: Chapter 26

Steamslime’s severed head fell to the sound of thunder.

Purple lightning coursed through the star circuit in the heavens as a dragon died on earth. Steamslime’s hands collapsed under his body’s weight. His shell’s gears ground to an abrupt halt. The burning, noxious fumes pouring out of its pipes evaporated with the blowing wind.

“You think…you apes have won?”

Even with his neck severed, Steamslime’s head still managed to speak on its own. Basil climbed down from the shell to better look down on his target, his halberd feeling light in his hands.

“There are thousands of dragonlords…and I am the least of them! Some are Level 30… Level 60… Level ! Our numbers will darken your skies…and our breaths will boil your seas!” Steamslime’s head coughed golden blood. “We know your names…there is no escape…we will hunt you to the end of the univ—”

Basil split Steamslime’s head in two and silenced him for good.

“Shut up, handbag.”

The moment he smashed the dragon’s skull, a glowing light erupted between the skull’s halves. A steampunk device larger than a car materialized before Basil: a tangle of golden pipes and gears surrounding a large mirror. Colorful cubic gems engraved with runes appeared at his feet, too. From their shape, they could fit into a port on the machine’s left side.

Category: Tool.

Quality: B.

Effect 1: Can record and project holographic games.

Effect 2: Can serve as crafting tutor.

Effect 3: Can serve as a spell tutor.

This steam-powered console is the best recreational device in the universe! This specific holomachine stored the saves of nineteen games, including: [

]; [

]; [

]; [

]; [

]; [

]; [

]; and many more!

The device was larger than a car, but to a dragon? It looked no bigger than a Nintendo Switch. Basil checked the gems. He counted nineteen of them, each recording a game. With the console, it made one item per level for a full inventory.

Steamslime gathered a hoard of video games.

Basil thought. Bugsy climbed down from the metal shell he had sabotaged, and their allies rejoined them once the noxious fumes had cleared.

Two humans died and the party only had video games to show for it. Even a gamer like Basil considered it a terrible trade-off. At least this device might provide some insight into the enemy’s culture.

“We… Did we win?” Bugsy asked. Although the dragon’s corpse rested at their feet, the centimagma sounded like he couldn’t believe in their victory. “Is he dead and…not coming back?”

“Thanks to you, Bugsy,” Basil said. “I couldn’t have landed the final blow without your help. You were very brave, and I’m proud of you.”

Basil didn’t think a giant centipede monster could blush, but Bugsy did. He snapped his mandibles in excitement and swooned. “Thank you, Boss.”

The rest of the group arrived, with Zachariel applying his healing palm to Basil and Bugsy. The acid burns left by Steamslime’s toxic gas vanished, although Basil had lost another shirt and Ogremoche’s pendant. At this rate, he would fight his battles naked.

“Can we eat him?” Rosemarine licked her lips at the sight of Steamslime’s remains. “He smells like jelly.”

Shellgirl, always the opportunist, immediately examined the loot they could harvest from the corpse. “Dragonslime Blood, Dragonslime Claws, Dragonslime Fangs, Dragonslime Bones, Magitech Shell…” A smile formed on her lips. “We’ll make a killing selling them off!”

“Payback time,” Plato said. “Seven lives are a lucky number, but I would rather have eight of them.”

Basil’s amusement at seeing his monsters’ antics lasted until he noticed Maya Elissalde. The houndmaster and her dogs stood before the dust of Major Grange’s VAB, heads heavy in mourning.

“Chief…” Maya bit her lower lip with the military radio in one hand and her whip in the other. Her eyebrows creased into a crestfallen expression. “And Anne, too. She was driving. They’re gone.”

“I-I see,” her sister answered through the radio. She sounded tired, so very tired. She had likely seen too many of her comrades fall. “Is there anything to bury?”

“Dust,” Maya Elissalde replied. “Nothing else.”

No answer came out of the radio. The dogs howled with no one to answer them.

“I’m sorry,” Basil apologized to Maya, trying to console her. “They died as heroes.”

