Backrooms 3: Kiosk Kingdom - Chapter 45 - 47

Hey everyone, we're onto a new level and I've got three chapters coming at you like a fastball to the teeth. Hope you enjoy the heck out of 'em.

In other news, I was talking with a couple of other authors (Michael Chatfield and Dakota Krout), who both have pretty successful Patreon platforms and they had some great suggestions I thought I'd run by y'all. Right now I only have a $2 tier and a $5 tier because I really didn't know what else to offer, and I don't want to offer something without their being a meaningful value add for my supporters. But here were their suggestions. I liked a lot of them, but I wanted to ask you guys to see what you think. I don't want tiers just to have more tiers.

$10 Tier - Free Ebook a Month. Supporters would receive a complimentary ebook copy of all new front list titles as they release. In addition, every month, supporters would get a selected ebook title from my back catalog, which I would pick. The book would be different every month. I know most of you are here for Discount Dan (which is awesome!), but I also have 40+ backlist books that are also excellent LitRPG series in their own right.

$25 Tier - Free Paperback Book a Month. Supporters would receive the benefits from the $10 Tier, plus every month I would select 1 Paperback Book from my back catalog that I would be giving out that month. You would get a redemption code to get your copy through the Shadow Alley Storefront.

$50 Tier - Free Hardback Book a Month. Same thing as the last tier, but instead of a paperback, you get a free hardback.

$75 Tier - The benefits of the $10 Tier and a Patreon Exclusive All Black "Croc-Stars" Bathrobe with large Croc patch on the back, baroque sleeves, and covered in googly eye patches. This would be the only place you could get that version of the robe. Plus, your choice of either the Paperback Book a Month or the Hardback Book a Month (whatever your preference is).

If you hate all these options, please feel free to let me know. Or if there's something else that you think would make a great reward, let me know that too. There is one caveat--this would only be for US based subscribers (other than the $10 tier), because International Shipping is just so dang expensive.

Thanks again for your continued support and enjoy the chapters!

Chapter Forty-Five – 10,000 Acre Woods

There was a noticeable delay stepping out of the kiosk—just like when we’d traveled from the 49th floor to the 75th. In my mind, that confirmed my theory that the Research floors were their own isolated spatial zones, somehow cut off from the rest of the Backrooms in a way I didn’t fully understand. The mechanics didn’t matter, though. Not right now. What mattered was that I’d be on my own for the next few minutes until the others could catch up.

The doorway I’d crawled through didn’t turn out to be a doorway at all.

Instead, I scrambled out on my hands and knees, covered in a thick layer of ash, emerging from the mouth of a fireplace. Like the 49th floor, I was inside a small house—though this one was miles better than the filthy log shack that Pinewhisker, self-proclaimed “Yulelord of Trees,” called home.

The walls curved upward in warm, honey-colored arcs, the grain of the wood telling me instantly that this entire place had been carved right into the trunk of a hollowed-out tree. And, given the diameter of the room, this was a truly huge fucking tree.

The space was neat and cozy—almost aggressively quaint.

Woven rugs stretched across polished wood floors, and shelves were crammed with mismatched teacups and well-worn children’s books. A small table was set for tea, like the host was expecting company any minute. A pot of something sweet-smelling simmered on a tiny woodstove beside a basic kitchenette—just a sink and a couple of cupboards, though a large glazed jar labeled “Hunny” sat prominently on the counter.

A miniature bed, even smaller than the one I’d found in Pinewhisker’s hut, sat against one wall, a cozy flower quilt pulled over the top with several pillows resting against the headboard. There were a variety of paintings of the wall—clearly, they’d been made with love but not a hint of artistic talent. They actually reminded me of the kind of paintings a kid might make, which sent off alarm bells in my head and instantly reminded me of the Tiny Tots Preschool back in Eternal Suburbia.

Overall, though the place was… nice. Disarmingly so.

Which was a perfect reminder that I shouldn’t trust it. The one guiding axiom in the Backrooms which had never led me astray was to assume that everything, everywhere, all the time is both lying to you and trying to murder you. I scanned the room for traps, and though I didn’t find any, that didn’t mean Jack shit. For all I knew half the stuff inside this adorable little house were actually mimics, just waiting for an opportunity to chew through my Speen.

The thought fled as I heard raised voices outside, though they were muffled by the thick walls.

I crept toward the front of the house, moving as quietly as I could across the floorboards, until I reached the stout wooden door. A peephole was set into the bottom half, so low I had to crouch—hell, I had to practically get down on my knees—to see through it.

I took a deep breath and pressed my eye against the peephole, which offered me a distorted, fish-eyed view of the floor behind.

The house was situated in a clearing, hemmed in by towering oaks and massive redwoods, their trunks so thick it would take a dozen people to wrap their arms around them. The canopy overhead was knitted together so tightly it turned the sunlight into a green, murky haze that spilled onto the forest floor. The only thing truly out of place was a slate gray Progenitor Monolith.

An ATM in the middle of an old growth forest should’ve raised a few eyebrows, but it wasn’t even close to the weirdest thing I’d seen today.

This close to the door, I could hear the distant sing-song chirp of birds and the chattering of squirrels, though every sound—the rustling of leaves, the creaking of bark—felt muted, swallowed by the forest.

Eight figures stood in a loose semicircle in the center of the clearing, all of them Delvers, and all of them radiating the kind of predatory stillness that meant they were waiting for the perfect moment to pounce.

Some wore mismatched armor—bits of steel plate strapped over leather—others decked out in riot gear covered in spikes, one in a latex suit that clung to every curve and left very little to the imagination. The sheer amount of mooseknuckle on high-def display was truly disturbing.

There was a hulking bear of a man clad head to toe in plate mail that looked like it had been stolen off some paladin’s corpse. At least two weren’t human at all—one was a broad-shouldered Cendral whose scaled forearms flexed like coiled snakes, the other was a bullheaded man with curling black horns and hooves that dug small furrows in the dirt as he shifted his weight.

And then there was her.

Tall, willowy, and unnervingly beautiful, she could’ve stepped right out of a Tolkien casting call—assuming you ignored the fact that the skin on her cheeks and the bridge of her nose had been stripped away. Raw muscle and pale sinew gleamed wetly where smooth flesh should’ve been.

