"As far as I can tell," Emerald said, "the Ancients had neither a numeral for zero, nor really a concept of zero as a number."

"Trippy," Mercury said. "I guess that's why there's no summon monster cantrips."

Emerald closed her eyes. "Sure. Why not. Between the rats, Netpedia'ing Ancient numerals, and waiting for you and Roman to convince Cinder that you didn't have any spells that could heal her, I think we've wasted enough time. So we can—"

"Are there any good doctors in town?" Cinder asked.

Emerald buried her head in her hands. "I swear, if I thought any one of you would make a half-decent DM, I'd give you the screen."

"I'd be pretty good," Mercury said.

"No," Emerald said.

"Okay, that one game with all the sprites was bad, but seriously, it's been years!" Mercury turned to Roman. "Come on, you think eight years is enough time to forgive one incident, right?"

"Not without knowing the incident."

"Adam? Cinder?"

"Probably," Adam said.

"No," Cinder said.

"You're saying that just to be contrary, aren't you?" Mercury asked.

Cinder grinned. "How's it feel, being on the receiving end?"

"Knock it off," Emerald said. "If this campaign implodes, I'll see if Adam or Roman feel up to the task. Or maybe have Adam comb the Fang for nerds. Until then, I'm DMing. So try not to drive me crazy."

There was silence at the table for but a moment.

"So...doctors?"

"It's a fucking fantasy setting!" Emerald said. "There are no doctors!"

"There are clerics, though," Mercury said. "We can pay them to cure diseases."

"Then let's do it," Cinder said.

"Oh no," Emerald muttered.

"Isn't that expensive?" Roman asked. "Especially for two? And yes, we're getting one for the troll if we're getting one for the wizard who'll probably set the druid on fire."

"I have set a party member on fire once!" Cinder said.

"That should be a rule," Mercury muttered.

Roman raised an eyebrow. "You have rules against calling magic missile 'mindfray,' using a picture of someone's ex as a backup weapon, and adding 'kill Fall, sorry Fall' to plans, but not setting characters on fire?"

"We only have rules against things people actually did," Mercury said.

"Incidentally," Roman said, "what's with one-twenty-four?"

"It's a reference," Emerald said with a sigh. "So. You want to get some diseases removed."

"Of course," Cinder said.

"One problem," Roman said.

"Yeah, you said it," Mercury said. "It's expensive. Since you need a fifth-level caster to cast it—not sure if they'd have one in this little town—it's gonna be a hundred fifty gold. Each."

"You are not going on another sidequest to get the money to pay for their cures," Emerald said.

"Of course not," Mercury said.

"Then—"

"We're going on a sidequest for the church. If we pull it off well, we might be rewarded with free heals and cheap holy water."

Emerald groaned again. "All against?"

Cinder raised her hand. Neo considered it, then tentatively raised hers as well.

"It sounds like a good idea," Roman said. "Free healing?"

"Indeed," Adam said. "Although I'd like to see if we could convince them to heal us so we can go on our current quest, first."

"Yes!" Emerald said. "Thank you! They do that! You're healed!"

"Shouldn't diseases have some impact?" Mercury said.

"Fuck off," Emerald mumbled. "Not another fucking sidequest. You help out at the temple for a day."

"Should we roleplay—"

"For once, no. We wasted enough time with the dustdamn rats. We're getting back on fucking track."

There was a pause.

"Wizard's house?" Adam said.

"That's the plan," Roman replied.

"Right," Emerald said. "You spend, what did I say, two and a half days travelling there."

"Random encounters?" Mercury asked.

"The rats were enough for me," Emerald said.

"Come on," Mercury said. "It's in the books. How can you have travel through the wilderness without at least a chance of random encounters?"

"No. You're with the wizard. Talk."

"Um...Delilah says hi," Cinder said. "And she asks about seeing the wizard's spellbooks."

"He laughs at her," Emerald said. "He then orders his apprentice to keep an eye on her."

"Is the apprentice male?" Cinder asked.

"Sure."

"I will use my feminine wiles to convince him to let me see his master's spellbooks."

Emerald sighed. "First off, he doesn't have unrestricted access to his master's spellbooks."

"I will use my feminine wiles to convince him to let me see his spellbooks."

"Yeah, about that...'feminine wiles'?"

"I'm seducing him," Cinder said, as if talking to a small child...about seducing apprentice wizards to convince them to reveal their spellbooks.

Emerald sighed. "Charisma check." Neo covered her ears.

"I only have a Charisma of eight," Cinder said. "Could I use my Intelligence? It seems like that would turn a wizard on more."

"That's it, I'm gone." Mercury left the table. "Call me when Cinder's done playing femme fatale. And let me know how much she sucked at being a succubus."

Adam nodded and followed him.

Roman just smiled. "I want to see this first-hand, actually."

"...Can I use Intelligence?" Cinder asked.

"You can properly leverage your intellect with a Charisma check," Emerald said. "I'm pretty sure no one's nerdy enough to...I can't believe I'm talking about this in a game."

"No, no," Roman said. "Please, continue."

Emerald groaned. "You're worse than Marigold and Mercury combined, Cinder."

