So a dwarf and two pixies want to ride a rollercoaster, but there’s that pesky ‘you must be this tall to ride’ sign. What is our trio of psychos to do? Apparently, the answer to this deep and significant metaphysical conundrum is to build a human-suit.

  As a well-known aficionado of LARPing as a mammal, I was not impressed. When the cloak was swept back, a crude wooden framework housed the central pixie, upon whose shoulder perched the ‘face’ of the outfit. The middle pixie, who likely had the second most unpleasant role of the set piece, perched on the shoulders of a dour-looking dwarf with a short trimmed beard. Two out of ten, at best. Only pervasive pixie dust could sell the shabby illusion and make it plausible.

  Little levers and pulleys were used by the torso-pixie to move the wooden arms that completed the world's shittest disguise.

  “Dis is dum Sbooby-doo shid,” I muttered as blood dripped down my chin.

  “The retrograde speciest attitudes of the humans on this world are the proximal cause of our dilemma, forcing this unpleasant facade upon us,” muttered the dwarf. I fixed him with a firm look. “Rock and stone!” he added halfheartedly.

  “So an outremonde dwarf, and a pair of pixies who suffer from congenital idiocy,” I said, raising an eyebrow at the trio. “I’m guessing Hollyberry is the top, and blessed by fresh air, so who might you be, Mrs Middle?” I asked the torso-pixie.

  “I ain’t telling you nuffin,” snarled the female pixie.

  “Bulb’s balls, Tiffin, there’s bugger all point lying at this point. It’s not like it’s going to matter. Our guest has made his final, terminal blunder by stepping into our lair!” announced Hollyberry.

  “I’m not so sure, HB, he’s a bloody dragon, despite his shitty suit,” grumbled the dwarf.

  “Saalk?nig sends his regards. I don’t give a shit what Hateskale said you could get away with. The dwarves have found an alternative supply of labour and cannon fodder, courtesy of yours truly, and the slave trade is done and dusted, on pain of dragon fire. Also, I’m buying the Empressessses Head. I guess you could consider this a forced merger.”

  Fuck these guys, I was going to make the Fidler’s and Longbottom territories come together in a union of dangly buttock fondling, expanding my territory outright. I figured whatever happened when the nobles picked sides in the upcoming war, I was going to be opposed to Hateskale anyway, so it would probably be fine.

  Tiffin pushed open the wooden struts that made up the chest of their weird contraption and fluttered up next to Hollyberry’s head, glaring at me the whole time. She casually held a pile of glittering dust in one hand.

  “Glitterbuns was an idiot, we won’t make the same–” Tiffin began, but I cut her off with a blast of green fire. The wall behind her began to melt as more mundane flames caught on the tapestries and started to spread.

  Pixie level 31 slain.

  Gold earned!

  Three hundred and thirty-two gold added to the Hoard.

  “Any other objections?” I raised an eyebrow at the remaining pair.

  Hollyberry snarled and flickered forward, a tiny crystal spear appearing in one hand. The shining point of her weapon slammed against my cheek, carving a shallow line from which a trickle of blood dribbled out to join my already crimson chin.

  My arm moved, following the system-ingrained muscle memory of my dragon-fu masters. Inefficient-Method-Of-Catching-Flies brought two fingers together on Hollyberry’s back, arresting his flight and leaving him spinning in place as he lashed out at my hand.

  “Patience, Hollyberry-san,” I muttered as I brought my other hand up around his torso and squeezed.

  Pixie level 42 slain.

  Gold earned!

  Four hundred and eleven gold added to the Hoard.

  I grimaced at the mush now coating my left hand and wiped it on my jacket. The damn thing was ruined anyway. I’d add it to my reparations from Hateskale, after we won the war.

  The dwarf was struggling to get out of the bottom half of the wooden human-suit, and he froze when I glanced over, pixie-smears now blending with the red of my jacket. Next time, I was just going to wear the cheapest clothes I had and damn my appearance. A fraction of my mind rebelled at the thought. How could lesser beings appreciate my majesty if I didn’t look the part?

  “Going somewhere?” I asked in a pleasant tone that caused a puddle to form beneath the stocky creature. It might also have been my smile, and I took a moment to return my teeth to more mammalian shapes.

  Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on the original website.

  “I just remembered I, uh, left the stove on. You don’t need me here anyway, do you, sir? I was just a glorified pair of stilts to those bastards, and I’m so glad you’ve righted the great wrong and set me free from their curse!”

  “Nice try. You are, in fact, going somewhere, though.” More evil grinning ensued from my end.

  “Erm, somewhere for a nice pint and a chat? I’d be more than happy to fill you in on the foul deeds of the flying gits. Sir.” The dwarf was slowly edging towards the door, partially to get some distance from the merrily burning wall behind him, but mostly to try and escape.

  “I want to see the slave pens. Any more pixies I need to know about?”

  “Ah, I don’t know about any of that–”

  “Don’t lie to me. I get… peckish when people lie to me”

  “Right this way, sir!” The dwarf said eagerly. “After you?”

  “I think not, age before beauty, stumpy,” I gestured for him to lead the way.

