The grinding session began in earnest. Garble would not be outdone by Spikey Wikey, an endearing term he was sure to use as he charged past to grab up two cute little rabbit slimes and grind them together in a great explosion of goo that faded into ether, coins and a single potion falling where once they were. "What the?"

Smolder lunged for it, grabbing the potion before it fell to the ground. "Got it! What is it?" She swirled the bright cyan-shaded fluid around in its glass bottle. "This was not floating around inside that slime."

Sandra stood tall and proud, adjusting her glasses as she cleared her throat, looking ready to dispense wisdom.

Spike spoke without even noticing Sandra's preparations, "Bet taking out the slime made it appear."

"Well, yes," she deflatedly agreed. "There's more to it than that." She waved in the direction the sparkles that escaped the defeated monster fled towards. "The energy that makes them up was forced out of their body, which sometimes is enough and gets caught in the right way to make new things, like the coins and the potion. The rest goes off to be reborn as new monsters."

“So wait,” Garble said, picking up a gold piece between his claws. “All we need to do to get more gold is beat up a ton of these stupid easy things to beat?” He grasped it in his hand and grinned wickedly. “That’s awesome!” He took to the air, not very high, flying over to another bunny slime, roasting it, laughing maniacally.

Smolder walked over to Spike, watching Garble. “I gotta hand it to ya. I didn’t think Garble would warm up to it as quickly as this.”

Garble was laughing as he terrorized the slimes, throwing them around like they were nothing, and Spike grimaced at Garble’s cruelty unleashed. At least they were monsters that seemed to exist just to be defeated. “Yeah… I kinda figured.”

Sandra, however, was staring at the menu out of her broach, a frown on her face as a bar on it went up ever so slightly as Garble smooshed another slime. “Why’s it going up so slowly for me…”

“Well you’re not really doing anything,” Smolder said. “You’re just sitting here watching Garble or us do all the work.”

“... So?”

“So,” Spike chimed in. “Aren’t you supposed to be like… practicing magic or figuring out how to beat monsters? Just watching people doesn’t help that much, you have to do it.”

"Well, yeah, sure, but you're taking them down so fast…" Sandra slowly scanned over the horizon before extending a figure to what seemed to be a tree. "There we go. I'll start on that, you assist, alright?"

Spike and Smolder shared a look. It was a tree…

Sandra gave a thumbs up before advancing on the helpless shrubbery. "This one's tougher than the rabbit slimes, but I have such great summons, we'll take it down."

As they began to walk, Spike hiked a thumb back. “What about, you know?”

Sandra looked back to Garble. “Well…” He was flying around, laughing raucously, snapping up the gold and bits of items dropped by the slimes and depositing them into a growing pile, which Sandra eyed greedily. “Let’s let him keep doing that. We won’t even be far enough away that he can’t see us.”

Smolder made a soft polite gesture as if to let Sandra past. "Show us what you have. You know what we can do." She wriggled her claw-tips. "Comes written on the can, you know?"

Spike was stroking his chin softly. "Yeah, sure, but I want to learn some of that magic… Later, I mean." Even at his most optimistic, he didn't see the option to do that in the middle of the grassy field. "For now, go on." Seeing magic that didn't require a unicorn horn was a step forward, right?

Sandra tapped her bangle twice, pulling her hand up high, a light trailing behind it briefly. In front of her, magic circles and a sparkle appeared straight up and down, and from top to bottom, as if something was draining off of it, a short wooden staff appeared, about the length of Sandra’s arm. She snatched it out of the air and held it straight out.

“Let’s do this!” she shouted, and wisps of flame began to collect around the tip of the staff, starting to form a little ball at the tip of her staff. She brought the staff back a little, and pointed it forward, the burst of fire flying in an arc toward the shrub monster, which had clearly noticed and cringed away from the flames...

You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.

Only for the fireball to go wide, striking several feet behind it.

All parties watching briefly froze, and there was a rustle and the shrub monster began to twist back and forth, and after a moment it became clear what was happening: it was uprooting itself.

“D-don’t just do nothing!” Smolder yelled. “Shoot again!”

Sandra twirled her staff in a display that did little as she backed up a step. "According to plan," she muttered with a lack of confidence, the flames gathering more slowly for the second round. "Remember we're a team, right?"

Spike rolled a hand softly. "Uh, how much tougher is this thing than the slime? It's kinda slow."

"Super slow," addended Smolder with a wry smirk, watching it rise to its full height, towering over them, but all its motions were almost comically sluggard.

