Chapter 80 - Night 80

After what seemed to be several hours, we finally entered the Toy Room. It's pretty old fashioned. The wallpaper is tacky, featuring a bitter mix of symbols… Each in a dark tone, while the wallpaper itself was a lighter tone of blue. The symbols were all silhouettes of knives, lollipops, or ghosts. Lovely. The flooring was covered in Toys of varying kinds… But many of them were Jack in the Box monsters, Doll monsters, tiny figurine monsters dressed as Cowboys, or Aliens. Fun. The Jack in the Box monsters were singing a beautifully eerie lullaby, presumably due to being cranked up… And it turned out to be absolutely true. One too many Doll monsters snapping their necks to face us screamed hysterically… And it's now completely obvious what is going to happen right about meow… Due to the Triplet's not actually having a desirable time, we were forced into fighting off the toys. It was wild. The scene before us quickly turned into a complete mess of battle. I made sure to cast my highly esteemed [War Meow] before taking a seat to devour my Candy… As I glanced over at Leoric who had detained the children. He's successfully gotten them held down… But it's a shame that he won't be able to fight this battle. Thankfully, Hobgoblin Samurai Punk isn't holding back this time.

Taking a closer look at the battle, I began to steadily observe how it was playing out. Several Scarecrows had been dying all over the place… But I couldn't quite realize the cause of death… At first, anyways. The Cowboys all seemed to possess ranged attacks. Pistols… While the attacks and attackers themselves are small, they certainly deal a decent amount of damage. It's pretty impressive… The Aliens seem to use magic type attacks, leaning heavily on the Gravity Magic category. They keep tampering with the flight patterns of my Clansmen. The Dolls are all wielding varying types of weapons… But they're mostly knives, and they're mostly focused on trying to slay White Beef Lady or Christina. The Jack in the Box monsters don't seem to care who they attack. They're all over the place, shamelessly wreaking havoc wherever they please... But I have a feeling that this entire room is just moments away from one of Cetilla's illustrious tornadoes. There's no way that a bunch of toys can survive her wrath… Right? Turning to face her… She was glancing at the battle herself, before she finally looked my way with a grin… Signalling that she understood the situation perfectly. She's the perfect candidate. The one and only solution to this here equation... It's the Dutchess of Doom. Giving her a nod, she let out a slight laugh before quickly disappearing from my line of sight… She's in battle. Turning to watch, I found that she had propelled herself directly to the middle of the room… And that there was a violent gust of wind currently developing around herself… Slowly gaining momentum as it swung around the Catkin repeatedly.

As she channeled her inner avatar amidst the brutal battle, a certain Scarecrow could be seen dramatically raising a stalk to meet the edges of Cetilla's forming Wind Barrier… Lighting the gusts on fire. It didn't seem to make very much sense to me… Because how the hell can fire survive in such intense wind?! But it totally happened, okay?! I swear! As her barrier grew… The orange flames spun more and more wildly, burning all of the toys in its path while suspiciously keeping all of my Clansmen alive. Eventually… The Barrier exploded out to engulf the entire room… Losing its original form, but going out in one final, quick blaze of glory. The flames disappeared in a matter of moments, along with the wind carrying them… But a vast majority of the Toys inhabiting this room have perished. There are three uncontrollably sobbing Triplets near the entrance of the room, and I can't help but feel somewhat bad for them… But they brought this upon themselves by resisting us in our endeavor to literally save all of them. It's their fault. I won't take responsibility. Not this time! Nope!

Moving along, we took the uncontrollably weeping children, our eternally groaning Bearkin guest, and our absurd amount of Candy with us into the next hallway… It's leading to the Maze of Mirrors. While we walked, I continued to eat Candy as an attempt at restoring all of the lesser Scarecrows who had been shot down. The hallway was torture. The amount of monsters within it, was disastrous. This is no doubt, one of… If not the most commonly used hallway within the eastern wing. I have a nose for these things. There were a whopping twenty monsters in each room, and all of way too many Mummies roaming the hall for me to see the end. We probably spent the vast majority of our night just traversing this one hallway. I'm beginning to regret my choice in paths. By the time that we had actually finished venturing through the hallway, I had reached level 828… And deciphered that a total of 70 rooms existed in this hallway. We spent way too much Candy facing that one hallway, but it's behind us. We're here. The Maze of Mirrors… Opening the door, I was met with a whole lot of us… They were all simply distorted images of us, until they weren't.

