Isekai'd, My Posterior!
Who missed me?! Wait, did you say nobody? Well, that sucks because I sure as hell missed all of you! Additionally, did you notice that I started the first three sentences with the letter 'W', and in addition to the previous additional, this chapter just happens to be the thirtieth one? This implies that I've completed a sequence of three thrice times, thus implying the symbolism that all things in three's are perfect or complete. I've even used triple alliteration of the 'T' in the previous sentence that additions the additional of the sentence starting with additionally to further emphasize my point.
Wait, none of you noticed that either? Dammit.
William was… dreaming. He felt an odd sense of déjà vu, coupled with the agitating resurgence of a migraine that reminded him of the time he had drunk a full cup of slush along with a shot of strong vodka, all because his idiot of a friend had told him the latter would get rid of the aftereffects of a brain freeze. And truth be told, the brain freeze hadn't come. But in its place sat the ear-splitting headache followed by waves of intense nausea that had seen him vomiting all over the girl he had taken out to dinner at the time. Needless to say, William hadn't gotten laid that night. Hell, he didn't even manage a first kiss. According to her he had smelt like a rotten fish doused in too much cheap perfume. What the hell had that even meant? It wasn't like she was a maiden of peerless beauty when her teeth were like the Ten Commandments: all broken like a thousand-year-old crypt keep.
He winced as a sharp pain lanced through his veins and into the center of his brain, eliciting enough force to make his sphincter throb painfully.
What was up with that? He thought being unconscious meant you didn't get the pleasure of feeling pain. Then again, he reasoned that if he was coherent enough to dream lucidly and contemplate his own state of unconsciousness, he was probably just a bit conscious to begin with. Take that sudden anal squeeze that brought about a phantom pain, for example. Sleeping people didn't feel those, now did they?
He hoped he wasn't being felt up or whacked over the head by Quelana again. He liked fooling around just as much as the next person but being molested by a Milf in your sleep wasn't as grandiose as one would imagine. If anything, it was downright terrifying. Why, you ask? Well, in William's case, it was due to the fact that he wanted to be awake whilst the hot firstborn of Quemera began grabbing at his hot spots and fiddling with his fine-tuned instrument.
Oh, he could imagine it now. The shy yet brazen woman straddling his waist, her face the perfect picture of contrast between anger and arousal as she furiously blushed at his cocky grin and their suggestive positioning. His voice would be deep and woody from being woken up so pleasantly, his hands would lazily reach up to caress the parts of her body she felt most insecure about, like her arms and thighs and stomach and feet, but nevertheless permitted him the freedom to traverse. She would express her findings from his fondling with soft breaths, pants, gasps and glassy-eyed stares that would make any man stand at full mast from her innocence. When she reached the point of her heavenly hips rolling against him in a mix of frustration and attraction, he would ask her if she wanted him to go deeper – make her feel even better than she did in that moment.
Her response would be an adorable glare that he was asking such an obvious question, and taking such a long span of time to give her what she wanted, before her soft lips would open up to say-
" Psst! Oi, can you 'ear me?"
Okay, he didn't think she would say that, but she would mewl at the slow rate at which he would be stripping her of her robes. He would take his sweet time too. Slowly peeling off her garments, reveling in the sight of her creamy skin, until she was bare on top of him – save for her knickers.
"Hey, hey, hey. Watch where those hands of yours go mate."
From there, he could wash her with compliments as he lazily traced patterns on her skin, inching closer and closer to her weeping flower, drinking in the embarrassed excitement she exuded as the aroma from her privates turned his mind carnal with sexual rage. Then suddenly, he would grasp a handful of her meaty thigh, making her gasp from the abrupt roughness of his petting, before her quivering gaze would meet his eager stare. There would be a moment of silence between them. She would breathe out harshly in anticipation.
And then he would cheekily pinch her round, ruby-red, exposed right nipple and make her scream.
"Yay, stop groping my chest, ya' perverted git."
SMACK!
"Gah!" William shouted as he caused himself and Laurentius to tip over their barrel and crash to the floor painfully.
"Ooooohhh…" the undead muttered in pain as he plucked out a splinter embedded in his forearm. Way to ruin a lucid wet dream. And it was just getting good.
