8 hours before.

Fayette stared in shock at the others. “What do you mean they stopped you? Are they idiots?”

“Apparently yes!” Olivia screamed. The [Doctor] was furious, she paced around her chair like a prowling lion, and her hands were clutching open and closed like vicious claws. But that wasn’t nearly as threatening as the rage on her face, like a roaring inferno.

“The fucking idiots just couldn’t stop poking around, then they made me stop! They won’t allow me to do a thing more! I’m not allowed at the clinic anymore!”

Martin of the Salted Knives, who was sitting at the table beside theirs sipped at his flask and sighed. “If it’s really as you say… I can’t imagine why they would do it.”

Fayette couldn’t either. She had rushed back to the shipyard, bursting with energy to assemble a hunting party, only to deflate as she saw the scene there. The rest of her party had been at the tables by one of the shelter buildings, where hunters had taken to resting up, trying to calm down a furious [Doctor].

The Salted Knives and Mousetrap were both seated nearby, but the other two parties were mostly keeping out of the discussion, wisely wary of arousing the [Doctor’s] ire. And what an ire it was.

Olivia had been forcibly removed from the clinic and disallowed from treating any more of the patients. Understandably, she was a bit upset. Olivia finally stopped pacing, then slumped down to her seat, head on the table.

“I just can’t believe they would really do this… I thought I finally had some respect…”

“Did they say exactly what reason they were using for this?” Mireille asked, trying to sound hopeful. “Maybe we can contest them.”

Olivia shook her head. “No—it’s just… They couldn’t take it when I kept on refusing to tell them how I was curing the patients. So they took the ones who got better and kept poking and prodding at them, endless questions of ‘Are you sure?’ and so on… and eventually, the symptoms started resurging for them.”

Fayette frowned. “They studied them so hard they got ill all over again?”

Olivia snorted. “Sure. Let’s go with that.”

Marie rocked on her chair and looked at the dark evening sky, trying to think. “Who gave the actual order to keep you out? One of the [Doctors]?”

“No… it wasn’t them, even. That [Mage] guy in charge, Cadeau. Apparently, his boss finally got word, and sent out a message commanding it.”

“That would be tough to get by…” Marie admitted. “Sorry, I don’t really know what to say here.”

“Don’t worry about it—it’ll pass,” Olivia said. She raised her head up from the table and gave her friends a wry look. “I’m used to it.”

Fayette stared at the despondent [Doctor] for a good bit, then finally sighed and leaned back in her own chair. “Well, moving on then… I haven’t told you about what I found in the city yet, have I?”

“You found something?” Mireille asked, suddenly tense. “What did you find, Fayette?”

“Don’t look at me like that—it was a good find! Maybe—if we go tell that Cadeau fellow about it, he’ll even have to give us some more respect.”

“Really?” Marie asked. “What did you find then?”

Fayette smiled. “I’ve found the culprit—the origin of the disease.”

Everybody froze in place, even the hunters on the nearby tables, and especially Olivia, who lifted her head up and gave Fayette a stunned look. “Bullshit,” she said.

“Nope, I’m serious,” Fayette said, looking around. “I almost got ambushed by that witch! She was… just an old woman—really. A really sick woman. But her class… it was the most awful thing I’ve ever felt. So high level. She was controlling the plague mana just like that! And the zombies were following her every command.”

Mireille rocked back in her seat, taking a deep breath. “That… that does sound big. That is a big find.”

“Were you in danger?” Marie asked, eyes full of concern.

“Well… a bit,” Fayette admitted. “Nettie really saved me there! But she won’t surprise us again, next time we’ll know what to look out for. So—”

Fayette stood and looked over the hunters sitting at the other tables. “Anybody feeling up for a hunt? This here is proper big game—lots of experience on offer I bet. You interested?”

Edmond, the bulky man who led Mousetrap laughed uproariously, then stood up. “Big game you say? Of course we’ll go in! How could we call ourselves proper trappers if we didn’t, eh lads?”

Louis, the gangly bowman of the group, sighed and took a long sip from his pocket flask. “No helping it—you’re the boss. You in too, Mark?”

The last man, the silent brooder who had been standing watch by the warehouse tunnel just shrugged, opting to stay silent.

Fayette nodded. “Good… that’s one team… What about you lot? Martin?”

The silver-haired rogue was stroking his whiskers and rocking in his chair, but he was also nodding. “I think we’ll come along too—nasty business like this has to be put to an end. But I won’t step in without informing command first.”

