Chương 218: Chapter 470: Pretty, Tasty Flowers

Ozzy was leaning against the bony carcass of Hungry Dog and catching his breath, thankful that he no longer had holes in his lungs. Rolly had done what he could to patch him up, and Suzette had given him three of her best healing potions. He drank the last of the three down, getting his health above 50%.

"I may have gotten a little overconfident. We were clearing those Gristle Daemons so easily. But that damned dog thing wasn't letting go once it got ahold of me." Suzette pulled a fourth potion from her bag and tossed it to him, saying, "I think those were the rats." Rolly nodded, "Or weak immature goblins, maybe large beetles. You know, the trash mobs at the start of the dungeon. This is a Tier 4 dungeon, and it will get tougher as we go down into it.

We were clearing out the trash mobs, and Hungry Dog was a minor boss at the start of the dungeon. We haven't hit the tough stuff yet. Dungeons are made to chew up adventuring parties, and we've got some weaknesses as well as strengths. I think we did well against that boss, most groups would be wiped out, especially if they didn't have a type of magic that could damage it or a good necromancer. On the bright side, we may have some sweet Tier four loot coming our way." Ozzy conceded the point.

"Time I should start getting more serious about things, then. The monsters are just going to get nastier the further we go. But first, we need to rescue Ben from whatever situation he's in." He started walking down the hallway, Rolly keeping pace and Squirmie scouting ahead.

"Right behind you." Suzette kept close to Ozzy's back and had her hounds keep watch behind them. She wished her little fairies had come with her, but they were terrified of the Pit. She'd given them another important job, scouting the area around Sedgewick for any sign that Winter was moving into the area. The part of the dungeon they were entering was different. The rough stone walls had heavy lichen growing in places, and where dirt had accumulated in corners, mushrooms had sprouted.

Spiderwebs were everywhere, but the spiders were only the size of apples and didn't seem aggressive. They followed the scents of flowers and sausages to where the corridor opened up. Squirmie was hovering in mid-air, looking into a large room filled with piles of rotting meat and decaying bodies with a well-trodden path down the center. Growing from the piles were vines with large yellow flowers that slowly rotated to point at the group.

The vines that grew across the floor and up the walls were slowly moving in their direction, and the vines hanging from the ceiling were drooping lower. The large yellow flowers expelled puffs of yellow pollen that moved toward them, filling the air with a sickly sweet scent. <Squirmie doesn't like these flowers. Stay back. And things are moving under those piles. > Despite the bug's warning, Rolly continued walking straight towards the flowers, and Ozzy followed, large smiles on their unconcerned faces.

"Pretty... tasty flowers..." <NO! Bad pet! Bad! Mustn't eat the flowers! You don't know where they've been! > Suzette knew she wasn't strong enough to stop Ozzy. Silverthorn vines sprouted from the dirt in the corridor and bound around his ankles, tugging him backward and anchoring him in place. Ozzy wasn't pulling hard, and she was able to stop him, but the vines were inching their way. Squirmie grabbed Rolly by the back of his neck and lifted him into the air, dumping him further back in the corridor.

She spat out gobs of webbing, sticking him to a wall then flew back to help Suzette with Ozzy. The Butcher was nearly asleep, his head moving back and forth in time with the bobbing of the nearest flower. <Oof! Big Boy has put on weight. Squirmie can barely move his bulk with these tiny wings. > Despite saying that, she managed to drag him back to Rolly and stick him in place. Suzette was staring at the flowers, "Those things are a variety of yellow lotus. Hallucinogenic, for sure.

I'm immune with my high poison resistance, and I'm guessing yours is high enough as well. Pixie wings aren't all you gained from the Duchess?" <We are what we eat! Squirmie wanted all the power in the old Fae, sadly, it cost her a set of arms! Squirmie wanted her pet to eat part of the face, but he was generous and let Squirmie eat it all. I'll make sure he eats part of the next horrible old Fae we kill.

> Further conversation on the benefits of eating Fae was cut short by three rotting corpses crawling from the mounds of decaying meat. Years ago, they might have been an orc, a minotaur, and an elf. Now, they were zombie thralls to the flowers. Blooms sprouted from each eye socket with roots buried in their brains and vines connecting them to the rest of the yellow lotus colony. They took slow but steady steps forward, the flowers producing puffs of pollen as they walked.

Suzette used her vines again to bind them in place. The elf stopped, futilely brandishing their sword, but the other two were stronger and began tearing the vines out by their shallow roots. She took careful aim at the minotaur, aiming for the eyes. It took three spells to hit both flowers, leaving burnt-out eye sockets. The creature became confused but didn't stop moving.

"The flowers are sensing organs, but I think the vines control them!" Squirmie yelled, <Stand back then. > When Suzette had backed to where Ozzy was, the princess burped loudly, and a Fireball impacted on the middle zombie, killing the remaining blooms but doing little damage otherwise. <Curses upon cheap, bargain wands bought from dubious fae merchants! > She let loose with an annoyed series of burbs, each sending a low-level Fireball spell into the room, blackening flowers.

