“Watch your back!” Norton strengthened the grip on his broadsword, drawing a horizontal arch with it and splitting the three kobolds coming at him. Blood splattered all over, not that we weren’t bloody enough to start with.

If you liked staying clean and out of contact with strange fluids, dungeon delving just wasn’t your job.

I turned back just in time to place my wooden shield between me and a three and a half feet of murder attempt-filled meatball. The kobold crashed on it, trying to chow it down with its teeth. Luckily, ‘smart’ would be the last thing a kobold was. Which was to expect from a lower dungeon floor.

Shaking my head and refocusing, I pushed in an upward angle, throwing the kobold up with some effort. I fixed my stance, used that momentum, gripped the sword in my other hand and trusted it upward with all I could. The blade sunk on the kobold’s belly, and the damn thing screamed what I’m sure it was kobold for “Fuck you”. Although I didn’t speak kobold. And I don’t thing kobolds can communicate between them…

“Oh, shit.”

Before I noticed, its body started to swell, some nasty meat chunks popping up and bubbling here and there. “I pierced the core. Here it comes…” It grew bigger, fatter, nastier, until it was twice its original size. Then gifted me with a totally free kobold blood bath treatment, gut pieces included.

“Really?! It’s the third time in the day!”

“Stop complaining and get your ass back here! I can’t hold the frontlines all alone!” Norton used his broadsword as a shield, blocking two incoming spikemadillos. They crashed on the plain part of the blade (which, to be honest, was wide enough to make a paladin’s shield envious), sparks blew from the crash, and the spike balls bounced back, flying all across the room.

“It’s not my fault you guided us into a spawn room!” To be honest I knew it was a douche move to blame a party member for a bad decision they make (we all make mistakes, don’t we?) so to make up for that I dashed towards him and sliced in a half a kobold trying to get him from behind. This time, making sure I didn’t hit the core.

“Sorry” I said. “I’m just a little bit off right now.”

Norton snorted. “Yeah, I heard kobold baths can do that to people.”

I laughed. “Better not to do it again, then.”

“We’re in the middle of a fight, people!” Anne nagged us from the rearguard, as usual. “Leave your brother bonding stuff for later!”

This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.

“I though your job was healing us, not being our mother!” I answered back, lifting my shield up again and taking the full brunt of a spikemadillo bash. I stomped on the ground, forcing it back and throwing it out of balance. It crashed hard against one of the room’s walls, the momentum it had built up so far worked against him, and the spikes on its shell got stuck on the cobblestone. It rolled back out of himself, losing the ball shape and now looking as if a weasel had tied up a durian husk on its back.

“That’s one less” I said, taking advantage of the moment and piercing it with the tip of my sword.

Anne’s spoke. Or rather, chanted, in that eerie voice tone mages used when the chanted their spells. As if speaking with two voices at the time.

“Falth Est Kale Sumirath…” The tip of her staff glowed, her hair danced in the wind as that mysterious force that always preceded a spell enveloped her.  Four magic circles, each concentric but misplaced like puzzle pieces, floated up in the middle of the air. She closed her eyes, and the circles began to rotate and mount into each other, pushed by Anne’s will. When the composed circle was ready, she opened her eyes, hit the ground with the end of her staff, and activated the spell.

~Lesser Purge Aura~

Then, everything inside the spell area, with her at the very center, was cleaned from filth. Dust, blood, guts, even things like sweat and odor, all disappeared in a blink of an eye.

“Now that’s what I was talking about” I said, giving her a thumbs up. “See, you’re pretty damn nice when you’re not grumbling around.”

“Keep ticking me off and I’ll set you on fire! Now take care of the rest! I’m starting to run out of will.” She might want to sound cool and annoyed and all, but the flush on her face told her off. We all knew how big of a tsundere our party healer was.

“Aye aye, captmom!”

Norton rushed forward, carrying his blade on his shoulder. He was building speed… And his blade was twinkling? Oh, he was going to use that huh. Showed how much he wanted to end this.

“Keith, I’m taking the big numbers out! Helen, when I’m done, use your scan skill! You and Keith take care of the rest of them!”

“Got it!” Helen, the party’s Explorer, threw her last poisoned needle to one of the kobolds getting too close to Anne, currently putting together what I assumed was a recovery spell for when Norton was done.

“Here I come…!”

Norton planted his foot on the ground, stomping with such strength it caused a slight tremble. He was aiming at the big monster multitude, attempting to take down as many as he could. The tingling light on his sword accentuated, became brighter… hotter…

Bloodier…

Burning, it was…

Then he saw.

Fire. Everything was fire. Fire and blood. His blood, Norton’s blood, everyone’s blood. And then the beast. Breathing fire. Horns tainted red. Wickedly sharp claws, bringing an end to all. He wanted to die. And live. And he was going crazy. And it wouldn’t last, because the beast was looking at him, and death gleamed on its ruby eyes, and…

And the vision was over, and all the sudden, Keith couldn’t remember what had gotten him so distracted. He couldn’t miss the chance to do this. Norton hardly ever used it, his only miracle.

A roar. Norton’s own. The blade’s own. And then, as he swung the sword forward, slashing but air in a horizontal arc, the roar became a name. The name of the miracle.

And then, a fire lion’s head opened its maws, turning all to a hell of flames.

~Feral Cinders~