Hey! Are you okay!? I neighed at the woman who might be Orlean Piercer.

It took her a few moments to look back up at me with a head tilted in confusion. "A horse?"

And you're a fucking gnome, shorty. No need to state the obvious. I rolled my eyes.

It was then that Flaze finally got off from my back to rush towards the woman.

"Hey, hey, it's okay." She hovered over the person in electric armor placatingly. Flaze was clearly still wound up and tense, after the power the woman in front of us had shown earlier. "Can you stand?"

"Oh fuck, I'm going to barf again…!" She completely ignored Flaze, and instead pried off her helmet. The face that was revealed was indeed familiar, but also not at all.

Blue hair instead of the dark brown locks of Orlean, long ears that sharpened from the bottom down, and eyes so large they looked like they might bulge out of her head, as if they were a demented attempt at granting an actual human being anime eyes. That's without even mentioning the literal feet of height she had lost overnight. Or at least, within a few weeks. A weight loss regime that truly works, if you ignore how much wider she had become instead!

The rest of the features however, were very reminiscent of Orlean, if only a tad stockier, and with a skin impossibly smooth.

"...What?" Flaze finally asked the million dollar question. "What… Who… Orlean?"

The woman perked up at the name, she looked up at Flaze's armored form, face yet obscured by a helmet. "Flaze?"

They stared at each for a few moments. As did I. Finally they both jumped up excitedly, Flaze tossed away her cap, and I got to see the joy light up in both of their faces as they crashed and hugged into each other.

I'm sure I didn't look any better. The joy and relief of a horse visible on my beautiful face.

"Orlean!"

"Flaze!"

"ORLEAN!"

"FLAZE!"

They began shouting each other's names, and I joined in, rushing to join the group hug. ORLEAN!!!

"Woah!" The woman in question broke my heart, when she instead jumped back in alarm. Sweat flowed down her skin as she began casting, sparks of static gathering around her body.

"Hey! Waiit!" Flaze thankfully came to my defense. She spread her arms wide in between the both of us, preventing a fight from breaking out.

"Flaze. That there is a monster. A dangerous one, I can tell." I felt the pull of Identify. "Yes, Level 68. But even stronger than normal." A bit of blood mixed with puke dripped from her mouth. "I'm a bit tired, but don't worry. I got this."

"No! Calm down!" Flaze protested. She pointed at me. "Jackal! That's Jackal!"

"...What?"

"Jackal Dolmer! Your friend!"

"The horse?"

"Yes."

There was silence, for a few moments.

"...Yeah. Okay. That makes sense." Orlean accepted the facts. And then she threw her back and began laughing hysterically.

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

It's good that it all ended amicably. It's good, but…

Now I wish I got the chance to smack her around.

I handily ignored the power difference between us, and instead I walked up to my friend. I raised a hoof, brought it up to her face, and then rested it easily on top of her head

Short. Shorty.

Bitch.

She somehow understood what I meant, I noticed that she scowled. Her expression turned back into a shit-eating grin the next moment.

"At least I'm not a horse."

Being a horse isn't bad. I huffed, proudly puffing up my chest.

"Sure." She smiled. One of those smiles that people give when an orphan child claims that their parents will come back for them.

What a fucking rude asshole, that I'm so glad is alive and around to still continue being a rude fucking asshole.

We quickly found shelter after that. We were barely seated when Flaze finally started asking the same burning questions that were ablaze in my own head.

"What happened to you? Why so little? Lightning! Mega pillars! What's up with those!?"

Orlean had no trouble explaining, that the pillars we found were indeed hers, or that the big formation around her house was her doing.

She was no longer human, hence the much shorter stature. She had chosen a blacksmith dwarf class at first, to craft weapons out of metal. One that even allowed for a certain amount of control over the stuff that she'd worked on, and had binded to her somehow.

It was a Class that really played to her strengths, for she had always been good at tinkering with stuff; from making a lot of our more impressive props, to being the person I cried to whenever my phone or some other device broke down.

The second Class she picked was then an enchantress elf. Flaze brought up how both she and I got some achievements and got better Classes, as well as both of them unlocked from the get-go. I gloated at Orlean's revelation that she wasn't quite able to manage such a feat, but I shrunk away when she pointed out how she was stronger than the both of us regardless.

Back to her being an elf, it was apparently a race that was more connected to magic, and highly creative, but not in the precise way dwarves were geared towards. More that of a painter or a musician. It was also what gave her big googly anime eyes. Ficking weeb shit. I bet that's why she picked it.

Regardless, it was a fitting Class for Orlean because she was as much an artist as she is someone that builds with logic, albeit the two concepts can be very hard to separate. To the extent that they are different though, Orlean is able to embody both aspects.

Her enchantments were more on the side of art. Runes were a way to convey your will towards magic, and have it act out accordingly. But that is a process that can be quite very subjective, hence Orlean's more cavalier approach towards it.

As for how she learned of the runes to begin with, the knowledge was in part crammed into her head through magic, but also something that she had to study. During the process with which she obtained her Class, some very basic runes were etched into her surroundings through the near cocoon of lightning that covered her.

"Enough about me!" Orlean huffed, after Flaze's relentless questioning. She cut us off before we could ask about her clearly enchanted armor, or the sword that we only now noticed she had. "Jackal is a fucking horse!" She then pointed at Flaze and Flaze, "You are two people! You just did that while we were talking! I'm far more interested in how your apocalypse has been going!"

She sat down and crossed her arms. Orlean looked like a little girl that was pouting, except her face looked even more mature than before somehow.

But her resolve was clear. She wasn't going to talk, until we've told her about our own story.

I gulped, for more reasons than one.

~~~

"Darkvoid's dead." Flaze had to be the bearer of bad news, being the only one of us who could speak.

Darkvoid is dead.

I wrote the same thing in squiggly and disjointed lines, so as to not let her take all burden by herself.

Orlean's mood immediately dropped, from the excitement of hearing the many stories of our merrier battles. Her favorite was when Flaze and I jumped off from many stories high, even though she herself could quite literally fly. Orlean's always been supportive like that, allowing the rest of us to shine even brighter. Not that she can't kick ass when she has to. In fact, right now she can kick more ass than I can.

No amount of badassery, however, could save her from the pain of losing a friend. We took a substantial break after that reveal, for Orlean to have a proper cry, to mourn for someone who had died days prior. Although, in a way, Darkvoid was also long dead before I and Flaze found him.

It was hard, seeing Orlean break down. It was hard because much as I thought I was getting over it quite well, Orlean's tears brought those same wounds to fester once more. If the tears were any indication, then Flaze too felt the same way.

Our break ended up extending well into the night, all further discussions postponed until the next day. My consciousness easily drifted away, as I cried myself to sleep.