"What's that sme-," Kali pondered out loud before coming to a realization, "Oh shit, the poison!" The slightly sweet smell of basil began to permit through the alley. Basil stood there, his sweat hidden because of his light purple fur. Green tinted wisps of gas formed in the air, surrounding everyone in the alley. Eodum looked around clearly alarmed by the development of the green gas.
Then, Kali's words dawned on the rat, "Wait, poison!?" Everyone sprinted out of the alley except for Basil, but it was too late. They had been breathing the smoke-like gas as it got thicker and thicker. Eodum itself wobble a bit on unsteady legs.
Eodum blinked a few times as colors filled its vision. It looked around at the brand new world that had come into view; rainbows of colors had spread over the bland, although still pleasant, surrounding. Eodum's eyes then came into focus on Kali. Her body had turned into a yellowish-gold color with holes going through her body. She looked just like… cheese.
As Eodum's eyes focused their piercing gaze on Kali, it felt itself salivating at the thought of eating all that delicious cheese. It still remembered the savory smoothness and mellow taste of that cheese it found in the alley in Seelf. In Nomed, it wanted to buy the cheese it found in the market, but it was far too expensive for something a newbie adventurer taking on two requests per day could afford. Even when it took over Nomed, it only dawned on the rat that it could grab the cheese when they were escaping, but it turned out that all the cheese had spoiled from no one looking after it.
Then there it was: the thing that plagued the Eodum's dreams. A food item that all rats deemed a delicacy. Delicious, savory, smooth, creamy cheese. Eodum felt its form shrink into its original body, readying for the hunt. Eodum's muscles all tensed in tension, and all at once it released the power stored in them. It pounced at breakneck speeds at Kali, jaws emanating gravity magic as they glowed a dull purple. As its maw closed in on the neck of the cheesy Kali, its soon to be meal disappeared from its trajectory.
Eodum landed a distance away from its prey. Its claws pulled up dust as it skidded to a stop on the empty, unpaved streets of Eman. Eodum's eyes scanned the area in front of it, looking for its lost meal, and finally, it focused on a figure on the ground. In the surrounding color-splattered world, Kali's shaking and scared figure was on the ground. While she wasn't affected by Basil's poison because of her dellich origins, the monster that plagued her nightmares stood there in front of her.
There it was, fur so dark she felt like she could fall into it, and she'd never reemerge. Eyes glowing white with no pupil, but still somehow focusing on her. The rope-like tail with a slightly barbed stinger at the very end of it. Its teeth were like small daggers lining its mouth, and its rough, somehow sharp tongue covered in saliva at her sight. It was this monster that made her retreat back to her hometown, and now it was the being that destroyed her home and friends. Now, it appears she was next.
Eodum felt itself tense up again, realizing that its prey was too nimble for it to stab with its tail. Instead, Eodum sprinted into the shadows and before anyone could realize it, Eodum's presence was gone. It felt like it had just disappeared. Then, Kali felt Eodum's presence appear behind her. She flipped around in response, but nothing was there. Out of the blue, a spray of crimson exploded from her stomach's left side, soon followed by immense pain.
A bloody, metallic explosion of red liquid came from her side as Eodum's gravity-enchanted teeth dug into her side. She could feel her internal organs get damaged. She collapsed to the ground as Eodum continued to dig into her side, blood and viscera were being splattered on the surroundings. A rib was crushed along with the side of her pancreas as Eodum continued its rampage in her side. Then, Eodum heard an echo in its mind.
[Due to raised Con and continual inflictions of poison, you have gained the skill: Poison Resistance]
Suddenly, the colors surrounding Eodum seemed to dim slightly as the flavor of mellow cheese disappeared, accompanied by the appearance of the flavor of meat and metal. Still a good taste, but considerably less so and quite surprising to the slightly dazed Eodum. It's mind was still hazy from the presence of poison, but it had regained some sense of control. With the reappearance of the rat's control, the jaws crushing on Kali's kidney disappeared. Eodum stumbled back, still out of it in a sea of dimmed colors.
Sheila held back on rushing to Kali's aid because of Eodum's drugged presence, but now that it was gone, she rushed in to heal Kali. Chant after chant of magic brought in the warm and soothing sense of skin, flesh, muscle, bone, and organs regenerating. The slowly closing wound stopped its fountaining of blood, and new blood filled Kali's veins. After she had been healed, she passed out from the pain and shock, and Sheila rushed over to Eodum. She quickly cured Eodum of the poison still plaguing its mind.
Eodum shook its head slightly, trying to knock itself out of its hazy daze. Its eyes settled down on the now healed figure of Kali, the slightly shocked Henry and Sheila, and a clearly traumatized Basil still oozing out gallons of hallucinogenic poison. Eodum calmly defended itself, "Sorry, I thought she was made of cheese." A moment of shock and confusion raced through Henry and Sheila's eyes before they narrowed to a judgemental stare. A sigh escaped their lips as Sheila went to calm down Basil.
"Wait, how come you're unaffected by the poison?" Eodum asked as it realized she was completely fine.
Sheila answered, "I'm undead, you can't poison a walking corpse."
Eodum looked over to Henry, "And you?"
"I'm a spirit, I'm made of fire," Henry cleared up, "Thank god that poison wasn't flammable."
Sheila walked over to the weeping Basil, "Hey, it'll all be alright, ok?"
"N-No, it w-won't," Basil managed through his sobbing, "S-Sis is hurt b-because of m-me."
Sheila put her hand on Basil's head, "It'll be alright, I already healed her. Don't blame yourself, I'm guessing you don't have much control over your poison?"
"N-No," Basil managed through another wave of weeping, "It c-comes out w-when-when I'm s-stressed."
"Then it's not your fault, it was a stressful situation," Sheila consoled Basil. Basil put his head to her shoulder and wrapped his arms around her for a hug. Even though she was a complete stranger and an undead, her presence was warm, calming, and like that of a caring caretaker. She turned her head slightly to face Eodum, "Well, now what? We traumatized a kid and you mauled Kali, what now?"
Eodum stayed silent for a second in thought, "We need to stay in this town. This town doesn't have any affiliations with any kingdoms or empires, so it's the perfect place to lie low. In addition, we can't have these two speaking about us, so we gotta keep an eye on them."
"Sure," Henry chimed in, "but how do we get these two back home. First off, Kali's going to be gone for a while, and the kid looks like he's on the edge of breaking. People are gonna ask questions, and they'll be hard to answer."
"We can say she got sick and suddenly collapsed, and that the kid was crying while distraught because of her sudden condition." Eodum suggested.
Sheila nodded as Basil kept crying into her shoulder, "Yeah, I think that'll work best. C'mon buddy, let's get you and your sister home. Could you lead us?"
Basil nodded and talked through another whimper, "Yeah, s-sure." With that, Eodum transformed back into its humanoid form. Sheila picked up the sleeping Kali and the party was led by Basil back to her house. Before the party left though, Henry froze the place where the incident had occurred. The ice covered the blood and damage, and when it melted it would wash everything away.
Basil kept leading Eodum and co, still leaking out a trace amount of poison, but Eodum managed to resist it because of the new [Poison Resistance]. The five finally found themselves at the door of a light wood house. The door swung open after a few knocks on the door. Laura and Freyr stood there for a moment before their eyes settled in shock at the sight of their unconscious daughter, and still crying son accompanied by the new strangers in town. Dellich rushed over to Basil and Luara went to the unconscious Kali on Sheila's back. Soon after, they both yelled out, "What happened!?"
"We'll explain." Eodum, Sheila, and Henry announced in unison.