That's right… At one point in the fun-house themed Maze, we had encountered weaker versions of ourselves. It was a pain, but thankfully… I was able to swat mine down with a hard karate chop to the face. Cetilla took quite the similar route, using nothing but a mere [Wind Punch] to slay her own which was attempting to conjure a whole damned tornado. Hobgoblin Samurai Punk swiftly took care of his, after having literally broken through his clone's Hammer with one strike of his own. After it gave way, the real Hobgoblin mercilessly continued on to drive the Hammer directly through the fake's face. All of the clones erupt into orange flames after having been slain. The Triplet's clones were troublesome at first, but we eventually decided to deal with it using Leoric. As I held the children down, I forced them to watch as the Dark Elf previously holding them ruthlessly cut down each of their distorted selves… Instilling great fear within each of their hearts… Fear that I will take personal responsibility for. These children desired to be treated as adults, as they have lived for so long within these walls… But for them to be treated as such, they should learn a few things… No? I think that respecting their Clan Leaders might be a good place to start. We're only here to help them, after all~

I was smirking alongside Cetilla while I thought of such things… Only to be brutally interrupted by a very loud sound. It's the sound of blades, grinding against themselves… Followed by heavy footsteps. Just two feet. It's one person, but they're carrying a whole lot of attitude as they walk. Some of the circus light bulbs began to flicker along to each step… One of them even broke, and I immediately gained a bad feeling; but my premonition came too late. It's the Clown. He's twisted, that's for sure. It doesn't help that I'm not entirely certain as to where he's coming from due to the Mirrors… But I'll try my best to describe his particular aesthetic because it is ALL that~ His makeup dresses him up to be more of a serial killer than a party performer… He's wielding two very long blades. He's not very lean, at all. His head is balding, he's pale but it might just be makeup… And he doesn't appear very young. His Clown Costume is top notch in the frightening department. He's covered in bloodstains, and the outfit itself seems to be in tatters. It was probably yellow to begin with, but it's orange, red, brown, or black. No yellow remains~ Overall? He has a very unappealing aesthetic. Not too easy on the eyes… Which are a bright beaming red, glowing with killing intent. Like all of the others, he's of Halloween. This is a Halloween ark, ladies and gentlemen. It's Halloween this, or it's Halloween that. Did you get the memo? If you didn't, then you probably never signed up for the Halloween Cat's Hottest Clock Hour Catalog newsletter. It's not a big deal, but you probably should ensure that you don't miss the next one. After all, it's terrible to show up late to these things. He's laughing… It's an absolutely twisted laugh, and I love every second of it. The Clown gets it. He's realized that this would be a battle of night~ Clansmen… Hold my things and protect my people… I'm going in.

Stepping forth, I began to transform… One stage at a time, for dramatic effect… Obviously~ I started with my wondrous 'Halloween Cat M (Four-Tailed)' while taking a few steps forth. As I changed form, as always… Wonderful orange flame effects emerged and consumed me to reveal my new body. Then, I moved on to my 'Halloween Cat L (Five-Tailed) as I continued to step forth… Penny was definitely slowing the time, many of the Clansmen performed wonderfully along to a slow beat of incoherent singing and thrashing… I don't think they were actually singing any song that I knew… It was probably just something they figured would sound nice for the occasion. It was dramatic, I'll give it that. It sounded as though Angels were singing, but there was also the addition of excessively ominous sounds. Pleasant~ While it all happened, the Cat Crew stood idly by, watching with varied expressions. Cetilla had a wicked grin on her face, but Hobgoblin Samurai Punk only sighed with a smile. Budget Shark held a shocked expression, as his stone mouth gaped wide open while he gazed forward. Turning back to face where I believed to be the Clown… I continued on to my 'Halloween Cat XL (Six-Tailed)... And slowly took on the final form. The 'Halloween Cat XXL (Seven-Tailed). There are definitely flames emitting from my own paws these nights. It's beautiful. After returning my [Barrier] to the smaller form which only protects my body… I let out a loud [War Meow] which was very painful to hear due to Penny's interference.

