Chapter One Hundred and Thirty-Eight - Bug Girls

"Ew!" Becky said as we shone a light into the room with the birthing pools.

I was pretty sure that wasn't the technical term for what we were seeing, but it was close enough. There were large pools, and little baby buglings were being born in them, bursting out of weird sacs almost fully formed and just a bit smaller than they would be as adults.

"Oh, god, it smells weird in here. Like a barn or something," Becky said.

"It... does smell like a barn," Fran said. "Strangly so."

"It does?" I asked. I sniffed at the air, but while I'd agree that the smell was strange, it wasn't anything I was familiar with. Warm and kind of humid, mostly.

Becky turned towards Fran. "You've been in barns before?"

"I was part of an equestrian riding club for years," Fran said. "We'd tend to the horses, who lived in stables. Not exactly a barn but close enough, I suspect."

"Oh... horse girl."

I stared at Becky, wondering what that meant, exactly, then I decided to refocus. "Let's clear the room out first?" I asked. "We can talk about Fran's horse-girlness after."

"Okay," Becky said.

"I'd rather not," Fran replied.

I wasn't so sure. I'd seen some images of women in full equestrian riding gear, and those tight pants had me thinking unwise thoughts sometimes. But it wasn't time to be horny, it was time to blow up monsters.

Becky was given a minute or so to go nuts, blasting spells across the room with wild abandon and frying a dozen or so buglings with ease. Then Fran and I stepped in for the mop up. I smacked a living bugling with a quick Shadow Bolt and used the time it was flinching to get in close and stab it dead.

Fran had an easier time. Her sword could burn through the monster's exoskeleton with relative ease. It wasn't instant. A swipe would leave a long burn, but not cut cleaning through, but if she slowed down her motions a little, she could pin one of the monsters down and basically melt through it. Not only was she cutting them open, she was cooking them from the inside. It was effective.

I pulled out a little bit of cloth to wipe my sword with after the last bugling in the room was dead. "Next should be the boss room, I think," I said. "This should be a small portal, but don't underestimate the boss."

"We're not gonna loot?" Becky asked.

"What is there to loot?" I asked. "You want a dead bug as a souvenir?"

"No? But I wouldn't mind looking into that chest."

I blinked, then spun around to see what she was talking about. There was, indeed, a chest. It was half-buried in one of the watery pools. It looked like it was made of bugling carapaces, and it was covered in a fine layer of dust. Still, now that she'd pointed it out, I felt stupid for not having noticed it sooner.

"Well, damn," I said before I moved over. I helped Becky pull it out, grabbing one side while she pulled out the other. We forced the chest out and onto the floor, then I backed up a little as Becky figured out how to open it.

"Oooh," Becky said.

"What is it?" I asked.

"No clue."

I looked in, tilting one of my flashlights to see better, and I had to agree with her. I had no clue what I was looking at. There were three objects in the chest, each one separated from the others a little. They looked like they were made from the exoskeleton of some buglings, only these things were about the size of like a baseball?

I knelt down, then carefully picked one up. It was in a recess in the bottom of the chest, wood shaped to keep the thing in place.

An egg? Only no, that's clearly not what it was.

"May I?" Fran asked.

"Sure," I said as I passed it up to her. I brushed my hands clean on the front of my pants while Fran turned the thing this way and that.

"This is a bottle," Fran said. "See, there's a cork, here. It's organic, however." She shook it lightly, and it made a bit of noise, water or something sloshing about. "Definately half-full of something."

"Do we take them?" Becky asked.

Fran nodded. "Oh, yes. Potions are sometimes worth their weight in precious metals."

Stolen content alert: this content belongs on NovelBin. Report any occurrences.

"Really?" I asked.

"Of course. A magical solution to something? Just the potential of reverse-engineering something like that could be worth millions. It's how magical-energy replenishing drinks became possible, certain magical medicines, and treatments for several issues have arisen. There are entire corporations dedicated to producing and selling product that only exists because something useful was found in a portal." She shook the bottle for emphasis. "This could be that."

"So we could be rich?" Becky asked.

"Or it could be a potion with an effect that no one cares for, with a short shelf-life. Or one that has been reverse-engineered already. Or some other liquid that humanity has no use for? The chances of this being something good are slim."

Becky deflated. "Aw."

"I'll... buy these off of you? A thousand dollars each?"

"For each of us?" Becky asked.

"Sure," Fran said. "Three thousands to both of you."

I think Becky meant one thousand dollars for me and her, not one thousand per bottle, per person, but when I looked up and met her eyes, there was an instant flash of understanding. We weren't about to correct Fran when she was tossing that kind of money around.

That was two month's rent for me. I didn't know what it was for Becky (probably a dozen gacha pulls or something) but it was more money than I bet she saw most months.

I tucked the maybe-potion bottles in my backpack, wrapping them in a spare shirt to keep them safe and to stop them from shifting around too much, then I gestured forwards. "Shall we?"

We shall'd.

The door to the boss room was as I remembered. Becky and I prepared to kick it in while I gave instructions on how to handle the boss. Very simple instructions that involved 'overwhelming' and 'firepower' in roughly equal measure.

When the doorway came down, it only took us a moment to spot the boss, then I brought up my shotgun--the quieter of the options I had--while Fran opened up with a handgun and Becky started zapping.

The boss kind of just... exploded.

Very satisfying.

"More loot!" Becky cheered. She ran off to the chest, shoving it open and then she immediately started to play with the stuff within. Fran and I moved over, a little less curious.

"You two can keep the armour, I'm hanging this on my wall!" Becky said as she moved the shield around.

I looked at Fran, who shrugged.

"You might as well take them. Maybe there's something you can do? I don't really need leg armour, I don't think," I said.

"Very well, if you insist," Fran said. "Though... I suspect I can purchase batter."

"I mostly suspect that Jane would be upset that they don't fit the look," I admitted.

Hmm, was now a good time to onboard Becky? We had some things to talk about, and inside of a portal was one of the few reliably private places that existed. Where there were, technically, ways to get a signal in and out, it was the kind of thing that was so expensive and complicated that only the bigger, richer corps and the government ever bothered, and it wasn't subtle. So, unless one of my friends here was recording, this was quiet.

It was also a little... ambushy, to give someone a chat in a place like this.

"Alright, I think we're ready to head out. Becky... we need to have a chat, so don't just run off, alright?"

"Sure?"

The exit portal was up, so it was simple to hop through it, and return right back into the garage we'd started in. I pulled up my mask and slipped on some sunglasses again, just in case, which prompted the girls to do the same. "I... didn't plan on where to go for lunch, Becky," I admitted. "Anything that you want to try?"

"What's the budget?"

"I can call my car to the restaurant we met at, if you want to fetch your bike. Becky can ride with me," Fran said. "As for where to have lunch, I'm sure I can get us a reservation."

"Since I'm paying, maybe not somewhere with a triple-digit menu?"

Fran didn't roll her eyes, because she was too classy for that, but I did get the impression that she wanted to convey the same sort of emotion. "I don't only eat at Michelin Star restaurants, Deadline," she said.

"Fair, fair. Just somewhere quiet, then?"

"Quiet I can do."

***