Tunnel Rat

Dr. Duran and Samantha turned to see Sydney triumphantly raising her arms in the air while stomping her feet. The stack of coffee cups next to her swayed ominously.

"Our little hacker isn't getting away from me. I figured out how he got a restricted race and what it is."

Steven was very curious. "Well, don't leave us guessing."

Sydney got a fresh cup of coffee, making the other two wince as she poured sugar into the cup for far too long. "He had criteria he was looking for. He wanted a tail and to be shorter. Now you think that would narrow it down, but with so many rare evolutions to animal hybrid characters, demonic hybrids, and even aquatic hybrids, it took a while to figure it out. But there was one more clue: cheese sauce!"

Samantha was confused. "Cheese sauce?!"

Sydney kept rolling. "Yep. Cheese sauce. I tried to bait him into having breakfast with me and talking. He didn't go for the hickory smoked bacon at first. He grabbed a bowl of hot cheese sauce for the eggs Benedict and started eating it by itself. He was in heaven and only left once he had licked the last bit out of the bowl."

Samantha was still confused. "That helps how?"

"Ha! Knew you were going to ask that. Firstly, there is a race that is technically playable by a character that is both short and has a tail. It’s on the list to be made available someday. And that race has a restricted class that shows on the list as a yellow listing. It has a quest requirement. And...the ultimate clue...only one race has a problem with cheese addiction."

Steven clapped. "Well done. You're right. Our little hacker must be a ratkin."

"And I know his class too. It’s only available to ratkin that come from a specific clan and have the ability to change into human form. The quest that lets you become a wererat is quite specific. You also take the special scout class for their race. The player is meant to be on the edge of society. A bit of a roguish outcast, doing work for the ratkin as well as the rougher parts of society like the thieves and assassins guilds. If we offered it for starting characters, I bet half of them would take it."

Steven had brought up the race and class combo. "Oh, maybe more than that. Look at the Enhancement Skills. A wererat scout can pick up an inventory skill cheaply with his enhancement points. That's one of the big bonuses for the class. Also, why it has some major downsides. Nice natural weapon and exploration options as well."

Samantha looked over Steven's shoulder, then paced around the room. "So, a group of hackers, who can get hundreds of people illegally into the game, also have a way to generate all the smugglers they need to move around whatever it is they don't want us to know about."

Steven was looking at his screen. “I’m not sure about that. This gets more and more strange as I look at it. The quest to get that class is very unique. I’ve never heard of it before and most of the details are obscured, but it does show that it has Unique Rewards. I’m going to have to submit this to Wally for another look.”

“But well done, Sydney. The next step is to try and find him in game, and find out what he is planning to do with the hundreds or thousands of people at his disposal.”

Meanwhile, not knowing that someone was on his tail, Milo continued his journey back to Harry’s mushroom farm. Digging out of the mushroom caves turned out to be easier than Milo had expected. No huge rockfalls had occurred, and he was able to greatly increase the narrow area he had to slide through. He grabbed the bags of shrooms and trudged back to Harry's home in the underground.

"Yo! Harry, I have your stuff."

The large man shambled out of his lab area. "I'm quite happy to see you succeeded. If you had died, it would have been ages before someone else took the job. Silly, since it's such an easy one."

Milo collapsed and leaned against a wall. "Oh, yes, very easy. No complications at all. You neglected to mention the myconians."

Harry waved him off. "Tsk, Tsk. The only way a myconian would come threaten you is if you stepped on a stemling, and then you would have plenty of time to run. They are quite slow. But are you saying you saw some? They have grown quite rare in this area. A natural thing, I suppose, with the rarity of mushroom groves."

Milo didn't know if Harry was joking or not. "Rare? There are huge caves full of them. I got chased by over a dozen guardians and one as big as a house. Not to mention the one as big as six houses."

"Six houses? If you are joking, I'm going to be very upset with you. What did you see?"

Milo felt a bit of danger from the rotund man. He must take his mushrooms seriously. “I swear. A mushroom that stretched upwards for several stories. It's in a massive cavern, covered in yellow flowers, and has a lot of nasty slaves hooked to it with vines."

