You'll learn your fate and prepare to fight it

"I wondered how long it would take one of you Halloween monsters to take this castle. To be honest, I'd imagined it would be Bathory; she'd raise a small army, drive out all of the invaders in one quick, well-timed thrust, and then establish this as her home as it always had been. I still haven't quite managed to figure out how you managed to take care of her. She's level 40, right? No... It's actually gone down." Noah spoke on and on, seemingly talking more to herself than to you, but she did steal a glance at you and flash a wry smile. "You dog... How'd you manage to drain her EXP? I may have made a serious mistake in empowering you to do the things you've done. It's quite evil of me to foist the problem of sweeping you up onto others. However, you may come to regret taking that EXP from her."

Noah had begun to talk to you as though you were some kind of adversary... would it make more sense to go ahead and defeat her now? She didn't seem overly worried about that possibility. You decided to go for another type of threat. Of course, you were a consummate gentleman pumpkin and it was far outside of your nature to violate a woman, but you could at least tease the possibility; you began to wrap vines up her waist until they snaked around those long, torpedo breasts of hers, giving them a menacing squeeze. You allowed your cloak to shadow your candle-lit eyes as you leered at her and told her your Cult of the Pumpkin was capable of converting her in a less-than-dignified way if you so chose.

The woman didn't struggle in your grasp, although she did breathe more heavily, a dark, blue blush spreading across her face. "Hearing that I'm your mother really didn't deter you at all, did it? You sicko..."

You told her that you being her child didn't seem to be deterring her from wanting to kill you, however she planned to do that.

"Events are already in motion, Ickibod, and destroying me won't stop them. Fondling my boobs or sticking me on one of those tentacles won't either. It's to your benefit to hear now what's in store for you. Don't worry... the 'official announcement' will wait until you've finished fortifying this castle of yours. I can give you that sporting chance, at least."

You decided to hold off killing her (or fucking her) for now. If she was some kind of prophet, you had to hear what she had to say... hopefully, it'd be a bunch of hogwash like what BigDickOldBastard threatened earlier. You eagerly anticipated asking Evilward whether you should worry about a person called Noah and learning they were a "right bastard" as well. Your vines eased up their hold ever so slightly... though it was hard to quit honking her boobs. They really were enormous.

"... Play while you can," she chuckled, smiling wider but looking a bit impatient at your method of entertaining yourself. "Here's the official roll-out that the 'boards' will be seeing later today." GM Noah managed to reach one gloved hand out from beneath the thick coil of vines you'd put upon her, then swiped it through an air. A new notification, much like the ones you checked to see your experience and stats, appeared floating in front of your face. At first, the fun pictures of Halloween creatures decorating this box of text seemed alluring. There was even a Pumpkin-Head on there! They'd made you look pretty cool in the drawing, although it was an outdated picture. You'd look even cooler if they redrew you in your black clothes with your lower-body vines.

Whatever childish excitement you felt at your depiction began to fade as your candle eyes scanned the notice fully...

Limited Time-- Spooky Summer Event!
Halloween monsters are hiding all over the event server! Look for the following monsters in landmark spawn locations on this server and defeat them to obtain Limited Rare (LR) equipment, obtainable only from this event! The adventurer who scores the most points will win a cash prize!
Points awarded by monsters will be determined by the strength of those monsters. Act fast before somebody else poaches your opportunity; these monsters are only here in limited quantities!
Monster List:
"The Countess" Bathory, Halloween Vampire Lord - Level 34 = 680,000 points
Exxod, Halloween Boogeyman - Level 33 - 660,000 points
Lupus, Halloween Werewolf - Level 27 = 540,000 points
"The Pumpkin Lord" Ickibod, Halloween Pumpkin-Head - Level 12 = 240,000 points
"Potion Lady" Stella, Halloween Witch - Level 10 = 200,000 points
Heng, Halloween Jiangshi - Level 4 = 80,000 points
The Halloween Zombie - Level 1 = 20,000 points
The Halloween Skeleton - Level 1 = 20,000 points
The Halloween Trickster - Level 1 = 20,000 points
The Halloween Ghost - Level 1 = 20,000 points
The Halloween Bat - Level 1 = 20,000 points
Monster minions of any Halloween monster = 10,000 points
*To discourage player killing during this event, anyone who kills another adventurer without a bounty during this event will accumulate a bounty of 100,000 points per player killed. The bounty player will receive a temporary ban for the duration of the event, if killed.
The event will last one week, starting tonight at midnight! Happy haunting! - GM Noah

"Oh yes, Ickibod. It's about to become much, much more populated on this server. Once I post this notice, over the next six hours, I think you'll be seeing all sorts of new faces around the server." The woman sounded extremely pleased with herself.

