An encounter with one seriously ornery Dick

By this point, you were pretty high on your high horse; it felt like everything was coming up Icky. You'd taken your first steps to occupying the castle of your dreams. You'd run off a whole, stupidly large cult. You'd surpassed your age old racial limitation of immobility. You'd somehow gotten to have consensual sex with your busty subordinate despite the fact that she hated your guts enough to temporarily throw in with a cult that counts among its ranks people named "Leather-Man" and "Ass-Plugger." You'd kissed a ghost with some tongue-- or your equivalent of a tongue.

So if somebody told you that that the faltering remnants of Evilward's old faction were trying to ambush your party, could you honestly be that worried? After all, Evilward and Crowmaster were supposedly the scariest members and you'd employed both of them. If the so-called "BigDick" was the person left leading all of the Town Watch members, could you really be frightened? They didn't have anybody else better they could pick to lead their forces in lieu of the Sheriff?

Still, you did recall that the ridiculously named magic-user had once captured Pike in an electric cage. Pike was no slouch when it came to fighting other players... that meant that the guy was either very tricky or very adept at using his spells.

One thing was for sure: you weren't trying to recruit this one.

You had no interest in capturing this guy and getting him to gender-swap the way Evilward had. Even if he did, you'd never be able to erase the name "BigDickOldBastard" from your head and the name "BigPussyOldBitch" wasn't any better. Knowing that made it hard to get much enthusiasm up for the encounter to come. If you could beat this guy, though, it would provide a measure of closure. After that, the only guy who'd be left of that first bounty party would be that coward who'd lost against Pike before and ran away from your crypt. Not much competition, in other words.

Your odd, slithering "tail" of vines carried you awkwardly across the stone floors of the castle and towards the main gate, while your ghosts followed behind you, regenerating MP at a slow, normal pace, but one preferable to if they'd still had to carry you via telekinesis. Once you got there, you understood that their arrangement had indeed been ideal for capturing the incoming raid party, as the stone wall up front had numerous small holes that would be perfect for prying eyes, but would yield no trace of movement from a distance. The team was made up of a whole lot of obvious newbies, wearing what you'd come to recognize as the starting clothes: boring tunics in brown, red, or green with white or brown trousers. Just a moment later, with hindsight, you felt a little silly for judging them on that poor fashion; after all, that equipment was just as decent as yours, and yours didn't even have pants! Not that those pants would have survived your new means of mobility anyway. They didn't make pants for pumpkin-nagas, or whatever you qualified as now.

There was really only one odd man out. You had to assume he was BigDick. Fortunately, you didn't have to judge the size of his genitalia; it was simply obvious because he was the only old man here. The guy looked like he'd been created as somebody's stereotype of a wizard, wearing a floppy green hat and wizard's robe, tied by a golden sash. In both hands he carried an oversized wooden scepter with a blue gem-stone embedded into the gnarled knot at the end. You found his name even more annoying once you realized he couldn't possibly live up to it. The guy looked nearly 100 years old and he was still talking about his big dick? What an ego on this guy! Maybe that's what made him a bastard?

This ambush party looked so shabby, you felt a little bad for disrupting it. However, with everyone's eyes facing towards the door and their backs turned towards the inside of the castle, this was the perfect time to break their ranks. You slithered into the center of them with a carved, perpetual smile on your face, then raised your useless scarecrow arms. With a loud "BAAAAAAAH," you released a shockwave of pure terror through the ranks using Sphere of Fear. The effect was far more pronounced than when you'd attempted it on the well-leveled Cult of Strong Bonds; the newbies all broke rank nigh-instantly, running straight through the gate that they'd been watching. The sound of wails and feet clattering across stone was deafening; many of them dropped their starter weapons in their eagerness to flee.

"Fuck," the old wizard grumbled. You realized now that he was wearing one of Evilward's warding talismans, probably to protect against both fire and fear. Doubtless he'd seen the sense in that, but hadn't had enough to distribute to everyone. "Fucking bullshit. This monster is bullshit. Shards is fucking broken now, goddamn!"

You noted with some confusion that it didn't seem as though BigDickOldBastard intended to fight you any longer, or, for that matter, even to acknowledge you. He was babbling to himself like a senile old man, in your view. Perhaps that was just due to his age? Curious now and relatively unafraid of what he could do to you, you approached, tilting your pumpkin and dripping orange slop onto the floor out of your mouth hole. Ridiculously, you asked him what was the matter and if there was anything you could do to help.

The old man looked into your carved smile with a disbelieving face and cocked one side of his mouth up in a wry grin; it was a sarcastic, belittling expression that looked very out of place on his elderly, wizened face. "What, is somebody GMing through this Pumpkin-Head now? Okay, I'll tell you what's the matter: this patch sucks! This new monster? B-R-O-K-E-N. The guy hypnotizes player characters, then he manages to fuckin' kill Evilward and the Crowmaster? What is this shit? The game's supposed to be about, you know, us, not your broke-out-the-ass monsters."

