Roy opened his eyes and surveyed his surroundings. He was back in the modest little cubicle tucked inside the grocery store. Before him was the table the body of the old man lay on, the only hint of its former residence was a small pile of ashes which was neatly, almost reverently, gathered near the center.

How long had he been standing here? Self-consciously, Roy pulled his arm back from where it hovered over the pile of ashes. Then again, it wouldn’t be too out of place for him to stand as still as a statue before the recently departed.

He wasn’t the only one to have stayed unmoving since his impromptu cremation of the body. The room had seemed to enter a state of static. Leo still sat on the ground consumed in his own thoughts, and the family of three stood quietly on the opposite side of the table. All was still and as perfectly quiet as the night outside.

He should leave, his role had been played and now there was nothing here for him, but he was afraid of disturbing that eccentricity in the air, that odd calm which followed a wake. Unsure of how to proceed, Roy stayed where he stood.

It was probably past midnight now, Roy felt as if he had just woken up in the morning. The brief stay within that other plane had seemed to wipe away all of his weariness. Had that been the effect of that state of mind or was it something else? Another question for the ceaselessly growing list he wanted answered.

But he was not without a means of finding those answers, there was Epipollus and the goblins, Metapelon the earth elemental, and now, Flou. They were out there, scattered all over what had become of the small town he had grown up in, all he had to do was muster up the courage to head out and ask them the pertinent questions.

He needed to act all by his lonesome, and the thought was frightening. Of course there was that thirst for answers to confront this new and dangerous world, but more pragmatically, he needed a way of convincing the people gathered in the grocery store to leave.

Judging by Owen's reaction to Nolan’s actions earlier in the day, it didn’t seem like Roy had much of a chance when it came to convincing the man. There was a nagging possibility that Owen wouldn’t be coming back from his mid-night escapade. It would greatly simplify matters, but the thought of obtaining some sort of advantage, even if it were for the greater good, through the death of another was bitter in his mouth.

Regardless of what he choose to pursue, it would need to wait until morning. So he had perhaps six to eight hours ahead of him, and he didn’t have the faintest idea of what he could spend that time doing. Looking around, Roy noticed that a blue screen was floating in his vision, it was faint enough to escape his attention earlier, but now that he had taken notice of it, it resurfaced.

Ability Up!

Defile LV 1 > LV 5 (Novice)

You Have Been Assigned a Minor Perk for Defile

May the Dead Shield Us

Offered corpses disintegrate slowly, providing light and warmth during the process. The intensity of teh light and warmth, and the duration of the disintegration is based on the CON of entity that left the corpse.

The ability had gone up five levels with a single use, and his minor perk had been picked for him. Both of those were surprising, but if he viewed the ability as the act of offering up a corpse to a deity, then it made sense that the perk would be based on who he choose to worship.

That was fine and understandable, but the effect of the perk was anything but okay. He would essentially be using corpses as campfire to provide warmth and heat. Would he soon be cooking marshmallows over a human bonfire? The though was unsettling, but he supposed the ability didn’t specify human corpses.

If so, would he soon find himself cooking a pig over a pig’s corpse?

“It’s almost midnight. Roy, let’s go and get some rest,” Leo’s words pulled Roy out of his thoughts.

Roy looked at the other boy and then at the family of the diseased, Roy caught Leo’s drift and the two quietly made their way out of the room and sloshed into the thigh deep water outside.

“Thanks for the help,” Leo voiced in a tired tone as the two headed towards the back of the store.

“Oh, that’s fine. It was just the thing to do, you know?” Roy bumbled as he walked behind the other boy. It was difficult making his way around with the near absence of light.

‘Right, things we just need to do,” he agreed as they stopped before the door to the infirmiry.

“I’ll see you tomorrow then?” he asked.

“Probably not, Doctor Brown is too old to care for the patients or administer treatment so I have quite a bit of work to do,” he answered reluctantly before pushing open the door and entering into the brightly lit chamber beyond.

The light was blinding as it streamed through the gap, then it was gone as the door closed quietly. The dark was even darker now that he had caught a glimpse of the light.

Blinking away the afterglow, Roy began to stumble away towards his own domicile. As he neared the far corner of the grocery store he caught site of two figures standing outside the door to Lestrat’s office. From the light spilling from the open doorway, Roy could distinguish the two as Lestrat and Greyson.

“You think she might have followed Owen out?” Greyson questioned in a worried tone that conflicted with Roy’s mental image of the man.

“Perhaps… we can’t be sure yet, let’s keep looking,” Lestrat responded as he smoothed back his parted hair.

“God, I think she’s got the guts to do it too,” Greyson continued, brushing away Lestrat’s assurances.

The boy looked away for a second and spotted Roy as he approached, “Roy! You’re here just in time, did you happen to see Madelyn around?”

“No… but I was with Leo the whole time,” so that’s what they were talking about, it seemed like Greyson was convinced that Madelyn had followed Owen out on his hopeless quest to secure pharmaceuticals for the old man.

