Shadowcroft Year 3 - Chapter Twenty

Most of the school seemed to be packed into the Golden Serpent Hall, which doubled as both the place for assemblies and the main dining area. Tet sat with them at their usual spot near the back of the great room. Up near the front, on the dais, Shadowcroft was conferring in hushed whispered with Suresh the Magnificent and several other professors.

Everyone was shivering with excitement.

Even Tet, who generally had a cat woman’s cool demeanor, was excited. “I guess there was a security breech and the information leaked out ahead of schedule. That could be worrying if the wrong dungeoneers found out about it.” She paused and cast a weary look to either side. “You don’t think there’s a spy, do you?”

“Oh, you have no idea, Tet.” Marko had shed his janitorial grays and was back in his jaunty vest and jeweled coat. “There are so many spies working for both the Spore Lords and the Zeta Ridiculans. Even I might be a spy. The Deep Dark has its agents everywhere. Fingers in every pie, if you will. And if I’ve learned anything in Clown College, it is that there are a lot of pies.”

The cat woman’s ears twitched in annoyance. With a vague look of disgust on her face, she kept on talking. “Anyway, the interschool tournament officials have let all the schools make the announcement.” She turned to Inga. “And speaking of interschool happenings, how are you enjoying your Cosmic Etymology class?”

Inga smiled. “I’m glad to say that, at least, is living up to my expectations. It’s absolutely fascinating. Did you know that there’s a species of desert worm that moves through the sands of Abbakus. They are very mathematically minded and easily larger than the Dread Kraken that lives in Loch Endless.” She gestured out the window toward the placid lake. “Their movement draws large quantities of Fulgur Apothos from nearby Celestial Nodes, which the worms then eat. Some dungeon cores have been able to harness that energy to protect their inner sanctums. We’ve also been studying gigantism in Armadillidium Vulgare, also known as roly-polies or your common pill-bug. The armoring is notable.”

At the mention of armor, Treacle’s ears flicked in interest. “I’ll confess, I would like to see what type of armor they use. We’ve been learning to draw inspiration from natures’ many assorted monsters in my Mercy of Manifesting Armor class. Professor Donald Crucible is a very nature-minded sort, which is not at all what I was expecting. He also happens to be a pacifist, which is a bit odd for a dungeon guardian.”

Logan titled his head. “What? Like he doesn’t believe in killing dungeoneers.”

“Yarp.” Treacle’s spider-like machinations helped him get out his crocheting stuff, and he was soon clicking again. “Professor Donald thinks that with enough armor, you don’t need to kill raiders. He thinks they can be changed. There is some truth to the nonsense that Marko listens to. There are actual dungeoneers working as accountants at the Department of Universal Dungeon Efficiency. Though, to my mind, that just proves some raiders aren’t completely evil, not that the Council is controlled by the Deep Dark.”

Marko raised his furry hands. “Whoa, whoa, whoa, wait up. “Nonsense’ is pretty harsh. And then you say that the Warning Bell is right about something. Not nonsense. In the end, we need to really understand where the Apothos comes from. I know, you all think it’s the Tree of Souls, but that’s only one theory.”

Treacle sighed. “It’s where Apothos comes from. The theory has been proven.”

“But what if this is all a simulation?” Marko asked.

Tet grimaced. “He’s deep into it, isn’t he?”

“Very deep,” Inga agreed. “But enough of Marko’s utter rubbish, please Treacle, tell us more about your armor class. I certainly wouldn’t consider myself a pacifist, but alternative battle strategies are very interesting, especially since armored defense does play such a large role within the world of Cosmic Etymology.”

The minotaur shrugged. “Not much to tell, really. The name says it all. But I am hoping I can combine what I’m learning in my Runeic Haiku class with Professor Donald’s class. One mystery has been solved. I know why our Professor Crucible has trouble with his brother. They are polar opposites.”

Inga nodded. “Professor Crucible at times can be unpleasant and difficult, but he’s been crafting me filing cabinets for the headmaster’s office. Archiving Shadowcroft’s papers has been interesting.”

