It’s an obsession, I suppose.

The metal of my lance strikes out, the sound ringing with clear intensity as the tip of the blade strikes against the hero’s sword. Pushing off, I vault over him just in time as the world behind myself erupts into an explosion of crystallizing white-magic.

Fighting, that is. It’s sort of an obsession of mine, though I can’t really say why.

  My boots thud against the sand and I drop down low, just in time to duck beneath the fist that whooshes over my head, the jangling of heavy wooden beads audible to my ears. Leaping, I ram the monk with my shoulder and send her flying off into the distance. She tumbles over the soft sand as she flies. The world erupts in a fiery intensity an instant later as the wizard’s fireball reaches us again.

  In the blink of an eye, the slime shoots out of my body and wraps herself around myself. The scorching fire erupts into a violent explosion, filling the world with a red light. She yelps in discomfort as the heat begins to evaporate her goo. Slimes can’t feel pain, but they can feel that something is wrong with their bodies.

  Turning, I quickly run towards the ocean and jump over the white-magic wall coming to interrupt my escape. Fresh water splashes up on high as my heavy boots press down into the mud and the nearly boiling slime quickly drops down, guzzling large mouthfuls of the cold wet as she cools herself down and restores her lost water stores. Blocking an entire fireball is pretty impressive for a slime.

  We only have time to stand still for a second before the hero rushes me. Hoping that the slime has had enough time to restore herself, I raise my lance and come to meet the hero’s strike once again. Metal shines out, sparks flying around the world like so many falling stars as the hallow sound of the ringing fills the air. My arms shake, as a wave of energy blasts out from around us, a shockwave that craters the spot we stand in, the wet sand sinking down deeper from the pressure. The water of the ocean behind us, retreating for just a moment from the force.

  The pressure of the shockwave shakes my body, shakes my bones and causes me to tremble like a fearful child as it runs through me. That single second passes and our weapons leave each other’s again. He lifts the belt and I lift my fist, smashing it towards him and pressing forward with a leap.

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  I fly to the side as something new smashes my body from an angle I wasn’t paying attention to. As I fly, I see slivers of white-magic dancing in the air all around myself, filling it like freshly fallen snow, reflecting the brightly shining sun on a winter morning.

  My body tumbles and rolls, filling itself with wet sand as I fly over the coast. A short distance away, my momentum slowed by my eighth or ninth tumble, I come to a stop and press myself back upright a moment later. My fingers clenched into the wet sand, pressing themselves together as I click them together, like an agitated crab.

*Tsksksksks*

  The lance stabs into the dirt as I press myself back up again. Again. Water sloshes out of my armor, the freshly rolling in surf, falling back down out of me, mixing back into the ocean where it belongs. I really like fighting. Pressing my hand against my broken jaw, I hold it upright as the dungeon-magic mends it back together. Tiny strands of material growing out of the dusty marrow of my bones, sewing itself back together as if I were being held in one piece by the dead-light.

I really like fighting. It’s all I can do. It’s all I’m good at.

  My arm cracks, as a ripple shoots through it, the dungeon snapping it back into place. Narrowing my gaze, I leap, jumping out of the way as a pillar of fire erupts where I just stood, the great burning-serpent hammering into the ground.

Sure, I can’t fight four people at once and win, it’s just not gonna happen. But it’s still a lot of fun and in the end, isn’t that the point?

  It only takes a second, before I land again, only having a brief flash of an instant to move out of the way anew, as a fresh hailstorm of white-magic pelts into the sands where I was standing. I suppose, honestly, it is less of a fight and more of an escape. But the principle is the same, I’m fighting to escape. Though I don’t really know to where. There’s nowhere to escape to.

  Sensing a movement at my side, I twist around, my open palm extended as the monk’s fist smashes into my open grip. Closing my fingers, grasping her fist, I look into her eyes as the shockwave of her strike ripples down the length of my forearm, shattering the bones once again. Putting on a squeaky voice, I click excitedly with my fingers against the body of the lance. “Hi!”

“Hi!” calls out the slime excitedly.

  Ducking down low, I sweep with my leg and knock her off of her feet. The monk falls down into the wet sand and I continue making my escape, not really sure where it is that I’m going. The start of this floor is really small, there’s nowhere to run and I can’t cross the ocean because the boat is ruined.

“Hi!” calls the slime, looking down at me and I look back up to her.

“Hi!”

“Hi!” she calls again and I nod.

“Hi!”

  Thinking about what to do, as I hear the roaring fire behind myself, chasing after us both, I think I have an idea. I was hoping not to, since it’ll ruin my cape. But honestly, I think we’re past that point now to begin with. It looks like shit already. Damn it. I hate the dungeon. Sliding to the side, I press my boots into the wet sand and leap, kicking off as I fly into the water.

  Splashing down an instant later as the world behind myself erupts into a volcanic blaze, I sink like a rock, drifting down towards the bottom of the fairly deep ocean, listening to the roaring sound of the water around my ears.

  I’m not sure for how long I sink for, but eventually, my boots touch the bottom of the ocean floor. At least it's quiet down here. I sigh, taking a moment to ‘breathe’ and relax, now that I’ve escaped the fight. I’m safe from the hero-party down here. I don’t know if the hero can swim, but he for sure needs to breathe air. What a loser.

The slime nods in agreement as I start walking along the bottom of the ocean.