I looked up toward our snowy destination and braced myself for the cold climb ahead.

“Are you ready?” Lurin asked, not waiting for a reply before taking the lead. I followed suit, and Gloria brought up the rear.

Aside from one near-disastrous slip that would’ve sent me plummeting 600 feet—thankfully averted by Gloria’s quick reflexes, followed by a full ten minutes of yelling—the climb was fairly uneventful. After three hours of trekking, we reached the mountain’s snowy expanse. Lurin paused to hand me my bizarre attire: a multicolored, puffy snowsuit that made me look like a rejected circus act. As ridiculous as I felt, the outfit was effective; I was sweating within minutes.

I’d been secretly hoping to encounter some sort of adversary on the way up, eager to test my new trinket, which seemed to pulse impatiently on my wrist. I decided to use it on the first enemy I encountered, be it a snow monster or even a Yeti baby. OK…I wouldn’t have used it on a Yeti baby. I’m not a baby-killing kind of dwarf.

As I crested the summit, my relief was short-lived. The flat mountain top was pocked with so many caves it resembled Swiss cheese.

“Wow, there are a lot of them,” I remarked, straining to hear any signs of life. All that met my ears, however, was the haunting wail of the wind.

“We should probably split up,” Lurin suggested. Just like that, my newfound courage seemed to drain away, as if vanishing down one of the mountain’s many holes. Until now, I’d felt bolstered by Gloria and Lurin’s presence, but the prospect of facing the unknown alone was daunting.

“Are you sure that’s wise? Yetis might not be easy to tackle,” I countered.

“Heh, Yetis aren’t that tough. I’ve been killing them since I was ten. My dad was a Yeti fur trader,” Gloria said. Her eyes flickered from pride to melancholy as she mentioned her father. It was the first time she’d ever spoken about her family.

“OK…Any tips?”

“Don’t get caught,” Gloria said and looked at Lurin, who nodded agreeingly. “Let’s go while we still have daylight. I’ll take the big cave on the left.”

“Are you OK with going alone?” Lurin asked.

No! Not at all! Please go with me! “Yes, of course!” I said and bee-lined for the smallest cave I could find.

Note to self: A narrow opening doesn’t necessarily lead to a small cave.

Darkness enveloped me quickly, forcing me to cast Light just to see where I was stepping. I burned through half of my mana potions, maintaining the illumination as I ventured deeper into the expansive cavern, and the stone walls grew increasingly rugged the further I went.

I had no idea what a Yeti looked like in Highland, but thanks to World of WarCraft, I was keeping an eye out for massive, white, furry beings. Instead, the first Yeti I literally bumped into was gremlin-sized with brown fur, almost invisible in the dim light. Its eyes had a sharply pointed shape, and it had a set of dangerously long claws for "hands". For a split second, I wondered how challenging it must be for the creature to pick its nose or, heaven forbid, scratch its eye.

“Fssikkkll, Fsiikklll!” it shrieked, its call resembling a dolphin’s, but without the charm. Then it began to rotate its arms wildly, reminiscent of an old Cessna propeller. I activated my bracelet, immediately feeling a surge of energy pulse through me—as if I’d just downed fifty cans of Monster, but far more intense and without the nauseating aftertaste.

With my rapier poised, the foolish Yeti charged, spinning its arms right into my waiting blade. Both arms were severed, leaving just a pair of stubs flailing like a malfunctioning teddy bear. It let out an even louder scream before I quickly dispatched it.

I stood there, surveying the now-lifeless creature at my feet. Despite the lingering rush of energy, I felt let down; the battle had been easy. Eager to make the most of the remaining adrenaline, I hurried deeper into the cave.

Barely twelve feet in, my eyes caught sight of a crystal protruding from the wall, its vivid blue in stark contrast to the surrounding dark stone. I seized it just as the energy rush subsided. The come-down felt like what I imagined the aftermath of a fifty-can energy drink binge would be—only worse.