Marko snorted in disgust. “If that’s even his real name. The papers probably aren’t made of paper.”

“They are too,” Inga said. “Working with the headmaster has been fine, but between his Crystal Terpsichorean and his Rosaceae Flysnag, it’s a toxic work environment. The Crystal Terpsichorean likes to hide things from me—usually the very thing I’m looking for—and then there’s the scratches I get from his Rosaceae Flysnag. Her rose thorns are so sharp!”

Logan knew about the scratches. He’d used his Kurrybooboos to heal Inga on more than one occasion.

Marko snapped his fingers. “There’s your spies right there. That crystal dancer can’t be trusted.”

Before the goat man could devolve further, Shadowcroft stood at the podium and raised his hands for silence.

“Attention, everyone. Since we are all gathered here, I have several announcements before we get to the locations of the Semi-Finals. Firstly, I would like to once again congratulate Logan Murray and the assorted members of the Terrible Twelfth. In his own unique way, Professor Suresh has extolled your virtues and told me how hard you have been training. I think I can speak for everyone when I say that we are all excited to see what wonderful things you shall accomplish. Secondly, as most of you are aware, Chadrigoth Nobleblade still hasn’t ascended yet, but I would like people to stop drawing fake moustaches on him in permanent marker. The graffiti is shocking.”

Both Lady Elesiel and Jimi Magmarty snickered.

Shadowcroft frowned at them, while Rockheart outright glowered. The pair would get a good talking to after the assembly, Logan had no doubt.

Shadowcroft cleared his throat and continued. “Now, before we see the six locations of the semi-finals, let us take a quick gander at our leaderboard, shall we? Light shined out of Shadowcroft’s core gem, displaying the leaderboard over their heads.

The Crystal Tiger = 1400

The Onyx Tortoise = 1399

The Vermilion Phoenix = 1125

The Azure Dragon = 1064

Logan winced. Last place. If Chadrigoth broke out of his iron cocoon before the end of the year, that could really change things, but right now things were looking rather bleak. The scores were higher, and a lot of that was thanks to some of Suresh’s students doing really well. And then there was the triumph of the Backstories.

Marko pointed at the board. “See. Look at the Azure Dragon Clan’s score. Six plus four equals ten. That’s not an accident.”

“You’re right,” Tet muttered, “it’s called math.”

“Is the Blue Divine Filter doing anything?” Logan asked. “If not, I think you should cut back. You weren’t like this before you started drinking it.”

“Like what?” Marko seemed genuinely confused by the question.

Suresh the Magnificent smiled smugly. While no one from the Ninth Circle had gone on to the Semi-Finals, he loved that his clan was in the lead.

Shadowcroft quieted down the murmuring with another raised hand. “Yes, yes, many dungeon guardians are doing very well this year. But now, let’s talk about what we’re really here for. Our very own Logan and Inga will have their work cut out for them in the upcoming bout. The choices this year are unique, and I would like to personally thank the following faculty for helping locate the dungeons—Professor Darnol Zeggenerschwar, Professor Arketa the Hellgazer, and the Rector Prime, Yullis Rockheart.

All three stood to a polite smattering of applause.

One conspiracy theory that was fairly innocuous was that Rockheart and Arketa had used the trips to scout out locations for their honeymoon. Were there wedding plans? Not even Emerick Warning Bellsman knew.

As for Professor Darnol, he travelled everywhere and took his cultivation class with him. That was another reason that the leaderboard scores were so high. Darnol had his students advancing by leaps and bounds. The exotic locations and the beautiful scenery had helped everyone unlock hidden potential. Everyone except the members of the Terrible Twelfth.

Logan thought about taking out his twine, but he simply didn’t have the heart. Besides, he had something else to focus on now.

“Suresh, would you like to do the honors?” Shadowcroft asked.

The tiger-headed man nodded. “It should be me. I’m the one teaching the tournament class, aren’t I?”

