Chapter 216: Cat

“You might have forgotten, but the one that got yanked into the hole was me,” Moxie pointed out. “Why do you think that the monster was after you?”

“Right before you got yanked, I saw a flicker of this reddish-purple light somewhere in the hole,” Noah replied, watching the patch of earth that he’d dragged over the hole warily to make sure that it didn’t shift. When nothing moved, he continued. “And, when I was falling asleep before we left Arbitage, I saw that same color on a cat-looking thing.”

Moxie’s brow furrowed. “Cat looking thing? You didn’t mention anything about it.”

“I’ll be honest, I kind of forgot about it. It vanished when I blinked, and I kind of suspected that it was Azel screwing with me or the like. Evidently, that isn’t the case. That didn’t seem like him.”

“You should really try to mention things like this before something happens.” Moxie crossed her arms.

“You’re probably right.” Noah rubbed the back of his head sheepishly. “I foolishly assumed that the cat wasn’t going to be trying to kill anyone. I suppose that was my first mistake. Everything is trying to kill us.”

“Almost everything,” Moxie corrected. “Unfortunately, I have absolutely no idea what the cat might have been. I’ve never heard of a monster that looks like a cat with red energy. Can you describe it more?”

“There were some spikes on it. That’s where the energy was coming from. Aside from that… it was cute, I guess?”

“No idea what it was,” Moxie said with a shrug. She glanced to Lee. “What about you?”

“Never heard of it,” Lee said. “Did it look edible?”

“Considering it was covered in spikes, probably not.”

Lee grimaced. She nudged the body of the splattered bird beside them with her foot. “So you weren’t fighting these?”

Noah shook his head and knelt beside the bird. He was loathe to touch it, but it only took a brief observation to realize that the black goop seeping from its mangled corpse was uncomfortably similar to what had been covering the plants in the cavern beneath them.

“Same rot,” Noah observed, rising back to his feet and dusting his hands off on the sides of his coat. “They’re definitely related, although the time of the attack probably implied that anyway. Also, the monster isn’t trying to attack again.”

Moxie heaved a sigh and rubbed the bridge of her nose. “Which means it’s probably intelligent and an ambush predator, meaning we’ve got another jaguar situation.”n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om

“Well, this one is slightly different. We knew what we were up against with the jaguar. We also knew its motives – eating us,” Noah said helpfully. “Aside from the fact that this monster is also likely cat shaped, I’ve got no damn idea what it’s capable of.”

“Even better.” Moxie’s words dripped with sarcasm. The three stood in silence for a few seconds.

“So… more hunting?” Lee asked hopefully.

“Might as well,” Moxie replied. “We’ve got a ways back to the city now that Noah’s sword got turned to mush. We might have to take the long way around and hope that we see some more enemies above ground, though. I’m not too eager to get dragged back underground. I think it might be wise to slightly adjust our plan, though. Let’s head toward the city and hunt along the way, but get some lodgings and stay within it rather than just collecting all our kills outside first.”

“Why? There’s probably more food in the city, though. I like that idea.”

“Dawnforge has protection against powerful monsters. I’m not sure what’s hunting Noah, but it’ll have more trouble getting to any of us when we’re inside the city.”

And, with that, they set out once more. The sun traced through the sky overhead, passing above them and continuing on its journey toward the horizon. The later in the day it grew, the hotter it became.

There weren’t any trees or other forms of shade near Dawnforge. Faint strips of clouds in the sky made for ill cover, and they were both few and far in between. The only form of protection was probably the shadow of the city’s walls, and those were still a day or two of walking away. But, as the sun’s path brought it closer to the horizon, they day grew colder and more tolerable.

Noah squinted, holding a hand to block the sun from his eyes. He was idly walking behind Moxie, but he wasn’t spending much effort actually looking for monsters like she and Lee were.

Instead, his thoughts were focused inward, on Natural Disaster. At the moment, he was locked in a debate. The fight underground had strongly reminded him just how important Tremorsense and other Imbuements could be, but he was still planning to make a few more changes to Natural Disaster to completely perfect the Rune.

I’ve got 5 unique Rank 2 Runes in Natural Disaster – Pyroclastic Resonance, Focal Quake, Howling Maelstrom, Trilling Monsoon, and Deafening Thunderstorm. Then I’ve got two duplicates, Pyroclastic Resonance and Howling Maelstrom.

At the moment, I already know that one of the duplicates should be replaced with something Ice based. Frozen Mist will be the basis for that. That’ll be easy. I think the thing I need to really consider is if all seven Runes should actually be completely unique.

Balance is a concern when putting all of my Runes together in my soul, but it’s not part of what I need to consider when I’m just putting an individual Rune together. Important for the whole, but not the individual parts.

Bah. I’ll get the Rank 3 Rune based on Ice and then figure the rest out later. I wonder if Dayton had anything relevant in his scroll.

Noah rifled through his bag and pulled out Dayton’s scroll, pulling it open. They’d still yet to run into any monsters, and he was confident that Moxie would warn him before anything important happened.

This was far from the first time he’d looked through the grimoire, but he’d been searching for Lightning Runes the last time he’d looked. Dayton had an extensive collection, and Noah’s search was quickly rewarded.

