I awoke upside down. The sensation was immediately disorienting, and I almost threw up—threw down?—my flapjack breakfast on the spot. Luckily, I held it in, and a moment later my vision settled.
The pool lay below me—or above me. Whatever—and something was keeping me pinned against the back wall by my paws. I twisted about, and saw it was a length of some grayish rope, with a consistency that reminded me of seaweed. It didn’t look particularly strong, but refused to give no matter how much I tugged.
A burbling hiss to my lower—upper!—right drew my attention. The mermanta lounged a few feet away, laying on its side as pups crawled all over it. At first, I thought it was nursing them, only to realize the truth as a few pups slipped off and rolled about on the floor.
The mermanta was feeding them, alright. From the body of a human.
At least, the butchered corpse had probably once been human. Their skin hung off them in ragged strips, and only the general shape told me what they might have been in life. As I watched, one of the pups grabbed a flesh strip and tore it away, chewing it happily.
Another nearby pup began to shake. It waddled a short distance from the others before seizing up and collapsing. A sheen of white webbing covered the creature’s body for the briefest of seconds as it jerked and grew longer, bulkier. The webbing fell away, and in the pup’s place lay a full-sized and fully grown mermanta.
Right. Instant evolution. That hardly seemed fair.
This new second mermanta hissed at the first, then flopped its way across the room. Before the door had slammed behind it, I was already twisting to gnaw at my bindings. No way I was going to be next on the pup feeding menu.
My teeth proved insufficient to cut through the bonds, but a quick Claw Slash managed the job just fine. I fell to the ground with a yip, losing whatever element of surprise I might otherwise have possessed.
Then I rolled over and found myself face-to-face with a half-dozen pups.
While the mermanta pups were less than half my size, a full six of them gave me pause. Enough of a pause for one to charge towards me. Instinctually, I hit it with one of my stun beams, locking the monster in place. The others hissed and drew back.
I knew that wouldn’t last. Already I could see the other pups breaking away from their parent, dropping chunks of dripping human to turn their attention towards the much more alive prey. Me. If I was going to put a stop to this before I got overwhelmed, I needed to act fast.
My Claw Slash wasn’t ready yet, but I still leapt at the next nearest pup, paws first. I’d been hoping to tear it up a bit, maybe even knock the monster senseless and let me continue on to the next.
I had not expected it to explode.
It was less popping balloon, and more a smashed-watermelon-on-the-sidewalk kind of explosion. The pup let out a watery cry as my paws impacted its skull, then sort of deflated, it’s face growing oddly wide as I pressed it between me and the floor. Foul-smelling liquid burst everywhere, coating my legs, my belly, my chin. I could feel the monster’s skin shredding beneath my toes.
What the heck. How had I managed to do that so easily? While the other pups cowered together and their parent began lumbering to its feet, I mentally swiped away the kill notification and stared at the dead monster beneath me.
Was it... because of my improved Power? I hadn’t really noticed any difference after raising it to Eighteen, but then again, the only monster I’d come in direct contact with since was the Rat King.
These pups were obviously much weaker. The only question was—how weak?
I intended to find out.
The stunned pup had recovered from my attack. It turned toward me just in time to take a hind leg to the face. Just like its sibling, the monster crumpled inward before it exploded in a wave of watery goo.
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You have defeated: Mermanta Pup (Basic) — Level 3
0 XP and 1 Common Core awarded.
My tail wagged. Oh yeah.
The adult mermanta let out a hiss of rage and anger that cut off as my stun froze it in place. I leapt forward, landing on two pups simultaneously, bursting them like a pair of overripe cantaloupe.
The other mermanta immediately scattered. Most didn’t get far.
I leapt from one to the next, crushing them beneath me. My vision filled with kill notifications faster than I could mentally dismiss them. The cement floor was slick with monster blood and I slipped and slid even as I pounced from one victim to the next.