The vines began to sprout more blooms almost immediately. If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, it's taken without the author's consent. Report it. Two of the zombies quit moving, their vines chewed through by the shadow hounds, but the elf turned suddenly, slashing and destroying both, quicker and more perceptive than the other two, and in much better shape. Squirmie tried to fly in low to cut through the last vine and was nearly cut in half.

A last-second dodge saved her with only a slight trimming of one wing. The zombie paused, then slashed at the restraining Silverthorne vines and charged Suzette, its sword weaving a complex pattern in the air. Suzette was standing in front of Ozzy, refusing to move. Her staff blazed, and two bolts of radiance took the zombie in the chest, staggering it and revealing silvered chainmail beneath the layer of dirt and rotted cloth.

Squirmie landed on its back and cut through the vine that was attaching it to the colony. Like a marionette with its strings cut, the zombie elf fell to the floor, the sword still clutched tightly in its hand. Rolly and Ozzy were stirring now, and the party retreated after Squirmie dissolved the webbing holding them down. Suzette looked at the room.

"I'm beginning to not like those flowers. The fire worked well, but I don't want Ozzy getting anywhere near that pollen again." Ozzy stood up, "Nope. That was enough for me. But I don't have to get close to burn them. And fair warning, it's going to get tough to breathe in just a moment. I'm going to counter that pollen with hot smoke." <Smoke is good! And who hasn't bought all their levels of Endless Breath? > Suzette nodded, "Live with a man who breathes smoke, you take all the levels of that you can.

Smoke is fine." Ozzy smiled, "I'll get to work then." The Butcher began breathing out great clouds of smoke, forming some of them into flying sharks. After five minutes, the hallway and the room were engulfed in hot smoke, and the flowers were wilting. Ozzy summoned his Billhook of Entrwined fates next, and chainey twined around it. The Butcher threw it hard at the far wall, where it stuck in the stone.

"Time to bring some heat." The billhook glowed brightly as Ozzy channeled his heat through it. Chainey began slithering toward flowers and vines, its red-hot metal destroying them on touch. The sharks dove in, tearing at anything they could see. The smell of burning meat permeated the area, but the smell of the pollen was gone, destroyed by the intense heat. A few zombies stirred, coming out of the layers of meaty mulch, but fell prey to the swarm of sharks.

Without the ability to see, and uncontrolled by the colony of flowers, they were easy to deal with. As the heat and smoke started to dissipate, they could see the room was clear of plants. Squirmie flew down to check and gave the all-clear signal. <Nothing lives, but I see many shiny things to gather once we have found our nest-mate. > The corridor beyond was much like the rest of the dungeon. Side rooms were filled with equipment for Butchering or torture, depending on what sort of meat was being cut up.

Several storerooms were filled with hanging sausages, uncooked and slowly drying. From ahead came low laughter and the sound of machinery grinding bones and meat. Ozzy entered first and looked around for Ben, not seeing him. Minions were working everywhere, hanging carcasses on meathooks that moved along an overhead conveyor belt or threw smaller pieces directly into a huge hopper over twenty feet wide.

The ground meat headed along another conveyor belt where more minions mixed them with spices and stuffed the casings, the finished sausages taken to hang and cure. Overseeing all the work was a creature as big as Ozzy but far bulkier. It was like looking into a twisted mirror. Where Ozzy was handsome with sculpted muscles, Grinder was made of twisted sinews and thick limbs. His small, mismatched eyes and flat nose were lost under a mob of bristly black hair. His mouth was full of large tusks and broken teeth.

His apron bulged where his gut tried to escape, kept in check by a heavy belt festooned with sharp, rusty knives. He leaned forward on the handle of a seven-foot-long cleaver, eyeing Ozzy with ill-disguised contempt.

"You're late! I've been waiting for you forever. So not only are you some cheating crappy little butcher that relies on smoke and flame to make his sausage, but you're also late to work! I scheduled you to go into the hopper twenty minutes ago! Have some respect for where you are, boy! We've got work to do! Sausage to grind! I thought dragging one of your little buddies back here would bring you by quicker. Didn't count on you to be allergic to a few flowers. What a slacker."

Ozzy was trying to ignore the taunts and find Ben, but was only partially successful. The guy was a real ass and he felt like charging and taking his head off.

"Well, I'm here now. Where's my 'little buddy'?" Grinder spat on the floor, "I told you, you're late. He followed the others into the hopper, screaming and calling for you to rescue him." In a high-pitched voice that mimicked Ben, he called out, "Oh no, my legs! Ozzy! Save me! Save me, Ozzy, you're my only hope!" He laughed again and swung his cleaver to his shoulder.

"Then he screamed a lot, and I turned him into pepperoni. You got a problem with that, baby butcher?" Ozzy pulled out his cleavers.

"Yeah, I do." The minions scattered as the two Butchers charged each other.