“How long have you lived in Ikuno?” Mark asked, trotting his massive, terrifyingly muscular riding rooster right beside hers. The thick, throbbing veins on the giant bird's featherless neck pulsed with every heavy step.

“I was born there,” Kaori responded, adjusting her grip on the leather reins. “Lived there all twenty-five years of my life. That vape shop in Kentucky was literally the first time I ever left Osaka.”

“That’s so wild that Sara found you, of all people, trapped down here,” he responded, shaking his head. “She’s been absolutely obsessed with Osaka since her trip. She physically glows when she talks about it.”

“That makes me so happy!” Kaori beamed. “She’s already told me so much about her deep love for the city!”

“How do you like it?” Mark wondered. “I only went for a few days. I went to Dotonbori. And that weird Family Guy-themed bar.”

“What’s not to love?” Kaori smiled, thinking about her life growing up in the dense, chaotic Korean market of Tsuruhashi. “It's not clean and quiet like the rest of Japan. It’s loud. The alleyways under the JR train tracks are so narrow you can barely walk two abreast, and the air is just constantly thick with the smoke of grilling yakiniku. So much good food. So many friendly, loud people! A lot of the country looks down on us there, but we’re happy even when they hate us.”

She closed her eyes for a moment, letting the memory wash over her. She remembered sitting on a plastic crate eating fresh, spicy kimchi at her Halmae’s shop, waiting for her mom to get off work, talking loudly with every single regular who came and went through the market. She knew every single face in Tsuruhashi.

“I don’t think it’s so much that the average people hate you,” Mark said thoughtfully, his cynical Earth-brain kicking in. ”I think it’s that your people were a convenient political scapegoat for a long time, and rich men like hiding their own failings behind the struggles of the less fortunate.”

Kaori considered his words, recognizing the truth of the Zainichi Korean experience. “It’s not the average men who hate us.” She didn’t let her mood crumble.

“Oh no,” Mark agreed. “They just poison the well from the top down.”

“Because they’re weak?” she wondered.

“No,” Mark answered, looking over at her. “Because you’re strong.”

Kaori sat with that as her giant rooster clucked softly. She was strong. Her mom was. Her whole big, beautiful, loud family in the market was. But right now, she was worried about her friend. “I hope I am strong enough. I want to save Erin.”

“We will get her,” Mark promised. “I’m not letting anyone suffer in this world anymore.”

They came to a stop at the top of a sheer, rocky drop-off that stretched as far as she could see in either direction. It was a massive, natural retaining wall. In the distance below, there was a small, snowy town with a huge wooden elevator that went down into another cavern. It was the exact town she had originally come in through.

“That’s it.” She pointed down to a small, nondescript building tucked behind a patch of gray trees on the outskirts of the snowy town. “He took all the captive girls into that shed over there.”

Mark tugged at his goatee in deep contemplation, his eyes narrowing. “Let’s go get her.”

“Whoa,” Kaori’s heart hammered in her chest. “Sara said just scout! She was very clear about the managerial orders.”

“Sara doesn’t know this specific location like I do,” Mark said, dismissing the chain of command.

“But she’s the leader,” Kaori protested, backing her massive cluck away from the dangerous edge.

Mark dismounted smoothly and reached his hand up to the cluck, patting its veiny, muscular head. “Wait for me here.” He turned to Kaori and reached a hand out to her. “Do you want to actually see Erin again today, or do you want to leave her down there to suffer for another possible week while we plan a corporate raid? You’re strong, remember?”

She stared down at the Changeling Wizard. He was right. She could do it. She stroked the cluck’s meaty girth to calm it and slipped off the saddle, a deep feeling of logistical wrongness churning in her tummy.

“Today. I want to see her today.”

“Good,” Mark said. “Wait here.”

Mark didn't hesitate. He simply walked to the edge and jumped off the massive wall.

Kaori panicked. She ran to the edge, fully expecting to see him fall to his death. Halfway down the drop, Mark calmly pointed a finger at his own chest. “Feather Fall!”

His descent instantly slowed to a gentle, magical drift, landing him softly in the snow below.

Kaori took a breath, called upon her innate Druidic magic, and jumped after him. Mid-air, she smoothly Wildshaped into a large snow owl, diving gracefully through the freezing air and landing softly on a branch near where Mark had touched down. She shifted back into her human form and ran to check on him.

“Mark!” She skidded to a halt next to him in the snow. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah,” Mark groaned, brushing the snow off his robes. “Hey… I had a whole cool Wizard way planned to get you down here safely. How did you… oh, right. Druid.”

