...don't wax nostalgic when traversing through hostile territories.

"Thus, when the light of morning came, in a town of what was normally eleven, there now were at least eighty, of which only fifteen were Players, the Paladin and Rouge excluded of course, sixteen were NPCs, and three were boss creatures. The rest were the poor monsters who saw the growing angry mob trapped in town and lacked the foresight to realize they too would be snared there."

It was such a shame that the she-wolf seemed to be cursed with silence, her laughter would be just be filling this empty, dreary tunnel with melodic, howling joy. But, her collapsing with in a soundless giggling fit against the tunnel wall was an acceptable consolation prize.

"Oh but things just don't end there, because guess who was now trapped in the very center of that mob, just out of branch's reach of the Treant boss on one side and two Orc Players with very colorful vocabulary on the other? Why, the Paladin, of course! They had neglected to realize that they simply couldn't just —"

The she-wolf perked up and backpedaled six steps, a hand snapping to your brim to keep you steady. Your confusion was quickly answered with a SPLAT — a glob of clear, viscous slime had fallen from the ceiling where the two of you were heading.

"Well dodged!" you breathed into her ears. She nodded curtly in reply. More globs of slime fell onto the pile. "I see no nameplate, ergo it seems it's just a poorly timed... trap...."

From the cobblestone floor, a bony arm of a glowing green skeleton rose into the slime. Two wickedly sharp claws curled as a whole forearm grew from the stone. The slime deformed and molded to it, its liquid sucking in more of the arm from the floor. There came the elbow, the shoulder, followed by ribs and spine lying flat along the floor. The slime adhered and molded to it, giving the structure and definition of some smaller creature. The pelvis emerged, but no legs followed.

The ooze's form rippled, and the glowing skeleton within was raised from the floor, the neck giving resistance to the motion until with a lurch and squeal of audible suction, the glowing bones were pried fully from the floor, finally extracting the skull with the lurching motion — small, yet draconian with two horns stretching back from its eyeline. The slime engulfed it, the eyes glowing a deeper, noxious green as it lolled to life.

It lacked a jaw, but the slime over its skull stretched and deformed with a gurgling howl that echoed off the walls.

Overhead, a nameplate finally popped into existence:

Level 1 | Specterbold-Core Slimeblight
Undead, Ooze, Kobold, Ethereal, Cored, Explicit

"What the bloody hell even is this?" you seethed in hushed tones.

This thing was only first level, but these tags! Undead implies high health and wound resistance; Ooze implies damage resistances plus regeneration; Kobold implies magic resistances plus pack tactics; Ethereal quite literally is flat immunity from non-magical, physical damage — what does Cored even mean? Why was it in bold? And just what is this 'Explicit' tag everything seems to —

The hand holding you steady tapped your brim's underside, near your maw. You tightened your grip on her head in response.

With a flourish, she withdrew her straw hat from her inventory, holding it by the brim in front of her, half hiding her face as her stance deepened and free hand poised behind the straw hat.

"They're marked as Ethereal," you gently reminded. "Your fists will go right through them."

There was a huff in response. Her free hand clenched into some clawed sign — the beads on her wrist glowed with a bizarre spectrum of light. They were listed in her inventory, what were those? Spirit beads? As in, extra damage to —

That instantaneous burst of motion from before — zero to fast — put her fist in the face of the slime-skeleton. The sheer **** of the strike splattered the slime covering its skull, leaving it loose and lolling. The green eyes pulsed and the arm moved to swipe only to be met with her straw hat, muddling the strike as she spun away and behind. Her other fist slammed into the de-slimed skull, the beads at the wrist flashing with the impact.

It shattered. The deep, poisonous green light flitting away through the air before coalescing into a dripping, green gem that — plunk~ — she grabbed on reflex and stowed. The whole of the creature dropped into a puddle of goo. The slime body churned, trying and failing to find purchase on the bones as they faded into nothingness.

The nameplate changed:

Level 1 | Decored Slimeblight
Ooze, Decored!, Explicit

Not that it lasted more than a second before her heel (or what amounted to her heel) slammed down on the quivering mass. It splattered into oblivion.

No loot dropped. No experience pinged. It was just gone.

Your Aware Wolf huffed, and rose out of her fighting stance. With a pop, she plucked you off her head and looked you over. Those long fingers brushed off stray slime.

"...oh," was all you were able to say.

She snickered and patted you on the crown. She ran her tongue along quickly along the edge of your maw and pulled you back onto her head.

