“Heeeuuu” Rum whined with apprehension, eyes ready to cry, his expression pleading against the merciless forces facing him. “Unfortunately for me, my elves are not for you to attack” His voice was weak, and mostly aimed at himself, few others would’ve heard him. Rum spread himself out in a T-pose, torch in one hand, the other palm open, maximizing his surface area. The art to being a good meat shield was to have lots of surface area facing the danger, and the speed to relocate into the line of approaching hurt. This is so painful, he agonized, and I’m alone now covering the back. I’m gonna need more speed! He whispered a “Muscles Grow” to his legs, and under his robe the magic grew muscles strong and with fresh new energy.

Twang-twang-twang! heralded the sounds from above, and Rum’s mind raced to calculate the optimal path of interception, his flesh as ready as could be to absorb this first volley of cursed arrows. “THUD! THUD! THUD! THUD-THUD!” Rum hadn’t studied this artform for long, but already he felt like an expert at taking the hurt. His meat shielding was not just the practice of a skill: his improved elegance, his dance with the will of evil, it all had become like an art of its own. Expertly, Rum flung himself into the path of every single arrow that would’ve hit an elf. All arrows except one.

“UDEVI, DODGE LEFT!” She didn’t think twice at his command, but sidestepped the incoming shot while fighting 2 skeletons in front of her. In total, only 5 arrows were stuck to Rum now, the rest had either missed or been dodged. "Heuh heuh” he laughed weakly, and tears fell down his cheek as his magic dislodged him of his new belly, leg and shoulder protrusions. It hurts, the thought willed its way into him, the experience of a violated body impossible to ignore, but I can endure, he consoled. The cursed magic, curiously enough, did not disappear with the healing spell. Standing up straight, being calm, closing his eyes for a second, and stroking his beard for comfort: Rum felt it all inside of him, not by his ordinary senses; but with his grasp of mana, he felt the curses within his ethereal self. It was there, in 5 times the last dosage. Already it was trying to spread, to interact with his body and corrupt it somehow. What it would end up doing to him he didn’t know, and I can’t afford to find out. Opening his eyes, Rum took a moment to observe the flanks behind him, and the line of elves. We’re holding firm, he concluded. If this is all they got, then this is working; my shielding is working, and we’re winning.

This wasn’t all they got though. From far up high, a familiar muttering of strange words reached Rum’s ears, before the world flashed in lights both blue and white, and simultaneously, Rum’s body also lit up in the same color. A triple “ZAP!” echoed as an after-thought of the 2 flashes that followed the first. Rum’s torch fell out of his hand, and he tipped backwards; his whole body collapsing to the hard mountain ground. All too lucky, he landed just the right way for his head to be the last body part to smack against the rock. His body was stunned though, unresponsive to the core, only a few twitching muscles reacting to overflow of energy. Lying there on his back, Rum’s shocked eyes stared into the ceiling, initially aimless. Around him, the nullified mage heard the frantic yelling of desperate elves.

“SQUARE FORMATION!” Royath yelled loud through the panicked noise. Urvanom down, Alkiath down, another elf warrior still down. There’d only been 9 elves left when they held. Rum was only hit by one lightning strike, that must mean there’s only 7 elves left, Rum calculated with a faint mental awareness. Rum’s body might’ve been out, and his mind was tired by fatigue and beat up by trauma, but even with the rest of him stunned, Rum’s thoughts ticked on, enduring, analyzing to their best ability. And with me out of action, the elven party had now gone from confining and managing their enemy, to a desperate last stand. All in the manner of seconds. Royath, their last elf with any claim to seniority, was now also their last chance for an orderly last stand.

Lying there, Rum tried to stay fully conscious, and to regain enough self-control to heal himself. His gaze, stunned and mouth-open dribbling, rotated about the room, grasping for situational awareness. Rotating to look behind himself as best as he could, his eyes caught the scrambling formation of the elven square, and the hoard of skeletons bursting past the retreating flanks. Royath positioned himself just behind Rum, so close and so imposing to look at, he took up the whole of Rum’s gaze. For a brief moment, their eyes locked, but nothing was communicated. Instead Royath glanced concernedly across Rum’s collapsed body.

