YAAAWN. Rum stretched his little snout wide open. Lazily, he opened his eyes, glancing around.
Their camp was at a regular rest stop along the western road leading up to Ermos City. Here, a wide area the size of a small block of houses, had its grass trampled by regular use. A few meters away there was the dirt road. No traffic went up that road so early in morning. A couple of other camps were set up at the rest stop as well. Like their own, these other camps were situated around a fixed firepit, with a dozen or more similar but unused firepits spread around the ground for whenever large groups would come to rest.
Rum knew this quite well, although his poor puppy vision made it less obvious from here down below. He lay his snout on Bresh’s puppynapping arm, and closed his eyes, ready to go back to sweet dreams.
Say it... Say it... SAY IT... SAY – IT! The compulsion in his mind fell upon his will like the overwhelming force of a breaching dam, and without thought, the sound erupted from Rum’s puppy mouth, right there where it rested flat and comfortable on Bresh’s arm.
“Boff!”
Rum’s sensation of his own body left him. He became a nothing, and then, seconds later, awareness came back again, and the very first thing that he felt, was something weird protruding up and in between his buttcheeks. Rum’s eyes opened up to the sight of two feet sticking out from under a blanket in front of him. Not long after he had recognized these two limbs though, did they start acting up, and really quite lively, Rum was surprised.
“MMM!” a deeply muffled shout filled the space between Rum’s buttcheeks, and while he hadn’t memorized the feet of Bresh, his mind scrambled together a picture of what might’ve just happened. Unfortunately for Bresh, Rum’s first act – being that he was currently down on both his knees and his two hands – was to sit upright, putting his whole upper body weight right down onto his butt.
“MMMMM!” Flailing arms hit Rum from either side as the deep cleft of his behinds pressed down against Bresh’s mouth and nose.
“Oh, sorry!” Rum managed, before reaching out with his arms to steady himself on the middle ground adjacent to the sleeping mage next over. He shifted his weight to his hands there, and lifted his opposite side leg up, hearing a sudden GASP! from below. Finally, he moved that foot behind and down next to her head, allowing him to push his whole posterior up and away.
Bresh wheezed, in several rapid breaths. Rum took the time to steady himself some more. Then Bresh tried to shoot her head up, only to find herself anchored to the ground by Rum. “Ouch, you’re standing on my hair!”
“Sorry!” Rum said for the second time in a row, and managed to awkwardly twist and turn until he found a new place for both his feet without stepping on any other person.
Bresh shot up again, taking herself up into an upright sitting position. Rum got some more space to move after that. He used it to rise up into a standing position, and from there, shuffled in-between and past Bresh and the other mage, until he was all out of their two-rows-three-columns arrangement of sleeping spots.
“Aaaah” he breathed out with relief at the ordeal. “Some way to wake up” he bent down to shake some dust off his robe.
“Uh, my face smells like your butt” Bresh grimaced, before standing up from her blanket and looking around at the camp. “Where’s the stream? I need to wash you out of my mouth.”
Rum straightened and looked about. It took him a brief moment to remember, but eventually he pointed over towards a small bridge to the south. The woman promptly set out on a heavy-footed march towards running water. As the woman walked, Rum studied his apprentice from behind. The new robes he’d conjured for her had an orange color with a brown tint. Eyes shifting up a little, and he saw waves of brown hair reaching down to her shoulders, ending in a rough cut. Finally his eyes moved higher still, and ending upon the hat. Like all the witches, it was a tall, pointed hat, and this too was an orange-brownish color, same as her robes.
The witch got only about three meters before she stopped under Rum’s secret stare. There, she promptly swung around, and marched back, not giving Rum as much as a glance. As the woman headed towards her sleeping spot, Rum’s analytic stare continued, taking in her face. A sprinkle of freckles dotted two big flushed cheeks. They were often flushed like this, Rum had noticed. Below her face, Rum saw a white embroidered shirt peek up from under the robe, giving the woman the opportunity to take the robe off should she want to, without thereby standing naked.
