The Rise of Greg

by Chris Rylander

  My foot got tangled in the skeleton’s rib cage, and I was suddenly sprawling as I crashed face-first into an even larger pile of bones. Heaps of femurs and spines and other odds and ends skittered loudly across the cave floor.

  As I lay there trying to figure out if I’d accidentally impaled myself on a loose bone, I couldn’t help but rationalize how much it likely didn’t matter either way. Because surely the sleeping Trolls would be awake now, and that’d be all she wrote for a clumsy Dwarf named Greggdroule and his pal the stinky blob, Blob.

  “Are you okay?” Blob asked as I climbed to my feet, wondering why I still wasn’t hearing the noises of startled Trolls grunting as they woke.

  But shockingly, all four Trolls were still fast asleep by the fire. It seemed as though Forest Trolls were pretty heavy sleepers (in addition to being insatiable carnivores).

  “Whew—that was close!” I said to Blob, as I spun back toward the entrance. “I thought for sure we were as good as Troll meat. Come on, let’s get out of—”

  But the rest of my words got stuck in my suddenly very dry throat as I faced the cave’s only entrance (and thus only known exit).

  Blocking the entire mouth of the cave stood a fifth, very much awake, and very much angry Forest Troll.

  CHAPTER 21

  GRangAHN og CHOngO GlurponDERIN IH aH ggg GrongOb!

  Uh, wrong cave?” I tried weakly. “Um, sorry about that, if you could just step aside, we’ll be on our way . . .”

  The Troll growled a thick, phlegmy, guttural roar of pure violence so dreadful and menacing that I would have collapsed and died right there on the spot if I hadn’t been too afraid to move at all.

  Then he yelled out, gargle-y and incoherent, “GRangAHN og CHOngO GlurponDERIN IH aH ggg GrongOb!”

  It immediately roused his four housemates from their seemingly unbreakable slumber. The other Trolls stood quickly, saw Blob and me, and joined the chorus of guttural growling.

  “Hey, have any of you seen Zunabar?” Blob asked as if he was making small talk with a harmless mailman. “About your height, maybe a tad taller, used to live around here?”

  The Trolls only responded with more gurgling, menacing growls. Or maybe they were hungry growls?

  Time would tell.

  “Zunabar was an old acquaintance of mine, you see,” Blob continued, seemingly unaware of the immediate danger we faced. “None of you have seen him?”

  The five Trolls slowly surrounded us.

  “I don’t think they speak the Plain Tongue, Greg!” Blob said to me. “Perhaps I’ll try some Orcish. Supposedly, Forest Trollian and Orcish come from the same phylogenetic tree.”

  Blob began making strange noises that didn’t sound like any language I’d ever heard. The Trolls seemed unfazed as their massive, rough hands clenched and unclenched.

  Then the first Troll struck, swinging his hand down onto me like a mallet.

  I turned to stone a moment before the impact, reanimated, and quickly rolled to my left to dodge another blow. But then a third Troll caught me with his foot, and I flew back into the cave like a deflated soccer ball.

  I slammed into the rock wall, which was covered in thousands of years of accumulated Troll slime, with a swampy THWANGCK!

  My new sword clattered to the ground nearby.

  The impact knocked the wind out of me. I wheezed silently as I struggled to get back to my feet. Near the entrance of the cave, the Trolls were taking wild swats at Blob with their feet and fists. He weaved in and out of their clunky legs with surprising agility, dodging their blows with ease.

  “Hey, now!” Blob cried out. “This is a rather rude way to tell me that you and Zunabar have had a falling-out!”

  I stood and picked up my sword, still struggling to breathe.

  Then I charged at the Forest Trolls.

  They were too preoccupied with Blob to notice me, and I walked right up behind one of the Trolls and took a massive swing at his Achilles tendon with my new weapon. But the blade bounced harmlessly off his calf, as if his skin and muscle were made of rubber. Ari had warned me that the sword might be pretty dull after spending so many years lodged in a rock.