In fact, that was the one thing they all had in common.

Every single one of them was missing patches of skin. Arms, hands, faces—all neatly flayed like someone had been peeling fruit.

Aspirants of the Skinless Court.

I scanned them through the peephole and Delver tags materialized above their heads. All were in their mid-forties—easily putting them on par with the other members of my group—though the willowy woman with the jacked-up face job was level 52. I was slightly higher level, but knew I was punching well above my respective weight class thanks to the mix of Relics I had stashed away inside my core.

Still, eight on one were bad odds, and even with my Horrors I wasn’t sure I would be a match.

I didn’t want to alert them to my presence, but I decided to risk a Spatial Core scan on the woman, hoping to get some idea of what I was up against.

Delver #04T - 01 - B07HGCNFLL – Celestari, Transmog [Level 17]

If grace could kill, the Celestari would be responsible for half the unsolved murders in the galaxy. Fine-boned features, flawless skin, and eyes that look like they’ve been painted by a moody Renaissance master, these pointy-eared prodigies practically ooze superiority. They’ve got the kind of fine, symmetrical features that look like they were designed in a lab for maximum cruelty, and the Celestari aim to deliver.

And they do. In spades.

Among their own kind, cruelty is an art form. Among outsiders, it’s a sport.

Some arrogance is warranted, however.

Celestari are, without exaggeration, among the best magic-users in existence. Their spellcraft isn’t just effective—it’s surgical, precise, and always accompanied by the faint suspicion that they’re holding back just to show they can. Dexterity comes just as naturally to them, whether it’s swordplay, acrobatics, archery, or twirling a wine glass in a way that somehow makes you feel poor. Add in lifespans that make other galactic species look like mayflies, and you’ve got a recipe for generations of meticulously cultivated arrogance.

On the downside, the Celestari don’t rush. About anything. Technologically, they’re stuck in a permanent golden age of their own making, endlessly refining designs from eras past rather than chasing the next big breakthrough. Where other species innovate, the Celestari curate. They’ll tell you it’s because they’ve achieved perfection. The truth is, they’re comfortable in their slow, glittering rut, and heaven help the moron who tries to drag them out of it.

That was helpful, but I wanted more. Needed more. So I used the Researcher’s Codex to dig deeper.

Ashely Greene

Specimen Biotag ID #04T - 01 - B07HGCNFLL

Variant Assimilation Level: 52

Race: Celestari, Transmog

__ __ __

Health: 123

Stamina Reserve: 87

Mana Pool: 293

__ __ __

Spatial Core - Active

(U) Kitchen Shears – Level 10

(C) Glass Veil – Level 8

(U) Perfumed Silence – Level 5

(U) Spun Sugar Cathedral – Level 6

(R) Opera of Ruin– Level 10

(R) Funeral Procession – Level 7

(R) Needlepoint Compass – Level 5

(F) Parasite’s Shortcut – Level 10

(F) Flayer’s Kiss – Level 15

(F) White Glove Vivisection – Level 15

Affiliations of Record

Aspirant, Skinless Court – Outer Disciple, Franchisee of the Kiosk Network

The scan could only show me so much, but based on her stats and listed Relics, two things were immediately clear. One, she and I had a remarkably similar builds—clearly focused on spell slinging and offensive power—and two, she was dangerous. In a straight up fight, I was sure I could take her, especially with my Horrors as backup, but against all eight I doubted I’d stand a chance.

I saw the woman stiffen momentarily as I scanned her, the hairs on the back of my neck standing rigid as I held my breath—just waiting to be discovered. But then the moment passed, and she shook her head, refocusing on something I hadn’t noticed before.

Hanging from a cage suspended from a thick tree bough was a large teddy bear, maybe three feet tall if the bear had been standing.

But this wasn’t just a teddy bear. It was the teddy bear.

An honest-to-God replica of the old version of Winnie-the-Pooh in all his honey-loving glory.

A tag appeared above his adorable stuffed head.

Dweller 0.990949B – Winnie-the-Pooh (Tea Shop Manager) [Level 49]

The bear was worn and ragged, his fur the faded gold of a sun-bleached photograph, patchy in places where the seams had split and been stitched back together with mismatched thread. His limbs were thin and a little floppy, as though he’d been hugged past the point of structural integrity and yet, for all that, there was something stubbornly wholesome about him. The bear had the kind of battered charm that made me believe he’d seen worse and survived it.

Though I wasn’t sure he’d be able to endear what the Aspirants had in store for him.

One leg had been torn off entirely, trailing a mixture of stained red fluff and grisly strings of meat. The contrast between the soft, squishy exterior and the puddle of blood was jarring and disgusting in a way I couldn’t put words to. The detached limb lay in the dirt below, half-covered in leaves. He was missing an eye—a gory hole where it should’ve been—while his remaining one was a dull glass marble clouded with pain. A deep slash across his belly had spilled bits of fluff and ropes of gray intestine.

It was hard to square what I was seeing. The bear looked for all the world like a stuffed animal, but clearly it was a living, breathing creature. A monstrosity spawned by the Progenitor Engine below, even if a loveable looking one.

“I haven’t seen whoever you’re looking for,” Pooh said, his voice somehow gentle, though it wavered with exhaustion and resignation. “And even if I did, I wouldn’t tell you. You’re here to hurt Christopher Robin, and I won’t let you. Not even if you kill me.”

The willowy woman tilted her head, her mouth curling in something that wasn’t a smile. “How many times do we have to tell you, dolt? We’re not here for Christopher Robin. We’re here for a man named Dan. He wears a red bathrobe and a paper crown.”

Pooh’s one good eye blinked slowly, stubborn and defiant. “Oh bother…” the bear hesitated for a long second. “Even if that’s true,” Pooh said in his thick, slow cadence. “I’m not going to help you anyway. You’re bad people. Mean people. And I don’t help mean people.” The bear paused and canted its head to the side in evident confusion. He looked lost. “Hello there, have you seen Christopher Robin? He’s my boy and he’s missing? I’ve been looking for him for so long.”

“Clearly this creature doesn’t know anything,” the big man in plate mail growled. “There’s something wrong with it.” The man frowned. “Something broken in his head.”