The undead got up from the floor and shook his wobbly head. From what he remembered before that oversized meat muncher had knocked him out like Ewen McGregor, he was surprised that he wasn't dead yet or had his flesh stripped off so as to act as the hollow version of bacon. Then again, he reasoned that if the Pyromancer hadn't been cannibalized yet, he stood a reasonably better chance of dying last.
But back to more important matters, like:
"I-I'm free." Laurentius' voice quivered like a damsel about to get her cherry popped. William flicked his hair over his shoulder as he got up, eyeing the undead cautiously as a cat would a flickering flame.
"I'm really out of that barrel," a nervous giggle escaped from his lips and the Pyromancer quickly clamped a hand over his mouth in surprise, gaze moving to William who merely offered a bemused smile. "Do you have any idea how long I've been trapped 'ere? The things I've heard 'an seen whilst bound to be some dickwad's morning breakfast?"
"I'd assume more than a month given that your beard resembles a furry muppet?" the Thief decided to hazard a guess.
"What's a muppet?"
"A little sock puppet with wire in its limbs to help you animate it as it talks, or you could just shove your hand up its ass. You know, like Kermit."
"…"
"Still not getting it, are you?"
"Uhhh…."
"You know what, never mind then."
He had no clue how long the otherwise upbeat Swamp-dweller had spent down here, sniffing drying stools of toxic basilisk shit, being tormented by the usual gluttonous gait of the butcher's here, and maybe suffering episodes of deliria with each grunt and wet smack of the cook's rusted blade against unsanitary human remains. Common sense would detail that the Pyromancer was quite sufficiently nuts in the head after nearly finding the promised neverland at the end of a meaty fist, so this freaky expulsion of awkward speech patterns and unintentional chuckles was normal. Even so, Laurentius looked bushed, hassled, sleep deprived. It was like he was some foreign officer worker living in Japan, sipping on too many energy boosters to stay up for overtime without any extra pay.
His robes never changed, the same muddled combination of rags and a medieval hoodie, a double string of red and white beads around his neck and the most torn pair of trousers William had ever seen in his life since the dumbass idea of ripped jeans.
"Anyway, thanks for getting me out of that blasted barrel." Laurentius said after his initial shock had worn off. "Or should I say groped me into being physical?" his voice quirked up and William scratched the back of his head sheepishly in reply.
"Yeah… sorry about that."
"Ah, well it ended up giving me the push I needed in the end. So, I guess I should still be grateful." The undead waltzed around the expansive room, filled to the brim with enough empty kegs to harvest a chamber of Everlasting Dragon sperm donations, before he looked down at his right hand quizzically.
William made to ask him why he looked suddenly so forlorn when a swish of air met his ears before Laurentius' hand burst into a torrent of living flame a mere few inches from his face.
"OH SHIT, COCK'S AND ROBBERS, you scared me!" the Thief gasped loudly, clutching his chest as his heart thumped against his sternum, like it was having an all-night 90's disco sex orgy at nine in the afternoon.
"Ehh, apologies mate," he offered William a simple smile with his big eyes shut that made the undeads cantering heart gallop at how good looking his charge suddenly became. "I was just eager to reconnect with my element, y' know? Been so long since I've seen me own flame that I assumed it would have vanished by now."
"Oh, I- wait, what do you mean by vanish?" the undead raised a pale brow and Laurentius gave him a quizzical look.
"Judging from your reaction, I'm guessing you know nothing about Pyromancy, yeah?"
The undead sweat dropped. He knew so much about it that he could teach the ginger how to tap into the Profaned Flame in a matter of moments.
"Well, since you saved my unwashed hide I… guess I could spare a few nuggets of wisdom. You did save me from being cannibal supper so…" the Pyromancer trailed off, and William's mind burst open like a tapeworm within a cyst after munching on too much brain stew.
This was the moment he had been waiting for since coming to this desolate rock! Although he refused the existence of Miracles, hated magic users with a passion and shamed the gods for their lack of innovative spell creation; he was simply overjoyed at the prospect of acquiring his own Pyromancy Flame. True to word, he didn't see this avenue of magic as a way to fight better – just use it to aide Oscar as he took on this kingdom's unforgiving bosses on his own – but for the purpose of the fanboy inside of him that wanted to fling fireballs at people like he was goddamn Natsu Dragneel, and the extraordinary use of Undead Rapport he had in mind to experiment with, the thought of becoming a so-called heretic never looked like a greener pasture until right now.
