As I fell, temporarily stranded in slow motion, I stared up at the monstrosity and my brain scrambled to make sense of what exactly I was seeing. The Dweller was huge, looming three or maybe even four stories tall, its shadow stretching long over the houses spread out on the street below. It was as if someone had sculpted the colossus from the remnants of every house in the neighborhood—a grotesque patchwork of flesh and meat, the shapes of suburban homes protruding haphazardly from its writhing mass like tumors.

Shingles made of cartilage, window frames of bone, and walls that pulsed as though they had hearts buried within them.

Its blocky head towered above the grotesque structure, a malformed mass of lumpy meat and gray stone with a single enormous eye that seemed to swallow the whole world. It stared down at me, unblinking, unrelenting, its pupil like a bottomless pit. Below its eye stretched a massive, jagged gash of a mouth, wide enough to swallow a car. A mass of twisted steel protruded from the top of its distorted skull, rising into the sky like a twisted crown.

The radio tower, in all its rusted glory.

The source of the signal and the true power of the HOA.

The tower hummed, sparking faintly with arcs of blue-white electricity, and I was certain I could hear garbled voices, carried on a distant breeze. Mostly, though, I heard Pink Floyd, blaring so loud it drowned out every other sound. It was a roaring bomb blast of thumping snare and ringing high-hats, the bass line a slow march, while the guitar cut through the haze—sharp and rebellious. I couldn’t think of a better song, considering the situation.

Dweller 0.241055A – The HOA – Home Overlord Association (Blighted) [Level 55]

The HOA isn’t just a boss. It’s a system. A tyranny.

A reminder that the true horrors of life aren’t found in dungeons or darkness—they’re found in the fine print of the beige-painted abyss. The HOA is every unspoken rule, every passive-aggressive note, every soul-crushing meeting where hope goes to die. It’s apathy. It’s the monotony of your life weaponized, and physically embodied as a shambling, three-story-tall architectural monstrosity cobbled together from suburban houses and the corpses of its unfortunate members.

As in real life, the HOA doesn’t just dominate the neighborhood—it rules it with an iron fist. It broadcasts an all-encompassing psychic aura of authoritarian micromanagement that forces lesser creatures, infected by its spores, to fall in line.

You’ll try to resist, of course. Everyone does at first. But the HOA is insidious. Eventually you will comply. Coerced through exhaustion and sheer convenience. “Just follow the rules, so you can get through this,” you’ll find yourself thinking. “It’s easier if you just obey.” And then, one day, you’ll look in the mirror and realize you’ve become part of it: a cog in its perfect, sterile, despair-filled machine. And if you dare to break any of its unwritten rules, the HOA WILL know. And it will judge. Oh, how it will judge.

Remember Sunnysiders: Trust the HOA. Obey the HOA. We are always watching. Always listening. The signal never sleeps.

The HOA description was immediately followed by a second prompt. One that left a cold chill of impending doom running along my spine.

Research Achievement Unlocked!

Poke the Bear

Hey, what’s that? If it isn’t the consequences of your own actions. You poked the sleeping bear just a little too hard and now you’ve finally woken it up. If only there was some sort of folksy wisdom about not doing stuff like that. Oh, well. You’re officially in the Find Out stage and this particular bear is really mean and three-stories tall. Good luck!

Reward: I’m not going to reward this kind of raw stupidity; 2 x HOA Citation – VERY, VERY bad things are about to happen to you.

Holy shit are we fucked, I thought as I dismissed the prompts and turned away from the creature, refocusing on the approaching ground. This thing wasn’t just a regular, run of the mill Overseer—hell, this thing wasn’t even like Funtime Frank, lord of the Jungle Jamboree. This creature was a minor deity ripped from the pages of myth and legend. Not only was it enormous, it was Level 55 and Blighted.

Even with all the new levels I’d gained, I wasn’t even in the same league as this monster.

Not even close.