“Pity,” the woman said, her gaze hardening. “But maybe that means he’ll remember something pertinent if we apply a little more… pressure.” She drew a gleaming filleting knife from her belt and strolled toward the cage, her movements lazy, almost indulgent. “And if not? Well, at least we can have a little fun while we wait.”

With her free hand, she grabbed hold of Pooh’s remaining leg.

“Perhaps I cannot flay you,” she said softly, “but that doesn’t mean I can’t hurt you.”

She began to cut. Slowly.

Pooh let out a raw, mournful howl—ragged and trembling yet filled with such real pain that I felt it lance straight through me.

The smart move would’ve been to stay hidden. To let the Aspirants finish their sadistic game while I waited for backup.

But… it was Winnie-the-fucking-Pooh.

They were literally torturing one of the most beloved cartoon characters of all time—a figured I’d grown up with as a kid. Hell, my mom had bought me a Winnie-the-Pooh bear for Christmas when I was eight. For three years, I’d refused to sleep without it, and I’d set a place for the bear at dinner every night until I was eleven.

I couldn’t just stand there and watch an innocent creature suffer like that—not even if it was a Progenerated Dweller. Sure, he might not’ve been real in the same way Temp, Harper, or Jakob were, but he was no different than Croc and the pain I heard in his soft voice was all to real. He needed help and I could offer it, even if it was the dumbest tactical decision in the playbook.

There was no way I could beat all those sadistic dickheads on my own, but with just a little planning, I thought I could probably hold them off long enough for the others to arrive.

I already had both Collective Consciousness and Sleepwalker equipped, thanks to my scuffle with the Sentinel, but there was one other Relic I’d need for my rough plan to work. I hastily swapped out StainSlayer Maelstrom for another Relic that I pulled from Spatial Storage, Mutable Personna.

It was an Uncommon-grade illusion spell that many of the Sunnysider carried, though there hadn’t been any reason to use it until now, since it offered no combat capabilities, and limited tactical value. The only thing it did was allow the user to alter their physical appearance in some rather astounding ways. It was the same Relic Ed used to disguise the partial corruption he’d suffered as a result of spending so long on the spore-corrupted 24th floor.

But a little illusion magic was exactly what I needed right now.

Working quickly, I summoned several Dopplebangers, then dropped into a crouch behind them—using them as temporary meat shields for my real body—before summoning a Sunnysider Kevin and slipping seamlessly into the Horror’s body using Collective Consciousness. The world lurched as I abruptly found myself inside the hulking monstrosity. Then, with a muttered prayer, I cast Mutable Persona, altering the Horror until it looked like the real me.

I glanced at myself in the glassy frame of a picture, hung with care on one wall, confirming that the changes were close enough to fool the casual onlooker, then tromped forward and pushed open the door.

The woman was still slicing bits and pieces off Pooh bear, but that all stopped the second I stepped into the clearing, pulling the door shut behind me with a rasp of wood against wood—concealing the Dopplebangers and my real body.

“Stop,” I said. My voice was steady, even though my pulse was a war drum in my ears. “Heard you were looking for me. Well, here I am, dickweed.”

The woman lowered the flaying knife and turned to face me, her lips curling into something approximating a smile, though with half the skin on her face missing it was hard to tell.

“And you said this torturing this poor creature wouldn’t accomplish anything, Skylar,” she said, her comment directed at the plate mail clad warrior to her right. She turned cold, calculating eyes on me. Judging, weighing, analyzing me. From the look plastered across her face, she didn’t seem impressed by what she saw.

“Well, well,” she said, her voice smooth as poisoned honey. “And here I was thinking you’d keep skittering in the shadows like the little pest you are. Yet you walk right into our circle, unarmed, and alone.” She tapped her chin with a finger. “Curious. I assumed you would be smarter than that, considering how much trouble you’ve caused.”

“Yeah, people keep telling me I’m not great with subtlety,” I replied, folding my arms. “Seems like they might be right.”

The woman took a slow step toward me, twirling the knife like it was part of some idle game. “You’ve become quite the troublesome buzzing fly, Discount Dan. The Monarch speaks of you often. With… irritation. That’s not an easy thing to achieve, you know. Irritating him, I mean. Most people only get his attention once.”

“Guess I’m just a special snowflake,” I replied. “Real gift for it. Some folks can juggle, others can play piano by ear—me, I make homicidal megalomaniacs grind their teeth at night.”

Her ruined lips twitched. “I imagine the Monarch will want you alive. A chance to study you. To peel back the layers.”

“We shouldn’t play with him, Ashely,” the big man in the plate mail said. “If he’s made it this far, you know how dangerous he must be. Best if we just kill him and be done with it.”

I kept my expression neutral, even as my borrowed Sunnysider heart thumped. “One small hitch in your plan,” I said. “You actually have to kill me first. And no one’s managed to do that yet. Plenty have tried, but none have succeeded. But you’re all welcome to join the list.”

Skylar snorted and rolled his eyes. “Cocky.”

“Confident,” I corrected. “Cocky is thinking this is a fair fight that you can win. Confident is knowing I’m going your turn all of you into corpses.”

That got a few feral growls, which was fine by me—keep them angry, keep them off-balance. The longer they stood here puffing up their chests and flapping their lips, the more time I bought for the rest of my team to arrive.

The woman’s smile vanished like someone had pulled a curtain across her face. “Enough of this. Take him alive if you can—the Monarch will want to play with his new toy. If you can’t…” She shrugged delicately. “Well. Mistakes happen. His corpse will suffice in a pinch.”

Eight sets of eyes locked on me, their owners moving in with the kind of predatory ease that said they’d done this before and, more importantly, that they’d enjoyed it.

I glanced at Pooh in the cage. He met my eyes with that one cloudy marble and whispered, “Run.”

Not today, Pooh bear. Not today…

“Alright,” I muttered under my breath, flexing my mismatched Sunnysider fingers as mana began to pool in my core. “Let’s make some bad decisions.”

Chapter Forty-Six – Outer Disciples

They came at me like they’d been rehearsing the kill for weeks.

The Cendral was the first to break formation, bounding forward with a serpent’s lunge, twin blades flashing in the green-filtered light. I slammed my palms together in a thunderous clap as I cast Frostfang Spire, a jagged wall of ice surging up between us. He danced away with a hiss, claws scraping furrows in the grass and dirt before the javelins of ice could impale him.