"Ah," Laurentius said suddenly and stared at his feet as William gave him a frown.
"What's the matter?" the Thief asked.
"Oh, nothin' really. I… was just wondering whether my offer would be appropriate as compensation."
William's frown intensified. "Why wouldn't it be?"
Laurentius rubbed the back of his head as he contemplated how to phrase his answer. "Well, my kind aren't exactly revered as decent company, after the whole incident of the Church renouncing our lineage as sacrilegious?"
"Yeah, so what?" The Thief spoke quickly, causing the undead to blink in astonishment. He couldn't help it. He was finally in the perfect position to acquire Pyromancy, and whilst he could have just asked Quelana, Quelaan or Quelaag to help him gain it, having Laurentius as his mentor as an alternative possessed more pros than cons. It would also garner him a summonable ally in the future – something the Daughters' of Chaos couldn't offer.
"So… you don't the magic unsavory?"
"For shit's sake man, hurry up and teach me how to flambé a hollow's ass," William exclaimed with a disgruntled expression that only served to make the Swamp-dweller chuckle in amusement and shock, respectively.
"Haha, okay then mate. Sorry for my trepidation, just 'ad to be certain. Name's Laurentius." The Pyromancer thumped his broad chest with a fist and grinned widely.
"William," the Thief replied and folded his arms, "I'd say it's a pleasure to meet you in this cellar of moss, piss, shit and growing fungi, but we'd both know I'd be lying."
The two undead shared a hearty laugh before William motioned back to Laurentius' burning right hand. "What were you saying about your magic burning out, now?"
The ginger blinked and stared at his hand before recollection struck him. "Oh! Yeah, despite what people tell ye, Pyromancy is actually a very fragile piece of magic." He directed William to stare at his glove as the small flame in his palm grew to the size of pilot light on a gas stove. "Our power is derived from the soul, as all magic is, however instead of channeling the output via staff's and talismans to burn our reserves – the art of fire requires a deeper understanding of the self to achieve actualization."
The undead nodded along as if he was touched in the head. He had read and heard all this before, what he really wanted to know about was that bit about a person's flame 'vanishing'. If such a thing could actually happen, it would mean a new bit of info regarding the perception of Pyromancy – which in turn could also have negative connotations for William, as it meant another piece of this world had diverted from the game.
"Willpower 'elps to summon the Pyromancies a person 'as learned, however, a regular exertion of their flame must be performed to allow their magic to still exist." This perked the undeads interest. If he was understanding Laurentius correctly, he was saying that to wield Pyromancy, the user would need to use it at least a few times on occasion to prevent their 'flame' from dying out. So that meant he could potentially lose the skill of Pyromancy if he didn't actively learn to control his ability.
"But why would it burn out? I thought Pyromancy is eternal so long as the Pyromancer still recalls how to tap into his inner-self or command his will?"
The flame in Laurentius' hand burning a fraction brighter as he smiled at the question. "Spot on thinking, mate, but you're still under the assumption that Pyromancy is like any old version of magic." He raised his right hand to eye level and reduced the flame burning on his palm until it resembled a flickering candle on a wick. "Whilst sorcerer's use fragments of soul energy to cast illusions and wards, and priests rely on faith to heal bleeding wounds, Pyromancer's are solely dependent on their wit and common sense. In the same notion, their magic tends to follow a similar line of thinking."
"I don't think I follow." William stated.
"This art is still technically fire, after all. In a logical sense, fire needs continuous inputs of wood to burn. Similarly, Pyromancy needs a regular upkeep of practice and refinement to still exist within its user."
"And if the fire were to go out?"
He closed his hand, and the flame was snuffed out, wisps of smoke rising from the gaps between his fingers. "Kiss the thought of ever using magic goodbye. Forget to synchronize with your powers just once and you can never use magic again. It's the ultimate cost of choosing to wield the ancient flame as your weapon."
It made sense in a way. No wonder many people avoided Pyromancy as their discipline. It would also explain why the followers of Lloyd and the Church had disavowed the art of Izalith. Aside from the homeland of Pyromancy being a preemptive foreboding for the waning years of the Age of Fire and the subsequent failure of Quemera which led to the birth of demons in the world, but the fact that a person could lose their ability to use magic itself should you forget to set your hand ablaze every Sunday morning was a tall order for shmuck with absurd magic reserves.
