The spot where Maple Leaf had chosen to wait for the arena gates to open was off to the side where things were marginally less crowded. Lianna was still wound up pretty tight when we reached them, her eyes darting around nervously and her teeth clenched to hard I could hear the grinding, so once we found a place next to Sigrid and Jane I put my hand on her forearm to get her attention.

  “I could've sworn you had a power that made you fearless but you look ready to bolt at any instant. What gives?”

  “I’m not afraid, it’s just that everybody’s staring at me,” she said.

  “No they’re not,” I said.

  “Actually," Jane said, reaching out to lower Lianna’s zipper to show more cleavage, “they are. Partly because she looks sexy as fuck, but also because she’s with you.”

  “You are a bit of a celebrity, Daniel,” Sigrid said, reaching out to lower the zipper a smidge more and getting an approving nod from Jane. “And now that everyone can see you chose her for your team, so is Lianna.”

  “I suppose,” I said.

  “Why would anyone pay any attention to me with you guys here?” Lianna said. “You’re both freaking gorgeous.”

  “Thanks, Lianna,” Jane said. “About time someone noticed.” Then for no reason at all she kicked me lightly on the shin.

  I mean, Lianna wasn't wrong about Sigrid and Jane. They definitely drew a lot of attention to themselves simply by existing, but in their current getups they were even more captivating. Sigrid always shone like a sunrise in her usual gleaming silver scale armor and long blonde hair, but Jane had once again switched things up. She’d dumped the long leather duster coat and merged elements of her original swashbuckler theme back into the look. The second skin of reinforced black leather pants still left nothing to the imagination, only now she sported knee-high buckled boots over them.

  The upper part of Jane’s outfit was a frilly white blouse cut enticingly low that Byron had enchanted to provide a modicum of armored protection. A tightly cinched black leather corset accentuated her assets while also acting as a bit of extra armored protection. She’d draped a white sash cavalierly around her hips, from which her trusty old rapier dangled in its scabbard with The Rapier Of Doom clipped beside it. Finally, she wore black gloves and, of course, some vital jewelry: her shield ring, her communicator bracelet, and her choker. She'd clearly made a trip to the salon herself, because her red hair was done up in a series of complicated braids I couldn't even begin to describe besides saying it looked really pretty.

  It wasn't like I didn't notice how good she looked, I just didn't see how it was my job to fluff her delicate ego by pointing it out. Lianna, on the other hand, was my responsibility.

  "Lianna," I said, "remind me to get you a new mirror. If you can't see how incredible you look then the one you're using must be broken or something."

  All three of them turned to look at me like I'd said something weird.

  "Stop hitting on her," Jane said.

  "I'm not..." I began, then saw the smirk. "Lianna has nothing to worry about, I don't fish off the company pier."

  "I have no idea if I should be offended or relieved," Lianna said.

  Suddenly, Lianna jostled me at the same time I heard Sam say “Hey!” I looked over to see a team of Players bulldozing their way through our group. They’d insolently barged past Sam, who’d in turn knocked Lianna into me.

  It was Team Droogs, infamous controllers of the Fire Dungeon, unmistakable in their all-white uniforms with those black bowler-hat helmets and tall shit-kicker boots. Each member had customized their look with various black accessories like belts, suspenders, gloves, and whatnot, and most wore some kind of black makeup like a bunch of Gene Simmons wannabes. A few carried bottles of milk from which they occasionally took a swig then glared around defiantly, as though daring someone to mock them. It was definitely tempting.

  “They’re really getting into character, aren’t they?” Lianna said with a sneer. “Goolying around peeting their moloko while looking to do a bit of the old ultraviolence. All we need is some Ludwig Von."

  “A strange choice of role models to be sure,” I said.

  I did a quick evaluation of the new faces among the Droogs and saw they’d maintained their focus on raw strength and attack powers, and the majority of them still had only the basic, most common elemental affiliations. Now that I could view team builder Statuses, I did a double-take after seeing the Droog leader’s for the first time. He had good abilities, especially one in particular.

