Their war party approached the dragon snake slowly. Their last preparations had been successful. Joseph had prepared a big pot of poison and all the squirrels had dipped their spear tips into it. With a final pep talk by one of the squirrels - it was given in random squeaks and yaps, Jospeh hadn’t understood anything - the unified army marched to the lake.

The water was still. They had expected this. One squirrel approached the lake slowly, lacking any kind of armor or spear. Its role was one of the most dangerous. It stepped carefully to the edge, still multiple steps away from the water itself.

Instead of moving even a single additional step, the squirrel picked up a pebble and threw it as hard as it could.

The tiny stone flew in an elegant arch and splashed down in the middle of the lake. Joseph held his breath. His fingers curled around his spear in anticipation.

Seconds later, ripples were forming on the water. A shadow was showing under the blue, before it burst the surface apart with a loud roar.

“How dares to interrupt my slumber!”

The snake glistened in the midday sun. Raising to its full height out of the water, it was at least twice as tall as Joseph. Its blue scales looked impenetrable, like tiny plates of platinum. The eyes held a sharp, dangerously irritated focus, locking onto the tiny squirrel on the shore.

Its whiskers still looked really dumb.

The tiny David opposing snakey Goliath raised its paw, forming one of the universal signs of defiance, the middlest of fingers.

The snake roared and threw itself forward, but the squirrel had already started a hasty retreat on all fours. The tree line was just a few meters ahead, but it wouldn’t make it.

Before the snake could snap up the tiny treat, the sun was blocked by a rain of needles. It had taken Joseph a surprisingly long amount of time to realize that they weren’t restricted to melee weapons. And spears were an excellent throwing weapon.

Instead of having the desired effect of breaking through the scales and creating the legendary never seen before porcupine snake, the tiny spears plinked off.

Still, the snake flinched, giving the squirrel enough time to escape between the trees.

It roared in defiance, snaking the rest of its body up to the shore. The lake had hidden much of its impressive length of twenty to thirty meters, making Joseph doubt their chances of winning for a second.

“Your puny sticks stand no chance against my heavenly form. Bow before your lord!”

This was the moment they had waited for. Like a horde of highly organized monkeys equipped with stone age tools, the squirrels surrounded the beached snake.

Joseph had theorized that the snake would be slower on land, preferring to stay in the water. He hoped he was right with his guess.

The snake didn’t stay stationary, instead it used its tail to try to sweep away one flank of squirrels. But the squirrels were prepared, using one of earth’s most favorite group tactics: the humble phalanx.

Squirrels stacked tightly next to each other, spears perfectly in parallel, the first ranks putting one end into the ground for additional stopping power, the next rank rising theirs slightly higher. Joseph hadn’t expected the squirrels to learn the highly coordinated move at all when he mentioned it off-handedly, but like all military tactics, they had a surprising knack for it.

In the end, the strategy was still somewhat useless. Beyond all planning and tactics were the fundamental laws of physics. One giant snake tail carried more momentum than the inertia of thirty squirrels.

The formation was broken in an instant, squirrels flying everywhere, spears broken like tinder. Still, a few of the tips had managed to squeeze between the scales, drawing the first blood of the battle. Two squirrels had even managed to hold on to the beast and were now climbing the scales in search of weak points.

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Joseph knew that the wounds were too superficial to properly poison the beast.

It was time for him to step into the ring. Even if the squirrels were motivated, without leading them from the front, they’d quickly lose their enthusiasm. With a last deep breath, Joseph stepped into the open.

He looked like shit. His pajamas were torn in multiple places. One of the pant legs was missing after an acid attack and some creative cuts to re-purpose the fabric for other various tasks. His spear looked like a crude implement meant for hunting small game or antique high-way robbery. His face was full of uneven stubble and his hair yearned for a comb. At least he was somewhat washed, and his skin gleamed with vitality.

With a single leap, he closed the gap between him and the distracted snake that was still focusing on the squirrels surrounding it. His spear pushed forward through the air in a clumsy strike, missing the sinuous body by a hand span.