A hissing object flying past my ear was my only warning. I turned and saw that the adult mermanta was no longer stunned. It raised its hand towards me and launched another dart directly at my face.
I activated my bracelet and immediately felt myself being hurled by the scruff of my neck backwards. My hasty retreat ended over open water. I fell in with a splash.
Water immediately coursed down my throat.
Gack! This stuff tasted even worse than I’d suspected. I thrashed about for a moment, trying to get my head above the surface. Sadly, my doggy-paddle has never been my strongest feature.
Still, I finally got myself righted, just in time to see the mermanta looming over the spectral version of me, staring at it curiously. The pups jumped about at its ankles, constantly trying to sink their tiny teeth into my non-corporeal form. It seemed they had been caught up by the illusion hook, line, and sinker.
Yes, that’s a fish pun. No, I’m not proud of it.
I turned and started swimming. If I recalled correctly, I only received ten seconds of invisibility from successfully using the bracelet. How much of that had I wasted thrashing about? With the goblins, they hadn’t lived long enough for the invisibility to matter, but now I suspected I’d need every second of it.
I resolved to raise up the level of my bracelet the moment I was away from here. A few extra seconds would have been appreciated right about now.
Before I made it halfway to the pool steps, I heard a splash behind me, followed by several more. I didn’t dare slow to look back, just kept kicking my legs as hard as I could. Something splashed into the water by my head—another dart. Dogdangit, as if I didn’t have enough troubles!
No time for regrets, only doggy paddling. The steps were five feet or so away. Four. Three.
Something latched onto my foot, sinking its teeth in deep. I yipped, thrashed and got maybe another foot closer before a mermanta pup bit into my other foot.
Suddenly, I was barely able to tread water. As much as my enhanced Power had aided me earlier, my diminished Speed was working against me now. It was all I could do to keep my head above the water, let alone make it the last few feet to the steps.
In desperation, I fired off a pair of stun shots behind me. One missed, but the second must have clipped one of the pups clinging to me, as teeth suddenly relaxed enough to pull my foot free.
I kicked again, heaving myself towards the bottom step. Before I got there, my front paws touched the bottom of the pool. Of course, murky as the water was, I’d forgotten the level was down.
Pain wracked my right hind leg as I dragged myself the rest of the way into the shallows. I lifted my leg and saw one of the pups latched onto my foot like an enormous leech. Kicking backwards, I smashed the monster between my toes and the wall of the pool.
You have defeated: Mermanta Pup (Basic) — Level 2
0 XP and 1 Common Core awarded.
More pups emerged from the water. I ignored them and looked further, searching for their parent. The mermanta still stood at the other end of the pool, a good thirty feet away, watching me. It started to raise its hand.
Before it could, I fired off another stun shot. I was climbing the steps and out of the pool before I even confirmed the hit. My claws scraped against the rough cement as I raced the clock around the pool’s rim, trying to reach the mermanta before fifteen seconds elapsed.
The mermanta blinked a weird, vertical blink. Its dart fired at nothing. I leapt.
My jaws found the mermanta’s throat and sank deep. The mermanta scrabbled at me, tearing chunks of fur away with its sharp claws, but I didn’t let go. I pressed down harder with my teeth, and the monster’s attacks grew weaker. It collapsed backwards, dragging me along with it.
I didn’t release my hold on its throat until I saw the kill confirmation.
You have defeated: Mermanta (Advanced) — Level 7
200 XP and 1 Common Core awarded.
Turning, I hacked and spat until the foul taste was out of my mouth. Blood ran down a few gouges in my back and my hind legs ached something fierce, but overall, I’d come away from this fight relatively unscathed. Now just the small matter of finishing off the pups—
The sound of a slamming door echoed through the room, reverberating off the water. I looked up to see the second adult mermanta standing at the other end of the pool, staring at me dumbly. One clawed hand still rested on the closed door.
My tail started to wag. My bracelet had one stun shot left, and Claw Slash was finally off cooldown.
I charged.