At the same time, it also made sense why Pyromancy was leagues above regular sorcery and miracles in the game. Doing a Pyromancy run was dope as shit, after all.
"Uh, well now that you know the dangers of the craft," Laurentius scratched his head again and gingerly held out his right hand, "y' still wanna join?"
William gave him a smile so wide it stretched his cheeks out like a micro-throng on a bodacious bubble butt.
"Undead army, here I come!" he shrieked and raised his hand to establish the connection between flame-users.
It was just a shame the plate-smashing butcher from before happened to step in at the wrong moment.
"Hnng!" it exclaimed gruffly, drawing a bloody meat cleaver from its back and stomping forward. William cussed under his breath whilst Laurentius froze as if he were ice before an ear-splitting scream fled from his bearded lips.
"AAAAHHHH!"
The sound made the Thief cringe and hold his head in pain. For a nonchalant nomad with an Australian twang, he really did scare like an atypical blonde bimbo in a horror movie about psychopathic forty-year-old serial killers.
"Stay away from me!" he gushed with fear before sprinting away from William's side, dodging the swipe aimed for his head, and subsequently blasting the butcher a point-blank range with enough firepower to level a bank ATM.
"NNNHHH!" the butcher wailed in a blunt scream before falling to its knees. William merely watched the Pyromancer speed off with a dumbfounded expression on his face.
It was as if some bastardized being of incomprehensible douchy-ness was purposefully making his undead life that much more difficult with inane plot twists and sudden quick-time events.
Not one to back down from a challenge he could cheat his way out of, William shook his head and narrowed his gaze at the retreating form of his new comrade currently giving an undead hound a solid boot to the skull. His stamina was still worthless, but he could give chase – at least enough to reach the Pyromancer and calm him the hell down. All he needed was the right motivation. He thought for a moment before it hit him.
This was precisely like one of those secret underground labyrinths he used to find whilst playing the second Assassin's Creed. He could do this. Operation Pyro Pussy just had its main objectives updated!
Imagining a white outline around his target, William kicked off into a run at full speed. Drawing his sword for good measure, the undead made a sharp turn at the end of the cellar and leapt over the wounded hound directly after it. When the toe of his boot touched the floor, he flung his blade out – catching the shirtless hollow entering the corridor by the throat. The sound of blood spraying onto the floor filled the room, along with a red mist just as Laurentius was making his way around the next corner, booking it for the door leading to the lower floors.
The Thief growled as he landed and broke into a dead sprint. If the ginger-haired undead made it to that door before William had a chance to reach him, he could run the risk of charging into his grave before the silver-haired undead had the chance to save his life and prevent hollowing. He snapped his eyes up and found a stack of kegs double decked like a set of stairs. Adjacent to it lay the upper platform that housed the mess hall. William's eyes glinted with an idea before he corrected his path and headed towards it.
The first barrel pair of barrels didn't take any effort to climb, however, the second forced him to use his hands to pull himself up before he had to dive to the right, directly into the mess hall. He stood up as quickly as his body would allow, his lungs burning with the sheer exertion of chasing a moving target when he noticed something running at him from his peripheral vision.
He saw the silhouette of what appeared to be a hulking anthropomorphic figure descend upon his form and decided to roll forward.
The loud clang of the other butcher's bloodied weapon met the hard wood floor, leaving splinters before it roared in agitation. William simply blew his hair out of his face as he scrambled to his feet and ran for the gap that led to the lower corridor Laurentius was currently screaming on.
"Oh no! God's no, leave me be!"
"Laurentius," William shouted as he dropped into the walkway and raced after a hysterical Pyromancer who seemed to pile on the speed at the sound of that infuriating cannibal's mouth fart.
"Calm the shit down, already! You're running for the lower levels!"
"I don't care where I'm running!" he shouted back as his face it the wooden door and he recoiled back, only to latch onto the doorhandle and yank. His strength caused the handle to snap off and he fell on his rear in shock, giving William more time to catch up with him – gnarly asexual butcher in tow.
"Fine then, just wait for me then."
"Sorry, mate. You're on your own!" Laurentius shrieked before he kicked in the door and ran through the entrance.