  “See, that’s what I was saying about human speciesism. I mean, it’s not like dwarves are a bad bunch, overall. Sure, we disturb unthinkable wossnames buried deep underground by some ancient evil every now and then, but overall we’re just like humans.”

  “I, however, am not just like humans,” I replied jovially.

  He led me down the ground floor and paused alongside an ornate bust of an elderly man. The hair and beard had been painted gold, or lined with gilt? I reached out, shaping a nail into a claw and scratching at it. That’s gold. I tried to vanish it into my storage space, and it didn’t disappear.

  “What’s up with this thing?” I snapped, as I reached out and grabbed it to pull it from the marble pedestal it was perched upon. It tilted forward, and some hidden mechanism caused the wall behind the bust to swing silently open, revealing a well-lit tunnel lined with red bricks. I tasted the air that rushed out, and found it was warm and damp, with a faint hint of cinnamon.

  “It’s a secret mechanism to open the hidden door, of course,” he replied while I glared at the dwarf and the elusive gold filigree on the statue. “Now that’s done, I’ll be on my way. I need to pick the kids up from school, a boy and a girl, cute as buttons and only six. It would be a tragedy for them to lose their only living parent so young, don’t you agree? Anyway, I’ll be off now.”

  I reached and picked the dwarf up by his collar and held him in front of me like a lantern as I made my way into the tunnel. The hidden door swung shut behind me without a sound.

  “I must protest, sir! This is why aristocracies always end up the enemy of the working folk! You forget where your wealth comes from, squeezing ever more from the lumpen proletariat as you seek to find new ways to exploit the labouring masses– erk!”

  I shook the dwarf back and forth until he shut up.

  “Alright, Engels, how many more pixies are we looking at down here?” I reached a staircase and began to cautiously descend.

  “None, sir! I swear it! There are half a dozen humans in residence at the moment, plus the slaves, of course, but they’ll welcome you as a hero!”

  I made my way along the corridor, peering through the bars that lined the windows in the doors. Quiet sobs could be heard, and behind each lock was a huddled collection of humans. Most had given up, just staring dull-eyed at me as I checked on them through the bars. A couple of children were crying, their tears making clean lines down their otherwise grubby faces.

  “I’ll be back to release you shortly,” I called out as I reached the steps at the end and started down to the next level. This set of stairs spiralled down a lot deeper, and let out into a vast underground cavern, a line of lightorbs dangling from tall poles leading along a gentle upward slope towards the glowing mouth of the cave in the distance. The true scale of the cave was impossible to tell; only the glow along the path and the glimmer of the entrance cast any light at all. I made my way along, striding through the shadows next to the light until my constant stumbling and stubbing my toes caused me to give up on the idea of stealth.

  At the mouth of the cave, a bandit caravan waited. A tall man with a grey beard, elaborately shaped and waxed, looked up from where he was preparing a set of wagons to make the run through the swamp and the next leg of the slave trade.

  “Is that dwarf loaded? Put him down and step away from him with your hands in the air. Who the fuck are you?” he snarled, reaching for his sword. His men, half a dozen rough-looking brigands, likewise reached for weapons. I was getting tired of this, so I tossed the dwarf behind me and transformed.

  My filthy clothes tore as my body reassumed its true, scaly glory. Tails flicked out and crushed men like flies, and I sent a blast of fire down either side of the grey-haired man to incinerate the rest of his company. Kill notification flashed past my vision, but I ignored them.

  “I don’t know who you sent you, and I don’t care who you are. But if you lay a claw on my person, the entire council of nobles will come down on you and your backer like a ton of granite!” he snarled, shaking a fist at me. Clearly, he was not an intelligent being. Despite my own lack of wisdom on occasion, in his shoes I’d have adopted a far more conciliatory tone with a multiton flying lizard that had just wiped out my force in seconds.

  Two tails came together and tore the body of one of his men in half, ending the pitiful mewling coming from the man, and I brought the upper part of his body to my mouth and tossed it down my throat, pausing to crunch and chew thoroughly.

  156.5 KG

  “I am reasonably confident that Jankins had syphilis, by the way,” the man sneered as I swallowed convulsively. No biggie, I fervently hoped.

  “Not anymore, he doesn’t. You’re pretty cocky for a human. You do appreciate the magnitude of your situation, right?” If he were delusional, I should just kill him now.

  “I am Baron Vladimir Hateskale, first lord of Longbottom, Downkrout and Dangleshire. I am here under the Emperor’s writ in my own lands, and you will cease this pointless bravado. Whoevers pet you are, they do not want to stir up a hornet's nest. Name your controller, so that I can demand recompense from them for the damage you have caused.”

  I considered my options and decided to trust my gut. My jaws snapped closed and swept him into the air, my neck stretching upwards as I tossed him down my gullet and into the aforementioned gut.

  Human (noble) level 52 slain.

  Biomass stored:

  223.5 KG

  Gold earned!

  Six thousand, five hundred and ninety-one gold added to the Hoard.

  A dragon called Bob has contested the ownership of Longbottom by killing (and eating) Baron Hateskale. War has been declared between the House of Bob, and the Barony of Hateskale. Gird thy loins, citizens of the Empire! Civil war is upon us!