I slumped against the cave wall, catching my breath and waiting for the bracelet’s lingering effects to dissipate. After stowing the crystal in my bag, I resumed my trek, though my legs felt like I’d just finished an ultra.

Soon, a rumbling sound echoed through the cave, growing louder, as if a stampede of angry bulls were charging from the depths. It wasn’t bulls, but it was a stampede—of sorts. Seven Yetis filled the width of the cave, their arms flailing like threshing machines.

“You call that an attack? I’ve seen dead kittens hit harder!” I yelled, targeting the Yeti closest to the wall, hoping that a swift, decisive strike would create an opening in their formation, allowing me to sidestep the remaining flurry of arms.

It worked. Drawing my rapier, I rolled through the gap while simultaneously casting Ward. My blade met fur, and the second Yeti collapsed. That left “only” five more. I considered using Hurt, but I didn’t want to waste the precious spell on these dirty fur propellers, learning from my encounter with Imrin.

Twenty-five breaths. “Your fur looks like a failed Pinterest project!” I shouted.

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Four left, and they had me surrounded. Screaming at the top of my lungs, I lunged at the nearest Yeti. My outburst must’ve startled them, as there was a brief halt in their chaotic arm-waving. Seizing the opportunity, I barreled into one, landing on top and quickly rolling away. Three remained, and for the first time, I saw doubt flicker in the eyes of my furry assailants. With another self-encouraging scream, I lunged again, and they retreated. I pumped my fist into the air—finally; I felt like a real fighter.

But then, one Yeti paused his running, looked over his shoulder, and I could swear that there was sheer panic in its small eyes.

A deep, guttural sound reverberated from behind me, vibrating through my core, just as I sensed a presence invading my personal space. My rapier still gripped tightly, I cast Ward again and spun around, taking a defensive stance. At first, I thought I was staring at two tree trunks. Tracing them upward, I realized they were legs—attached to a massive creature. It looked like a nightmare cross between a bear and an ogre, covered in fur and muscle, with tusks protruding from its gaping maw.

The sight paralyzed me just long enough for it to seize me, pinning my arms like King Kong, holding a distressed damsel. Defenseless, it lifted me off my feet.

“You’re so ugly, even a troll would swipe left!” I rasped through crushed lungs, wincing as I heard the unsettling crack of my ribs before I felt the pain. I glanced up and saw that my insult had barely made a dent in his health.

“Hurt,” I wheezed with what little air left in my lungs. The spell’s impact was substantial enough that it caused him to drop me.

“Rest,” I said as I plummeted back toward the ground. An unfortunate side effect of the Hurt spell was that it made him mad. Really mad. I tried to stand up, but I was too hurt. I narrowly dodged his first stomping attack by rolling, but ended up pinned against the cave wall with nowhere else to go. When I saw the giant foot obstruct the view of the owner, I did the only thing a hero can do when about to be trampled to death by a giant in a hidden cave on the top of a stupidly named mountain in a place called Purgatory. I closed my eyes. Squeezing them shut, and waited for the inevitable pain of being smudged like a bug by a giant.

Instead, a familiar tune filled the cave.

“Get up, Tim!” another familiar voice called out—Gloria. She vaulted onto the giant and began scaling the massive creature like a cliff face. I caught the panicked look in Lurin’s eyes as he played his flute; he wouldn’t be able to keep the giant entranced much longer. Ignoring the pain, I grabbed my Doss lute, which had miraculously survived the onslaught, and began harmonizing with Lurin. In moments, our tunes aligned, and I saw Lurin’s expression ease. That’s when I heard Gloria’s battle cry from high atop the giant’s head.

The saying ‘the bigger they are, the harder they fall’ holds particular truth in a cramped cave. I rolled against the wall, clutching my Doss lute, narrowly evading the giant’s collapsing hand, which crashed to the ground just above me.

“Gloria! Lurin!” I shouted into the now-quiet cave.

