The beginning of the night was as they all had been, those last two weeks. We moved across the empty zone between the Shattered territories and Racoon City before going deeper into the Withered’s territory. We had to be cautious, stealthy and quiet on our way, making sure we were avoiding the Skulkers and Husks that populated the outskirts of Racoon City, otherwise, we would see ourselves in a battle we couldn’t win. If that happened, our best chance would be to flee as quickly as possible, as we had in the various fights we had been in recently. There simply were too many Withered Hunters, and even Withered Skulkers and Husks could be dangerous if they came at us in large groups. My group was individually powerful, even Alex had found a rather interesting niche in combat, but there were only four of us.

And what a surprise Alex had turned out to be. They had really come into their own during those recent days of combat, constantly improving their tricks and increasing their arsenal. At first, it had only been cans of flammable substances, relying on me to ignite them, and a simple sling made from some cloth, allowing them to launch rocks and other small projectiles at our enemies. Nothing truly impactful, but those rocks, in addition to the occasional psychic blast they could send out was enough to get started.

And getting started, they did. They still had their cloth-sling but, with some assistance from Lia, they had managed to create a slingshot, adding quite a bit of impact to their attacks. In addition, Lia had asked me if I knew how to make an actual crossbow, something that would hopefully allow Alex to compensate for their lack of upper body strength, and lack of overall mass. Sadly, I only knew the very basics of that, forcing us to put that idea on hold. But I had been able to work with Alex to make a few rather interesting, and incredibly nasty, concoctions from simple, household chemicals. Things that would give enemies nasty, chemical burns, or allow me to light them on fire with nary a thought. While the homemade napalm was far from the real stuff, it was more than enough to burn.

Sure, we had some small accidents, chemicals weren’t quite as stable as they used to be before the change, but thanks to my magical perception and instincts, I was able to detect trouble before it could occur, allowing us to dodge the worst explosions.

I also managed to get the Alchemy skill for myself and even levelled it to three. Mostly by blowing things up, but I didn’t mind too much. Sure, I really wanted to make some healing potions or general medical supplies, but if explosives were what I was good at, eh, I could work with that.

Or rather, have Alex work with that, while I kept using my magic to interfere with our enemies. Alchemy was useful, but for me, it was merely a secondary skill. I was a Sorceress, exploring the elemental section of the Arcane Path in all its glory.

Though the improvements Alex made weren’t limited to fighting. Maybe the biggest improvement of all came from an idea of Lia, namely an attempt to help Alex speak, or rather communicate. Her idea was, if Alex was capable of understanding the spoken word and had demonstrated enough intellectual capacity to use tools, why not try teaching him sign language? If people unable to hear could learn it, or people who had lost their voice for some reason, was there a reason a racoon would be unable to learn?

We had to raid a bookstore for a primer, to which we added a couple more books, either for future reference or for good, old entertainment, but with the book in hand, Lia and Alex made swift progress. Not yet to the point of fluency but it was good enough that Alex could make themself understood, not that I was able to keep up with their progress, simply because I didn’t invest enough time. Sadly, their work-around didn’t help Silva with her inability to speak, her paws weren’t quite nimble enough to sign. Maybe at some point it would work, but for now, she was limited to growls and barks. Which she used to make herself understood, without too many issues.

Generally, the idea to learn sign language and agree on a set of simple, obvious signals that we could easily see even in the dark, or while distracted by other things, was a good one. So far, we had used some simple pantomime in situations where speaking would be dangerous, but those could only convey so much. Holding up a hand, palm towards another, sure, that likely meant stop. Pointing at something to direct attention, also obvious. But a signal to prepare a specific type of ambush, or one to create concealment magic or other less intuitive things that came up often enough during our nightly excursions? Those we had to imagine and agree upon ourselves.

For the first time since my original intrusion into the area, we reached the part of Racoon City where there were almost no normal Undead, just Withered Husks, with a few Skulkers thrown in for good measure. Our goal for the night was to penetrate as deeply into Racoon City as we could, trying to gather information before we retreated back out.

Sadly, as we moved into the area I had been in before, I immediately noticed a shift in the psychic noise all around us. A part of the shift was just like it had been the last time, something I was confident was merely part of our location, like stepping out of a loud area and into a quieter one. The noise shifted but it didn’t mean that one was discovered upon stepping into the quiet area. But the other part of the shifted noise, that felt more urgent to me. I couldn’t understand it, but from the many times I had heard the Withered’s psychic communication, I was relatively certain that something had just gone on alert. Maybe they had noticed us, maybe it was something else, the didn’t really matter, what mattered was that we were in danger. Looking over to the others, I saw Alex make the agreed-upon signal for danger, though not for a specific danger. Just, danger, meaning they didn’t really know what was going on either.

And it didn’t really matter where the danger came from, just that it was there and we needed to get away. Gesturing to the others, I made the signal to evacuate. Immediately, Alex tossed out a few small canisters after priming them, causing the reaction within to start. It would take a bit of time, somewhere between a minute and five minutes, for them to go off but that was just what we wanted. Once they went off, they would cause noise and release an incredibly noxious odour, hopefully distracting any Withered that were sniffing around for us.

The canisters hadn’t quite landed when we already turned around, our movement just as coordinated as it had been, only now, we were trying to get as much speed as possible while maintaining concealment.

Tension ratcheted up in my body, though even as we moved, I tried to stretch my perception as far into the area we were moving away from as I could. There was something out there, it felt as if it was just at the cusp of my awareness but I wasn’t able to grasp it. Maybe that was for the best, grasping the influence of an entity able to create and control this many servants might be detrimental to my health, mental or otherwise. Or maybe I was imagining things, but I didn’t think so.

The Withered, of all flavours, moved too coordinated to be individuals, at least that was what Lia and I were agreeing on. When fighting them, unless they were surprised, magically bound or stunned, they demonstrated a preternatural awareness of their brethren, their coordination almost at the level that Sigmir and I had achieved before our bond grew deeper. A complete trust in one another, combined with a sense of where the other was and what they were doing. They were better coordinated than any wolfpack I had seen on Mundus and just as coordinated as a swarm of Ankhegs, a species considered to be a hivemind.

Whatever the case, we needed to get out of Racoon City before things went completely pear-shaped, I could already feel multiple psychic signatures moving in our general direction, though I couldn’t feel any that seemed to come directly for us.

Still, if we got caught here, we’d be in serious trouble, this deep in their territory even I would be pressed to escape, let alone make sure all four of us could escape.

And so, we moved, our flight mirroring my own retreat from this area two weeks prior.