“Snakes & Ladettes”
Kain encounters a ramshackle trading town, Paul-Mart, set atop a small hill between the Forest and the Wall. Without much worth trading, Kain returns to the creek to retrieve his only, and most valuable, possession: the shovel left for him by Kabong. At the water’s edge he encounters the pompous, puffed-up Snake King… and by posing as a magician of great power, Kain saves himself from attack. Snake, as it turns out, is in need of a champion, someone to rescue his castle from an invading force, one he is curiously helpless to fight against. He makes Kain an offer: help evacuate the intruders from his home, and Snake will provide a map that could lead Kain back into the Kingdom.
Kain’s first attempt fails miserably and he’s captured by the castle’s inhabitants, the lovely and deadly Softwear Pirates, led by the cuthroat Captain Meeks. A savvy group of sword-wielding warrior maidens, they aren’t deceived by his feeble lies, and they throw him in a cell. There, he learns of the running feud between the Pirates and the Snake, how Kain isn’t the first “champion” to be sent to free the castle, and how the Pirates are on the cusp of surrounding, and killing, the monster monarch.
While waiting for the Pirates to decide his fate, Kain discreetly outs an impostor in their group, Cinnamon Sally Bulofski. By threatening to expose the cross-dressing peeping-tom to his fellow female teammates, Kain gets Bulofski to agree to help him with a plan, and it’s something more than just escape.
During the night, Kain is freed by an anonymous benefactor. He returns to the water’s edge, to reconvene with the Snake, who isn’t satisfied in just seeing the escaped Kain. Where is his victory?? Nowhere to be found… but there IS a triple-double-cross, though, with Kain coming out on top: the castle now belongs to Paul-Mart, and Kain gets a 20% ownership stake. The first item he claims is a map… ….one that, in theory, can lead him back home.
