The naga didn’t re-aggro me until it had returned to its own original aggro area, at which point it hissed and made a beeline for me. I jumped across the lava river to land in front of it. Once again, I didn’t do a thing as it hit me with its claw.

  It recoiled as the Afraid status triggered again. I grinned. I could have kissed the thing.

  But I didn’t kiss it. I punched it, releasing the damage I’d stored from its own strike. As it tried to spin around to run due to the Afraid status, I stomped the ground, doing meager damage to it with Rock Tumble. This made it stumble, and that gave bonus damage to my next hit with the club. It reeled back with a pained cry as the words Critical Hit appeared faintly above the point of impact.

  Next, I kicked it right in its fiery chest, dropping it. Where anyone else would take fire damage from that, I took nothing.

  The creature managed to get a quick spell in, but another solid bash from the club caved its head in. It whiffed away in a puff of black smoke.

  I stood there, breathing hard, and checked its loot. A smile split my face as I found my third Magma Direplate.

  “I don’t get it,” Dave said. He continued to patrol above us, but his voice came through clearly, like always. “Why did you aggro it twice?”

  “I wanted to see if Knuckle-Cracker could trigger twice on the same enemy,” I said. “And it can. If I leave aggro range, it resets, and the creature’s next attack will act as if it is its first attack on me, all over again.”

  “Okaaayyy… but that’s not that useful, is it? You aren’t going to go around aggroing and un-aggroing the same critters left and right. That would be pointless. You only get experience from killing them, not kiting them.”

  I shrugged as I pocketed the loot. “You never know.”

  “And do Hunters even have an aggro range?” Dave mused. “I don’t know if that trick will work on Hunters.”

  I nodded. I couldn’t count on that, either, and he was wise to point it out.

  I jogged back to the pile of loot from the pack of four dead nagas, poked through it, then took it all. Then, I said, “Watch the HUD.”

  “What are you up to now?”

  I didn’t answer. I just scanned the area with my eyes, checked the HUD to be safe, and opened my equipment menu. I then rushed to equip all the Magma Dire armor I could—some gloves, boots, and a belt. Naturally, I couldn’t put on a leg, head, or chest piece.

  Most of the pieces gave fire resistance and a few points of armor, but the Magma Direplate was unique. It gave 10% additional HP for each armor piece I wore in the set. When I hovered it over my chest slot, it populated 40% HP, showing that I’d be getting that much HP gain if I equipped it.

  Instead, I opened up the NerveGear’s info-box with my other hand. I flicked down to the bottom, where the Lucky Socks upgrade showed up. It had a prompt: Sacrifice Item?

  If you come across this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.

  Thanks to this World Tree upgrade, I could sacrifice three of any Red grade item to the NerveGear, and it would take on one stat from the sacrificed item. I could have waited to see if better Red items appeared, but

  After I swiped for yes, a three-slot inventory screen appeared. I dropped the Magma Direplate in, and the other two copies in my inventory automatically populated beside it. Nifty.

  I checked the item one last time. Its bonus read 10% again. I frowned, but I sacrificed all three of the plates anyway. 10% was still useful.

  They vanished, and the screen went away. I scrolled back up to the NerveGear’s main stats:

  Immunity to Plasma (Fire, Lightning, Void)

  +40% HP

  I laughed and closed the box. It had given me the 40% after all. Looks like armor-set bonuses still work when items get sacrificed. I filed that away for future use, although I didn’t know if I’d ever be able to upgrade the NerveGear again. Upgrading the World Tree along the same branch didn’t guarantee that, after all.

  “Holy dachshund balls,” Dave said. “You got all that from sacrificing a Red -grade item?”

  I chuckled and re-equipped my better armor. The 40% stat didn’t change.

  “Modern problems require modern solutions,” I said.

  “Mmm. That sounds rehearsed.”

  “It’s from an old meme,” I told him, closing the equipment screen. “You wouldn’t be able to relate.”

  “What’s a meme?”

  “Pictures with pithy quotes on them. Lore used to collect them off old computers we found in the—”

  “Fuck!”

  Dave’s cry made me whirl, and I caught a flurry of his feathers as something dropped out of the sky. I swung my club to keep the object from hitting me.

  My heart thundered. I checked the HUD. This thing had attacked Dave. It must have come from Bridget, then, so she had to be close—

  “You little fuckers!” Dave raged. “Errgghh! They do it every time!”

  He sounded pissed, but not worried. My pulse quieted in my ears, and I lowered the club a fraction. My gaze fell to the object.

  It was a box. Wrapped in paper. Tied up with a bow.

  “Is that… is that a drop?” I said.

  Dave landed on my upraised club. “Yeah. A fan drop. They come in the open world instead of the vaults.” He angrily plucked a loose green feather off his wing and spat it out again. “The bastards always pay extra to try to hit me with it. I swear, the Conduit added that feature solely to capitalize on all my ex-girlfriends.”

  I chuckled a little weakly and stepped over to the box. I felt suddenly wary of it.

  “Are they safe to open?” I asked. “No pranks?”

  “Oh, no, they can totally bomb you. But the bomb has to have a five-second timer, at least, and it can only trigger when you open it. And those are crazy expensive. Like, hire-a-hitman-to-kill-your-mother-in-law expensive.”

  I stood over the gift for a long moment, plotting all the ways I would get the hells away from it. A good old-fashioned pitch should work.

  “Should I wait? Open it somewhere safer?”

  Dave eyed me. “Do you really trust my advice on that?”

  Silence descended, heavy and obvious. He knew that I knew that he wanted me dead, at least before I could Conscript anyone else.

  To his credit, he didn’t deny it. I didn’t know if that meant he meant me no harm, or if he didn’t think I’d believe him anyway.

  “Fuck it,” I said. I reached for the box. I pulled open the ribbon fast, and found that the box had a lid. I tore it off.

  I kept my eyes peeled for numbers, for countdowns, for beeping.

  My heart stopped at what I saw instead.

  The world spun. The smoke and haze swirled past me. I felt dizzy. I was holding my breath.

  There, on a pad of cotton batting, was a necktie. It had rubber duckies printed all over it.

  “Oooh! A trinket,” Dave said. “If it’s any good, we can replace your Riftguard Amulet with it. What does it do?”

  I stared at it. At the little orange rubber beaks.

  “Talon…?” Dave said. “What’s got your panties in a sailor’s knot, kid?”

  I swallowed, then took the tie out of the box. I didn’t open its info-box. I just looked at it.

  Remnant: It’s from my brother.

  Remnant: It’s from Lore.