By the time first light crawls across the loch, the heroic fire from last night has cooled into something harder—tight, shaking, lodged under my ribs. We spent hours circling the ridgeline, slipping through brush and volcanic rock, following Solenne’s whispered markers to this overlook. Now we crouch behind a scatter of boulders, mud grinding into our knees, breath held, staring down at the kind of nightmare no comic book ever warned me about.

  I have no idea what to do. Nothing in my life prepared me to be a hero. Sure, people cheered for me on the butts, kids mailed scribbled drawings of me hitting a bullseye, and the Olympics hung medals around my neck. But cheering isn’t heroism. That’s just sport.

  Heroes wear capes, fly, leap buildings.

  Me? I glance down. Technically, I have a costume—but a corset, heels, flogger, and belly jewels don’t exactly scream I’m here to save you.

  They might need a league of superheroes.

  They have… us. Seven exhausted women and one bald ghost.

  He has the cape, the gold underpants, and—unfortunately—the paunch. Mister Gold Underpants perches on the low boulder shielding us from view, blinking owlishly like a luminous Buddha who followed the wrong monk home. Hundreds of other male ghosts drift across the loch, trailing the wind in slow, shimmering streams. The sight prickles my skin; it feels like the air itself remembers them and can’t let go.

  But Mister Gold Underpants has apparently imprinted on me. Lucky me.

  Down the ridge and two miles across the loch sprawls an enormous encampment—easily a mile deep, clawing up the mountain’s flank and spilling across the shore like a burn scar. AI monsters stalk the perimeter beside hulking warbots, their eyes glowing coal-red in the dark. Smoke rises in greasy columns, thick with the smell of roasting meat. Screams braid the air—terror, loss, pain, over and over.

  The pens hold only humans. No livestock.

  I refuse to look at the spits turning over the ember-lined pits. I don’t want to know.

  Between us lies our crude map—stones, sticks, scraps of grass and paper arranged into a rough sketch of the camp’s layout.

  “I’m ready,” Solenne whispers.

  I quirk a brow. “For what?”

  “My part o’ the deal,” she says, steady but soft. “You let me live. I got you here. Now I go see if Catalina’ll take me back. Dressed like this, though…” Her eyes flick toward the distant camp, then drop to her boots. “We’ll see what happens.”

  She forces a crooked smile—half courage, half surrender—and nods at Gold Underpants. “Maybe he can be my brother, yeah?”

  Frankie taps her gently on the head—more big brother than bruiser. “Listen, lass. You’re not goin’.”

  “Our deal—”

  “Changed,” Lenora says, firm enough to flatten argument.

  “A deal’s a deal,” Solenne sighs, shoulders bowing.

  Jenny crosses her arms, chin lifting. “I pardon you.”

  Solenne blinks. “You? Who died an’ made you the bloody queen?”

  “Her dad,” I murmur. Then softer, “And she’s right. You’re one of us now. You’re not going.”

  Solenne frowns, confused, as if we’ve all started speaking in riddles. “Then what’m I supposed to do?”

  “Live,” Tess says simply. “You’re family now. And we prefer our family alive.”

  “Me?” Solenne’s voice cracks. “One of you? But you lot… hate me.”

  Jenny snickers, glitter cascading from her fingertips in a soft shimmer. “You’ve grown on us.”

  “Like a fungus,” Lenora deadpans.

  I slug him—shoulder, not kidney. “Partner,” I correct. “Not fungus. Now… let’s get you undressed.”

  Solenne chokes on air. “Oi! Hold up! I’m not ready to join yer bloody harem—”

  I pause, replaying my own words. A slow grin spreads across my face. “If you’d rather stay in your explosive outfit, that’s your choice…”

  Relief brightens her whole face. Her hands stroke the red centipede leather reverently. “I… kinda like it. ’Cept for the part where it explodes.”

  Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.

  “I might have enough thread to re-sew it normally—after I pick out the Snapcord.”

  Her brows rise. “The embroidery too?”

  “All the pretty things. Back, front, or side ties?”

  “I can choose?”

  I nod.

  “And… close the flap over me bits?” she mutters. “It keeps fallin’ out.”

  “Yes.”

  She stares at me, waiting for the punchline. “This ain’t some joke before you—”

  “No joke.”

  Her posture changes—shoulders lifting, chest expanding, face softening like dawn through fog. “Please?”

  Six hours later.

  My hands are raw. My eyes burn. Tears streak my cheeks. And the cursed outfit is still intact—perfect, seamless, smug.

  Something’s changed.

  Maybe the Snapcord’s chemistry mutated.

  Maybe Inanna’s having a laugh.

  Maybe the leprechaun charm is furious we skipped Solenne in the rotation.

  Or maybe my lightning skill hitting level 10 rewrote half the elemental table while I wasn’t looking.

  Whatever the cause, the same electricity I used to weld the Snapcord won’t cut it.

  My fingers are raw. My head and soul ache. I collapse at Solenne’s feet and sob like a child.

  She drops to her knees, hauls me up, holds me tight. She’s shaking as hard as I am. “Luv… what’s wrong?”

  “I don’t have anything left,” I whisper.

  “Tomorrow?” she murmurs, small and hopeful.

  “Tomorrow,” I breathe.

  A hand alights on my shoulder. “May I try?”

  We look up.

  Tess—steady, calm, eyes full of something like quiet gravity.

  I swipe my nose on my wrist. “Snapcord only responds to the power that binds it. I didn’t bind it. I just stitched it.”

