Ma wasn’t very happy when it rained. Not because she didn’t like the drops splattering over her head, but Pa, Add…Adrian, and I would inspect the dirt for any pests that only made themselves visible in the rain.

  Well, they would. Pa and Adrian, I mean. They’d go up and down the rows, looking at the insects in case there was an infestation of Corn Larvae or something like that.

  The way rain, and well, soil moisture works is that rain doesn’t just disappear. It seeps into the dirt and tries to find small pockets of air to overtake. Ma said that in theory, it just makes the soil damp – but in practice, it floods out the shoddy tunnels and cavernous hives that the insects below made.

  Crickets are burrowing animals, you know. So are pill bugs, and ants – while they don’t burrow – their tunnels are quick to flood during a rainstorm, which causes them all to spread out on the surface.

  And that’s not even getting me started with the worms! Those wiggly, squiggly things would writhe in puddles, as happy as their simple internal systems could make them be.

  Ma wasn’t happy with cleaning out the dirt, mud, and other debris that we’d drag in. It’d also make my makeshift shoes wet, soaking the parched leather, and then flooding my socks and toes.

  Ophelia’s boots had no such flaw. I laced the black drawstrings tightly over the dark leather, and as I stepped into the salt water of the Den of the Drowned, the only part that was getting soaked was where my tibia – the shinbone – was uncovered above my boots. Well, actually I think this is what Jasmine referred to as stockings?

  Torment, the entire getup was rather nice. Ophelia’s sense of fashion was different from mine – in the sense it existed. The front was a dark-brown tailored bodice, snug and clinging to my skin that could be made ‘tighter’ with the ribbing in the back. The neckline was scandalously low, carving into the shape of an upside down heart – a sweetheart neckline. The very center of the dark-brown bodice was a shining red gem, which acted as the centre point for both vision… and where the surcoat and accruments connected.

  Atop of the bodice was a gray and black surcoat, sliding over my arms and giving me some warmth and covering over the skin. It felt like puff sleeves with how smooth they were, and they connected well to the mantle that really gave that aristocratic look. The coat extended past the boy-shorts that hugged my hips, and looked like an open-front skirt. The black and gray swirled around together.

  The only part that I didn’t have was the red ribbon. Myrrh offered to tie it on for me when she saw how the System dressed me, but I was already running out of time.

  “First time in a Lair, Necessity?” Vesper called, her voice echoing off the walls. It bounced twice, before I realized I was meant to respond.

  “Mmm…” I considered the question. I technically went through a goblin Lair before, but I wasn’t really hunting anything. I was just looking for a way through.

  I wonder how Wizex and Laertes were doing.

  Surprisingly, Vesper didn’t say anything, and when I finally caught up to her she was out of breath. Again.

  “Well?” she asked.

  “I thought about it.”

  Vesper side-eyed me as her own boots splashed into the salt-water. “Ha ha, very funny. The Whispers are always on, Ashley, but they’re never in like… a person’s voice. It’s like people telling me what people are thinking. At the rate they’re thinking it. I can hear a man talk about his crush on his second grade classmate at the same time I hear a boy thinking of how drunk he can get off this paycheck. At the same time! And here? It’s just ‘brains brains brains brains brains’!”

  The thought alone was funny to me, and I couldn’t suppress my body catching along to a laugh. “Yeah. I constantly hear and see death around me. I can focus and see how lively someone is, but…”

  “You just always have an idea of where dead things are?”

  “Yeah! I mean, this place is filled with it, and there’s quite a few downstairs.”

  “Ashley,” Vesper began.

  “...And there’s actually some near us too…” I continued.

  “Ashley!” Vesper said again.

  “Like…”

  “...Behind this door, duck, near?!” Vesper said, and ducked.

  “Ye–” my chest crumpled inwards and I coughed out blood. The damp scent of saltwater spread around me, being overpowered by the coppery-scent of blood. That was also the same taste I had in my mouth, as my head dunked underneath the water we were traversing. My throat spasmed, trying to both expel the seawater from my lungs… and replace it with oxygen.