As for you... you weren't pleased at all. In fact, you were terrified. People coming after you for your books had always been a problem... now, on top of that, they could earn Limited Rare equipment, whatever that was, as well as a cash prize. Would people really be that stoked about some gold? That's all cash was, right?

This announcement advertised your exact level to the whole server and told them all that you were out there and could be killed... You could expect opportunists like the Crowmaster to come in from all corners now. Even your lesser minions weren't safe... they were worth a little chunk of points themselves. Killing the Ghost and the Trickster could push someone over if they got the Boogeyman instead of Bathory.

Furthermore, the wording seemed to clear up your earlier question: you and the other monsters were available in "limited quantities." You asked Noah to clarify if that meant one or a couple times.

"Oh... That is confusing, isn't it? Thank you; I'll correct that before I put the patch live. Obviously, it means only one, starting from midnight. Feel free to die as many times as you'd like until that time with no consequence, except to your EXP and inventory."

Just one ****... all someone had to do was love-tap your Trickster and she was gone forever.

Angrily, you constricted your vines around Noah and began to shake her; her face couldn't get any bluer than it already was, but it was on its way there regardless. You demanded to know why she'd do this to the Halloween monsters!

"That was the plan all along, Ickibod. My server is special," she spoke with a grin on her face, but with her body trembling beneath your grasp. "I do want you to put up a good fight. Show the limits of that intelligence I gave you! But, heaven forbid, don't actually plan on surviving... That's simply not in the cards for you. Remember, though: this limited life you enjoy until that time is all thanks to me. You're just one small component of Noah's arc!"

You no longer had any desire to learn more from the woman, nor did you have any reservations about doing what came naturally to monsters. You converted as much as your stamina as possible into strength, then squeezed tighter until you heard her give one more strained laugh.

"If we meet again... show me how that explicit factor is working out for you-!"

That was the last thing she managed to get out. The taunt was followed by a shout of pain, a sickening snap, and finally, the ringing of ****-bells. Furiously, you tossed aside her body while it "back-to-towned." At the last moment, you remembered: adventurers sometimes had useful loot. You summoned your Phantom Hands to help and desperately searched the corpse for something that could help you in your challenge to come... Unfortunately, her gear mostly consisted of cosmetically-enhanced junk. Still, you came away with a few items of use:

Halloween Map x8
Revive Totem x1
Blue Aura (Cosmetic) x1

... Actually, that last one didn't seem useful at all, but it seemed like the kind of thing Winnifred might like as a present. Was it even worth thinking about your cultists as "your cultists" any further? Would any of them still want to follow you after the word got out how much they stood to gain by killing you? You didn't think they'd betray you just for some fancy weapon, but even if they weren't going to, they couldn't stick around you... to do so would mean killing players for you, and to do that would mean racking up a 100,000 point bounty per kill. You didn't know what a "ban" was, but it was levied as such a threat, you imagined it must be serious. Then again... There might be a way to game the system. If there was, Pike would help you figure it out.

Now, as for the other items: a Revive Totem was useful for obvious reasons. Supposedly, it would consume whenever you would be killed and revive you, as long as it was in your inventory. Why hadn't it worked for Noah just now? That was a bit of a mystery... As for the maps, you had your Phantom Hands hold a few up in front of your face and observed their contents. They all appeared to be identical. You'd never actually seen a map of this world before... it was much smaller than you imagined. Your castle was in the north. South of that was the abandoned cabin and nearly on top of that, slightly to the east, your crypt and the clustered caves. To the far west was a dense forest... you wondered how many of the Halloween monsters had gathered there. Finally, to the far south was the adventurer's guild and the surrounding settlement, a huge place full of humans, elves, dwarves, and what not; monsters dared not tread in that direction.

