cores. These were strange, as they continuously let out a soft, barely audible, ticking noise. He showed them to the others, but they let him keep them as his share of the loot.
Roland poked and prodded the puddles as they burbled away, writing his findings in his journal as he observed their properties. Rhinus didn’t overly seem to care, finding a spot to meditate to recover some mana.
Billy and Scrap Heap scouted ahead as the other two occupied themselves, figuring another wave wasn’t imminent so soon after the last. The most obvious trail brought them to a copse of trees. Not the kind that had badges and were jumpy, but the kind that huddled together closely and were made of trees. The ground around the circle of trees was absolutely massacred. Like, no need for CPR. DNR form had been signed and filed. The earth was churned and the roots were destroyed to the point that the trees were showing signs of withering.
Billy squeezed his small frame between the trees, of course. On the other side was a perfectly circular clearing in the form of a circle. It was paved with paving stones, forming a circle of pavers. In the middle of the circle was a floating three-foot tall white crystal. Billy could feel the mana from it, like electricity on his skin.
As he circled the crystal, he noticed that the crystal had a passenger. A leech? Symbiote? A small, golden scarab beetle was latched onto the bottom of the crystal. It was just… Sitting there. Then, the crystal flashed. In that flash, a beetle appeared. Billy hurriedly pointed his wand at the monster and vaporized it. It burbled into nothingness.
“Threat detected,” came Scrap Heap’s monotone voice. The scout slipped into the stone clearing, clearly searching the area for more threats.
“I think it just spawned a monster,” Billy mused.
“Threat assessment?”
“Negligible? I think. Wait.” Billy hesitated, his mind going miles an hour. The little hamster in his prefrontal cortex was paying his rent in sweat, today, boys. He reached over and touched the crystal. The feeling of electricity went from static to a multitude of static shocks, but it wasn’t overly painful. He sent mana into the crystal. Nothing happened. He sent more and more until a full half of his mana core had been drained… FLASH (not that kind). A beetle appeared, but was unceremoniously executed by Scrap Heap. Clink. Some coins fell to the stone floor.
“I think…” Billy pondered a moment. “I think we just found a money machine.”
“A training ground, at the very least,” replied the scout.