Marko nodded in approval. “Such an alpha move. I love that confidence.”

Suresh sauntered to the podium and cast out images of the six worlds in quick succession, talking about the benefits and the drawbacks of each.

Logan and Inga exchanged nervous glances. This was it. The moment they’d been waiting for. Yes, it was an honor to be in the tournament, but still, it was going to be dangerous. Any dungeoneer, of any level, might show up to try and destroy the Celestial Node. Just like in real life.

Shadowcroft and the rest of the Tournament organizers walked a fine line in luring raiders in. They couldn’t attract too much attention from the guilds, or else the really powerful dungeoneers would swoop in and annihilate the student dungeon cores. At the same time, the raiders had to be powerful enough to add some excitement to the competition.

For the first time ever, Marko was paying close enough attention to summarize the dungeon locations.

“Okay, Sucrosia is the candy world. Does sugar rot? Not sure.

“Twilittia is a gloomy world full of shadow creatures? What’s the difference between a ghost and a shadow creature? Shadow creatures poop. I know that for a fact.”

“Don’t elaborate,” Logan hissed.

Marko kept on with the commentary as Suresh talked about each of the worlds. “Necroscant is the cemetery world. Pretty straight forward.

“Angleria is the dungeon inside a giant fish’s mouth. Totally unrelated side note, but ‘Fish Mouth Dungeon’ would be a good band name.

“Pallooshun. Smoke. Ash. Big cities. Deep sewers. And the Kintookie Mines. I could work wonders with a space like that—set up a series of interrelated scenes depicting slave wages, terrible bosses, abuses of power, labor unions, cave-ins, and ghosts. I’d make it a musical since there are, strangely enough, a lot of songs about mines and mining.

“Eurofaux. Typical boring dungeon. Rock and yawning, but that becomes the tabula rasa, a blank slate for bug and mushroom fun.” Marko nodded. “Six dungeons. You’d want Necroscant or Angleria.”

Suresh cleared his throat. “Those are the six locations. Now, for the possible dungeoneering parties that may or may not find the various nodes. We’ve narrowed it down to a possible seven teams. We have prepared a brief summary of each. Keep in mind, the Semi-Finalists may or may not be facing these raiders. We have no way of knowing who might stumble upon the dungeons. We’ve done our best to keep the more powerful guilds from knowing about the competition while luring in moderately powerful freelancers in. Based on our best efforts, we have the seven average raiding parties on deck.”

Logan felt a shiver run through him. At first. But when he started seeing what he and Inga were up against, he felt strangely confident. And a little baffled. Some of the teams were… bizarre.

First up was the Berserker Gnomes. Suresh used his dungeon core to flash two pictures, both rather blurry, of a tall man in a trench coat. Protruding from the coat were five evil-faced gnomes with various haircuts and beard configurations.

Five Gnomes in a trench coat? Surely, that couldn’t be a thing.

But according to Suresh’s brief that was exactly what they were up again. This crew was essentially the Voltron of evil dungeon pillaging gnomes—they could pike together, creating their ultimate trench coat form. And when not stacked five high, they fought as a pack of knee-high berserking swarm. Gummy, Gammy, Jimmy, Fruity, and Snickers. Together, those vicious gnomes were a well-oiled rage machine.

Treacle squinted. “I knew a Gummy growing up. He had anger issues. Bet it’s the same. I do still wonder that Sucrosia is an actual place. Gnome dentists referred to it as a place of eternal torment. Bet that’s the same place as well.”

Marko was about to spout off something, but Inga stopped him. “Shush. I’m writing down the names of the teams.

Next up was the Ultimate Norms. A menacing team of adventurers appeared on the conjured display at the front of the Hall. They were a tough looking crew, their faces contorted into grimaces. The five wore a wide array of armors and wielded a variety of powerful weapons—enchanted swords, epic battle axes, a chained kusarigama. There was one notable exception. A paunchy, balding guy in a bowling shirt. He also happened to carry a bowling pearlescent, glowing bowling ball.