The rest fanned out, smart enough to try a flanking maneuver.

I couldn’t let that happen, not as badly outnumbered as I was.

Even as powerful as Sunnysider Health Regen was, if they managed to hem me in, they’d cut me down before I could whittle my way through their ranks. Right now, my most powerful trump card was controlling the battlefield. I thrust my hands out and a second round of Frostfang Spire bloomed to my left, another to my right, funneling them into a narrow, more easily defensible channel in front of me.

“Remember,” I snarled, “you assclowns asked for this.”

I triggered Hydro Fracking Blast, splitting the beam into three powerful strands using Hydrokinesis, as I mowed down the fighters encroaching from the sides. Pushing them back, where my ranged spells would be more effective and I could mitigate physical, up-close-and-personal combat.

I had no idea how well my illusion would hold up under close scrutiny and wanted them at range for as long as possible.

Two Aspirants tried to bullrush their way through the beams of water, which was about as smart as charging a machine gun nest head-on. One of my beams neatly punched a hole through the first one’s throat, dropping him like a bag of bricks while blood gurgled out from terrible gash, while the second caught a blast in the chest that sent him spinning gracelessly into a nearby tree trunk—bits of armor cartwheeling off his body as he flew.

Automatic weapons opened up from the back line.

The latex-suited pervert hosed the clearing with an ol’ timey drum-fed SMG, bullets whining and slicing through the air. I threw up a floating ice shield, the impacts shattering it into a storm of glittering shards, but the deflection bought me precious seconds. I didn’t have access to my tools—not without giving away my ruse—but thanks to Hydro Fracking Blast, there was plenty of ambient moisture in the clearing to draw on.

With a thought, I shaped the liquid into frozen spears and axes, then sent the lot of them surging forward on strings of telekinetic power. The conjured weapons jabbed, slashed, and hacked at the Aspirants, not doing much damage, but keeping them away and buying me a little more breathing room.

An arrow thunked into the dirt inches from my foot. Another grazed my shoulder. I snatched the third from the air with Psychic Sovereignty and whipped it back at the bowman—a woman in crude leathers—catching her clean in the thigh.

Still, despite my best efforts, I couldn’t stop everything.

Another volley of arrows and gunfire rattled through the clearing. I deflected what I could, and soaked up what I couldn’t, bullets riddling my Sunnysider body and threatened to dispel the tenuous illusion I had in place. It was even worse when the Celestari woman started unleashing a volley of spellfire. With a flick of her wrist, she sent a legion of spectral blades the size of meat cleavers flying toward me, spinning end-over-end.

I ducked behind an ice wall.

The blades hit, stuck halfway through, and hummed like angry wasps trying to burrow through. But one caught me in the arm, punching through the bicep and out through the tricep with a flash of excruciating, eye-watering pain. I was thankful this wasn’t my real body, even if I felt every cut and scratch.

Or, in this case, puncture wound.

 They weren’t meat cleavers, I realized as the blade stuck in my arm started frantically opening and closing, chewing through meat. They were enormous, industrial-strength kitchen shears. The enormous array of powers the Backrooms offered was a benefit, but it also made it exceptionally difficult to anticipate what any given enemy was truly capable of.

I wrapped one meaty mitt around the handles and pulled the scissoring blades free, my Sunnysider Regen already kicking into overdrive as the wound knitted itself closed. The conjured scissors melted away into nothingness as I tossed ’em away before responding in kind. I sent a pair of frozen javelins shooting toward her, but before they landed a shimmering bubble appeared around her.

It reminded me of the soap bubble Gwendolyn the Good Witch of the North used to fly through the sky. This one wasn’t soap, though. Instead, it was oddly reflective glass.

When the spears of ice slammed into the barrier it shattered, dissolving my twin constructs into puddles of tepid water, then erupting into a cloud of twinkling glass shards, as fine as dust. She gave one little puff with her lips and the cloud rolled forward like a sandstorm. It washed over me, impervious to my ice barriers, and clung to my skin and clothes, opening a legion of tiny—almost microscopic—wounds across my face, chest, and arms.

It hurt worse than skinny diving into a pool of fiberglass insulation—something I’d actually done once on a dare.

The glass particles slipped into my mouth and nose, shredding my throat and windpipe before it eventually reached my lungs, making it almost impossible to breathe. The microparticles also sliced into my eyeballs and my vision went to static fuzz almost immediately. The world blurred around the edges, and it was like trying to look through frosted cellophane.

I heard her murmur something in that lilting, too-perfect Celestari voice, and then the air screamed. A tornado of literal razor blades enveloped me, circling and churning, every gust peeling away skin and fabric. I could feel my concentration lapsing and knew the illusion wouldn’t hold for much longer—assuming the Sunnysider survived the spell, which was uncertain at best.

Already, my HP was down below thirty percent, and it was dropping faster by the second.

I pushed through the pain, enduring the brunt of the whirlwind, and split my mind.

For a moment, the world tilted sideways, and I thought I might black out entirely—but then I was seeing double.

With one eye, I saw through the Sunnysider battling out front, while the other stared at the backs of the Dopplebangers and the inside of the quaint little treehouse. The mental strain of functionally being in two places at once hit like a migraine with a crowbar, and blood leaked from my nose in slow, red rivulets. Still, it had to be done. While the Sunnysider body soaked up punishment on the front line, I reached out and summoned a handful of my Necromarshalls—Drumbo, Synthia, Uncle Sam, and Rudolpho.

The treehouse wouldn’t hold anymore than that.

Not with me and the wall of Dopplebangers taking up the rear of the house. With great effort and trembling hands, I also slipped free several Health and Mana Regen cards. I pulled the door open with the power of my mind and sent the cards spinning toward the Horror fighting for his life as the rest of my Necromarshalls ducked beneath the stooped doorway and launched themselves into the fray.

With that done, my attention snapped back into focus, this time once more inside the body of the Horror wearing my face. The whirlwind of blades had died away a moment before the spell cards landed, activating on command and bringing the Sunnysider back from the brink of death. Grievous gashes and a legion of lacerations mended in an instant, my HP shooting back up above sixty percent as my Necromarshalls went to work.  