“I don’t know a lot about what’s going on in this world or this RPG life,” Kaori admitted, “but I know how to use my animal powers pretty well!”

He nodded. “We’ll definitely need that if we want to get in there.”

She looked at the small building in the distance. It looked no bigger than a typical market stall back in Tsuruhashi, but she was absolutely sure she’d seen dozens of people forced inside. “I can be a mouse. I can sneak under the door.”

“Nah,” Mark shook his head. “No sneaking. Craig is way smarter than that. He built a brutal anti-Rogue detection system for the party's battle-cart once, and not even my best NPCs could bypass it. No, you’ll need to be ready to fight.”

“I don’t want to fight!” she cried, clutching her floral armor. “I don’t want to hurt anyone.”

Mark looked at her and held his empty hand up in the air. “Book!”

A heavy, leather-bound tome materialized in his palm. He handed it to her. “Then get creative. Learn the Druid spells in there better than anything else. I built this game engine to specifically reward ridiculous, out-of-the-box, creative gameplay and players. You are far more likely to fail by doing nothing than you are to fail by doing something big, bold, or completely stupid.”

She took the heavy book from his hands. She quickly paged through the exhaustive list of Druid spells and abilities as they walked stealthily through the snowy trees toward their destination. “I can just cast any of these?”

“Yeah,” Mark said softly. “The original tabletop game only lets you cast a certain number of spells, or certain power levels, per day. But the engine is written, again, to reward innovation. If you can use it, use it.”

She took the time to hastily memorize a couple of spell names and their strange acoustic descriptions, and read a bit more about the limits of her shapeshifting in the couple of minutes it took to reach their destination. She shook the book, dismissing it into the ether.

“It doesn’t look like anyone is actually in there,” Kaori whispered from behind a tree.

“Underground,” Mark said knowingly. “It’s always underground. Luckily, though, I believe these specific dungeon generation models are not deep cave systems, though I don’t know exactly where the exit comes out.”

The wooden door of the shed flew open. A massive Owlbear stepped out into the snow. Kaori ducked hard behind the tree and hid as Mark watched the creature intently.

“Those bird guys are mean!” she whispered.

“They’re called Owlbears,” Mark corrected. “And, unfortunately, I think they all work for Craig now.”

The Owlbear trudged through the snow on the path toward the weird, quiet town without fanfare. Once it was out of sight, Mark moved. She followed him up to the shed door. When he pulled it open, a long flight of concrete steps plummeted down into the dark.

She followed Mark down the steps until they came to a single, heavy steel door equipped with a sliding metal viewing hatch at eye level.

“How are we going to get in?” she wondered.

She noticed Mark's fingers dancing in a complex somatic pattern as he mumbled a couple of arcane words to himself. After a moment of staring blankly at nothing, his Changeling skin rippled and stretched, perfectly mimicking the terrifying, feathered visage of an Owlbear.

He knocked heavily on the steel door. “Like this.”

After a few seconds, the metal hatch scraped open. A pair of beady eyes peered out. “Password?”

“Shia LaBeouf’s sick ‘stache,” Mark grunted in a perfect, gravelly Owlbear voice.

The slide slammed shut. There was a heavy mechanical click, and the squeal of rusted hinges as the steel door swung open.

It revealed dozens of cramped wooden desks lined up in a massive, sweltering subterranean room. Sweating human captives sat at each desk, frantically filling tiny glass vape juice bottles from massive vats. Several heavily armored Owlbear guards walked the aisles, yelling, poking, and prodding at the exhausted sweatshop workers. A long central hallway passed through the middle of the room, splitting it in two and running as far back as she could see. The muffled sounds of screaming could be heard echoing from the distance.

“Take that new one to room twelve,” the Owlbear who guarded the door grunted, pointing a feathered claw at Kaori.

Kaori’s eyes flew wide with terror. “What?”

“Got it,” Mark said gruffly. He grabbed her wrist tight and ushered her quickly past the guard before he could look closer. “Just stay close, and stay quiet. We’ll find her and get the fuck out of here.”

Each subterranean room they passed was exactly the same. Dozens of captive workers, many actively crying and sweating through their clothes, mechanically filled vape juice bottles and assembled metal mods and tanks. Mark pushed them past each room with speed, not letting her linger to get a good look for Erin, until they finally reached a massive cavern at the very back of the complex.

This room was three times the size. It had three times as many suffering people, three times as many guards, and a towering, foul-smelling Cave Ogre actively patrolling the floor, prodding the workers much harder than the Owlbears in the previous rooms.

Kaori scanned the sea of miserable faces. It ended fast as she picked out the distinct, faded rainbow-dyed hair immediately.