Fayette grimaced. “I guess there’s no way around that.” She turned to her friends. “You all in for this?”

Everyone stood up.

“Of course,” Olivia said, a dark gleam in her eye. “I want to punch something really good and hard right now, and I definitely want to spit in that Cadeau bastard’s face one more time.”

—

Cadeau did not even look up from his papers as three hunter parties crowded into his office and told him of what they had found. He had a simple answer.

“There is no need for such action, everything is in hand,” he said as he kept jotting down notes on some very unimportant-looking paperwork.

Fayette stared. “What do you mean there is no need? I just told you I found the big disease master!”

Cadeau sighed and put his pen down, then leaned back in his seat. He gave the assembled hunters a cool look. “You did well in your orphanage rescue mission, but this type of hunt… it is foolishness. Let me remind you. My superior, [Grand Magus] Mondoug is in charge of cleansing the city, and he will see it done. Very soon now. The time nears.”

He looked left and right meeting every single hunter right in the eyes. “You. Don’t. Need. To. Do. Anything. Just… sit back and relax. Everything will be handled.”

“He will handle everything, really?” Olivia spat. “He, who has not stepped one foot in here for this whole time? He, who sent out a notice that my medical activities should be stopped, even if he never came to see my results?”

Cadeau leaned forward and lowered his voice. “Don’t make a fuss. His activities are not for you to peer into, and I trust he has a good reason to stop your activities. Why, I heard there were reports of uncertainties—”

“Bullshit reports!” Olivia shouted. “If those other [Doctors] had just shut it and stayed away, everything would have been fine! My methods had no faults! It was their fussing that messed it all up! And now I’m supposed to just accept this too?”

Cadeau stared at her coldly. “Are you done? You have done some good work, so I will ignore the discourtesies you have just said—let’s agree that those words were never spoken. Regarding any other activities…”

He sighed, then picked his pen back up, returning to his paperwork. “Fine. Do as you wish—have your little operation. But remember. It. Does. Not. Matter.”

The hunters gave him one last baleful stare, then filed out of the dim office, back outside. Everyone was silent, deep in their own thoughts. Fayette included. She stared at the gate which led to the rest of the island and thought.

He didn’t forbid us from doing it… But he did say it would be useless. He doesn’t care one bit about finding the main disease spreader, or whether we fight it. Is that because he doesn’t need to? Will that [Grand Magus] really handle everything on his own? The mages were setting up some things in town…

Should she just… turn away and go to sleep?

Fayette balled her hand up into a fist. No.

“Hey—we’re all still doing this, right? He didn’t forbid us, right?”

Mireille snapped her eyes open. “You still want to? I mean…”

“It was the way he looked at us,” Olivia said. The [Doctor] looked around and met everyone’s eyes. “You all saw it, right? He really doesn’t respect us one bit. Doing what he says…”

“No—” Edmond said. “I can’t accept it either.”

Fayette smiled. “Good, if you are in, I think we can do this. What about your lot, Martin?”

The man stroked his beard and studied Fayette. “Girl, why do you really want to do this? It’s not just some grudge thing, is it? Don’t you think the [Magus] will handle things?”

“Oh—well…” Fayette shrugged. “I just want the experience, really.”

Martin laughed and tapped his son on the shoulder. “Hah! Now that’s some proper hunter spirit! I say we’re in! What type of warrior would leave a challenge like this unanswered?”

Marie and Mireille shared a look and shook their heads together. “I guess there is no helping it then,” Marie said.

“But! First things first! Everyone, can I have your attention?” Mireille interrupted.

“Hm, what is it?” Fayette asked, already fixing up a mask on her face.

“We’re not doing this without a solid plan! Fayette, tell us everything you know about our enemy. If we do this, we’re doing it right.”

 

—

 

Now.

Fayette stared at the disease-ridden woman who had just been blasted to shreds by a bomb, and who then just transferred all her injuries to a zombie swarm. The woman didn’t even look winded. Fayette turned to Mireille, who had stepped outside of Marie’s [Hidden Cupboard].

“Well, that plan failed.”

Mireille nodded. “Yes, it did.”

“I told you we should have put more oomph into the first strike.”

“Yes but… we had to stay stealthy, right? You didn’t know how observant she was. This was as much as we could risk without her noticing.”

