The four of us made our way from the cave to the forest with extreme caution. We went one by one so that the possibility of someone seeing us would be minimum. I went first to the edge of the forest and gave the signal that it was safe and my wives came one by one. In the evening yesterday I had only seen half of the monkeys return to the mountain with the cages. The leader had not returned and had probably stayed in the forest, so that the banana could be kept safe. Today morning however I had missed when the monkeys had gone to the banana.

We silently made our way to the place that had the magical banana. From a distance we saw that today there were not only monkeys at the place but also Lazaki men. There were at least ten men and thirty monkeys in total.

The four of us squatted behind a large tree.

“How will we kill them all?” Dani asked. She had her quiver of unending arrows but I doubted that we could kill all of them from the distance using arrows.

“The objective is not to kill them all,” I said, “it’s to destroy the banana. We’d have to distract them so that at least a few of them move away from the banana.”

“How will we do that?” Slia asked. I pursed my lips in thought. What kind of a distraction would do the job? I could send Slia and Lia to create noises at a different spot and at the same time Dani and I could kill the remaining Lazaki and monkey slaves, and destroy the artefact. But I did not want any harm to come to Slia or to Lia. On top of that Lia could only heal others but not herself.

I looked at Dani.

“We don’t need to kill all of them,” I said, “but we would have to kill a number of them. Now listen you three…”

I told them of my plan. Slia and Lia would go a certain distance from the site and create noises. They could shout and do whatever they wanted to do as long as they could attract those present at the banana site. Then they would have to move in a circle to create the maximum distance between themselves and the Lazaki and come back to the place where we were presently.

Meanwhile, with some of the men and the monkeys gone from the site, I would throw myself to the site of battle with my sword, while Dani would stay at a distance and shoot her arrows to aid me. Dani had said that her aim had been considerably improving. Maybe it was because the more we were staying in the barbaric realm the more we were getting accustomed to it and the barbaric realm were also was getting accustomed to us.

We set the plan in motion. First Slia and Lia went. I prayed that nothing would happen to the two girls. Only when they were gone that it struck me that they couldn’t see any of the Sense Screens and they might pass through one or more Sense Screens and the sorcerer would come to know of them. But I had to take the risk. The sorcerer already knew anyway that we had not gone from the barbaric realm.

After a while we began to hear Slia and Lia shout and create as much noise as they could. As expected, some of the Lazaki men and some of the monkeys went to investigate. A couple of minutes later, I threw myself into the scene. I caught one of the Lazaki men from behind and slit his throat and then I met the others head on. The Lazaki were of a shorter stature than me and I used this to my advantage. I was able to land harder blows on their swords and the strength of the blows would throw them backwards. I would be quick to put my sword through their hearts.

Three Lazaki came at me at once. I leapt backwards, fully aware that I couldn’t tackle them together. Thankfully the next moment one of them dropped with an arrow sticking to his neck. The other two were momentarily distracted. I kicked one of them on the chest, then slit the throat of the other.

I then raised my sword and repeatedly stabbed the chest of the one I had kicked. At that moment, a monkey leapt onto my back followed by another, and then another. Arrows began to fly in my direction and hit the monkeys. But they just kept throwing themselves upon me. For every one that Dani was able to hit with her arrows, two would jump onto me. I tried to shake them off but failed. I was able to kill a couple with my sword, but then I found my sword being pulled away from me. Next I knew the sharp canines of a monkey were sinking into my shoulder.

Stolen novel; please report.

I let out a cry. I boxed the monkey on the face and I was somehow able to wrench his teeth out of my shoulder, which only resulted in blood gushing out of the holes that the monkey had made on my shoulder.

Next, a monkey bent my knee and I fell face first onto the ground and tasted soil. More and more monkeys began to leap onto me. And at that moment the group of Lazaki men and monkeys that had gone to investigate the noises made by Slia and Lia returned apparently given up on the investigation. The Lazaki men now surrounded me, even as the monkeys covered my back.

I lifted my head to see that the Lazaki men had grins on their faces. Was this how I would go down? The monkeys had sunk their teeth into my legs and back as well and pain was flooding me. I wished Xoris to give me an urge to indicate what would be the correct thing to do at the moment to save myself, but he didn’t. He probably had no idea how to get me out of this situation.

And then I heard a cry.

“No, Slia—!” It was Lia’s voice. From the corner of my eyes I saw the two of them bursting into the scene, Lia trying to hold back Slia but failing. Slia ran to me almost hysterically. The Lazaki men present only laughed and they grabbed her. She tried to shake them off but the men overpowered her. And then something happened.

Bits of Slia’s skin began to fall off, exposing not blood but fire underneath her skin. Before half a minute had passed, Slia was completely a lady of fire. Even her hair was on fire. I could barely look towards her, she was so bright. The Lazaki men had let go of her before long and they were too paralysed with fear even to move.

And then Slia burst. For a moment my entire vision was covered by fire. The monkeys on my back cried out, and I could feel the heat. And then the explosion was over in the span of a few seconds. All skin had returned to Slia and her clothes were also on. She however looked very weak and she fell on her knees. The Lazaki men were all dead, their bodies charred. And so were the monkeys that had held me down. Many of them had fallen off my back and I could see their blackened bodies lying beside. I crawled from underneath the hot heap of dead monkeys and fell forwards. Slia’s fire had killed all our enemies, but it had absolutely spared me.

I was still bleeding from the wounds that the monkeys had given me and my health bar was barely there. However, somehow, I mustered up the strength to stand up. Dani and Lia ran into the scene and they tried to help me, but I declined.

There was a stone of considerable size not far from the great banana. I went and picked this up. I took it near the great banana, some of the hands of the drugged monkeys still touching it. I raised the stone and then struck the banana hard. A shattering sound echoed about the place. The monkeys that had been still touching the banana lost in ecstasy suddenly seemed to wake up. Seeing me they immediately fled. The monkeys in the cages that had been tied up however were still drugged. I reckoned that it will be a while before they wake up. The doors of the cages were open, so the monkeys should be able to tear the ropes around their hands and legs with their sharp teeth.

At that moment all energy seemed to leave me and I fell to the floor of the forest. Lia rushed to my aid and cast her healing powers on me. It was a considerable while before Lia’s healing could fix my wounds. I still however felt very weak. Slia was still on her knees in the same place.

“Is she all right?” I asked about Slia to Lia and Dani.

“She said she will be,” Lia said.

“How did she do that?” I said, gesturing at all the dead Lazaki and their monkey slaves.

“Only she knows,” Lia said. And then I recalled Slia’s father telling me that Slia had powers deep within her that could surface during times of peril. After a while I had acquired enough strength that I was able to stand up.

“We should get moving,” I said. “The sorcerer and the Lazaki probably already know what has happened here and they will be sending more monkeys and men to get us. We should be gone before that happens.”

“I don’t think I can stand up,” Slia said in a small and weak voice.

“We’ll help you,” Lia said. She and Dani helped Slia to stand up, supporting most of her weight. But even then Slia barely seemed to have any energy to move her legs.

“Let me carry her,” I said.

“Are you sure?” Lia asked, for although my wounds had healed considerably they hadn’t healed completely.

“Yes,” I said. I hauled Slia over my shoulder. “Are you comfortable?” I asked her. Slia made a small sound telling me that she was.

It took a while to get back to the cave. We didn’t see any Lazaki or the monkeys coming down the mountain. I reckoned that by pure luck, Lia and Slia had avoided passing through Sense Screens when they had gone to create noises to distract the Lazaki and their slaves.

***