Professor Suresh pointed. “Norma, Norm Norm, Norman, other Norman, Nom Norm, and Bowling Norm. Be careful of that last fellow. He is their cleric and wields the fearsome Bonecrusher. It’s a magical bowling ball that always finds its strike. He was one of the original members of the Holy Bowlers. There is some tension there since they are the third team we are luring in.”

Naturally, the next image showcased a team of humans in bowling shoes and matching padded armor, guiled to look like bowling shirts. The big chunky held a flail with three huge bowling balls connected to a handle. One of the Holy Bowlers wore a cloak covering his face. The center figure was a thin man whose right hand had been entirely replaced by a bowling ball.

Suresh pointed. “That’s their leader, Roy Munson. He lost his hand in a terrible bowling related incident, but instead of bowing out of the dungeoneering game, he replaced the limb with the divine bowling ball of Sisyphus. He is both a fearsome warrior and a man of keen wit. The one in the cloak is the Mysterious Striker. Then there’s Seven Ten, the Alleyway Avenger, and the dreaded Kerabatsos. They are all worshiper of the god of the Ten Pins, and they are the most powerful of the teams we’ve found. A good portion of them are Azure Branch cultivators. B-class clerics of the highest order.”

Logan turned to Marko. “So there’s bowling in the Ashvattha multiverse?”

“And miniature golf,” the satyr said. “Pass times that are pure fun. If you’re in middle school...”

Inga was taking notes furiously with most of her four hands. She shook her head, which made her antennae flop around. “We should’ve covered this in our dungeoneering class and not simply watched those Devil McClure films. They are so outdated.”

Professor Suresh flashed the next image. “These are the Fighting Gyarus, a team of women bent on sucking reality dry of Apothos. Unlike many dungeoneers, they know exactly what they are doing, and they simply don’t care.

The Fighting Gyarus were hard-faced women in what could only be described as Japanese schoolgirl uniforms. Along with some chain mail thrown in for good measure. One of the women, however, was in a strange combination of an American cheerleader uniform and plate mail. She had big pink pompoms, studded with spikes.

Suresh gestured. “That’s Cindy Killshot, and those are her Poms of Insanity. They focus her magic with deadly results.”

The image shifted to the cheerleader throwing deadly pink missiles and destroying a Swamp Dragon’s dungeon core while the evil Fighting Gyarus grinned and cheered.

Marko sat their blinking, utterly dumbfounded. “You’ll never believe this, but I’ve had very specific dreams of being killed by a group of women who look exactly like that. I mean, exactly. Pretty sure it’s prophetic. Although I don’t mind—if you have to die, there are definitely worse ways to go.”

Logan rolled his eyes and slung an arm around Marko’s shoulder. “Never. I’d never let murderers schoolgirls kill you.”

“Please,” Marko said weakly. “Let them.”

“Suresh must’ve noticed the desire in the dungeon satyr’s eye, because the professor moved on abruptly. “And now we come to Breaking Bard.”

The next picture was a group of skinny, pasty, ruffians with their arms crossed. Musical instruments hung off the ratty leather armor with a steel pauldron here and there, which seemed more about fashion than protection. They were just a few missed haircuts from looking like a metal band. There didn’t seem to be a warrior among them, except maybe some chubby guy who was wearing a shirt of daggers and holding a guitar.

Suresh singled him out in particular. “That’s Todd Mars, good with a knife and even better at ear-bleeding guitar solos. Breaking Bard is a team of thieving, rogueing, loansharking bards. Mr. Murray, they know about you, and they want your mushrooms. Todd likes knives, a great deal, but he also likes to use his guitar to crack dungeon cores with licks both catchy and dangerous. He’s joined by Vince Pinkbottom, Nikki Whiteman, Tommy Lee Ehrmantraut, and the notorious Mick Fring. They aren’t the most motivated of dungeoneers, but what they lack in motivation, they make up for in magic items. They have a variety of rings, bracelets, and musical instruments that allow them to heal, find traps, and avoid local law enforcements.”