"For the love of- I SAID WAIT, YOU UNCULTURED HILL BILLY!"
The butcher behind William made another groan in its chest as it neared the smaller undead and he grit his teeth in frustration. He needed to get this obese wanker off his back somehow. Maybe by chopping off its clubfoot? No, he would need it to enter his range to do that. If only he had grabbed Laurentius' hand sooner and at least gained a Pyromancy glove in return, he could have tried to conjure up a smokescreen in this scenario – perhaps even tapped into his inner-self and managed to blast off a leg out of rage.
Wait, that was it! A simple delay in the behemoth's movements would suffice just as well as mortally wounding it, why did he not think of it before?!
Reaching his left hand behind his back, William retrieved the dagger he had pilfered from the first corpse he had found whilst in the Undead Asylum and flicked it up before catching the edge of the blade between his fingers. He sure hoped his left hand was as good at throwing as it was at jerking off.
Tensing his muscles, the Thief blindly flung the blade backwards, before the sweet sound of a pained groan reached his ears. William turned back to the butcher as he reached the door to the sewers to see the broad being crouching down to grope its ankle where his dagger had impaled to the hilt. It looked up at him with what he assumed was rage behind its tasteless sack covering, and he roughly shut the door before turning around to search for his runaway companion.
He opened his mouth to shout as he ran down the slimy steps, "Laurentius, where are yo- ackggh!"
William choked on the air as his legs were submerged in the thick, soupy water. What was this stench? It was an impure mephitic1 vapor to his senses, so badly saturated in the very air around him that he couldn't stop the bile that raced up his esophagus and added to the murky water below.
"Aggh…" William looked up as his eyes watered freely. He felt nauseous as he forced his unsteady legs to move through the muck. A torch-wielding hollow entered his vision from the end of the corridor and turned to him, but all the undead could make out was the burgundy complexion of a five-foot stick of jerky with flashlight.
Groggily, he raised his sword and walked towards it, but his sight tilted diagonally and turned everything 3-D and he stumbled three drunken steps to the left, avoiding the burning torch that the hollow tried to hit him with. William swiped his blade out haphazardly and luckily struck his opponent in the face, slicing the wrinkled things head open from the right eye and across to the opposite ear. The hollow groaned out mutely as it plonked into the water below and William turned with a flinch, as the sound of rushing water made his head spin.
"L'rentus!" his slurred shout echoed along the sound pathway before his soaked boot thumped against the steel grid of the drains underfoot. The Thief gazed around, searching for that yellow-bellied turkey called a Swamp-dweller, but only found a mix of sickening dull colors corrode his vision as he teetered over his own two feet, shook his head and stumbled backwards.
He couldn't focus his mind, the stench in this level of the Depths was exponentially more morose than the surface level he had just come from. William groaned as he tried to make sense of his surroundings, only to trip over the grate in front of him and go flying over the balcony leading down to the main sewage pool below.
"Aaahhhh- OOGHBBB!" he landed with a splash as his head went under the filthy water. The coldness of the tainted liquid shocked his brain back into clarity as he blew out the water that had gotten into his mouth and lifted his head out.
"GAHH! Air at last!" he breathed only to cough loudly and regurgitate the sewage he had accidentally swallowed.
" Bleeehhhhh! Ew, did I actually swallow a dismembered big toe?" he grimaced as he stared down at his own floating puke before a shadow descended upon him and he looked up warily – looking like a waterlogged cat that just realized how to flush a toilet.
There, sniffing him like the huge mess of atrociousness it was, stood the mother rat of the sewers, blind right eye staring at him like a pasty orb of pus. Its whiskers vibrated like black electricity wires and the Thief blinked as the eye drew closer and closer to his person.
And so, in light of William's current situation, he did the only thing that came to mind:
He socked the humungous rat in blind eye with all his anger that the ocular nerve exploded, showering him in a cocktail shampoo of infected secretion, blood and an almost endless tangle of stringy blue and green ocular veins.
The massive rat screeched like someone shoving a needle up a cockroach's ass before it pulled its head backward, the veins from its eye latching onto William's foot and yanking him along like he was in a backwards rodeo, before his boot slipped off his foot.
The undead screamed as he careened over the pool of sewage and onto the inclined bank draining said waste into the deeper levels of Depths. The undead had a moment to shout out the ridiculousness of his predicament before he fell into the hole cut at the end of the incline and slammed face-first into the chamber below.
