The bar was a dive called "The Listing Ship," nestled in a district made of stacked shipping containers and leaking pipes. The air smelled of rancid beer and wet rust. The team sat in a booth, a single flickering magic candle illuminating their faces. The silence was heavy, broken only by the drip, drip of some blue fluid from the ceiling onto Nana's shoulder.
"I hate this place," Nana grumbled, not even looking up.
Kurok dipped a finger into a puddle of beer on the table. The brown, murky liquid instantly transformed into a thick, white foam, scented like vanilla. He tasted it. "Not bad. A bit bitter. Like your commentary."
Suddenly, the bar's door exploded. Not broken—devoured. The wooden planks were reduced to a shower of wood chips that turned into bacon crisps as they fell.
Framed in the doorway stood the Gutter King who had given them the beer. His coat of greasy rags was torn. Behind him, a dozen of his men, armed with modified tools and rusty guns, aimed their weapons.
"The arm," growled the Gutter King, his voice distorted by his gas mask. He pointed a finger at Kurok. "You owe me an arm."
Kael raised an eyebrow. "We drank the beer. The terms were unclear."
The Gutter King fired a gun that launched not a bullet, but a net made of dried, yet still pulsating, purple intestines. The net flew towards them, aiming for Kurok.
Nana was on her feet in an instant. Her blades didn't cut the net; they shredded it. Chunks of slimy, violet entrails flew in all directions, splattering against the walls with wet, slapping sounds. One piece landed in the mug of a patron at the back of the room. The man looked at it, shrugged, and swallowed it.
"I like the crunch," the man said simply.
The fight erupted. It was a ballet of raw, back-alley violence. A thug threw a rusty wrench. Kurok caught it mid-air. The wrench transformed into a steaming hot dog in his hand. He threw it like a shuriken. It embedded itself in the thug's shoulder, who screamed, not in pain, but in rage, before tearing it out and taking a bite, mustard spurting from the wound.
"My sausage!" Kurok protested, seeming more annoyed by the theft than the attack.
Nana was in the heart of the fray. She didn't dodge; she countered with brutal precision. She grabbed an attacker's arm, made a sharp twisting motion, and the crack of the breaking bone was drowned out by the sound of a slot machine spitting out coins at the other end of the bar. She shoved him, and he fell backward into a barrel of magical waste, which immediately began nibbling on him.
Meanwhile, the leader, the Gutter King, charged straight at Kurok, ignoring everything else. He brandished a circular saw made of teeth from various creatures welded together.
Kurok smiled. "You're hungry? I can sense it."
He didn't even raise his hand. He just looked at the saw coming for him.
At the last moment, the circular saw... died. The teeth softened, became mushy, then transformed into a whirlwind of al dente spaghetti that wrapped around the Gutter King's arm. The man stared, dumbfounded, his weapon now a giant, impotent dinner accessory.
Kurok stepped closer, plunged his hand into the mass of pasta, and pulled out the saw's motor, now a cooked, steaming meatball.
"Here's your arm," Kurok said, stuffing the meatball into the man's coat pocket. "Now we're even? I was trying to relax."
The Gutter King looked at the meatball in his pocket, then at the spaghetti around his arm, then at his routed crew. He grunted, turned on his heels, and left without a word, dragging his spaghetti behind him.
Silence returned to the bar, heavier than before. The patron at the back burped loudly.
Kurok sat back down and picked up his foamy beer.
"Where were we?" he asked no one in particular. "Ah, yes. I hate this place."
End of Chapter 11.