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Harry sat down in the dirt. "Oh my. That's going to make things difficult. Describe things for me. Leave out no detail."

Milo did, Harry, staying silent and shaking his head for most of the story. "That's quite amazing. I haven't gone into the caverns for decades. I had no idea those caves had regrown that way. The biggest must have migrated in and then rerooted. Something that big doesn't grow in just a hundred years. But the yellow flowers are bad news. They do indeed enslave people. Luckily, they can't leave the flower colony."

"By the way, just curious, but when you killed the big one, Cronk, did you bother to search the body at all? A heartshroom from such a creature would be quite valuable."

"Really? Maybe I'll go back and look. How valuable are we talking?"

Harry reached into a pocket and pulled out some fish bones, some shiny rocks, and an old crumpled pair of muddy socks. "Hurmmm...one moment, it's here somewhere. Ah!" At the third pocket, he found a small cloth sack. Opening it, he dumped out a wrapped bundle. "Open it up. I'll think you'll like what's inside."

Milo opened the bag carefully. "It's full of dead worms, Harry."

"Oh, is that where those went? Wait, try this bag." The second bag had a rather plain copper ring in it without a stone or other ornamentation. "The interesting thing about some really powerful items is they look like common trash. It's why I kept that one. I love common trash."

At Harry's urging, he tried on the ring. He immediately knew what it was.

Ring of the Swiss Army.

Made by the Archmagi Elsener and given to each member of the mage corps of Swissleland. This ring can cast the following spells without the need for mana. Each spell may be cast one time each day.

Darn Socks (2 pairs)

Water Breathing (self, 1 Hour)

Summon Nut Cracker (Lasts until no more nuts are present in 10'.)

Protection from small biting and stinging insects (Keeps them at bay for 1 hour.)

Heat Fondue (Creates a small flame that will heat oil or other things in a fondue pot. Duration 4 hours.)

Sharpen Tool. (4 sharpening per day.)

Karl's Handy Tent Helper (Sets up a large tent or packs it up. Usable twice a day.)

Summon Guard Lizard (Brings a Guard Lizard from the Feenokioki swamp to guard your camp.)

Dog Bite Fixer (Takes the edge off of nasty hangovers.)

Summon Wine (1 Quart, lowest quality.)

"Ha! Knew you'd be impressed. Now let’s talk trade. An item like that doesn't come along every day."

Milo thought about it. He had no clue what the heartshroom might do and was a bit leery of the warning about side effects. And while the ring was odd, it looked quite useful, or he could trade it off to someone else. Mostly, he knew Harry really wanted the weird item, and Harry was one of the few people Milo knew. He lived down where Milo wanted to explore and had offered to teach him stuff and give him jobs. Even if the ring was worthless, it might still be worth making the trade.

"You talked me into it, Harry." Milo got his pack and pulled out the Earthen Heartshroom. Harry looked at the strange thing in awe.

"Oh yes. Thank you, Milo. This should do nicely." And with that, Harry opened his mouth extremely wide and pushed the whole thing in. He made joyful chewing sounds for a full minute wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. "Oh, thank god. I feel so much better after that."

Milo had backed away while Harry was eating. He wasn't sure what was going to happen. When nothing happened, he was a little disappointed. "So, what happens now."

"What happens now..." Harry said. “Is that I get to take my first bath in 50 years. Luckily, I have a good scrub brush and some sulfuric acid. That should help. You might want to head upstairs for a day or two until the stench clears out." Harry tossed him a bag that clinked. "Here's your pay. Go have some fun. Then if you still want to help an old troll with his jobs, come find me again."

Milo didn't have to be told twice. He grabbed his odd belongings and started to climb back up towards Shadowport.

Congratulations! You have completed the quest: Shrooms in the Dark

-Harvested 20 pounds of the correct mushrooms.

-Actually returned, a first.

-Completed a bonus objective of curing Harry of his Earthen Mana Deficiency.

Rewards: 100 copper pennies, instruction in basic mycology, and Dr. Harry Earthtongue considers you afriend.

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