Marko had silly grin on his face. “Gotta be honest, I kinda love them. While I’ll never go rogue—Ji-Soo would kill me dead if I did—if I did go darkside, I would totally join up with them. My lute would fit right in.” His face darkened. “I’d make it fit.”

“We have two left,” Professor Suresh said. “Next up, the Cat’s Meow.”

He flashed a picture that looked a lot like a ThunderCats promo, circa 1987, but in real life and not animated. It was a collection of cat men raiders from Kitterxob, all holding medieval weapons.

Suresh’s eyes narrowed. “This is another powerful group of raiders, and while some have accused me of being from Kitterxob, I am a rakshasa, not a Ferox. Notice my clearly mannish hands.” He lifted them up, showing them off. Logan was pretty sure he’d recently had a manicure. “Now, the Cat’s Meow just might be the most powerful group of raiders here—even more adept than the Holy Bowlers, if not for the fact that they can’t get along. There is no single leader to corral their baser instincts. They can’t even pick a name. For a time, they were the LightningCats, then they were the Cat’s Pajamas, and on some worlds they still are. At the moment, for our purposes, we’ll refer them to them as the Cat’s Meow.”

Suresh then showed the last of the possible raiding teams. “Finally, we have Lupine Fury. They are a raiding team of shape-shifters, but oddly enough, none of them are actual werewolves. Nor do we think there were ever werewolves in the party. Our working hypothesis is that they don’t actually know what the word ‘lupine’ means. Vocabulary isn’t their strong point. Killing dungeon cores and stealing Apothos is.”

Suresh showed them side-by-side images of the shifters in their human form and then in their hybrid form.

You had the turtle man tank.

There was a porcupine archer.

A crow girl rogue.

A skunk woman wizard.

And a huge bear wearing a silver helmet. Unlike the others, the bear didn’t look like a half-human, half-animal hybrid. It simply looked like an enormous bear in a helmet, though it did have gleaming silver claws on both its hands and its feet.

Suresh nodded. “We have precious little information about the Lupine Fury, though it seems that the werebear is the leader. However, there are rumors that the silver helmet is cursed, and slowly driving the great ursine beast mad. There are also reports that the non-mammalian shifters aren’t integrating very well with the rest of the members of their party. The entire group is bloodthirsty, though, and while they might look like rather adorable in their animal forms, they will kill you if given the chance.”

Suresh flashed the last image, of a skeleton king, lost in a fog of yellow-green smoke, full of porcupine quill arrows, having his dungeon core gem shattered by the bear’s gleaming silver claws.

“That picture was taken not but a week ago. The dungeon guardian was Ozzie Ossified. And he is no more. The Celestial Node on Gamma Hybro Six is also no more and, as a result, the then entire Gamma World is withering on the branch.”

“It is a sobering reminder of just the kind of evil we are fighting against.” Suresh’s gem dimmed. “What we do here is important, people. Never forget that. While I am petty and have my favorites, I am forever vigilant when it comes to the health of the Tree of Souls.”

Logan glanced down at the list of possible raiders. Berserker Gnomes. The Fighting Gyarus, which included a world-ravaging cheerleader with deadly pom poms. The Ultimate Norms. The Holy Bowlers. Breaking Bard. The Cat’s Meow, and lastly, Lupine Fury.

Who would Logan and Inga end up fighting?

Suresh ended his lecture by pointing at the Terrible Twelfth’s table. “And so, Logan Murry and Inga Thosa Therian. We have a lot to do to prepare you for the Semi-Finals. I’ll expect you and the rest of the tournament class to show up early tomorrow. We still have three weeks before the event, but I want you two fully prepared. However, if something unfortunate happened to you in that time, it wouldn’t be the end of the world. We still have Fractilla. This would be her chance to shine.”

Fractilla the ice imp winced and gave Logan a look that said, I’m so sorry our teacher is wishing death upon you and your friends.

Logan hardly noticed. That was just part of life at Shadowcroft Academy.