The group had voted on setting up camp for the night on the verge next to the toll booths. From what each of them could remember—provided the System hadn't done too much geographical fiddling—the exit road for Lichfield was just a little further up the motorway, and from there, it would be a reasonably direct yomp to the Cathedral. All things being equal, as far as they could reckon such things, they were probably no more than three hours away from completing their Quest.
Nevertheless, after the pounding the second team had just taken at the hands of the elite troll, the general consensus was that a good night's sleep - and an opportunity for Health and Mana Pools to refill - was infinitely preferable to braving the rest of the journey in the dark. Although she wasn't sharing her private theory with the others, Lorelei suspected it wouldn't make any difference to their eta if they had chosen to press on this evening. No matter how fast - nor, she thought, how slowly - they travelled, she felt they were fated to arrive at their destination just as the Doom Clock countdown they could each see in the corner of their vision reached a critical point.
She'd tried to run her suspicions by her Guide, but it was still maintaining a studied silence since the confluence of lucky outcomes that had brought about the end of her most recent battle.
Thus, as the others milled about, doing their best to avoid staring at someone who—from their point of view—had just delivered the sort of improbable, solo destruction more usually seen in Liam Neeson movies, Lorelei resummoned the open Quest.
*** Quest Awarded *** Save the cheerleaders, save the world
Objective: Get your new best friends somewhere safe.
Quest Description: Well, who would have thought it? One moment, you were running around, punching kobolds to death with your bare hands, and the next, you are suddenly the grizzled, reluctant saviour of a small group of helpless, gormless innocents. Don't times change? We'll keep this one nice and simple. Lead your faithful companions to the sanctuary of Lichfield Cathedral. They'll be safe there. Promise.
1/3. Take no more than 49% casualties: Look, see how generous I'm being? I'm not even saying you have to keep all these fuckers alive. Collateral damage is entirely acceptable; I might even say desirable. Just get most of these guys through the Cathedral doors, and I'll be happy. And there are Zombies in the group! Those little darlings are pretty much invincible. What's not to like?
2/3. Take no longer than two days to reach your destination: It's helpful to have some sort of jeopardy, isn't it? To tell the truth, I have some spare Doom Clock animations I wasn't properly able to roll out during the run for the Safe Zones, and I'd like the chance to make use of them. When time runs out, something suitably epic will happen, so don't test me on this, okay?
3/3. Defeat the Chimera: You'd expect nothing else, would you? When you reach the Cathedral, there will be an appropriately difficult creature to defeat. For the sake of clarity, I want you to understand that this is a Party Quest. As in, you need to do it in a group. I don't usually have to make this so clear at the start of an integration, but then some dozy fucker soloed a Kobold Guardian by mistake.
Rewards: I'll come up with some sort of snazzy title for you. You love your titles, don't you? Oh, and I'll also gear up whichever of this motley crew makes it through alive. What's that? Still not sold? Okay, well, depending on how you do, I'll give you access to some of the XP I took off from your most recent kills. How much is entirely at my discretion.
Lorelei knew that the others had picked up some version of this Quest—Steffan had said it was called Follow this lunatic, and half of you will die—which had given the group somewhat of a Sophie's Choice about the whole thing. She wasn't sure whether any of their little road trip survivors were feeling too optimistic about the whole thing anymore. Having little else to do - the others had insisted she 'take a break' - Lorelei looked at each of the Quest parts in turn, trying to get a sense of how tomorrow was likely to play out.
Starting at the bottom, she couldn't help but give a little mental shrug at the idea of them taking down another party boss. Sure, she had no doubt that the Chimera was going to be testing, but they'd all received this Quest just after their panicked escape from the slaughter at the Amber Zone. Since then, they'd each added quite a few Levels, and from the constant snark from her Guide, she figured more than they were really supposed to have done. That little Level 40 farce with the Graffiti Imps and the Urban Shadow had pretty much power-levelled them up too. Then, defeating the Toll-Booth Trolls had pushed everyone up another tick, and - although no one was bragging too hard - there were lots of pretty smug faces when post-battle notifications were looked over.
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Of course, it obviously wasn't beyond the System to cheat and give whatever the fuck was guarding the entrance to the Cathedral a massive power-up to match all their shiny new Levels, but worrying about that wasn't going to make any difference to the outcome, was it? They were either going to arrive and bitch-slap an underpowered Boss around, or the System would have responded and artificially boosted it to be a challenge and they were no worse off than they were when they started.
After everything she'd been through since the integration had begun, that hardly raised a 'meh' on her internal give-a-fuck-ometre.
