Tallon ran as fast as his party could. He could have run faster, but Fener and Seren were injured, so he was holding down the rear—in charge of annihilating anything that got too close with his explosive charges. Vasen and Vale were holding the flank, both using their own explosives to deadly effect.

“I think I can see the walls,” Fener panted, holding the wound on her side and grimacing with each step.

“Orion and his team are on the way!” Tallon launched another charge at an invertebrate that was closing in, turning the twenty-legged, centipede-like enemy into a fourth-of-July firework.

“Good! We can use all the help we can—” Vasen kicked a water-scorpion that tried to lunge at him. “… get!” He unleashed an explosive bolt from his crossbow, which detonated in a deadly explosion of chitin and ichor.

The last eighteen-hours had been a nightmare.

After they had defeated the Baron of the Black Sands, they’d assumed that the path back to town would be a peaceful, if morose, trek. The fact that they hadn’t defeated it before the timer on their Critical Quest ran out was, evidently, a problem.

They had to fight the boss after having their memories returned—something that no one else had to do, as far as he knew.

They’re the lucky ones, Tallon thought.

Fighting the boss actually hadn’t been too bad. The looming boss fight was something to focus on—something to stop them from wallowing in their sorrows. After they had defeated that overgrown scorpion… well, then they had all the time in the world to think.

Up until, that is, a half-wolf, half-fish monster tried to take Fener’s head off while she kept watch. Luckily, her reflexes were fast for a spell-caster, and she’d managed to jump out of the way. The creature had collided with her torso, sharp fangs tearing open the wound that now caused her so much pain.

They’d dispatched that first wolf easily enough; Seren was still awake and took the thing’s head before it had a chance to attack again. What wasn’t easy was defeating the other nine that came soon after, all attacking at once. Seren had been bitten on the calf by one of the creatures, leaving behind a healing debuff that stopped the wound from closing completely—the same debuff that afflicted Fener. Tallon had been disoriented and sluggish during the entire attack, and it was lucky that no-one was seriously injured.

They were still recovering from the attack when the next group of monsters found them. It became clear then that this was going to be a recurring theme. The monsters advancing were all water themed—a stark contrast to the desert creatures they had exterminated in the sands to the south. It stood to reason, then, that those creatures were of the advancing force of creatures, the ones that were coming from the east and heading toward Valbrand.

It also stood to reason that he and his friends were fucked.

As he looked at Fener ahead of him, hobbling as fast as she could, he scrunched his face up in anger for the hundredth time, once more chastising himself not being there to protect her when the water-wolf attacked. He knew self-hatred was a fool’s game, so he pushed it aside, choosing to focus on keeping them safe in the present.

“How… far… to go?” Seren wheezed out.

“Not far,” Tallon answered. “Keep moving. We’ll see the town walls in no time.”

As if in answer to Seren’s question, Tallon noticed the trees came to an end ahead.

That must be the cleared section before the walls. We’re almost there!

He dodged a magical water-based attack that came from behind, lobbing an explosive charge in the general vicinity of the caster in response. It detonated, and he heard an inhuman screech. He smiled.

They approached the cleared land, but just as Tallon thought he could make out the city gate in the distance between the trees, a large water-wolf leaped in front of them. It snarled and snapped at Fener and Seren, who both stepped back, falling over each other in their attempt to get away from the beast’s gnashing maw.

Seeing one face to face for the first time, he inspected it

Of course it’s called something stupid like an Aquanine. I hate this fucking System.

The rest of the party rushed to their defense, explosives being launched at the creature to chase it back as all three of the standing members helped the fallen two to their feet. In the time it took to ensure the safety of everyone, the rest of the pack had also come from the side, completely encircling them.

Tallon whirled, looking desperately for a path out, but there were creatures in every direction that were clearly from the water zone. The wolves blocked the path forward, the water-scorpions and other invertebrates blocked the path from where they’d come. Giant insects, crustaceans, and isopods—all teamed up to prevent retreat.

He returned his attention to what must have been the alpha wolf, noting the intelligent gleam in its eyes. He inspected it.

Aquanine Alpha

You planned this, didn’t you, you slimy fucker?

As he readied his magical weapon to unleash hell, hoping against hope that he could get his friends out of this horrific situation alive, the thing took a step forward.

Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

The line of creatures approached, some taking long, eager steps forward, others carefully filling in the gaps between the larger creatures. They worked together, all moving as one cohesive unit, despite the variety of species present. It was as if they behaved like a liquid, not leaving a single avenue for escape.

He held his finger firmly on the trigger, waiting for an opportunity to attack, but not wanting to cause the approaching monsters to rush in. He felt completely trapped. His instincts railed for him to squeeze the trigger, to blast open a hole and escape through the breach, but his friends were injured, and they wouldn’t make it out with him.

He wouldn’t leave them behind, so his finger stayed unmoving on the trigger, and he waited for his chance.

Something round appeared above the head of the Aquanine Alpha, seeming to pop into existence from thin air. It dropped, moonlight shining off of what looked like a metallic surface. It struck the alpha wolf’s head with a heavy thump.

The wolf yelped and jumped back, shaking its head and peering around in confusion. The rest of the monsters all paused their advance, looking to their leader for some sort of direction.

The round, metallic object rolled further toward Tallon and his party. It stopped on a dime, and odd, flexible appendages extended from the ball-like object. He braced himself, ready to attack the foreign thing with explosives if needed. A head extended upright, a weird circular saw popping from the top of its dome with a soft whir.

A red light emitted from what he now saw was a small robot, and he felt a force come with the light. It touched his will, but left it entirely unchanged.

