Chapter 145

A radiant azure butterfly fluttered across the grass, gently flitting from blade to blade. Pickle watched her target with a furious focus, like a tiny tiger, only her eyes visible from where she hid in the long grass.

After many minutes of patience the butterfly at last came close to where she hid and she pounced. Leaping into the air, reaching to catch the pretty sparkly thing!

She missed completely of course, and rolled head over heels across the grass until she came to a stop with a flop.

A moment later the butterfly alighted on her unmoving head.

It lazily moved its wings up and down in the sun, sunbathing, seemingly considering the goat child a complete non-threat. After a moment of disbelief Pickle growled at the indignance and grabbed for it in a surprise attack, but the butterfly casually fluttered away, teasing her by remaining just out of reach.

“Badfly,” she groaned before sitting up.

Clearly the butterfly was cheating and magic. A hero like her couldn’t be outsmarted by a butterfly, that made no sense. She’d have to make some artistic flourishes to the story of her epic hunt when she told it to Bean later.

She flicked away a blade of grass on the bridge of her nose and watched as the gem like butterfly fluttered across the grassy square that was home. New father was there, being grumpy as usual. Doubly so than normal as new mother was visiting for her monthly deep clean of the place.

Pickle didn’t mind. When new mother visited that meant the most amazing food ever would soon be served because new mother was a very good cook.

In the past she’d even tried to get Bean to eat new mother’s super tasty food, sneaking portions away from the table to feed him. But he’d simply hissed at the stuff and angrily licked his eyeballs. Bean had a weird sense of taste.

Things had been peaceful with new mother and new father pottering around the various buildings that made up home and that seemed likely to continue until nap time. But then the front door had swung open and the green girl who had eaten too much had appeared, then, to her astonishment, a giant teddy bear had stepped into her world.

Today was clearly going to be a great day.

Pickle was a good girl. At least in her estimation. No, wait, more than good, she was a hero! So of course she was the first to figure out that the girl who wore clouds was hurt really bad, and first to fetch the healy box that new father had taught her about.

They’d saved her of course, thanks to her quick thinking, which just went to show how heroic she was, butterfly or not. She would definitely be telling Bean about this later when they had their midnight storytime.

The only thing that had been better than being very heroic and amazing was the appearance of the giant teddy bear. Now that was something she could stare at forever. So much fluff, so much bear. It was hard to comprehend. The only one who could possibly compete with this new fluff bear was the ultimate fluffy boy. It was a shame he wasn’t here, two big fluffs were so much better than one.

She wrinkled her nose as she recalled that Bean wasn’t a fan of the ultimate fluffy boy. Which was silly, really, who wouldn’t be a fan? Fluff was so soft and he had so much fluff! Fluff!

It was one of the few times that she and Bean had ‘argued’, the last storytime had ended with lots of arm waving and huffing, which bothered her a lot, she didn’t want to upset the bald lizard.

New father had saved her from the dungeon, but Bean...

In the early days, after leaving the dungeon, when she couldn’t sleep and spent her nights weeping, he had come for her. At first she had been scared of the thing creeping in the dark, but then she had slowly gotten used to the bald lizard’s presence, and then somehow they had begun to communicate, mostly wordlessly and with gestures.

Her forever connection to the bald lizard had formed when she had come to understand that Bean was afraid, afraid in the exact same way she was. He too had come from a place of nightmares, a place of horrors, a place that preyed on the mind.

She’d asked him what his bad place had been, had it been the dungeon like her?

Bean had told her, his voice a scratchy whisper, a voice not used in years and years.

He’d told her, “The Place.”

She’d instantly understood that was its name, it wasn’t the dungeon, it was so so much worse than that, and then she’d seen his eyes, the sheer depth of the trauma there was like a physical blow. She couldn’t breathe at the sight, her throat constricting, her guts filling with ice. His eyes told her that what had been done to him had happened there, the loss of his scales, his lack of voice, the endless haunting fear.

