Book 3: Chapter 51: Patch 9.0: The Catacombs' Secret

When the crab was holding up Rock, trying to attack her, it was cute because of how Rock was switching between nonchalantly looking at Fenrir and barking at the crab. He also knew that she was in no actual danger. However, with how powerful some of these undead are, he wouldn’t be surprised if they could inflict some damage on her.

That is what has pissed him off.

Having the undead trying to kill her is also much more serious than a crab holding her up in the air.

“Come on, Cass, I’m bored of fighting these fucks already,” Fenrir says, looking over at Cassiel with a smile.

Cassiel immediately recognizes the look in his eyes. Seeing that look excites her in more than one way. “Agreed,” she replies.

Reinvigorated and pissed off, the two hack and slash away at the undead still in the room with them while Oleander, Rock, and Shogun handle the undead in the hallway.

One of the ghouls that attacks Fenrir gets its arm cut off and then used as a club against it. Sure, smashing its own arm into its head may not be an effective way of killing it, but it makes Fenrir feel better after getting pissed off.

Every cut that Cassiel makes with her sword on the undead attackers glows with holy energy, and they react as if they are burning from it. She doesn’t even notice how her sword is glowing more brilliantly with every single undead that it slays.

In the hallway, Oleander shoots enlarged thorns through crowds of zombies which manages to take out dozens of them at once. When needed, he also supports Rock and Shogun by using vines to bind the undead to prevent too many from attacking the two canines at once.

Rock and Shogun cooperate in their fighting. They may have only known each other for hours, but they are perfectly synergized in their movements. Rock knocks the enemies down and then Shogun goes in for the killing blow. She also shields him from any attacks that would be dangerous to him but hardly affect her, and he’s pushed her out of the way from some attacks that not even she would be able to handle without being injured.

As for Rao – well, he’s just happy that he has his content disabled. Otherwise, he would probably be looking at a very gory hallway, and he can’t handle gore. Even what little he can see without traumatic content being enabled is enough to make him feel nauseous.

“Hey! Remember your promise!” Cassiel shouts at Fenrir when she sees him hanging an open mouth right by one of the zombie’s necks.

Fenrir stops in his tracks and stares at the zombie. The zombie is just blankly staring at him while growling.

“Sorry, got caught up in it,” Fenrir explains before ripping the zombie’s head off with his claws. “Is it bad if I’m kind of curious how they taste? I mean, when I’m in this form, it’s really tempting. And it is just a game, so—”

He looks over at Cassiel.

She looks disgusted.

He shouldn’t have said anything.

Fortunately, one final zombie distracts her enough to warrant her sword impaling its head.

Fenrir finishes off his fight by yanking off all of the leech-maggots from his legs and stomping on them.

“Sounds like they’re done out there,” he says.

“You need a bath,” Cassiel says.

“I mean, probably, but why do you say that?”

She points at his hair.

Fenrir grabs his hair and holds it in front of him. His pure, white, beautiful and fluffy hair has been dyed red, yellow, brown, and has chunks of zombie flesh in it.

He looks far more disgusted than she did just a moment ago.

“Re-remember what you said about loving me?” Fenrir asks, looking over at Cassiel with teary eyes as his arms and legs return to normal.

“No,” Cassiel answers.

His teary eyes turn into quivering puppy eyes as his ears fold down against his head, his tail almost tucking between his legs.

“I – I need a bath,” he says in the most pitiful voice that Cassiel has ever heard from him.

It’s almost enough to make her want to hug him despite his appearance.

Almost.

Rock runs up to the door, looks inside of the room, and starts barking and excitedly wagging her tail when she sees Fenrir! She charges into him and jumps up with enough force to knock him over, licking all over his face while pinning him down.

Fenrir is happy that at least one of the girls in his life will still give him affection when he looks like this.

Then he notices that Rock looks even worse than him and the inside of her mouth looks – well, far worse than his hair does.

He remembers what happened the last time that Rock was licking his face, so he seals his lips and puts a hand over them before she decides to lick some zombie guts into his mouth.

Meanwhile, Shogun walks over to Rao, shakes his body to get rid of most of the guts and gore on him, and then sits down while looking up at his owner.

The two men look at each other.

Rao knows this look from Shogun. He also knows that he really is grossed out by gore… but his companion did good, so Shogun deserves the petting that Rao forces himself to give.

Oleander stops underneath the doorway and sighs.

Cassiel and Oleander look each other up and down.

“Are – are you okay?” Cassiel asks him, all of his feminity having disappeared underneath the layers of death covering his body. There’s even a hand stuck in his antlers that he hasn’t noticed.

“I… might have to work on some more subtle magic. When you’re shooting giant thorns into squishy zombies… they get everywhere. I need a hug, Cass Cass,” Oleander whimpers, holding his arms out for a hug while looking at her.

“No way.” While she was fighting just as much as Fenrir was, racking up even more kills than him, she has managed to stay relatively clean. Most of the battle’s aftermath has ended up on her armor instead of her skin and hair unlike the rest of them.

“You misunderstand, Cass Cass. I need a hug. I’m not going to be the only girl here covered in this gross stuff,” Oleander explains while shambling toward her like a zombie.

“Don’t – don’t come any closer! I’ll – I’ll,” she remembers what she said about threatening Fenrir and realizes she probably shouldn’t be threatening any of her friends, “we – we can talk about this! I’ll hug you later, alright?”

Oleander senses her weakness, gets a shine in his eyes, and lunges at her!

“No! O-Olly!” Cassiel shouts, jumping out of the way, but she’s too slow.

Oleander has grappled onto her arm and uses his grip to swing himself around onto her back, wrapping his legs and arms around her from behind while nuzzling his head against the side of her own.

Rao and Shogun finally look into the room. “They’re an energetic bunch, bro,” Rao says.

Shogun looks up at his owner and nods.

Fenrir is moving his head away while keeping his mouth covered from Rock’s assaulting tongue, and Cassiel is on her knees trying not to cry from the grossness that Oleander is smearing onto her.

When the happy reunion comes to an end a few minutes later, everybody gets up off the floor and looks over what they just went through. A couple dozen bodies are inside of the room, and even more are outside.

Rock and Shogun clean themselves out in the hallway while the more humanoid members of the party look through the room and the bodies.

It is a game, after all, and it’s possible there’s some loot that might have been on the undead.

Oleander is more interested in the bookshelf in the room, though.

“I’m not finding anything,” Fenrir says. “You?” he asks, looking at Cassiel.

Cassiel shakes her head.

“Bro… don’t you think it’s like, disrespectful to be looting the dead?” Rao asks.

“What? It’s a game and they were zombies trying to kill us. This is normal,” Fenrir explains, looking up at Rao with a confused expression.

“Yeah, but like, they’re dead.”

“Have you played any RPGs before this?”

“Uhh, what?”

“RPGs. Role-playing games.”

“Ohh, nah bro, I don’t like that role-playing stuff. I saw a video once of a dude shouting ‘lightning bolt’ at this other dude in the forest and they were all dressed up funny, and I was like, ‘yoooooo’ that’s so embarrassing but like good on them for having fun, but yeah, I decided that role-playing stuff ain’t me after watching that.”

Everybody in the room stops what they’re doing to look at Rao and blink a few times.

“Did – did I say something weird?” Rao asks.

Now that Fenrir thinks about it… when playing a virtual reality RPG, is it really any different from LARPing? Sure, it’s technically in a game instead of reality, but it’s just as real.

Fenrir doesn’t know how to feel about the fact that not only is he apparently becoming a furry, but now he’s a glorified LARPer.