Reaching back to her spot, Bresh bent over her things and picked up just one thing: her new artifact – The Super-Sonic Broom. She studied the tool for a moment, eyeing it from the tip of its hardwood shaft, where a bunch of runes were carved, and down to the dense bundle of bound golden fibers at the other end. It was a fine broom by most standards, even pretty one might say, although in a simple fashion. Bresh The Witch grabbed the broom closer to its midpoint, holding it mid air and horizontal. Lifting a leg carefully, she mounted it and cast Rum briefly a glance of eye-contact. Then she turned to face the small bridge towards the south. Runes lit up with a white glow at that point, and the woman went up, flying away. Rum took in the sight of her one last time as she cruised away at slow speed. There he noticed her wavey hair flutter in the wind along with her robes, and that under those robes, long white pair of socks ran up from a pair of orange-brownish bootlike shoes. What a sight you are, Bresh. You quite remind me of a butterfly, crossing the sky. There where you go, you look like one of nature’s beauties: a splendor of color and shape.
Rum took in a breath of air through his nose, and turned his eyes towards the sun. Despite this sudden awakening, I feel awfully well-rested. Maybe, if Bresh can stop puppynapping me, I could continue to sleep like this. He glanced down at his Puppy-Sleep Bracelet, touching its doglike ears with a careful thumb from his other hand.
By the time Bresh returned, the dwarves and Elrith were awake, and some of the other mages had also stirred to life, and so had the other nearby parties of strangers. Their own party did not bother with those others though, instead Rum and the others just ate breakfast, and packed together their belongings. Those belongings included sacks of valueables from the dungeon also, which were carried by all, though the dwarves and Elrith had decided it was better to let Rum and White Rose carry the heaviest valuables, in exchange for some few extra coins of the loot. Rum thus stepped onto the road with his rucksack and two large and heavy sacks on his back, his Beast of Burden spell making the process easier and less detrimental to his body than it should’ve been.
At the head of their expanded group Elrith walked, carrying the lightest load due to her small size and presumably low strength score (Rum had never been allowed to Rumalize her, so he and the others just had to take her word for it). After their common boss lady there followed the dwarves, side by side like the couple they were. To the edge of the dwarves and just behind them was Amez. Rum’s little brother looked perpetually bored where he walked, and while he did carry most of his own share of the loot, with some carried by White Rose, he hadn’t really come for the loot but only the adventure. Predictably, his face was less than excited at the manual labor required of him now going home. Behind Amez followed the apprentices of Rum – all except two. Bresh had by this point discovered that it was much more pleasant to simply ride her broom half the time than to commit her feet to the hard ground, and so she would rather fly circles like a watchful bird around their slowly moving position, occassionally coming down to sit and lean against a tree or rock ahead of them. The other apprentice was Farklend, he was trailing shortly behind Rum, White Rose and Electrospark, trying to read his book with his left hand only, while his right hand held onto the small sack of loot hung over his right shoulder, next to his backpack. Impressively, the apprentice managed to get some reading done, although...
“Farklend, you’re falling behind again!” Bresh shouted from just above. Farklend, wrapped in Woof The Book, looked up as if he hadn’t heard what’d been said. A dumbfounded look scanned his surroundings first, before it went up and at Bresh. His eyes followed her pointing hand, which led ahead and to where the rest of the party was – a good twenty meters at least ahead of him. Farklends eyebrows shot up, and awkwardly he began to jog up to the others. Bresh just shook her head at the man, and flew on ahead to the others, passing them.
It was a mildly short-of-breath Farklend who just a minute later came up next to Rum, the latter glancing over to the man with a smile. “You doing okay, Farklend?”
The apprentice, red-faced, gave his teacher a quick look of attention, and nodded back to him, his own expression neutral. He took a second to realign the small sack over his right shoulder, and almost immediately started looking down into Woof The Book again, causing him to slowly, and gradually, fall behind Rum and the others once more.
Bresh, having flown far ahead of the party again, was coming back towards them. In the distance, Rum saw the witch wave her hands for attention.
“The witch wants something?” Rulli asked, raising the attention of those in the party who’d rather been focused on the scenary.