“Damn it all! She slipped out of Lestrat’s office a few hours ago and we haven’t seen her since,” Greyson punched a shelf nearby in frustration and the rickety metal structure tipped precariously before thudding back into place.

“Calm down Greyson, we'll keep looking, everything’s fine…” he assured, though it was hard to tell who exactly was in need of assuring.

“Hah, you sound like Mrs. Maes,” Greyson quipped as he shifted the shelf he had knocked out of place. The sentiment silenced Lestrat and the boy could only shuffle uncomfortably in place.

“Anyways, Roy, you should probably go get some rest, there’s nothing to be worried about,” he turned away from Greyson and addressed Roy.

“”Oh… I can help, I’m not really tired. I got this funky skill and now I’m all rested,” he wasn’t quite sure how he had become rested, but it was probably related to the system and telling Lestrat it was the effect of a skill would suffice for now.

“Are you sure? I mean, your help would be greatly appreciated but…” he trailed off, reluctant of dismissing help he so clearly craved.

“I’m good, so what’s the plan?” Roy chimed in response.

‘The plan…” Lestrat looked around at the two, “We’ll split up and look through the entire store if we need to! Greyson takes the front, Roy can look through that the aisles, and I’ll check the other rooms.”

“Sounds like a plan, I’ve got the guns to deal with the outside, Lestrat’s got a good handle on the layout of the store, and the rookie can take it easy,” Greyson voiced his assent and hurried on his way.

They looked and they looked, the roof, the basement, the storage spaces, they even pulled out the flashlights and took a brief trip around the outside of the building. Of course she wasn’t here, it was obvious the fifth time around when the sun began to peek over the horizon and the land took on that dusty grey hue again.

They were near the front, about to mount another brief expedition, this time to the gas station across the street, when they sighted a shape stumbling through the mist. It was human, but malformed, with more than a single pair of legs and a few too many bumps atop its shoulders.

“Who’s there!” Greyson shouted as he stumbled out the door and tried to blink away the fatigue plaguing his eyes.

“’Tis Oliver bearing our hero home!”

“Madelyn!” they rushed forward to meet her halfway, and as the mist parted it revealed the girl and the source of the deformity they had spotted.

She was carrying Owen against her shoulder as she stumbled forwards, struggling under the weight of what was now more akin tenderized flesh than man. His legs were mangled stumps trailing sinuous flesh and his body resembled parched earth with its many jagged cuts.

Limbs jutted out at chaotic angles and at places the bone poked through the flesh to reveal their maw like cracks and fractures. Roy stumbled as he caught sight of the burden on Madelyn’s shoulders, and images of his own leg after the battle with the Hastaos flashed through his mind.

Roy averted his eyes and scrutinized the calm surface of the water, trying in vain to wipe away the horrendous scene that threatened to crawl through his orifices and churn his organs.

“I-is that… Owen?” Lestrat asked, but the answer was obvious from what remained of the crisp blue uniform clinging to the man.

“The one and only, come quick and help me escort our brave warrior inside.”

Biting back their horror at the state of the man, they helped drag him indoors and set him upon a table. From the slow rising and falling of his chest they could tell that Owen was still alive. This was confirmed by a quick check of his status which showed that his HP stood at a measley seventeen.

Greyson rushed off to fetch the doctor, leaving the other three to attend to the man hovering just over a dozen points above death.

“Cutting it quite close,” Lestrat commented as they stood around, unsure of how to tend to the grievous wounds.

“I ascribe this success to the liberal use of potions,” she lectured self-confidently, though she swayed from side to side and her own body was covered in gashes.

“You followed Owen out?”

“Why of course, what would a hero be without his loyal comrades?”

“Please… I was worried,” Lestrat turned away and dabbed at his eyes.

“Right, it was silly of me to leave you all in the dark wasn’t it,” she stopped closer to the boy and lay a hand on his shoulder.

“No… no…. you had to go, Owen wouldn’t have made it otherwise. We were just too…”

“No need to be so melodramatic, we each take up our own roles upon this stage. There are many but this one is mine,” she painstakingly lowered her bag onto the ground and leaned against Lestrat. ”Look, Leo and Greyson are coming back. Why don’t you escort me back to your chambers and nurse my wounds?”

“Right, of course,” appearing somewhat more enlivened, Lestrat helped Madelyn along as they walked away.

“Tell Leo there's a good selection of prescription drugs in the bag, it may be too late for old man Jasper but who knows when modern medicine might come in handy? Remind him to catalogue everything and send a list to Lestrat,” she instructed as she walked away.

“Wait, how do you know the old man passed away?” Roy was sure they hadn’t told her.

“I checked his HP before leaving. He had around half an hour left”

Roy hadn’t, but they had. Owen, Madelyn, Lestrat, Nolan, they knew the old man wasn’t going to make it, that they wouldn't make it back in time even if they had gone to the pharmacy. It was a lost cause, but hope drove Owen to dash into what amounted to a suicide mission.

Was that courage? Was that foolishness? Was it a quality to be admired and heroized?

It was, it wasn’t, who could say?