Shea swore she was cursed by RNG. Even after her transformation gave her a head of white hair, it still wouldn’t get her smuggled into Europe.
She was only here to swipe a little stuff. Why did she run into a freak show?
These guys wrapped head to toe in tentacles—one look and you knew they weren’t normal!
She’d hidden her presence and melted into the dark. Yet the Cultists sniffed her out at once.
They didn’t seem to have eyes. They tracked by scent.
So the infiltration skills she was proud of did nothing against them.
She’d only made it down to the third floor and nabbed barely a few coins before the Cultists found her.
Now two Cultists chased her up and down, driving her wild. If not for her top-tier escape skills, she’d be caught already.
And if those pitch-black tentacles got her... she’d 100% end up a hentai heroine, right?
Clinging to the belief she must not get caught, Shea sprinted upstairs. If she jumped from that window, she’d be safe.
She vaulted the railing onto the fourth floor. Facing the two sluggish Cultists below, she couldn’t help a hint of provocation.
“Hey, you two seafood specials, think you can catch me?—oh, crap!”
The two Cultists shot two tentacles from under their ritual robes, grabbed the railing, and started hauling themselves up. Shea bolted, scared out of her wits.
“Octopuses should stay in water. On land, how are you gonna outrun a cat?”
Shea, brimming with confidence, ran back to the exit. She hadn’t scored many gold coins tonight, but at least she kept her life. Live to steal another day.
Time to bail!
But when she reached the window that should’ve been open, she froze.
The window was packed tight with clumps of fish corpses, wound together. Sharp spines bristled over them, leaving her nowhere to start.
She tried to edge past the spines and push the window. It didn’t budge.
“...”
Shea pulled her hand back, awkward. By then the doorway was already blocked by two members of the Tidal Cult. There was no escape, not even with wings.
“Uh... gentlemen, the moonlight’s so bright tonight. How about we open the window and admire it together?”
But through the other panes, the sky outside was overcast, like it might rain.
“Or give me a minute. I’ll pop the lock, and we can enjoy that beautiful moonlight. How’s that?”
The people of the Tidal Cult looked at her like she was an idiot. They had no intention of hearing her babble.
A mass of tentacles and bone spikes unfurled from their robes, sealing off every angle Shea could dodge to.
“Hey, hey?! If you won’t look, fine! Don’t pull knives, guns, or tentacles!”
Even so, their dense barrage still couldn’t touch a single hair on Shea.
She slipped through and tossed a smoke bomb to the floor. The acrid fog could mess with the Tide Cultists’ senses.
But the smoke wouldn’t last, and the room was too small. Shea knew she had to risk it.
She chanted a Starry Rank Exploding Spark in her heart and blasted one Cultist.
Boom!
The dull blast rolled through the room. One Cultist staggered, and Shea broke through their blockade. She slipped out into the hall.
The Cultist who took the full hit swayed, then stood again.
Through his tattered robe, she could clearly see semi-transparent, gel-wrapped viscera. It was nauseating.
And he looked unhurt. A normal person would be half-dead from that. It proved these Cultists could no longer be called human.
“Run, run!”
She vaulted the railing and dropped to the second-floor lobby.
The second floor wasn’t connected to the first. To reach the front door, she had to take the stairs down.
She tried the windows. The Cultists weren’t giving her the chance.
Slime and bone spikes sealed every window on the second floor. There was only one word for it.
Trapped—like fish in a barrel.
“I just came to scrounge a few coins. Why am I this unlucky?!”
She kept cursing as she ran.
Once she got out, she was absolutely calling the police. As a thief with a sense of justice, she had to drag evil into the light.
Assuming she got out, anyway.
The two Cultists caught up fast. They weren’t going to use the stairs.
With their modified bodies, a drop from a few floors wouldn’t even scratch them.
And the second floor was their home turf. Everything here was already corroded by sea air.
One gesture, and the floor and walls could turn into tentacles and bone spikes they controlled.
To the two Cultists, Shea jumping to the second floor was pretty much signing her death warrant.
“She has nowhere to run.”
One of them extended an arm covered in scales. As mana rippled in the air, tentacles and fish spines crawled across the walls and floor around them.
The bone spikes cut off routes, and the tentacles hounded her from behind.
If she got caught, the roster of hentai heroines would add one more name—Shea.
“There are so many cute sea creatures. Why do you people always pick tentacles!”
The thicket of spines grew denser by the second, making even running a struggle.
Most exits were sealed. Getting out was nearly impossible.
Fight back?
After one of them tanked her spell without a scratch, resisting would only make those tentacles more excited... right?
Roar!!
With no way up or down, something punched through the floor under Shea. A huge black mass of flesh appeared beneath her.
It was studded with human heads, clearly a monster assembled by some horrific ritual.
“What even is that?!”
Before she could run, its tentacles snagged her and reeled her in inch by inch. Looked like it was going to eat her alive.
Shea tried to break free, but their sizes weren’t even in the same league. Her strength was as futile as a bug trying to topple a tree.
“This is the pet offered to our Lord.”
The two Cultists on the second floor watched the black flesh-thing with satisfaction.
They didn’t spare Shea’s life a glance, even a bit relieved she hadn’t caused trouble.
“Next, offer the pet to our Lord...”
“Your pet is ugly.”
A new voice sounded behind the two Cultists.
It was Abel, who’d already taken care of the Cultists on the first floor.
He hadn’t expected the fusion array to be set in the first-floor ceiling, or two more Cultists to be here.
