Cat Core 2, Chapter 19.

Chapter 19.

“There goes poor Zork. I thought that going to this world would mean all the cheaters were gone, but here we go with four pally again,” Florence complained as the party finished off the last threat in the master bedroom. Just like the most popular build in Dungeon Delve, here were four paladins, clearing her home out with their cheating ways.

“Well, at least we’ll have our first adventurers to make it to the second floor. Don’t compare these adventurers to the game we played back on earth. They’ve had a solid run so far, but I’d bet my ball of yarn that they’re running low on mana. Once out of mana, a paladin is just a normal warrior,” Doug replied. He was right, not that she was going to give him the satisfaction of telling him that. The four dwarves didn’t say much during their delve, but whatever deity they followed must have specialized in earth magic of some sort.

The party had somewhat better gear than most, leading Florence to believe they were likely level three or four and not completely new adventurers. Paladins, shamans, and sword mages with healing affinity could all do about the same thing. This group had used magic to bolster their leather and chain armor with a rocky shell and enhanced their weapons with a magical glow that gave them heavier impact. The early encounters didn’t even make the four of them break a sweat, but after hitting more of the level two defenders and tangling with Loki forced them to start burning through their resources.

Florence hadn’t seen too many dwarves in this crazy new world, so she was kind of pleased to have a chance to watch them work. Given they were in a hilly area and there were large mountains in the distance, the area was probably perfect for a dwarf clan to live in. The fact they were all the same class didn’t seem to detract from their ability to fight, though the few traps in her home did get some good licks in. The flame trap in the living room had crisped up a couple of them, which forced their first use of healing magic.

“Without a rogue in their party, your traps are doing well, we’ll have to turn you loose to build what you had planned. When these four leave our home, there should be more than enough cash to work with,” Florence said.

“Indeed, I look forward to mixing things up a bit and have some good ideas for the second floor,” Doug replied, perking up when she mentioned that he would get to play with trap designs soon.

They stopped talking to watch her babies do their thing in the great room. The dwarves took the stairs cautiously, they must have known a new level meant greater challenges. But with greater challenges came greater rewards so that egged them on. Buttercup, Puddin, and Winston had been napping on the chairs and sofas in the room, but they scrambled into action as the adventurers approached. All her babies in the great room were level three and being brawler kitties, they were the size of a medium dog and heavy with muscle. Hissing, arching their backs, and bristling out their fur, the kitties made ready to fight.

The paladins didn’t waste any time, the party of four cautiously approaching the brawler kitties. Two of the adventurers wielded axe and shield, while the other pair sported oversized two-handed axes, forgoing the extra protection a shield offered. Having cleared the first floor, they tried to keep an eye out for any surprises, and given the number of commando kitties Florence’s home had, their wariness was justified. Willow had been hiding under one of the end tables, but when she launched her attack, but one of the dwarves was ready, and his huge axe swooped in to cleave her little baby in two.

Just before the shield bearers closed with her brawlers, Winter popped up in the far corner of the room. The glow of ice magic was already surrounding Florence’s white-furred mage kitty as he unleashed his first spell. Shards of sharpened ice flew from his paw, peppering the paladins and slowing their advance. One of the dwarves disengaged from the brawlers, his two-handed axe raised to chop into poor Winter. Stubby dwarven legs charged across the great room, but Winter was a smart one, she had anticipated this type of attack. Dropping her ice spray, the mage kitty instead focused her magic on the floor in front of her, coating it with a thin layer of ice.

The Dwarven paladin hit the icy floor and Florence was surprised just how slippery frost-covered carpet could be. With a shout of surprise, the dwarf went down, sliding past Winter and slamming into the back wall of the house. Her mage kitty wasted little time forming ice spikes and hurling them at the downed dwarf. It looked like Winter would score a kill, but even the higher-level second-floor kitties only had so much mana. Her babies seemed to run out at the worst time, and Winter had run out just as the dwarf regained his feet. With no other option, Winter charged the dwarf, her puny mage claws doing little against even the simple armor the dwarf wore.