After finishing, the fight began. Masterfully, I leapt forward in attempts at swiping my claws into the Clown… But I hit Mirror, instead. It's not a big deal… But it's depressing. Penny! Cut the effects! I need to know where the damned thing is first! Ugh… I ended up needing to call out to her manually, due to a clear lack of Lanterns. It was painful to speak in this moment. I tried doing it quickly, so that it sounded natural… But it came out a little funny. Oh gosh… As soon as she stopped using her abilities, the Bandsmen changed tunes and began to perform 'F*nhouse'. As I scouted the area, a whole lot of poisonous fog came out of nowhere. It was yellow… I think it might have been mustard gas? It's not pleasant, I'll say that much. I'm taking roughly 10 damage each second. Intense, considering that it blocks my vision as well as harms me consistently regardless of my M. DEF.. Is he… Hiding in the poison or is he waiting outside and watching? It's probably the latter. I'll just leap out, and… Smash into a Mirror. Epic. The Mirror broke, revealing dilapidated wallpaper. I'm almost uncertain about whether or not this room was always in the fun-house theme. Honestly… I never expected the Clown to pull out some silly poison ability, judging by how he was wielding two freaking swords that appeared more like saws. The poison is spreading too quickly… I don't even know where I am at this point. Looking at my Clansmen's statuses… They seem to still be safe. Cetilla might be keeping them out of the gas… But I'm beginning to regret the idea of taking this on by lonesome.

I probably stumbled around for several minutes, before I finally encountered it. The bright, glowing eyes… Slightly visible through the fog. I've found him. Not taking any chances, I leapt forth to find that it still wasn't even him, and I'm beyond my wits. Taking a turn, I saw him again.. And this continued for another couple minutes before I actually got him. Finally… He raised his blades to defend against my attack… And it landed. I felt him! As I relentlessly continued to thrash my flaming claws at him, I whipped down a [Pumpkin Bomb] worth 2000 MP… Engulfing my line of sight in flames within only a matter of one second. It's my flames, or it's his gas. We're doing this. He's capable of blocking some of my attacks, but I've definitely landed quite the fair few. He's pretty sturdy, but he's not very fast. The entire time, he's continued on sadistically laughing to his heart's content. Even as he continued to be slowly shredded away. After around a minute, he finally tried to retaliate against my barrage of swipes… Bright orange light trailed along behind his blade as it swept into my Barrier… Before he tried to carry it down, dragging it through… It dealt incredible damage. I believe it may be due to the teeth on his blades. Each tooth counts as an additional cut, or something like that. I lost around 500 MP in that one moment… But I carried on to continue my swiping, and managed to finally catch him off-guard. One of my swipes… It actually carried him off of his feet, and he flew a little before smashing into a Mirror. Pouncing forth, I continued on towards him… Not giving a moment to regain his composure.

It only required one final, clean brush of my claws to rip his face off entirely. Leaned up against the wall before me, is an utterly mangled Clown… Blood, guts, shards of glass spewed out all over the place, fabric of his costume shredded amid the mess… Flames everywhere, and the faint trace of fog still blinding me. This entire ordeal… It's taken a considerable toll on my MP. I've lost over 7000. It's been fun, Clown… But this is farewell. I've ascended to level 974. I'm almost there… The big, one thousand. I need to be level 1024 before I can sell my soul to Halloween. At this rate, there's no reason for me personally to be taking on the Sphinx… I've reached my quota. I'm practically there. Just one more hallway, and it will certainly be within my grasp. This is the moment… This is the moment that defines a Hero. If I continue on my way to stop the Sphinx, regardless of needing the power or not… Then I'll truly, be doing it all for the sake of Halloween. This is the moment… If I do this, I'll be capable of deeming myself… Truly, a Hero of Halloween. I'm getting goosebumps just thinking about it~ I suppose there's really no point in turning back meow that we've come so far… Heh~ I was mulling over such topics until I finally escaped from the gas, once and for all. I'm within flames, but I'm not taking any damage. I wish I had my Lantern on me… That would be nice. I suppose I'll just check over my status for a moment~

