Chương 36: Chapter Thirty-Six: Quests Cleared

THIRTY-SIX Sepsis of a magical mushroom stunk. Raw sewage with rotting eggs on a hot summer day. That was all Roan could think about as he leapt to the side as the giant shadow, an abscess he noted, started to drain out of the mushroom in a pressurized stream. Every zombie froze as their wiggling mass of roots froze. Something large and solid spilled out of the liquid rot, hitting the ground with a wet splatter. Roan reached over with his hammer and pulled it toward him as the abscess continued to drain.

The strike team were efficiently killing the anomalies now, but more than one shot him a glare as they watched him standing to the side. Roan ignored them as he pulled the mass toward him. It was slick with the black goop, but it looked like a partially formed body. A full grown person that had been folded up into a pretzel. He could see a hand and a pair of feet, but they each had seven digits on them. It jiggled as if there were no bones to it, just a mass of jello-like flesh."

The alert hasn't gone through that I stopped the escape attempt." Roan stabbed the flesh with the spike on his hammer and ripped sideways. Chunks of gelatinous flesh flew away and he kept slashing at it, tearing and ripping it apart until he finally got the alert he'd been waiting for. QUEST COMPLETED ESCAPE ATTEMPT THWARTED 2, 500 CREDITS EARNED Roan couldn't stop the smile that came to his face from that alert.

All across the cavern the anomalies seized up, spasming as the strike force continued to slaughter them. Bodies fell to the ground as they worked faster and faster, intent on finishing the work before they stopped seizing.

"What makes this so special?" Roan whispered as he looked at the wound in the great mushroom. It had stopped spitting black goop and was already healing, green light filling the darkened flesh. There was still a hole in the mushroom, opened by the spike but widened by the flow of goop coming out of it.

"This is going to be gross," Roan muttered as he rolled up the sleeve on his hand and jammed his hand into the open wound. It was hot, not scalding, but not far from it. Mush rolled around his hand and slid free to slop to the ground as Roan pushed his hand in deeper and deeper until his arm was wedged up to his shoulder." What caused the infection?" The thought kept rebounding in his mind as his fingers kept searching, digging through flesh as the heat began to increase.

Roan began to think he'd done this for nothing as he started to reach healthy flesh with nothing to show. Up and down he waggled his arm as much as it could go, searching for anything to make this trip worth his while. His fingers snagged on something cold. A smile spread across his face as he dragged the shard free of the mushroom. As soon as it cleared the mushroom the wound healed instantly. The giant mushroom flared once and then began to dim until it was a gentle light. You could be reading stolen content.

Head to Royal Road for the genuine story. QUEST COMPLETED FIND THE SOURCE OF THE CORRUPTION REWARD: ITEM TOKEN (COMMON GRADE) BONUS QUEST COMPLETED CLEANSE THE CORRUPTION REWARD: MANA CORE SPLINTER 1/5 FLOOR QUEST GENERATED UNITE THE MANA CORE SPLINTERS A MANA CORE HAS BEEN SPLINTERED AND SPREAD ACROSS THE FIRST FLOOR OF THE TOWER. DISCOVER THE SHARDS TO RECREATE THE MANA CORE. EVERY SHARD INCREASES THE RARITY OF THE CORE. REWARD: MANA CORE"Holy shit."

Roan pocketed the shard instantly, smearing goop over his clothes even further. They were ruined anyway and he knew he'd be shelling out the money to pay for them soon. He did his best to wipe his hand and discreetly looked around to see if anyone had noticed. Darren was staring at him. Of course Darren was staring at him. The man had a perception ability and seemed to always notice everything around him. Which included Roan's nice find.

Darren didn't say or do anything, just blinked and went back to killing the frozen anomalies. QUEST COMPLETED ANOMALIES DESTROYED: 4347/4347 REWARD: LEVEL BONUS MULTIPLIER" That's a lot of rewards just for this little fight. Whatever that prisoner was, it screwed up this encounter. Made it a lot easier for us," Roan thought. Aside from the one dead member of the strike team, there hadn't even been an injury. It was just a hunch, but he didn't think the reanimated corpses were supposed to be that easy to fight.

Not when they had been growing stronger by eating the shards of processed life energy.

"It seems to be calming down. Do you think we could harvest it or something?" one of the sect members asked, walking up the now healed mushroom and running a hand along the stalk. Moira was there a moment later with a knife and she carefully peeled a strip of the glowing stalk off. The mushroom glowed brighter for a second and the strip of flesh was replaced instantly. In her hand the mushroom still pulsed with vitality.

"This is good. We're going to need to buy containers Darren. As many as we can and we need to harvest this thing, carefully. We need Tyler, this is exactly what her family works on!" Moira yelled excitedly. Roan worked his way over to the dead member of the strike team and glanced down at the man and found the amulet.

"I'll take it to her," Roan volunteered as he scooped the necklace up. He wanted to get back to the saferoom and the marketplace as soon as he could. Between the item token he'd earned and the thirty-one hundred credits he had more than enough to buy the learn skill if he got back now.

"Thanks, Roan. We're going to stay here for a bit," Darren said and Roan heard the dismissal in the man's voice. He shrugged internally, not really caring. That the mushroom was powerful and useful was undoubtedly true, but he had earned his own rewards from the fight." I can always bribe Moira with what she learns. I don't have to be part of their Pact to get things. It just won't come automatically." He debated whether joining with the group was a good idea, but he still didn't like the connotations of the group.

Inside the tower was one thing, but once they left to continue with their goals was to be declaring a revolution upon the world. Or at least shaking the status quo so hard that attention would come toward them." You have a goal. But the goal is limited to the tower? Why not take it? Odds are you won't make it out of the tower anyways and won't have to deal with the repercussions?" Roan argued with himself before he finally had to admit it was simple. He didn't trust Darren.

The man gave him the same feeling he would get when he'd see some turf fights break out and the leaders of the gangs would emerge from their hideouts. A calculating ruthlessness to the eye that spoke of inhumanity. Of mechanical weights and measures." Don't lie to yourself. He reminds you of what you've become. And you don't like that." Roan pushed that thought to the bottom of his mind and turned his thoughts toward what his rewards were and what he could get from the market.

Money was burning a hole in his pocket and he was ready to see what this tower could really reward him with.