In your ghostly voice, you asked him: "when you say 'patch,' are you referring to the pumpkin patch, where pumpkins typically spawn?"

"No, I'm not talking about a goddamn pumpkin patch! I'm talking about the latest one, the one with 'rival behavior,'" he scowled, forming air quotes with two fingers on each hand and clenching his teeth. "You guys fucked up the whole world."

His words were still very confusing, but you tried to see through his anger to the root issue. It sounded like when he said "you guys" he was referring to the Halloween monsters. Was he saying that you-- and possibly others-- were encroaching on their RP area and messing things up? You supposed you could see why that would bother him...

"I'm logging out till you guys put the shit back the way it was. Lost yourself a customer! Enjoy your fuckin' 'Cult of the Pumpkin' bullshit " the old man finished, flashing double middle fingers. With that, the old man's eyes rolled back into his head for a moment, then he blinked sleepily and adopted a hunchback stance. As if seeing you for the first time, he suddenly recoiled and backed against the wall. "A-Aaaawaaah! The-The Pumpkin Looord!"

You thought you understood what had just happened. One of those "gods" must have just left Dick's body, leaving behind only the confused old man.

But still! Seriously rude! No wonder that guy calls himself a bastard! You didn't even know what you were being blamed for, after that huge rant of his!

Suddenly, the old man snapped back into it, then readopted his cross, younger expression. "You know what? No. I'm not going to just leave. I'm going to screw up this whole fuckin' Halloween in May event you've got going. I've got friends in the other server, you know? I'm going to get them to come in here and fuckin' clean house. Scorched earth. I'm talking camping spawns, player killing, fuckin' chaos! You're gonna turn your back on me, the customer? Fuck you! Fuck you, motherfucker!"

You were just about tired of this guy's ridiculous name-calling; you swung around and bopped him with your head to shut him up. The effect was... not what you expected. To your surprise, he went flying across the room and smashed his head and shoulders against the wall with a loud crack. Oh, shoot! You'd put so much from your stamina into your strength and dexterity that you were way too strong to be hitting old magicians with low armor class like that. You slithered over to see if he was still conscious... Nope. It wasn't that you'd really wanted to talk to him any more... In fact, part of you was relieved he'd expired just now so you didn't have to listen to any more of his vulgarity. But still, this was just elder ****, not to mention that you kind of needed some clarification on the "scorched earth" he'd mentioned... That sounded pretty ominous.

Your ghost and Trickster approached from behind you, taking either side as the bell tone began to play for Dick. Unfortunately, he wasn't worth much EXP. "Oooh! I didn't get a chance to back you up! I-I was still thinking of which disguise I wanted..." the Trickster sighed, crossing her hands at her lap sheepishly. You reached out to give her a head-pat, then decided against it, not wanting to poof her. You just told her instead that it was okay. "But... The stuff that guy said sounded pretty dangerous. Do you know what a 'server' is?"

You didn't, but you imagined Pike probably would. You'd heard the word only very sparingly in the past and only from adventurers. The best you could tell, it related to gods somehow... perhaps it was like the religious idea of a pantheon? Was he saying he was going to call down other gods upon this server? That was a little scary, but on the other hand, you'd held your own pretty admirably against the servers strongest so far. Heck, you'd even technically defeated a level 40 vampire! "Bring on your worst friends, you OldBastard!" you thought to yourself with a scoffing laugh. Only... you quickly admitted to yourself that your hearty laugh was just you trying to calm yourself down. In truth, Dick's threat had you a little rattled. How were you supposed to fight back against gods without knowing what they really were?

Finally, a sight for sore eyes: Pike arrived alongside Winnifred, with the Crowmaster shambling far behind. Very far behind, actually. You noticed the guy's eyes widen when he spotted you and, for whatever reason, he stopped walking forward, hanging off in the distance instead, as though to hear the outcome of your conversation before he approached any closer.

"The heinous Puffin Lord emerges! I'd hoped to never see your like again!" Winnifred greeted you, spitefully spitting at your vines. That was just how the poor-spoken career role-player showed affection. You were used to it. You gave her a friendly pat on the head to welcome her back, leaving straw stuck in her hair.

"Holy wow, Icky... I can't believe you're alive! Did you learn some kind of teleportation spell while we weren't looking? Or was this Evilward's **** thing?" Pike questioned, crossing her arms across the breast of her skimpy, jack-o-lantern printed bikini. "I was thinking to myself: if Evilward took him, she's waaay too dramatic to go anywhere but the castle. That role-play stuff is just baked into her."

You vaguely considered telling them that there was more baked into her than that, but you held your tongue. You asked them if they noticed anything different, then modeled off your new vines, turning this way and that.

"The fiend slithers!" Winnifred called out, seemingly aghast.

"You've got legs now! Well... Uh... Leg. Twisty mass of legs?" Pike commented. "And ghosts, for that matter. I'm assuming those are your ghosts?" she questioned, tilting on her bare toes to look over your shoulder at the Trickster and ghost hovering in the doorway. "You sure make friends fast for a guy that, like, couldn't even move around to meet people a day ago." You had to nod your head at that. "So what's going on, anyway? Anybody in the castle?"