  Dirt crashed against the surface of the water, and my conscious brain took over. I stopped gulping in saltwater and just rolled – slowly, held back by the sand as if it were part of the conspiracy. I only managed a halfroll, half of my face and body still in the water, as something crashed right beside me.

  Quickly, I lifted myself up and my head went sideways. Air and thoughts were getting hard to keep, and my breathing forced out pained gasps from the shattered rib cage. Vision slowly adjusted, and in front of me, in the ‘blackening’ salt-water was a ripped apart… thing.

  It should have been a [Zombie]. It’s skin was raggedy, stretched against the bone, and barely wished to remain. There were noticeable holes in the ‘pelt’, showing off the musculature that was strengthened with Anima.

  But the parts of it that weren’t like a [Zombie] were far more pronounced. Barnacles created a hive-armor against the left side, which was accented by a starfish sucking on the thing’s open brain. The skin, while raggedy, was blue and bloating in spots; squiggly black lines danced in those postulates.

  Torment!

  I pushed backwards as the postulate exploded! A spray of writhing worms thrashed in the air, smacking right into the water and beginning to swim away.

  “Ashley! Get the other one!” Vesper yelled, her ink-tentacle returning back to her arm. It dripped black blood, staining the stone, cavernous walls. I looked back down to see the [Drowned] torn from the waist, both ends pooling that black blood into the ocean water.

  My hand jolted forward, instinctively in the way I knew. Green Tethers formed in the distance, as my eyes locked with the other [Drowned].

  It was more skeletal in appearance with far more visible bone. Its eyeball had glossed over, and the wispy hair was locked underneath a moldy, ruined, red bandana that had become the start for a colony of barnacles. Its jaw creaked open as the five tithes formed.

  The [Drowned] groaned as its necrotic legs dragged itself closer to me. It’s spasming arms raised up…

  …and hurled a dagger!

  I was waiting for that. I had my suspicions that the [Drain Life] was going to be functionally useless on things that weren’t basic creatures.

  I slammed my body back into the stone wall; the dagger hissing in the air beside me. It collided with the floor, clanging uselessly away. I weaved my hands as the Abyssal Dagger came from the void; its heat burning away the scent of salt and blood. It whistled in the air, following both my guidance, but its own inner will.

  There was no ‘tug’ on the Symphony as it pushed into the [Drowned]’s skull. Just the continuous forward motion. Bone, Skin, remaining organ-matter hissed into vapour, melting and becoming ash in the same moment.

  The dagger appeared back in my hand, and I heaved. Shakenly, I pulled out Madeleine’s backpack and pulled out the third healing potion. My hand raised to my chest to feel my ribs – and they were definitely broken. I uncorked it, and allowed that disgusting cherry taste inside my mouth again.

  “Hey, put these in too, won't ya?” Vesper said, crouching besides the corpses and taking their weapons, coins, and even one new potion!

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  “I don’t think the dagger or club is a good fit,” I said, but took the potions and coins. They disappeared with no clink down the hole.

  “Amaril, you are new. Like I asked, first Lair?” Vesper said, angrily picking up the weapons and even armor they were wearing and just dumping it in my bag.

  My bag fit it all in, and didn’t feel heavier. Where in the Plains was this when I was harvesting crops?!

  “No.. second. I went through a goblin Lair once, it’s where I met Wizex.”

  “Sweet! What was the Lair room like?”

  “The what?”

  Vesper shook her head, muttering the word ‘virgins’ under her breath. “Monsters, if you aren’t aware, [Necromancer], have a [Lair] that guards [Treasure]. Us [Hero] types want that, unless you — oh Amaril, you were serious. Are you actually a [Farmer]?”

  I slowly nodded.

  Vesper bent over with laughter, before approaching me and raising her hand. It slid forward, but I quickly pushed myself away, letting her pat nothing on the back.