While he was still withdrawing his weapon, the snake changed focus, locking him with its slitted eyes. He could already hear it retching acid up, so he preempted the move with a dash to the side. Its head snapped to the side, following his move before the spit flew from the snake’s mouth like an arrow.

His manoeuvre was still successful, allowing him to dodge the spit-bomb barely. Still, he was unused to the fast movements, and he struggled with stopping, which resulted in him performing an involuntary roll, stones scratching against his back.

He got up as quickly as he could, but it was already too late. The next attack was on its way and hit him square in the chest. His pajama got ruined instantly, the acid hitting his bare body moments later.

But there was no pain. The fluid slowly dropped off his body. He removed the last few drops with his hands.

“How? HOW?” Good. The dragon was driven even further into his anger.

His resistance to the acid was one reason why it had taken so long to prepare. Mo Li Bei had shown him a recipe for an acid-resistant topical cream. One ingredient was on the rarer side, forcing Joseph to search the basin up and down until he’d found enough to slather his whole body in the substance. It felt horrible, like a thin suit of slime, but isolated well against all acids commonly found in the mortal realm.

He still had to be careful. After all, he couldn’t cover his eyes, mouth, or nose.

Joseph stepped back slightly, hoping to draw the snake further from the water. The two brave squirrels had made their way up the body close to the head, and the snake was trying to shake them off with wild swings of its body. One squirrel was thrown off, but the other one was able to use the momentum to leap to one of the two eyes.

The huge orb was half its body size, but it was one of the most vulnerable points. Even if the squirrel had lost its spear on the way, it still had its natural weapons. With a final bit of effort, the squirrel bit into the eye.

With a mighty hiss, the snake buckled in pain, swinging its tail in wide arcs, pushing more squirrels away. Even the brave warrior, hero of the moment, got thrown off, but it held a fist of victory into the air, mouth bloodied with eye.

The distraction gave Joseph the courage for a second try, and he once again jabbed his weapon forward. This time, he was able to hit scales. Purely because of his size and strength, he could leave a furrow, creating a new weakness for the smaller combatants. But it still wasn’t the deep cut he hoped for.

Enraged, the snake started to spit randomly around himself, creating a rain of dangerous projectiles. Joseph tried to block as much as he could, but a few squirrels were hit by the acid. Tails and legs were burned into stumps, bodies turned into corpses.

While the previous hits had thrown the squirrels around, their small robust bodies allowed them to survive a lot of impacts. But the acid was too much, and they lacked the same protections that Joseph had.

The encirclement started to break, leaving the snake space to escape. A few squirrels tried their best to jam their spears between the scales, but it was fruitless. The snake was too large, and the squirrels were too weak.

If the snake managed to reach the water unscathed, the fight would be over. The speed boost it got from swimming would make it impossible for them to hurt the beast at all.

But Joseph had learned to fight from an alchemist. And if Mo Li Bei had taught him one thing about alchemists, it was that they didn’t fight fair. If poison didn’t work, resort to trickery.

When the snake got close to the water, it rustled against a few innocent looking balls. The squirrels had planted the alchemical concoctions when the snake had been distracted by Joseph.

The movements of the snake spilled some of them into the water just as the snake was entering it. They reacted with the water, exploding in a spectacular fashion. A wave of sound tore through the army, water spraying everywhere.

The explosion knocked the snake back onto land, tearing a huge hole in the jaw of the beast. Its head fell onto its good eye with a heaviness that made the ground shake. With the enemy dazed, the squirrels fell onto the snake with new fervor. Spears got poked into gaps, ears and other holes with a bloodthirsty glee.

Joseph had waited for this moment all along. With a last thrust, he rammed his spear through the open wound into the brain of the snake, instantly killing the beast.

The poison had been somewhat of a Plan B from the start. He had proposed using explosives to Mo Li Bei, who had overlooked the idea due to them being useless after the mortal realm.

With exhaustion, he sat down surrounded by the cheering squirrels. His celebration was interrupted by a blue window opening before his eyes.

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