The hoard began swarming the survivors on all sides. Streams of skeletons poured in from the direction of the former flanks, and into the cave for a full encirclement. Among these were 2 skeletal warriors. As they ran to complete the encirclement, each came close enough to notice Rum’s still faint movements, the muscular twitching of his fingers and feet, trying to come back. As if by gravitational capture, each one slowed down, their skulls rotating to look down at him, drawn to his lifesigns. Stepping out of their former swarm-guided direction, they changed course and began walking up to Rum, raising claymores and battle axes above their heads. Rum could but lay there in a rare rapidly growing fear, as the skeletons stepped up to his immediate adjacency, standing there for but a second, before their weapons swung down, each aiming for deep brutal cuts to his torso. No, was the only intelligble thing his mind could produce, before the weapons entered their downward deadly arc; before facing blades intent on destroying his helpless self.

“CLANG-CLANG!” Bursting onto the scence at the last moment, Royath swung a looted longsword and deflected both blows. Positioning himself right in Rum’s upward view, over his slowly returning awareness, Royath pointed his body and sword rapidly here and there, challenging any nearby skeletons to try their fortunes with him. Seeing no other blows incoming, Royath rapidly took another step forward, and with un-elven-like ferocity, the battle-experienced elf cut down both skeletons with ease. A trio of others then descended upon him, each one possibly sensing Royath’s lone situation and trying to exploit it. But with 5 swings to block or deflect, and 4 cuts to disconnect bone from bone, he stood again alone, his sword once more aggressively pointing at every direction as if to scare the undead. A mildly silly thing to do in hindsight, as skeletons did not feel fear. Skeletons, after all, while maybe not particularly intelligent, were still scarily rational. Perhaps though, Royath managed to make some rational point with his executions of the dead, because no skeleton was quick to step forward.

“Get up! Move into the formation!” Royath commanded down.

“Triiiinity... of Hhhheealing” Rum produced from his lips. A green lightshow bathed across his body, restoring his brain’s activity, restoring his senses and muscle control. Over the course of a few seconds, Rum managed to rolled over with Royath fighting above him. Unable to quite stand yet, he began crawling clumsily towards the formation. About halfway there, he managed to push himself up to one knee, and then the other knee, before raising himself to a frail standing position. Juuust in time to recieve a massive blade straight into his back. “Aaaeeeuuugh!” he groaned, and fell down onto his belly again from the sheer force of the strike. Not affording a second to look back, he just continued crawling, whispering a desperate little “Trinity of Healing” to himself. Hearing the steps of boots walking behind him, and then over him, Rum subsequently felt a sudden sharp pain as Royath yanked the battleaxe out of his back.

“Let’s get the mage into the center!” Royath yelled, and a small path cleared in front of Rum into the square defensive formation. With the healing reaching its final phase, his crawling pace increased at the last meter. Inside the formation was already another elf, a male shield elf who barely breathed but had no clear signs of cuts, bruises or piercings. It must be one of the victims of the lightning strike, Rum concluded. He put a hand to the elf man and gave him the green healing light treatment. As the elf’s eyes opened up slowly to the restoration, his eyes stared weakly at Rum, nothing communicated. Then man began glancing to all his sides, awareness and energy returning. Noticing the desperate fight going on without him, he began scrambling to get up as quick as his healing body would allow, skipping any conversation with Rum. The healing was a slow process though, and so the scrambling took some time, and required a couple of tries when he failed to stand, but it was certainly a display of determination, and when he finally stood straight up on both legs, holding his shield and his sword, the healing magic had just finished up. Physically ready, the elf wasted no more time.

“Let me join you” he said to another elf singlehandedly guarding one of their 4 sides. The other elf equally wasted no time on either thought or conversation, but stepped aside immediately to create space. With Royath having also rejoined the formation, it was now back up to 8 elves, 2 for either side.

“What about the others” Rum said loudly over towards Royath’s back, “we need to save them, if they’re not already dead.”

