Entering the Lollipop.

We stopped at the DJ stand and made our way to the back corner where the team was sitting. I eyed the newcomer.

This was the fleshmancer that Elle and Imani had hired. The tall, gaunt mage sat rigid, sandwiched between Louis and Linus, Elle’s fan. Louis had a cookie from a street vendor and was devouring it, getting crumbs everywhere.

The fleshmancer held a cappuccino in a slender hand. The man looked down with disdain at his blue flowing robes, which were now covered with crumbs. He was sitting ramrod straight, and he flicked the crumbs away as Louis, oblivious, continued to happily munch while Linus stared with puppy dog eyes at Elle.

I examined the newcomer.

Grigori the Placid. Human. Level 93 Fleshmancer.

This is a hired mercenary of Team Meadow Lark.

This Mercenary worships Gula.

Gula was a new one, and I filed that away.

The thin, poised man looked absolutely out of place between Louis and Linus.

Linus’s shirt had changed from a naked picture of Elle to one with a moving, all-over print of an extreme close-up of Elle’s screaming face as she was casting Ice Bolt or a similar spell. The flashing caption underneath read, “Right in the keister!”

I’d asked Imani and Elle to bring the fleshmancer because we wanted to get this guy to talk to both Corcundas. Elle said the guy had a stick up his ass, but he clearly knew what he was doing, and he and Imani had been trading healing tips while he’d been sequestered in their safe room.

As we approached the back of the bar, Donut took one look at the guy and let out a harrumph.

Donut: HOW ARE WE GOING TO GET HIM INTO THE GUILD? HE DOESN’T LOOK LIKE SOMEONE WHO CAN SING!

Carl: No, probably not. We just need to make sure YOU get in there so you can charm his pants off and get Porky to come out.

Donut: YOU STILL HAVEN’T TOLD ME THE FULL PLAN. WE DON’T KNOW WHY THIS IS SO IMPORTANT ALL OF A SUDDEN.

Carl: I know. I’m sorry. I know you’re scared. I wish I could tell you everything. I don’t take the trust you have in me lightly, and I need you to trust me on this one. I will explain it all after it’s too late for them to take the prize away.

Donut: WHAT DOES THAT EVEN MEAN? WE’RE SUPPOSED TO BE PARTNERS IN THIS, AND YOU’RE MAKING ME NERVOUS. THE PRIZE IS, WE CAN BRING TWO PEOPLE WE WANT TO THE ELEVENTH FLOOR. ELLE THINKS YOU MEAN THE PRIME MINISTER LADY AND MAYBE CASCADIA OR SOME OTHER SHOWRUNNER, BUT SHE’S AFRAID THAT KILLING THEM ISN’T GOING TO DO ANYTHING. AND I DON’T THINK WE SHOULD HURT PRIME MINISTER VICTORY. I KNOW SHE’S A BAD GUY, BUT SHE’S ALSO MY FRIEND, AND I’M SCARED ABOUT WHAT YOU’RE GOING TO DO.

I reached up and scratched Donut.

“I know you’re scared,” I repeated, this time out loud. “I’m scared, too. But all will be clear if we can just get through this next part. It’s all important now. The pig, this quest, and the war mage plan—all three will help us survive. All of us.”

Onstage was the karaoke regular Dekoki the kappa from team Yokai. Her team was right there, front and center, cheering her on. The Minister of Blood-Letting was also there, dancing with his skeletons behind him.

Dekoki was singing “Cruel Summer” by Bananarama. I paused, watching them all, remembering that instant when Finley had been mowed down.

They are all the main characters in their own story.

The cruelty of this particular floor was getting to me. I sighed and turned to the main part of the table, finally taking in the full scene. Before we dealt with this Corcunda quest, we had an even more pressing matter.

Tran and Zhang sat at the end of the table, flanked by Imani and Elle. Tran was in his spider wheelchair, nursing a beer, while Zhang had his head down on the table. I knew Elle had been trying to talk to Na, but that clearly hadn’t worked.

“Did you put your song in?” Imani asked as I slid into a chair. Donut jumped to the table and gave Zhang a headbutt.

“We did,” I said. “Prepotente is up there now arguing with the DJ. He’s going to try to get in, too.”

“Hi, Donut,” Zhang said, reaching up and giving her a pat without looking up.

“What have we decided?” I asked, looking at the sour faces all around.

“Hey, Carl,” Tran said, sounding morose. “We were just explaining to Zhang that he’s being an idiot.”

Zhang finally looked up, eyes rimmed red. “It’s the only way. Rezan. Sammi Harrison. Ming Lui.” He reached up and touched the side of his face. “Soo-bin kissed my cheek before that last heat. She said she trusted me. They’re all dead now.”