Drumbo barreled forward, hurdling over the Frostspire barrier then slamming to the bullheaded Aspirant like a Mac truck, knocking him clean off his feet with a shoulder check that sounded like a tree snapping in half. But the Horror didn’t stop—he was a Juggernaut on a rampage and hammered into the next target with those slab-thick fists, driving them down into the dirt with a sickening crunch of bone and cartilage.

Synthia vaulted into the air, nimble and lethal, her chainsaw revving as she vomited a Feral Hairball into the face of the freak in the latex gimp suit. The hairball—a writhing mass of feline fur, golden eyes, and hissing mouths—began tearing away his skin in a frenzy. Machine gun fire ripped through the air, but he wasn’t aiming at anything in particular and the bullets tore harmlessly through the canopy above, sending a smattering of leaves floating down.

Before the gimp could properly get his bearing, Synthia sank the chainsaw into his collarbone in a spray of blood. He screamed, high-pitched and wet, as she twisted the blade and carved through his neck. He fumbled the SMG and it landed in a tangle of underbrush as he went down with Synthia on top of him, hacking away at the man’s torso with the reinforced claws of her other hand.

Rudolpho—true to his nature—immediately took to the skies, dashing above the clearing on hardened platforms of air as his nose blazed red with sickly radiation. Boils erupted on the Aspirants as he passed overhead.

Uncle Sam made a beeline for the Celestari caster, closing the distance in a blur of unnaturally long legs, the tails of his coat fluttering out behind him like battle standards. In his hands was the burning cat-o-nine tails that had once belonged to Krampus. No one on the team had any use for it, but it was way too good to just leave lying around, collecting metaphorical dust in Storage. And there was no way I was putting something that powerful up for sale.

But the Heartfire Lash sang in Uncle Sam’s hands.

He cast a gout of roiling flame that pushed the caster back then struck with the whip, carving a deep gash across her thigh before she could conjure another spell. The woman shrieked—not in pain, but in outrage at being denied her target—and retaliated with more spectral kitchen shears, one of which embedded itself in Uncle Sam’s bony shoulder. The Horror didn’t even flinch. Instead, he grinned and pressed the attack, driving her back to the edge of he clearing.

My icy barricades broke under the weight of the battle. But that was fine. They’d done their job.

With my health steadily climbing, I triggered Hydro Fracking Blast again, blasting Aspirants left and right as my Horrors took command of the battlefield with overwhelming, unchecked aggression.

But it didn’t take long before resistance found me.

Skylar materialized in a flash of violet light, using some sort of Blink Step technique to teleport behind me, his huge sword already in motion.

I twisted just in time to intercept with a raised arm covered in a thick layer of protective ice. The impact still staggered me, and though the ice shell saved me from losing the arm completely, I felt the bone beneath fracture and sag under the force of the blow. I ignored the sharp lace of pain and drove a knee up into his gut, then followed with a punch that turned his nose into pulp and sent several teeth flying.

Skylar didn’t even see to notice. Instead, he grinned and promptly slammed his ruined face into mine.

I staggered, blinking blood from my eyes, just in time to catch the edge of his sword across my shoulder. If this had been my real body, the strike would’ve ripped apart flesh and shattered bone, but the Sunnysider had a set of heavy steel pauldrons affixed to his shoulders—all neatly concealed by the illusion of Mutable Persona. The armor turned the blade without leaving so much as a scratch.

That earned a frown from the armored warrior, but he still hadn’t connected to dots yet. I was sincerely hoping he never would.

With a roar, I dropped low and cast Lawn Mower Wind Blade—an ugly, churning buzzsaw of air exploded outward from my belly. Skylar caught it full in the chest, the edges of hardened air grinding against his armor, shooting up white sparks and leaving shallow cuts across the exposed flesh.

He stumbled back a step, coughing, but still had more than a little fight left.

We traded blows—hammer and fist, steel and flesh. He was stronger. Faster. Better equipped. But I had one thing he didn’t: any shits to give. This wasn’t really my body, and though losing a Horror would be a minor inconvenience, it certainly wouldn’t be the end of the world. I fought like a demon and didn’t anything hold back. I used everything the Sunnysider’s body could give me—speed, weight, brute force, and desperation.

I ducked under a swing and drove a shoulder into his gut, then followed it up with a hammer blow right to the groin. No one could shrug off a good ol’ dick punch.

He grunted in pain and back peddled, before driving his sword downward in a brutal overhead strike. My eyes widened in shock, and I knew the Horror would never survive…

Except, the blow never landed.

Instead, another blade flashed into view—this one dark steel stripped with veins of red and white—stopping the strike mid-swing.

Skylar grunted in surprise as the Dark Solstice Cleaver slid his weapon wide, nearly taking his arm with it. The follow-up blow was worse—Temp’s greatsword arced in low, neatly penetrating his armor and splitting open his gut like a bag of wet leaves.

He hit the ground screaming, entrails dragging behind him, trying to stuff them back in as blood soaked the dirt. Temperance drove her sword through his face, killing him where he lay.

[Level Up! x 1]

I sucked in a ragged breath as Temperance stepped up beside me, a wild gleam in her eye.

“Glad to see we’re off to a good start,” she said, stilling grinning like a lunatic. “Are you alright?” she asked, glancing sideways at me.

“Not really,” I rasped. “But better now that you’re here.”

“Good,” she growled, lifting her sword and turning to face the remaining Aspirants. “Now let’s spit roast these fuckers.”

I grimaced at her word choice. “Uh, that might not mean what you think it means, Temp.”

“Oh, I know exactly what it means,” she said, voice hard and cold. “A devil’s threeway. You fuck them from the front, I’ll fuck them from behind.”

“Right,” I muttered, rolling my shoulders. “Just… maybe don’t say that out loud again.”

“I don’t like to make promises I can’t keep,” she replied before charging into the fray.

I said a silent pray of thanks that Temp was the first one through, and not Jakob, Harper, or Croc. Jakob was powerful, but he detested killing humans if he could avoid it, and what I really needed was some no holds barred bloodlust.

With Temp’s sudden appearance, the tide began to noticeably shift in our favor.

The Sunnysider was on his last legs, so I let my consciousness slip back into my own body.

