“The village!” Aalis gasped then they both recoiled as a throaty roar overpowered all other sounds.

“What was that?!” Judd cried.

Aalis was already running towards the village and Judd was fast to chase her. As they burst from the line of trees, a great grey hulk came into view, smashing its way through one of the buildings, splintering beams and scattering the thatch. Judd grasped Aalis and pulled her down as one beam flew towards them.

“What is it?” Judd cried.

“An ogre! Dragoslava said they used to hibernate in the northern mountains.” Aalis gasped. “It has woken up hungry and angry!”

The people of the village were running from the twelve foot tall ogre who looked a little like a human but with skin that had the texture of stone, probably to blend in with the mountains. Around its waist was a tattered loin cloth which did nothing to hide its rather enormous backside. Its bottom jaw jutted out, revealing jagged teeth and a long black tongue that ran over its bulbous lips as it grabbed pig and crammed the poor creature into its mouth.

While it was distracted, Judd scanned the rubble remains of the village and caught sight of a tuft of red hair cowering behind an overturned cart.

“Stay here.” He ordered and ran to where Caste was shaking so hard his teeth were making a ridiculous clatter. “Caste!”

“Where have you been?” Caste demanded. “You go running off without explanation and leave me to be chewed by…that!”

“It’s currently chewing a pig.” Judd growled then paused. “I thought monsters ate human flesh!”

Caste opened his mouth then paused. The two of them raised their heads slowly and looked over the side of the cart at the ogre. It chomped for a moment, its little eyes narrowing and it spat the masticated contents to the side, drool trickling from its jaw.

“Maybe it thought the pig was a child?” Caste gulped then hunkered down, flattening his hair. “Oh curse my red hair that looks like a target!”

“Wait…” Judd thought frantically. “If it thought the pig was a human…it’s eyesight mustn’t be good.”

“What good is knowing that?”

“Anything to give me an advantage.” Judd retorted, unsheathing his sword and going to stand up. Caste grabbed his arm and pulled him back down.

“Are you out of your mind? You cannot go up against that!”

Judd gazed at Caste, his fears returning to him…

…then he heard a child screaming in terror and suddenly his fear was afraid of him.

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Judd stood and bolted out from the cart, away from Caste’s grasp. The ogre was advancing on Aalis who had two children behind her. She was trying to keep the well between herself and the ogre but with one stomp of his dingy sized feet, he crushed the stones, their usually unbreakable form turned to powder.

“Hey!” Judd cried. “Over here!”

The ogre, not the smartest of monsters, preferred what he could see rather than what he could hear and what he could see were two particularly juicy morsels and a more mature meal in front of him. He lumbered towards them and the children screamed some more. Judd ran at the ogre and used his sword to slash at the ogre’s ankle. It roared and halted in its advance, one of its barrel sized hands clasping its ankle, green blood so dark it could have been black, covering its sausage fingers. It grunted at the blood and its beady eyes turned and locked onto Judd.

Suddenly Judd realised he was out in the open, without cover, facing off against a creature that was at least ten times as heavy and twice as tall as him. He was pretty sure that all his training told him NOT to end up in such a situation. The corner of the ogre’s mouth trembled as a terrible, gurgling growl echoed out of its throat and Judd’s spine went into hiding as its fingers cracked loudly as they curled into fist mallets.

In the pause between heroic acts, Judd’s fear returned with a vengeance.

His palms became slick with sweat as the ogre advanced on him and he finally unlocked his legs and dove for cover, sacrificing his sword in his desperation. The ogre roared angrily and stomped again, over and over, trying to crush Judd like a cockroach. Judd scrambled and rolled, his body jolting as the ground shook, the ogre able to cause the very earth of Terra to shudder.

He couldn’t keep up the mad dash forever. Sooner or later, probably sooner, he wouldn’t be able to move in time and all that would be left of him would be some revolting jelly remains in the imprint of an ogre’s foot.

Then, unexpectedly, there was a slight reprieve. The ogre gave a strange warble, almost like a cross between a growl and a yawn and Judd flung himself behind the chicken coop. The chickens had vacated, squawking in terror and he inched towards the edge of the coop and peered around it. The ogre had stalled, almost in a trance like state, standing in the middle of the decimated village.

Judd couldn’t comprehend what had arrested its attention so and looked around frantically. He spied his sword near the remains of the well, looked between ogre and the sword…then ran.

His presence jolted the ogre out of its reverie, and it roared and thundered towards him. Judd leapt over a large chunk of unbroken stone and lunged for his sword. To his horror, as he picked it up, the pointed end did not rise with it. In the ogre’s chase, it had stepped on the sword, snapping off the most effective piece of it.

But a sword was a sword…albeit a broken one. He grasped it wildly, skidding in the dirt and flung himself onto his back just as the ogre tripped on the stone and fell towards him.

Judd heard a scream of fright as the body of the ogre tumbled on top of him, Judd’s less than impressive sword driven deep into the ogre’s chest.

Aalis gasped, standing not far from where the ogre had begun its final charge of Judd. She went to dash forward but her legs were weak and she was terrified of what she would find. The ogre was half popped up on the broken well remains and from beneath its overweight torso, a human leg protruded.

“No…” Aalis breathed. “Oh…no…”

Then as she watched, the foot gave a wriggle and then the leg it was attached to gave a squirm and then the ogre’s body shifted ever so slightly as something beneath it tried to get out. Aalis ran to the flailing arm and grasped the hand, heaving backwards until Judd finally clawed and scraped his way free of the ogre’s corpse. He was stained with dark green blood, scratched and bruised but he looked at her with a strangely delighted expression and smiled...

…right before he emptied the contents of his stomach.