Royath glanced back quickly just to be sure he was the one being addressed. He returned quickly towards the fight in front of him, and answered with his own back turned to Rum: “Then do that! There’s not much we can do without breaking formation.”

Rum looked around, trying to see if he could spot the missing elves. He found each one, though at different locations, and the sights that met him were gruesome. They had all been stabbed and cut thoroughly by skeletons in the absence of someone to defend them. They might still be alive though, Rum hoped, feeling a despair run down his throat. Not for himself, but for his new friends. I need a plan! They need help! Could he clear a path with Disrupt Skeleton? Maybe, but if I run out of mana before the hoard runs out of skeletons, I would be stuck and doomed.

Rum quickly turned to Royath. “We need to move the formation. I can clear a path with my magic, but I’ll need back-up. We’ll have to move the entire square.”

Royath thought about the suggestion while violently dismembering multiple skeletons in front of him. “Fine” he said, “ELVES! Get ready to move the formation into the path Rum clears for us!” He ended his statement by 2 rapid-succession decapitations of skulls from skeletal torsos.

“Alright” Rum said quietly, mostly to himself, before wiping an accumulation of sweat and various dirt and other fluids from his face. Grabbing hold of his mana, he poured it forward into the area in front where he planned their first move. While he did so, he gave a glance over towards the bottom of the inner cave. Sorry Urvanom, your body is too far away. We will have to help you last. 2 elven warriors and Alkiath however, were rather close. With some simple mental pathfinding, Rum planned a route that would take him first through each of the 2 elven warriors, before landing on Alkiath’s position. “Disrupt Skeleton!” he shouted, and held his hand out towards the skeletal hoard beyond the elf protecting him. The skeletons were basically standing in a long multidirectional queue to throw themselves at the elves. Not everyone could fit in battle at the same time, and so the skeletons further behind, unless they happened to have a ranged weapon, were patient enough to just stand there and shuffle forward when the one before them was taken down. It’s kind-of morbid, if I think about it. Behind the skeletons currently battling his elven guards, Rum’s magic claimed its first causalty, as the first skeleton of the queue of death just collapsed on the spot.

When 2 more had fallen, the first elf warrior, Udevi, stepped forward from the formation, causing the nearby elves to one-by-one step away with her.

Swooosh! Rum heard above his head, the sound of an arrow missing its target. He looked back and up into the deathtrap. Up there, the witches continued their assault with skeletal archers and cursed arrows. Luckily, it looked to Rum as though the elves were capable of deflecting and blocking the incoming arrows now, but the 360 degrees assault on their formation did not leave much room for mistakes and miscalculations. Pressures came from everywhere. Rum decided to take it out of his mind, and focused on continuing the disabling of skeletons ahead. As the skeletons continued to drop down on their spot, the formation continued to step forward and into the clearing path.

It took a whole minute, but they arrived at the near vicinity of their first elf. They were just a couple of meters away when Udevi stepped out of the formation, into an area cleared around the body, and quickly dragged it, pulling the elf into the formation. Rum’s first act was to check for lifesigns. Touching for a pulse, the signs were faint, possibly even only imagined, but I can’t afford a negative guess. “Trinity of Healing!” he said, touching one of the elf’s belly wounds, investing no extra doubt in the elf’s life prospects. Within a few seconds, the elf began a noticeable breath, and then coughed blood violently. “That’s a relief” some elf said from the square. Rum didn’t register who, and instead watched the recovery with a sentimental doctor’s care. After a few seconds, he took the moment to close his own eyes a little, and recover some extra mana with a mental meditative mode of minimal thinking, of momentary intentional thoughtlessness. His eyes shut up when he felt his arm grasped. The elf on the ground looked up into his eyes, nodding at him.

“Can you stand?” Rum asked. The elf nodded some more, and then grasped Rum’s arm a little harder. Together, they got up, the elf needing a little help to stand up fully.