Word Bank
1. Mephitic – (adj.) (especially of a gas or vapor) foul-smelling; noxious.
Much appreciation to all of you for still sticking with me. Also, thank you Quartermass for the fancy adjective to add to my word bank. I did my best to focus on the real aspects of Lordran as I wrote this fic, and as such, scent plays a vital role in the explanation of every scene and area. Just a reminder to everyone that if you actually intend on getting Isekai'd into Dark Souls, settle for a place other than Lordran. Seriously, I think your nose would die and melt off before you even had a chance to explore it.
That reminds me, I've gotta write up a glossary of words once I finish this fic.
Omake: Fourth Wall Epiphany
"Undead army, here I come!" he shrieked and raised his hand to establish the connection between flame-users.
It was just a shame the plate-smashing butcher from before happened to step in at the wrong moment.
"Hnng!" it exclaimed gruffly, drawing a bloody meat cleaver from its back and stomping forward. William cussed under his breath whilst Laurentius froze as if he were ice before an ear-splitting scream fled from his bearded lips.
"AAAAHHHH!"
The sound made the Thief cringe and hold his head in pain. For a nonchalant nomad with an Australian twang, he really did scare like an atypical blonde bimbo in a horror movie about psychopathic forty-year-old serial killers.
"Stay away from me!" he gushed with fear before sprinting away from William's side, dodging the swipe aimed for his head, and subsequently blasting the butcher a point-blank range with enough firepower to level a bank ATM.
"NNNHHH!" the butcher wailed in a blunt scream before falling to its knees. William merely watched the Pyromancer speed off with a dumbfounded expression on his face.
It was as if some bastardized being of incomprehensible douchy-ness was purposefully making his undead life that much more difficult with inane plot twists and sudden quick-time events.
Meanwhile, in a concealed room high above the clouds, and a million multiverses away from William, The Powers That Be widened their eyes as they dropped their Quill of Destiny, looking down at the Chosen Undead from their Heavenly pedestal and frowning deeply.
"So he already knows," the being breathed and opened another tome labelled 'William' before picking up their Quill once more, "What should we do to confound his understanding? Kill him?"
"Don't be silly," Velka chuckled from her seat across from The Powers That Be, casually reading through a volume of Jump whilst she ran a pale hand through her ebony tresses, "I thought you wanted him to suffer. Death would be too much of a mercy."
"Yes, but that defeats the purpose if he figures out who's really pulling the strings."
The pop of Velka's chewing gum explained her nonchalance regarding the topic, only serving to further frustrate The Powers That Be.
"Right then, I'm going to alter his memory."
"And create a generic plot regarding every Isekai'd human to ever enter the SoulsBorne Universe? Booo rrrinng!"
"Then what would have me do?" Asked The Powers That Be.
"Get some hot female character to occupy his attention so much that he forgets about the whole idea of being controlled." The Goddess of Sin waved them off, causing The Powers That Be to blink in astonishment.
"That's a brilliant idea. Many thanks," they replied before scribbling away in William's tome.
Velka turned to look at The Powers That Be as they worked when a hopeful expression filled her features.
"You could always ask me to step in and do that for you, you know…? It would be nice to visit my homeland once in a while." she received a thorough shake of the head in reply.
"There's already enough difficulty thinking about how to portray your magnificent features if I agree to your motion. Additionally, writing up sufficient Lore to compensate your arrival would kill my creative flow." The Goddess pouted as she watched them work. "Besides, I'd feel as though I'm copying the idea from another great creator if I did that."
"Phooey," Velka sulked in her corner before standing from her chair and walking toward the nearest door.
"Heading out?" The Powers That Be asked from their position, still writing life into William's story. Velka shrugged.
"I see it as giving you a chance to speak with someone other than the imaginary characters in your head."
"As you wish, save travels Velka." The being waved. Velka smiled sweetly as she stood by the door before speaking.
"Thanks for all your hard work… Mihairu7," and darted out as The Powers That Be finally lifted his head to stare at the door he imagined someone opening and closing.
"Oh, come on! You promised you wouldn't say my real name!"
The being looked at the closed door in front of him and blinked dumbly as realization struck home.
"Dammit, she's right. I really need to stop talking to myself."
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