I didn’t need my Blindsense anymore, my ears were plenty good enough. The people betting what I could only assume was their version of cold hard cash were loud enough that their voices carried down the hall I found myself in. The shadowy ghost of Kendrick followed along behind me like a less adorable version of Stella. I would give my left hand to have her with me instead of my less than reliable ‘Master’.

A loud howling of what might have been laughter came blasting from the room up ahead. The sound of it grated on my ears and sent an unwelcome shiver down my spine.

“Told you, Grack. There’s no beating Team Tor when they’re on a roll. Pony up my friend.”

“Fuck off, Wor. Don’t play high and mighty with me.”

“I don’t see any korens in my hand.”

I pressed my back against the wall and leaned ever so carefully forward to peek into the room. For a moment it was nothing but blinding green-hued lights and then the scene revealed itself to me. My jaw dropped at the sight as my brain scrambled to make sense of it.

The room was large and the floor sunken. At the bottom of the dip was a pool of stagnant water. Plants grew from the depths of the pool and small bugs, some of them with glowing rear ends, buzzed just over the rippling water. Two creatures sat in the pool around a central table, staring up at the wall ahead of them that was covered from the ceiling to just above the floor in screens. Each screen displayed a different zone but all of them were heavily populated by the Crocs that had haunted my world for far too long. Most of them were the regular kind but there were plenty of the Combustion Crocs and even a few King Crocs on display. The creatures at the table looked just like the Crocs on the screen only intelligence shone in their eyes and they wore what could be described as clothes but looked more like silvery formfitting garbage bags. One of them even had a pair of hexagonal glasses resting at the height of its long pointed snout.

It was hard to suck air past the lump in my throat that might have been my heart dislodged by the insanity I was seeing. I pulled back, closing my eyes and banging my head quietly on the cold slimy wall.

“Bit much for you, sweetheart?” Kendrick said in a thankfully quiet voice.

“Just a smidge. What the hell are they?”

Kendrick’s shadow leaned the way I had and his featureless dark face scanned the room. “Looks like a pair of Generals. Hard to say though since they’re out of uniform.”

Generals. Uniforms. The words bounced around my head, fueled by the nonchalant way Kendrick had said them. It was the same way he occasionally spoke about the Forerunners. Just like they were a regular part of the world that only a daft fool wouldn’t know about. Well, I was that daft fool and it was infuriating being left so cruelly in the dark.

“Do you have a book or something that will teach me all this ‘universe is a game for asshole gods’, bullshittery?” I snapped, smacking a hand over my mouth when the voices in the room behind me faltered for a moment.

“What was that,” the one that I think was named Grack said.

There was silence for a moment and then the other answered. “Guess it was just one of the servants. They’re getting lazy the closer the game comes to finishing.”

“Think that boy Orion will actually succeed this time? He’s tried three times now to free the moron Melumek.”

The other snorted and said, “I doubt it. The man has been destined to fail since the moment we reached his world. Don’t forget, he slept right through the first event. He didn’t even get a glimpse of the pillars before he woke to chaos.”

There was laughter and then, “I forgot about that! He really is just a hopeless specimen. Almost as pathetic as that so-called 'King of the Forerunners'.”

I saw Kendrick’s shadow stiffen and suddenly I was feeling much better about being here listening to a pair of giant Croc’s bellyache.

“Hmm,” I said. “I wonder who they could possibly be talking about.”

“Please. I could cut them down with a single swing and they know it. They like to play superior because they’re from one of the first worlds. It's just sad really when you think about it.”

“So you know about Orion?”

“No. There are many of us though. It is not surprising we haven’t crossed paths.”

I scoffed, sure he was lying to me before turning and slinking away from the odd Croc Generals. I could stay and listen hoping that they might say something important but honestly, I just wanted to find Nora and Gabby. Together we would shut this place down, or whatever the quest was alluding to, and return home to a hopefully Croc-free country.

Speaking of quests, I paused in a tiny darkened alcove and opened up my menu, focusing on the update notification to take me straight to the quest in question.

Quest updated: The Witch of Evermore

Description: The witch has gifted you the potion needed to enter the Croc sanctuary. Now it is up to you to find a way to clear the Croc invasion.

This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it.

Time remaining: 4 hours 47 minutes.

Crap. I’d been so focused on everything that was happening I hadn’t even noticed the little timer beside my quest menu icon. Still, surely I could find the others and shut this place down in under five hours. That was a pretty long time after all. Hell, by the end of it, I’d be desperate to go home just to get some sleep.

“Do you know where Nora and Gabby might be?” I asked my shadowy stalker.

“Probably in a place that makes a lot more sense than right outside a General's office,” Kendrick replied.

I glared in his direction but couldn’t see him in the darkness of the alcove. “Very helpful.”

“I aim to please.”

“You aim to piss me off,” I grumbled.