  The Troll spun around and actually roared like a lion. Its rotten breath nearly knocked me unconscious as I collapsed to the ground.

  “Greggdroule, run!” Blob shouted.

  I looked up just in time to see a pile of goo soaring into the air and splitting into five separate pieces midflight. Each section of mini-Blob splattered onto a different Troll’s face. They cringed and cried out as they bashed their own faces with their fists.

  Blob had just created a diversion so I could get away!

  I didn’t want to waste his valiant effort, so I sprang to my feet and weaved my way through the staggering Trolls on my way out of the cave.

  I knew Blob didn’t have organs or bones, and was seemingly impervious to Forest Troll attacks, otherwise I would have stayed back to make sure he was okay. But the animated pile of boogers was older than me by at least several thousand years, maybe more, so I figured he knew what he was doing.

  I sprinted down the mountain path, keeping my eyes on the ground in front of me to avoid tripping on the larger rocks and pits.

  When I got to the bottom, I stopped and glanced back. For some reason, I had envisioned I’d see nothing, the five Trolls still tied up in chunks of my good friend Blob. But that was clearly the sort of hopelessly optimistic thinking that Dwarves were not supposed to engage in.

  Instead, I saw Blob, back in one piece, hurtling down the hillside after me, equal parts rolling like a getaway snowball and slithering like a liquefied snake.

  Behind him, the five angry Forest Trolls were in close pursuit, holding an array of primitive but deadly-looking club-type weapons.

  The Trolls may have had stumpy legs, but they could book it when they were mad enough.

  “Keep running, Greggdroule!” Blob shouted as he neared.

  It was the first time I’d ever heard fear in his voice, and the sound of his panic absolutely terrified me. I didn’t need any additional encouragement, and so I turned around and resumed running.

  We reached the stream a few moments later. I realized it was a crossroads, with three potential options (and only a few seconds to decide):

  I could run back toward our camp, where I had a small army of reinforcements waiting. Or, well, not exactly waiting . . . In fact, they’d be caught pretty off guard and therefore be not at all ready to defend themselves from the Forest Troll ambush I’d bring with me.

  I could lead the Trolls as far away from the camp as I could, pretty much ensuring that I would be dissolving inside a Troll’s belly by morning, but also keeping my friends safe for at least one more night.

  I could turn around and make a stand here and now, using Dwarven magic and my new sword (and a smelly blob named Blob) to fend off five pretty large and intimidating Forest Trolls.

  As far as options went, they were all pretty lousy.

  But it was what I had to work with, so there was no point whining about it or hoping that some other person from my past was going to swoop in out of nowhere at just the right moment to save me.

  And so I quickly made my decision.

  Yet another in a long series of mistakes that would prove disastrous.

  Legend always said Dwarves were doomed to failure. But I’d found at least one thing I was supremely good at: failing with style.

  CHAPTER 22

  Blob: The Steak Sauce

  The Battle of the Forest Trolls started off better than expected.

  It turned out I had been gone a lot longer than my companions had anticipated. And so rather than sitting around a campfire casually cooking up dinner and telling funny Dwarf stories, the group was already on high alert, fully armed, and ready to send out a search party looking for me and Blob.<
br />
  Which means they met the five Trolls charging behind me through the woods with a thunderous clang of weapons and spells.

  First, someone (either Ari, Glam, Tiki, or Sentry Five, being that they were the only ones in our group besides me with the Ability) cast a spell that lit up a huge wall of fire across the path behind me, theoretically cutting off or slowing the Trolls’ pursuit. Unfortunately, the wall of fire did basically nothing, and the Trolls charged right through it like they were fireproof.

  Next, Glam came flying in from above (apparently she had been perched up in a tree the whole time). Her fists transformed into boulders as she landed on one of the Forest Troll’s shoulders. She pummeled the Troll in the head and face repeatedly.

