Chapter 6 of 78 · Book 5, The Butcher's Masquerade

Chapter 6 — Miriam, Pony and Bianca

Book: The Butcher's Masquerade · Part: The Hunt · Previous: Chapter 5 — Zockau · Next: Chapter 7 — Whataburger · Floor: Floor 6 — The Hunting Grounds · Series: the series

Opening

<Note Added by Crawler Everly, 5th Edition>

Summary

Everly's Cookbook note on mercenaries: 1,500 gold a day each, unlootable, paid for the whole floor even dead, easily lost between saferooms, and their levels mean nothing. Carl wakes in the back of a railway cart under an opalescent dome, soaked in blood, with Sore as Shit (six hours) and Blood Trail — a bleed that keeps open wounds weeping so the wounded can be tracked by smell. Half an hour in a coma from a Woozy bolt amplified by Prepotente's own inebriation spell; the goat and Miriam Dom had been casting area debuffs on the drunken hunters when Carl's barrels ruined it. Miriam is a vampire now — level 52, still a Shepherd healer, floating, fangs, drinking only from what Pony has just killed — and the cart is pulled by Bianca Del Ciao, a Hellspawn Familiar, level 32: the family goat, encased in a soul-protection spell and dead anyway, reborn as a draft-horse-sized black demon with stubby wings and a body that crackles like a campfire (the AI's card is an essay on Susan, Queen Elizabeth's psychopathic corgi). Miriam keeps ten unaltered boers in carriers, Pony and Bianca's siblings, indoors since 'the unfortunate incident with Angelo'. Donut has a red upward dagger after her name: Hunter Killer x1.

Carl's notifications: level 54 (Donut 41); I Wanna Go Home! for teleporting to a stairwell in the first thirty hours ('Don't be a little bitch'); You Crossed a Line You Didn't Even Know Was There for the ring's first use — 'Don't mind that tingle at the back of your mind' — and a Gold Junkie's Box; The Hand that Claws the Master thirty-five times, thirty-four Gold Hunter-Killer Boxes (one extra, for a kill the AI had held back: 'Shhh. Don't tell the mudskippers'); Mass Casualty Event, a Platinum Asshole's Box, for more than 250 non-mob casualties — which does not bother him as much as it should. Zev is back: their numbers are insane, stay near Prepotente for the demographic, Odette's show tomorrow without Katia, new security protocols for all crawlers, and the Vengeance of the Daughter contract still binds them. Pony, level 55, now a Profane Vitiate with a satanic goat glowing on the back of his hand, announces decapitation traps ahead that need 'a special touch'; Carl casts Tripper and sets off all of them. Pony demands satisfaction, Carl tells him to suck his dick, Pony bursts into tears in Miriam's robes — 'He called me by my special name' — and Miriam makes them apologise and hug. The goat screams in his ear.

Characters

• Carl — Level 54, 34 hunter-killer boxes, a Junkie's Box; hugs a goat.
• Princess Donut — Hunter Killer x1; 'This is why you tell me the plan first.'
• Miriam Dom — A vampire healer who floats and feeds on Pony's kills; ten boers in her inventory.
• Prepotente — Level 55, Profane Vitiate, a satanic-goat tattoo; cries when called Pony.
• Bianca — A hellspawn goat the size of a draft horse, pulling the cart.
• Zev — Back on the account: Odette tomorrow, new security, the contract still binds.
• Mordecai — Wants to know whether Carl used the ring; says it is addictive.
• Vrah — Carl's guess: she is the Grand of Zockau.

Locations

• The Selva — A railway cart on a jungle trail under a spell dome; traps everywhere near Zockau.
• The bugbear settlement — Scorch marks at the gate where Tripper went off.

Motifs

• Achievements — You Crossed a Line; The Hand that Claws the Master x35; Mass Casualty Event.
• The Ring of Divine Suffering — +1 dexterity; Mordecai calls it addictive; 'that tingle at the back of your mind.'
• The hunters — Thirty-four dead before the release; Hunter-Killer Boxes only on this floor.
• The mobs are victims — More than 200 NPCs dead, and it does not bother him as much as it should.
• The Dungeon Anarchist's Cookbook — Everly on mercenaries: a scam.
• The show — Plenty of Plenty; a demographic Carl and Donut are not trending in.
• Sponsorship — Zev, restored; security protocols for transfers.