The wall of Dopplebangers had vanished, dealing no damage since none had actively been dealt to the real me, but it was always better to be safe than sorry. I quickly swapped Relics, exchanging Collective Consciousness, Sleepwalker, and Mutable Persona for StainSlayer Maelstrom, Neural Slip Stream, and Echoed Aura, then slipped out through the front door. The second I was clear, I took to the air, hovering eight feet up from the forest floor as I began to cast.

First, I summoned more Horrors, black vertical slashes rippling through the clearing as Kevins, Kathys, Timmys, and Yetis poured out like water from a broken faucet. My army immediately went on the offense, slaughtering with total disregard for their own safety or lives. The Aspirants quickly found themselves badly outnumbered, our roles reversed, as they formed tight defensive pockets to stave off the unnatural creatures.

That only benefited me. With them all in one place, my AoE spells would be that much more effective.

I cast Echoed Aura, pairing it in Group Love Mode with Neural Slipstream.

Neural Slipstream (Group Love Aura): Gain +50% to movement speed and 25% intangibility, reducing all incoming physical and elemental damage. Allies are 50% more susceptible to Physic and Mental-based attacks.

In an eyeblink all of my allies became cloudy, partly intangible. Arrows and spells phased through them as they fought, though the aura didn’t decrease the damage they dealt, thanks to the secondary threshold ability, Poltergeist.

I cast StainSlayer Maelstrom next, raining fat drops of bleach down onto the assembled Aspirants while Temp went on the warpath, carving a bloody trail through anyone standing in her way. The skinless dickheads began to fall, their formations caving under the concerted pressure from my Horrors, while I hurled a barrage of spells in their direction.

Chapter Forty-Six – Oh Bother

By the time Jakob showed up, the Aspirants were all but dead, the clearing a charnel house floor of blood, guts, and amputated limbs. After that, it didn’t take much to mop up the remaining forces—though I was sad to see that Ashely, the Celestari spellcaster, wasn’t among the fallen. Apparently, she’d seen the writing on the walls and had used the chaos to slip away, back into the forest and well-away from the killing field.

Temp, Jakob, and I—along with a little assistance from the members of the Rat Pack—were already looting corpses and stacking bodies by the time Croc and Harper arrived. 

As I sorted through our haul, my displeasure that the Celestari had managed to escape a well-earned death only intensified. She clearly had some powerful spells at her disposal, and I had no doubt Temp would’ve given anything to get a Relic that let her summon a whirlwind of actual razor blades. That sort of thing was right up her alley and very on brand, from a thematic standpoint. Somehow, though, I got the feeling that we’d have another chance at killing her.

It wasn’t all for nothing, though.

Sure, I didn’t feel great about murdering a bunch of people, even if they were sadistic ass wads, but I got a level out of it and a bunch of new, relatively high-level Relics.

Garage Door Guillotine summoned a semi-corporeal garage door that slammed down on all enemies in range, dealing blunt damage with a small percentage chance of decapitating enemies beneath 15% total health. Slapshot Air Puck unleashed a high-velocity puck of condensed mana that ricocheted between enemies, dealing concussive damage to multiple targets, while Ball Gag of Blessed Silence—naturally taken of the mutilated corpse of the gimp—forcibly shut down enemy casters by stuffing their mouths with a conjured ball gag that leeched mana.

There were a number of specific bow and arrow related abilities, scavenged from the now dead archer, including Laser Pin Pointer, which allowed the user to mark a target with a red laser dot—all subsequent ranged attacks would automatically seek out the marked target, even if they were moving or hiding. It didn’t guarantee a hit, but it came pretty damned close. And Thumbtack Assassin fired a volley of low-damage projectiles from any ranged weapon, specifically targeting joints and nerve endings.

They were painful, petty, and extremely annoying. It definitely had some broader applications as a Spell Card, and could probably replace the Summon Screw ability attached to my Balloon Menagerie Claymore Mines.

One of the best Relics was a Stamina-based ability that came courtesy of Skylar, the evil paladin.

Bounty Hunter
Rare Relic – Level 1
Range: 100 Meters
Cost: 25 Stamina
Cooldown: 1 Minute
Cast Time: Instant

Did you know it only takes 20 bucks and a blood sample to become a licensed Bounty Hunter in the state of Florida? No, seriously. They hand out those certifications like Kool-Aid at a cult farewell party.

It’s even easier in the Backrooms.

Bounty Hunter lets you tag a single enemy as a Parolee—flagging them for immediate “reacquisition.” Once tagged, you can teleport behind them instantly, so long as they are in line of sight, and your first strike hits like you’ve got a vendetta and a court order. Your next spell or melee attack deals 3x normal damage and slaps them with the Detained Affliction, which reduces the target’s movement speed by 25% and disables all movement enhancing abilities for 15 seconds.

Great for assassinations, ambushes, or dramatically appearing behind someone and whispering “You skipped your court date, shithead.” This ability cannot be used to target anyone deemed an ally.

There were a bunch of other great Relics as well, but I’d need to look through them more closely when I had a little downtime.

There were also the bodies themselves to consider. Eldritch Taxidermy let me craft Horrors from any fusion of organic and inorganic material—and dead Delvers definitely qualified. They were high level, obviously powerful, and would’ve made great reanimated cannon fodder.

Problem was… I couldn’t bring myself to do it.

Maybe before using Collective Consciousness, but not now. I knew too much. I’d seen firsthand that pieces of their identity lingered even after death, like dusty cobwebs clinging to the corners of their minds. My Horrors weren’t fully aware of who or what they were, not exactly—but they knew something was wrong. Knew they weren’t supposed to exist. That awareness made them dangerous. Desperate. In hindsight, I figured it’s probably why they fought so hard. Not for survival, but because some part of them hoped for an end.

Doing that to Progenerated Dwellers was bad enough. But doing it to people? Even awful ones who probably deserved it? That was another one of those lines I didn’t want to cross—especially considering I’d already crossed so many. This place wouldn’t make a monster out of me, no matter how hard it tried.

So instead of sending their corpses back to the store for processing, I stripped ’em down and burned ’em where they lay. Burned ’em until they were nothing but ash and smoke and bone. One last act of mercy none of them likely deserved.

I stood there for a long moment, watching the last of the flames smolder and die out. The air stank of cooked flesh, the trees still echoing faintly with the violence that had just unfolded. My thoughts were heavy and dark, but there was one shining light in the midst of the carnage and death.