With a single swipe of his axe, the dwarf was able to finish off Winter, and looking back on the rest of the battle, her other kitties were just about done in. Buttercup and Winston were down, and Puddin was on her last legs. With a final hiss, the bloodied Puddin latched onto a dwarf’s leg, tearing a deep wound even as she succumbed to the axe blows raining down on her. It took the dwarves a few moments to pry Puddin’s jaws apart and free the comrade, and even more time to cast healing magic on all four of the party.

“Brothers, I’m nearly out of mana, should we continue,” one of the dwarves grumbled as the others looted her babies.

“Aye, at least a bit further, we’ll need the extra coin for repairs,” one replied. It was true, they had swatted down her kitty defenders, but even if their wounds were healed, the dwarves had taken a beating. Chainmail links were snapped and leather torn to shreds in places. The shields that two of them bore had deep claw marks all over the surface. Florence wasn’t sure how long a shield was good for, but if it was all clawed up, that meant it might break soon, didn’t it?

“Fine, move slow but cautious. These beasts are getting stronger,” another mentioned.

“Aye brother, stronger, but not all that different. I’ve never seen a dungeon populated by pets, it’s disturbing and a bit sickening,” A dwarf grumbled.

“Sickening! How dare he, Doug. Who does that net-decking little hooligan think he is. Why, I’ve a mind to drop my summons on top of them at the next champion room, that will show them. Insulting an old woman’s home, like that. The nerve of some people,” Florence ranted.

“Hold on, they likely don’t know any better and don’t realize you’re different than most other cores. Remember we need to keep the kill ratio down if we don’t want to attract unwanted, and likely fatal, attention,” Doug argued, somewhat panicked that Florence was going to do something rash.

“Don’t get your fur tangled up, Doug, I’m just mad, not stupid,” Florence replied. She had been planning to drop her summons on them in Spud’s room if they made it that far, but she didn’t want to give Doug the satisfaction of knowing he was right about her doing something he thought was “rash”.

“Very well, you had me worried. Oh my, they didn’t do all that well, did they,” Doug said, drawing her attention to the bathroom where her two undying kitties had been hacked down in seconds. They were kind of scrawny and only about a strong as a mage kitty, but without any magic, they were kind of easy targets for a well-armed and armored party.

“At least we’ll get to see how their ability works, hopefully, it isn’t too gross. I don’t’ want no zombie cats dripping gunk all over my floors,” Florence said.

They settled in to watch as the dwarves selected a door to proceed through. Both bedrooms were waiting, but once they selected one, the other would be locked out. Florence wasn’t sure if she liked the way that worked yet, she wanted the bypassed kitties to have a chance to defend their home, and it did seem like kind of a waste to have one set of them locked up if they were under a big threat. Maybe Doug would know something, she hated to admit that he had some good advice once in a while.

“Hey Doug, is there any way we can set the kitties loose in the bypassed room?” Florence asked.

“Hmm, not normally with the type of setup you’ve devised, but you can override it and set them to release after a certain time frame has passed,” Doug replied. The kitten advisor was quiet as the party selected a door, which led them to the desert-themed bedroom.

Inside, Archimedes fired off a flare of light as soon as the party entered, blinding them temporarily. Her babies must have been practicing because the other two were already on the move, looking away at just the right time to avoid being blinded. Sherbet bowled into the lead paladin, knocking the dwarf over and going to town on him with oversized claws and teeth. Sandy materialized to launch a devastating stealth attack against another dwarf, her claws continuing to extra damage as the dwarf blinked rapidly to regain his sight.

The paladin in the back hadn’t been affected, and he conjured a magical hammer of light in front of him, the glowing weapon hurling into Sandy who gave a pitiful yelp before keeling over dead. Archimedes responded with a pair of magic spheres that slammed into the dwarf that had killed his friend, penetrating the armor, and disrupting the heal spell he had been working on.