Bresh descended lower, and slowed down as she came in front of their party. “There’s a laaarge group of adventurers ahead.” She pointed down the road. “Like huuuge. HUNDREDS.” She gesticulated the enormity with wide spanning hands.
Elrith came to an abrupt halt, causing the others behind her to stop as well.
“Hundreds?” their party leader asked.
“Hundreds” Bresh reiterated. “Minimum two hundred if I’m a judge.”
“You sure they’re adventurers?”
“Certain! Remember who I am. I’ve seen how you dress and equip yourselves. This is hundreds of people with swords and shields and wands and staffs and all sorts of armor and robes. They look like the most irregular bunch you’d ever seen, and a few of them at the front look reaaally high level, like strong enough to give Jorteg a rough time. But most of them actually look like they’ve barely seen a fight before.”
“Oh damn” Elrith said. “It’s The Zerg.”
People in the party began to give each other glances.
“The Mecha-Gnomes were sending their zerg to deal with Jorteg’s Dungeon, remember!?” Elrith turned about to speak to the others. “And now they’re here, coming our way.”
“A zerg?” voiced Bun. “You mean, those dungeon busting armies? They were gonna target Jorteg?”
“Not were gonna” Elrith shook her head slowly, her eyes appearing wide and serious. “They ARE gonna, except Jorteg’s already dead. And we’re carrying his loot, and journeying with his apprentices.”
“Former apprentices” Larkoff commented, his tone reprimanding and slightly offended.
“They don’t know that” Elrith replied, and the group went silent for a moment. Bresh slowly descendend in amongst the silence and touched ground. Dismounting, she walked in amongst the gathered party, broom in hand.
“We could just explain the situation” Amez offered.
“You don’t say shit!” Elrith snapped at the tattoo artist, and a silence descended once more while Elrith appeared to be thinking hard. “Okay” she continued, “all of you, hide your artifacts! Quick!” Everyone began to look for places they could put away their rings, the book, and other items. Bun with her robe, and Bresh with her broom had a more difficult task in that regard though. “Okay just wrap a cloth to cover the runes” Elrith said when Bresh pointed out her situation, “and stuff the bottom of it inside a deep sack.” She turned to Bun. “In your case” she shook her head. “If anyone asks, just tell them you’re wearing a family heirloom.” Elrith sighed. “One artifact. We can explain away one artifact. A party full of artifacts? We’d be BURRIED in questions!” The party leader went back to thinking, putting a finger to her lips as she walked back and forth in front of their group. “This, this next thing is just as important.” She turned to speak directly to everyone. “Nobody – and I mean NOBODY – must suspect that Jorteg’s dead or that we are to blame.”
“Don’t you think they’d be happy that Jorteg’s dead?” asked Rum.
“Yeah” Bun agreed, “you’d think they’d thank us, and celebrate. Why is it so important that they don’t know?”
“Oh, you innocent fools” Elrith responded, and started to walk back and forth again, talking and walking. “No. They’re gonna be angry! I’ve been to a zerg before, and I can tell you – Bresh probably saw it now too, but didn’t know what they were – well, I’ll tell you, they’re going to have an advance party of upper level members. We’re talking passed level 80 at minimum. A whole group of them. And they will have been given the honor of slaying Jorteg themselves – an epic battle to make them heroes with all the praise, admiration, and status that comes with it. They've prepared ever since they got this assignment and have probably been wanting it for months or years. No – they're gonna be FURIOUS to find an empty dungeon! Their disappointment is going to cause rage and bitterness. And I won't have all that aimed at me because of you!” Elrith spun around to fling an accusative finger at Rum. “Not to mention the scores of lowbies who are gonna hate us for destroying one of their few chances at a proper adventure and loot." The woman stopped her back-and-forth and stood in front of them all. “NOBODY SPEAKS – unless spoken to. NOBODY MENTIONS ANYTHING. Lie if you have to. Tell them we got this loot from a chest in another dungeon – Baryo’s Dungeon, that’s maybe a bit too low level dungeon, but me, Rulli and Gilda have experience from there so we can make up a believable story.” She pointed next to the apprentices. “You, tell them you’re university mages on a mission if need be.” She pointed to Rum. “You! Make their story believable if need be.” She looked around at all of them. “And for all of you: keep it short, whatever you have to say, and refuse to say more if you’re able. Let’s just walk passed them. Raise no suspicions. Let them be none the wiser. Can you do that?”