Winnie-the-Pooh.

Or at least the Backrooms version of him, at any rate.

Croc had freed the bear the second the mimic arrived and was already fussing over him like a worried parent. It came as no shock, whatsoever, that they two had immediately hit it off.

I headed over to talk to the bear while the Rat Pack scurried about and Harper set to work patching Pooh up after his encounter with the Aspirants. I’ll admit that I was more than a little worried the bear would actually turn out to be a homicidal killing machine, disguised as a sweet, loveable stuffed animal—but for once, he was exactly what he appeared to be.

Just a lost toy.

One on a search and rescue mission for his missing boy, Christopher Robin. But there was something subtly off about him. Pooh didn’t come across as overtly dangerous, not exactly—but the little bear seemed caught in a constant fog, like his memory was fraying at the edges. Something vital was missing, and he knew it… he just couldn’t seem to remember what.

“Thank you for freeing me,” Pooh said with a tiny nod as Harper worked.

Her Field Surgeon ability couldn’t regrow limbs, but Pooh had no trouble fixing himself—popping the leg back into place as crude stitches appeared on their own, sewing the wound shut. He did the same with his missing marble eye, plucking it from a pile of leaves and pressing it neatly back into the socket.

Some kind of innate mend ability, if I had to guess.

“Those were not nice people,” Pooh said rather forlornly. “The 10,000 Acre Wood used to be full of good people, but they are harder to find now than a good pot of honey.”

“Well, you don’t have to worry about Dan,” Croc said, tail waggling happily. “Of all the people I’ve met—and I’ve met a lot—Dan is the best. He always helps other people, and he gives me Froyo whenever I want. Plus, he found me a copy of the first and second Twilight movies and he lets me watch them at night, which is about the best thing in the world. He may or may not have a case of incurable hemorrhoids, but that’s not something you can really blame him for. We all have our issues.”

“Really?” Pooh asked. “He helps people?”

“Only all the time,” Croc replied. “Just last week we rescued a bunch of hostages from this evil Santa guy down on the 49th floor. We threw a party afterward and everything. You should’ve tasted the stew!”

“Well, maybe he can help me, then,” Pooh said, canting his adorable head to one side. “I’m looking for my boy, Christopher Robin. Have you seen him by chance?”

Harper squatted down beside the bear. “How long have you been looking for him?” she asked.

“Think, think, think,” Pooh said, tapping the side of his head with one paw. “Time is hard to keep track of here,” he finally said. “Thirty years, I suppose? Maybe more. I can’t seem to recall. But I’m sure he’s around here somewhere. He probably just got lost.” He chuckled. “Christopher Robin is always getting turned around and the forest is a very big place, after all. And he’s just a little boy. Maybe nine or ten. He has sandy brown hair, and he wrinkles up his nose like this”—the bear wriggled his snout—“when he’s thinking.”

“Sorry,” Croc said, shaking its head. “I haven’t seen anyone who goes by that name, but if he’s going to turn up anywhere, it’ll be Dan’s store. Lots of lost Delvers show up there, eventually. And even more will start arriving once we manage to kill the Franchisor and claim the Kiosk Network.”

A look of fear flashed across Pooh’s face. “Oh bother…” he mumbled. “You’re looking for the Franchisor? He’s very dangerous and not at all nice. And getting into Steamboat Studios is very tricky business, you know.”

“Why’s that?” I asked, curious what the little bear might know.

“Well, it’s at the heart of the 10,000 Acre Woods,” Pooh said matter of factly, “which means you need to go all the way through the forest, and the forest can be a very dangerous place. A lot of my friends are here—Eeyore, Rabbit, Piglet, Kanga, Roo, Owl, and Tigger too. But something bad has happened to them and they aren’t the way they used to be anymore.” The bear dropped his head. “I’m the only one left who remembers why we were created in the first place. To help people.” Pooh frowned. “But not the bad people who are all over the floor now.”

“There are more bad people here?” Jakob asked, his words soft and oddly comforting.

“Oh yes.” The bear nodded in confirmation. “Just like that bunch who trapped me. They all having missing patches of skin, and seem to be searching for someone, though I can’t remember who…” he trailed off and his eyes widened in obvious concern. “Do you think they’re looking for Christopher Robin?”

Something angry and feral rippled behind his dark marble eyes and, just for a moment, his fur bulged and grew before shrinking back down.

“No, I think they’re searching for us,” I said. “But if you’re boy is here somewhere, they might hurt him anyways.”

“Then what if I help you?” the bear offered. “I can’t do all that much—I am only a very little bear, after all—but I could show you the way to through the 10,000 Acre Woods and help you get to Steamboat Studios.”

“You would do that?” I asked, raising an eyebrow.

“So long as you promise to help me look for Christopher Robin along the way,” Pooh agreed. “He must be so scared out here. All alone and with no one to help him when he gets sad.” He perked up as though recalling something important. “But I know every inch of this forest. It is my home, after all. It changes a lot—always shifting and moving—but I know the pattern like the back of my paw.”

The bear raised a stuffed paw, and seemed shocked to find a speck of blood that didn’t belong. That wasn’t exactly encouraging.

“And I might be able to help in case we run across the others,” Pooh continued after a moment. “Tiger, Eeyore and the others. They don’t like outsiders, not very much at all. But if you’re with me, you should be okay.”

I didn’t have the heart to tell the little bear that Christopher Robin probably wasn’t real—just a memory of a time that have never existed outside of books and stories—or, that if he was real, he was probably dead and long gone. I felt bad using the bear’s obvious grief and confusion, but I wouldn’t turn down any help I could get, especially if it let us slip into Steamboat Studios without altering the Franchisor.

“Just give us a minute to talk about it, okay?” I asked.

“Of course, take all the time you need,” Pooh replied. “It’s really no bother at all. I’ll just help myself to a little honey while I wait. I’ve got a full pot in my treehouse.”

The bear toddled off while the rest of us formed into a loose circle on the edge of the clearing to discuss our options moving forward.

“You know we’re never going to find that child, right?” Temperance said, folding her arms across her chest. “It’s a waste of time even looking.”

“Probably,” I said. “But if he can help us steer clear of the worst Dwellers, I’m all for a little detour.”