"I... well... ahem! I take it you have fought these before." You less asked than realized out loud. The she-wolf scowled and nodded. "Well then. I am glad my concern was quite misplaced. I can't do much in fights, you see. I am, after all merely a hat." She snickered at that with an understanding shrug. "Right. Shall we?"

She nodded and hurredly jogged down the tunnel.

..and then she stopped, seven steps later.

"Erm. I do not see any more of those creatures," you mumble quickly. "We should hurry before more appear — it was tagged as a Kobold, and there never truly is just one blasted Kobold." Her ears drooped, head sinking into her shoulders as her tail went limp between her legs. Her anxious looks around did not help matters as you became aware of every little tiny sound that echoed through the tunnel. Her turning in place just fueled paranoia.

She saw it before you heard it — SPLAT

More slime fell, three paces away.

"Another one — if you kill the slime before the kobold skeleton emerges, perhaps it prevent it from forming?"

Her ears lowered further, flat across your brim now, as she lowered into a fighting stance, again hiding her striking hand behind the straw hat. She did not move from her spot.

This reeked of the brilliant intervention of a Player. On a hunch, you pulled open her character sheet header.

Level 1 | Aware Wolf

Claimant Worker, Scout, Always Aware, Stealth, Whisperless, Harvester, Melee, Explicit
> Current Task: Returning Home | Waiting at Waypoint: 'bLich Tunnel 1 - Spawn 2' (7m 34s)

Active Status(es): Bane of Ironteak

EXP: 640 / 1500

Carry Weight: 28.8 / 30 kg

"Damnation and shears, a waypoint? A Lich!?" you scowl. "Is that Player trying to kill you?"

SPLAT

A second slime began to congeal, off to the left. The first was still drawing its skeleton out of the floor. Your eyes facing rearward caught a pair of flailing, clawed skeleton arms emerging from the wall. Slime came creeping from the floor to meet it.

The two of you were quickly being surrounded. That burst of speed she had, you remember Monk players having something similar. It had a long cooldown, at least back then. With how powerful the opening strike was on the first one, one could reasonably assume the cooldown persisted over the years. She could open with it in this incoming fight, but that would only dispatch one of these undead kobold slime... things. There would be more as time goes on. You needed to find an out — and if you knew Players (which, unfortunately, you do) there's always a hole somewhere in their marvelous plans.

You had planned on combing through her full character sheet after the tunnel, but if there was a hole in this Player's plan, it would be there.

Rather, it better be.

Level 1 | Aware Wolf

Claimant Worker, Scout, Always Aware, Stealth, Whisperless, Harvester, Melee, Explicit
> Current Task: Returning Home | Waiting at Set Waypoint: 'bLich Tunnel 1 - Spawn 2' (7m 20s)
> Queued Tasks:
> Return Home

Active Status(es): Bane of Ironteak

EXP: 640 / 1500

Carry Weight: 29.7 / 30 kg

Max Worker Range: ~15 kilometers

Attributes

Skills

Feats

> Feats marked with [Hidden] are visible only to this Creature and its Allies

Always Aware | Rank 2 [Racial] — Cannot be Sneak Attacked.
Rank 2 : Does not suffer first-round penalties when Ambushed.
Preternatural Instinct [Racial] — Capable of interacting with Entities with the Ethereal or Phantasmal trait(s) without the need for Magic or a Soultouch Curse.
Claimant Worker [Claimant] — Grants boons, buffs, and status based on development level of Worker's associated Claimant and uniquely-allocated Fealty Facets.
False Flag | Rank 1 [Claimant, Individual, Hidden (False Flag)] — Removes the "Home" line from the Character Sheet of a specified Worker, preventing others from seeing it on a successful Perception check. Applies the [Hidden] trait to one (1) random Claimant Feat on selection. False Flag is always considered [Hidden].
Pressganged | Rank 5 [Claimant, Individual, Hidden (False Flag)] — Replaces Aggressively Passive for a specific, selected Worker. Enables extended Worker Range, starting at a base 3 kilometer radius and increasing 1.25xRank, before additional modifiers. Enables Worker to participate in all combat types at and away from Claimant, enables Worker to gain EXP from combat, increases Worker Replacement Cost 2xRank.
Note: Choosing not to pay at heightened Replacement Costs forfeits all allocated Fealty Facets and Worker is regenerated as normal Claimant Worker
Rank 2 : Pressganged Workers only count toward the Worker Cap when within Claimant Boundaries.
Rank 3 : Adds 3xRank to 4 Skills of Claimant Owner's choice. Subtracts 5xRank from all Crafting Skills to minimum of 0. Worker can no longer take part in Construction or Maintenance Tasks.
Rank 4 : Instantiates Worker as an Instantiated Entity, thereby classifying as a Minion and requiring Minion Upkeep in accordance to Rank 1 and 2. Increased Task Cooldown time. Enables assigning of Tasks within Range regardless of Location Hazard(s). Renables Aggressively Passive-styled Gathering Priorities for Worker.
Rank 5 : Worker Range increased to 2xRank. Worker Replacement Cost increased to 4xRank. Enables Combat Priorities for Worker. Enables Worker to be added to a Party.
Note: Workers added to Parties ignore Worker Range, but suffer from the Homesickness debuff after an extended period away from their Home. Workers in Party may travel to/from their Home Claimant without being dismissed from Party so long as Party is within the individual Workers' normal Worker Range. Workers dismissed outside of their individual Worker Ranges return to their Home Claimant.
Note: Homesickness currently sets in at 1xTotalFealtyFacetsAllocated hour(s); may be changed in the future
Whisperless | Rank 2 [Claimant, Individual] — Worker does not create noise on their own.
Rank 2 : Auto-succeeds against sound-based stealth checks.
Note: Worker can still cause noise by interaction.

