A health bar appeared, but the magic missile had only taken about 20% of its health.
After a quick glance of the minimap—the lemurs were still a block away—I sprinted toward the monster as Donut pumped it with two more missiles.
“Watch its arms!” I cried as I formed a fist. Donut leaped from my shoulder.
“Sic ‘em!” she yelled as she skidded to the ground.
Mongo and I both leaped into the air. I landed on the clown’s chest as Mongo screamed and started tearing at the prone clown’s ankle just above the shoe.
The clown’s chest caved in with a crack as I landed. It felt as if I’d just crunched into a wooden pallet that had splintered under my weight. I fell to a knee and pulled my hand back to punch.
Another missile crashed into the clown’s raising arm as I punched it in the face as hard as I could. Its neck snapped back. A long, forked tongue lolled out. The little hat went flying, and the red wig fell off. I pounded again and again until its head caved in.
A mass of red dots was getting closer, and they’d be here in fifteen seconds. I pulled up the clown’s inventory:
Clown Meat
Big Top Ticket
35 Gold.
I looted it all, plus both of the oversized butcher knives, the red wig, and the little hat. Mongo remained at the clown’s ankle, tearing at the skin and growling like a dog with a bone. I bent to pick him up, and I realized he’d gotten noticeably larger. I picked him up anyway, and he squealed in rage. I put him back down a foot away.
“Tell him to follow us,” I said as I turned toward the next alley. “Hurry.”
“Mongo, come!” Donut cried.
This alley curved into a small labyrinth, dotted with doors and stone walls. The saferoom appeared to be a tavern about fifty meters down a dead-end alley. A sign hung in front of the tavern, naming it “The Belly-Rubbed Pug.” A pug in a top hat and a suit appeared on the sign. I worriedly watched the wave of red dots swarm into the main street as I pushed open the door and ran inside.
Unlike the saferooms from the previous two floors, this appeared to actually be some sort of renaissance fair-style pub. The three television screens remained, and the general layout was similar to the manned saferooms. A Bopca protector stood behind the counter, looking at us with curiosity as we entered.
The first thing I noticed was that the sleeping rooms—there were only five available—now cost money to rent. Ten gold a night, which was nothing. Between Donut and I, we now had almost ten grand in gold. The food cost money as well, but it appeared to be equally inexpensive.
I kept my eye on the red dots to see if they would follow us into the alley. If they knew we were in here, we’d have a problem. They didn’t appear to have seen where we’d gone.
I moved to the counter to order a drink. I needed one bad.
Thwum.
Mordecai teleported into the room, standing just to the side of the main bar. He stood with his pants down to his knees, eyes closed. “Now ladies,” he said, his voice slurring heavily. “One at a time. Grannie first. There’s plenty of Mordecai to…” He trailed off. He opened an eye, looking upon us.
“My good sir, I must ask you sheath your sword immediately!” the Bopca cried. “This is a family establishment!”
I glanced over at the gnome. His name was Gordo.
Mordecai quickly pulled up his pants. He was still in his tuxedo, but the tie and jacket were gone. His barbed tail got caught on the edge of his belt, and he couldn’t pull them up all the way. He awkwardly fed the tail through the pants and fastened himself. He stood there, swaying. I could smell the alcohol wafting off of him.
It’d been twenty minutes since we left him. Twenty minutes.
“You weren’t supposed to go to a saferoom for a couple more hours,” Mordecai said. He wagged his finger. “If this is going to work, you need to listen to your manager.”
Mordecai stumbled and held out his hands, balancing like he was standing on a surfboard. “Where did those two girls and their grandma go?”
Then he vomited on the floor, sat in it, and passed out.
Gordo leaned over the counter and made a face. “This is your manager?”
“Yep,” I said.
He shook his head sadly. “You two are so dead.”
“Yep,” I said.
5
Mongo had risen to level three and almost doubled in size. He was going to be a very bright and colorful monster when he was done growing. His pink-hued feathers grew longer and thicker along his little arms, mixing in with a line of deep-red feathers. His tail also grew longer, making him appear more dinosaur-like and less like poultry. The skin around his eyes took in a bluish tone. His beak had widened and grown larger, too. A nose chomp from him now could do serious damage.
“They grow up so fast,” Donut said sadly. “He’s too big to sit on my back now.”
“Pretty soon you’re going to be able to sit on his back,” I said. I knew the real version of these things on earth weren’t as big as they were in the movies, but I could tell already that the game was growing Mongo toward a more cinematic, crowd-pleasing size.
While Mordecai snored loudly in a pile of his own vomit, Donut and I opened our boxes. We each had a Silver Earth box. We also both received a couple random achievements. I had no additional loot boxes, but Donut had a gold pet box she hadn’t yet opened. The most notable new achievement was for stumbling upon our first quest.
New achievement! It’s Elementary, My Dear Crawler!
And you thought all you had to do was bonk monsters on the head.
You’ve received a quest! Puzzles and intrigue and mysteries, oh my! If you want to survive in this world, you’re going to need to be more than just a pretty, sword-swinging barbarian. Some quests require brute strength, yes, but sometimes you also gotta use your noggin.
Reward: We don’t want you getting bored. That’s your prize.
That was interesting. If there was some sort of mystery involved, I wondered if it required us actually talking to people. If that was the case, Donut’s astronomical Charisma was going to be valuable.
Donut opened up her earth box and gasped.
She’d received three items. Two were unopened boxes that appeared to be from Amazon.com: a scented candle and a large-sized cat tree with multiple scratching posts and platforms and a round cat hammock. It was larger and fancier than the one she’d had in our apartment. I would have to put it together myself. The candle was labeled “Sea Breeze” but smelled nothing like the sea.
The third item was a potion. An Earth Hobby Potion. I read the description.
Earth Hobby Potion.
Per subsection 1256-C of the Indigenous Species Protection Act, this particular reward is required by the Syndicate Government to be awarded to all Crawlers who have chosen a domestic class.
Taking this potion is optional, however it may not be sold or transferred to other Crawlers or entities.
Upon drinking this, you will immediately obtain a Level Three skill ability in a unique, Earth-based hobby. The benefit is chosen at random, however you will not receive a skill that you currently have.
Gods, I hate it when the lawyers make me put their crap into the descriptions. Don’t you? Anyway, this could be something useful like Parkour or Jui-jitsu, or you could get fucked and receive some useless crap like Stamp Collecting or Kombucha Brewing. Don’t get your hopes up. The fact your planet was filled with so many boring assholes with inane, ridiculous hobbies tips the scales way out of your favor.