“But that’s the problem, isn’t it?” Jakob said. “We’re still too weak to fight the Franchisor. I know you’re level fifty-five Dan, but the rest of us have some catching up to do. I’m only level forty-nine and Harper is only forty-two. We have to assume the Franchisor is at least as strong as the Polaris Vora or, perhaps, even the Blight Sentinel from the last floor. He probably isn’t alone either—it’s safe to assume he has reinforcements of one kind or another.”

“You’re not wrong,” I admitted, “but you are forgetting something. Dwellers aren’t the only thing to hunt on this floor. You heard the bear—sounds like this place is crawling with Aspirants.”

“That would make sense,” Harper said, nodding along. “This is the last chance the Monarch has to stop us from claiming the Kiosk Network. It’s a good bet he dispatched a ton of disciples to keep us from getting through. Probably some powerful ones, too.”

“You really want us to hunt people, Dan?” Croc asked, sounding concerned. “Like real people?”

“I agree,” Jakob said rather sternly. “You know how I feel about killing other Delvers. I’m willing to do what I must, but fighting in self defense is very different than purposely targeting other Delvers—even if they are Aspirants.” He grimaced and shook his head. “I can’t condone this plan in good faith.”

“I get that,” I said. And I did.

We all had our own lines in the sand, and killing other Delvers was Jakob’s. But pacifism was a luxury I couldn’t afford. Not if I wanted to survive. Not if I want to see my friends survive. I wouldn’t ask Jakob to do anything he wasn’t comfortable with, but this wasn’t something I could turn a blind eye to forever. I’d killed before and had no doubt I would again. Truth was, I’d always known that it would come down to a bloody and ruthless fight with the Court and this was just the first battle of many.  

“Listen,” I replied stoically, “I don’t want this any more than the rest of you. Hurting people was never on my bingo card—and I certainly don’t want to kill them needlessly. But this is a war. You gotta remember, we didn’t ask for this fight. This is self-defense. If it were up to me, we’d open the store and let anyone in for a hot bite to eat, a safe place to sleep, and a chance to sing kumbaya around a flaming dumpster, but that isn’t an option. These douchebags are here to kill us and we need to get stronger to stop them. As far as I’m concerned, that makes ’em fair game.”

The dog seemed to consider my words for a few seconds before nodding slowly.

“Okay, I understand… I just don’t want you to lose yourself, Dan. Even if it’s totally justifiable, I’ve seen too many Delvers sacrifice the best parts of themselves to survive. Their empathy. Their kindness. Their compassion. I don’t want that to be you. Any of you,” the mimic added, its googly eyed gaze turning to the others. “Just promise me that we won’t do anything that’ll make us the bad guys, okay Dan?”

“I can’t promise there won’t be bloodshed,” I said, “because there will, and we’re going to have to do things that will probably make all of us uncomfortable—”

“Not me,” Temperance interjected. “I love this plan.”

“Fine, not Temp,” I conceded, “but we’ll be smart about it. We’ll hunt Aspirants as we slowly move toward Steamboat Studios. Level up as we go. Besides, it’s about time that we take the fight to the Monarch and his dickhead followers. I know he has a long reach, but this time he overreached and we’re going to cut his fingers off for it. I’m sure he’ll be able to bounce back, but any Aspirants we kill here, will be one less Aspirant that can take a poke at us down the road.”

Jakob shook his head. “I still cannot condone this. I will come with you because we are in this together, and I’ll fight if I must, but I wouldn’t kill. Dwellers are one thing—Mit Entschuldigungen, Croc,” he said to the dog with an apologetic nod, “but people are different.”

“It’s fine,” Temp said with a sniff, “I’ll kill enough for both of us.”

“That is not any better, Kleiner Hase,” Jakob said. “Arguably, it is much worse.”

“It is what it is,” I said. “And, for the record, I’m not asking you to violate your conscious. Besides, so long as you participate in the fights, you should still be able to earn Experience even without actually killing anyone.”

“It’s worked out for me okay,” Harper said with a shrug.

Jakob grunted, clearly disgruntled, but nodded. “Fine. Just so long as everyone knows where I stand on the matter.” He sighed and glanced around the bloody clearing. “If we are going to do this, we’d best get moving. If that caster really did slip away as you suspect, Dan, then she might return with more Aspirants. We should be gone before then.”

“Yeah,” I replied. Then I paused. Frowned. “But before we go, there’s something I need to do.” My gaze flickered toward the out of place Progenitor Monolith. “Won’t take long.”

I’d earned a two new levels between the battle with the Drekhnaar Drones and the fight with the Aspirants, but it wasn’t stat points I was concerned about.

Leaving the others behind, I headed toward the Monolith and quickly pulled up my SBR. I spent my ten points, dropping five into Resonance—bringing the total up to 131—and split the remaining five points, three to Athleticism and two into Toughness.

What I was really concerned with, however, were my titles.

After killing Natasha Anno, I’d earned a very dubious title called Cold-Blooded Murderer, which doubled the amount of Experience I received from Delver Deaths.

 Despite how good the title was, having it equipped made me sick to the stomach—a constant reminder of the terrible thing I’d done to earn it—and I’d quickly replaced it the second it was an option. But even though it was sickening, if we were going to spend time hunting Aspirants, I’d be an idiot to leave it unequipped. Double Experience was just too good, and since it was an evolving title, chances were I’d get added benefits if I killed enough Delvers.

I didn’t really want to think about how many people I’d have to cut down in cold blood to accomplish that feat but, like it or not, I was pretty sure I was going to find out.

The thought of adding it back into my active roster made my skin crawl, but I did it anyway. Sometimes in life, you just had to suck it the fuck up and make hard choices. Bad choices. But I’d do anything to protect my friends, even if it killed a small part of my soul in the process.

For the time being, I swapped out Overkill Overlord—though I promised myself it wouldn’t last forever. Just until I did what needed doing.

By the time I closed out of my SBR, Pooh had wandered over to the others and was devouring honey, dipping one paw into the clay pot then jamming his face full of liquid gold.

“So will you help me look for Christopher Robin?” the bear asked, smacking between great big bites.

“Yep,” I said. “Let’s go look for your boy and hunt some bad people while we’re at it…”