“Look, we’ve got a skull emblem, there’s a skull on the sign, it’s common sense, man.” I said.

Shelby made a face, “yeah, but the rest spot looks less dangerous.” We were standing at the intersection of Cloverdale and Taylor, not a real intersection, but that was far from the weirdest thing that we saw today. Cloverdale had a little skull on its sign, and Taylor had three small “z”s on it.

“It’s not a rest stop, it’s just saying that Taylor’s so boring you’re going to fall asleep.”

Shelby side-eyed me, “you don't know that.”

“You don't know that I know that.”

“You don't.” He said.

“You don't know that.”

“Don't I?”

“Do you?”

“No…” he admitted.

“Exactly.” I said, and stepped onto Cloverdale.

“Wait, fuck… whatever, okay.” Shelby said and followed me. Immediately, the Dark Souls smoke wall formed behind us. I heard an unpleasant bubbling, and looked around for the source.

“Those breakfast burritos catching up with you?” I asked Shelby. He looked at his stomach ostentatiously and shook his head.

“Nah, I got an iron stomach,” he said. That was true, I watched him chug a half gallon of milk and immediately run a quarter mile without vomiting. I don't remember why he did it, I think we were drunk.

“Then what's that bubbling sound, you hear that?” I asked.

“I dunno, probably that goop.” He said, pointing to a puddle of black ooze that was pooling out of the gutter grates in front of us.

“Ew, gross.” I said, and started speed-walking down the street.

“Chris, uh, they’re doing something. Uh, Chris?” Shelby called from behind me.

“Let’s not fuck with it, dude, it’s like those sewer gators from New York,” I called over my shoulder. I looked back ahead to see more Dark Souls fog in front of me, “shit, nevermind.” I said and turned around.

Shelby was flanked by two roughly humanoid figures, both a little shorter than him, made of the thick, viscous sewer ooze glistening almost purple in the light. Each had a single, large eye, about the size of a volleyball; one had it in its head, the other had its eye secured in its stomach. The name plates above their heads identified them as Level 2 Tar Elementals.

“Remain calm,” I said, running back to my friend, “we have to remain calm, Shelby.” Shelby swung at the cyclops tar monster with the short sword we took from Klesper, but it just got stuck in the thing’s torso.

Vesper Blade - Rare Magic Sword

Forged by the long gone Vesper family of assassins, members of splinter and cadet branches now vie for possession of these coveted blades.

* +2 Dexterity

* +2 Charisma

* +1 Strength

* Weapon Ability [Yawn]

* Weapon Ability [Bad Dream]

“Shit, fuck!” Shelby shouted, struggling to pull the sword out of the ooze. The cyclops tar elemental swung his arm at Shelby, pulling him closer into the ooze. A purple splat icon appeared over Shelby’s health bar and his health started ticking down slowly.

“You’re not staying calm!” I screamed.

“Why are you yelling at me?” Shelby pleaded, a little bit of tar pouring into his mouth.

“Oh, sorry, Scooby-Doo 2.” I explained, stopping in my tracks a couple yards away from Shelby and the monsters. The elemental with the tummy-eye started lumbering toward me, leaving puddles of tar in his tracks.

“What?” Shelby asked, incredulously.

“Fuckin, uh, tar monster. Scooby and Shaggy. You know what, it’s not important.” I said, dodging tummy-eye and pulling out one of Klesper’s black knives.

Pitch Dagger - Uncommon Magic Dagger

A common part of any assassin’s toolkit, these daggers are popular for their [Red Siphon] ability, draining a target's HP and converting it to MP and SP.

* +2 Dexterity

* +1 Wisdom

* Weapon Ability [Red Siphon]

* Weapon Ability [Bad Dream]

I only got the stat boost once, even though I had two, but beggars can’t be choosers, right? Wrong! I was pissed.

The cyclops monster was fully around Shelby’s right leg and arm, and they were currently locked in a stalemate. He was trying to poke the monster in the eye and while avoiding the rest of its body, and neither were making any ground.

“Shelby, duck!” I shouted. He went limp, leaning backwards and even pulling a little bit of his body out of the tar, leaving the elemental’s big stupid eyeball exposed. I threw the pitch dagger straight into the eyeball, right into it’s fucking pupil.

Shelby started screaming, probably due to the body horror unfolding right next to him. Black tar spurted out of the eye as it slowly deflated. The elemental reached up and pulled the dagger out of its eye, accelerating the deflation, and absorbed the knife into its body, wailing in pain the whole way through.

Even though the knife was stuck in its body, I still received the benefit from [Red Siphon], my SP ticking back to full as the cyclops monster slowly died. The hold it had on Shelby weakened as its health depleted, and soon enough, he was free. The first tar monster was almost just a puddle on the ground, our weapons sitting gently in the middle.

Before I got a chance to celebrate, tummy-eye grabbed my torso from behind.