When she glared at him with her single eye, he immediately regretted his words.

“So what?” Maya snapped at him. “Why couldn’t they live as heroes? Why couldn’t they come back to life like your stupid, vapid cat?”

Plato hissed at her. “Hey, you think coming back is easy? When I revive, I feel the pain all over again!”

“I’m sure they’ve earned their place in Heaven,” Zachariel reassured Maya. “They had good karma. Good deeds matter more than poor spiritual health.”

Basil himself kept his mouth shut. He knew nothing he might say would assuage his allies’ sadness. Basil had only met the Major once, but the Elissalde sisters had fought with his squad for days, perhaps even longer. If Steamslime had slain Bugsy and Maya offered comfort, her words would have sounded like empty platitudes, too.

“Basil?” Officer Elissalde called through the radio. He noticed that she said ‘Basil’ and not ‘Mr. Bohen’ for once. “The portal is still open.”

Basil’s relief turned to worry. Indeed, the star circuit above their heads remained as active as ever. The rift of light continued to let weak monsters enter Earth. The group hadn’t received experience either, which meant the event would continue.

“I’m seeing humanoids coming out of the rift, alongside cloud monsters…” Officer Elissalde marked a short pause and the sound of a bullet firing echoed through the radio. “One of them attacked the statues!”

“Why isn’t the rift closing?” Maya Elissalde asked in shock. “We beat the boss!”

Defeating a monster has no influence on how long an [

] will last. A rift will close on its own time, and not a second before.

Basil checked the Incursion’s countdown and cursed. “Everyone, to the portal!”

They had four hours left to kill.

When the Incursion counter hit zero at long last, the portal finally closed.

Basil watched the rift weaken, surrounded by watcher scraps and improvised barricades. He, Bugsy, Plato, and the hounds formed the first line of defense while the rest of the team buffed, healed, and provided suppression fire at the back.

None of the creatures that came out of the portal proved anywhere as dangerous as Steamslime. Most were watchers and low-level clouds with eyes. Neither were a match for Basil’s party, and he doubted they would receive any experience from them.

But they arrived in waves without giving the team any respite and targeted Dax’s petrified citizens on sight. Without Rosemarine and Zachariel to continuously heal them, the party would have collapsed from exhaustion midway through the Incursion; by the end of it, the team’s healers had run out of both SP and medical items to replenish them.

Incursions weren’t a sprint, but a marathon.

Two gearsmen who escaped the rift in its last hour gave the team quite the fright, but a combination of Officer Elissalde’s long-distance anti-material rifle, Shellgirl’s artillery, and Rosemarine’s bombardment proved sufficient to deal with them. No other dangerous creature crossed the rift afterward.

Basil considered two possibilities: either that Steamslime’s defeat convinced the Unity to cut its losses and stop sending powerful soldiers to take a town of limited strategic importance; or that they had troops to spare, but none of them were weak enough to cross the Level Barrier.

The former option was flattering; the latter, terrifying.

Although Basil’s team slew all the monsters threatening petrified civilians, some creatures managed to slip through the cracks. The group was so busy fighting the hostile invaders that they couldn’t afford to track down those more interested in running away. There was no sign of the humanoid figures Officer Elissalde noticed earlier. They had fled before the party could even approach the rift.

Basil had the feeling that these runaways would cause him many headaches in the months to come.

The golden circuit in the skies above disappeared. The stars’ radiance dimmed and the links between them disintegrated. The crimson aura above Basil’s head receded and was replaced by the night sky’s darkness. The rift’s awe-inspiring radiance dimmed over time.

Basil suddenly wondered if the rift worked both ways. Not that he was mad enough to cross it, but he was tempted to leave a parting gift to the Unity.

“Rosemarine,” he said. “Send an exploding clone through.”

“Yes, Mister!” The plant duplicated herself and her clone leaped into the rift’s light. The doppelganger instantly vanished from Basil’s sight. He couldn’t tell if it disintegrated upon touching the portal or made it to the other side.