Fealty Facets Allocation Breakdown

Abilities

> 12/12 Abilities Points Allocated

>> Falcon Strikes With Flames Abandoning
> AP: 3
> Prerequisites: You very much are On Fire (At least 1 stack of Burning)
> Fire should burn in your heart, not on your flesh. When Burning, unleash a Heavy Attack that concentrates the flames surrounding you into your foe, setting them on fire in pace of you. On Crit, double the amount of Burning applied.
[ KEEP THIS ABILITY TOP OF LIST PLEASE
With Worker Abilities being open to any Baron-and-above titled Player to toggle on-and-off at will, I've talked the Devs into letting us leave notes under them. The Good: We can let each other know on a per-Worker basis on why an Ability is active. The Bad: Anyone with a high enough perception can read them too — so don't note too much here until False Flag is adjusted to hide them.
As for this move, Anti-Flame is VERY important here, with Ironteak now imploded. There's no Cooldown, it can be done whenever on fire. I see no reason to keep this tagged on. At worst, it literally is a free burn heal.
— T, 13/10/42 ]
[ You mean at worst, it punches the thing that set it on fire, healing it. Potentially critically so. The AP is better used just sitting unspent for the teeny, tiny, does-fuck-all damage buff, and even then that 0.0001% extra damage will do more than this trash move.
— TheDirectiveDetective, 29/10/42 ]
[ I'm putting this on all Pressganged Workers' topmost Ability as a friendly fucking reminder: Please keep non-topic discussions in the Guild/Claimant Chat Channels and similar. False Flag still is not hiding these note logs. Don't ruin the whole thing, please, or make Worker character sheets fifteen pages of 'non-standard' smut RP between someone and said Worker — I will not be naming names, naming which Worker, or kink-shaming (even though it was very hard not to. Advice to whom it may concern: read some bathroom stall graffiti porn, you'll learn something, just keep it to your damn self), but not only did the poor Worker needed therapy, so did the Level 73 Player who happened across said Worker out in the wilds. Be lucky the former was fixed with just a Worker regeneration.
— TheDirectiveDetective, 03/04/43 ]

>> Bandana and Fist, Indeed Can Rise
> AP: 3
> CD: 20s
> Draw upon the power of the earth below to shatter the air in one toasty strike. Can one break guards with this? Sure you can.
[ this combos w blu headgehog its dash wrks in air like it goes really, really far
— Moiderizer_Moidsturizer, 21/01/43 ]
[ And diagonally down, as well. Movement stops on touching the ground, sadly, but this is a really good find. BHSY normally has to be on the ground to work, so something is in play here. If we can get BHSY to attack up-and-diagonally that opens up a lot of new areas to exploit. I'll experiment with ramps once I convince the devs to put them in. Also. I've sent you a link to a speech-to-text mod, Moid. See if that works better than the default, it's been acting up and interacting weirdly with the spellcheck for weeks. If anyone else needs it, let me know.
— T, 23/01/43 ]
[ Don't worry about the ramps, Blue Hedgehog always stops at an edge on the ground. But, that extra 3 feet — meter, sorry — the jump on this attack gives plus the guard break Blue Hedgehog enough distance to kill the bigger basic creeps in Ironteak in one round!
(PS: Holy shit this works so much better! I can finally write in game and actually do the '**** by Postcard' questline now! <3 )
— Moiderizer_Moidsturizer, 04/02/43 ]
[ Awwww yeaaa! You lotion up that mystery, Moid! Hope you got some luuuuuuube, duuuuuuuude!
EDIT: Duuuuuuuudeeeeetteeeeee!
— JetlaggedFrett, 24/01/43 ]
[ Trimming this convo down due to length. ...I'd trim it further but that edit out of context is somehow a fucking meme now?
— TheDirectiveDetective, 03/04/43 ]
[ Oh right. TDD, you and Frett are always on at different times. The 'EDIT: DUDE/DUDETTE' (with varying length of vowels) is something they, Moid, and Reevo latched onto. It makes more sense in-person. I made sure its all in good fun, of course.
— T, 03/04/43 ]
[ I've been told I immediately broke that rule on 'no off-topic chatter' in the Ability notes in record time. You may laugh at your Emperor, so I've been told to post here.
— T, 03/04/43 ]