“Like I told you,” Tran said, clearly doing his best to sound patient, “this is not your fault. And it’s not all Na’s fault, either. They attacked her. Rezan was an ass. And the decapitator had it coming. Never trusted her.”

Zhang shook his head. “They attacked us because Na’s gone completely psycho. There’s nothing left. She died when her brother did. I thought maybe I would be enough, but I’m not.”

“She didn’t get player-killer skulls,” Tran said. “It’s those dreads of hers. They all killed each other.”

“It was horrible,” Zhang said. “I can’t do that again. I can’t do another race with her.”

“Wait,” I said, raising a hand. “What do you mean, ‘It’s the only way’? What are you planning?”

Zhang wiped his nose. “Na is in lead saddle for the next race. I’m going to kill Torpedo when her back is turned. It’s the only way. I’m not strong enough to stop her, and if any others try to, they will die, too. But with Torpedo dead, the system will kill her. It’ll kill us both.”

Torpedo was the name of their mount. The octopus.

“No,” Donut said. “No, you can’t.”

“That won’t work anyway,” I said. “Not anymore. You just lose your containment. Na is strong enough to get to the finish line without a mount. But you’re not.”

He shook his head. “What else can I do?”

“No,” Donut repeated. She looked at me, eyes shining. “We’ll find something to fix it. Right, Carl?”

“She’s killing people,” Zhang said. “She’s stopped talking to me. She got poisoned, and it’s slowly draining her health, but it’s not going down fast enough. She’s not who she used to be.”

Tears streamed down his face. He met my eyes, and he ripped the target capeoff. He threw it on the table. “I wish I had died before. In the temple. I was scared, but I wasn’t ashamed. Now I am ashamed. I wish I’d never gotten this far. I wish Jun was here. Why? Why was it him and not me?” He started to quietly cry again. “I promised him I’d watch over her, and I can’t even do that. What sort of friend have I been?”

“Oh, Zhang,” Donut said, rubbing back and forth against him.

“There’s gotta be a way,” I said. “We need ideas.”

“That’s what we’ve been doing,” Imani said. She sounded grim. “We’ve been workshopping ways to fix this.”

Zhang wiped his eyes and then the words just tumbled out of him. “She ripped Jun’s eye out of his face after he died, and then she ripped her own eye out to install it. Who does that? It was then that I should have known she was gone. I used to think I could, you know, keep her from going too crazy. Jun didn’t want us telling people what had happened on the eighth floor in Beijing. She apologized. She’s always been so practical, so matter-of-fact. She wasn’t like the others at the warehouse. She never joked, never laughed. But she would smile at her brother, and she would smile at me sometimes, too. She used to be so pretty. And I don’t mean pretty in the face, but she was that, too. I mean, I used to feel so safe and happy when I looked at her. She was my best friend’s sister, and I thought maybe I could get her to like me, and we would get married, and I would have my best friend and her, and now I have nothing.”

He put his head back down on the table. He let out a sob. “We have to kill her. What other choice do we have? If we don’t, she’s going to keep hurting everyone.”

“She’s not killing for fun,” Tran said. “She’s not going out of her way to hurt people. She’s not bad. . . . She’s just sort of lost her humanity.”

I nodded, remembering what she’d done to that mantaur on the fourth floor. She’d pulled all his limbs off just to keep him alive. She’d always been like this. She’d been a sociopath this whole time. But that wasn’t a bad thing. “We need that. We need people like her. She’s so strong.”

“She’s not a weapon, Carl. She’s a person,” Donut said. Her voice lowered. “And I like her, of course. But we can’t let her keep hurting people.” She straightened. “But we can’t let Zhang just kill himself, either. It’s not right.”

I stared at Zhang’s target cape sitting on the table. The AI had given it to him on the previous floor after he survived the battle inside of Club Vanquisher. He hadn’t had to go to that fight. He’d gone because we’d needed his help. And Li Jun had died keeping Donut protected when she was in the tower. Even though we had been the ones to originally help save them when they were on the Maestro’s show, we owed them a huge debt.

Donut: WE NEED TO FIND A WAY TO TALK SOME SENSE INTO HER. IT’S THE ONLY WAY.

Elle: I was just in there with her, and I gotta say, she’s gone completely whackadoodle. And by this point, does it even matter? Every race from now on will have her versus a bunch of others.

We had three hours until the next heat.

We had so much to do. We were going to sing in a few minutes, and the war mage thing . . .

And then, there it was. Of course. Of course.

I had an idea, but we’d have to move fast.

Li Na didn’t worship a deity. She couldn’t worship one with her Changbi race.

Despite what Donut said, Li Na was a weapon. A weapon that could be especially effective if she was pointed in the correct direction.

I sent multiple messages, including one to Bodi.

Carl: Bodi, did you commit do a race yet for this next heat? Zhang is going to need a jockey. Li Na is leaving the dungeon.