"Stop chasing me already, you stupid monkeys!!" - Garami

  *Boom, boom, bada-boom!!*

  "You forgot to mention not to throw their bombs!" - Bloom

  "I'm starting to doubt that they even care." - Garami

  The fight against the "Lesser Child Nues" went in my favor...if it had been a one-on-one. But this feels like 100-on-one, so it was about time to skedaddle outta here. I saw Noire after I exited the building, still chasing the rat in the bottle, but joining her would just lead to her getting bombarded and burned. Literally.

  The two last Glashtyns were after her as well, and Lily was following them again. Her stamina must have reached a low-time low. And yet Noire is still running at full speed. What?

  I had Bloom go and tell Lily to take cover somewhere and recover, as I hopefully would have shaken off the monkey army by then. And as one could guess, I overestimated my fleeing abilities.

  "*Monkey scream*!!"

  "Aw, shut it!" - Garami

  I fired a Darkness Trick Bullet in the jumping monkey's face and continued unfazed. When is this going to end?

  "Master!" shouted Bloom after poofing back to my side. "I think I have an idea!" - Bloom

  "Great! I'm open to anything at this point!" - Garami

  "Make the Nues and the Glashtyns fight each other!" - Bloom

  "They're on the same side! Both of them are part of the Hidden Hideout's monster forces!" - Garami

  "No, you would think that, but the Nue species are youkais. They do not spawn in fae-based habitats! They are an invading species, not a local one that the Thermopylae Hidden Hideout can bring into its ranks!" - Bloom

  "Are you serious?! Wait, there's no time. We'll just go and test that theory out right away!" - Garami

  I jumped down from the roof and ran towards the Glashtyns. The monkeys stayed on the roof to throw their poop bombs at me. Smart move on the monkeys' side, I have to give them that. Dodging the bombs got a tad more difficult now that they came from above me, but still not TOO difficult. I wouldn't mind if they lowered the difficulty to easy-mode, but beggars can't be choosers.

  When I caught up to the Glashtyns, the horse-faced goblins tried to smash me with their clubs. I ducked down into a sliding dodge and went underneath them and their boink-sticks. A smooth dodge, if I have to say so myself. And the monkeys were still throwing their bombs. Which landed right in the faces of the two Glashtyns.

  A moment of silence, excluding the cartoon-like chase between the rat-in-the-bottle and Noire, fell. Then, a second later, the Glashtyns roared and redirected their killing intent on the monkeys. Yeah, I would have done the same should anyone throw exploding poop at me.

  One of the Glashtyns threw their club at the monkeys on the roof and smashed several of them to pulp. That got the monkeys agitated enough that they too changed their aggro, leaving me in peace and started throwing their bombs at the Glashtyns.

  "Wow, that idea really worked..." - Bloom

  "Please don't tell me the odds for that victory. I'm scared to know." - Garami

  While the monkeys and the horses were busy messing around, I caught up to Noire. She still had the vial of that blue anti-Changeling powder in her pocket, so I grabbed her by her neck like the catgirl angel she currently is, threw the contents of the vial in her face, and finally put an end to this stupid comedy show.

  "*Cough, cough*, what is the big idea!? And where is this?" - Noire

  "You don't remember going all feral?" - Garami

  "Who are you calling a Feral!?" - Noire

  Whoops, forgot about those Ferals with a capital F. Yeah, that was my bad.

  "Master, the Church of Chaos goon is fleeing!" shouted Bloom, warning us about the rat who was too busy escaping that he had yet to realize that Noire wasn't after him any longer.

  "Just let him! We're in shambles here." - Garami

  All this fighting and fleeing has taken its toll on both my SP and my MP. Seeing the latter being less than 10% is a feeling I haven't had in a long while. Noire is even worse, as the adrenaline from the cat genes or whatever has made her fall to the ground. I doubt she even has the strength to walk. And then there's Lily...

  "We're retreating. The real strike force can handle the rest. Bloom, lead me to where Lily-*CRASH*-?! What now!?" - Garami

  A loud sound came from the direction of the strange tower that the Bloody Glashtyn was in. When I looked in the direction, after taking off my blindfold because we were a good distance away from it, I saw the silhouette of the tower falling apart. And as if following its steps, the buildings around us, starting with those closest to the tower, started to follow suit.