There was no conceivable way we could beat the HOA. It was too big. Impossibly powerful. What we needed to do was turn around and retreat for the store as fast as our feet would carry us—except we couldn’t do that, either. Croc was lying on the asphalt, twenty feet below. Ed and I were simultaneously careening toward a similar fate, while Jakob and Temp were inside the torso of the monstrous creature with the disruptor, which was the only thing keeping the rest of the Sunnysiders from tearing us limb from limb.

To complicate things further, the disruptor needed someone to man it or the entire thing would shut down and stop working.

Every option was bad.

Knowing that, I began to cobble together a rough plan.

I had seconds left before Neural Slip Stream ended, and I needed to make every single one of ’em count. First, I pulled out the green plastic parachute figurine I’d picked up from the derelict Loot Arcade. The one-time-use Artifact would let whoever used it negate fall damage. As a noncorporeal Spectral Thought, I didn’t need to personally worry about falling—since I was resistant to all forms of damage—but Ed had no such protections.

This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

I could always try to pluck the Delver from the air using telekinesis, but I didn’t want to risk something going wrong, plus I needed to get to Croc. The mimic was my number one priority. So, I pulled my arm back and fastballed the green parachute man right at Ed, hoping he was smart enough to put two and two together. Then, I put Ed from my mind, angled my body, and propelled myself toward Croc like a human cannonball using Psychic Sovereignty.

Moving at six times normal speed, I closed the distance in the span of an eyeblink and slammed unceremoniously into the ground, landing in a crouch.

I turned and rushed to Croc’s side just as Neural Slip Stream lapsed, and the world lurched back into normal speed. Up above, there was a sudden whoosh of movement, and I caught sight of Ed floating to the ground on a ghostly green parachute while the HOA Kaiju continued to rage. I ignored both Ed and the colossal monstrosity, focusing on Croc instead. Its hind legs were twisted and mangled, but Croc’s health bar was still above a quarter and the dog’s chest was rising and falling in a steady pattern.

Thank the good lord for small miracles.

A group of listless Sunnysiders were drawing closer to us, and I needed a little more time. They were probably more or less harmless, since the signal was jammed, but I didn’t want to take any risks.

I pulled free my Super Slammer of Shielding and dropped it against the asphalt with a muttered, “Let’s Pog.” A golden bird cage of pure energy encircled us, insulating us against the encroaching Sunnysiders. In theory, the metaphysical barrier would protect us from most forms of physical, arcane, or elemental attack—though I doubted it would do much good against the HOA, if it decided to take any direct action against us. It was better than nothing, however, and Croc was injured enough that I wasn’t sure spell cards alone would do the trick.

I pulled a Greater Healing Zimma from storage, popped the cap with one thumb, then forced the bottle between the dog’s lips. It only took a few seconds before Croc’s eyes shot open and a ragged gasp escaped from its mouth. The mimic’s body shuddered and convulsed as its legs twisted and popped back into proper alignment. The sound was nauseating, but the halting, hopeful flutter of Croc’s tail made it all worthwhile.

“Oh Fiddlesticks,” the dog said groggily, slowly gaining its feet as it shook its head. “Did anyone get the license plate on that bus that sideswiped me? I think that’s how the saying goes, right Dan? I’ve never seen a bus in real life, but I’ve read about them. Even saw a picture in a book once.”

“You nailed it, bud,” I replied, feeling a tense knot loosen inside my chest. So long as Croc was okay, then everything would be okay. “How are you feeling?” I asked seriously, trying my best to ignore the chaos and carnage unfolding all around us. It was tough to do.

Without guidance from the signal, the Sunnysiders were losing their collective shit and several knock-down, drag-out brawls had already erupted all across the street and adjacent lawns. Ed and Woodstock had landed amongst the chaos, and the Delver was busy battling his way clear of a pair of Kathy’s who’d cornered him near a garage.

“Just another day in the Backrooms, Dan,” Croc said weakly. “This is just a scratch, honest. I’m pretty sure Ponypuff’s done worse to me, and I’m good as new now.” The dog waggled its bottom to showcase the functionality of its rear legs. But the dog’s cheerful wiggles quickly subsided as it stole a look at the rampaging HOA kaiju. The creature didn’t seem to be targeting anyone in particular. Instead, was shaking its whole body and smashing through houses with reckless abandon, stomping anything unlucky enough to be stuck under foot.

