Tunnel Rat

Chapter 98: Looking for a friend

Your group has killed an Ancient Sea Hydra. While not a named monster, this creature was far above your level. It was also a type of Eel and deserved to be turned into lunch and dinner.

You gain 5 CSP and 250 experience in combat skills. This is doubled to 10 CSP and 500 points for killing an ancient foe!

Steamed eel was tasty, but only the first meal or two. Milo had sat with Captain Pike for a couple of hours, watching the ogre chow down on chunk after chunk of the cooked Hydra. Pikes most favored past time, after hunting monsters, was cooking and eating them. But even he could only eat so much. Luckily there were a lot of hungry people in the city.

The fishermen got to work immediately, constructing racks to dry and salt the meat. The tough skin of the hydra would make thick leather, the fatty layer on the body would be rendered to oil, and the bones would be ground for fertilizer. There was talk of rebuilding a tavern using the huge rib bones.

Milo spent half of a day eating eel, learning how to correctly throw a harpoon from Captain Pike, and discussing various things the ogre had eaten over the years. Pike made humans nervous, especially when he was eating. Milo appreciated that. Way too many people wanted to talk to him, and he just wasn't in the mood. He needed some down time. Some deep, deep, down time. What got him moving was when the dwarves started to argue.

When the rest of the engineers showed up, a huge row broke out. The captain of the ship they blew up wanted the engineers to replace it. The engineers sneered and told the scavengers not to play with critters too big for them to handle. At some point Milo heard his name mentioned, and he quickly skulked away. This wasn’t his fight.

It was suddenly too noisy up here.

He had cheese and a smattering of other foods. He'd finished all his tasks. It was time to go someplace quieter.

He began his search for Harry where the battle had taken place. The remains of the dwarven tunneler were surrounded by a large pile of scrap metal and broken parts. Vary, Shift-Stick, and Pillbug were searching for any lost pieces and deciding what to keep and what to sell for scrap.

Milo gave them the story of what had happened up in the city. Pillbug was visibly upset when he heard it was a Scavenger ship that had been blown up. "Those thieving varmints will rebuild it, for sure, but they'll make off with any useful bit of metal or machine part in the city. They've got no sense about them. Drink all the profits, then complain they don't have money for a boiler refit."

When he asked about Harry, Vary told him that he'd found big chunks of what had used to be the huge troll, but in all cases they were quickly decaying into soil and sprouting mushrooms. They had done their best to put as many of his large pieces as they could find in one spot. Everyone had heard the legends of trolls piecing themselves back together. Details on exactly how that worked were hazy.

Milo went and took a look. A large pile of mulch with mushrooms of all varieties sprouting out of it seemed to be all that was left of his friend. He sat down on a rock, and stared at the pile. What good was killing a boss and getting loot if it cost him a friend? He went back over the fight, but there were too many variables to even begin to think of how he could have changed things to save his friend.

The mulch pile was a crappy memorial to Harry. He wanted to do something better. There were varieties of fungus Milo had never seen before. Harry would have added those to his collection. He carefully plucked one of each and decided he'd go start crops of them in Harry's basement area. Maybe he'd be back some day?

Harry's area was as he remembered it. But it seemed deserted. Full crops of mushrooms filled all the beds, and there were unwanted varieties starting to invade some of the carefully cultivated farms. Milo needed a break from the game, and was planning on logging out here, and getting to work on the place when he got back from Section-E

The sound of snoring changed that. He followed the sounds into one of the side caves. Heaps of mushrooms had been scraped together to make a bed. Milo didn't understand what he was looking at for a few seconds. There seemed to be a huge arm in the bed. A five-foot long forearm, thicker than his body. Only by following the sound of the snoring did he find the very small troll attached to the arm. It looked like Harry, if Harry had only been three-foot tall, and his left forearm was twice his size.

The troll woke up. "Oh, Milo? Excellent. Can you be a good lad and get me something to drink? There should be a few bottles of a nice mycena and puffball solution in the lab. That should do wonders." Milo retrieved the large jug of ground mushrooms and water, and helped Harry to drink it down. His small stomach got bigger and bigger until Milo was afraid it would burst.

"Ah, that's what I needed. I should be able to get big enough soon that I can remove this damned appendage without problems."

Milo squatted on his heels, getting closer to Harry and asked, "Maybe you could explain what the hell is going on?"

Harry giggled a bit. "Oh, I forget how odd this must look to non-trolls. When a troll gets old enough, they gain the ability to regenerate from accidents that would kill anyone else. It seems my left arm was the biggest chunk of me left, so that was the part that grew a new me. After I had a face and could see where I was going, I started crawling down here just using my hand. Thank the gods it wasn’t just an elbow or something. Much tougher to move.

I've almost regrown a whole body but I can't remove that huge arm until I out-mass it. Otherwise, I'll just grow from it again."

"I hate to impose, but do you mind sticking around a few days and helping out?"

Milo was happy to. Harry was a friend, and this place was quiet and dark. "I don't mind Harry. I'm going to take a long nap, and then I'll get to work on the shroom beds in a few hours, and mix up some more food for you." Harry nodded and went back to sleep. Milo did likewise, and logged out of the game.