I stomped from the alcove and continued down the path I was on moments before, using my Blindsense to scan ahead. Occasionally at the very edges of my range, a red or colorless aura would pop up but it disappeared as fast as it appeared more often than not. I followed no logical path as I wound through the maze of tunnels and halls occasionally opening a door here or opening a hatch there. Once or twice I found a useful lootable but it was never a great horde of goodies. Maybe one day the Witch of Evermore would send me to the lair of a dragon. There was bound to be endless treasure in a place like that. Crocs really couldn’t compare.

“I’m getting really sick of this constantly being separated thing. What kind of clan can’t even stay together?” I snapped when we’d spent a good forty minutes weaving through endless green-hued tunnels without seeing so much as a monster let alone my friends.

“Maybe you should chain yourselves together. It seems to be working for us.”

“Sure, let me just pull the spare pair of god-spelled cuffs from my ass,” I said.

“Oh, what a good idea. What else do you have up there? I’m fond of clamps myself. Bend over, I’ll have a look.”

“I hate you so much.”

Kendrick only laughed in response and much to my own disgust I smiled too. He always bested me at the banter game we played but one day I was determined to beat him. The more we played the more fun I had though I’d never admit it to his face. The man would enjoy that far too much.

A flash of green drew my attention away from the shadowy man I was chained to and off to the right. A single green aura raced across my view before fading as it moved too far from me. A moment after a second green aura followed it. I let out a bellow and rushed in the direction I saw them, focusing hard in an attempt to catch sight of them again. Down one path and then another I splashed through the trickle of muck that filled the halls, not much caring that the filth was beginning to leak into my boots.

The auras grouped together, blazing now that we charged down on them. I skidded to a halt when they throbbed and one by one a cluster of red auras popped up around them. My brows dropped as I stared ahead at a wall, focused on what I could see beyond it.

“I know you’re using a skill but a whole heap of insane vibes are just wafting off of you right now. Care to tell me what's going on before I chew my own ghost arm off?” Kendrick asked.

I mumbled in a monotone, not bothering to give my answer any more of my focus than was strictly necessary, “You’re not a ghost, you’re a demon.”

They were surrounded but not dead. They also weren’t moving which meant they weren’t fighting. There might be a heap of the enemy monsters there but there was no way Nora would go down without a fight unless she was incapacitated. Which meant they’d probably wandered into some sort of trap. A trap I could handle; it was the specialty of my class after all. I suppose it was Gabby’s too but I think, and don’t hold me to this, that things had changed for her when she’d become a Daughter of Umbra. She was still an incredible archer but I wasn’t sure her skills developed the same way mine did. Why none of us actually bothered to talk about our developing levels was beyond me. There just never seemed to be time. That felt more like an excuse than a true answer though.

Enough! I scolded myself before continuing on down the path I’d chosen at a more sedate pace. I paid attention to where I placed my feet, determined not to give my location away. I was no good to the others if I was trapped as well.

“Can you scout ahead?” I whispered.

Kendrick lifted up his arm. “I can try. Not sure how far this thing will let me go, though.”

“Try. I don’t feel like being Croc feed right now.”

“What has the world come to,” Kendrick murmured just loud enough for me to hear. “The Master lowering himself to the position of a Jackroller.”

“I’m a Bandit now.”

“Same difference, sweetheart.”

The man pushed a door open just a crack. A wedge of bright green light filtered out making me blink and press myself closer to the wall. Kendrick’s head swiveled in my direction for the barest of moments before he slipped through the door and disappeared from view. Kendrick didn’t appear as anything to my Blindsense making it impossible to watch his progress from this side of the wall. The best I could do was hold my golden cuffed wrist as close to the doorway as possible to give him some movability on the other side. I could hear my pulse thundering in my ears as I waited. Caged energy began to fill me and I itched to move. To do something. Anything. The red auras shifted and danced around the green ones, teasing my frozen clan members. One of the green auras pulsed and flickered and I knew it must be Nora. Whatever she was trying was making her hard to focus on. I just hoped it wouldn’t get her or Gabby killed.

Overhead a siren blared and flashing red lights filled the hall, blending with the green light to form a sort of sickly brown color. Fear stabbed at my bubble of energy, bursting it as easily as a pin would a balloon. Unable to stop myself I Blinked and rushed inside, swinging my head around as I looked for a place to hide.

Kendrick’s shadow stood frozen a few feet within the room. Wisps escaped his form but otherwise, he was motionless. Above him, carved into the ceiling, were fantastical runes I couldn’t place. They pulsed at the same rate as the siren blares. Only a few directly above him were lit up but I could see many others lining the ceiling, looking more like a poor decorator's choice than protection against intruders.

Careful not to step beneath the carvings I dodged to the side, ducking behind a single long rectangular box that was shoved into the corner. The chain that bound us brightened, the golden hue stark against the darkened colors of the Croc’s favored lights. I swallowed as the pounding of many feet marked the arrival of the many red auras my Blindsense was picking up.

A wave of Crocs pushed through a wide doorway. Between them, I could see another room just like this one with Nora and Gabby stuck the same way Kendrick was standing in the center. Only half the Crocs had come this way in search of their newest catch. I swallowed as my breath came in short sharp bursts. It was down to me to free them all but if I stepped under those markings I would be as useless as my clan mates.

What the hell was I supposed to do?