Encircling the entire map as it was displayed was a thick ring of mountains. "Edge of the World" had been written across their length. You tried to picture in your head what that meant, but it wasn't easy... Could that really be as far as the world went? You'd heard people talking about oceans and things before... But apparently, those didn't actually exist in this world? At least if this map was to be believed. It would take someone a lot wiser in the ways of the world than you to figure out what that meant.

Whatever the case, the most important part of this map was obvious: there were crude pictures indicating the starting locations of all of the monsters. There you were in your caves, alone. Wait, no... the Halloween Bat was there too, in a different cave. It was just by chance that you hadn't encountered him earlier. Up in the castle were Bathory, the Trickster, and the Ghost... In the forest were nearly all of the others. If midnight was indeed the timer to start the lethal part of this event... That meant you had a little under 8 hours left to work on your castle and, if you so desired, seek out the other Halloween monsters to join forces with them. Or... would it be better to let them serve as distractions and save yourself?

No. You'd gotten this far due to the help of others. The other Halloween monsters deserved the same chance! If you could just find them and get them to join your Cult of the Pumpkin, you could bolster your strength and protect them at the same time. Once the situation was explained to them, they'd doubtless see the light and ally themselves with you. A level 33 Boogeyman or a level 27 Werewolf could do you a world of good; as far as you knew, there weren't many adventurers out there who scratched those levels. Plus, once they realized Bathory was on your side, they'd be all the more likely to come over. She had strength, charisma, and-- now that you had the explicitness to realize it-- a pretty luscious body. Who wouldn't want to be around her?

The greatest handicap you had right now was time. Reaching the monsters would take time. Convincing them would take more. Returning would take even longer. You remembered that portal spell that your Ghost had cast in the past... maybe that could be utilized again, to cut that travel down a bit? You sure hoped so... who knew how far the forest was from here and how well hidden the monsters would be within that forest. The annoying part was that to convince them of a monster coalition, you'd have to go there yourself... that would mean leaving all of the building to some other minion of yours who could also access the monster's building menu. The Trickster was probably the only one smart enough, other than Bathory, who was woefully trapped on the other side of the map.

... You needed to get a message to her too. This was becoming a huge headache...

In a hurry, you slithered down the stairs, waving maps in your Phantom Hands and shouting for the others to join you in your booming, ghostly voice. Oddly enough, the basement group came, but Pike didn't, despite the fact that she theoretically should have been closer. "What is it, you orange-and-black banshee? Your voice echoes throughout every hall; there is no need to make such a racket," Evilward growled.

"The caller is full of vine," Winnifred pointed out, red-faced and dizzy. She hiccupped, gave a snorting giggle, then nearly fell down the staircase back into the cellar before Evilward caught her. The Trickster jumped, worried she was about to get poofed by your ally's free-falling body.

"She means 'the cellar is full of wine.' It is well stocked. I have no idea why... it seems fresh," Evilward corrected the sloppy cleric, throwing her forward and away from the staircase by the scruff of her cloak.

"The dungeons are quite empty! Haven't been used for some time. I saw more black leather down there... I get the feeling the Cult of Strong Bonds may have used it at one point, but they cleared out for the armory after that," the Trickster added.

You were happy for all of this information, but had no time for any of it. You told them all they were going to need to immediately join Pike... You only had enough time to explain everything that had happened and was going to happen once, then, you'd require urgent action from all of them! Exchanging as much of your stamina for dexterity as you could in order to slither faster, you led the way, heading towards the right side of the castle where Pike had gone earlier. Already, you had a bad feeling shivering through your vines... What if GM Noah's treachery had already gotten to your first and most loyal cultist?

The floor of the castle was running red with blood and littered with the useless, not-worth-stealing gear that newbie adventurers might leave behind when PK'd. You could tell Pike had been having a field day. No way she'd lost to anybody, right? If so... why wasn't she answering you?! You boomed her name louder, begging her to come rejoin the Cult so you could start your strategy meeting, but more importantly, just to confirm she was okay!

Once you finally found Pike, her absence up to this point would finally begin to make sense...