  “Of course the Goddess of Change selects her next ‘daughter’ to be a [Farmer]. I can see why Whispers was convinced I should hitch on with you.” Vesper finished, before standing up. “Okay, so… for us normal types that adventure, we want to kill the monsters, loot the bodies, slay the [Boss], and take the treasure.”

  I watched her as she talked. My hand idly felt my chest again that it was healed, but a healing potion wasn’t actually that cheap. Well, I guess it was now.

  But if I even had one of these earlier, my life in Oakheart would have been easier.

  “I… okay. But, like… Wizex swore loyalty to me. These things are [Undead]. Can’t I, you know, convince Lorelai too?”

  “You want to [Overtake] it? You’re more than welcome to try. I think that’s the only real way a [Cult] can grow? Say, have you already overtaken Flowers-By-The-River?” Vesper asked.

  “No. That’s… actually why I’m here. I’m supposed to kill Bazerie, so I can start my own underground market,” I explained.

  The two of us stood up, but I stopped her from moving forward.

  “Bazerie,” Vesper asked. She turned to the side and nodded. “Ah, [The Countess], or [The Blood Witch] as she’s calling herself. Fun! I’ve always wanted to kill a mobster.”

  There were two bodies in front of me. One had a rather fine hole through its head, but the other was torn in two.

  The Abyssal Dagger appeared in my hand, and I sliced my palm. Dark, crimson blood spilled atop of the [Drowned], and the Symphony tightened.

  Howling winds of winter mixed with the dirge of death. The Major notes of the Necromancer were the same; the unending, the unmoving, the static domain of winter. But the Harvester was carnage. It was blood, it was fury. It was death, and the joy thereof. It tasted so sweet, and felt like the warmth of a fresh kill bleeding its final drops atop of you.

  The whirling crescendo weaved into the [Drowned], and its body reassembled. The pierced hole through its skull reassembled, and its glossy eyes reanimated with a deep, emerald green flame.

  The second one however required my attention. I could connect its body together to make one thing, but that’d just make a second zombie…

  “So, you’re willing to help me kill Bazerie? Just like that?” I tested Vesper.

  She nodded. “I am going to join your Cult, anyways, Sister Necessity. I’m just a bit early to secure my place.”

  “You keep calling me that, but isn’t it the Sweetest Daughter? Or even Death’s Daughter?” I asked, and turned my attention back to the bodies.

  I could grow bones. It was true I could repair it for a second Drowned, I wanted to….

  Experiment.

  I pulled out my book and found a spot near the wall. Vesper was amused, but came beside me and took a seat. “I can use a rest too, I guess,” she reasoned.

  I was about to sketch, but Vesper spoke first. “I didn’t know you were the Death’s Daughter. Killed a bunch of kids at Lyric Bay, from what the rumours said. Why though?”

  I bit my lip, stopping myself from entering a manic anger. Instead, I sketched.

  I wanted something different. I could just keep remaking zombies and the ilk, but that’d be the same tool over and over again. Instead, why not make something that solves the issue Vesper and I are having, and can aid the one [Drowned] I had?

  I liked crabs. If I split the cage apart and expanded the bones, I could make it scuttle outwards like legs. I could then extend the legs backwards and carve out pieces of the Tibia to act as ammunition. If I reconnected it through the esophagus, and connected it through the gasses in the stomach… a makeshift propulsion system?

  The high concept was easy, but Vesper and I sat in silence; me refusing to answer the question, and her deciding to steal my romance novel and read it for herself.

  It took 45 minutes as the ocean weaved up and down, but… medically, this was right. Chemically? I’m not sure, but if it didn’t work the way I thought naturally – at the end of the day, I was making a complicated way to fling bones and make a crab/scorpion like creature.

  It was going to be an [Abomination] either way, and I had other spells that could fill in the gaps.

  The bones cracked and weaved together. The rib cage splayed out like legs, clacking over the ground in hasty steps. The arms became sharp, strong scythes, and the head and spine reattached to the ‘battery’ of two legs-made-stingers.