Name: Nero Miki

Race: Cat (Halloween)

Weapon: Lantern (Unarmed)

Mount: Broom (Unarmed)

Class: Halloween Cat (Sub Class: Witch/Tamer)

Level: 974

HP: 4870/4870

MP: 11629/19480

SP: 81/100

FP: 78/100

P. DEF: 820

M. DEF: 712

STR: 3896

INT: 9740

DEX: 2922

LUK: 974

AGI: 5844

Titles:

[True Halloween Cat+5], [From Another World], [Fish Mongerer+3], [Master of Disguise+4], [Mana Guzzler+3], [Candy Mongerer+2], [Master of Time+1], [Witch of War+3]

Abilities Learned:

[Flying Broom+3], [Soul Merge], [Clansmen Capture+2], [Hallowed Gate+4], [This is Halloween+2], [Wailing Keep+4], [Language Comprehension+1], [Shapeshift+3], [Barrier+3], [Daily Candy+4], [Claw Fishing+4], [Disguise+5], [Recovery by Sleep+3], [Enhanced Meditating+4], [Swim+3], [10 Minute Makeover+2], [Pumpkin Bomb+3], [Bonus Mana+3], [Time Skip], [War Meow+2]

Ahh… It's not bad. I honestly feel as though I probably did pretty well for my first life as a Halloween Cat. My second life is going to be far better, I feel certain in that department. I'll be able to keep my clothing from this time. The same thing goes for my Lantern and Broom… Which I should really have replaced at this point. If I live to escape from this place, I definitely need to attain better weapons. I'll also try to get myself even nicer clothing. The best of the best, for yours truly. I'll try to get Cetilla and Hobgoblin Samurai Punk their own elitist costumes, as well. We're going to be the most powerful individuals of the Lost Kingdom after we're through here. Well… I'll be getting weaker some time in the near future, but that's not relevant. Luna and the Cat Crew can take over. They're more than powerful enough. At this point in time, I'm genuinely more useful as a means of providing us with Coins… But even that can apparently be neglected due to how lucrative adventuring can be. If we can find another Dungeon even half as lucrative as this one, we won't even need the Cat's Costumery. No offense to the Cat's Costumery… But I'm going to need a whole lot more Candy than I'm currently capable of attaining to earn us as much as this one Dungeon will have should we succeed. We could easily just become excessively well-paid Mercenaries willing to venture into Dungeons and rescue prominent fools unworthy of their family's fortunes. I can still create clothing for the Monster Knights and Goblin Villagers… So it's not as though I won't be gaining proficiency for [Disguise]. I like Clive, though. I wouldn't want to mess with his business, as he genuinely does seem to require it… Maybe I can do both?

To be frank, lately… Most of the products that I've been preparing for Clive have been coming out of Candy. I can afford it, I've done it… It's just not enough to be incredibly profitable. At the very least, the Cat's Costumery is beginning to appear to be more of a side job than anything else. I can keep it going, but it's no longer going to be very influential to my way of living. Also… Due to Budget Shark's earlier petrification… He's practically going to be absent for around half of this entire Quest. It may be prudent to take half of his cut, and bestow it to my Clansmen. I can probably get something pretty spectacular to help Luna rule Halloween in my absence. She needs a new weapon. She's been wielding some sort of Spellbook… But it doesn't look very good. No offense to the Church of Lilica… But they could bare to bestow their Priestess' with higher grade Spellbooks. It literally isn't giving her ANY stats… Ahh~ I've finally found Cetilla's Barrier. I can smell it. Following the smell of Pumpkins, I walked into five Mirrors, shattering every single one and taking varying damage… But I have located the origin. I repeat… The Night Cat has landed, over… Ughhh~ I'm still not getting any signal. I blame the Mirrors.