In much the same manner, Lorelei suspected that the second part of the Quest—take no longer than two days to reach your destination—would prove to be a MacGuffin. She hadn't exactly run the numbers, but their progress to Lichfield was obviously being artificially slowed down in order to provide appropriate drama. Had he been less jumpy around her right now, she might have asked Steffan to work it all out, but in the end, what did it matter? The System obviously wanted them to rock up outside Lichfield Cathedral just as their Doom Clock was entering the final countdown.
Not for the first time, Lorelei found herself questioning the motivations of the super galactic entity behind Earth's integration. For all the talk of peace, love, and supportive altruism in the formal messages they had received, the System's actions seemed far more directed towards bringing them into conflict than partnership. She might not be entirely sure she wanted to be 'Team Fortuna', but she shared her patron's ambivalence about what was taking place here. Even this Quest - a classic Escort Mission - was more about manufactured peril than it was about making sure everyone survived.
And that led her to the bit of the Quest, which caused her some worry.
Take no more than 49% casualties. Lorelei had been blithely assuming this was going to work out okay. Not counting herself, ten of them had started the Quest, and they'd only lost the two Red Shirt Mages. Pete, Hild, Michael and Michelle, Kris, Zorrobar, Steffan and Chrissy were all still in one piece - even if the fight with the elite troll had made that a little wobbly for a while.
So, she was batting 80%, right?
But that's where her worry was settling in. The title of the Quest - Save the cheerleaders, save the world - might just have been the System riffing off a TV Show with almost one good season. However, the description of the first part of the Quest explicitly mentioned Steffan's Zombie Cheerleader's being pretty much 'invincible' as making this stage a bit of walkover. So, coupled with the Quest title, it seemed like the System was counting his zombie army as part of the group.
Lorelei redid her maths. If they'd started off as nineteen - ten humans and nine zombies - and were down to eight . . .
There was a pause.
***Help Message***
Oh, by all the Lords of the Sky, I can't watch your face struggle with this anymore. It looks like you are taking a particularly traumatic shit. 42%. It's 42%. Eight over nineteen is 0.42. What the fuck went wrong with the education system on this planet?
"Welcome back," Lorelei said, letting the insult slide.
***Help Message***
I'm not 'back'; my spidey senses just kicked in that some gormless shaved ape was struggling with basic arithmetic, and I had to act. With great power comes great responsibility, you know? And now I've helped you crack that particular primary school maths problem . . .
"Just a minute. Can I check something with you? I honestly need your help here. And you're the only person who might know the answer. Please, I will be ever so grateful."
***Oddly Affected by your Flagrant Efforts to Flatter Message***
Go on.
"If the Zombies count as part of the group, why haven't we failed the first part of the Quest?"
***Wishing I'd Trusted my Instincts and Fucked Off Message***
Think about it, honey-pie. This Quest was constructed when the group you were in had a Necromancer and his zombies as part of it. What possible reason could there be that, despite dropping to a 42% survival rate, you haven't yet failed the test? I mean, it's a tricky one. I'm not sure how you are possibly going to be able to figure it out. I'll even throw you an extra clue. Your current group survival percentage is not 42%. It's 47%. So close, and yet so far.
Lorelei looked over at the skittering form of Steffan's Shadowweaver Arachnis.
***Bingo***
Lorelei nodded slightly. That made sense. The group might have lost the cheerleaders, but Steffan could use his powers to replace them.
"So, we need one more team member to be over the threshold? And can I presume that if we arrive at the Cathedral at under 51%, that will be an automatic fail?" Lorelei paused. "And, obviously, now I've realised this, you are going to fix it so there are no more encounters between now and then for us to pick up any slain enemies to boost the numbers, aren't you?"
Silence.
Lorelei hadn't expected an answer, and - to be honest - the lack of one was all she needed to confirm her way of thinking. They were destined to reach Lichfield Cathedral just in time tomorrow. The Chimera would be an easy wipe, or it wouldn't. And, most importantly, if they didn't do something this evening to get back over the 51% threshold, they'd fail the Quest the moment they arrived.
Lorelei took a breath and stood, the others becoming instantly wary as she did so. Seriously, they were treating her like some sort of superhero. She hoped it was more Man of Steel than Homelander, but provided it kept Hild from ragging on her anymore, she'd take it either way.
"Steffan!" she called.
The Necromancer pretty much fell over himself reaching her side, his spider not far behind. "Yes?"
"We find ourselves having a little mathematical difficulty, and it appears you might be the only one who can help."