Black Freezing Night – Rank 3

Noah let out an audible snort.

“What?” Moxie asked.

“Sorry. Just looking at Runes that I’ll be using to fix my Rank 3,” Noah said, giving the rest of the scroll a look-over before rolling it back up and returning it to his bag. “Dayton had a very strong tendency to make the edgiest, lamest sounding Runes I’ve ever heard of.”

“I still can’t believe you’re walking around with that – not to mention the other one,” Moxie said over her shoulder, shaking her head in disbelief. “Absolutely unfair.”

Noah opened his mouth, then slapped himself in the forehead so hard that it echoed through the flat field. Moxie and Lee spun toward him.

“What happened?” Moxie asked.

“I’m an idiot,” Noah said. “Dayton’s Runes are chock full of dark-aligned Runes. Isn’t that exactly what Lee needs? I can easily harvest at least two or three Rank 3 Runes made from them.”

Moxie blinked. “I… how did I miss that? Shit.”

“I probably can’t do it for all the Runes, but Lee already has two Umbral Body Runes,” Noah said, speaking faster as the idea took further root in his mind. “You’ve got a Rune called Cursed Concealing Shadow and then a bunch of Shift Runes, right? Which ones did you replace?”

“Two Shift Runes.” Lee’s features darkened as her thoughts drifted to something that she clearly wasn’t a fan of. “I’m too scared to remove the Cursed Concealing Shadow. It’s too integrated into my body.”

“And what were you thinking of trying to make for the combination? Do you know yet?”

“I’ve been thinking about it a lot,” Lee admitted. “I… I think I might have to choose between shifting and concealment.”

“What do you mean?” Moxie asked. “I’m sure there’s a way you could find a way to work both in.”

“Probably,” Lee agreed. “But that would also mean I would have to split my intention between them, at least for that first Rune. That would probably mean that I wouldn’t form anything perfect.”

“Which one are you leaning toward, then?” Noah asked. “It sounds like you’ve already got a lot of Shift, so if that’s the direction–”

“Shadow. Shifting was a way to keep myself alive in the Damned Plains. It let me stay out of the eye of anything too powerful. But, now that I’m here, aside from a few specific situations, I don’t’ think I actually need it as badly. It’s still useful, and I’ll probably always keep some Runes related to it, but I think it would be better to focus on Shadow. Maybe I’ll keep a single Shift Rune in the combination, but not more than that.”

Noah reached into his bag and pulled Dayton’s grimoire back out of it, tossing the scroll to Lee. She caught it, then gave Noah a confused glance.

“Look through that whenever you get time,” Noah said. “Figure out what Runes you think might have components that are useful to you and try to make a list of what kind of Rune you want to make. Once you figure that out, we can get you a few of those.”

Lee beamed at Noah and nodded, clutching the scroll to her chest. “Okay!”

I can’t believe I didn’t think of that earlier. Dayton’s grimoire also has a bit of free space on it, so we can store some pretty solid Runes on that if we happen to run into any before I can buy some good Catchpaper.

“What’s that expression on your face?” Moxie asked Noah, slowing her walk to a stop.

He was so distracted that he nearly bowled into her. Managing to stop at the last second, Noah coughed into his fist and shook his head.

“Sorry. I was just thinking about how my attention has been getting pulled in so many different directions that I can’t focus on anything. I feel like I should have been able to solve half of these issues if I could just stop and handle one at a time.”

“Maybe just do that, then?” Moxie suggested. “What’s the rush, Noah? Half of these problems aren’t yours. They’re ours. I – and I’m sure Lee as well – we both appreciate how much you’re trying to help us, but neither of us will die if you can’t get us perfect Runes by tomorrow.”

“I know, I know. I just keep swapping from one thing to another,” Noah said wearily.

“Well, what’s the first thing you need to work on? I’ll help you keep on track,” Moxie said.

“Probably finishing my ice-based Rank 2 Rune,” Noah said, sending her an appreciative smile. “I need to find another one, since I’ve currently got something called Frozen Mist, and it’s not great. If I find another Rank 2 Ice Rune, I think I could merge the two and make one that I like.”

“Okay. Easy. We just keep our eyes peeled for–”

A flash of reddish purple danced across the rocks to Noah’s left and vanished beneath the ground. Moxie clearly saw it too, because she leapt back, raising her hands defensively. Noah and Lee both dropped into fighting stances as they all searched for the energy.

“I think your cat is back,” Moxie whispered.

There was a loud crack. Pebbles trembled all around them as the ground started to rumble. A mound formed a dozen paces away from them, bulging upwards. Stone and dirt tumbled away as a jagged white and grey hand burst from the ground, slamming into the earth. Its claws dug deep through the stone as the ropey, blueish muscles running along the arm connected to it bulged.

A gangly monster pulled itself out from the ground. Dirt crumbled away from its body. It was humanoid, but impossibly gaunt. Large, ovular holes riddled its body. The monster’s face looked like someone had put it into a blender.

One eye was on its forehead, and the other seemed to be where its ear was meant to be. A crooked, spine-filled mouth sat askew on one cheek, just beside another hole. The monster arched its back, letting out an ear-piercing wail.

“That,” Lee said, taking a step back. “Does not look like a cat.”