“What’s it doing, Dan?” Croc asked, sounding confused.

“I’m pretty sure its trying to dislodge Big Bertha,” I replied. “That and get rid of our friends. Ed told me the disruptor will shut the Pulse Nexus down for good, but that it’ll take some time. Twenty minutes, at least. Could be as long as half an hour. Problem is, we need someone up there to operate Ed’s stupid machine and the only one who knows how it works is Ed, who is down here with us—”

I froze as an idea suddenly occurred to me.

I pulled out my Etheric Walkie Talkie and thumbed the button, praying this would work—which was in no way certain, considering how much radio interference there was.

“Temp, Jakob, come in over. How are you guys doing in there?” I sent, my voice filled with unspoken desperation.

There was a long, silent pause and for a moment I feared the worst.

Then the radio crackled, and Jakob answered, “We are alive but dealing with a few issues at the moment. The creature seems hellbent on voiding us from its bowels and it’s dispatched some strange sort of Dwellers to handle us. Pasty white creatures called ‘Zoning Leukocytes’—effectively, giant white blood cells. They are quite numerous, though Temperance’s disease abilities seem especially effective.”

“Copy that,” I sent, my mind whirling. I pursed my lips into a thin line. “Hang tight for as long as you can. I’ve got an idea, but I need a few minutes to get set up.”

“What are we going to do, Dan?” Croc asked, and I could feel the panic underlying the words. On some level, Croc believed this was the end for us and it wasn’t hard to understand why. Croc had lived a long time and had seen hundreds of Delvers come and go over the years. Though the mimic tried to stay positive and upbeat, the truth was, almost all those Delvers had died in a variety of genuinely horrifying ways. Croc had finally found people who cared and now the mimic was on the verge of losing all of us.

Of losing everything we’d worked so hard to build.

There was no way we could beat this thing. Not a chance in hell. It was just too big, too powerful. But maybe we didn’t need to. If Ed was right, we just needed to buy enough time for the disruptor to do its work and fry the HOA.

The fact that Ed was down here and not up with the Disruptor was a… wrinkle was one way to put it. Giant nightmare pain in the ass was another. Getting back inside the monster would be tricky, maybe even impossible, but thanks to the magic of the Walkies, it was possible that Ed could talk Jakob through the disruptor’s run sequence. Just like ground control guiding a passenger through the process of landing a plane. Jakob was smart so I was sure he could figure it out, assuming that Temperance and my two Taxidermied Horrors could keep the Zoning Leukocytes at bay.

That could prove to be tricky, but there was a way we might be able to help on that front.

We needed the HOA spending all of its attention on us and not the Delvers screwing around inside its belly. We needed to make ourselves into the bigger threat.

And as that idea clicked into place, I knew exactly what we needed to do.

“Do you know how to drive, Croc?” I asked the dog, feeling the faintest flicker of hope.

“What, like the golf carts?” Croc asked, cocking one ear in curiosity. “Because I did spend a little time playing with the golf cart.”

“Similar, but bigger,” I said, nodding.

“I mean, I understand it in principle, sure,” Croc replied, sounding uncertain. “But to be perfectly, one-hundred percent clear, I’ve never actually done it, done it. Like on my own. It probably isn’t that hard, though, right?”

“That’s the attitude,” I said patting the dog on the back.

I glanced up at the bloody red moon hanging huge and ominous above us. Having Croc drive was a terrible idea, but for my plan to work there was no other way. Ed was going to have to relay instructions about working the disruptor to Jakob and there was no way he could do that racing through the hostile suburbs. As for me, I couldn’t be behind the wheel, because I was going to be busy serving as the distraction.

This was a terrible idea. Easily one of the worst I’d ever had. Given the circumstances, however, it was also the only plan that had even a hope of working. Resolved, I reluctantly summoned my newest Taxidermied Horror…