  Stoney was probably our best asset, in terms of translations (he spoke fifteen languages, including Forest Troll), navigational skills, mission knowledge, generosity, geological aptitude, and, most of all, combat. And he wasn’t going to sit this one out, blind or not.

  He charged toward the thundering rumble of the Trolls’ massive footsteps. Even though he was at least seven feet shorter and weighed probably three or four hundred pounds less, he still collided with one of the Forest Trolls with enough force to send them both sprawling into the trunk of a massive spruce nearby. The tree split in half and crashed down into the forest behind them, taking several smaller trees with it.

  At that very moment, I actually thought we were going to win.

  Foolish me, I’d never learn.

  Because a short time later, we realized how tough these things really were. Literally nothing fazed them; nothing seemed to injure them, not even magic.

  I did seem to remember something from Monsterology class about the Forest Troll’s legendary resiliency. Which is a word that sounded harmless on paper (and thus was easy to forget), until you actually saw it in action.

  For instance:

  No matter how many times Glam battered the Troll in the face and head, her Glam-smash boulders merely bounced right off the thing as if they were made of foam. Even the blows that did appear to inflict a wound, or split its head open, didn’t slow it down or seem to cause any real pain. A few moments after she’d landed on its shoulder, the Troll simply flicked her off like she was a bug.

  The Trolls broke through magical vines like they were made of brittle straw, were completely unfazed by magically summoned winds and fires, and didn’t seem to care at all when a magical lightning bolt was fired from the sky and hit one in the arm, singeing its biceps black with a smoking sizzle.

  Even Stoney couldn’t seem to hurt these things as he battered them with rock-like blows, twisted their limbs, and fought with all the fury of a fellow Troll. Through all his brutal assaults, they swatted him easily away, laughing as if he were a gnat and not a two-ton Rock Troll with unimaginable strength.

  Our weapons mostly bounced off their tough skin without leaving so much as a mark. Froggy somehow managed to stab one of them in the left eyeball, surely partially blinding it. But the beast didn’t even flinch as it plucked Froggy from its shoulder and then pinned him to the ground under one of its knobby, stinking, bunion-covered bare feet. The Troll grinned triumphantly, purple blood oozing down its cheek from its eye socket as Froggy futilely squirmed under his foot.

  To put it bluntly: we were completely outmatched.

  We stood no chance against these things. Just ten minutes after the battle had started, it was over, and we had lost.

  The remaining Sentry guards (unwilling to stop fighting and surrender like the rest of us had, once we realized we couldn’t win) were all dead. Stoney (our one chance to negotiate with these beasts) was nowhere in sight and presumed missing in action, or worse. Glam, Froggy, Ari, Tiki, Lake and I were all lumped on top of Blob near our campfire, in a heaping, injured pile of broken Dwarves.

  The five Trolls loomed over us, ensuring we wouldn’t try to escape. But the truth was, we were all too sore and tired and defeated to do anything but tend to our wounds and wonder what horrible fate awaited us.

  It didn’t take long to find out.

  The Trolls quickly engaged in some sort of heated conversation. Their native tongue sounded like just a bunch of primal grunts, growls, and raspy wails.

  “I think they’re having an argument,” Ari said, wincing as Tiki wrapped her badly wounded arm in a loose piece of cloth while also attempting a healing spell.

  “What do you think it’s about?” Glam asked.

  The rest of us shrugged, as Blob slowly oozed out from where we sat and gathered himself back into one slab of slime next to us.

  “Whether to eat us raw like tartare,” Blob answered, “or butcher us and grill our steaks over a fire.”

  We all turned to look at him in horror and shock.

  “I totally forgot back in the cave that I can actually speak Forest Troll,” he said. “Ha-ha, silly me. I’m always forgetting which languages I can or cannot speak. Rather amusing, no?”

  Nobody else found it funny at all. Instead, we swallowed back our urge to vomit everywhere, knowing we were about to become Troll food.