Sherbet continued to maul the dwarf he had knocked over, clamping his jaws on one of the paladin’s wrists as the adventurer tried to take a swing at him. Shaking his head from side to side almost like a dog would do, Florence watched Sherbet pull back as the dwarf’s wrist gave a disturbing crunch of bones breaking before the entire hand was pulled away. Howling in pain, the dismembered dwarf finally was rescued by his fellows, a pair of axes slamming into poor Sherbet and knocking him off their comrade. Her baby clawed and scratched, unwilling to open his mouth to add his bite attack, as that would mean giving up the dwarf’s hand.

“Look at that, a dismemberment, that’s something new,” Doug mused, the little guy was really getting into the fight.

“Serves them right for insulting me and my home, good job Sherbet,” Florence said. She didn’t know if her babies could hear her in combat, but she thought she caught a gleam in his eye that told her that the kitty knew she was proud of him. Sadly, the battered Sherbet wasn’t a match on his own, and Archimedes was fighting a losing battle against one of the dwarves, the mage kitty proving no match for the paladin’s skill with a two-handed axe.

“Hold still brother, I need to see the wound to restore it,” one of the dwarves said as he poured healing magic into the stump that was still splattering blood all over the sand-colored carpeting. Florence had thought the dwarf was a goner, but while the others were finishing off Archimedes and Sherbet, he had managed to pull a potion from his belt with his one good hand and slug it down. It didn’t stop the bleeding completely, but the magic in the potion must have kept him from croaking due to blood loss. More magic was expended, and after prying the severed hand from Sherbet’s jaws, they were able to reattach it.

“I know these guys are probably higher level than the others that have tried out our home, but even these jokers have to be just about out of mana now,” Florence said hopefully.

“I believe you’re right; I’m estimated based on their spells and abilities that these four are around level five maybe one or two could be level six. Given standard stat distribution and mana regen caps for their class, the well is about to run dry, so to speak,” Doug confirmed. He tried to explain to her all that nonsense about levels and stat distributions, and whatnot. But she really didn’t care to get into that much detail.

It was at that time, with all of them focused on healing up the guy with the bum hand when her undying kitties showed up again. Now, them little critters weren’t stealthy and all that, but since the dwarves were distracted, both her babies were able to finally do some damage. Much to her disgust, the poor kitties did look like a pair of zombies from them spooky shows that Doug would watch late at night sometimes. Florence didn’t cotton to that type of entertainment and would have put a stop to it if Doug hadn’t insisted that they were educational. She let him have his fun as long as he only watched them types of movies when she was already in bed.

“Not the best of fighters, but these undying variants of our defenders can be useful, I must say,” Doug added as they watched the dwarf cradling their wounded comrade shout in pain as two zombie cats attacked. Like before these undying kitties weren’t powerful and died quickly to the party, but they had landed more shots and the wounds would have to be healed. Florence couldn’t imagine anyone wanting to go trooping through a dungeon after getting scratched by zombie claws.

“That is it, brothers, we should return,” The dwarf that had just been scratched said as one of the others healed his wounds.

“Agreed, we’ve done well enough for our first run and at least know what to expect now,” another said. They gathered themselves and made their way cautiously toward the stairwell, eyeing each kitty corpse for signs of reanimation.

“They did well, though I must admit to a bit of disappointment over not seeing our home champion work,” Doug said.

“Yeah, and Spud too, he got a new class, and we don’t even know what the guy can do yet,” Florence added.

“Spud is not someone that I wish to associate with or watch unless it is absolutely necessary,” Doug said, pouring on the attitude.

“Ware the shadows brothers!” A dwarf shouted as one of their number was attacked.

Florence was confused, she didn’t have any commando kitties left, at least she didn’t think she did. But it turned out it wasn’t a kitty at all, as a lanky goblin in leather armor appeared after dealing his deadly strike. The dwarf slid off the twin knife blades of the goblin, convulsing as whatever poison coated those weapons went to work. Fighting broke out among the other adventurers as more goblins appeared from the shadows, launching their own attacks.

“I’s come back like I promised, pretty little gem. Now, Blivix will take his prize,” A very unwelcome voice said.

“Oh dear, I know that guy and I think we may be in trouble Doug,” Florence said.