We? Jaid looked up at the rim of the crater and saw a pair of honey eyes staring down—another member she thankfully didn’t recognize.
“Don’t bother being friendly with them, Dice,” the woman called down to her partner and then jumped down next to him. “They’re CP slime, and they don’t need our help. In fact, they’re our rivals that we shouldn’t have saved in the first place.”
“Sorry about Egawo,” Dicatta was a bit more friendly. “She’s not really a big fan of authority after, well you probably heard about the Power Station if you’re in the CP. Oh, and you must be Jaid then! I’ve heard a lot about you.” He held out his hand for a shake but she left it hanging.
“Oh hello new friends!” Dura rushed over and wrapped his arms around both of them in one big hug. “Thank you for saving my ears and my blood! I don’t think I met either of you at Fiendcon. I am Dura, the Maddening Monk. How are—”
“Are you here on a job?” Jaid asked before he could start rambling endlessly.
“Nothing official,” Dice confirmed. “We were just nearby and heard the screaming. Probably killed a hundred or so monsters already on the way here as we tried to find the source, right Egg?” The woman nodded to him but then right back turning up her nose at the others.
“Well, this area has been officially sanctioned by the CP for investigation,” she tried to explain. “I doubt Drim would want you guys interfering with government business, so it might be for the best if you head out. Though we’d be fine with, and I’m sure the civilians would appreciate it if you made sure there’s no monsters left within the blockade.”
“Hmph, this traitor thinks she can tell us our business.” That really pissed off Egawo and she strutted over to Jaid, getting right up in her face and making her voice more prominent and piercing. “Yeah, we have heard a lot about you. So don't act like you know what’s best for us when you’re the one causing the most problems.”
“Hey, it’s fine,” Dicatta tried to mediate. “I’m sure the past is in the past. And no one really talks about her like she’s an enemy. Hey, in fact, maybe we should team up. We’re going to stick around and help out either way, so wouldn’t it be best for us all to work together?”
“Uhh, I don’t know—” Jaid started but was quickly cut off.
“Hell no, I’m not working with her,” Egawo outright refused. She then went over and started to noogie her fists into Dicatta’s head for suggesting it. “We should just call Tize here, and then I can blast this whole place clear.”
That was a name Jaid hadn’t been expecting to hear, and one she could have gone the rest of her life without hearing again. The idea of being forced to deal with or work alongside him in any capacity caused her anxiety to swell, so instead, she caved and suggested, “I think the five of us will be fine. Sure, let’s work together and we’ll get through this quickly.”
“We are on orders, though, to try and uncover the history and secrets of this place, so try not to damage or destroy anything further if you would. And if there’s any humans left alive, leave them to Dura to capture. We’ll take them in for questioning.”
“Fine, but we’re taking pictures of any evidence,” Egawo stared her down and then insisted, “And you get to lead the way, Mrs. Prude.” She gestured her hand to the void of darkness that appeared to be the only hallway out of the room.
Jaid did as asked, which she would have done anyways as leader of their own group. What she didn’t expect though was a light buzzing against the flat of her back. A small pocket had been added to the pouch that held her sword so that she could carry her phone with her more easily on missions. She’d received a text from Izma asking if she should count the two other Fiends as allies for her Curse.
『For now』 Jaid texted back.
It actually didn’t take them long to find someone thanks to Egawo boosting the volume of any human breathing in the area. But that person… it was hard to say they were a person anymore. They had been eaten alive, most of their body missing. It seemed they’d desperately hooked themselves up to some machine that was keeping them breathing, but they themselves were no longer conscious or responsive; a living corpse.
They decided it best to let the person die out of mercy—a morbid start to their joint endeavor. Since she didn’t know what kinds of monsters were around, it was hard for the Fiend to tune into any of their frequencies, but Egawo did generally boost the sound of movement and scratches. While staying alert, the group made their way towards the only other sound of breathing far away from them in the facility.
One room at a time, they searched through everything. While they knew the general direction of the breaths, they couldn’t really tell how far and how to get there. However, it didn’t sound too pained or panicked—just a reasonable amount of terrified that didn’t appear to be in immediate mortal peril.
“Woah, look at all these drawings for new monsters!” Dura brought over some blueprints to one of Izma’s spotlights. “Crazy that they’re actually trying to come up with new ones when nature already has so many. Hey, isn’t this the one that Jaid squished earlier?” After rifling through several pages, he held up a diagram of the Garden Cleel, or as they called it, Experiment CLAME-4521X16. Didn’t quite roll off the tongue.
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At least that explained why Jaid had never seen that monster before. Since she no longer worked for the living Monsterpedia, the knight had taken it upon herself to research them, not wanting to be caught off-guard when leading troops. She just had to make sure to not look at the contributor who wrote basically every bestiary entry, lest she wanted to be annoyed.
“There’s something in this room,” Izma suddenly alerted the group, two of her braids extending to stop them in their tracks.
“Does she have like scanners or something?” Dice asked them, but they could only shrug, not really knowing the inner workings of the coffin since neither of them had ever actually seen inside of it.
