“Sofiane, we’ve wasted an entire week here. We need to make a run for it. ” Shuixing said.

By now, Shui had recovered from the worst of her drug-induced weakness and graduated to anxiously pacing the dungeon and rattling off theories to Sofiane who could not understand a word of them. For the past several days she had become even more frantic to leave while Sofiane argued it was too risky.

“I know, Shui, but if we get dimension-jumped, that’s it. Everyone’s dead. They already got Pechorin, and Natsuko and Daisy aren’t coming. We’re all that’s left. And for all we know Baphomet’s cult might get mopped up any day now. I just don't think it’s worth the risk,” he replied.

“We don’t have the time to wait! We go now or we wait to die,” Shui said, glaring at him through the bent and cracked frames of her glasses.

Anxious though she'd been, her new vehemence surprised Sofiane. Something had changed overnight and since that morning Shuixing had grown more and more stubborn and agitated, and this time she really meant to go, with or without him. She was reminding him of a certain red-headed gremlin.

Sofi grabbed Shui’s arm as she marched towards the dungeon entrance. “Wait! Shui, please—”

Two steel-blue eyes stabbed back at him and he realized there was no changing her mind.

He exhaled and let go. “Let’s at least think of a plan. We might make it past the Non-Heroes, but if Baphomet catches us, we’re dead. Let’s at least be smart about this."

Shui’s gaze softened and she nodded. The plan they came up with was not great, but it was better than nothing. First, they would try to find a couple isolated Non-Heroes. Next, they would sneak up and knock them out without dealing HP damage so they could steal their clothes and FDJ rods. Then, disguised as one of Baphomet’s followers, they would sneak back into the Mage’s College, find Shuixing’s compounds, and book it to Deco Imperia.

The first part went off without a hitch. After searching fruitlessly for days, the Non-Heroes they stalked were more focused on their conversation than picking through the bushes lining the gravel road. Once two patrolling Non-Heroes passed them, Sofiane stood up to go bang their heads together. Before he could, Shui yanked him back down.

“What!?” Sofiane whispered.

“Listen to their conversation,” Shuixing replied.

Listening, Sofiane realized they were talking about how they had “hit” another Hero, though the way they were talking, “they” probably referred to Baphomet’s entire cult. Sofiane checked his Use-Rankings and discovered the total count had decreased by two; the first decrease since Pechorin had been jumped. He immediately checked on Gomiko and the rest of Team Harald, but all of them appeared safe.

“It wasn’t Natsu or Daisy,” Shuixing whispered.

Talking it over, they deduced Shuixing’s ranking had changed by two and his by one, suggesting the two Heroes they'd force dimension-jumped were above and below Rank #106. That was no small feat. Pechorin’s death could be chalked up to a freak accident, but there would be no way to disguise two more. If the Yishang hadn’t already informed the other Heroes of this new “special event,” they would figure it out soon.

“Well, it means Baphomet's days are numbered,” Sofiane said. Out of sheer curiosity, he checked Baphomet’s ranking. He was sitting at around #50. Still pretty powerful, but anyone above Rank 40 could wipe the floor with him.

“Maybe,” Shuixing said. “But it also means that any Hero that wants an FDJ weapon can get one.”

Sofiane swallowed. He hadn’t thought that far ahead yet. His focus was on getting Shuixing safely back to her lab, and since that was the next step…

Masking his own footsteps behind the two Non-Heroes they were stalking, Sofiane got close enough to bop the first Non-Hero in the back of the head with a large stick and when the other turned around to see why their partner had fallen face-first in the gravel, Sofiane cued up the stick like he was playing billiards and nailed the other across the jaw. Both lying unconscious on the ground, he motioned for Shuixing to help him drag them into the bushes, confiscating their FDJ rods along the way. When the adrenaline wore off, Shuixing pursed her lips and looked down at the bodies.

“Erm…”

“Yeah, I see the issue,” Sofiane replied.

That being the two Non-Heroes they had snuck up on were big, burly Bolters in purple overalls. Neither Sofiane nor Shuixing could be described as either big or burly. Sofiane held up one of the overalls which was taller than him.

“Do we wanna try and ambush some smaller Non-Heroes?” he asked.

Shuixing shook her head. “Not enough time. This will have to do.”

Though skeptical, Sofiane put his legs through the pant holes and did his best to ignore the damp patches of sweat. Once worn, the bib of the overalls went almost to his neck while the legs puddled around his ankles like the train of a dress, even with the steel-toed boots sliding around on his feet. Least convincing of all was the hair he'd grown out over the past two years that refused to stay tucked under a flat cap. He looked over at Shuixing who was equally unconvincing.

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“We look like we’re playing dress-up,” Sofiane said, flapping the ends of his sleeves.

Shuixing exhaled in frustration. Their disguises weren’t going to be much use if they were caught immediately. At that point it was better to go in abilities blazing. At least then they wouldn’t trip on shoes eight sizes too big.

“Hey, look! The grooves lead off the path," said a voice.

The voice came from the other side of the bushes. Another downside of big, burly victims was that they made big, burly tracks when you dragged them through gravel. Nonetheless, Sofiane had a grin on his face, because the voice was feminine with a Cascadian accent, meaning they and whoever they were with were Cascadian anti-royalists. A perfect match for a disguise. Sofiane pressed Shui’s head down and the two lay in wait for the unsuspecting Non-Heroes to investigate the bushes.