As the healing finalized for the elf, he joined the square formation, now up to 9 elves. Rum, meanwhile, raised his hand towards the hoard again, and started phase 2 of his route of salvation. “Disrupt Skeleton!” he yelled. Nothing much happened for a couple of seconds, and then, once more, the skeletons began collapsing, clearing slowly a path for the formation to equally slowly begin stepping forward again. The way up to the next elf went smoothly, and was but a repeat of the first elf they’d saved. Almost dead, but not quite, and nothing that Trinity of Healing could not ultimately cure. The third phase towards Alkiath was a slow grind though, and Rum had to ask for a pause.

“Continue the advance, elves!” Royath commanded, “Cut the path when the magic is down!” And so the grind did not stop, even if Rum had to. Royath even switched places with one of the elves, and joined the advancing side of the square. Skeleton by skeleton, they came, all until they were within the immidiate range Alkiath. At that point, Royath aggressively spearheaded an advance straight into the mass of skeletons, a mass whose behaviour could pretty much only be described as surprised. Alkiath then stepped away a little, opening for another elf to run forward and grab Alkiath’s body, pulling it with haste into the square before the formation closed again. Rum was still restoring his mana when he saw Alkiath’s bloodied face. Seeing that face however, he decided squeeze himself dry like a lemon on its last drop juice. With hands shaking from mana exhaustion, Rum forced the green lightshow to appear, albeit weaker than any would’ve liked, and Alkiath’s first lifesign was a bloody cough more violent and disturbing than any Rum had so far seen. Blood sprayed from his mouth across the backs of his fellow elves, and like a broken burst-firing sprinkler, the violently spraying coughing continued for a while, all until Rum’s magic finally managed to clear the elf’s lungs and throat of blood and destruction. Lying down like a pancake, just breathing in life, Alkiath’s eyes came to rest upon Rum’s totally and likely comparatively more exhausted face. “Taking you with us” the sub-committee leader began, taking a deep breath, “must’ve been the best choice we ever could’ve done.”

Another half a minute passed, and then the elves were back up to 11 elves, the effectiviness of the formation much returned. And to everyone’s delight, the crowd of skeletons had visibly shrank. There were now only between 50 and 70 skeletons left, measured by a careful guess and attempted rough count of standing skulls.

The formation had now began moving into the cave, going for the last elf needing saving. “Forward!” Alkiath shouted, and with great efficiency, the formation stepped and cut its way forward, into the inner cave.

“Conserve yourself!” Alkiath commanded Rum, as he saw the mage starting to down death-queued skeletons again.

Cut! Bash! Dodge! Block! The formation’s warriors continued on methodically clearing the path towards Urvanom. Behind the warriors, other warriors had sheathed their swords, and now drawn bows again. Swooosh! and Crack!, their arrows followed the cutting warrior’s suit in what began to be a steady rate of destruction.

“They’re winning!” shouted an old witches’ voice from far up high. “We need more!”

Inaudible discussion followed. From his slow-walking mana-resting state down below, Rum watched the witches and their skeletal archers.

“I’ll go!” responded a younger witches’ voice, and a moment later one of the witches disappeared into a tunnel.

Some more murmuring followed, before each of the remaining witches began casting their most awful spell again. When the words stopped, 2 arcs of lightning flashed across the cave, and Royath and a Alkiath collapsed immediately with shaking. Rum was quick to their aid, but the same spellcasting began, and just as Rum cast his first Trinity of Healing, 2 more flashes fell upon the cave, and yet again Rum collapsed to the ground, stunned. On top of him collapsed a shield elf. And suddenly the party had gone from winning to once more fighting a desperate fight of survival. No healer, and not a single senior warrior to guide them. The remaining elves just held on to the formation as if it was their life, something which it possibly were. The shocked elves were clumsily pushed and pulled to the center, stacked on top of Rum in fact, while the remaining 8 elves put up a valient defense of their bodies.

“Triiiinity... of Hhhheealing” Rum once more produced, when his immobility began waning. This repetition of events is annoying. Rum grunted, as his healed up self strived to push away the heap of elves on top of him, to give him room for escape. Finally able to fully pull his body out of the heap and stand up, he began healing the piled elves, one at a time, starting with Alkiath lying there on top.

