Chapter 55: 55: Fan Service

The next system message announced that the new contract was in effect. The mice could no longer visit this building and would offer a cheese stone to ZipZing if it were created. The image of the little mouse Shrubbery had chosen as their new messenger appeared at the end in gold.

The last system announcement read: "5 Karma bonus for achieving a peaceful resolution to the Enchanted Shop's rodent problem using your own resources."

It made Danika feel a little better about giving up the aqua stone. She checked her character sheet and found that she'd received two Karma that the system hadn't specifically mentioned. She wondered if that meant they'd completed two quests, and asked Shrubbery, "How many Karma did you get?"

Shrubbery complained, "They took the light." She pulled up her own menu and reported, "Two. Can we leave now?"

Danika cast her light cantrip for Shrubbery, and suggested, "Try climbing up and knocking on the trap door?" She cast another cantrip the instant the light faded, and pulled the pouch with the last of the radishes out and began crunching on one.

Shrubbery obediently climbed up and knocked. She looked down at ZipZing and asked, "You're just going to sit there and eat?"

Danika cast her light again and replied, "Spells use up a lot of energy."

Shrubbery knocked louder on the door. "Hey!" she yelled. "They are gone!"

Danika gathered up the remains of the apple that had turned her into a cat, including the furry seed. She ate another radish to keep her energy recharging and kept renewing the light for Shrubbery.

Shrubbery commented like Aishin had, "That looks so wrong, cats don't eat radishes."

Danika huffed a silent laugh. "I'm almost out of foods again," she informed the dryad.

As though thinking of him had summoned it, Aishin's little bat appeared with a message. Danika read it while Shrubbery asked, "What did you do to those mice? It's so cool to have the golden mouse messenger, but I feel like I didn't do anything!"

Aishin's message asked similar questions: "Wow! It just notified me that my party was the first to complete the White Mouse Messenger quest! What have you been doing? (And why another mouse quest? Or was it an unfinished ending to the Fairy Mice?)"

Danika wrote back to Aishin while she answered Shrubbery, "I gave them an infinite water stone in exchange for leaving this place. You were totally integral to the plan! I was so afraid that if I admitted I had it on me, that they'd just take it and kill me off, but thankfully I could tell them that my large dryad friend had to return first!" She felt like she exaggerated only a little, but Shrubbery giggled.

Danika's answer to Aishin read: "Well, currently we're locked in the enchanter's basement. It was a different mouse quest, probably because I'm still a cat. It may last up to 75 game days we think?"

"Dryads don't have any useful power without sunlight," Shrubbery informed her. "If we'd had to fight we'd have been in real trouble."

"Would illusionary sunlight work?" Danika asked curiously as she crunched on the next radish. She stared at the trap door and tried to come up with another plan. She'd told Shrubbery not to worry and that there were other exits, but she'd seen how some of the mice had appeared to walk right into the stone walls the way the slimes had.

Aishin came online a moment later, and Shrubbery replied worriedly, "I don't know. Is that your last radish? You can stop casting until you find the other exit, I'll be ok." Shrubbery knocked loudly one last time and then climbed back down and sat gracefully on the floor.

Danika stopped casting her light and agreed, "I'll focus on finding the exit then." She felt deceitful. She opened up her mouth to admit that she was no longer certain that there was one…

Shrubbery spoke first. "I've always been kind of afraid of dark enclosed places. It goes pretty well with being a dryad since we are sun powered."

Danika's mouth snapped shut and she padded around the perimeter of the crowded room, poking and pulling at the shelves and the walls instead. She had only made one full lap around the room when there were loud voices raised overhead.

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Danika looked up hopefully. She recognized Aishin's voice even muffled through the floor. A moment later there was a sharp explosion and Shrubbery squeaked fearfully.

There was a silence after the explosion, and then a scraping noise. A moment later Aishin opened the trap door. He dropped through it without bothering with the little ladder, and Shrubbery gasped and pointed at him. She sputtered incoherently, "It's it's, him, that…"

Danika looked at her and then told Aishin, "I think she recognizes your avatar?" She surveyed Aishin and added, "You go through a lot of clothes don't you?" His face was uncovered and his clothes had shredded spots again.

Aishin grinned at her and replied teasingly, "Meow meow meow?"

Shrubbery whispered shyly, "She said you go through a lot of clothes."

"Only since I met you," Aishin said laughingly. "It makes me think you must want to see more of me and the game is trying to provide."

Danika gazed at him with a slightly horrified look.

"ZipZing?" he asked. "I was teasing?"

Danika babbled worriedly, "What if that's really why? What if it's all because I said your face is pretty? I'm so sorry!"

"Stop," Aishin instructed firmly without asking what she was saying. He knelt and put his hand on her head. "If that was really all it took, I'd be naked all the time."

"I never said I want to see you naked!?" Danika protested. She turned to Shrubbery who bravely repeated it for her.

"So self-centered," Aishin chided with amusement.

Shrubbery explained quietly, "There are probably millions of girls who want to see that avatar naked."

Aishin looked up at her and asked wryly, "You're a fan?"

Shrubbery waved her hands around a bit before replying, "Ah, I don't know if I'd say fan, I'm not extreme about it, but I do like their music."

Danika closed her eyes and thought how glad she was that she was a cat right now. Her wings would have been flaming. Aishin's fingers moved comfortingly over her head and he told Shrubbery, "I love the music. But let's get you two out of here, I really don't have time to play right now."

Aishin scooped ZipZing up and swiftly scaled the little ladder. Shrubbery gulped and followed them up quickly. Aishin set ZipZing down gently and asked, "All good?"

Danika looked doubtfully around the shop. The enchanter was huddled in the farthest corner with a white face. "Well, we'll manage from here," she declared. She gave Aishin a firm nod, and wrote quickly in her messenger screen: "We'll manage. Go do what you need to," she instructed. "And thanks."

Aishin snatched it up as soon as it appeared in the paws of a little golden mouse and read it. Then he winked at her and logged out.

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