Chapter 59 – Crazy

With Mero in the lead, the pair made their way down the nearest set of stairs, quickly winding down to the first floor, before creeping over to the front door to check outside; Seeing the way clear, as the mobs that were there previously were likely still following the shouts and clamor of Eron that were fading into the distance, they darted out, sprinting across the cracked and broken road littered with odd looking carriages...

Passing close to one, Cam was tempted to take a closer look- the thing was unlike anything he had ever seen! Glass windows on all sides- and even one on top! - and the odd looking black wheels... to say nothing of the fact that there didn't appear to be any sort of harness for a draft animal, or even handles meant for servants to pull or push the contraption... he had no idea how it was supposed to move. And he was curious.

But now wasn't the time to indulge in his curiosity, and he knew it.

Moving past the odd carriages, Cam and Mero hurriedly crossed the street and rushed into the next building- but their sudden flight didn't stop there; Moving through the building, they searched for a back exit, or even a window they could easily climb through, before checking to be sure the area was clear of mobs and moving on, trying to get further from the initial site of the disturbance...

Across narrow alleys and wide, open streets, past more of the strange carriages and through buildings, the pair didn't stop moving until they finally came to a street where the monsters where roaming as normal- or what they assumed was normal for the mobs, considering their still limited information on the floor...

Backing away from the still closed door, the pair cautiously made their way up several floors to hopefully avoid packs of hellhounds roaming close- though, Cam realized, given the mobs Scent Tracking Ability, avoiding their notice would be a lot harder than just hiding- before searching for an interior room to hunker down in, not wanting to risk imps spotting them through a window... or the random chances that a flight of them just happened to wander through said window...

Thankfully, while Cam didn't know what purpose this building had supposedly served- from the number of chairs and desks, and the lack of beds, he assumed it was some sort of workspace- there were a few interior rooms; The one they found was... another oddity to him: though dirty, the tiles covering the floor and walls was once white, and the room held several of those odd, stone chamber pots he had seen in the safe room at the start, as well as multiple sinks with mirrors hung over them... Though the lack of showers confused him.

Was it a bathroom? If so, why so many chamber pots but no showers? Maybe it lacked showers because people had only worked in the building? Or was it just more Tower bullshit?

"Are you going to summon Eron again or what?"

Shaking his head, both to rid himself of the pointless thoughts about a random room in the Tower and in answer to Mero's question, Cam sighed as he leaned against the wall. "Not yet. We Leveled from all that craziness, so I want to distribute Stats first... and, speaking of, I need to subsume and resummon you so you get the increased Stats, too."

"Do you think you can summon me back first? I want to see if I can get the better Stats this time!"

"I... don't think I really choose which of you I summon... Do I?" Cam asked, more to himself than to answer her question; He hadn't really considered if he could pick which of his clones to summon first, or which got the higher Stats... But that also went right back to their divergent personalities! Was there something off in his head, and he had multiple personalities just floating around in there, waiting for their own clone body? Or did his subconscious just kind of... create their personalities as a way to help combat the loneliness and isolation of climbing solo?

Neither options sounded... healthy...

Sighing softly, he knew this wasn't the time to be worrying over his mental state; He was on the Tenth Floor- an Anomalous Floor, no less-, and currently hiding from a massive number of monsters... that really only amounted to a fraction of the enemies on the Floor!

Running a hand over his face, he forced away the uncomfortable thoughts and glanced at his Stats; With all of them being at 35, except for Vitality, which had gotten an the extra point with his last Level, he liked where he was sitting with his balanced build. If anything, he had never felt better!

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Well, except for the bit of worrying that he was going crazy...

Shrugging, he quickly distributed his Stats: Two into everything, to keep them even, and his final Free Stat... into Agility, figuring that the little extra speed and flexibility would be important with how much they were already having to scramble to dodge mass waves of monsters...

Taking a second to appreciate his Stats, he smiled to himself; Sure, he couldn't match up to Epic or Legendary Classers in their primary Stats... but he wasn't trying to match their specializations! His Class gave him too many options for that!

And specialization also meant glaring weaknesses. Mages would be slower, and squishier. Bruisers wouldn't have as much mana. Tanks wouldn't do as much damage... Of course, spreading himself out like that had weaknesses of its own, but he could live with that.

Well, assuming this crazy ass Floor didn't kill him first.

"Ok, I'm statted up. You ready?"

"Sure." Mero shrugged, quickly setting aside her gear so she could be subsumed- and both of them grimaced at the same time as they once more thought about the extra difficulty that came with having to equip his clones... and not having enough space to store all of that gear. "Try summoning me first, ok? I really want to rub it in Eron's face if I get the higher Stats!"

"If you insist..." Cam smiled wryly at having his own clones acting like they did- but, if they were fragments of his own personality, what did that say about him? Shaking his head, he quickly subsumed his clone and tried to resummon her- which, surprisingly, worked. But...

"Damn..."

"Well, I guess it's set or something." He shrugged, not really caring that much which of his clones got the better Stats... or even wanting to think about the whole thing much anymore; Things were crazy enough without adding on worries over his weird personality issues...

"The sacrificial lamb returns!" Eron exclaimed the instant he was summoned, arms thrown wide dramatically... Until Mero smacked him in the stomach.

"Stop being an idiot and get your armor back on! We're still on the Tenth Floor, remember?" She hissed, already working on her own armor- though she did pause, head tilted in thought for a second. "Where did that phrase come from, anyway? And why would anyone want to sacrifice a lamb?"

"Let's just... not dive into questions we don't have answers for, ok?" Cam asked, rolling his eyes at his clones- was he really this scatter brained? Or was it something unique to his clones... but that thought raised even more questions in his mind. "We have enough problems as it is, what with trying to figure out how to deal with constant waves of mobs coming at us every time we fight..."

"So... how are we going to deal with this?"

"Guerrilla tactics?"

"You ever wonder where that phrase-"

"Don't start, Eron! Cam already said for us to focus!" Mero cut off the other clone to finish her point. "Guerrilla tactics could work. Kill a couple mobs, then quickly move to somewhere else. Maybe bounce around between a few areas, giving them time to settle down again before we hit the same area... Then rinse and repeat until we have a block or two completely clear?"

"Yeah, that could work..." Cam nodded thoughtfully, the back and forth with his clones helping to calm him- even Eron's mischief and joking was reassuring, in its own way.

"You two are forgetting something- ok, technically, I'm sure the idea is lurking somewhere in your brains, seeing as I thought of it..." Eron added with a smug grin- causing them both to roll their eyes at him. "But we have Mimicry!"

"The imps and hellhounds are too small for us to change into..." Cam said slowly as a plan started to form in his mind- and a small part of him couldn't help but wonder how his clone had hit on that before him...

"But there's plenty of other stuff we could change into." Mero added with a grin. "We hit a group, run off... and, as soon as we're out of sight, we switch to something the mobs wouldn't look twice at!"

"You know, I was thinking that having our armor and weapons be part of the change was a bit of a downside, since we can't use them while we mimic something..." Eron threw out, looking thoughtful. "But it's also kind of handy. Since we won't have to drop or store everything when we use the Ability, we'll still have everything at hand when we change back... And we can even use that to ambush mobs!"

"Ok, so we have a new plan." Cam agreed with his clone, liking the idea. "We just need to figure out what sort of stuff we can change into that will blend in..."

"Let's take a short break here to rest after the craziness, then we'll get to it."