Pathbreakers: Multiclassing For Fun And Profit

Time left until monsters respawn: 0 hours, 17 minutes.

The sound is what I notice first. The sound of buzzing. An all too familiar sound of flies. The disgusting insects are flying about the former grocery area, which seems to be a cornfield. At the far end, some 200 yards away, I see daylight. The regular glass sliding doors of the front of the Get! shine like a beacon in the night. Though just like the other areas this place is well lit. And clean. Aside from the dirt.

The ground is the familiar white tile of the Get! but rows of corn seem to sprout from between the tiles, cracking and tilting them. Dirt is coming up through the floor as well. The corn rows extend all the way across the area, making visibility utter crap.

I check my radar and use Ping for good measure. I learn three very important things at once. 1) Ping's range exceeds my Radar's but it gives my radar tracking on enemies that it detects. 2) There are hundreds, if not thousands of flies in here, and they're each about the size of a standard American football. 3) These flies seem to notice when they're Pinged, and don't like it.

About 3 dozen flies leave a trio of corpses they're eating and fly towards me. My back is already to the ice wall behind me so I've got nowhere to run. I scan one.

Syrup Fly. An overgrown insect that can spit sticky globs of corn syrup after eating raw corn. Not tough or strong, but dangerous in swarms. The current size of this swarm is 4,897. That means you're boned.

Jose is there and I hear his gun charge with electricity. As I pull my knife and prepare a Flame Thrower I say to him “There are almost 5000 of them, single shots won't-”

A small yellow and blue orb of electricity flies out of the gun, much slower than a bullet, but still fast enough to hit the target. The hit fly immediately explodes into goo but then bolts of electricity jump between the falling parts before jumping off in many directions, killing about a dozen of the other flies. These flies get hit by the electricity and just fall to the ground. Some twitch as they die. It's fucking rad as hell.

“Shit that's awesome!” I yell, then cast Flame Thrower to torch the rest of the fly posse. I have to wave my hand around like a hose to get the rest.

We're no longer being attacked so, just to check, I scan a bug.

The current size of this swarm is 4,861. This means you are still boned.

The number decreased. But that means it's accurate. “Yeah, we're not going to kill them all.” I say.

Nat is climbing out of the ice tunnel behind me and asks “What do we do then?”

“Well, I have a bad idea,” I say. Jose nods for me to continue. “My Ping spell lured a bunch of them to me. I can lure them away, probably die, but you guys could get everyone else out while the bugs are distracted.”

Jose checks his gun and, without looking up, says “Arcing Shot, my area attack, it doesn't have a target limit, just an area limit.”

“So?” Brian says, pulling himself out of the ice tunnel.

Jose points back at the ice tunnel. “What if we pack them in tight?”

A few minutes later (14 minutes until monsters respawn) everything is in place. I stretch and do a few lunges before starting my run.

“Ready?” Nat asks from the other side of the ice wall. She and literally everyone but me are back there. Jose is at the front of the pack. Brian, Theo, Nat and a couple of civilians armed with Fire Bats are right behind them.

“Okay, on three!” I shout. There's no reason for the countdown other than to psych myself up. “One, two, three!”

I run. I run as fast as I can to the front door of the Get!. I'm about halfway there when bugs start chasing me. I'm three quarters of the way to the doors when I pivot and cast Ping. Hundreds of flies are notified of my presence. The buzzing of wings is deafening. I can't even hear my own voice as I cast Flame Thrower to toast some bugs that are already on my tail. I only cast for 2 seconds, just long enough to kill myself a path back through the bugs.

I run again. This time I push myself as hard as possible. My thighs are burning. I feel muscles in my feet strain. I'm halfway back and cast Ping again to anger more insects. I run but a fly lands on my back. I have no idea what it's doing, and don't have time to care. I glance at my radar and it is almost entirely red, the dots of a thousand or more bugs covering it entirely.

I run. I'm almost there. My lungs are on fire. My blood is boiling. I cast Ping one more time and dive into the ice tunnel.