Fayette looked around and saw a vast horde of zombies approaching from every direction. The Salted Knives were stepping out to block them off, helped by Marie’s stone Magic, while Mousetrap was readying their trap equipment. And Olivia was readying her knives.

“Well Mireille, you know what this means?”

The [Seamstress] nodded. “Time for plan B.”

Fayette moved, broom in hand, running right at the plaguemother who was still getting her bearings. The woman stared at her with twitching fingers. “You. You whore!”

So uncivilized. Fayette ducked under two rushing zombies and reached the woman’s side—only to jump back at the last second. The plaguemother had been readying to defend against Fayette, and so completely missed Louis shooting a rope arrow at her, followed by Olivia dashing in with her knives from behind. A brawl started.

But Fayette kept away. The brawl wouldn’t be decisive, as the bomb had proven, they needed heavier firepower. They needed a weapon with lots of power. And this place…

Fayette eyed the blasted-apart street crossing, littered with corpses dead from sickness, as well as the sludge of many dead monsters. A lot of mess, all caused by a disease. A disease that had been spread by a very particular person. A complete disaster of hygiene and cleanliness.

For a [Combat Maid], it was a place brimming with power.

Fayette started cleaning.

There were monsters and hunters fighting all over the plaza, along with an enraged Plaguemother throwing out barbed roses, but Fayette avoided it all. She danced between it all. With a broom as her partner, she started the first phase of her waltz. The dust! So much dust!

Fayette used [Sweep Dust]. The billowing dust and smoke roused by the explosion began swirling to her in a great vortex, and she skated around the battleground, bringing her cloud of dust along. She hopped over a ghoul’s tackle and slipped between two razor-sharp roses. She kept enlarging her cloud of dust, larger and larger until it was thick as the worst sandstorm.

Then she threw a bit of spice into the mix and started running to the center of the clearing—where Edmond and Louis had managed to ensnare the plaguemother into a net. She was trashing wildly with claws, a horde of zombies rushing to help, and Fayette jumped right in—

And trust her broom into the woman’s open mouth.

A cloud of dust and spice followed. Her cheeks bulged. Sand and sharp bits of rock scraped at her eyes and face. And then she roared.

Fayette was blown back by another furious wail, and the frenzy of the monsters grew more violent. Her cloud of dust was dispersed high into the sky. The plaguemother had used the shock to get out of the net, and was now rushing into the midst of the horde.

Well, damn. There goes plan one.

But her dust was now high up in the sky, darkening the early morning, and so the battlefield had gotten cleaner. And [So Fresh, So Clean] had started charging up. But not enough—not yet.

Fayette made a quick check of the battlefield, and saw that all her friends were handling their own parts seemingly fine so far, and reached into her apron.

She swapped to a mop and started cleaning up the zombie gunk all over the streets.

 

—

 

Marie saw Fayette’s first attack fail, flinched at the roar, then went back to work. She was using her magic—openly.

No need to hide it among hunters. Especially a situation as tough as this.

Martin was beside her, coordinating the defense and making sure she was safe, for Marie had an important role in the fight. A horde of monsters was streaming in from all directions, and the air was thick with their rotten scent.

The [Lady] was raising up barricades.

While Mousetrap and the rest of her party were holding up the center and fighting their main foe, The Salted Knives had the perimeter. Marie was raising up earth and brick from the streets into a multitude of barricades that stalled and directed the flow of bodies, making sure all the monsters ended up in trapped kill zones where the experience hunters could make minced meat of them.

“Reinforce that bit there,” Martin said, observing the situation with one eye while aiming throwing knives with the other. His head was spinning this way and that as he monitored his party and the overall battle, all while throwing out an endless array of knives into the mob, and directing Marie.

And the [Lady] was struggling to keep up. “I’ve got it,” she said, even as sweat covered her brow. Magic was racing all along her skin with the full strength of her reserves, but it was barely enough.

She raised a barricade, but the monsters piled on top of each other to jump over.

She repaired a broken-off bit, only to find three more barriers lacking once she was finished.

She repaired the old, even as the perimeter constantly shrunk as the hunters were pushed further inside. She bit her lip. “This isn’t working.”

“Trust your friends,” Martin said, keeping his voice calm and efficient. “They’ve got the foe on the ropes, and we just need to endure until they can move in to help us. To the right—erect a new layer there.”

Marie saw the spot and began pulling up another layer of pavement, forming a corresponding ditch in front of the wall. Then she looked back searching for Fayette with her eyes. “It’s just—”

“Watch out!”

