As Jay had hoped, the string of tracks that led to the alligator village also led to wherever the crocodiles made their base. At the very least, it led somewhere they tend to congregate. The tracks led directly to an oasis in the swampy region of the island, at least, what passed for an oasis there.
Along the way, Carlos had responded to Jay’s message request. He joined up with them, making the party fully prepared to deal with whatever the crocodile village might throw their way. At least, as prepared as they could be.
The party arranged themselves in a ring around the muddied oasis, gazing down into the pool. Using Kamala’s tracker, Jay could see all the tracks leading down into the pool.
Jay tried to focus on the quest, but his brain was already thinking about meeting up with Claire. Moreover, he was looking forward to a future talk with Ichibad. It was unlikely the enigmatic Cat Sith player knew about the conversation Jay had witnessed. He could leverage that information into answers to his own questions.
No crocodiles were physically present around the entrance to their assumed lair. There was no wildlife in that area at all, aside from the companions the players brought with themselves.
“What now?” Carlos asked. “How are we getting inside?”
“I have an idea,” Jay noted. “Throw your shield on me. I’ll jump into the water and see if they have any traps. If they do, the shield will protect me. I’ll air dodge out when I start taking damage. I don’t really want to know how the game simulates electrocution. If everything’s good, I’ll let you guys know and we can forge ahead.”
“You can air dodge in the water?” Carlos asked skeptically.
“Of course,” Jay stated plainly. “It’s just a directional dodge. It doesn’t actually rely on using air.”
“Alright,” Carlos relented. He cast the spell on Jay, which only took a few moments. The shimmering field of protective energy appeared, though it wasn’t nearly as prominent as the shield Sarah could summon to block all damage
Before Jay stepped into the pool, he added ten points into his Strength statistic from his extra levels. In recent battles, there were many instances forcing him to fight in melee combat. He wanted a boost to that damage. With his outlaw style, weaving swordplay into his combat rotation was ideal, anyway.
The swamp smelled absolutely horrible. When Jay dived into the murky waters, there wasn’t any improvement to it. He couldn’t hear much, though that could easily be due to the muffling within the water. He monitored his heads up display—waiting for the jolt of electricity to damage his health.
But nothing came. The water was harder to see through than the alligator village, but Jay persisted. Several lengths later, he found himself looking at a similar shelf to the design at the alligator village. Satisfied that there were no traps, Jay went back to notify his party.
“It’s all clear down there,” Jay promised. “No electrical shocks. No signs of traps. I say we go down there and show them what’s what.”
“Yeah!” Jenny cheered, her ever present optimism lifting his spirits. The hour was getting late, so the positive energy was a significant boost.
After utilizing consumables to buff up, the party cautiously made their way as a unit through the dirty waters. Jay expected some sort of resistance from the crocodiles, but he encountered none. He was on edge for the other shoe to drop.
Everyone passed through the water, stepping up onto the ledge, dripping went. The entrance at the alligator village had led directly into the village proper. The crocodiles used a longer tunnel. The party took positions with Sarah in front, in case of attack, and Ken watching their backs.
They crept forward, foot by foot. Since Jay was on edge, he was the first to see the other shoe drop. He just didn’t have time to do anything about it.
Sarah bumped into a tripwire at the front of the group. The tripwire pulled loose some rock in the surrounding tunnel, which caused a cascading effect. More rocks fell loose, creating a cave-in. The bulk of the rocks didn’t land directly on the party, surrounding them instead.
The way forward was blocked, but there was no retreat, either. At least, not easily.
Sarah said some words that would have appalled their mother, and then added, “Any ideas, Jay? You live for this nerdy puzzle stuff.”
“This isn’t much of a puzzle,” Jay laughed. “But I guess–”
“You know what I meant, dork.”
“That I do have something for this.” With a flourish, he summoned the five pickaxes he still carried from his inventory. The items were distributed among the party and everyone rotated taking swings at the caved-in rock. Fortunately for Jay, breaking the rocks apart was based on the Strength statistic. Those additional points were fortunately timed.
The team worked for fifteen minutes to clear out all the rock. It slowed them down, but ultimately didn’t stop their progress. When they dug through the rocks, at least enough to slip through, the party continued cautiously.
Everyone was still waiting for the next trap. Sarah’s eyes were peeled for any more tripwires. Jay was expecting some kind of pitfall, though most other party members were unlikely to catch anything. Even Ken didn’t incorporate much Perception in his build, compared to Jay.
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They made it into the crocodile village without incident—the issues waited for them on the other side of the tunnel.
Arranged around the entrance, waiting for the party, was a small horde of crocodiles in their actual beast form. There were so many that it was impossible for Jay to count. He estimated their numbers to be around fifty or sixty. When the party drew close, the crocodiles closed in on the party.
“Should we fight from inside the tunnel?” Sarah asked.
“Ken and I need the space,” Jay replied. “We should be fine with some space to move. The regular crocodiles are super easy to clear. Ken and I will help try and keep them off the casters.”
Sarah took her position in the front, opening with her taunt and flamethrower of holy energy. The combination of abilities allowed her to quickly gather the attention of a large number of the crocodiles. Ken and Jay spread out to her left and right, engaging the enemies with their swords readied. Even Zenya jumped into the fray, working to prevent their front lines from being bypassed.