"Right, right. I have this!" She raised her staff high, flames gathered for a second strike. "Focus focus... " She stared dead at the treant as it took its first great step towards her. "Big target, can't miss. Can't possibly--" She swung the staff forward, flames not emerging on one coherent ball but instead a sprinkling, like a burst of confetti that set a few of its more dead leaves ablaze but did little real damage to the thing.

The shrub creature stepped forward, closer to Sandra, and she gasped, trying to step back, stumbling and falling on her butt. A very leafy limb extended from its side, and began to swing down on Sandra in a wide hook. It swung slowly, but built up momentum, and Sandra was frozen stiff, her eyes wide with terror.

Spike reached for her, but it was a moment too late, her form sent sailing in an ungainly heap. "Got her," cut in Smolder, jumping up to grab the air-borne wizard from the middle of her tumble.

His eyes on the bushy enemy, turning towards him, he flexed his claws. "Alright, I don't have magic, but I do have plenty of fire, which I hear trees don't like." The tree was unimpressed by his claim, taking a stiff step towards the small dragon. His cheeks bulged with his attack before vomiting forth a great cone of dragon's fury, enveloping the beast.

Unlike the slime, it did not melt. It barely caught on fire, approaching despite the burning heat to smash down a branch right on top of Spike's head, stopping his attack and sending him to the ground in with a loud 'oof!'.

"Shoot." Smolder set Sandra down roughly, half-dropping her as she almost bounced off the turf back towards the leafy nemesis. "Now you're askin' for it!"

She leapt up, into the air, and pounced on the shrubbed monster, slashing at its branches, clipping several of them. It swung it’s branch-arm at her in another slow but powerful arc, except she was much faster than that, and easily avoided it. She puffed her own puff of fire as well, scorching a little of the flesh underneath the branches.

Spike pulled himself up, a little woozy, seeing Smolder darting and pouncing on the monster. She was already better at this, he thought, shaking his head to dismiss the thought. He could prove himself! Adventuring like this is a dream come true!

Besides, it didn’t hurt that much. “Another breath, coming up!” He announced, and inhaled deeply. Smolder caught his form out of the corner of her eye, flapping herself up in time for the flames to hit the foliage monster, causing it to stagger back just a step. It was progress.

She landed next to Spike, in a ready stance, cracking a smile to herself. This wasn’t so bad. He was tough but not that tough. He just took a lot of punishment. She bared her claws and ran in with a low growl.

Sandra gathered herself to her feet, watching her new summons clash with the great creature. "Hey, Garble!" she called out to him even as he smashed three poor slimes at once in a great sliding pounce that ground them to so much ooze. "Help take out this shrubent! It's a better fight than the slimes, promise."

"Say what?" He snatched up the small bag that had fallen from one of the slimes. "Whatever. Hey, Sis, you need help? I get Spike callin' for backup, but you, really?"

"Kiss--" She ducked under a swinging branch, slipping around the plant. "--my--" She bit down fiercely at the base of one of its limbs, tearing it free, though it had so many more. "--scaly backend! Help or not, your call! I'm havin' plenty of fun on my own."

Garble lifted his shoulders as he ambled closer. "Yeah, you're doing alright."

Sandra threw up a hand with a frustrated cry. Why were her summons so hard to control?! "Hey, do you have fire resistance or not?"

Spike heard the question even as he was diving out of the way of a slow attack. "Huh? Yeah, hard to hurt a dragon with fire." He gave a thumbs up that turned into a sudden swipe, pruning the branch that was reaching towards him. "Back up, you badly upkept shrubbery!"

As Spike and Smolder continued to slash and spit bits of flame at the monster, Sandra got herself up. She closed her eyes began to focus again, feeling her magic flow through the staff she was holding, also feeling the staff shape her magic in a way she was not capable of. At least, not yet. The flames gathered at the tip of the staff, and she focused them. She needed them hotter, more explosive.

Once she reached almost as hot as she could manage, she opened up her eyes. Aiming. Aiming always sucked. But the monster was slow, and the dragons would be immune to her fire.

Garble watched the girl squint her eyes and focus real hard, somehow producing fire on the tip of a wooden stick. Which didn’t burn. Magic is weird.

Sandra held the spell, aiming… aiming. She released it, the blast pushing her arm back. With the sound of a deep cannon blast, flames rushed forward towards the violently clashing meeting of dragon and wood. All became heat and fire, washing over them all, lost to sight in a moment of rushing air, exploding brilliance, and a blossoming of fire that caught fire to patches of grass around them.

Garble stopped next to Sandra, one scaly brow raised. "If you just toasted my sister, I'm gonna be really angry, just so we're clear."

Sandra laughed with a bravado so false even she knew it was hollow. "I'm sure they're fine, they're dragons!"