She snatched her arm free just in time. The jaws snapped shut, and the creature bucked fiercely, forcing Ris’kin to reach backward, toe-claws digging into wrinkled flesh, and held on to the still-embedded spear for balance. Who would’ve guessed the blesmol’s tough hide would work in our favor?
Unfortunately, the spear’s shaft was less tough. It snapped in half with a crack, sending us tumbling nose over tail to the hard stone floor for the second time that day.
She landed on all fours—shiny new reflexes for the win!—though my avatar’s bruised ribs continued to scream their objections at this continued rough treatment. She spun around, broken spear in hand and held defensively before her, but the mole-rat was no longer attacking.
In fact, it no longer seemed to care about anything.
The psychedelic moss had done its job, and done it well. The blesmol’s tiny eyes were now entirely pupil. They stared off blackly into the distance, looking at the tunnel wall but seeing… well, gods only knew what they were seeing. Pink elephants, perhaps? Something as colorful as it was terrifying, anyway.
Thank you, ghoul’s beard.
I sighed with satisfaction at having resolved the situation without anyone’s guts ending up on the floor. Then I realized the sounds of combat from back down the tunnel had fallen quiet. Had my gnomes successfully defeated their foes, or were their gnomish intestines even now decorating the ground just out of sight? Dread clenched at my subconscious. Ris’kin sensed it, and we began to hurry back toward the rest of our party.
Then Longshanks lurched to his feet. Before we could even think about restraining him, he stumble-hopped toward the drooling mole-rat and stabbed it in the eye again and again until finally its legs buckled and it collapsed forward, dead.
My Augmentary dinged, but I barely noticed. Breathing heavily, face almost purple with exertion, the furious gnome turned to face Ris’kin and me. We both felt a flash of panic as we registered the intensity of his expression and the weapon still clutched in his now-bloody fist. Then it became clear his attention was on something behind us.
We whirled around, then flattened ourselves against the wall just in time to avoid being trampled. The other four mole-rats—including the extra-large one I’d mistakenly assumed to be the alpha—were charging down the tunnel toward their fallen leader.
No; not charging.
Fleeing.
They ran right past the corpse of the scarred mole-rat, barely even bothering to skirt the spreading pool of blood and skull-juice, until they’d disappeared into the darkness.
The rest of the gnome scouts followed a few seconds later, yelling triumphantly and jabbing their weapons at nothing, as though they’d been the ones to drive the creatures away. Longshanks raised his hand to high-five them, then toppled sideways, unable to stand any longer.
Two of the scouts dashed forward to inspect their leader’s mangled leg. The other three made a beeline for the leg-mangler’s corpse.
As they pulled out obsidian hunting knives—formerly belonging to kobolds; we had a whole stockpile back in the Grotto, looted from our fallen enemies—and started to get to work sourcing more material for future outfits, a flashing dot in the corner of my vision caught my eye. I gratefully looked away from the grisly proceedings below and expanded the Augmentary.
Now that it overlaid my entire field of vision, I saw that there were actually two flashing symbols. Both of them were above Longshanks.
The first was self-explanatory: a red droplet inside a red circle, clearly denoting the gnome’s critically injured status.
The second symbol, however, simply looked like an exclamation mark, again inside a circle.
Well, that’s not helpful. What’s that supposed to mean? That Longshanks is surprised, perhaps?
That was fair enough. If a creepy naked monster had bitten most of my leg off, I’d be surprised too.
When I investigated further, however—focusing on the little icon and willing it to explain itself—I was greeted with an unexpected message.
Advanced vocation unlocked!
Hunter
The life of a hunter is dangerous, yet rewarding. After days of tracking, stalking and sleeping rough, what better feeling is there than finally bringing down your bestial foe and mounting its head above your fireplace?
Oh, and providing your people with meat and materials, obviously. You rugged hero, you.
Prerequisites: Scout vocation, 1x creature rivalry (basic)
Oooh. A new vocation! And a noble one at that.
An image of Longshanks viciously stabbing the hallucinating mole-rat pushed its way into my mind. I blinked it away and was instead treated to the sight of the other scouts skinning its dead body while nearby their bloody leader grinned deliriously from the ground.
Okay, maybe “noble” wasn’t the right word. But any new vocation was a step in the right direction, wasn’t it? Gnomish hunters would be useful, especially if the tribe’s population continued to expand the way Ket and I had planned.
I was extremely tempted to assign Longshanks the hunter vocation right now, but I hesitated. There were a few things I’d need to unpack first—“creature rivalry,” for one thing—and which I knew my sprite would want to discuss before I made the decision. Besides, having spent the last few minutes focused on the Augmentary, I was already missing the sights and smells of our blood-infused surroundings.
Trying not to think about how psychotic that last part made me sound, I mentally blinked my Augmentary out of existence. Another blink and I was once more looking out of my avatar’s eyes.
Ris’kin was surveying the tunnel, alert for danger as always, and her nose was twitching at the foul odors emitted by the bloody mole-rat carcass.
I sensed revulsion from my avatar, which was unusual. At first I assumed it was in response to the sight of the gnome scouts rolling up the ragged strips of freshly-skinned pelt and stuffing them in their backpacks. Then I realized her disgust was actually directed at the mole-rats. Ris’kin was almost angry at the creatures’ lack of intelligence, the way they’d all run off the instant they lost their leadership.
More interestingly, my