Clack! Clack! Clack! A chorus of new noise came from up high. Rum looked, just in time to see the young witch returning. In front of her, behind her, everywhere around her, from tunnels below as well as tunnels above, streams of new skeletal archers emerged. Within short time, almost all the ledges, and almost all the ledge space up high, were covered in the arrival of close to 20 more archers. Rum just stood there, face astonished. Next to him, Alkiath’s body rose up, tired and clumsy. As the elf noticed Rum’s gaze, his own body turned to follow it. Next to Rum’s astonished face, Alkiath’s face took on its own, greater astonishment. And dread.

“Elves! The enemy archers! They’ve multiplied! Watch out!” Getting a grip on his new circumstances, Alkiath looked around and found one elf still using a bow instead of sword. Grabbing the elf warrior’s shoulder and bringing him face-to-face, Alkiath accidentally showered the man’s face in spit: “Take out the archers up high!” He pointed. The elf warrior wiped his face a little with his robe, before following the pointed finger. Wasting no more time, the archer simply stepped forward and changed places with Alkiath. He then drew an arrow, aimed the bow up, pulled the bowstring and fired.

Rum multitasked watching the ranged menace up high and healing the remaining elves below. His eyes caught the moment when the first skeletal archer had its skull pierced with expert precision, and promptly fell forward and down towards the body of Urvanom.

“Mage” the elf archer said while getting ready another arrow, “why aren’t they firing back?”

Beginning the healing of Royath now that the shield elf was recovering, Rum simultaneously analyzed the witches’ position for an answer. The elves and Rum had lost half their torches in the ongoing fight, it was getting dark and difficult to see. Yet, Rum could make a good guess: the witches were moving from skeleton to skeleton, performing magic.

“I think they are preparing for a mass volley!” he respondend, “They’re magically cursing every arrow in preparation.”

At that prompt, the elf archer began speeding up his process. With incredible speed and accuracy, and in spite of their half concealment by the dark, the bowman managed to down 5 more skeletal archers in methodical succession.

But it wasn’t enough. As the 5th skeleton fell from up high, all the remaining skeletal archers raised their bows, and drew their strings.

“Volley!” screamed Alkiath, “Incoming!” Despair and terror flew through faces and hearts of almost every elf standing. They were getting so close, almost there, almost no skeletal warriors were left to challenge them on the ground, and their formation was really closing up on Urvanom’s body.

Twang-twang-twang-twang-twang-twang-twang-twang-twang-twang-twang-twang-twang-twang-twang-twang-twang-twang-twang-twang-twang-twang-twang-twang-twang-twang-twang! The simultaneity of the sounds produced but a blur of loosened string noise, but what a terrifying noise.

Swooosh-swooosh-swooosh-swooosh-swooosh-swooosh! Again like a blur the arrows came for them. This however, was only the noise of arrows completely missing. The lucky arrows, the good arrows.

Clang-clang-clang-clang-clang-clang-clang! This was the hard noise of deflection, of swords cutting angry arrows, of saving their wielders and their wielders friends, of elves escaping by thin hair a most terrible fate.

Thud-thud-thud-thud-thud! Another noise, the hard noise of impact, but, it must admitted, a comforting thud, the one that let you know the large shields of the elves had done their job, and absorbed the deadly arrows. The arrows not even risking the elf it was aimed for anymore. This was the noise of assurance.

Thud-thud-thud-thud-thud-thud-thud-thud-thud! Lastly, there was the soft noise of impact. This one was not comforting, not in the slightest. This was the horrifying thud, the one announcing the wounded, causalties, elves hurt and imminently hurting. It was the one that promised bloody sights, and rapidly growing despair.