“Ay” Rulli replied.
“Aye” Gilda followed.
The rest of the party remained silent. When their silence had stretched on a bit too long, Elrith repeated herself. “CAN YOU DO THAT!?”
“Aye!” the rest followed.
Elrith pushed passed most of the people and walked up to White Rose and Electroblade. “Eeeh” she voiced concern. “You look too interesting. You’re definitely going to attract attention. A gnome without limbs carried in the harness of a person of secret identity, with a fortune of treasure on your back?”
“If you want to” Electroblade began to respond, “I could lead White Rose off the road, and we could stealth through the land around the zerg, meeting you further ahead on the road?”
“Nah” Elrith shook her head. “They’ll be so many, and they’re likely to have scouts. That’s why you all need to start panicking now, or at least act like I told you now, because even if we don’t see them yet, their scouts could find and report us at any moment.”
“I’ve snuck passed worse things before” Electroblade shrugged. “Remember, I’m an adventurer, and more experienced than you.”
Elrith pretended not to have heard that last part, instead looking as if in thought. “No. I’m thinking that White Rose needs to hand zes loot over to somebody else. It looks too incredible that ze can carry all that by zeself. After that, I think it would be wisest if you in fact walked ahead of us, and drew in all their attention, taking it away from our party. Except...” Elrith produced a pained grimace. “I’m thinking if it’s possible any of them might have an item equipped to reveal–” she took in an anxious breath “–undead.”
“Nah” Electroblade shook her head. “I know what you speak of, and I’ve seen them. Those items are too rare and cost too much mana to use. Their high level people might have some on hand, but they won’t use them. Not out here. They’ll feel too confident, and certainly won’t expect to stumble upon an undead on the road.”
If you spot this tale on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.
Elrith looked to be weighing the statement by her return stare. “Hmm... it’s a risk. But – it’s your choice. If you wanna take that risk: go ahead. Just make sure they won’t give us a second look when we come after you.” Elrith thought for a moment, then glanced around at the others. “Okay!?” she demanded. People nodded.
They began to redistribute White Rose's loot. Rulli and Gilda were designated as the new pack animals of the party, taking an equal share, until White Rose had only a small sack of valueables left.
“That definitely looks less suspicious than before” Elrith eyed the result. “Still interesting, but not in a manner that should bring out greed.” She nodded to herself. “Okay, you two get ahead of us.” Elrith waved White Rose and Electroblade forward. “We will take a break here and let you march on first. Until you’re enough far off nobody thinks to put us in the same party.”
After a brief silence, Electroblade nudged her vehicle, and the interest-capturing duo began walking down the road.
"Now we just wait" Elrith commented, and the party, one by one, stepped over to the roadside and put their things down, sitting on grass. A couple of people, first Amez and then Rum, took off their boots to let their toes rest in the open air.
It wasn’t until the vanguard of the zerg revealed itself at the horizon that Elrith rallied the party members to stand up, pick up their loot, and continue walking. At that point, the gnome-skeleton duo were over halfway between them and the zerg.