  From that point onward it became my mission to see Push Your Luck in use so I could mimic it later. If Murder Hobo was a great Gift, which it was, then Push Your Luck was a simply amazing Power. I hadn’t figured out the specifics, but I was pretty sure Lianna’s It’s Fine gift worked along the same lines, offering a constant, generalized, low-level boost to her fortune. May the odds be ever in her favor.

  “Step aside, peons,” a Droog said as he brazenly shoved Lancelot out of the way. Lance bristled and was about to pull out his sword but Arthur put his hand out to stop him.

  “Don’t,” Arthur said. “It’s what they want.”

  “You have to stand up to bullies,” Lancelot said.

  “It’s not worth it. Let’s just beat them in the quest.”

  Lancelot grumbled, but took his hand off his sword’s hilt and glared after the Droogs as they sauntered on to accost others.

  In their wake, two more teams made their way toward us, although in a much more civilized manner. Once again, Team Legion and Team Spice were together. They must’ve really bonded after their mutual cult quest, which was nice to see. It was also nice to see Achmed had taken my recommendation and brought Peter and his gang into the Legion. Those five pushed ahead of the rest and came up to me, all smiles.

  “Mister Lamont, sir,” Peter said.

  I held up a hand to stop him right there. “Please don’t call me that, Peter. It’s just Daniel.”

  “Sorry. Daniel. We didn’t get a chance to thank you properly before for what you did for us. You really saved our necks.”

  Yeah, at the expense of having my own neck severed. But I’d do it again in a heartbeat to rescue those kids.

  Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

  “You’re welcome,” I said. “I’m glad it all worked out in the end.”

  “What did you do this time, Mister Lamont?” Jane said.

  “He rescued us from the Silver Sword,” Peter said.

  “Ahhh,” she said. “So that’s how the whole thing with that Flint guy came about. Out saving cats again.”

  “Cats?” Peter said.

  “You never heard of that?” Jane said. “Save the cat? Never mind.”

  “And thanks for suggesting these guys,” Achmed said, having caught up and joined us. “They’re a good crew.”

  “They’re fitting in well?” I said.

  “Some are still getting used to calling out the names of their actions, but yeah. It's a good fit.”

  I introduced Lianna to Achmed and his Legion, then to Tiff and Team Spice. This was my first glimpse at Tiff’s new recruits too, and as expected she’d brought on all women. One of them in particular was worth noting: it was Celeste Jones.

  The first time I’d seen Celeste was a few seconds before the tutorial ended when she conveniently appeared out of nowhere, ready to take the final spot I wasn’t allowed to fill on the team I built. Most conveniently, now that I thought about it. But she’d somehow triggered Sigrid’s danger sense and Kenji ended up filling the empty space.

  It only occurred to me at this moment that this was just the second time I’d seen her. In all this time, even after I’d spent several days following Players around collecting their abilities, I hadn’t once seen her around. She’d shown up to the Maple Leaf open house, but had once again been vetoed.

  I still didn’t know what about her had given Sigrid the heebie-jeebies, but it certainly wasn’t lack of ability. Wherever she’d been spending her time, it was obvious from her Status she’d been an active Player. Her stats were better than most Players who’d been on teams all along. If I had to guess, I’d say she’d been adventuring out by the sea, she had too many leveled up water-based abilities to have remained land-locked this whole time, but I still found it odd that I hadn’t seen her around.

  Achmed and Tiff seemed a bit distracted. I noticed they were spending longer than usual checking out Lianna's Status, no doubt trying to figure out why I’d chosen her above everyone else to join my team.

  Achmed’s mouth hung open when his eyes reached the weapons she wore.

  “Uhhhhh, are those what I think they are?” he said, pointing at them.

  Lianna drew her pistols and held them up. “What, these?”

  “Where the frig did you find actual guns in this place?” Tiff blurted, then her eyes glazed momentarily as she evaluated them. “Holy fuck!”

