I level up again. 9th brings me widen spell for increasing area of effect spells, and I also grab three abilities that give me access to two bonus spell slots per level where I have spell slots (0-4th, at 9th) and let me prepare any Divine spell, psionic power, or psychic spell in those slots. Oh yes, and those are three independent abilities, so that's six bonus spell slots per spell level (two Divine, two Psychic, and two psionic). They go nicely with the variant I picked up prior that does the same thing for Arcane spells. I needed that one to repair my Eidolon.

One day, after the dust settles from the mass arrests, Detectives Jessica and James Jones rope me in to a case.

Jessica starts my briefing,  "This case doesn't make sense. We have sanitation workers vanishing on the job all over the city while doing pipe maintenance, but other than that, we can't find any common threads."

James continues, "They've got no common contacts, both sexes, six different nationalities, four different colleges, a dozen different high schools, all times of day, all days of the week, and no bodies to examine."

Jessica's turn again, "Same MO, though. Worker goes down the hole, at some point there's a scream on the radio, and the hose goes slack. Pull the hose up, and nothing is attached. Just a ragged end. Drop a camera down, and there's nothing to see."

James is up again, "And it's gotten worse. After they had it happen twice ten miles apart at the same time, they stopped doing maintenance. I am told we got maybe a week or two before things get bad enough that folks stop being able to flush the Johns. And then of course disease becomes a major issue."

Huh. That… sounds suspiciously like an adventure hook. "When was the first? And do you have one of the broken hoses?"

Jessica gives me a date as James hands me a short section of hose. One side is cleanly cut, presumably so they don't need to lug around however many feet of heavy hose, the other… I get a ping from Knowledge (Dungeneering), which I share, "OK, so… we appear to have an infestation of oozes. This hose was eaten by acid from one of them."

Jessica asks the obvious question, "What’s an ooze?"

And James answers, "A fantasy monster, with biology that makes no sense. Think a bunch of bacteria - like, way too much, enough to fill a closet - working together to move, hunt down prey, and kill it with acid. Voracious predator, but will eat anything organic - and I do mean anything; they live in sewers in the game because  of easy access to waste. Many varieties split into two if you try to cut them. They generally leave stone and metal untouched."

"But that's just a fantasy, right? where could it have possibly come from?"

I really don’t want to say, but I'm honest… "Where did you get your magic?"

James and Jessica give the same answer at the same time, "Your milk."

I sigh, "Yes. And the first disappearance was just two days after I started dumping excess milk in mass."

Jessica curses, "And you can't NOT milk yourself.  Which means we can't be picky about who we give it to, because monsters either way, and humans are easier to predict."

James injects some reason, "That is just a guess at this point. It's not a working theory until we know what the milk does for non-human drinkers. Lab rat time?"

Everyone agrees, so we go to the pet store, buy a rat, a cage, and a few accessories, and set it up in the Bungalow in case of escape. The water bottle is filled up with my milk, otherwise it's just standard for a pet rat: Bedding, wheel, and a bit of food. We set a camera on it, and call it a day.

The next day, the rat is gone, the cage busted open. When we go through the video at high speed… we're glad we had some isolation. The rat drank the milk, went to sleep, grew an outrageous amount, woke up, had twelve babies, chewed it's way out, and relocated. Knowledge (Nature) tells me they are dire rats now. Hunting them down is a simple matter: Scrying, Teleport, and Scorching Ray takes care of them quickly. The method is called "Scry & Die" for a reason. I make sure to count and get them all, adding in a Locate Creature spell to be sure.

Of course, that only works when we know what specific creature to kill. We saw the mother rat, and had video of the babies. The oozes won't be so simple, as we don't have direct visuals on them. And they have a much larger territory, so Locate Creature won't be of much use either, even once we know which species of ooze we're dealing with… assuming it's just one species. I have dumped a lot of milk.

We reconvene.

"So… proof enough," Jessica begins, "Where do we go from here? Monsters aren't exactly covered in the police handbook."

I think back on the buffs I gave to Jessica and James, "You two should be fine, especially if you remember to wear those rings I gave you. The beasts will barely be able to scratch you, and you're immune to any debuffs they may have. They shouldn't be able to hurt me at all."

"Debuffs?"

James answers Jessica, "Spells and effects that make someone or something easier to kill. A lot of oozes have paralytic poison. Oozes are reasonably durable, though, and bullets may trigger splitting. I have a few direct damage spells I can prepare, but…"

That has an easy solution, "I can hook you up with some wands and a magic greatclub. Money isn't an issue for me, and I have been keeping my Dedicated Wights busy: I have all kinds of things. You can also Shapechange into something suitable, maybe a silver dragon, and use the breath weapon, wings, and tail slap. Avoid the bite and claws, obviously."

"So… what, we just dive into the sewers with body cams and wander?" Jessica doesn't seem sold.

"Not just that," James explains, "We also get to play with some of Chris' toys, like wands of spells we can't cast ourselves, clubs enchanted to be extra effective, and of course his buffs."

"And we can track the oozes. They eat filth, so we can just follow the cleanest path to find the oozes," I add.

"Can't do everything ourselves, we'll probably need to set up a monster hunting team once we prove monsters are real," James is being practical.

"So… we bring in the corpse of one or two, the video of us killing it, then set up some of the uniformed officers to handle it going forward?" Jessica seems to be warming to the idea.

"Yeah… although that does mean I'll need to be a bit more liberal with my buffs. I will basically be mass manufacturing super soldiers. And it doesn't deal with the underlying problem."

"Milk production. Even if we manage to extinct the beasts…"

James interrupts Jessica with, "Which is not a given; there's miles of tunnels down there, and they've had weeks to spread."

Jessica glares at James as she continues, "Right. Regardless, we need to ramp up consumption to match, or it'll just happen again."

So… "Maybe an ice cream parlor? 'Made locally from the very breast milk available!'"

James laughs, but shoots my idea down, "Funny, but no, that'd never fly with the FDA. Religious ceremonies can get away with all kinds of things, though, and a lot of the regs vanish if it's members only and no charge. The FDA concerns itself with things for the general public."

Jessica adds, "That could work. Kind of like if you make your own whisky and drink it with friends on your land, it's legal, but if you take it elsewhere or sell it you need to deal with inspections, licenses, and taxes."

I pause, "Don't tell me…"

"I have a still in the attic, yes."

"Makes good stuff, too," James adds, "When's the next batch ready?"

Jessica sighs, "It's ready now, but it's just not the same when it can't affect me anymore."

"So Chris 'helped' you with the drinking problem, then?"

Wait, why'd he pause on either end of "helped"?

"I didn't have a… ok, yes I did, and yes he did. He tells me I won't feel a buzz from booze ever again. Fixed the addiction, too, so I don’t have any actual cravings, but…"

"But you miss the feeling?"

"Yeah."

James hands her a card, "These folks might help."

Jessica frowns as she reads it, "Alcoholics Anonymous?"

James nods, "It's the addiction program with the lowest recidivism rate out there, the mother of all ten step anti-addiction programs. A lot of it seems silly to modern sensibilities, but it is THE most successful program out there. You're already dry, and they won't make fun of you. What have you got to lose?"

"I suppose I can go. For now, though… hunting time?"

"Hunting time." James turns to me, "Chris, you'll need a body camera yourself. We can grab one at the station. Come on…"

And so, we head out.