After our first encounter with those things, we had to turn back. I couldn’t fight them, not without any sort of protection for my hands. The first one we came across was a simple level two green slime. Donut and I had both already hit level seven by this point, and I figured it’d be simple as killing the bugs.
Kicking the green slime did nothing but burn my feet. I made the mistake of trying to punch the pig-sized blob, and it almost ate my arm off. As it was, I sunk elbow deep into it, and my right fingerless glove dissolved right off my hand. The right arm of my leather jacket melted away.
It ended up killing itself thanks to my Damage Reflect ability. My arm was red and bubbling and screaming with pain by the time I pulled it out of the green, gelatin mass.
I received an It burns, dunnit? achievement for that one.
Thankfully, the steel chain wrapped around my knuckles remained intact. In fact, the links appeared to gleam after the fight, as if they’d been cleaned.
I waited to heal, and we turned around, giving that neighborhood a wide berth.
It was then, as I gazed upon the next neighborhood over, that I got an idea on how to cover more ground as quickly as possible.
I pointed to the neon sign that remained blinking off the main corridor. “Da Tutorial Guild.” It looked as it had when we first arrived. “We are headed in there.”
Donut: YES O.K. THERE WILL BE MONSTERS IN THERE.
“Stop,” I said. “Please stop.”
I’d made the mistake of showing Donut the chat feature of the party menu. One could click on the party’s name, and a chat option appeared at the end of the list. For me, a virtual keyboard materialized floating before me, but after spending some time with it, I figured out how to just think the words while focusing on the chat window. Apparently Donut, as a quadruped, had a completely different interface.
When the messages came, they popped up with a haptic buzz in my brain, and it startled me every time. Donut spent a good ten minutes sending me message after nonsensical message until I finally told her to stop. She had, until now.
“Using the chat is quite enjoyable to me,” Donut said. “Now I understand why Miss Beatrice was always on her phone. I wish it was connected to the internet. I think I'd have a lot of fun on the internet.”
“It’s good to have,” I said. “But you don’t need to do it when I’m right here. It hurts my head. Also, don’t type in all caps. It makes it sound like you’re shouting.”
“Okay, fine. Be a grump,” she said as we approached the alleyway.
Thanks to Donut’s Torch spell, we didn’t need to carry a light when we entered the pitch-black corridor.
I was expecting another goblin machine to be waiting for us, but the alley was abandoned. The place smelled of machines, oil, and pineapple.
“I’m okay with killing goblins,” Donut said as we walked. “But I don’t think there’ll be stairs this close to the edge of the map. Remember what it looked like on the show? Each floor was smaller. I think we need to head east before we start seeing stairs.”
“We’re not going to kill the goblins,” I said, indicating the tattoo on my forearm, which still appeared on the exterior of my intact left jacket arm. “Not if we don’t have to.” We eased our way down the alley, keeping an eye out for red dots.
It didn’t take long. We turned a corner, and three level two goblins approached, all brandishing pineapple sticks.
“What is with the goblins and their fruit?” Donut asked as they approached, screeching.
“I don’t know,” I said. “It’s weird.”
Before they got too close, I lifted my arm, showing the tattoo. “I have free passage through this area!”
The goblins all stopped at that. The moment I showed them the mark, their dots turned from red to white. They lowered their weapons and looked at one another, as if confused about what to do next. They started gibbering in their language. Finally, one turned toward me.
“Where you get that mark, human?”
I had a carefully-prepared answer. Hopefully they would…
“He blew up one of your filthy tractors and smeared three of your friends all over the cobblestones,” Donut declared. She pointed daintily south. “They’re in that next neighborhood over if you want to scoop ‘em up.”
“Goddamnit, Donut,” I whispered. The goblins stared at us with a slack-jawed gaze of incredulity. “Let me do the talking. I’m the one with the brand.”
“And I’m the one with the 37 in charisma,” said Donut. “They’re not going to care. Watch this.” She started walking toward one of three goblins. “You, sweetheart,” she said. “What’s your name?”
“Uh, I don’t…” the goblin began. “I don’t think I have a name.”
“Most unfortunate,” Donut said. “Hmm. I’m going to call you B.A.” She looked at the other two goblins. “And you guys are Face and Murdock.” She looked back at me. “Remind me why we’re here again?”
“I want to talk to some of the goblin engineers,” I said.
“B.A., be a love and show us to some of your engineers. I do believe they’re the gentlemen who wear culinary items upon their heads.”
“Uh, okay. Yes, ma’am,” B.A. the goblin said.
“Wait,” Donut said.
“Yeah?” B.A. said.
Donut indicated the tiara on her head. “It’s not ma’am. It’s Princess Donut. You got that, B.A.?”
“Um, okay. Okay, Princess Donut.” He turned and started marching further north into the dungeon.
“What the actual fuck?” I hissed at the cat. “How… Did you know that was going to happen?”
“It’s simple,” Donut said as we walked. “Mordecai told me that the higher my charisma is, the easier it will be to get them to do what I want. As long as they can speak and their dots aren’t red and they aren’t a boss or a really high level, I can control them just like I control you. Mordecai says for the first four or five floors, I can talk anybody into anything. How do you think I’ve been getting Tally to give me five plates of salmon this whole time?”
As we walked, we passed several groups of level two goblins. We also saw a few types I hadn’t seen before:
Goblin Bomb Bard. Level 5.
These bastards are more unhinged and sadistic than those guys who couldn’t pass the psych exam to join the military. Bomb Bards are experts with explosives, and they strike with a variety of ranged attacks that’ll blow your socks off. If the one you’re looking at right now has more than half of his fingers, then he’s probably very, very dangerous.
One of the bomb bards glared at us as we passed. The goblin, indeed, had all of his fingers. He tossed a small, glass ball up in the air, catching it absently as we marched past. Each of the level twos on either side of him cringed each time the glass ball went up in the air.
We turned another corner, and we entered a large workshop. At the end of this room was a wooden door, and based on the minimap, I immediately determined beyond that door was the lair of yet another neighborhood boss. It appeared this next room over was almost identical in shape to that of the Hoarder.
I looked about the expansive workshop. We were surrounded by about 25 of the engineers and a smattering of others, including two level seven “shamankas” who stood guarding the far wall. The engineers all wore something odd on their heads, but it wasn’t always pots and pans. One wore what appeared to be a hockey helmet. Another sported one of those padded helmets worn by boxers.
A massive steam engine dominated the western wall, and the engineers crawled about it like ants. Wheels and cogs whirled and chugged away. On the opposite side of the room stood a line of six parked goblin murder dozers. These also crawled with goblin engineers. Multiple tables covered with tools and giant, greasy parts lay scattered about the room. A vast pile of coal stood in the far corner near the boss room.