The ‘hole.Worm( )’ ability spat us out halfway towards the Mall, but, instead of running in that direction, Tina took us towards Downtown by summoning a serpent of neon-green energy that Steve and her rode atop. I rolled along besides them atop my longboard, easily overtaking them in speed thanks to the tricks I was pulling off.
The streets were in total chaos, with Players battling against monsters that’d escaped from the many dungeons around the city.
“It seems that getting rid of the Humanbusses had the side-effect of emboldening the dungeon enemies,” Panda remarked.
Truth be told, I didn’t give a crap, as I was only focused on saving Bee. The Manhunter’s Badge was still just pointing up into the sky, where the light of the morning sun was dying it pink and orange.
I realized I had another way to track her and pulled out the Soul Compass:
‘Soul Compass’ x
“No ledge is powder, France is bacon.”
- a dyslexic philosopher
By uttering the True Name of an Enemy, Boss, or Player, within your Region, the compass will point in their exact direction.
Charges: 2/3
Weight: 1 Panda
image [https://i.imgur.com/VeZQEui.png]
“Bee,” I told it.
ERROR!
Target does not exist within your Region.
“Piece of shit,” I muttered, throwing the compass back into my inventory.
Tina’s serpent sped up and went right in the crowded intersection ahead of us, and I quickly came up besides her, just in time to see the new street had a massive furrow in the pavement.
“Are we going to chase down the Metro?” I asked her.
“It will come to us,” she replied.
“Is the plan to fight that giant Train?” Steve asked, worried.
“No,” Tina replied. “We will let it eat us.”
“What!?”
“It won’t kill us,” I told him. “Probably.”
Steve looked on the verge of tears, but he didn’t start complaining like I’d expected, and instead just sat there, no doubt considering where he’d gone wrong to end up here.
We followed the furrow of the giant Metro Train for three more blocks, passing by a couple groups of Players battling it out with orderlies from Calm Springs Asylum.
“What are those things doing here?” I wondered, just as we rounded another corner and saw the Psychiatrist fighting off Chris the Backstabber and three other Players.
Dr. Juliens’ face was opened like a meat rose, his arms had a second joint, and his legs were inverted and ended in hooves. His hook-nails were in the middle of tearing apart one of the four Players.
I crouched down on my board, before shooting myself forward, my fist pulled back.
[YOU!] the Psychiatrist’s staticky intercom voice screamed, as he saw me.
He threw the torn-up Player aside and spun to face me, just as my fist slammed into the middle of his unfurled rose face.
“Punch.spinTheWheel( )!” I exclaimed.
Everything froze. Chris was in the middle of exploiting the Psychiatrist’s distraction by jabbing his daggers towards his exposed back. Tina’s neon-green serpent had lifted up and opened its fanged maw, preparing to lunge forward, while she sat on its head and Steve was about to fall off its back.
Everyone’s eyes shifted to look at me, until the golden wheel descended from the sky.
We’re back, baby! And for real this time! No Lucky Dice shenanigans!
*Audience whooping*
Before last time, when ‘Gambit’ cheated the odds—
*Audience booing*
—he triggered ‘Jelly Bones’. That was quite a riot, wasn’t it?
*Audience cheering*
He somehow survived, which is surprising, but it means that we have another chance for him to trigger you-know-what!
*Audience begins chanting ‘Demon Incursion’*
Fingers crossed everyone!
We have a new exciting outcome on the board since ‘Jelly Bones’ has been replaced, and it now looks like this:
Enjoying this book? Seek out the original to ensure the author gets credit.
Scramble that Wheel
Miranda’s Wrath
10x Damage
Arney the Tickler
Lucky Die
Demon Incursion
Come on then, say the magic phrase!
I wondered what ‘Miranda’s Wrath’ would do, but seeing it on there suddenly inspired me.
“Mammon! Listen to me, I just had a great idea!”
*Sigh*
Not this again. I’m going to spin the wheel if you don’t say the words.
“Wait! It’s about your servitude thing! I think I’ve got a way to solve it.”
I’m listening…
“I know this Adjudicator who is looking for a pet.”
An Adjudicator? You’re not pulling my leg, right?
“His name is Breezy.”
Breezy?
Do you mean ‘THE BREEZE THAT TRANSCENDS MOMENTS AND GATHERS COSMIC DUST UPON A WEIGHING SCALE OF BONE’?
“Yes! That’s the one.”
Everyone around me was looking between me and the board, no doubt wondering what the hell was going on.
Alright, I’ll bite. I think I can handle being a pet.
And serving an Adjudicator would certainly be preferable to Gargalob.
But, you need to bring me a Contract of Servitude from this Adjudicator friend of yours.
“I’ll get it to you!” I promised.
“Why are you even trying to help this guy?” Panda muttered, confused.
“He’s a slave to the corporate hierarchy of Demons, so of course I’d help liberate him.”
Let’s not waste any more time.
Say the words.
“You’ve got it. Spin the Wheel!” I exclaimed.
The golden wheel began to spin and the red and green triangles blurred together into one color, until the flapper at the top started slowing it down and separating them. My eyes were glued to ‘Lucky Die’, but I thought ‘Scramble that Wheel’ might also be okay.