“There definitely is something,” Egawo backed up the claim, boasting the ambient volume of the room, trying to pick up the odd breathing rhythm and heartbeat that was somewhere nearby. But she must have boosted it a bit too much, because they were all nearly knocked off their feet again by a loud booming croak.
“Look up everyone! There is danger above!” Dura called out as he flung his scroll over at Dicatta. It covered him just barely in time to block the massive tongue from walloping the boy in the face. Izma angled one of her spotlights towards the ceiling, and while they couldn’t get quite a good look at it, Jaid decided to fire upon it with a bolt of lightning.
Even though the electricity didn’t seem to do much damage against the hard carapace, it was enough to startle the monster and cause it to fall to the floor with a resounding thud, kicking up dust and sending papers flying. Izma acted immediately, trying to wrap her braids around the monster and restrain it. Dura was still reeling his scroll back, but once he had it in hand, he attempted to do the same.
But before they could get much headway, the monster’s body rolled up into a ball and it sped away. That gave the Fiends just a moment to breathe and get their bearings before the monster spun around and charged back at them. At least the knight had enough time to figure out what it was, since it was actually a previously recorded monster. And its flailing, rapidly spinning tongue was a dead giveaway.
It was called a Roly-Toady, a cross between a toad and a roly-poly. They curled up in their carapace and rolled around but left their tongues hanging out. These would act like whirling whips that would bash anything in their path, and proved very dangerous and deadly.
Jaid rushed to the front of the group and made a wedge of clones to divert the attack. When the monster bounced off her wall of swords, one of the clones tried to slice off its tongue. However, despite her blade being one of the sharpest things in the world, her eyes jumped wide in surprise when the extra-tough and rubbery tongue wrapped around the blade and then springed right off.
If even her sword couldn’t cut it, just about no other conventional weapon could. But fortunately, Fiends weren’t conventional weapons, and Dice stepped forward. “I can kill it!” he claimed with certainty. “I just need it to sit still for a moment so I can properly do the calculations!”
“Alright prude girl, let’s corral it!” Egawo barked the order to Jaid. She amplified the noise in the surrounding hallways to annoying and aggravating levels so that the monster wouldn’t try to flee. Somehow, the Roly-Toady seemed to have figured out that she was the source of its new headache and targeted her next.
When the beast got close, Egawo slapped one hand across the other in the monster’s direction, and massively boosted the volume to the point that it was violent, sending it out in a wave in front of her as an attack. This sent the Roly-Toady speeding into a u-turn, but it still managed to wham the tip of its tongue into her stomach.
The attack barely scraped her, only causing her to scoot back about a foot on her heels. And she looked down at her shirt, surprised that it remained perfectly undamaged. “Don’t worry, new friends!” Dura called out with two thumbs up and a huge grin. “When I hugged you earlier, I made your clothes indestructible! They may not save your life, but they will block most harm now!”
Jaid would have to make sure he reverted that later, since it was considered a proprietary technique of the Central Peace. But she knew how useful it really was, her own combat outfit saved countless times thanks to Dura, so it was fine if the clothes remained resistant for now.
Once the monster got away from the walls, the knight started to encircle it until she managed to form a complete ring. But there was still too much room for the monster to zoom around in, so she began taking steps forward, removing clones as needed to tighten the circle a bit at a time.
It wasn’t a fast process, since sections of the circle had to focus on defending at the same time, but they were easily able to fend off the strength thanks to the boost from Izma. And also benefiting from that boost was Dice. He wasn’t directly in the defensive ring, since that would leave him exposed, but a clone was keeping him close, making him walk along with them.
It wasn’t quite the same level of benefit as he’d get from Tize, but the boost still let him focus more, zeroing in on the cuts he’d need to make. As the Roly-Toady lost its momentum, confined to a smaller place, he got closer and closer to completing the needed calculations.
Eventually, the monster gave up on trying to roll around like a wheel. Instead, it laid flat on its side and began whirling its tongue around like a helicopter blade, whacking all the clones at once. But it made no headway, just bouncing its fleshy whip around, ricocheting from sword to sword, probably doing more damage to itself with the recoil.
Because of this new tactic, Dice was able to finish up the scan and the monster suddenly exploded into dozens of pieces. This included the tip of the tongue which still carried the momentum of the Rolly-Toady’s attack, plinked off the barrier of blades, and then ricocheted around the room, forcing the Fiends to duck and cover. Except for Dura, who welcomed the flesh-ball with open arms, then cheered like a zoneball goalie when he caught it.
It was a shame that the tongue would degrade and dissolve, or else Jaid would almost be tempted to make some armor padding out of it, due to its springiness and shear resistance. Not that her current set needed it, since it was plenty comfortable and had Dura’s added durability. But who knew if she’d always have it or needed a change. Maybe she could convince their scientists to look into it.
But with that monster out of the way, the hodgepodge group of Fiends continued their search for the source of the breathing. It didn’t take them too long since there were no more monster ambushes, but that didn’t mean they weren’t attacked.