At first, Rum saw very little of the adventurers in the zerg. He could see some blinking metal from people on horses and what probably was a dwarf on a ram. Some blobs of color could’ve been mages or they could’ve been people in colorful capes. As the little party and the zerg vanguard moved closer though, and the rest of the mass of people came into view, he was able to discern all these people at front who’d been chosen to slay Jorteg. They were three urban elves, including a man, a woman, and an androgynous person. The dwarf was a big man, and massively moustached, like his moustache had truly unbelievably dimensions, and it was also curled up to stand on either side like a boar’s tusks. Fierce and warriorlike. The four mecha-gnomes though were less standout, as was typical of their kind. If one disregards Electroblade, Rum mentally added. The gnomes were all men, except for the last gnome, a smaller tight-lipped woman. Her demeanor was business-like, and her gait serious, even out here and far away from the dungeon, she had that kind-of aura, composed and determined all at once. Altogether, Rum saw eight would-be heroes walking ahead of the zerg. Among them, the dwarf and the two cisgender urbans elves had elaborate armor filled with decorations, producing the image of successful seasoned warriors. The vanguard’s tanks, Rum thought. Dropping into the ethereal world for a moment as he walked, Rum saw that the plated armor of the people were powerfully enchanted. Truly outfitted to fight a dungeon lord, as they should be. Glancing with his ethereal sight across the surrounding urban elves and mecha-gnomes, he saw two magic staffs held in the hands of the remaining urban elf and the smaller hand of the female gnome. Along with their staffs, whose magic radiated brightly in Rum’s ethereal vision, the mages both had reserve wands at their belts also, and several magic rings on their fingers. Looking over at the male gnomes, they carried a mix of weapons, most of them enchanted. Rum dropped out of the ethereal world to study them more. One of the gnomes had a series of crossbows on their person, small ones, but mechanical. Rum didn’t know how they worked or what their enchantments did, but as the gnome in question did not appear very threatening compared to the mages and tanks, he guessed that the gnome must’ve had some edge to his arsenal that made him qualified for the vanguard. The second male gnome had a duel set of short curved blades, the kinds made for deflecting and stabbing rather than blocking and slashing. A duel-wielding blade master – up front and deadly. Finally, the last person among the would-be heroes had a small curved shield, together with a short spear (normal sized for a gnome). While the speargnome did also have a sword at his belt, the spear was the real price of all the three items. Its magic radiated almost as much as the staffs, and Rum could only guess at what it might do in combat.
Far ahead of the dungeon party, Elrith’s strategy unfolded itself as White Rose and Electroblade did indeed catch attention. The roughly two hundred or so bunch of human, urban elves, dwarfs, and mecha-gnomes, wearing all sorts of gear, stared at Rum’s disguised baby and zes babysitter with utter curiosity. Rum couldn’t hear it from where he was, but he could see them turning their heads and shouting towards White Rose and Electroblade, and Electroblade animatedly answering while walking at the side of the road. At one point, one of adventurers broke from the march and went up to White Rose, apparently offended by something. In return, Electroblade drew her blade and ZAP! the guy, sending him sprawled to the ground with electric cramps.
Rum felt his heart jump at that point. Up until now, he hadn’t thought much of the plan. It was just a simple ruse they were running. But when he saw the adventurer trying to mess with his magic child? Something awoke in him. Was it a feeling of fear? Could it be anger? No, a tension gripped him, but it was an anticipation, an anxiousness. An anxiousness that he should be there and deal with the situation, even if that would lead to even more attention their way. What if they try to gang up on White Rose and Electroblade? They were far away though, and Rum would not have been able to avert an escalation if something happened right now.
ZAP-ZZZZZZAP! Another adventurer had strolled up to Electroblade and thought himself better than her. As the man fell to the ground and spasmed there, Rum tried to feel relief at the easy with which the gnomestress took down her opponents. That man probably regret his actions right now.
Then the worst came to be. A bunch of adventurers began to shift within the zerg, a small mass of people, their slowing and then turning towards a new direction. Towards White Rose and Electroblade. First a trio of adventurers, the first from the shifting mass, stopped right ahead of the two – blocking their path. Following this, other adventurers spread around their position, surrounding his baby and babysitter in a quickly closing circle. Rum’s heart sped up, and then stopped as the encirclement closed on him, leaving but a small gap for him to see hints of what was happening. Without thinking he felt his feet starting to speed up, soon passing Elrith by, who called out for him.
“Hey! Rum! Stop! Don’t walk ahead of us!”
But Rum didn’t listen, his eyes were fixed on the scene as he saw the mass of bodies congregating, with one one and then two humans walking up to Electroblade, both of them appearing to talk her down with red faces and aggressive gestures. At some point when the argument started to heat up, Electroblade not backing a centimeter, Rum unconsciously dropped the loot he was carrying onto the roadside. His feet sped up even more, and before he’d realized what he was doing he was jogging, his mind entirely focused on the events ahead.