As one, the monsters surrounding them attacked. He dove for Fener. There was no time to say anything; he simply tried to cover her as best he could, his instinct to use his body as a shield. He didn’t feel the bite of mandibles or the scrape of claws, though—he felt the rush of wind as the monsters from behind them dove over and past them, toward their true target.

Klang.

“Oh, yes. That feels wonderful,” a robotic voice said, like someone was talking through a vocoder.

Klang.

“Thank you.”

Tallon looked up to see the small robot held firmly in the maw of the giant wolf. It threw the robot in the air, catching it with a vicious chomp of its jaw.

Klang.

“Again, if it pleases you.”

The rest of the monsters were crowded around the wolf, trying to cut, bite, or otherwise hurt the mauled robot when he came back down, but none could reach him.

“Get back!” a familiar voice yelled, as something landed amongst the mass of creatures.

A cloud exploded from within the mob of monsters, the red, clearly dangerous miasma engulfing the entire group that was attacking the party’s metal savior.

Orion stepped into view, casting an ability, followed closely by Arika. Tallon looked for the last members—the Warrior in plate armor and the Rogue.

Shadow, wasn’t it? And Honeypot?

His musings were interrupted when he caught a blur of motion in the corner of his eye. He turned to see Shadow emerge from the trees, sprinting past them. Following his running trajectory, he saw what looked like dragonfly-nymphs, all of which were casting what was probably the water attack that almost hit him earlier. He inspected those, too.

Nymphomancer

Oh, I fuckin’ HATE you, He cursed the System.

He shot an explosive at the center mass of the nymphs, as did Vasen and Vale. Shadow arrived as their explosions landed, silencing one mid-cast on the end of the line with the wicked swing of an odd-looking sword.

The Rogue—Honeypot, who was wearing a skirt for some godforsaken reason—appeared behind the nymph at the other end of the line, stunning it and slashing it three-times with a scythe. Their explosions had obliterated the three in the middle, and Tallon watched as Shadow sliced the one he’d interrupted in half.

Tallon turned his attention back to the main mass of monsters to see a pile of lifeless bodies. The Red gas had almost completely dissipated, and he could see only one monster left standing—the Alpha. Where its body had previously been covered in light blue fur that looked slick and wet, its coat had a light green tinge—the membrane that covered its body and given the appearance of fur now pitted and damaged.

The wolf clung to life, just as it clung to the robot that was still firmly wedged between its teeth. It staggered, barely able to stand upright after the damage that the cloud had inflicted.

“Use your explosions,” Orion said. “I wouldn’t recommend getting too close, just in-case some gas lingered.”

“Won’t we hurt your friend?” Fener asked. “The robot is your friend, right?”

Orion waved away her concern.

“That’s Gizmo, he’s my familiar. Just shoot him. He’s into it.”

Fener looked at Orion with visible confusion. “He’s what?”

Three explosions hit the wolf at once, all in the chest. Each blast had the robot Gizmo in their radius. Light erupted from the eyes and mouth of the wolf, and it seemed to explode from within as the light engulfed Gizmo, and the automaton let out what almost sounded to Tallon like a satisfied hum.

***

Orion couldn’t believe how effective his Blood Mist Potion had been.

It took out everything but the mini-boss with a single dose… we’ll have to be extremely careful with that stuff.

He carefully approached the Bomb Squad, keeping an eye on the trees for any lingering monsters.

“Are you guys okay?”

“Daddy,” Gizmo interrupted, laying on his side and staring at the sky. “I love when you wake me up for middle-of-the-night fun.”

Honeypot burst into laughter. “Gizmo! Phrasing!”

Arika narrowed her eyes at Gizmo. “I’m starting to think that’s on purpose…”

“We’re alive,” Tallon said, also squinting at Gizmo, “but the last day has been hell.”

He went on to describe the harrowing journey they’d experienced over the last eighteen-hours.

“Do you guys need healing?” Orion asked Fener and Seren, eying off the healing potions in their hands. “Why haven’t your wounds closed?”

“Some sort of debuff from the wolves,” Tallon growled. “That’s the main reason it was such a horrible journey—we could only go as fast as our two wounded.”

“I think I may have something for you.” Orion smiled. “Though only the two of you with the debuff should drink it. It has a twenty-four-hour cooldown, and well, the rest of you might need to use it in that time frame.” He pulled out a cauldron that contained forty-charges of the miraculous healing potion, putting it in front of the wounded pair and allowing them to inspect it.

Fener raised an eyebrow. “We’ve seen nothing with healing of this potency before. Will it really work?”

Orion shrugged. “It’s worked on everything so far.”

Fener went to take a drink, but Seren took it first, saying, “It never hurts to be careful. I’ll take a drink and see what happens.” He looked at Orion apologetically. “No offense, Orion.”

“None taken.”

Fener shot a glare at her party member, taking offense where Orion didn’t. Seren ignored her protest and drank. A healing light washed over him as the wound in his leg closed before their eyes, and the pale pallor of his skin retreated in the blink of an eye.

Fener hit him on the arm.

“Oh no, look! You’ve been killed by Orion’s nefarious poison!”

She grabbed the cauldron and drank. Her wounds and color healed in similarly spectacular fashion, leaving them looking like they’d just woken up, rather than spent the last eighteen-hours running and fighting for their lives.

“Wow,” Fener remarked. “Where the hell did you get that, and where can we get some?”

“It’s of our glorious leader’s creation,” Honeypot said. “The crafters are making more of it in Valbrand now.”

“The crafters? What have we missed?”

“A lot,” Orion said with a laugh. “I’m glad you guys are back. We’ll catch you up on the way back to town.”

The System had a different idea.

No sooner than they exited the trees, Orion received a notification, along with a flashing-red symbol in the corner of his vision.