The Barrier had been engulfed by my flames… So I decided to wait it out. I sat there for a considerable period of time, until finally… The flames had dispersed greatly. I don't know how else to do this, so I guess I'll just poke it with my paw… Losing yet another thousand MP… I was able to put an end to Cetilla's Barrier. She's glaring at me with a face that can only mean one thing. She's dejected that her Barrier can't hold up against my left paw~ I mean… If I were her, I'd probably be pretty upset as well. Thing is, I'm not her. Also, her Barrier is a fake. It's not a real Wind Barrier… It's a Pumpkin Spice Wind Sphere. And so, I'm meow consuming my Candy once more as we travel through the Maze of Mirrors. The Bearkin finally stopped groaning, and I became worried… But after removing his paper bag mask… He's still ugly, and he's still a Bear. Hobgoblin Samurai Punk confirmed it... It's a Bear..tru… Oi! What?! Turning to face the Hobgoblin casually walking along as if nothing happened…

"What do you mean he's a Beartru?!" [Nero] screamed hysterically while chewing on Candy.

"I mean he's a Beartru." [Hobgoblin Samurai Punk] explained with a lighthearted look in his eyes.

"What the hell is a Beartru?!" [Nero] slammed back with an exasperated expression as he finally put down his Candy.

"...Some sort of Halloween Bear, I guess." [Hobgoblin Samurai Punk] shrugged with a smile.

...Janus?!

"Do you know?!" [Nero] begged the question with a psychotic expression as he gazed up toward the ceiling.

"...It's an earlier formed Evolution to a Berrotrulikhal." [Janus] replied with a calculating expression without having even appeared.

...Oh. Obviously... I should have known better… But why did this happen so quickly?! I don't think he's been here long enough to become a Halloween Clansmen?! Just how proficient is this damned Scientist?! Can he reverse it? On second thought… I doubt it. Most mad Scientists can't even replicate what they do… Let alone reverse it. It's done. He's a Beartru meow… Perhaps, he'll step forth even further into the darkness before we finally escape this place. It can't be helped. Not by us, anyways… Even I have limits. Hobgoblin Samurai Punk and Cetilla both freaked out a little over Janus' voice, but I quickly explained that I'm in good with a God these nights… Before continuing to devour my Candy. They took the knowledge in strides… Well, Cetilla did. She seemed slightly speculative, but carried on relatively quickly. Hobgoblin Samurai Punk on the other hand, seemed jealous. He wants his own God to talk to about stuff and things. It's like that. When you're a Prophet, not everyone takes it so kindly… Because they themselves desire to be Prophets… But no Gods want to take their phone calls… So they take it out on you. My only hope, is that I don't end up being crucified. If that could just not happen, Janus… That would be great. If I could just not die through crucifixion, that would be absolutely spectacular. Did you hear about the Witch of Night? Oh yeah… He died of old age or something, right? Yeah... Let's do that. Kay?

Finally finished with exiting the Maze of Mirrors, we were met with yet another hallway. We decided to pay attention to the Mummies roaming ahead of us, before beginning with the doors. Hobgoblin Samurai Punk took the lead, and was being healed by Luna nearly constantly… Who I was healing with Candy. The fight went on for quite some time, but he came out of it looking like an absolute champion. This entire hallway appears to be a mess. According to Melissa, they call these… The Halls of 10 Horrors. It's a fitting name, most likely due to there being 10 different types of monsters which appear within it. When we finally began to open the doors, the lesser Scarecrows took the lead… But if it wasn't a One-Eyed Slime room, then Hobgoblin Samurai Punk swiftly stepped in and took over. If it was Slimes, Cetilla swept in with her insanely high spec Wind Magic. Other than heal Luna, I really wasn't doing anything. I gained absolutely no experience points out of the ordeal, but given my current status… I don't care. They can have it all~