“Over here!” a voice responded after what felt like an eternity but was probably mere seconds. I maneuvered around the colossal corpse to find Lurin standing near Gloria. At first, I couldn’t make sense of what she was doing—it looked as though she was rubbing against the giant’s flank. But when the creature burst open, emitting a foul, death-like stench, it clicked: she had gutted it.

Then, astonishingly, she climbed inside the giant.

“Wha…what is happening? Why…ARE YOU ALL MAD!?” I yelled at Lurin, who stood smiling like a twelve-year-old on Christmas Eve.

“Wait a moment, Tim. Just wait and see…” He didn’t look at me when he said it, just staring at the gaping wound in the giant that Gloria had just entered with a big grin on his face.

After another hour that wasn’t an hour, I heard and saw something moving inside the corpse. Suddenly she came out, holding something in her arms. Everything was red, but when she dropped it to the ground, I could see what it was. Ice crystals. A lot of them.

“This is one of the ancient Giants. Do you know how rare it is to see one!?” Gloria said excitedly, smiling, looking like Carry in the Stephen King movie after they had covered her with blood on the theatre stage.

“No?”

“Most people believed these giants had vanished from existence. This one might have been the last of its kind,” Lurin explained. “They were once the rulers of this mountain and generated ice crystals within their bodies. And Tim, do you realize that this was a level twenty creature?”

I shook my head.

“There’s more inside,” Gloria announced before darting back into the cavity of the giant. She made several trips, each time returning with a handful of ice crystals until a small mountain of them lay before us.

“So, how do we get these down the mountain?” I asked.

“We don’t,” Lurin replied, to which Gloria responded with a knowing smile.

“What? Why go to all this trouble if we’re not bringing them back with us?”

“Because they’ll vanish along with the body,” Lurin said as we watched the giant’s corpse disintegrate. The speed of its decomposition astounded me; within a matter of seconds, it vanished, leaving behind only the pile of crystals. “The Yetis will take care of these. We only need to take the ten we require.”

I opened my mouth to say something, but decided there was nothing to say. Another surreal day in a strange world. I shook my head and grabbed nine crystals.

“You need one more,” Gloria said, the once-red blood now resembling dark chocolate as it dried on her skin.

“No, I got one from earlier,” I said.

“Well done, Tim! Well done!” Lurin said. “I knew there was something special about you. OK, let’s get down to DuckVille before it gets too dark.”

The journey downhill was significantly quicker than our ascent, though it took a toll on my knees. Halfway down, Lurin abruptly stopped and pulled a scroll out of his bag.

“I almost forgot. This is for you,” he said, before rejoining Gloria. I let them move ahead as I unfurled the scroll to read its contents.

Congratulations! You have successfully completed your quest and have reached level eight as a bard of the Highland clan.

Your achievement has granted you a new skill: Singing Blade. This skill can only be used with a one-handed blade and lasts for 10 breaths, attacking all enemies within range. To summon the Singing Blade, strike a note on your Doss Lute and say the command word, “Singblade.” The skill will need to recharge for 250 breaths before it can be used again.

At first, I was thrilled—until I reached the part that said the skill had to be summoned using the Doss Lute. How was I supposed to do that? I picked up my Doss Lute and plucked a string as high as it would go.

“Singblade!” I sang.

I didn’t feel my rapier leave its sheath, but I saw it floating in midair in front of me, its point eagerly seeking a target.

“HECK YEAH! THAT’S SUCH A COOL SKILL! FINALLY!” I yelled, the echo reverberating off the mountain. Gloria and Lurin came rushing back, halting when they saw my blade suspended in midair, searching for someone to attack. Then it shot toward Gloria.

“NO!!” I screamed. Gloria barely dodged it before it turned and went for Lurin. But just before it reached him, it disappeared, and I was seeing spots after hyperventilating to the tenth breath.

“What are you doing?! Are you trying to kill us?” Gloria yelled, storming toward me. As she came closer, I noticed blood on her arm—my rapier had grazed her.

“You have blood on your—” was all I managed to say before the world went black.