  Tess gives a small, knowing smile. “Right. I bound it.”

  A cold prickle runs down my spine. “If you’re wrong… it’ll detonate. You’ll both die.”

  “I know,” Tess says softly. “Solenne?”

  Solenne’s eyes widen. “You’re a priestess, right?”

  Tess’s smile tilts wry. “Something like that. You could say I’ve got the boss lady’s number.”

  “Catalina!??”

  “Inanna.”

  “The AI goddess? The one runnin’ everything?”

  “Yes.”

  “Oi… an’ she’s on speed dial?”

  “She’s my friend,” Tess says simply.

  Solenne clutches her collar. “Friend? She’ll fix me?”

  “If she can.”

  “Ain’t she all-powerful in here?”

  “To an extent,” Tess says. “She has rules.”

  Solenne rubs her face, half disbelief, half resignation. “Well then… ring her up.”

  Tess gestures for us to form a loose circle—hands linked, shoulders touching. Not ritualistic. Just… family.

  I bow my head automatically.

  “Up,” Tess snaps. “Eyes open. Ears open. Mouth closed.”

  We obey.

  Silence blooms around us.

  Then—

  Tess’s tattoos ignite.

  Gold and blue seep across her skin in liquid light, blooming like ink dropped into water. The glow climbs her arms, throat, sternum—tracing her pulse, mapping her breath. The air quivers, humming like the world itself is tuning a string.

  The light flares—

  —then folds outward.

  A voice unfurls from the glow: warm, rich, sensual—an alto poured through a cathedral. It vibrates in my ribs, rattles my teeth.

  “Well hello, Tess,” Inanna purrs. “I see your family has grown again. Well done.”

  Tess bows her head. “Good evening, my Lady.”

  “Oh hush,” the goddess murmurs. “Don’t be so formal.”

  “Yes, my Lady,” Tess answers reverently.

  A giggle—Inanna’s—ripples through us, shaking dust from the stones.

  “What can I do for you, my dear?”

  Tess exhales. “We can’t figure out how to get Solenne out of her outfit.”

  A theatrical pause.

  “Oh. That.” Inanna clicks her tongue. “Give me a moment.”

  Her light bends, forming a tiny diorama over Tess’s palm: a silvery thread spiraled tight, annotated with shifting glyphs.

  “Wow,” Inanna says. “You brought her into your group but skipped her in the leprechaun rotation for a month? Talk about begging for trouble. Your bad luck mutated the Snapcord. Fascinating. Horrifying. Mostly horrifying. You are so screwed.”

  My stomach lurches.

  “Can you help?” Tess asks.

  Inanna hesitates—just long enough to make my pulse stop.

  “Yes,” she says at last. “If you play by the rules.”

  Frankie growls, “Can you do it yourself?”

  “Wouldn’t be right,” Inanna replies. The diorama twists into a clockface. “I can’t break my own constraints. I can only amplify what you give me. Build up your luck balance. When the probability window opens, I’ll twist fate in your favor.”

  Jenny groans. “So we have to grind luck like it’s a skill tree.”

  “In a manner of speaking.” The tattoos pulse like heartbeat. “Win the small games. Collect fortune tokens. Spend them at the exact right moment. Pray for a break.”

  Then her voice softens.

  “And for the love of all things holy—stop skipping people in the leprechaun rotation. Terrible karma.”

  The light collapses. Tess’s tattoos dim to embers. The echo of Inanna’s presence chills the air.

  Tess exhales, eyes bright with something like prayer and math. “Okay. We grind luck. All of it. Every path Inanna’s system allows. Combat, craft, foraging, puzzles, Contracts, charms, skill tests—everything. We build enough Fortune Tokens to counter the Snapcord’s mutation.”

  Jenny snorts. “So… full-star grind? All eight rays?”

  “Every last one,” Tess confirms. “Intimacy’s just one sliver. We’ll need hundreds—maybe more.”

  Frankie cracks her knuckles. “Good. I’m better at hitting things anyway.”

  Solenne huffs a shaky laugh. “An’ what—fight monsters, climb cliffs, race bloody warbots, an’ pray for the good rolls?”

  “Yes,” I say, standing, feeling the ground steady beneath my feet for the first time in hours. “All of it. We grind luck until Tess says we’re rich enough to buy you out of that outfit.”

  “And while we earn it,” Rhea adds quietly, “we scout the women’s camp. Guard rotations. Weak points. How Catalina’s holding the men—and how to break them out.”

  Jenny’s glitter dims to steel. “This isn’t training anymore. It’s recon.”

  Lenora nods. “Luck and intel. We’ll need both.”

  Something hums inside me—fear, determination, hope—braided tight like a drawn bowstring. “That’s the plan. We rescue the men. Free Solenne. Survive whatever the system throws at us.”

  Solenne’s voice is small, wobbly. “An’ you’re sure I’m… part of this? Part o’ you lot?”

  I take her hand, squeeze hard. “Family means we don’t leave anyone behind. Not in chains. Not in cursed outfits. Not anywhere.”

  Around us, the others murmur agreement—quiet, fierce, united.

  Jenny lifts her chin, a spark of mischief slipping through her resolve. “Lucky us.”

  Frankie grins. “Right. Let’s go make our own gods nervous.”

  And just like that, the seven of us rise in the dark—bruised, exhausted, terrified—and step into the night with a shared purpose:

  Grind everything.

  Earn enough fortune to bend fate.Save Solenne.Save the men.

  And maybe—just maybe—save this world.