As it came to a stop, it rolled right past ‘10x Damage’ and settled in the middle of one that Panda had specifically warned me against.
Well, that’s unfortunate.
The result is:
‘Arney the Tickler’!
Demons can sleep easy, knowing this nightmarish abomination has been teleported to the world of ‘Dirt’ and is no longer able to hurt them.
Here is the effect:
‘The Demonic Nightmare Fiend, Arney the Tickler, is manifested into the GREAT GAME. He will hunt down Player ‘Gambit’ for the next 7 days.’
Truly a terrifying outcome!
And remember: If you die in your dreams, you die in real life!
It’s unlikely he will survive this one, folks!
*Audience cheering*
“Ah, shit,” Panda cursed.
An appraisal hit me out of nowhere, and, from the way everyone’s gazes shifted, it seemed it wasn’t just shown to me.
Level 99
‘Arney the Tickler’
Nightmare x
“Tickle, tickle, tickle!”
Though originally nothing more than a myth to frighten the little Imps and half-demon spawn into behaving, Arney was given birth through the fear that came to be associated with his name. Every time a Demon sees his visage in their nightmares, his power grows ever stronger.
As his name implies, Arney loves to tickle his victims, but the problem is that he doesn’t know when to stop. It is not an unusual sight, amongst the Demons who dreamt him up, to find one of their kindred dead in their nest, a twisted and stretched-out grin on their face.
As a Nightmare Entity, he only exists in the Realm of Dreams. However, you have now manifested him into reality and he knows your scent.
You can run, but he will never stop hunting you.
image [https://i.imgur.com/juavTVO.png]
Then time resumed and my fist slammed into the Psychiatrist’s rose face, sending him flying down the street, his body tumbling and skipping across the asphalt, scraping off bits of his skin and flesh.
“Smack ‘im!” Brock squealed in joy.
Panda looked around anxiously, while I shadowboxed the air and advanced on the downed Boss.
“I don’t see Arney anywhere,” the plushie said. “Maybe he only shows up when you’re asleep.”
Tina’s serpent slithered forward and immediately lunged its fangs into the Psychiatrist, filling his body with green poison. The impact site of his unfurled face was starting to turn purple from Brock’s new upgraded curse.
Steve stayed back, watching Tina and I, while Chris the Backstabber didn’t waste a moment to join in on the kill, sticking close to me and waiting for an opening.
A hook-nailed double-jointed arm swept around Dr. Juliens as he got back onto his hooves. The strike caught Tina’s serpent in the side of the head, destroying it, but she managed to jump off it in time.
Instead of falling to the ground, neon-green hair blossomed to life on her bald head and eight thin serpents of the same energy shot out from her back and bit into the Boss, pumping even more venom into his system and slowing her descent.
The Psychiatrist swept his arm out and destroyed her magic, before releasing a high-pitched screech that caused a violent tremor around him and cratered the asphalt.
Chris used an ability that teleported him into the air above the Boss and he quickly fell down with both of his daggers, digging each of them into the side of Juliens’ neck.
“Watch out!” I yelled as I leapt forward with SPRING_HEEL.
The Backstabber kicked off from Dr. Juliens’ back while tearing out his blades and releasing a deluge of blood.
A second later I connected my fist into the middle of Juliens’ torso.
“Pow.”
ACTIVATING SCRIPT: Math.pow(Punch)!
Number of Punches recorded in fight: 31
Calculating 31 to the power of Punch
…
Calculations complete!
Though not charged anywhere near its full potential, the damage was still enough to cave in the Psychiatrist’s torso.
“He’s not dead yet!” Panda warned.
Chris surged forward and rammed his daggers into the Boss’ back, keeping him in place. I put Brock around Dr. Juliens’ neck and my left hand on his shoulder, and then pulled as hard as I could, while Chris repeatedly stabbed him in the back.
The sound of tearing skin and flesh came as I tore the Boss’ head from his neck.
As I tossed the meat rose head aside, Chris stumbled back a step and then plopped onto his ass.
“Thanks,” he said breathlessly.
Tina came over and looked at the headless corpse. She was back to being bald, and I got the sense that she transformed into Nina during her fights.
“Was that Dr. Juliens?” she asked.
“Yea.”
Tina kicked the headless body. “I like him better this way.”
“Gambit released him from the Asylum earlier,” Panda revealed.
“Snitch,” I said.
“Where’s the Moth Girl?” Chris asked from where he was sitting.
“The CPS took her, but I’ll get her back,” I replied.
“The Child Protective Services?” he asked, confused.
“Oh, you know them?”
“Of course?”
“He’s thinking of the wrong one,” Panda remarked.
“Is this your new group?” I asked, looking at the three he’d been with when we came here. One guy was already dead from his wounds, while Steve was desperately asking the other two if they had any Sanity Pills.
“They’re not very strong,” Chris remarked as he got back to his feet. “There were six of us until we hit up a nearby level 7 dungeon… Then we were immediately ambushed by this freaky guy.”
Neon-green hair sprouted to life atop Tina’s head, announcing the return of Nina.
“The Cold-hearted Survivor seeks the Lost Child. Bring him to the Temple.”
Chris looked at her. “Huh?”
“She says you’re coming with us,” I translated.