“Should we check it out?” asked another voice.

“Gods no! If some of us got attacked we’ll probably get attacked too. Let’s go find higher-ups and get them to investigate,” said the first voice, gravel crunching as they walked away.

“Gods-dammit, you idiots,” Sofiane mumbled.

The gravel crunching stopped.

“Did you hear that?” said one.

“The person saying “gods-dammit, you idiots”? Yeah.”

“We’re for sure not looking now. Let’s go tell The Prophet.”

Not wanting to lose his chance, Sofiane jumped through the bushes to where the wooden barrel of an arquebus was waiting for him. With a split-second reaction, he pulled his newly-stolen FDJ rod up to deflect it and it connected with the barrel's jagged tip and sent his weapon—once again—through the ground.

Sofiane stared at his empty hands. “Why does this keep happening!?”

Ready to greet him were three women. Two were, as he suspected, Cascadian anti-royalists wearing red-white-and-blue dresses with frilly aprons and red liberty caps. Both were armed with their usual arquebuses, except the tips had been filed into the telltale bumps of a force dimension-jump surface. The last of the three was a dark-skinned woman with white hair wearing some kind of spandex jumpsuit with added straps and spikes and tubes. Most likely a member of the Entropic Axis from that new moon region that Sofiane didn’t care about.

“Halt! Surrender in the name of The Prophet and you will be given a fair trial!” said the moon villain lady.

Sofiane raised his hands over his head. “Okay, I surrender.”

The three women blinked, not really expecting a Hero to give themselves up that easily. But as they figured out what to do next, Shuixing came up behind them and went down the line bopping them on the top of the head with the smooth part of her rod. The first two, the anti-royalists, dropped like a sack of potatoes. The last of them, the woman from the moon, raised her own hands in surrender.

“Wait! Let’s work something out!”

Shuixing shared a look with Sofiane who shrugged. He didn’t really know what they were supposed to do with a prisoner. Instead of knocking her out, Shui kept the rod’s tip pressed to the woman’s back as a threat.

“I have information. I’ll tell you anything you want to know," the villainess said with no particular emphasis.

“Okay, two questions right out the gate,” Sofiane said. “Who are you, and why do we care what you have to say?”

The woman cleared her throat and in the tone of delivering a speech said, “my name is Chaos General Vidorgia, feared nemesis of Mooncom and scourge of Selenia!”

Sofiane squinted in confusion. “What the fuck is Mooncom?”

“Mooncom is— oh, you’re a nobody Hero,” Vidorgia said, her oratory voice dropping to one of mild annoyance.

“Nobody? It’s not like we know who the hell you are either,” Sofiane replied.

Vidorgia checked her spiky indigo nails. “No, but only because you haven’t—or, sorry, can’t—make it to Selenia. I assure you the top-ranked Heroes know me quite well.”

“Aren’t you part of Baphomet’s cult?” Shuixing asked. “Aren’t all Heroes your enemies? Who cares who's high or low-ranked.”

“Yes, well—” Vidorgia tossed her platinum hair. “A villain is only as memorable as her adversaries.”

“You don’t seem very important if you got beat by two nobodies," Sofiane replied with a smirk.

Vidorgia flushed. “You know very well the dynamics change when dimension-jumping is added to the equation! I have stats you know. I am intended to be the final boss of Selenia. In a fair fight I could kill you both with a flick of the wrist.”

The smirk dropped off Sofiane’s face. That part wasn’t bluster. If Vidorgia really was the final fight for the newest region, that meant the Yishang had summoned her to be a challenge for the top Heroes. Vidorgia picked up the smirk he dropped.

“Oh? Are the Heroes reconsidering their superiority complexes?” she asked.

Sofiane rubbed his forehead. “No, my superiority complex is too well-established. Anyway, listen, Baphomet has been feeding you bullshit about the—”

Vidorgia rolled her eyes. “Yes. Obviously.”

“Huh? So then why—”

“It’s a Special Event I’m supposed to take part in," Vidorgia explained. "The Non-Heroes go crazy, start killing Heroes, get the numbers up for a bit. I know all about it. I wasn’t born yesterday."

“You were born like, four months ago!” Sofiane shot back.

“Which isn’t yesterday, fool! This kind of thing isn’t up to me. If I don’t play along, I’ll get reformatted. Do you know how awful it is to wake up and know that you lived a life and had a whole personality that you can’t remember? I’d rather have an arm chopped off! Now clearly, you two fighting Baphomet is part of the Special Event, so my role is to fall into your hands and feed you info to speed things along. So let’s get to that part. I’m tired.”

Shuixing sighed. It was bad enough that Heroes didn’t take any of this drama seriously, but there was something depressing about the Entropic Axis not taking it seriously either. Sure it was all a lie, but Shui missed the days when both parties could pretend to be locked in an eternal battle of good and evil. However, as Shui’s thoughts turned on the complexities of introducing an entire other metaphysical layer to unpack with the Celestials, something popped into her head.

“Vidorgia, instead of you giving us information, what if we gave you some?” Shuixing said.