Dialysis Book: Chapter 7: the Moonstruck Inn

The inn was two stories of solid timber with a country flair that I found entirely comforting.  It looked so in place in this tiny rural town, that it just screamed come in here and drink.  The smells from the kitchen were great and the short innkeeper greeted him warmly as he entered the room.

Better yet, the innkeeper didn't even bat an eye as Shade followed him in.  That was one nice thing so far, no one cared about your pets here.  They just let them stroll in with you, and often complimented you on how pretty they were.

On earth, service dogs always get a side eye from at least one person.  Either the local Karen, or the local anti-Karen depending on if Karen was the one bringing the dog.  Here, I estimated all the dogs that traveled with people were companions and you did not want to get on their bad side.

Because they could be ninja’s.

Shade was wearing his adventuring bandana, which hid his Earth made collar, and made him look totally awesome.  All I needed was to find some sunglasses and I could have put my proud pupper in a beer commercial.

“And you are sure you don’t need help,” said Spivy comfortably.  She was resting in my pocket, like usual.

“No, we are going to manage this on our own,” I replied, trying to sound confident.  “It is just some rats.  I’m sure we’ll be fine.”

“And you don’t want to pick up some better equipment,” she asked.

“We looked at the equipment like you suggested,” I said unhappily.  “It would have cost all of our money, so we’d need to do another quest.  This one looks easy and we get free room and board afterward so we just stay in the guild and wait for the Airship.”

“Sounds logical, of course I would mention that you’ll be broke and under equipped when you get to the next town,” said Spivy.

“I am equipped properly,” said Shade, who only needed the bandana.  “Dog armor seems like a cash grab.”

Spivy chuckled and relaxed comfortably in my pocket.

Content, I walked over to the innkeeper and waited a moment for him to notice me.

"Greetings, are you looking for some lunch?" said the innkeeper as he checked his apron.  The inn featured a large common room and there were about a dozen people sitting at long tables eating lunch.

The meal consisted of a tough looking bread and stew.  I didn't see how people could eat the bread as it was, but then noticed everyone was dunking it in the stew before taking bites.  There was no silverware, just enough bread to make it work if you weren't aggressive about it.

"No, my name is Max, and I'm here on other business," I said as Shade walked over to me.

"Well, I'm happy to be of help," said the innkeeper as he reached over and scratched Shade on the head.  "Fine dog you have there."

"Shade is a good boy," I said, checking the paper, "I'm looking for Tasaldan Stoutknee."

The innkeeper nodded, "That would be me."

"I have a quest here, concerning some rats," I began and the affable innkeeper looked shocked.

"Don't be yelling that out in the common room," he said, dragging me to the side.

"Sorry," I said as the dragging ceased.

Tasaldan looked back to his guests, none of whom seemed to have noticed my outburst, "Adventurers are supposed to be discrete."

“I’m sorry about that,” I began.

“You don’t look like an adventurer,” said the innkeeper.

“Actually, it's him, my dog, Shade,” I said, glancing down at Shade.  Tasaldan looked at the dog curiously.

"Don't worry, I am a ninja," said Shade.  I heard a tiny scream.

"I should have known," replied Tasaldan, entirely non-pulsed by my talking dog.

"Yup, if you just show us the way, we will get rid of your problem," I said with the false bravado of someone who had no idea what was going on.  Tasaldan eyed the both of us totally unconvinced of our skills.

"You seem a bit lightly equipped for rats," he said meaningfully.

"Well, I will be doing most of the work," replied my faithful hound.

"He's naked except for a bandana," replied the innkeeper.

"I have shadow powers," replied the dog.

"Does that power include some form of armor," asked the innkeeper.

“Armor is a cash grab,” said Shade.

“You realize you don’t get paid if you die, right,” asked the innkeeper.

"Yes," I replied confidently.  "Now where are those rats!"

“You’re funeral,” he shrugged and pointed us towards the rats.  It turned out to be a doorway to an earthen tunnel that I realized was some sort of cellar deep under the building.  There were various boxes in the chamber and at one point it must have been used, but every one of the boxes was split open.

There were small footprints going from the various crates to a large hole in the wall that looked almost man sized.  Something, or some things more likely, had eaten every scrap of food down here before vacating through the tunnel.

I poked my head through and on the other side of the wall was another cave.  This one looked natural, with small holes on multiple sections of the wall illuminated from the light in the crack.  The new section didn't smell like goblins, it had a whole different aroma.