  “I’ve got some too,” I said, and showed them mine.

  Nina, Byron, and Morgan also held up their P1s. “I replicated a few more, too,” Byron said, grinning.

  “You replicated?” Achmed said.

  “Every Maple Leafer with Crossbow has one. We've got a few of the rifles in inventory too,” Byron said, reaching into his and pulling out an R1 Assault Rifle.

  “Rifles too?” Achmed said. “What the hell is going on?”

  “Oh, that reminds me.” I took a P2 out of my inventory. “Here Nina, take this one. You won’t be able to use it yet, but hang onto it. I’ll need to teach you a new skill first so just use the P1 for now.”

  She accepted it with a look of curiosity that turned to joy when she saw its Status and the healing shot power.

  Tiff grabbed my arm and pulled me closer. “Where did those come from?!” she hissed.

  Lianna and everyone on Maple Leaf looked sheepishly towards me.

  Tiff let go of my arm and chuckled. “This is one of those what happens in the catacombs sort of things, isn’t it?”

  “Something like that,” I said.

  “Since you’re sharing with other teams, where do we sign up?” Achmed said.

  “Let’s talk after this quest,” I said. Arthur was in my line of sight, and I saw him frown when I said that.

  “Seriously? I was joking, man,” Achmed said.

  I gave him a smile. “I wasn’t.” Arthur’s frown turned into a scowl. Maybe I hadn’t quite smoothed things over with him as well as I'd thought yet. Or maybe he just wanted a gun too.

  As Tiff was about to open her mouth to say something I cut her off with another smile. “We’ll talk too, Tiff.”

  “Yes we will,” the Team Spice Captain said and smiled back.

  “By the way, Tiff, this is Nina and her husband Byron. I mentioned them before.”

  “The healer, yes,” Tiff said. “It’s nice to finally meet you properly.”

  Seeing the friendly terms I was on with the other two teams, more Maple Leafers started chatting with them. I watched them silently for a while. These people were going to be the seeds of the Players Guild. It was a good place to start.

  I felt Lianna elbow me softly in my side. When I looked at her she tapped the side of her head, a prearranged signal that meant she wanted to have a private telepathic chat.

  Me: What’s up?

  Lianna: Are you really going to give guns to those other teams?

  Me: I plan to give them to everyone eventually. Shield generators, too.

  Lianna: As long as they're in the Player's Guild, though, right?

  Me: Well yeah, of course. But I was also thinking the NPCs who learn Toron-do should get them too.

  Lianna: You really are fixated on defending the city.

  Me: I have good reason to be.

  Lianna: There’s still something you’re not telling me, isn’t there?

  Me: It’s still just a hunch.

  Lianna: But one you’re at least confident enough in that you’ll go to extreme measures to guard against it.

  Me: What can I say? I’m a cautious fellow.

  Lianna: Cautious? You? All evidence to the contrary, mon Capitan.

  While everyone kept chatting I took the opportunity to look around at the other teams. When my gaze landed on Team N3m2s1s I saw Kiki staring our way. She didn’t seem to notice me looking at her even though it seemed like she was staring directly at me, then I realized it wasn't me she was looking at. She was wholly focused on Lianna. I couldn’t read the expression on her face, but I could tell whatever she was thinking or feeling, it was complicated. Then her focus shifted to me and after we locked eyes she immediately turned her head to the side, looking as far away from me as she could without moving her body.

  I had a hunch so I kept watching her, and sure enough, as expected I saw her sneak a peek back at us through the corner of her eye, so I smiled. This time when she looked aside she turned her whole body away so fast her pigtails whipped around like tetherball ropes so all I could see was her back.

  Yeah, whoever said it was right. That chick was loco. Kinda cute in her own unique way, but totally batshit.

  I know what I was watching when Annabelle made her first appearance. (Bonus points if you know what I was watching around the time her pink-haired sister first appeared.)

  up next: Yahello Players