Marie was suddenly thrust to the ground by Martin’s strong arm—just in time to get her out of a stealthy ghoul’s way. But the pounce landed on Martin instead. The rogue went down, knives flashing.

“No!” Marie jumped up and stomped the ghoul on the back of its head furiously until it dissolved, revealing an unsteady but living Martin from beneath. She extended a hand to help him up, cursing her carelessness. “Sorry, are you okay? Are you hurt?”

“Just a scratch! Don’t worry, look to the front, reinforce that bit!”

Marie almost believed him, until he saw how unsteady the Rogue was on his feet. She stopped mid-cast, staring at the blackening marks on his arm. “You got bit.”

“Pa! Are you okay?” Martino shouted, dashing back to check up on him.

“Get back fool boy!” Martin flinched, swaying on his feet, but his other hand kept moving, already throwing a steady stream of knives out. “I can hold up for a bit more.”

Marie bit her lip and turned back to her casting. But she also raised her voice. “Olivia! Get in here! We need a pill!”

—

Mireille saw Olivia dash out to the injured rogue, but the [Seamstress] kept her eyes on the prize. The plaguemother. The ghoulish woman had gotten a dozen zombies arrayed in formation around her, but they had all been bundled together by ropes.

Mireille’s strings and needles were busy at work as she struggled to hold the foe in, and Mousetrap by her side was using a steady stream of trap and rope skills to reinforce their binding.

“This is working,” Mireille said, panting heavily. “We can do this.”

Edmond nodded next to her and kept throwing more rope into the mix. “Just as long as another ghoul doesn’t break free…”

“One’s here!” Louis shouted from the other side.

Mireille groaned as she saw another of the fast monsters break through the perimeter and rush to the plaguemother’s side, where it began tearing right through the layers of rope. “Shit!”

Fayette, can’t you clean up faster?

 

—

 

Fayette realized that she had a problem. A zombie blood problem.

Her plan had been to clean up the blood from the battlefield in order to charge up her skill and give the main foe a good bash to the head—but there was an issue. The longer the fight went on, the more zombies were arriving and dying.

And more blood was flooding the streets.

Much more than she could keep up with using her skills—even aided by magic. Her skill was weakening as the battlefield was gradually starting to become dirtier than it had been when she started.

Curses, I’ll have to do this with an incomplete charge…

“Everyone—I’m using my skill!”

“Go for it! We’ve got her pinned,” Mireille shouted from the other side of the zombie pile.

Fayette began running in.

Marie was holding up alright, and Martin seemed to have gotten steadier on his feet with the pill he had gotten from Olivia, but the fight was stalemated otherwise.

Attacks were constantly being flung at the plaguemother, arrows and knives, little bombs and spiked barbs, but she just kept on healing it all away as the flock around her grew. It wasn’t strong enough.

But Fayette’s mop was brimming with power.

“Now!” Louis shouted and pulled on his rope while activating a skill. The bundle of zombies was suddenly released from their bindings, unwound side by side, opening a clear path to the red-eyed woman at their center. Her skin was bulging with plant-like growths and the swirl of plague mana was growing, but Fayette cared not.

She ran right in, lifting her broom up for a vicious overhead blow. Two zombies rushed in from the sides, trying to stop her, but they only collided into each other as Fayette skipped right through.

The plaguemother saw her, and her eyes widened.

Fayette smiled. “I’ve got you.”

With her full strength and speed at work, she got close and brought her mop down, finally letting her building charge go right at the bound woman’s head.

She hit her in a bright flash of blue and crunching bone. Fayette felt her mop break through something, then finally break itself—wood falling into splinters. She lifted her eyes up.

The plaguemother hadn’t gone splat.

She was smiling with sharp inhuman teeth, and her left hand, now a monstrous bulging growth was raised up, though it was now reduced to ruin. She got a block up in time. “Got you,” she hissed.

Her jaw unlatched from her face, opening her mouth hideously wide as a thick, vile smog suddenly rushed out from her mouth right at Fayette. It covered the [Maid’s] face wholesale in a sickening cloud.

But the boon laid on Fayette’s hand flared and a protective layer kept it all just off her.

Fayette jumped back in a panic and gave a sigh of relief when she saw that none of the cloud stuck to her. Thank the [Saints] that worked. But—

The plaguemother was still by her army, and her wounded hand was already being returned to normal. Fayette cursed and stepped back, rushing to reinforce the perimeter.