“Rum!? Brother!” Amez apparently was jogging up towards Rum from behind, but Rum could only look ahead.
A woman stepped into Electroblade’s space, shortsword in hand. Electroblade’s weapon pointed back at the woman threateningly, but when the other woman met the sword with a parry, a sudden flash of electricity from Electroblade did nothing. Elemental blocking enchantment, Rum quickly reasoned, and his jog became a sprint.
“Brother!” Behind Rum, Amez dropped his own loot and started sprinting as well.
The vanguard looked curiously at the two figures running towards them.
“What’s the matter?” asked the female elf tank on her horse. Rum only ran passed her though, not giving her a reply nor as much as a glance.
“Rude” commented the dwarf, as Amez came after, likewise ignoring the vanguard.
“Wait” the male elf tank halted his horse. “Wasn’t that Amez The Body Enchanter?” All of the vanguard’s heads turned to watch Amez run towards the main body of the zerg, where a commotion was brewing.
“Amez...” the incredibly moustached dwarf spoke, “body enchanter? What’s he doing here?”
Rum’s legs plunged him into the main body of the zerg, which had by now more or less devoured White Rose and Electroblade from his sight. He ran into and shoved aside adventurer after adventurer. One tall, big and burly adventurer with a warhammer tried to grab him. “Hey, what’s the hurry here?”
But Rum just breathed out “Muscles Grow”, and within seconds he was strong enough to strongarm the strongman, bending away the huge man’s thick fingers with such force that the man dropped the warhammer in his other hand, yelping in surprise pain. Rum continued on after that, shoving aside adventurers much more forcefully than before. The adventurers meanwhile took the hint, and as Rum progressed through the mass, more and more of them stepped aside in good time, giving him a clear path ahead.
Rum stormed into the encirclement like a juggernaut, casting forward a mage and a ranger in the act, both of the unlucky adventurers’ slamming face-first into dirt and pebbles.
“White Rose, PUNCH THEM!”
Electroblade was bladeless, the female adventurer from before held the gnome’s one able-bodied arm in a tight grip with her hand, while Electroblade’s chin was grasped with the other. A dominating pose for adventurer, and a humiliating one for Electroblade. Two other adventurers had grabbed either of White Rose’s arms while a third held zes neck in a choking grip.
As soon as the words hit White Rose’s magic senses though, zes arm went straight up, sending zes two assailants dangling off the ground on either side. Next ze arms swung straight down, sending the assailants’ feet crashing hard against earth. The assailants naturally stumbled at these quick, jerking motions, losing their once steady grisp around zes arms. As her assailants loosened around her arms, White Rose became free to carry out the commands of Wizard Daddy. As if not needing to see what ze was doing, White Rose simultaneously punched up with both zes arms, each going into the chest of its respective assailant, left and right. Whatever remaining grip these people may have had on ze was nullified in an instance as both assailants grabbed their chests, complaing about shattered ribs. However, White Rose was not done. Again, zes arms went out, punching, but this time straight into each of their faces, the grace of zes strike giving ze a near t-pose with both adventurers knocked backwards and onto the ground, noses bleeding. Next for White Rose was the assailant at zes neck. An annoying individual, if not particularly effective in either limiting or harming ze. The assailant tried to grab White Rose’s neck harder, attempting to strangle ze with all his might. Of course, where there is lungs and no windpipe, there is nothing to choke. So instead, White Rose, zes arms completely free now, simply moved zes arm up, over zes shoulder, and punched the adventurer’s face from the odd angle. The first blow gave the man, a sneaky rogue by the look of it, a bloody nose and a confused expression. Yet whether out of reflex or training, the man did not loose his grip. So White Rose punched the man again: twice, thrice... the man could only handle three punches before he lost his grip along with his feet. He simply collapsed, falling down White Rose’s back. Finally, White Rose dealt with the easiest opponent of them all. Ahead of zeself, ze simply knocked the teeth out of the woman who’d been trying to dominate Electroblade. The woman stumbled back at that. A step forward, and a second PUNCH!, and the woman fell to the ground. Another trio of teeth missing.