Ken’s abilities, although he was slower than Jay, helped him dance from enemy to enemy. He also had several tricky abilities that confused the monsters or supported the party in creating openings. Evidently, it was possible for him to trip crocodiles. The beasts flipped over onto their backs.
Jay pushed himself to use his outlaw style with the Vital Points ability active. The crocodiles had many more available critical points than the War Form monster. He took aim with his magically created ammunition, blasting the creatures with critical hits. With the heavy damage, he was able to take out each crocodile in only two well-placed shots.
Jenny’s buffs were a godsend, as they always were. Her restorative tag was hardly necessary. The defense boost from her other tags reduced the damage from crocodiles to negligible levels. Jay took some bites to his legs, but the pain sensations were barely even noticeable. It was like being bitten by a mosquito—super annoying, but not dangerous. Cuddles took the opportunity to aim for the highlighted areas with laser beams.
Zenya was turning the crocodiles into her chew toys. She was so much stronger than the beasts that she was able to lift them off the ground. With a crocodile in her jaw, she would shake her victims by the tail. The strategy disoriented the crocodiles, allowing her to pounce and finish them off afterward. Unlike her, Scales was just happy to be present, spitting tiny rocks at the foes.
Casey was able to provide the party with some support buffs, which helped cover some of the gaps in what Jenny provided. But more than that, she was able to provide timely boosts to Zenya. Many of her abilities revolved around increasing the power of her contracted pets. When she wasn’t supporting the party, she was casting her most powerful spell: the spectral tiger head. The tiger was relentless against the crocodiles each time it was summoned.
There wasn’t much of a need for further support, so Carlos focused on targeting the enemies with his holy light spell. Adding to this, his cherubic angelic summon fired arrows of holy light into the horde of crocodiles. The Cardinal player still found opportunities to protect the party with his shield spell.
Taylor Lynn pushed hard against the horde of enemies. Her lightning spells dealt with swaths of damage toward multiple targets. She played this spell strategically, focusing on enemies that were struck by Sarah’s holy flamethrower. Those monsters were deeply focused on Sarah, allowing Taylor Lynn to pick them apart.
The wave of crocodiles fell quickly, not putting up too much of a fight. They severely outnumbered the party. Only so many of them could attack an individual player. Between Ken’s repositioning and Taylor Lynn’s clever usage of earthen walls to control the battlefield, the horde of beasts never really stood a chance.
After breaking through the horde, they were able to see some of the crocodile village. Surprisingly, it was built very similarly to the alligator village. Jay shouldn’t have been surprised, but he was. He expected the developers to make a departure from the original style as a statement piece.
The other thing that stood out to Jay was the lack of actual villagers. It took some time for the truth to sink in as the party sought out further enemies, but he realized what had befallen the villagers. A regular villager wasn’t able to assume a Battle Form, so they were being sent to fight in the regular crocodile form. The effective guerilla strategy did a lot more to highlight the intended design of the crocodiles, picking up where the environment was lacking.
The next they found was a group of a dozen Battle Form Dissimu crocodiles. Overall, the party kept a similar strategy. There was no reason to fix what wasn’t broken. Jay did change one minor element.
An individual Battle Form crocodile was much more deadly than a regular beast. To account for this, Jay spent much more focus on using his Purple Haze sword to inflict blindness. He utilized his crossbow primarily to deal killing blows at point blank range with Vital Points. Sadly, trap bolts were useless against Battle Forms.
Slowly but surely, their strategy and heavy usage of buffs worked out. All dozen of the Dissimu wielding Battle Forms fell.
It took them another twenty minutes of searching—fighting through crocodiles wherever necessary—to locate their intended target.
When they found it, it was a single crocodile wearing a Battle Form. Instead of wielding its natural claws, this crocodile carried a staff. The glaring thing about this creature was that its name contained the word ‘Pathfinder.’ That was the label given to the goblin running the show from Goblin Town.
Next to the Pathfinder was a pedestal, which held a single object. That object was glowing with power that illuminated the whole cavern. The purple light was impossible to look at, but whatever object emanated from it, couldn’t be seen. Jay couldn’t be sure what the artifact actually was.
“You have come far,” the Pathfinder pointed out. “This is as far as you will go. Soon, by the power of the heart, my fellow Dissimu will be returned to me. We will overwhelm you with our strength and you shall not bother us again.”
The party was silent, letting the NPC say its piece. When nobody replied, the Pathfinder spoke again.
“I offer you this one chance to redeem yourself. Take this portal and go back to whence you came. Keep your ill-begotten gains from this island and never return to bother my people.”
In front of each party member, a shimmering blue portal appeared. Jay inspected the portal in front of him.
System Message: This portal leads back to Tumultua. If you take the portal, your safety is guaranteed. Warning: You hold the Compass of Mercura. Taking this portal will destroy the compass, forcing you to find a new way to return.
There was no chance Jay was going to take that bait. They were so close to completing Pami’s quest to destroy the artifact. It was right in front of him.
Carlos, on the other hand, was obviously interested in the respite the portal offered. He stepped cleanly into it, vanishing from view along with his portal.