“Oh fuck off,” I said, the purple splat now on my health bar.

Status Effect: Tarred (Indefinite Duration)

* Take 1 damage per second.

* Movement is slowed by 33%

I pulled out my Grass Blade and my other Pitch Dagger and activated [Flurry of Blows], making quick work of the eyeball pressed up behind my back. Tummy-eye groaned loudly and let go of me, quickly reduced to another puddle.

Even though Shelby was pretty useless in that fight- it’s okay, we still love him-, he shared the XP I received due to him being in my party. We were about halfway to level three.

He walked up and smacked me in the face.

“I needed that,” I said.

He smacked me again, “I needed that too.”

Shelby hit me a third time.

“You’re pushing your luck, Shelb,” I said.

Unauthorized reproduction: this story has been taken without approval. Report sightings.

“Scooby-Doo 2,” he said, nodding, “next time I’m choosing the route.”

I rubbed my face, “the tar guys weren’t that bad.”

“Says you, you’ve got like, ten knives. I have a sword.” He said, crossing his arms.

“I have three? Do you want one of my knives?”

“... Yes.”

“Yeah, sure, fine, that’s cool,” I said and handed him the Grass Blade.

“Dope, thanks,” he said and dematerialized it into his inventory.

“Hey, where is everyone?” He asked as we meandered down the street. We both needed to wait a bit for our health to fully regenerate, so we had to kill some time.

“I don’t know, it’s been super quiet.” I said. One by one, we knocked on all of the doors that we passed by, and got no response. None of the houses had any lights on, either. We tried peering in through windows, but found no signs of life.

“Shit, Chris,” Shelby said, going pale. He was looking into the garage of the ugliest house I’ve ever seen. The garage was big, front, and center, pushing the rest of the house back, and there was a single lopsided window cutting into the brick molding on the lower half of the wall. The roof looked, like, automatically generated from the geometry of the house, forming some weird edges. It was a mess and I hated it. I reluctantly approached the window and looked in, cupping my eyes to keep out the glare. Can you tell that I’m stalling? I’m stalling.

The garage housed what at one point was an old Volvo, but was now unrecognizable had it not been for the logo badge lying on the floor of the garage. A thick, willow-y tree had sprouted from the engine, the hood and the rest of the paneling had been twisted and fundamentally changed. Instead of steel, the car was covered in a rigid, fleshy-looking material. The engine-tree seemed to have ripped the hood off the top of the car, revealing two mangled corpses in the front seat. Their arms were twisted like corkscrews at the elbow, forearms caught in the branches of the trees. A hole has opened up in each of their faces, black voids that seemed to go deeper than the back of their heads.

I stumbled backwards and fell down. Out of instinct, I pulled my stuffed rainbow trout, Alfredo, out of my inventory and clutched him to my chest.

“H-holy fuck, what the fuck?” I asked.

Tears were welling up in Shelby’s eyes, “what did that?” I couldn't find the words. Shelby shook me, “Chris, what the fuck did this? What's gonna happen to us? Chris!”

“I don't fucking know!” I snapped. Shelby recoiled and wiped his nose. “Fuck,” I said, “I'm sorry.” I offered him Alfredo, but he didn’t take him.

“It's okay,” he said and stood up. He helped me to my feet, “this is the weakest we'll ever be again. We have to keep leveling up and stop whatever did this.” He sounded more confident with every word.

“You're right, fuck.” I scrubbed my face, “we gotta go, man, I don't wanna find out what did this right now. Maybe not ever.”

“Who's gonna stop it if we don't? As far as we know, we're the only ones here left alive.”

“What about Evan?” I asked, “he was in that bubble.”

“A bubble's not gonna protect him from that thing.”

“Don't say that, man, Evan’s gonna be fine,” I said.

“I hope so, but we gotta be ready for the worst.” He gestured toward the garage, “because that shit is the worst.”

I nodded, “we gotta start grinding.”

“Let's make sure this never happens again.”

The Dark Souls smoke wall dissolved, revealing our next options: Bell Street and Grant Street, at a Y- intersection, or fork in the road, I guess.

“The illusion of choice…” Shelby remarked, both Bell and Grant had a little skull on their sign.

“What do you think it means?” He asked.

“The skulls? I dunno, probably just, like, a regular ass monster. The tar elementals were chill.”

“Seems legit. Where do you wanna go?”

I looked back and forth between the two streets, “I dunno, your choice.”

Somewhere beyond Grant Street, storm clouds quickly gathered in the sky. Thunder boomed loudly, twice in the same spot.

“That way.” Shelby pointed down Grant. I gave him a weary look.

“Eye of the storm, baby, eye of the storm.”

“That's not the fucking eye!” I protested, but he was already a couple steps onto Grant. Just like last time, the monsters spawned immediately as we turned onto the street.