"So is this a root cellar," I asked, realizing Tasaldan was still waiting at the top of the earthen stairwell.

"More like a rat cellar, right now," said Tasaldan.  "Come see me when you are done."  With that he shut the door leaving the two of us in the underground.

Spivy yawned inconveniently, "This should be fun, remember the adventuring maxim, always have an exit."

"Bah," I said as I started to hear the skittering.  It was just rats.  I brought up my minimap and tried to gauge the best way.  We had to be somewhat tactical about this, I guessed.

"It is this way," yelled Shade as he barreled towards the noise, running through the crack into the next room.  I used a bit of essence to summon my 'spear'.  Armed sufficiently, I started to shimmy as Spivy's head poked out of my pocket.

“Here’s a torch, mighty adventurer,” said Spivy and a torch appeared in my hand, and then lit itself.

“How dark could it possibly be?” I chuckled.

VERY VERY DARK.

The goblin caves were at least lit, down here it was pitch black except for my feeble torch.  The first room had been lit by similar torches, which seemed to run without fuel.  My torch burned, and stank, and didn’t provide nearly enough light for where we were, which was the worst kind of horror movie cellar I could imagine.  I was using mapping as much to figure out where we were as I was to keep track of our opposition.

"There is one more passage to your right," Spivy said casually.  I sent a trickle more essence into mapping skill and she was right.  The small room we were in had a passage leading back to the stairs and a second one that shot out further into the unknown.

"Keep in tight, Shade," I replied, as my dog started digging into the wall searching for rats.

Shade paused, “I thought I was supposed to keep loose, to prepare for battle.”

“Stay close to me,” I said.

“Oh, because you cannot defend yourself, I understand,” said Shade who resumed digging.

"Watch the ceiling," said Spivy, pointlessly.  The ceiling was dirt and loose stone, a rat would have trouble climbing on that.  Unless they had a core.

“Do all monsters have cores,” I asked.

“Yes, but most aren’t going to be developed into adventurer killing levels,” said Spivy.  “They will be cute, little rats.”

"Found one," yelled Shade as he yanked out the largest rat I'd ever seen and shook it violently.  The creature died, and its body glowed brightly for a moment.

“Holy shit,” I said as the rat was tossed to the side.  The glow took their inventory, but it left the body which was the Arnold Shwartzengar of rats.

"Oh, a baby," said Spivy as Shade pulled out another rat that was now the largest rat I'd ever seen.  The second rat was large enough to give a large cat a run for its money.

Not in a fight, I was strictly talking size.  If you were wondering, the rat's teeth were enormous.  I was wearing my hiking gear still, which was thick enough to repeal any minor environmental hazards one could happen upon while hiking.  It was not going to be up to the task of dealing with those teeth.

As I thought about this, the rat jumped back to its feet, and instead of running away it instead hissed loudly at my dog.  Shade snapped at it and the rat danced backward as I spotted several sets of eyes in the light from the crack.

“Don’t get surrounded,” said Spivy casually.

"Um, Shade," I said as he bit towards the rat, grabbing it by the foot and flinging it into the middle of the room.

"What, I am winning," said Shade as a massive rat leapt from behind to land on his back.  I poured essence into my Spear core and thrust forward with my weapon, taking the creature in the neck.

Unfortunately, I had a short spear and to attack I had to get much closer to the rats than I would have liked.  Another massive rat the size of a corgi leapt out of the darkness and I barely got my spear in position to block it.

With Shade and I working together, we could probably handle this though.  He was capable of tearing a rat apart in a few seconds and I was capable of keeping his back clear and just barely protecting myself.

"We got this," I yelled.

"Of course, Chum! With my speed and your standing there with stick, we can't lose!"  yelled Shade as a rat bit down on the end of his tail.  Now if you think hitting a rat jumping through the air is tricky you should try to stab one attached to the end of your dog's tail as he spins around desperate to grab at the creature.

The most important part, from my perspective, is that since Shade was occupied in saving his tail, the other rats had time to search out another target.  I used my spear like a staff, smacking several away as they leapt at me.

“Oh, what about the ROUS?” said Spivy with a tone of finality.

“Rodents of Unusual Size,” I chuckled,  “I don’t think they can get any bigger.”