To Rum, perhaps more despair than anyone else. Because as the only one without a sword, or any other means for that matter to deflect incoming blows, he’d become the – this time involuntary – meat shield of the elven party. But this time, the meat shielding had been irregular. If meat shielding even had any sense of regularity that is; any normality at all to speak of. The arrows had been too many, their trajectories too difficult to track. 9 arrows had hit their target, thus the soft noise of thuds had announced. Of these 9, Rum had bore the brunt. The fact that he had 6 arrows stuck in his body, all cursed, wasn’t the big issues however. The big issue was were and how they’d landed. Rum had tried, within the little space afforded him inside the formation, to dodge the arrows that would hit. But one of them had snuck up on him, heading straight for his left eye at an unaccounted-for angle. In a moment of despair, Rum had raised his left hand, hoping to sacrifice it instead of his eye. Instead the, result had been the arrow impaling his hand upon his left eye. Had he not had just as big a concern elsewhere, he would’ve hoped intensely that the arrow hadn’t reached his brain. But he did have other, just as big concerns. The moment after his left hand had been impaled upon his eye, a moment that staggered him and broke his focus, another arrow had been aiming lower, much lower. In fact, it had gone straight towards his most treasured tool of relief: his penis. Just as, or maybe more desperately, he’d flung his right hand in the trajectory of the arrow the instant this trajectory became evident. Luckily his loss of depth-perception had not impaired his ability to coordinate and use his one piece meat to shield another piece of his meat, but neither was a mere hand adequate. Like his left hand and his left eye, his right hand became impaled upon his relief tool. Rum’s mind now, was mostly just the consuming orchestra of pain, total regret (possibly at being born) and the loud cracking of the human spirit. Rum cried, weakly, but with tears. Right eye only of course, tears were a luxury his left eye could no longer produce.

“Aaaaeeeuuu” cried an elf next to Rum, louder, and more terrified. The mystery of where the 3 other thuds had gone was soon enough solved: they’d gone right into the belly of their only bow-wielding elf.

As Rum came face to face with the terrified elf, some of his own growing self-pity withdrew. There were, after all, more people than just him suffering. Alkiath came in to have a look at them. When he saw Rum’s face and left hand he was horrified. When he saw Rum’s right hand however: he was mortified. His own eyes bulged so large they appeared to try to jump out of his face. Giving the elf archer a glance as well, the sub-committee leader made a decision. “ROYATH!” he called out, and Royath turned around, revealing his position in the formation. Alkiath pointed up. “We need those skeletons out of action! You take over the archer role.” Turning back towards the formation, Alkiath gave Rum a last look of pity. “Just... Hurry up and recover.” Was what was spoken, but his expression was more like I’m so, so, so, so, so, so deeeeeeply sorry!

“Trinity...” Rum began, and stifled the cry in his throat, “... of Healing”. A slow process began, by which the familiar green lightshow spread itself around his body, before concentrating into an intense, strong vibrant color about his eye and dearest tool of relief. The sensation of having an arrow, at a snail’s pace, slide out of one’s eye like a reverse impalement, is the kind of nauseatingly awkward sensation I would not wish for anyone else. How does anyone, EVER, endure eye surgery? It was actually less of a bothersome experience than unimpaling his penis, at least there I can choose not to look!

Clack-cling! Clack-cling! Sounded the 2 arrows as they each fell off his body, no longer unwelcome protrusions, just a recent bad memory. The eye took some time, but it regenerated itself back to normal. Rum just breathed with relief, and closed both eyes. His left hand now free, he put it against his forehead, letting it move upwards, stroking his baldness. As if the sensation would distract him and put him at ease. His other hand joined in to cover his eyes, to shield it from light, to close up his sense of sight. Briefly, he stood there. But then: the resting was over. A battle was still going on, rest is a luxury. He opened his eyes again, took his hands away, and quickly grabbed the wounded elf archer by the arm. “Trinity of Healing!” he yelled aggressively. He led him a step forward and positioned them both in the middle of the formation.

“I’m tired elf.” Rum began, still holding onto the elf, “Tired of arrows in my eye, my penis, my belly, my feet dammit! My body has had enough punishment!” He gently shook the elf. “This battle must end, soon!” The arrows finished loosening themselves of the elf, and fell in a trio of clack-cling! down on the ground. The elf seemed to be fully recovering. When the archer tried to leave, Rum held on tight, and instead pulled the elf closer, putting his arm around the elf’s neck and shoulder instead, holding him in close. “Talking of penises. You’re not healed. I AM NOT HEALED! There are curses moving in our bodies, elf. Dark magic trying to take hold, to drain our energy and make us sick. I can already feel it!” Rum grabbed his chest with his free hand, and moved his hand around in a strange comforting circle, as if to indicate the unwellness of his being. “We must complete the purge of our illness!”