When the rest of the star circuit disappeared, the rift of light collapsed into nothingness. Only the ruins of Dax’s arena remained, silent and unmoving.

They had won, albeit at a great cost. The city center was a smoking landscape of destroyed buildings and fiery ruins. The party’s explosives had caused almost as much damage as the rampaging gearsmen.

As for the petrified citizens, Steamslime had trampled many of them in his rush to the stadium. Other statues broke when the dragon collapsed buildings on their heads and the monsters that came out of the rift also destroyed a few. Basil estimated that the death toll reached the high hundreds.

But thousands more had been spared an early grave. It could have gone better, but most civilians survived the chaos and Basil’s team cleaned the city of Unity troops.

The region was finally at peace.

Congratulations, you survived an [

]! Your Party earned 60,000 EXP and 30,000 Bonus EXP (total 18,000 for you)! You earned 7 levels!

“Seven levels?” Basil nearly choked upon seeing the number. That was more than he had ever earned in one attempt. Incursions were incredibly profitable experience-wise. It made sense for the System to incentivize Players to participate in dangerous battles.

“One more,” Rosemarine whispered in anticipation. “Just one more…and then…and then…haha…”

She laughed to her heart’s content, which Basil found adorable. Aww, she would enjoy a growth spur soon! Still, he hoped her metamorphosis would be more manageable than Bugsy’s own.

“Well, it is done,” Officer Elissalde said through the military radio. “The battlefield is clear.”

“You can come down from your nest, Officer,” Basil replied.

“Neria. After all we went through today, Basil, I think we can get past formalities.”

“All right.” Although he remained slightly wary of lawmen, Basil was quite fond of the officer. She was friendly and reliable. “Are you up for a drink? I think we all deserve it.”

“We have drinks, partner?” Shellgirl asked.

“No, but we have our pick of empty supermarkets to raid from.” With the Unity expelled from the city, Basil and his allies could finally loot its pharmacies, shops, and businesses for food and parts.

“That will be a pleasure; after we bury my unit,” Neria replied with a heavy heart. “I don’t want to leave their remains exposed to scavengers. Some of the monsters escaped and might still lurk in the area.”

“What about the humanoids you saw?” Basil asked. “What can you tell us about them?”

“I couldn’t see them clearly,” Neria admitted. “I can’t even tell if they were humans or not. A few of them wore hoods and carried bows.”

Bows? Basil wouldn’t have expected archers to come out of the same place as a steampunk snail dragon. He wondered what the world beyond the rift looked like.

“I know the land like the back of my hand,” Basil said. “We’ll find them wherever they hide.”

Afterward, the team split the spoils. Since nobody could store Steamslime’s shell in their inventory—it counted as a ‘house’ according to the System—Basil kept it alongside his game console. The Elissalde sisters would keep the dragon’s other remains, much to Shellgirl’s dismay. Basil knew she would come around after they looted the city’s supplies.

“We should hold a funeral for my car, too,” Basil said as he helped Maya lift a petrified man into a large military truck. “She was a good girl and deserved better.”

His joke amused Maya enough to make her crack a smile. “We held one for our combat helicopters, too. Shame we couldn’t piece it back together.”

“HQ has crafters capable of repairing military vehicles,” Neria replied as she closed the truck’s trailer. The group had filled it to the brim with more than two hundred petrified humans, and the Ogre Den’s server rested at the front. The Major had been wise enough to drop it off at a safe place before venturing back into the fray. “Maybe I can convince them to pay the city a visit.”

“All clear, sir,” Zachariel told Basil. He and Bugsy had stuffed a second truck with statues. “What about the others?”

Even if the city’s population had shrunk compared to what it was pre-apocalypse, it would take multiple trips to evacuate all the statues.

“There’s a vast underground parking lot near the bridge,” Basil said. “We’ll transport the statues underground and booby-trap the access ways.”

Neria nodded sharply. “I will present Zachariel to my superiors and convince them to transfer Dax’s population to Bordeaux. With a fleet of trucks, we can wrap this up in a single trip.”

