Guin logged back in, ready to go. Tik-Tak greeted her by prancing around her legs while Liorax watched them both from his perch on the statue of the woman. After playing with him a little, she looked down one of the paths near the marble statue, where her quest indicator was pointing.
Checking her map, she traced the path she would need to take to get where Tik-Tak’s mother was. Deep inside the territory of another Border, she would likely have to be prepared for another fight. Is there going to be another boss battle like the Lore Master? She wondered, her eye twitching.
“Nothing for it, I guess,” Guin mumbled as she closed her map window. Combat was one of the largest parts of an MMO. She would have to get used to it sooner or later—and, pain aside, she might as well do it while she couldn’t die. There was a high probability that what awaited her ahead was more than simple beedants or moarbits.
“Guiiin!” Tik-Tak called to her, bouncing up and down as he waited for her on the path. “Let’s go, let’s go! Momma is waiting!”
“He is an impatient creature...,“ Liorax mused, then yawned widely. Guin snorted as she cast her [Spirit Armor] and [Fox Form]. The way the cat reacted reminded her a bit of the bat barista.
“Let’s go,” Guin told him, and he floated down to her shoulder.
“Onward, chariot,” he said, sitting on her back.
Chuckling, she caught up to Tik-Tak, who tagged her with a nip at her ear before he shot off down the path. As she took off after him, Liorax flew off in front.
It took them about twenty minutes to get across the border, where dozens—if not hundreds—of beedants and moarbits meandered around the forest, bringing a smile to Guin’s face as she took out her dagger. She went to work, turning the bugs and rodents into treasure.
Several dozens of corpses later, though, Guin noticed that the forest had begun to change.
“What the hell..?” Guin muttered. Vibrant greens turned grey, then faded to purple, until the grass became a substance that resembled tar. The trees looked like they were rotting—but not a typical rot. The black tar-like substance was crawling up the trees, eating away at them. A dull fog hung over the area, blocking out the sun. The air was moist and thick and smelled foul, like a summer’s eve in the middle of a bog.
Ducking her head as she stepped into the area, Guin asked, “Is it supposed to look like this? Oh shit—!” Guin ducked behind one of the trees quickly, though almost immediately, she yelped and pulled away from it when her hands touched the tree’s gooey trunk.
Her prey had changed. Considerably.
The beedants had grown larger, had grown hands, and learned to walk on their hind legs alone. Their sharp pincers gnashed together with horrible, echoing sounds. They look like Blee, Guin thought distastefully. As for the moarbits, they were a little less intimidating, but they, too, had changed. Their size increased, and they now sported large antlers.
“Corruption,” Liorax growled.
“That doesn’t sound good,” Guin said.
“Yiiiii... Momma...” Tik-Tak made himself as small as he could and started to circle Guin’s legs. “Momma... I’ll fix it... I-I’ll take care of Momma....” Guin knelt and petted him, trying to calm him.
But Liorax snorted. “We should count ourselves lucky that it’s only spread this far,” he said. “This kind of corruption... I can smell it. Your mother was powerful for a Che Land Fox. Or...?” The roan-colored cat’s attention shifted to Tik-Tak, his eyes reflecting a new respect for the anxious little fox.
“What should we do?” Guin pressed. “Can I even fight these things by myself? Those bugs are bigger than I am!” There was no way for her to tell what the power gap was between the two. If it was as big as the gap between the gobos and the Lore Master, she was screwed.
“I can only offer minor help, I’m afraid,” Liorax said, sounding almost genuine. “All you can do is try. I’ll give you one of my auras, but know that my spell is me, and I am my spell. I won’t be able to communicate with you, but I will hear your commands. Should you require my physical presence, merely speak my name.”
Nodding, Guin clenched her dagger and stared her enemies down. After making sure that her spells were in place, she gave Liorax the go-ahead. He spun around, glowed green, and disappeared. A light shone over her, and she saw that she had gained the [Battle Ready] buff again.
“Stay here,” she told the cowering little fox.
“Yiii...” seemed to be the only response he could give her.
Entering her fox form, she stepped closer to one of the Corrupted Moarbits, but this creature didn’t just ignore her.
Shit! Guin began to scramble back as the Corrupted Moarbit glared at her and roared. Antlers down, it started after her. Her brain working as fast as it could, she dodged, and the creature ran head-first into the tree in front of it.
Guin’s eyes narrowed. Some sort of [Rush] technique? Unfazed, the creature turned around and glared at her, its eyes emitting an odd, black smoke. Its mouth dropped open, revealing all of its sharp, pointed teeth, and—Are those... like... snake fangs? Guin froze. She had to admit that the antlers were far less intimidating than the pincers were - but if these things could poison her...