She’d burst into tears and the bald lizard had fretted, tears rolling down his scale-less cheeks.

They’d held each other, shaking and crying in shared trauma until the sun had risen, so much fear and trauma cried out in one night that she had felt light headed and shaky limbed the next day.

It was only after she had found Bean and in him someone who so perfectly understood her that she had been able to open up to new father and new mother and family.

That was why she was so fiercely protective of Bean. He was family.

Rain let out a breath of pained air as he moved to sit cross legged by the table, his arm twinging because the marble sized holes that had been punched through his flesh had only been half healed.

He lifted a bear paw to touch at it, but paused as movement caught his attention.

Pickle was there, standing on the table. She held out a bottle for him. A healing potion.

“ ... Thank you?”

Rain brought his bear paws together and gingerly plucked it from her hands. Pickle gave him a brilliantly pleased smile, her eyes squeezing shut with joy. He wasn’t sure she knew who was in the plushie, but she had quickly noticed he was injured. That was kind of impressive in a way.

The bear paws of course were just nubs, they didn’t have any digits, and he had no way of actually using the potion on his wounds.

It was time to lose the plushie.

A dozen dark centipedes poured from his fur, their pincers sliding into the fabric. Then they began to scissor.

“What the hell are those things?” snapped Warwick, his crossbow once more materialising in his hands and pointing at Rain.

Rain didn’t answer but sat patiently as the centipedes did their work, cutting and chewing a ring around the neck, the shoulders, the legs, and then finally dividing the torso into front and back sections. The fur lined fabric cut up in a way that he could maybe sew it back together someday.

It was a ridiculous thing to wear really ... but he had liked being able to walk through the city without people screaming their heads off in fright or attacking him.

The centipedes finished and took hold of the cloth, tugging the separate parts away as he held out his arms and spread his legs.

The stuffy spherical head pulled free and his head was bathed in sunlight. He breathed in fresh air through his nose with a long breath. Of course then the wool stuffing poured down on him from the opening on the bear head held above and he sneezed as he breathed it in.

Most of the rest of him was covered in the wool stuffing too as the limbs were pushed and pulled off. His lap was just a heaping mountain of wool which Pickle immediately jumped into with an excited cry of “Fluff!”.

“Injured still” he groaned, snatching up the potion from one of the centipedes and throwing the entire thing into his mouth instead of struggling with the miniscule cap. His teeth turned the glass to harmless powder and he swallowed it down with the contents.

“What in the...” came a shocked voice.

He turned to see the muscular woman staring at him, her body tense as though expecting an attack. He couldn’t say he blamed her, seeing a monster appear out of a teddy bear sounded like something from a leveler’s worst nightmares.

“He’s ... probably not going to attack. It’s ... okay,” said Warwick after a moment, the crossbow lowering.

“And you brought a monster of this size, and- and threat, up from the dungeon? Are you insane? You were supposed to have put this kind of thing behind you a long time ago!”

“Not mine. A slave. Hers.”

Lyra waved vaguely at Velatha. “Haha, yeah, he’s mine. Don’t, uh, worry, he’s mostly harmless.”

“Mostly harmless...” muttered the woman staring at the enormous and terrifying wolf monster as the black centipedes retracted into its fur.

Opal snorted, “The mostly bit is cause he ate an entire Orc tri-blarhghl-”

Lyra cut the goblin off by slapping a hand over her mouth. She laughed awkwardly as the others stared.

“Ignore her, she’s just trying to stir up silly drama. Uh, V-Velatha, do you do what Warwick does too? The whole dragging up monsters from the dungeon for low levelers thing?”

Velatha narrowed her eyes at the clear attempt at a subject change.

“ ... No, I’m mostly retired from dungeon diving. I did my time and I’m happy enough with my level and my work. Risking my life to catch slimes and rats in that hell hole is an idiot’s game.”