White Rose looked around zeself. Wizard Daddy had said “PUNCH THEM!” Did them include all the people around ze? Ze took a step toward the nearest adventurer in the encirclement, who jumped away in fright – an instant reaction! Inside White Rose’s head, that man was no longer the closest target now, so ze glanced towards the next person, turned a little, and moved towards her. Her feet backed off immediately. Sending her into the people behind her, which she pushed against, rapidly squeezing herself out of the encirclement and leaving the scene altogether. This was all very confusing for White Rose. Should ze just pick a target and stick with it until ze could punch the person? Or should ze just try until one of the targets would remain in place long enough for ze to carry out the punching? White Rose strode towards a third, who backed off as well, and a fourth, who ran off! White Rose felt, or at least thought, that ze was failing zes Wizard Daddy. He’d said “PUNCH THEM!”, and ze’d only managed four out of... how many were there really? Ze started counting, all the while rotating about zes position, making sure to note them all.
Meanwhile, Rum stepped into the center of the scene, eyeing the bleeding facing of the four people on the ground. Electroblade’s previous victims appeared to have been taken away already.
“What are you all trying to do here!?” Rum shouted to the crowd, accusing them in his tone. Behind him, Amez finally arrived panting, his slowing down turning into a careful walk as he came into the circle. The younger brother stared around at the people on the ground, at White Rose rotating about zes position, and to the frightened and antagonistic onlookers.
“That person, whoever she or he is, wouldn’t take to us.” A warrior replied from the crowd, and both Rum and Amez turned to find the man. He was bald, like Rum, but thinner, and carrying a single plain saber at his belt. No armor, nothing but a white shirt and black pants. “That’s rude, not to talk to someone, and when someone tried to confront the person about it, this little gnome here attacked!”
“I see.” Rum nodded, serious and unkind in his expression, but staying rational. “Well, this person is called White Rose, and is my friend. And is mute. How can you expect an answer from someone mute?”
“Well we didn’t know that, and nobody told us!” The man defended himself. “That fact doesn’t make it more right to attack us though.”
Rum walked up to White Rose, or rather to Electroblade, giving her a raised eye. “Is it true you attacked first?” he asked her, while noticing her blade on the ground. He looked at the weapon, and went to pick it up.
“They weren’t willing to leave us alone” she replied. “I had to give the trash some thrashing.”
“NOW HANG ON HERE!” shouted a woman from the crowd, a spellsword by the look of it, a sword and a wand at her belt, while a small thin breastplate covered her chest. “See how that little bitch is talking to us?”
Rum looked the woman’s way. “Do you think that Electroblade – which is the gnome’s name – was speaking of you when she said trash?”
The woman was about to answer when Rum cut her off. “–I don’t think it’s very nice to not respect a no for an answer, and while Electroblade may be crass with her words, I think her sentiment should stand: disrespecting their unwillingness to converse was unacceptable behavior. Disrespecting people like that isn’t right. WOULDN’T YOU ALL AGREE?” He turned and shouted out towards the crowd, taking away the woman’s chance to naturally respond to him.
Nobody responded a word, they all just looked at him.
202 punch targets. That was how many White Rose had managed to count. Minus 4 already punched ones, that left 198 targets left to punch. But how would she accomplish punching all of them efficiently, if most of them tried to run off like two of them had? It could take forever running after each one of them! And if two of them ran off at the same time in different directions, ze would have to run twice as long to catch the next one after first. And if 100 ran in 100 different directions, she would... wait, how would she calculate that? Wizard Daddy had mentioned something about the unit circle. He’d called it some kind of ideal circle, which could represent circles in the world, and it consisted of 360 degrees. That’s what he’d called it, degrees. And so, if each one ran in a direction different from every other, and each direction was maximally away from every other direction, each target would land at some direction which would be a number from 1 to 100, multiplied by 3.6 degrees. And if...
Amez stepped into the crowd. “Hey hey” Amez’s arms came up. People looked at him immediately.
“That’s Amez!” Someone said and pointed.