  “They’re . . . they’re really going to eat us right here and now?” Ari asked, her face pale—whether from blood loss or fear, I wasn’t sure (but probably both).

  “Indeed, it seems they intend to eat us,” Blob confirmed as the Trolls continued their argument.

  “How can we get out of this?” I asked.

  Nobody responded. We all knew there was no escape. We were no match for these things, even with magic. Magic suddenly didn’t seem so, well, magic anymore. Or perhaps we simply didn’t know how to use it to the fullest extent of its power. We still hadn’t technically completed our training yet.

  The Trolls finally stopped arguing, and one of them produced a massive knife with a curved blade longer than two of us put together. Another stalked off into the woods. A third lifted his huge shield and spit a glob of Troll saliva onto the concave side in what I can only assume was a futile attempt to clean it.

  “Oh, it seems they’ve made their decision!” Blob said as if this was good news. “Apparently, they’re going to butcher you and go with the seared-Dwarf-steak option! And they’re going to use me as the steak sauce!”

  CHAPTER 23

  A Tasty Sack of Dwarf Brand Pretzels™

  I’ve never been a sauce before!” Blob said. “I’m totally flattered, but still, I don’t really want to get digested. That might actually kill me! But of course I always did say I’d probably taste good, proving that . . .”

  “Blob, please!” Ari said, close to tears. “We’re all going to die unless we find a way out of this!”

  “On the count of three,” I said in a low voice, “everyone run in a different direction. They can’t catch us all, can they? Then maybe at least one or two of us will get away.”

  “I don’t want to be the one who gets away,” Glam said. “I’m not leaving anyone behind.”

  “Tis nary ye superlative strategy,” Lake said somberly. “Notwithstanding doth be’est ye dismally ideal per thy foreseeable liberation.”

  But we didn’t get a chance to debate it any further. We were scooped up by the Trolls and thrown into a huge sack made from finely netted rope. The holes were large enough for some of our arms and legs to poke out, but too small for any hope of slipping out entirely. Unless, of course, there was a Dwarven spell that could somehow temporarily liquefy us.

  Speaking of liquefied people, Blob obviously couldn’t be contained by a mesh rope bag, and so he clumsily rolled along on the ground as the Troll carried us to a nearby tree.

  “Blob, run!” I yelled down to him. “Make your escape now while you can!”

  “And abandon my new friends?” he cried out from ten feet below. “No way! Unless this is a trick? Are you trying to get rid of me? You are, aren’t you? I knew it! I knew my smell was more
than you could take. I mean, I always suspected it, even back when . . .”

  I sighed in frustration and tried to tune out the insecure ramblings of the slimy, smelly, yet undeniably loyal blob of goo trailing behind us.

  The Troll strung up the rope sack from a high tree branch. Another Troll was setting up a pile of wood nearby for a fire. The shield (likely a makeshift frying pan) lay next to it. The Troll with the knife was sharpening the curved blade on an oddly shaped rock.

  It grinned at us hungrily as yellow saliva ran down his chin and dripped onto the forest floor in a steaming pile.

  “There’s got to be a spell that can get us out of this . . .” Ari said.

  “Indeed!” Lake said. “Ye Ability-laden companions commence spell casting forthwith!”

  Ari, Glam, Tiki, and I all began attempting some sort of spell that could break us free from this rope sack. I thought of a fire igniting the rope threads, and plants with razor-sharp edges that would sprout down below to cut us free. I even tried to simply will the rope itself to dissolve or break or weaken.

  But nothing happened.

  “Are you guys trying?” Froggy asked after several minutes.

  “Yes!” all four of us responded at once.

  “Oh, are you trying to cast a spell?” Blob asked below us. “Because it won’t work. Ha-ha. I mean, good luck with that . . .”

  “What do you mean it won’t work?” I asked, a little annoyed that he was still being so casual about all of this.