There was a white panel van parked in the middle of the road. It was surrounded by a swarm of toddler-sized, bowling-pin shaped birds with stubby chicken legs and penguin-like flippers. They were an inky black, with spots of white on their backs, with similarly white heads. Their beaks varied from bird to bird, ranging from short and tiny to big, hooked, and jagged. The Level One Suburbs Goonlets squawked angrily as we approached, and about half rushed towards us, the others staying behind to break into the van.

Shelby looked at me, eyebrow quirked, “goonlets?”

“Ew,” I said, and kicked the nearest one in the head, sending it flying. The goonlets were weak and fragile, a great opportunity to test out our new weapons. Their main, and really only, attack was to throw themselves beak-first at you, dealing negligible damage. Shelby's shortsword killed most in one hit, and the ones he didn't kill would bleed out as they slept.

[Yawn]

Weapon Ability

Attacks made with this weapon have a 50% chance (adjusted by target's Wisdom) to inflict a stack of Drowsy for 30 seconds.

Status Effect: Drowsy (30 seconds)

* Stacking: When stacks of Drowsy equal the target’s level, they fall asleep.

* All stacks of Drowsy are negated when the target takes damage.

[Bad Dream]

Weapon Ability

Attacks made with this weapon have a 20% chance (adjusted by wielder's Intelligence) to avoid removing Drowsy from the target.

The goonlets biggest strength was their numbers, but chaining my [Red Siphon] and [Flurry of Blows] allowed me to keep up well enough. Shelby, though, turned that advantage against them. He eventually gave up the sword, finding it too awkward to bend down and swipe at them, and just picked two goonlets up by their chicken legs and swung them around.

A throng of goonlets had formed around Shelby, though immediately as one got within swinging range of him, it would turn tail and flee, only to get squashed against the outer group of goonlets trying to get in. I circled the throng, corralling and encouraging the goonlets with my dual knives. What resulted was a slow, blunt-force meat grinder, combining Shelby’s might and my speed with the horrific power of a terrified and enraged crowd.

Shelby swung a battered goonlet over his head and slammed it down onto the last surviving bird thing, crushing its tiny body. We both stood there, covered in blood and sweat, catching our breaths, until Shelby gave me a thumbs up, exhaustion on his face. The van shook violently, reminding us that it was there.

We hit Level 3, though, so we decided to check out what we got before fucking with the van. Pugilist gave me a point in Strength, a 5% bonus to blocking efficiency, and a 10% damage bonus when I was using a Knuckle-type weapon, like brass knuckles. I also got a point in Charisma from leveling up. Shelby got a point in Charisma too, and Fighter Level 3 gave him a point in Strength, a 10% bonus to health regeneration, and a 10% damage bonus when using swords. Not a sexy level for either of us, but it would help keep us from dying.

Satisfied, Shelby unlatched the back doors of the van, and they were immediately flung open, knocking him on his ass. I gaped in awe as a massive, glowing green butterfly crawled out of the back of the van. Its wings, undulating in the air like a lava lamp, slowly unfurled, and then flapped powerfully, showering us in a glittery dust as it flew away.

Effect: Blessing of the Nebulatail (30 Minute Duration) Added

* +50% Magic Damage Resistance

* +50% SP Recovery Rate

* +50% MP Recovery Rate

* +1 Luck [Permanent]

Achievement Unlocked: Gentle Creature

Gain a Boon or Blessing from a Mythical Beast.

Reward: Job Unlocked: 027 - Tamer

“Thank you, space butterfly.” Shelby said, a tear running down his cheek, still on the ground.

“What the fuck… it’s beautiful…” I said as Shelby got up.

“Do you think that fucked up the car?” Shelby asked.

“No,” I said, “no way, it’s too…” I struggled to find the word.

“Majestic?” Shelby suggested.

“Pure, good, ethereal, something like that,” I said. We looked up at its shape, growing smaller and smaller as it ascended into the stratosphere, until another thunderclap broke us out of our stupor.

The next streets we could go down were Nicholas and Hawes. Hawes had another three “Z”s on it, and Nicholas had a big red skull with horns on its sign. Shelby and I looked at each other.

“That’s scary,” I said. Shelby nodded, and then pointed down Nicholas Street.

“That’s where the storm is,” he said. Hawes was bright and cheery, straight ahead of us. Nicholas was dark and gloomy, to either side of us, making Hawes look, I don’t know, biblical in comparison.

“We don’t have to go,” I said.

“We don’t, but we are. I think the only reason it’s stormy is that the enemy’s already spawned, which means someone is either dead or needs our help,” he said.

“Are you sure?” I asked.

“Yeah, I think so. The storm just kinda happened, right? Just like how the goonlets and the van just showed up,” he pointed out.

“Fuck, I think you’re right,” I said, “what kinda idiot would get into a fight with a big, red, horned skull monster?”

“Evan.” Shelby said.

I nodded reluctantly and painfully, “Evan."