  My brain burned. Worse than anything I had ever felt, and my connection with the world shattered. Drool poured out of my mouth, and even think was hard.

  Vesper eyed me.

  Mouth opened and closed. I nod, trying to focus.

  She looked at me and rolled her eyes. Pulled out blue glass thingy from pouch. Uncorked it.

  Handed it to me.

  I held it.

  She groaned, and pushed against my mouth.

  Blueberries.

  Sludge!

  Disgusting SLUDGE!

  Vesper's hands remained, forcing me to drink the Potion of Symphony fully, and my thoughts slowly returned. “How are ya feeling, girl?” she asked.

  “Thanks,” I said, turning towards my creation. The crab-scorpion-undead creature walked around, scuttling beside the standing [Drowned].

  So, the less medically or naturally sound it was, the harder it was for me to create. Poor things must require so much Anima to exist.

  I wouldn’t need it for too long.

  Vesper helped me up, but then held onto my arm. “You wanna know what I think happened, Necessity?”

  I groaned, but let her talk.

  “You got in your own head and figured that’s what a [Necromancer] has to do since they’re a [Necromancer]. But look at me! I’m an [Oracle] and I have given zero Prophecies! I have also only been in TWO orgies for a [Cultist]. The trick is, you can do what ya want. Good, or evil.”

  I frowned at her explanation, but followed beside her. The two undead I had created led the way in the spiralling, descending caves.

  “So, what, just do anything I want, and never a Quest?” I asked her.

  Vesper shook her head, stepping over the mossy rocks that littered the descent. “When I was thirteen, Mom and I had been part of a caravan going from one dead-end town to another. This was, of course, on the way to find a new husband, and a few years after mom tried to kill me for being the village freak who knew everyone’s secrets.”

  I steeled myself for her story, but watched my two creations lead the way. They couldn’t be more different. The [Drowned] seemed at ease, pushing slowly and steadily. But the [Abomination], the… [Crawler] was in constant pain, its raspy voice heaving in and out.

  “And?” I prodded.

  “Well, yeah, we were raided by some [Bandits]. You know, non-people, non-citizens. That’s where I met, of all names in the world, Tim Hallows. A [Bandit]. Interesting last name, right? Yeah, Pa adopted me. Well. More like… Mom tried to sell me off for her freedom, and Pa found that so disgusting that he kicked the vile woman out and kept me as his daughter. Said that even as a bandit, family was important, and any parent willing to sacrifice their children instead of themselves was barely a human.”

  “Seems like a nice man?”

  “I’d hope not. He liked murdering unarmed civilians mostly by making them strip, tying their ankles together, and letting them ‘run’ out of the encampment. He’d give them thirty seconds before using a composite bow with blunted, wooden arrows. And I think some of his members were rapists? That side was kept away from me.”

  “...What am I supposed to say to that, Vesper?” I bluntly asked.

  “That he was an awful man, but a good father to me. And that’s kind of the balance you have to live in. I see my Mom as a sinner, and Pa, for all his faults, as The Dreamer’s Gift to a scared young girl. I know, objectively, he’s evil, but…” she gave a half shrug.

  “That doesn’t really make me feel better about Lyric Bay though.”

  “It shouldn’t! You’re human, and not a psychopath. Or is it Sociopath? I don’t remember. You’ll find everyone’s line in the sand is flexible, and you found something you hate. Don’t do it again, and if your God tells you to do it, the God is wrong, not you. If The Final task the Dreamers have is to Kill Pa, well, I guess they wasted their time selecting me as their [Oracle].” Vesper happily said.

  I nodded, and as much as I wished to continue the conversation, the cavernous descent opened into a yawning maw.

  A whirlpool in the center of a limestone room, with hundreds of [Drowned] around and stuck to the wall. In the water, the Drowned Queen swam.

  Vesper and I nodded at each other, and the Dagger flew back to my hand.