“Amez The Body Enchanter!” said another.
“Hey everyone. Eh, this here is my brother.” He patted Rum’s shoulder. “He’s not always the best with people, and White Rose–” he gestured to ze, “–and Electroblade–” he gestured a little lower, “–they’re not really good either. Why don’t we all just try and calm down, and try and understand that this was all an unfortunate misunderstanding. We don’t want to fight anyone, or get someone mad, and I’m sure you don’t want to fight anyone either... except monsters and the dungeon lords of course!” Amez smiled, forcing a bit of lighthearted laugh out of himself. A few of the adventurers were infected by the remark, their faces turning a smile as well. “No reason why we can’t be friends.”
“Hey! You threw a tankard at my head at The Minotaur’s! I still got a scar!” A young man with shortcut hair, leather armor, and a sword at his belt, walked into the circle with both hands on his hair, pulling apart some of it to reveal a scar underneath.
“Ah. Well, that’s in the past” Amez said reflexively. “It was an accident, I didn’t mean to hit you that bad.”
“Accident my arse, you threw that tankard with all your strength! You could’ve killed me!”
“Sorry!” Amez responded, and shifted his stance from reflexive denial of guilt, to performative humility. An almost perfectly smooth transformation. “Sorry man. I really am” he said slowly, and put on the utmost expression of regret. “I didn’t mean to do that, yet that wasn’t okay of me. You know what? Why don’t I try to make it up for you. Why don’t you come to me, whatever time works for you, and we find an available slot in our schedules, and I’ll fix you up a tattoo. A body enchantment – free of charge!” Amez gesticulated his gift-giving, offering a sad smile along with the bribe.
“A body enchantment?” the man halted his angry expression.
“That’s Amez The Body Enchanter!” A woman spoke from the crowd. “He’s one of the best body enchanters in Ermos! You should be sore not to get one of his tattoos. I’ve only heard of what he can do, but it’s amazing. But I’d need a lucky strike at a dungeon twice my level if I ever were to afford one.”
Murmurs began in the crowd, the words “Amez” and “tattoo” and “enchantment” whispered in awes, in gossip, and in poorly concealed dreams of greater power.
Amez, taking on a more confident appearance, walked up to the man he’d once struck bloody, and grinned at him, putting a hand on his shoulder. “For that, can you forgive me?”
Breaths slowed, and the crowd began to listen, curious for the reply.
“I...” the man look conflicted for a second. Finally, he nodded. “I can forgive you. Accidents happen.”
Both men’s smiles broadened, and Amez embraced the man with one arm, looking out towards the crowd. “Can’t we forgive, and forget? All this–” he gestured to the fallen people, “–was a terrible misunderstanding. A misunderstanding that should end. Can’t we all just part ways on good terms? Rum!” He looked towards his brother. “Why don’t you heal up these people, and anyone else who needs healing – even those who weren’t hurt here. And we all leave each other with peace afterwards?” Amez looked into the eyes of the crowd.
Rum thought for a moment, and nodded. “That seems like a wise course, brother.” The wizard stepped over to the nearest punched face he could find, and leaned down, not waiting for the reply.
“EVERYONE THINKS THAT’S FAIR?” Amez raised his voice, inviting responses.
“Myeah” came a first reply, followed by some more “myeah”-s and “sure”-s. People nodded, some gave a weak thumbs up, and overall people seemed to accept the idea.
Amidst all this, White Rose walked up to a guy. Ze stared at him, innocent-looking. “What you want, mute?” Grumbled the guy.
PUNCH! The horizontal force of White Rose’s bony fist, who shout out like a mechanical spring, crashed against the man’s shoulder, lifting him off the ground by sending his upper body straight backwards, faster than his legs could follow. The man went straight into the crowd of people behind him, sending them all sprawling to the ground in a heap of limbs and knocking over many more in the process.
197 to go, White Rose counted. Then, ze proceeded to punch the next target, and every other member of the zerg. Each of zes punches delivered with maximum speed, along an optimal visitation path, leading to the least expenditure of time before overall completion. A feat, ze was sure, would make Wizard Daddy proud.