You asked them if they were aware that BigDickOldBastard and the remnants of the Town Watch had set up here to ambush them.

Pike slowly turned to watch the Crowmaster, who had already retreated a significant distance away while you were talking. "Huh. That's pretty interesting. Cause, see, ol' Colt over there told us that the Town Watch had given up the search and we shouldn't worry about their schemes any more. He told us the gate would be wide open and said he'd watch the rear." You saw her grab a throwing dagger from her pouch and begin to hoist it with one hand.

You wrapped one vine around her wrist and urged her to stop; she had to let the Crowmaster go! You told her that something was off about your monstrous activities lately and that before you guys enacted any more **** against adventurers, you wanted to discuss it with her.

"Yeah, sure, dude."

You wondered how much of that fast response was her vulnerability to manipulation and how much was the understanding of her character. At any rate, the crafty Crowmaster ran away. You were happy to let him go for now... You didn't really need him now that you'd learned to move around on your own, plus, his rate of betrayal was... really bad. Keeping him around for any reason was starting to seem like a pretty terrible idea.

After a brief round of ghostly introductions and several questions as to why Evilward was now covered in syrupy plant goo ("scandal less!"), you set down your small cult in the Strong Bonds room and began to go over the situation as it stood, while dismissing your ghosts to go watch the door for any side of intruders.

First off: if anybody needed leather, you'd just gained an absolute pile of it from the Cult of Strong Bonds. Leather armor, leather accessories, whips and dagger weapons, the whole shebang! The party unanimously agreed that Evilward should set about crafting them some better gear... it could still be bikinis, but they needed something with some kind of defensive stats, not just cosmetics. Once Pike handed her over the Ultra version of the leather-working manual that Jezlee had been coveting, she got to work with no grudge at all. She was probably just eager to finally dress into something besides that exhibitionist cape.

Second matter: the castle. There were still adventurers in here-- though supposedly not in large quantities-- and you needed help getting rid of them. You saw Pike's eyes shine and her lips curl into a wide grin. "He he! Now you're speaking my language, Icky! Stab stab stab~"

You shook your head. This brought you to point three: you thought that... for lack of a better word... the gods were starting to rebel against you. You didn't know if they were jealous of you or if they were angry at you for your arrogance, overstepping your boundaries as a loot monster, but whatever the case, a god had recently leveled some very hateful words at you.

"Uh, dude... I don't know if you've noticed, but you're about the luckiest monster in the world! You basically grew a dick, a snake tail, and had your way with an immortal vampire. I don't think the gods have any problem with what you're doing. If they did, would you be this lucky?" Pike questioned.

"As if gods could ever love such a foul creator as this," Winnifred remarked, turning her head and swishing her blond hair in disgust, before turning back with a look of concern in her blue eyes and a frown on her soft, pink lips. "Pike, wait a sec. I think I see what's going on. Um, Icky? How much do you actually know about the 'gods?'"

You told your group that you didn't understand much about the gods at all. They seemed to possess adventurers and create pumpkin patches, but that's about all you knew of them. Some of them seemed nice-- like Winnifred's- while others of them seemed god-awful to converse with-- like Dick's.

"He's a right bastard," Evilward agreed from one corner.

You told them your reason for worrying about the opinion of the gods: Dick's god had told you that he was going to bring in some nasty friends to rain hellfire over the whole world. It sounded like your peaceful world was about to be transformed into the end times or some kind of Armageddon.

Evilward rolled her eyes. "Nah. He's going to try to drum something up using the boards and he'll just get shat on. Don't worry about it."

You shook your head and told everyone that you couldn't afford to be reckless. Dick's problem seemed to be that he was jealous and angry of all the successes you'd accomplished, often at his expense and others. You thought it might be time to go back to the Skillbook Santa-Claus idea... You had to show everyone that there was no reason to hate you before this judgment of the gods got called down upon you. That meant no killing the rest of the adventurers in here... Every adventurer you slaughtered would mean another god just like Dick's, pissed that you'd gotten in their way and looking to call vengeance upon you.

"Look. I see what you're saying, but we can't just like... commit to being completely non-violent. Not only is that boring as heck, but also, you've got to stick up for yourself sometimes, man! That's just the way Shards is," Pike pointed out, crossing both hands in her lap and slumping her shoulders. "You are inherently a creature that was made just to be hit over the head and spit out books. 99.9% of the world still sees you as that. Trying to be Santa Claus is nuts."

Winnifred looked between the two of you, then cleared her throat and shut her eyes. "If I may... I have a suggestion. I believe these in usual problems may call for unusual solutions. There is a rather simple why to guide Ickibod out of the darkness and into a greater udder standing of what, if any, threat he may face." The whole group watched Winnifred with dumb frowns-- except for you, being incapable of frowning-- as if they'd forgotten that she was capable of having useful ideas and were also still doubting that this one would be any different from her usual horny shenanigans.