I was immediately tackled by the largest rat possible.  It was enormous, rivaling Shade in size, and he weighed 80 pounds.  A rat with those sorts of teeth could take off my arm, and he looked hungry.  Fortunately, he landed badly and I was able to shove him off with only a massive bleeding wound on my arm and neck.

“I don’t see a flame spout or quicksand handy, what do we do?” I said.

“Finally asking me for help,” said Spivy as I smacked another rat away and one bit into my boot.  I kicked that one free but if not for the thick rubber he would have penetrated.  I could feel where his teeth had dug in, and that was one of the smaller ones.

“Yes,” I yelled.

“Passage,” she said and my minimap pulsed, indicating the tunnel she indicated earlier.

“Shade, follow me,” I said and ran into the hole.  It was just big enough that I stayed mobile, but it was slowing me down.  Shade yipped and then backed in after me, limping slightly.

“I’ll be alright, I am a brave boy,” said Shade as we continued moving through the tunnel.  I could hear skittering in the earth next to me.  The rats didn’t use the big tunnels, they used smaller ones, with the possible exception of the huge rat.  It didn’t seem to want to directly engage though.

“What’s up with the big rat,” I asked.

“Oh, a King Rat,” said Spivy.  “That’s worth about 2 gold, if you can kill it.”

“That’s what’s causing the inn’s rat problem,” I asked.

“Did you think the innkeeper couldn’t kill normal rats,” asked Spivy.  “I thought you were the clever one.”

We continued retreating through the small tunnel until it opened up into another chamber.  It was smaller than the first chamber, and ended abruptly in the middle.

“It's a dead end,” I yelled and Shade whined.

“I do not want to be eaten by rats,” said Shade, a note of panic entering his voice.  Shade was a loyal doggo, but there were limits.  Still, he stood at the ready.  We would go down fighting, an amazing ninja dog and the guy in thick jeans with a stick.

I wasn’t sure if that was going to be better or worse than being eaten by goblins but I didn’t want to test it.  The only advantage we had here was that with the limited space to engage the rats couldn’t get behind us.

Shade comped on another rat as it charged, and one leapt down from the ceiling.  I skewered it with my spear but I could already feel my essence ebbing.  I was running at least at a medium burn, and I couldn’t keep that up forever.  Shade was similarly lagging, he was a skirmisher not a stand up fighter.

“Pay attention to your surroundings,” said Spivy as Shade tore into another rat.

I upped my mapping skill for a moment, but aside from the flat wall behind us nothing looked even remotely interesting.  “What?”

“Eyes, use your eyes,” said Spivy.

I glanced back at the brick wall behind me, then realized there was a brick wall behind me.  I kicked at it while Shade desperately battled in the greatest fight of our lives to hold off our ultimate foe, some rats.

The first kick did nothing, but my second kick aimed at a different spot when entirely through the brick wall like it was clay.  A thin wall of clay that had given up on being bricks decades ago.

I heard splashing and glanced into the sewer.

“This isn’t much better,” I said, pushing through the wall more fully.

“I believe you meant to say, this is salvation,” said Spivy as my minimap highlighted and I spotted the most glorious thing in the world.  A ladder.

“Shade there is a way out,” I said as I pushed myself through the wall.  I stepped into the muck filled sewer, feeling something flood into my damaged boot.  I didn’t care, the ladder was close.

Shade followed, getting to the hole in the wall before he yelped.  I spotted a rat biting down on his back leg, attempting to drag him back.  It wasn’t the king rat, or he would have lost the leg, but it was still large enough to hold him while the other rats did their business.

I flung my spear at the creature, striking it dead center.  Shade stumbled out and I grabbed him, pulling him out of the muck filled water.  It dripped from his wounded paw.

Running to the light, I started climbing with Shade on my shoulder like a baby.  I started up the ladder, struggling with Shade’s weight until I got to the top and forced open the manhole cover.

Only then did I realize the rats wouldn't go into the muck.  I stared down the empty hole for a moment before sliding the cover back on and collapsed onto the pavement in the alley.

“That sucked,” I groaned, realizing that I had several bad bites on me that I’d ignored because of the imminent peril.

“I am a bad ninja,” said Shade, licking his injured rear paw, which was covered in muck.  He took out a piece of bark and the wound partially sealed.

Spivy hopped out of my pocket and looked at the both of us, “Hi, I’m Spivy your helper fairy.  Do you want some help with your adventuring?”