“And if they deny your request?”

“Then I’ll organize the transfer behind their backs.” Neria observed Basil in silence for a few seconds before making him a proposal. “You’re sure you don’t want to come with us to Bordeaux? It will be safer than monster-infested wilderness, and we need people with your talents.”

“Thanks, but I’ll pass.” Basil smirked. “It’s my home, and monster-infested wilderness is our natural habitat.”

Plato nodded in appreciation. “We didn’t suffer so much to establish a territory to abandon it.”

“We’ll be all right, Miss Elissalde,” Bugsy said. “We’ll keep the place in order, I promise!”

“Then this goodbye.” Neria Elissalde smiled and gave the party a polite bow. “We’ll stay in touch through the radio. Thank you for everything.”

“It was…” Her sister trailed off and left her sentence hanging. Nice? Terrible? Basil could tell the loss of two friends affected her greatly. “You are good people.”

“You are great people!” her basque shepherd barked, echoed by the doberman. No matter how dark a situation, dogs always managed to make friends. “I hope we meet again one day!”

“I don’t,” Plato replied gruffly. Nobody cared.

“Sir, it was a pleasure,” Zachariel said before shaking Basil’s hand. “I can’t wait to introduce spiritual reforms to this world. Heaven knows humans need a karma shock therapy.”

Why did Basil have the feeling a new Vatican would pop up in Bordeaux? Come to think of it, did the Vatican still exist? He wondered what kind of dungeon would spring from the San Pietro Basilica.

“Good luck, Zach.” Basil shook the angel’s hand. He would miss the healer, but the army needed Zachariel more than a lone human living in the woods. “Careful about anti-vaxxers though. I don’t think your coronatheism theory will sit well with them.”

“Don’t worry, sir. I’ve been trained to bring the flame of knowledge to the masses, one stake at a time.”

Maya climbed on one truck with her dogs. Zachariel and Neria took the other. As she put on her seatbelt and prepared to leave the city, the police officer glanced one last time at the ruins of Dax’s arena in the distance. Her expression was one of doubt and uneasiness.

Basil guessed what frightened her. “You’re worried about a future Incursion?”

“If that snail spoke the truth, that he was the least of our enemies…what will come out of a portal next time?” Neria sighed. “We barely made it through today’s attack. I fear tomorrow’s may be too much for us.”

Basil would be lying if he said he didn’t share her fears. He had survived so far through skill and luck, but so had the Major until a stray shot ended his life. Death called without warning and the world would only grow more dangerous as time went on.

But so would humans grow stronger and more adaptable.

“Our species survived the ice age, global warming, the black plague, and two world wars,” Basil said with a shrug. “We’ll survive this apocalypse, too.”

Neria Elissalde answered his resolute determination with a sad smile. “I received more information from HQ,” she admitted, “about Paris.”

“Oh?” From her crinkled face, Basil shouldn’t expect good news. “What happened to the capital?”

“Accordingly to early reports, multiple dungeons appeared in the city. The Louvre turned into a true pyramid, the Eiffel Tower into a fortress…the Seine dried up, and sand filled the Champs-Élysées.” Neria’s jaw clenched. “We think the government was decapitated in the initial strike. The army established control over a few cities, but they’re too far apart to link. At this point, General Leblanc is considering an alliance with a group called Metal Olympus to make up for our troops’ losses.”

Basil could read between the lines. “You don’t think we can win the war.”

“What war? It’s not France vs Germany; it’s us humans against robots, monsters, bugs…” Neria glanced at Bugsy. “No offense.”

“None taken,” he replied cheerfully.

“The army can reassert local control in the cities we occupy and establish safe zones, but retaking the country looks more and more unlikely,” Neria said. “You’ve survived so far by hiding on your own, Basil, but it won’t last forever. The monsters will grow more numerous, more dangerous, and from what we’ve seen today, more organized.”