Her first instinct was to run away, but Guin clenched her teeth. Why would you run? She asked herself, fixing her stance. The only thing she could do was to try not to get bitten.
But how would she do that?
Ultimately there was no reason why her tactics from before shouldn’t work on these guys. The rush attack wasn’t too different from the one that the Gobo Club Thugs used—and those had been far more intimidating. These guys were just jack-a-lopes.
The moarbit rushed at her again, but this time she was better prepared. Dodging just enough for the creature’s attack to miss, she human shifted, grabbed it by the antlers, and pulled it down hard, slamming it into the ground. Disoriented, it struggled against her grip and pawed at the air. Taking advantage of its prone state, Guin executed several stabs and and backstabs until its body, at last, grew limp.
It was quite the hardy creature. Had she been unlucky, the outcome of that fight could have been much different.
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But with a strategy in development for the Corrupted Moarbits, she turned her attention to the Corrupted Beedants next.
Feeling far more comfortable after her experience with the moarbit, Guin didn’t hesitate trying out her tactics on the nearest beedant—and they worked to fair effect. Their evolution made things difficult when trying to reach the creature’s underbelly, but it really did seem to be the kind of creature that traded power for defense.
Confident in her ability to handle them, she called to Tik-Tak, and they continued at a much slower pace. Unlike before, she couldn’t just leisurely kill the enemies in her path; she needed time to kill them, all while looking out for back attacks. With practice, Guin found herself able to take on two or three enemies; adding a fourth was asking just slightly too much without some kind of CC to back her up. For now, while Liorax was keeping her buffed with his powers, Tik-Tak nimbly drew the agro of a least one of the pests and parade them around until Guin could safely take it.
As they pressed on, Guin started to see were traps in the area. With furrowed brows, she saw so many untriggered ones that she had to assume that the humans must have been in the area quite recently. Surely, they knew about the corruption, then?
Occasionally, she saw that Corrupted Beedants and Corrupted Moarbits had been caught in the traps. More frequently, however, the victims were other kinds of animals. Weasels. Squirrels. A deer. She even saw another red fox. Guin turned her head away.
“Yii... G-Guin,” Tik-Tak stopped with his tail between his legs and asked her. “C-Can we free their bodies at least?” His eyes were full of sorrow.
Guin went over and looked at one of the traps. Trying not to stare directly at the broken corpse of the squirrel that was in it, she fiddled with it, but she honestly had no experience with such things.
“Mmm,” she started, shaking her head. “I have to be honest, Tik-Tak, I don’t know how to disarm this thing.” Tik-Tak lowered his head as she spoke but perked up when she added: “Let’s go talk to your mother’s spirit first. If we can clear the corruption, it won’t be as dangerous for us. Then, I’ll go into the village and see if I can learn anything about the traps. I promise you that I will come back and get them out of these traps—and I’ll disarm the others while I’m at it.”
A new determination grew on the little fox’s face as he nodded. Guin stood and looked in the direction of her map marker. Not far now, she told herself and started off. However, sensing that Tik-Tak was not following, she turned.
“Tik-Tak?”
The little fox put a paw on the broken squirrel’s head. “I-I promise that I will come back,” he said softly. Puffing out his chest a little, he made his declaration: “I promise... I’ll protect this forest. Just like Momma and Papa...”
With that, he turned and shot off toward the cave.
He’s a good boy, Guin thought, a smile flickering across her face as she went off after him.
About ten minutes later, they found themselves at the cave—which was in an even worse state than the rest of the forest. Tik-Tak ran into the cave with a cry: “Momma!” but Guin was not so eager. The mere sight of it made her stomach churn.
It was like a black monolith of pestilence.
Around it, the whole atmosphere had shifted as the Veil and Che had merged on a gloomy, stormy day.
The cave was set into the side of what Guin suspected was once a rocky bank but was now like melting coal; it was tar-like and wet like the ground and trees had been, and it reeked of sewage and decay—from the cave wafted such a horrid wall-like stench of rot and decay that Guin bounced back and retched. She pulled her robe up to her nose and started walking, but it was hard to bare. A light shone over her head at that moment, however, and she began to feel better. Looking up at her status bar, she saw that Liorax had changed his buff to the de-buff [Dull the Senses: Smell].
“Thank you, Liorax,” Guin said in a weak voice, both impressed by and genuinely grateful for his abilities. Taking her torch out and lighting it, Guin stepped into the cave.