"I never wanted to combine with Mary!" Mercury shouted from across the room.

"I thought you weren't listening, Mercury?" Emerald shouted back. "Anyways...no one gets turned on by reciting trivia, you still need Charisma. And you lack it."

"And your character isn't much better!" Mercury shouted.

"Shut up or get back to the table!" Emerald shouted.

"Fine," Cinder said. "Fifteen."

"And with your Charisma modifier?" Emerald asked.

"...Fourteen."

"And now I'll roll an opposed Wisdom roll," Emerald said. "He's not an idiot, so I'll give him a thirteen in Wisdom, and a circumstance bonus for having something to lose. Eleven plus three is fourteen, enough to—"

"I'll do a you-show-me-yours-I'll-show-you-mine thing," Cinder said. "With the spellbooks."

"...Damn you all," Emerald said.

"Accept it and fade to black!" Adam bellowed. "Think of the role-playing possibilities!"

"That's what she said!" Mercury shouted.

Emerald rubbed her temples. "Why do I put up with this nonsense? Fine. Delilah seduces the apprentice, who I need to stat up, and they look at each others' spellbooks."

"Next time, play a sorcerer!" Mercury shouted. "They have high Charisma!"

"Not fucking helping!" Emerald said.

"It sounds like I'm helping with the—"

Emerald threw a bottle of bluish-white Dust at Mercury. She apparently critted, since the bottle hit him in the head, covering it with ice. Mercury flailed his arms and fell over. Adam dragged him to a wall.

"That was a waste of Dust," Cinder scolded.

"Worth it," Emerald said, watching Adam smash Mercury's ice-covered head against the wall to break the icy covering before he suffocated.

A minute later, a shivering Mercury, coughing up flakes of ice and with shards of it stuck in his hair, came to the table. "New rule," he said. "No throwing Dust." He coughed again. "It's bad for my health."

"I dunno, Merc," Emerald said with a grin. "I think it was pretty funny."

Mercury started coughing. Adam got up to hit him on the back, knocking a chunk of ice out of his mouth. Without warning, Adam then smashed Emerald's face into the table.

"What the fuck?" Emerald said.

"Ha," Adam said flatly. "I hit your head against the table, just like I did with Mercury." He sat down. "You know what would make this even funnier? Ice cubes in your lungs."

The impact of Adam's statement was dampened only slightly by Neo falling out of her chair, laughing.

"...I'm sorry, Merc," Emerald said. "Just...try to be a little more...non-provocatory? Especially when I'm already…"

"Provoked?" Mercury suggested.

"Yeah. It's been a nasty few days of work, and then the adventure gets derailed by Rat Quest and Cinder fucking the fucking apprentice…" Emerald sighed.

"Soda?" Mercury asked, handing one to Emerald. She took it wordlessly.

"I'm normally good at not making people explode on me," Mercury said. "Especially people with Dust. But I'm not used to other people making it worse...Cinder."

"Don't go blaming it on me," Cinder said.

"Hey, I know it's my own actions. Actions I wouldn't have taken if you hadn't thrown off my calibrations, but my own actions nonetheless."

"Calibrations?" Roman asked.

"Yeah. I've got an internal annoy-o-meter, it normally stops me before I go too far. But Cinder threw it off." Mercury coughed. "It's like Grant is with Scrolls."

"Who's Grant?" Cinder asked.

"Shush. Hey, Em, remember that time Grant accidentally called the police while trying to find the store's schematics?"

Emerald snorted. "Oh, we gave him hell for that. Damn funny a week later, though."

Mercury coughed some more.

"Can't imagine someone that terrible with tech would last long," Roman said.

"We joked that Grant screwed up the cops' cars, and their guns if they tried to shoot him," Mercury said.

"Come to think of it," Emerald said, "did Grant ever get shot? Badly, I mean."

Mercury coughed and spat out a chunk of ice. "Not when we were working with him, I don't think."

"Lucky bastard," Roman said. "How much longer will you be going down memory lane?"

"I'm good," Emerald said. "Yeah, sorry about the Dust. I just…"

"Lost your temper," Mercury finished. "Look, it happens—" Mercury coughed several times. "It doesn't always happen this bad, but you didn't mean it to. Hell, I'd rather put up with the occasional outburst like this and normal Em the rest of the time than normal Cinder all the time."

"I'm sitting right next to you, you know."

"I promise to be more careful if you do," Mercury said.

Emerald smiled. "It's a deal."

"Great," Cinder said. "You've kissed and made up. Now, this apprentice…"

"Not now," Emerald said. "We can discuss it after we've figured out the deal with the wizard, and—" She paused as Mercury coughed loudly. "And after I've figured out the apprentice's spells. And level. And where you're getting the ink."

"Ink?" Cinder said.

"You'll have a few minutes right now," Mercury said. "I could really go for a hot drink right now. Adam, want to make tea?"

"I'll help," Emerald said.

Roman watched the three of them leave. "Neo, do you think we'll ever make it twenty minutes without something happening?"

Neo shook her head.

"Me neither. Maybe we should try to find a less drama-ridden group?"

Neo shook her head. "Ppcn?"

"We've got a little, yeah."