“It won’t matter if they can’t find my home,” Basil replied. The argument sounded weak even to him.

“I found you, partner,” Shellgirl pointed out. “Your house isn’t that hard to find. Anybody who follows the stream will see it.”

“We can coexist with monsters.” Basil waved a hand at his team. “We’re the living proof of it.”

“Can you coexist with the Unity?” Neria shook her head. “What I mean to say, Basil, is that your methods let you weather the storm so far. But when it grows too strong, it will blow you away. Joining us in Bordeaux would be safer. Numbers and community are strengths, not weaknesses.”

There was some truth to her words, but neither numbers nor soldiers protected Paris.

“The monsters target large communities as a priority,” Basil pointed out. “By your own logic, monsters will escalate beyond our ability to fight back at all. It’s damned if I do, damned if I don’t.”

“I don’t have a long-term solution,” Neria admitted. “At least until we’ve found out more about Dismaker Labs, what they want, and what this System even is. It’s our only hope for things to return to normal…if that’s even possible anymore.”

Basil suddenly realized that she was as lost as he was. She had seen her way of life collapsing before her eyes and now braved a dangerous new world.

“I’ll study the game console,” he tried to reassure her. “Maybe it holds answers about the System.”

“I hope so.” Neria gave him a final nod. “We’ll keep in touch. Take care, Basil.”

“Good luck.”

And on these words, Neria Elissalde drove away toward the rising dawn. Her sister followed with her own truck, both vehicles leaving the city without turning back. Basil’s party waved their hands, legs, and vines at them as they vanished beyond the horizon.

So did his hopes of the army returning peace to the land.

But Basil couldn’t show doubt. Not now, not before his friends. They were exhausted after a long battle and deserved a moment of relief. No need to burden them with his doubts.

“My friends, we’ve won the Second Neighborhood War,” Basil declared with pride. “We can finally go back to what truly matters: eating, gardening, and doing nothing all day.”

“And making money,” Shellgirl chirped in. “Don’t forget the money part.”

“Good riddance.” Plato stretched his back. “The humans were okay, but let’s not make it a habit to team up with whiny dogs.”

“I thought they were nice,” Bugsy replied. “Very friendly, too.”

“Why do you hate dogs so much?” Basil asked Plato. It confused him slightly. “Most of your kind coexists peacefully with them.”

“Dogs are insidious!” Plato hissed, his eyes hateful. He clearly had grievances he needed to get out of his chest. “They bombard you with love! At first you think they’re cute, entertaining maybe, but they are bottomless pits of insecurity! They demand constant affection, and before you know it, your owner spends all their time with a whiny Maltese dog and dumps you in a forest to fend for yourself!”

The sheer bitterness in his cat’s voice told his owner that this rant came from the heart. Basil felt his stomach turn with sadness. “That is what happened to you, isn’t it?”

Plato glanced at the skies, which was an answer in itself. “Anyway, we’ve got work to do. A bird escaped from the portal, remember? You let one live, and next thing you know, the dodos come back from extinction to play banjo in your backyard.”

“What are dodos?” Rosemarine asked. “They sound tasty.”

“I’ll pass,” Shellgirl said with a sigh. “I’m exhausted.”

“Me, too,” Basil added. They had fought all night long and deserved a rest. “The hunt will wait for another day.”

“We could celebrate with a marathon,” Bugsy proposed. “Shellgirl hasn’t watched any episodes yet.”

“Nice idea.” Basil glanced at his pets, his friends, and his new family. “Everyone in favor, say aye!”

“Aye!” all of them answered.

“Then let’s go find a new Renault,” Basil replied with a grunt. “We’re not walking back home.”

As the party went on the hunt for a new car, Basil gave the rising dawn a long hard look. The sun had risen in Earth’s skies since time immemorial. It had shone on the dinosaurs, the mammoths, men, and now monsters. All the species that failed to adapt to new circumstances vanished.

Basil Bohen aspired to a quiet, peaceful life.

But as he watched the rising sun, he wondered how long he could make it last.