“How?” the elf asked.

“Pull up your robe, new friend! Give your penis air and get ready for urination! We will urinate – together!”

With his free hand Rum pulled up his own robe. The elf next to him looked at him a bit oddly at first, but then slowly did the same. Next, Rum looked the elf deep in the eye, and spoke his magic: “Filter Body”. Rum willed the magic to spread itself out, to split and form 2 independent currents of effects. 1 heading into the elf, and 1 going into him. The yellow magic gleamed across their bodies, and both Rum and the elf started to grimace a little, as if suddenly experiencing a physiological change, something which they absolutely did.

The elf met Rum’s eyes. “I’m not sure I can do it, I don’t feel like I can urinate right now.”

Rum closed his own eyes, breathed slowly, focusing on his bladder. “I struggle too, but don’t worry. It’ll happen, just let it. Let your bladder know it’s okay, and I’ll turn it on with more liquid pressure than 10 of any of those water walls in your tree house!”

“10? That sounds painful, could we keep it at max 5?” the elf looked genuinely concerned.

“Just a slight exaggeration on my part. Suffice to say, you will urinate.”

And urinate they did. Together, in the midst of a battle for life and death going on around them on every side, the human mage, and the elven archer, urinated with magic; a great exorcism of curses, by the most natural of means. Along with the yellow gleam of their bodies, a dark yellow shower erupted from their joint belows, causing each one to roll their eyes, and, from the power of release energy: to lean on each other. A little side-hug in their yellow rain of a curse-purge.

“What are you doing!?” Alkiath intruded. “Why are you urinating on us?” Indeed, the power of their joint showering had produced spilling in an unintended direction, and Alkiath pointed accusatively and irritated at the bottom behind of his robe.

“We’re purging curse magic.” Rum sighed with pleasure.

Alkiath opened his mouth to respond, but couldn’t.

“You know” Rum spoke again, a near irritation arising in his voice: “I never, ever, want to experience an arrow to my penis again, or my eye for that matter. Alkiath – next time – you elves bring waaay more shields!”

Alkiath still had no words to respond with, and so he just nodded in agreement, before turning back towards the fight, ignored what’d happened. Rum and the elf archer, now sufficiently relieved, let their robes fall down and Rum stopped holding onto the elf. They’d created a massive puddle in their midst, which quickly turned out to be an issue. As Udevi stepped back from an aggressive charge of 2 nearby skeletons, she stepped into the puddle and slipped, falling to her knees. With her left hand leaning on the ground for support, the glove she wore consequently became thoroughly soaked.

“Sorry” Rum said. The elf next to him had an expression of too much embarrassment to say anything, and instead just grabbed his bow, turned about and aimed it up at the skeletal archer menace for urgent distraction.

Udevi spent exactly 2 seconds to be equally weirded out and confused looking down at and smelling the urine she’d slipped into, before the reality of the battle she was engaged in stopped her from questioning Rum or even recognizing he’d said anything. She quickly stood up again and counter-charged back into the heat of the fighting.

Rum turned and looked at the fighting. First he looked up, where one of the witches seemed to be pulling an arrow out of her shoulder, now you know how it feels!, and pulling out a potion to drink from a small satchel she’d been carrying. Royath had been doing a fine job. Around a quarter of all the archers were down now; they were making progress. Around Rum, the party was approaching the final stages of skeletal vanquishment. Only 20 or maybe 30 skeletons still stood. They would be destroyed in no time.

“This is the final stage, isn’t it? Or do you have any other damning tricks to play?” Rum spoke to nobody in particular but himself. Yet it was an important question in need of an answer, preferably before it manifested itself.

The reality was: they’d endured quite the show of force now. Another heroic battle that Rum could, if he wanted to, add to his list of deeds. An item for his dungoneer resume. But even if we win now: how do we escape the dungeon?