  "Bloom! Go to Lily and have her get away from any buildings!" I shouted at Lily before picking up Noire and escaping to a more open space. And as I predicted, the wave of destruction reached even to this place. The Glashtyns were safe due to them being on the ground, but the damn monkeys were swallowed by the collapsing houses, which did cause some extra explosions.

  Honestly, being surrounded by a bunch of buildings that suddenly dismantled themselves in front of our eyes, as if someone had decided to remove all the screws and nails that held them together, was a scarier experience than you would have imagined. And I thought the idea was plenty frightening from the start!

  "*Cough, cough*, Boss? Where are you..." sounded a voice from a nearby dustcloud. Great, we found Lily.

  After we regrouped, we waited till the rest of the dust stopped being in our faces. And when that happened, we saw that we were now surrounded by ruins. All of that fancy hot spring district is in shambles, and some of the materials are even disintegrating into aether or magic power or whatever you wanna call it. And the source of the destruction, aka the weird tower? Completely gone. That Alchemists' Union guy I met before must have a finger in this.

  While we were relatively safe, the monkeys were all but annihilated. The few remaining primates fled for their lives, running towards the forests. Good riddance. As for the Glashtyns, they were in one piece. I was afraid we were in for another battle, but they only glanced at us before leaving us. I think they're walking towards where I webbed the other Glashtyns. And knowing how tough those numbskulls are, they might still be alive even after getting a house or three on top of their skulls.

  Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

  "Let's get the f**k outta here before they get back!" - Garami

  "Yes, Boss!" - Lily

  "When did you two get so close...?" - Noire

  Let's tell her that later and skedaddle-!

  "And now what?!" - Garami

  "Boss, do you see that too?" - Lily

  "I am too tired to even care..." - Noire

  It seems everyone got this System Message. If I had to guess from its name, the Chaos Church seems to have done something that prevents you from obtaining titles while in certain locations on the continent...? And the tower from before was part of the problem...I guess? If that's true, then damn! I should have destroyed it then. The quest rewards must have been massive.

  Speaking of rewards, holy molly! That's a lot of stuff!

  "B-b-b-b-boss! Something weird just popped up!" - Lily

  "Woooow. That is a lot." - Noire

  Please show some more enthusiasm for this, okay? But man, were there so many missing titles from my title list? Now I sorta understand why the Chaos Church didn't want people getting skills. Not only the skills (and sometimes AP), but the titles themselves sometimes have effects of their own.

  If the Chaos Church somehow managed to make other people lose out on several titles, but the Chaos Church itself was excluded from this anti-title barrier or whatever, then the gap between the Chaos Church and other people would grow. Still, how did they gain the knowledge to do that? Rather, how is it that they were allowed to mess with the freaking World System without getting hit by divine punishment or whatever?

  "Now I see where the Church of Chaos' sudden interest in architecture came from." - Noire

  "Sudden interest?" - Garami

  "Right, you were not from Solomar. Starting a few years back, the Chaos Church suddenly started building weird constructs. People thought that was fine, better than having them secretly kidnap homeless or whatever, so they did not think too much about it." - Noire

  "Hey, I know about that! Once, they tried to build a big tower, but it fell on top of itself all on its own! Many people got a good laugh at that back home!" - Lily

  Right, these two are both from Solomar, where the Chaos Church has its headquarters. And the part about them building a tower is something I can't ignore. Noire, despite her exhaustion, seemed to notice my interest in Lily's words and gave a follow-up.

  "Speaking of buildings, Filyn's company often went and took down 'dangerously constructed buildings' in Velantas. At least before I left them." - Noire

  "Okay, that's sus as hell." - Garami

  Was Filyn's group trying to complete this "System Disrupter" quest on her own? Hold on, "quest"? Maybe...maybe the Chaos Church was working for someone on the "management side" of the World System? That would explain how they were able to do all of this and not get punished for it.

  Regardless, we should still leave before the Glashtyns decide they do want a piece of us for revenge. I've had my share of buff horse faes for one day. Yikes...

  Foul Eater]