That skill is complete horse dung!

“Olivia, your turn!”

 

—

 

The [Doctor] hadn’t yet been that active in the fight, but there was a reason for that. A very good reason. She was making preparations, setting the stage, preparing the grand final act.

Because the plaguemother was not yet a believer.

When Martin had been struck, Olivia had rushed to his side with her pill held out clearly visible, yelling about how she was coming in to heal. And the plaguemother had heard her and had watched. Those cold eyes had been focused on the [Doctor].

And they had seen her medicine work.

[Placebo] started to take its hold.

She had then audibly started yelling out about healing and handing even more pills to the other fighters, all while the plaguemother’s eyes stayed focused on her.

And finally, Olivia saw it in the monstrous human’s eyes. Fear.

She had become a believer. But one last part remained, a final bit to reinforce the effect to its absolute maximum.

“Are you sure about this?” Olivia asked Edmund, watching the brawl going on all around her. The two were just in the middle of it all, in a way that let them fade into the ruckus, and the plaguemother had lost sight of them completely. A useful skill from Edmund.

“I’m sure,” Edmund said, nodding. The burly hunter kept his eyes focused on his prey, and his broad arms were ready. He had a pill between his teeth, ready to be crushed in his mouth at any moment. “My capstone is an unbreakable hold—she won’t be getting free from it. You’ll have time.”

Olivia rubbed her forehead, trying to calm her rushing thoughts. “But your ability requires touch contact. Are you really sure?”

“Should a [Doctor] really mistrust her treatment so?” Edmond asked, eyes light. But suddenly he looked to the side and met Olivia’s eyes, instantly deadly serious. “I do trust your medicine. One of my friends was among the injured, and I saw how your medicine helped him recover. You have my gratitude.”

Olivia stared. It had been long since someone she barely knew had said such words of trust in her. She inhaled sharply, then breathed out, turning back to her quarry. “Then… let’s do this.”

“Go!”

Edmund rushed in through the brawl, arms wide and ready to grapple, and he bit into the pill in his mouth. He was on the plaguemother in two seconds, and suddenly the woman was clutched and bound in his thick arms. “[Ironbound Grapple]!”

The plaguemother began scratching and clawing wildly, emitting a thick haze of plague essence all around her, but the grip didn’t let up one bit. And then the plaguemother saw Olivia stepping from the front, slowly. Dramatically.

Like an [Actor].

In her hand, Olivia had an oversized syringe filled to the brim with a bright green liquid—which was actually just one of her strongest poisons. But… she had written to the syringe’s side, in wide and easily-legible bold letters.

Cure, they spelled out.

The plaguemother’s eyes widened and she began trashing even more in a wild panic. The other hunters snared and blocked off any zombies from near her, and for just a moment, only Olivia and her stood there, with Edmond holding the woman in place in an implacable grip.

“No! No! Stay Away! No!” The plaguemother wailed in a rasping voice, but Olivia…

Just laughed. Ominously. Like she had practiced many times before. She pushed at the syringe just a bit, so that some of the liquid would drip out of the oversized needle head. Everything to craft that perfect mix of fear and belief.

“Hello, dear,” Olivia drawled as she stepped forward slowly. “Don’t you know a disease must be treated with a [Doctor]? Naughty, naughty, you’ve been haven’t you?”

“No! No! Stop!”

Olivia prowled forward like a hungry lioness, and lifted her syringe up, like a dagger ready for a stab. “This will only hurt a bit.”

For that instant, she felt the triumph of victory, and pushed her weapon down with the full extent of her pent-up rage, and then—

And then—

Bright pillars of light suddenly flashed all over the horizon, blinding Olivia.

She flinched back, and as her head swirled, the [Doctor] saw that the whole island had suddenly been encircled by a ring of magical light. And she remembered the words Cadeau had said to them.

The [Grand Magus] will solve everything.

It won’t matter.

“No!” Her eyes reddened and she jumped back at the equally-stunned plaguemother, trying to bring her syringe down for that final push. That final jab. That win she so desperately felt a need for.

But as she stepped forward, it was suddenly in slow motion. Her hand was moving a full second behind her mind. Olivia tried to bring her weapon down, but it was futile, because—

A skill had activated. Something far too strong. A skill covering the whole island under a veil of dominance.

Everything.

Was.

Slowing.

Down.