“Die, monster! You don’t belong in this world!”

With a vigorous swing of his sword, the Hero smote the mighty beast before him. His blade carved a path of victory, ending the abominable creatures in his path to save his girlfriend.

The foul, tiny draconids were no match for the great, noble, pure warrior of the Goddess, and they all cowered in fear before the brilliant light that shone down upon him through a gap in the dark clouds overhead. He was winning this fight easily, and the kobolds were running away, leaving not even their fallen behind as they fled from his holy power.

Of course, that was what was happening according to the handful of brain cells inside Axis Wode’s obscenely thick skull, though that was far from the reality that was occurring around him. Sure, he was swinging his sword alright, but there was no blood shed in this battle by his hand save for that which was his own.

The truth of things was radically different from that which Axis’ dumb-as-dirt brain could tell him was happening, though that may have been due to the fact that he had by now received multiple stones to the noggin as well as a fair few darts to the body that were filled with hallucinogens.

Although to be fair, while he had a tiny, tiny mind, his body was remarkably resilient, so maybe the delusions he was suffering from were due more to his own innate biology and the alterations made to him by a certain dragoness than to any concussions and weaponized ‘acid’.

But at least part of his delusions were somewhat true. The kobolds he had been fighting in a moronic attempt to secure a secret key that did not exist had indeed fled, but unlike his altered perceptions, there never were any among them that were wounded or dead due to his actions.

No, they had retreated because it was, to them, quite obvious that Axis was simply too durable for them to take down. After all, the brat had taken a literal five-ton boulder to the head and seemingly shrugged it off, not taking a single scratch from it or anything else that he didn’t do to himself.

Hell, the only way they were able to do anything to him (though even that was debatable) was when they used those drugged darts on the cuts and gashes Axis had inadvertently put on his own body. Thankfully, though, they had been forced to deal with this overly durable moron before, and while they ultimately fled every time after their escalation of force proved insufficient, they had learned quite a great deal about the new ‘Hero’.

And the biggest thing they learned was that he would not chase anyone running from him, or anyone he thought was running from him. This was a weakness that he had to an absurdly insane degree, as if you turned and ran away, he would stop his pursuit, focusing on the next nearest being, and if you then turned back around and attacked him, he would still be focused entirely on reaching his new target.

The man was tough, but dumb, and that was perfect.

They could not take him down now, and they knew that. Better to let another servant race of the Dragons take a crack at him and save their strength for other, less tough opponents. Besides, they were many, and he was but one. He could not be everywhere, and his open hostility towards the chosen servants of the Dragons was like signing a death warrant for the village that he called home.

Though tougher than expected, the brat was not nearly as strong as was feared. This would work out well for them and their retribution against the bastard’s hometown, as they could very easily let the moronic ‘Hero’ lead himself into a trap that would take him days, if not weeks, to get out of.

…

“Die, Monsters! You don’t belong in this world!”

Charging forward, Axis swung his sword, the head of a kobold rolling aside as he moved deeper into the cave system. The beheaded monster yelled back at him in a foreign language that he, due to the power of the Goddess, instinctively understood.

“You dumb shit… can’t you say anything else or is that too complex for your mammalian brain?!”

He ignored the fallen creature and reached another of its kind.

“Die, Monster! You don’t belong in this world!”

“For the love of… That is the eighteenth time you’ve said that in under three minutes!”

“Die, Monster! You don’t belong in the world!” Axis shouted as he bisected a red-scaled draconoid. The creature’s upper half vanished into nothingness as its lower half teetered like it was ducking down before running away sans the body’s upper half.

“Get clear! Get clear!” yelled one of the already dead monsters as Axis reached a large, open cave room. In the center was exactly what he knew had been here all along, and there it lay, lodged in the ground, awaiting someone to take it and use it in the final battle.

He had already picked up the Secret Key earlier on, though the magic on it made it appear as nothing more than a simple oddly-shaped root to those not as attuned to such things as he, and now he had the DracoExcaliSlayKiller, a weapon that masqueraded as a nearly rusted through sword but had the power to one-shot the evil Dragon-Lord Monarkea at the cost of its own continued existence!

Lifting the sword of ultimate bad guy killing from where it had been so callously dumped among a pile of highly valuable loot, Axis studied the blade and marveled at its power.

“Die, Monster! You don’t belong in this world!” he proclaimed as he put the sword away. He turned to pick up the rest of the valuables that the kobolds had gathered. The monsters had protected a pile of literal garbage and manure instead of this pile of treasures, using magic to hide that fact from any weaker eyes, letting people think that they were guarding gold, gemstones, and valuable relics and artifacts instead.

But he saw through their deceptions. To the untrained eye, all the things in this pile may have looked like garbage, but Axis knew that they were all priceless treasures that he could use later on. In fact, he found a few pieces of armor to use right here to better complement his fighting style.

To the foolish eyes, these may have looked like a metal washboard, a broken iron bucket, and a large tin serving plate, but he knew that these were actually arcane relics that were a front breastplate, a helmet, and a shield respectively. After outfitting himself appropriately, Axis turned to leave and saw that the way out was blocked.

“Die, Monsters! You don’t belong in this world!” he said as he looked around. He knew his musings were truth; there had to be a puzzle for him to solve that would open the way out.