“WHAT THE FUCK IS THIS?!” Curstl demanded as Icarus and her sped through the field of grey slimes with small, round, glowing cores within.

They were atop his new prototype, it looked a lot like an oval-shaped bowl with a massive forest of levels, valves and buttons.

“THIS IS INNOVATION!” Icarus cried uncertainly as his face was relentlessly sprayed with the remains of slimes that they went over.

The massive, thick pillars inside the entire zone they were in was flat, consisting only of flat, hardened dirt and large patches of grass over which spawned grey Slimes.

“WHY CAN’T YOU EVER DRIVE ONE OF THESE THINGS SLOWER?!” she demanded as the large, metal engine in the front of the machine began to smoke.

“…”

“…”

They both looked at the soon-to-be bomb as they hopped off the speeding vehicle and onto the thick, bouncy membrane of the tar-slime below.

It casually shifted around; seemingly unaware it was being used like a chair.

Curstl planted a bone-shattering smack to Icarus’ head.

“Ow! What was that for?!” he demanded pulling his goggles off.

“EITHER ADD BRAKES OR LEAVE ME OUT OF YOUR SUICIDAL TESTS!” she exclaimed as a flash of vibrant orange light indicated the vehicle just exploded.

They both turned to face the massive cloud of smoke followed by the loud bang and the shockwave that managed to send some of the smaller slimes flying.

“There it goes…” Icarus remarked breathing a heavy sigh.

“It’s always the engine…” he thought.

With a loud crack, a bolt of lightning flew from the darkness to where Icarus stood only moments before.

Curstl was now holding him over her shoulder as if he was a sack of potatoes; a sack of potatoes that she just saved from becoming a sack of baked potatoes.

“What the hell was that!?” she asked.

Icarus breathed a sigh.

“Not again!” he exclaimed as from behind patches of taller grass and a few pillars appeared a dozen armoured people wielding many different weapons.

Their armour was pitch black and shiny.

“They don’t seem friendly…” Curstl remarked.

Icarus nodded.

“Yeah… we’re a little… screwed…” he sighed.

Curstl raised an eyebrow.

“I can just kill th-” she was cut off by one of the armoured men much to her annoyance.

“Icarus, you and your assistant have been sentenced to death by his majesty! Surrender!” cried one of the soldiers.

“Why the hell would I surrender if you’re literally here to kill me?!” Icarus demanded.

“…”

“For a quicker death?” the soldiers speculated.

“Put yourselves in my shoes, would you pick a quicker death?” Icarus asked.

“Well, no, but from our point of view you’re going to die, so you might as well surrender!” another guard exclaimed.

Icarus shook his head.

“Ah, but you see -”

Before the conversation could continue, Curstl appeared pulled a wand from her pocket and pointed it at the clustered group of soldiers.

“Arcane Explosion!” she exclaimed as a big orb of white light appeared, charring the grass and searing the flesh of all the soldiers.

“Arcane Lightning!” she continued as from her wand came an arching beam of light that travelled along the soldiers, from one to another until they were just crispy corpses.

Curstl looked at the dozen dead, smoking corpses with a satisfied expression.

Icarus looked at her and then the soldiers.

“WHAT LEVEL ARE YOU!?”

Curstl flicked her hair smugly.

“Thirty-one!” she announced.

“…”

“How’d you cheat?” he asked.

“I DIDN’T, I GOT THIS XP NORMALLY! NOT THAT I REMEMBER, BUT IF I DID THAT’S WHAT I’D SAY!” she screamed the entirety of her statement.

Meanwhile…

The L.F.T.O group was asked to send at least a few members to a big event organised by the prince.

In the end, John, Bonifacius, Foxly and Crown were chosen as the representatives, Bromy refused to attend.

He specifically said: “I’m going to dissect everything in this underground treasure chest of biology, the prince is not exempt from this list!”

His threat worked and Crown agreed to go in his place.

And so Bromy spent several hours with a notebook, hunched over a patch of crystal flowers in the massive garden behind the palace.

Alex, Thal, Revenberry and the Thief headed out to explore the town.

They were on a quest to visit every place that sold alcohol in the entire city.

As such, they started with a small establishment near the palace.

It was a tavern called “Terry’s Tavern”, the building looked shabby, built from grey-coloured bricks with a wooden roof.

The alcohol was terrible.

Meanwhile…

JohnWillStab, Crown, Foxly and Bonifacius sat around at the big wooden table at the centre of which were several, unreachable piles of bread and water.

John didn’t want to risk the humiliation of trying to grab the food only to have to sit down and pretend he didn’t want it once he realised it was too far to reach.

They were just way too far to reach without climbing onto the table.

He looked over to Bonifacius who seemed content sitting at the table in silence, every now and then he would glance at the food which was still out of his reach as well.

John looked over to Crown who looked at the cakes, soups and breads on the table longingly.

Foxly was the same.

There was nobody else in the room other than the four of them, they were told to wait for the prince to arrive.

Outside the door stood the two individuals, one looked like a butler and the other was a maid.

“They’re not taking any food for some reason… perhaps they realised it's poisoned?” asked the maid.

The butler shook his head.

“Nonsense! The surface dwellers are all idiots! They couldn’t have realised!” he replied in a hushed whisper.

They continued looking at them through the crack in the doors.

They noticed everyone’s eyes were fixated on the food, though not one of them reached for it.

“They’re all looking at the food! They must have realized!” cried the maid.

“Of course not! It must be some savage custom of the surface dwellers to look at their food for a few minutes before eating it!” the butler exclaimed.

He took a deep breath before stepping into the room.

“HELLO.” He spoke very slowly and annunciate every syllable of each word to make sure the primitive surface dwellers understood him.

“Hi,” John said casually.

“YOU CAN EAT NOW. IT IS FOOD TIME NOW.”

“…ok” John nodded.

“Are thou feeling alright?” Bonifacius asked seeing the clearly senile old man have trouble speaking.

“FOOD IN MOUTH, GOOD!” he gave them a thumbs up.

Uncomfortably, everyone at the table also gave him a thumbs up.

Quickly he charged out of the room, closing the door and leaving a little crack for him and the maid to look through.

Again, none of them reached for the food.

“Damn it! Do those savages not know how to eat normally?! Can they even use cutlery?!” the butler asked looking at everyone stare at the piles of food.

The maid nodded.

“They do seem quite uncivilized… what kind of place is the surface?!” she wondered.

“One of their group spent the last hour looking at the flowers in the garden! I hear they don’t have flowers up there!” she exclaimed.

The butler nodded.

“Yes, and the other three went off to admire our civilized buildings, I hear they’ve just been drinking cheap alcohol in our taverns since they left!” she shook his head.

“In any case…” he began.

“We need to make them eat the food, or the king will have our heads!”