Everything was damp and dark and... sticky. The walls, and the cave floor, were all covered in what seemed to be a thick black goo sticking to her shoes, causing her to slip several times. When she lost her balance, she would lean on the cave walls for support, but each time she did, she had to struggle to get her hand to come off. What the hell is this shit? She wanted to ask, but it didn’t seem harmful. Shoving her feelings down into her stomach, she made way one foot at a time.
Tik-Tak wasn’t that deep inside the cave. Guin found him quite quickly, pacing back and forth in front of what looked to be the corpse of an animal. Assuming it was his mother, Guin walked over slowly and knelt, but as she did, she covered her mouth with her hand, and tears came to her eyes.
If it was Tik-Tak’s mother, it was hard to tell, for the creature had been robbed of its skin and left to rot, with all manner of maggots and bugs crawling over the unidentifiable, greyish-black remains.
“M-Momma!” Tik-Tak was crying as he paced in front of the corpse. “It’s me! It’s Tik-Tak! Momma? Where did you go? Yiii...”
“Tik-Tak...” Guin started to reach out, but then there was a bright flash. Wide-eyed, Guin watched as sparks flew off from the corpse and started to catch. “Tik-Tak...,” went Guin, edging back as the cave walls came alive with light and shadow.
The little fox jumped away as the flames grew. Higher and higher, they rose until they took up the whole width and height of the cave and turned bright green. The cave felt like it was burning and freezing at the same time, and Guin folded her arms, feeling feverish as she watched a pair of red eyes open from within the fire, mad in rage. As the fire died down, it looked rather like it was melting into the outline of a vaguely fox-shaped spirit. Guin moved her mouth, but in her fear and shock, there were no words.
“Ah... Ahhh! Momma! D-Don’t be mad!” Calling out with a pleading voice, Tik-Tak jumped in front of Guin with his tail between his legs. “T-This is Guin! She’s my friend! She wants to help! She’ll help you! P-Please, Momma!”
The fox made of the strange liquid fire made no motion; the rage seemed rather painted on her face. It did not move as Guin heard, “ A Che-kind dares to enter this place—my home?” The fox’s voice echoed in her head, similar to the Webspinner’s and Wise’s, but rather than having a gentle, ethereal quality, every word the fox spoke gave a sensation similar to nails on a chalkboard. “I care not for such things as motives. Those of the Che who enter here are only begging for death - and I shall be happy to oblige!” Raising her head proudly, the fox’s expression flickered into a smile as cruel laughter rang out. Guin to shuddered. Flames spread out from the corpse, threatening to engulf them both.
“Momma!”
“P-Please wait!” Guin shouted. “Wait, I—I just want to help you and the spirits of White Fox Forest! Please listen to me!”
The fox stopped laughing and flickered back into a look of displeasure.
“Yiiii!” Tik-Tak cried as he scuttled back from the flames licking at his paws.
“Hey!” Guin stomped her foot and glared at the fox in the flames. Scooping up the frightened Tik-Tak in her arms, she shouted, “Isn’t this kit yours? How could you threaten him like this? He brought me here to help you!”
Another screeching laugh rang out through the cavern. “Then more the fool he! A child who brings another child and calls it ‘help.’ Tell me then, who are you to help me? How, exactly, do you propose to... ‘help’?”
“How do you expect me to ‘propose’ anything when you resort to violence first!” Guin shouted back angrily.
“...You funny little Che creatures, living in your wooden houses with all your pretty words and false civility—are we not the same? This is my house; you stand it. It is my house you and yours have defiled. Were the situation reversed, would not you be like me?” the fox spirit asked. “If my stupid child were to stumble into even the sight of your little village, would your people not skin him too? Would they not? Well then, why should you expect anything less from me?” The flames grew hotter and brighter.
“So what?” Guin twitched. The fox was not wrong, but the words irritated her. “You think that that’s an excuse be just to like them? A handful of them have wronged you, and now it’s everyone’s fault? Everyone should die in your little quest for vengeance? Even your own child? Shouldn’t you want to be better than them?”
Tik-Tak struggled out of her arms and landed clumsily. She was afraid that he had hurt himself, but the little fox walked forward with a series of ‘Yii’s, moving closer and close until his little nose touched the flame.
“Tik-Tak—” Guin moved to stop him, but before she could, the little fox darted into the fires. “Tik-Tak!” Guin screeched, getting ready to run in after him, but the flames burned her hands. “Shit!”
Searching for him in the flurry of oranges and reds, yellows and greens, the flames began to retract. Curious and optimistic, Guin walked forward as the fires drew back. Sure enough, there was the little fox, crying atop the skinned corpse of his mother—the green fox spirit looking over him— with a pained but kind look upon her face.