>> Blue Hedgehog Snacked Yesterday
> AP: 6
> CD: 60s
> Channel the fourth World Spirit, the chaotic knight of the wind, to zoom into into a super-boosted dash, preferably towards a chili dog vendor.
[ When I catch whomever is purposefully untagging this ability on this Worker again because of it's stupid name and description is getting their title revoked — and if you complain you're banned from my kingdom. You can swap out other abilities, just not this one and preferably not Falcon Strikes. End of discussion.
— T, 29/01/43 ]
[ Fine. More discussion because a simple warning isn't enough. Any and all Monster Attacks that Players can't use do not list how they work, and it's been like that since launch. Get that through your head. Do you know why 'Doils the Spoils' has a statue as a meme and not a mastermind Thief over in at Martello Monastery? Because Doils was on the receiving end of this: Dash up to 0.5xAcrobatics (essentially) instantly, free Attack on whatever poor sod is in the way with to-hit debuff and damage buff proportional to distance traveled. That's AFTER all other effects, I've tested it. You know what counters the to-hit debuff? Ambush Sneak Attack. So, what keeps this move from being OP? That god-awful sound proc'ing a movement reaction to anyone that hears it. Oh wait. Guess what Claimant Feat this Worker has thanks to the buildings and upgrades in town?
TLDR: Untag this ability and it's not on accident? Call support and have them walk you through how to uninstall the game, because it's clear you have no brain.
— T, 02/02.43 ]
[ Two words: 'Spawn Tomb.' Don't understand? Don't worry; don't untag.
— T, 15/04/43 ]

>> River of Blood Purges Stuffy Nose
> AP: 2
> Passive
> Can't get sick if your hemorrhaging blood washes away the germs. taps head
[ Fucking slimes — since when do they spread disease? Where was that in the patch notes? Whatever. The survivability just beats out damage output, this time. Had to swap out Quench of Cactus for the AP. Toggled that useless Falcon Strike on again since that's the only other 3 AP Ability we have for this money pit and that AP Damage buff is still bugged. It has the health for this ability, so long as it doesn't pull more than three of those fuckers. Which it shouldn't, thanks to Whisperless. It'd have to fuck up its stealth spectacularly in BitchLich's Tunnel of Grool otherwise.
— TheDirectiveDetective, 25/04/43 ]

Inventory

Carry Capacity Modifiers:
2x Str
Bane of Ironteak

Max: 46 kg
Min: 30 kg

Current: 30 kg

Gathering Priority

> Customize what Items this Worker should Prioritize. Determines what Items are Dropped in favor of what. Accepts Wildcard (*) characters.

Combat Priority

> Customize what Creatures this Worker should Prioritize over others and how. Accepts Wildcard (*) characters.

"Tie my tongue and shear me sideways — what the fuck even is all this?"

An educated summary, worthy of accolades indeed.

[[A/N: TLDR on Wildcards, as the Hat has realized the Wolf's "Emperor" is not the sort of stupid Player the Hat is used to. Wildcards can be substituted for any word, allowing for search patterns. "Potion of *" would catch both a Potion of Healing and a Potion of Poison, so long as it has 'Potion of' in the name. Expanding on that, "* Potion *" would grab anything that would have "Potion" in it's name at any point, like Greater Potion of Swiftness or Empty Potion Bottle, or literally just Potion. Just the Wildcard itself, "*", means "all things". So in the Priority lists, our Aware Wolf can pick up anything so long as she has Carry Capacity for it, but would drop it in favor of things higher up on the list.

Bonus Fun fact: Wildcard characters can be used in Google searches.

EDIT: I've fixed the Aware Wolf's inventory; somewhere along the line I made a Wood Plank 1kg instead of 2kg and didn't update her source character sheet.
I also cut down on the Wildcard notes, because what was done in several lines really should had been done with one -- this is what happens when writing under the influence of a massive sleep debt.]]