The next morning.
Ding-a-ling-ling...
The crisp chime echoed in Duke's ears, dragging him out of his sleep. Frowning, he reached for the communicator on the bedside cabinet. The moment he connected, a panicked voice exploded in his ear.
"Mr. Duke!!"
"Jessas, don't shout like that~"
Rubbing his eyes, Duke sat up, still half-drowsy, and looked at the screen. On it appeared the image of Jessas, the first mate under Captain Othellon.
At the moment, Jessas looked utterly disheveled, his expression filled with terror. Even his usually proud chestnut hair had turned greasy.
"The camp has been attacked, we need your help!"
Perhaps just seeing Duke brought him some comfort, because Jessas's tone, while still urgent, was no longer as frantic.
"Attacked?"
Duke raised a brow. He had only been away for two days, how could an attack have happened so soon?
With Rengar serving as the camp's guard captain, plus the series of early-warning systems Duke had left behind, the place wasn't exactly impenetrable, but it was certainly rock solid.
So how could something like this happen?
"Over fifteen members have vanished from inside the camp, and last night the survey team that went to fetch water also disappeared without a trace."
"It's like… like…" Jessas's expression twisted with dread. "Like some invisible monster is slowly eating us away!"
At that, Duke's face grew serious. His defenses were nearly flawless, he had learned his lesson from that incident with Kha'Zix.
In the jungle, no amount of preparation was ever too much.
The Hextech shield generator he'd installed could withstand even a frontal assault from a drake until he returned. Add in the drones stationed in camp, the underground alarm traps, and the 24/7 surveillance cameras…
On top of all that, Rengar and Nidalee, predators at the top of the jungle food chain, were on guard.
So how could anything have gone wrong?
"What exactly, " Duke wanted to press further, but seeing the fear in Jessas's eyes, he held his tongue. Now was not the time for questions that would only deepen the panic.
"I'll be back at the camp in thirty minutes. Until then, gather everyone in the center of camp and let Rengar and Nidalee protect you."
"Yes, sir!"
Hanging up, Duke took out Echoes of Fate and lit a cigar.
"What trouble now?"
He sighed, rubbing at his temple. "I was planning to search for Uroya's potion today, and now this?"
"Annoying."
Finishing his cigar without finding an answer, Duke got dressed, packed Pride and Wally into his inventory, and went to find Othellon.
"Mr. Duke, has something happened?"
"There's a problem back at camp. I need to return right away. If anything comes up here, contact me through the communicator."
"Yes, sir."
Othellon watched as Duke summoned Tahm Kench, stepped into the River King's gaping maw, and vanished with him into a swirling river vortex.
Neeko and Katarina were left behind, Neeko disliked riding with Tahm, so Duke didn't bother inviting her, and Katarina had strict orders to guard the envoy team.
As for Duke, he was heading back to camp to see just what the problem was.
The camp, once bustling with life, now looked like an abandoned dump. Trash littered the ground, along with scattered signs of chaos.
Everyone was huddled in the camp's center. Rengar stood watch with his pack of bone-mawed beasts, while Nidalee clutched her spear, scanning the surroundings.
"Big cat, don't you think the pollen smell is stronger than usual?"
"That's not my concern. I only care about finding the fool who dares mess around in my territory!"
Rengar's eyes blazed with fury as he gripped his rune-forged hunting blade. Nearly twenty people had vanished on his watch. This was a personal insult, and he intended to find the culprit and tear them into eight pieces.
Nidalee sighed. Felines were always moody, and both she and Rengar were no exception, but right now, he was on the verge of a full-blown rampage.
Suddenly,
A vortex swirled into existence on the ground. Rengar's ears twitched. He whipped his collapsible blade disk from his belt and hurled it toward the river, then leapt after it.
Tahm Kench emerged from the whirlpool, his enormous mouth opening wide to happily swallow both the flying blade and the leaping Rengar.
With a satisfied pat of his belly, Tahm chuckled. "Not bad. First thing I see when I arrive, snack time."
But he hadn't forgotten his real task. He opened his mouth again, and Duke stepped out, dragging a soggy Rengar by the scruff.
"This idiot," Duke muttered, tossing Rengar to the ground. "Tahm, check the camp. If everything's fine, you can go."
"Right away, boss."
While Tahm waddled off, Duke approached Jessas, still dripping from the river water. "Tell me exactly what happened, every detail."
"After you left, we continued our usual work. Under Rengar's escort, we went into the jungle, collected local plants, soil, and rocks for study. But last night, several people vanished without any sound or sign. And this morning, the water-fetching team disappeared too. That's when we called you."
"How many missing now?"
"Eighteen."
Duke rubbed at his brow. Tahm returned from his patrol, reporting, "Boss, aside from lingering death echoes, I found nothing unusual."
"Alright, good work."
Sending Tahm away, Duke pulled up the surveillance footage from yesterday and this morning. He'd only been gone for a day and a half, less than two days, and already nearly twenty people were gone.
Yet, even after combing through the drone footage, he found nothing.
"Strange. How can there be nothing?"
"Take me to the victims' tents. And tell me their original assignments."
"Understood."
Jessas led Duke through the camp, Rengar trailing behind with a dark scowl while Nidalee remained on watch.
Inside the first tent, Duke saw rumpled bedding, but no other traces, as if the people had simply vanished.
He imagined some unknown force creeping in during the night, killing in an instant, then erasing all evidence.
Kneeling to check under the bed, he found nothing. But his gaze fell on a small potted plant atop a table.
The soil looked freshly disturbed, recently transplanted.
At first he was about to move on, but the plant's vivid red leaves and green buds tickled a memory.
"This is… Night-Bloom Jelan?"
"Oh, this flower?" Jessas brightened. "The exploration team brought it back yesterday. They said it was rare and beautiful, something you almost never see in Piltover. One member, a former florist, gathered all he could find."
"All of them?"
"Yes. But everyone liked them, so they were divided evenly. Many tents now have one, and some planned to take them home for their wives and daughters to see."
Duke's lips twitched. So this wasn't a failure of his defenses, just his people courting death themselves.
He remembered Night-Bloom Jelan from a rare flora compendium in Piltover's library, a book he had originally used to prop up a table leg, only to read it out of boredom and commit over a hundred plant species to memory.
This flower, with its complex buds hidden among red leaves, grew only in deep jungle shade. It was valued in alchemy and medicine, but it had a deadly quirk.
It would ensnare nearby creatures to use as nutrients, animals, insects, bones… anything.
And it was connected to one infamous being.
A champion named, Zyra.