“That’s her!” Kaori perked up, pulling against Mark's grip.

Mark nodded, dropping his Owlbear disguise, and started purposefully toward the girl's workstation.

They didn't make it.

The Cave Ogre made short work of the distance between them. It put a massive, filthy hand up against Mark’s chest, pushing the Wizard back hard.

“No go you!” the Ogre grunted. It snatched out with its other hand, grabbing Kaori entirely by surprise and yanking her effortlessly up into the air.

The sudden rise was nauseatingly disorienting as the Ogre shook her violently back and forth. Through the dizzying motion, she caught Mark getting a spell ready. She didn't wait to see what it was. She did the first thing that came to mind.

She Wildshaped instantly into a tiny red fox, slipping right out of the Ogre’s massive, clumsy grip and dropping to the floor.

“Enlarge Penis!” Mark yelled, reaching out and tapping the Ogre's leg.

The Ogre looked down in utter confusion as the front of his pants started to grow rapidly. A massive, unnatural pressure ripped forcefully through the seams of the Ogre’s filthy Jordache jeans. It quickly grew to almost four feet long, heavy and completely unmanageable.

Kaori the fox passed swiftly between the Ogre's legs and ran straight for Erin's desk. The Ogre flailed wildly, fighting for balance against the sudden weight of the whipping, massive member.

Mark wasn't done. He cast his follow-up.

“Everlasting Orgasm!”

By this time, the Owlbear guards had noticed the intrusion and charged them. But the Ogre went completely wild, roaring in overstimulated agony. He spun in circles, flailing his giant, four-foot member around like a fleshy club, physically knocking into Owlbears and workstations alike, casting a torrential, blinding wave of jizz everywhere across the warehouse floor.

“Erin!” Kaori morphed back into her human form and grabbed her exhausted friend from behind.

As Erin spun around in her chair, Kaori could see how much she’d suffered over the last year written in the dark circles and hollows all over her beautiful face.

“Kaori!” Erin gasped in disbelief. She leaned in instantly, planting a desperate, bruising kiss on Kaori's lips, completely stopping the Druid's heart.

This was exactly what the last two years of longing had been building to, but it was happening here, in the middle of a chaotic, jizz-covered fantasy sweatshop.

“Let’s go! Hurry!” Kaori yelled, pulling away.

She turned and saw the Owlbear guards being brutally beaten down by their own flailing Ogre, but more reinforcements were quickly swarming through the doors, heading straight for Mark. They had to go, but she wouldn’t leave the Wizard behind.

“Can you do that magic teleporting thing you did when we got here again?” Kaori asked Erin.

Erin didn't answer. She simply vanished.

Erin suddenly appeared directly next to Mark in a flash of purple light. She wrapped her arms tightly around his waist just as three Owlbears swung their clubs at his head.

Flash. They were standing next to Kaori again.

“There!” Erin panted.

Mark looked at the girl in shock. “You have Blink? Nice. Grab Kaori, and do that all the way out of here. Don’t stop until you hit the outside wall. I’ll be right behind you.”

Kaori didn’t have time to say anything before the girl she had fallen hopelessly in love with wrapped her arms tightly around her.

Suddenly, the scenery shifted violently. They were in the hallway.

Flash. They were at the stairs.

Flash. And again.

Until finally, they were standing outside in the freezing snow. Kaori gasped for air and looked back at the shed door for Mark, but saw nothing coming up the stairs behind them.

Suddenly, a magical rip appeared in the thin air next to the wooden door. It opened into an almost perfect, glowing purple disc. Mark stepped calmly through the portal, brushing snow off his shoulders.

“Are you two okay?” Mark asked.

“Mark?” Erin said, her eyes going wide as she finally got a good look at his face in the daylight.

Mark turned and gave the rainbow-haired girl a really good, hard look. The realization hit him like a physical blow. “Holy shit. Erin… we have to run.”

They began running toward the massive retaining wall, sticking to the cover of the gray trees. Thankfully, no Owlbears followed them out. Kaori was shocked by the exchange.

“You two know each other?” Kaori yelled between breaths as they ran.

“Yeah,” Mark answered, not looking back, his voice incredibly tight. “I’ll let you tell her how you know me, Erin.”

After a long moment of thought, just as they reached the bottom of the towering wall, Erin finally answered.

“I used to date his best friend,” Erin said quietly. “Sara.”

 

[SYSTEM ALERT: Elite Encounter Cleared.]

[XP Awarded: 24,000]

[Level Up Available! Unspent Attribute Points: 18]