Bodi left early when he saw the orcish contingent in the back. Drinks or not, he didn’t want to be anywhere near that trouble. Plus, he’d not reached the legal drinking age of Norway. Also, other orc were far too likely to know him. So far, he’d kept the entire party from noticing anything critical about himself.

  Spoon thought he was blackmailing him with his age, as if. Nobody actually cares how old you are.

  Sixteen has always been the perfect age for saving the world. Young enough to be idealistic and old enough that everyone pretends they can’t tell. Although identifying sixteen year olds does seem to be a challenge these days.

  Bodi had been loitering outside the bar. He’d purchased a faux fox mask unable to find any Fawkes masks. Not that he knew about the Guy, just that he wanted to look fashionable in the right circles.

  Bodi didn’t mind being underestimated, over aged, and largely ignored. Orcs had a certain reputation. His reputation had gone from bad to worse. His mother had been a woman obsessed with power and all its trappings. His father an off worlder with limited understanding of anything.

  His mother had believed she’d get written into a story. She’d wanted her name known. To become one of the side characters who inevitably died when one felt the most pain about it. She envisioned a place for herself in a world that never wanted her. For his father, it had been a passing curiosity. For his mother, it had been everything.

  And thus, fully orc, but also gifted weirdly useless perks of a bastard son, Bodi had, with his mother begun a systematic extermination of Chosen Ones in their region. The first step, had been reducing raids on farming villages, and encouraging royals to raise their children in stable environments.

  The next step, equally radical, had been insisting upon younger marriages. Nothing stops a Chosen One faster than a toddler. Between his mother and the village they’d made an agreement for complete peace based entirely on birthrates and none singles of any species.

  Finally, they’d enacted effective eldercare and reduced the need for mentors to go wondering about looking for random children to give quests too. The system hadn’t been perfect exactly, and they’d found a great loophole in Chosen One animals as well as certain cults. But that had been later. When he’d been old enough to fight.

  Now though, he wanted to be free of that expectation. Not held back by the worldview offered by others. By the expectation. So he’d traveled as far away as he could, and found in the middle of nowhere, Adville. His plan had bene going soldier, but that dwarf-giant had been so frustrating to deal with. He’d always been a go with the flow kind of person, and now it seemed the flow was heading nowhere.

  Exactly how he hoped.

  Everyone knew quests were a crapshoot. You run around getting items only to find out off worlders took all the good stuff. How many critical to the world items does one expect find in a nearby region of magic? Especially when everyone of those items has a useful plotline for another story?

  Only a Fae like Nettle, clearly a complete shut-in with limited real world knowledge, would even attempt such a thing. The rest of them were there to sponge off the money and avoid their real life problems. Naturally, all of them dying might be a real life problem especially as they get further and further way from any semblance of protection from the world monsters.

  He should go back and monitor Nettle. That was the job. In exchange, he got to avoid fucking over fate, again. Do you know how boring beating fate gets? All the love triangles look the same. Bodi and his mom were professionals at ending supposed fate. But it had just become a job, a role he no longer desired. A role he never desired.

  He adjusted his mask. Why go on a quest you know mean nothing? Why protect someone honorably when you don’t have honor? Why change?

  Thankfully his super deep shower thoughts got ended by the brawl.

  Kriti ran out holding her headscarf down. She yelled at Bodi. “Go get the rest of the drunk idiots. I can’t risk my hair!”

  Miffed that she immediately identified him even with a mask, he complained, “Too much hair of the dog?”

  As he walked by, she offered him not one but two single fingers. “Day’s wasted. Spoons sleeping, should be helpful, and Laural’s been talking to the rats for thirty minutes.”

  The story has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.

  “Table leg or broken wine bottle?”

  The crowd exiting exploded from the doorway. He waded through the human pile, slowed down by the mass of bodies going in the opposite direction.

  “As if any of us are drinking wine. But both.”

  Bodi turned his shoulder and pushed his way through several drunken species. They rolled away like pins in a bowling alley. His greater mass and energy shoving them aside.

  He stepped inside to see the bar absolutely all bashed up. Least one believe the wooden chairs and tables were particularly weak, clearly a magical disturbance, complete with weird flicking blue and red lights, was taking place.

  Spoon muttered to himself rolling over in his chair. Their table to the leftside of the room had no damage and he appeared unaware as fizzling spells rolled out from his general direction. That really would be more helpful if he’d been awake. Day sat on the floor of the right side of the room. Curled in a tight fetal position as various angry drunks ran over and got a kick off or two. Then the spell spun by grabbing and yoloing them into random objects.

  Laural sat at the table giggling. Before her, an entire drunken mischief of rats appeared to be performing various circus acts such as juggling themselves and making stacks of five walk around together on two feet. She reached for her glass and drank more.

  The spellwork itself didn’t make any sense. It would explode all the glass. Then throw a random chair, sometimes it grabbed those attacking Day. Other times it fizzled pass harmlessly. Of those still willing to attack, only about six people remained actively trying to harm anyone. Two apparently in the corner beating down an orc, uninterested in the main areas fight. The majority of the beings in the room, tried to escape via windows or doors, or lay there holding injuries.

  Only one table, led by a very alcohol covered minotaur, of four were going after Day. This might sound like an unreasonable number for Day or Spoon. But Bodi had the advantage of not being drunk, not having the weird spell bubbles bother him at all, and considerably more strength than most.

  As predicted, he picked up a table leg and a beer bottle. The spell flashed by, broken the glass out onto his hand, and got shards in it right away. He hurriedly chose a second table leg and swearing at the blood going down his hand.

  He charged the minotaur. Head of the snake and all that.

  One should know better than to charge a bull. The minotaur neatly stepped out of his way.

  Bodi ran headfirst into the bar. He bounced off, stunned.

  “Are you with the drunk lady?” He grabbed a fist full of shirt and managed to lift Bodi an inch off the ground. His biceps were straining though.

  “Nope. Just wanted to brawl.”

  The mintaur grunted dropping Bodi to his feet.

  “Fine then.” His nose wrinkled. “Wait.”

  Bodi took his opportunity and went slapping in with both chair legs to each kneecap.

  The minotaur bellowed and collapsed. He was defiantly the largest of the attackers and the smallest of the three remaining companions shook his head. “I think I’m good.”

  He staggered away not even sparing a last kick for Day.

  The other two, both troll mixed humans took up either side. “You’re dead, tusky.”

  Press x to doubt.

  As they tried to pick each a side, he moved over towards the table with Spoon and Laural. “Will you two even the odds?”

  “Heh,” Laural had her fingers doing chorus line kicks. The rats obediently performed this drunken stupor with pure conviction.

  Spoon snorted and awakened. As he smacked his lips, the spellwork vanished to nothing. Meaning even less help than before.

  “Help?” Spoon asked, rubbing his face.

  Finally in place to flank him, but not hit each other, the right troll jabbed at him. Bodi ducked. The left troll struck seconds after. Their coordination already planned. It hit Bodi’s ear. The thing split open and bleed, but he maintained focus on the right troll. It planned to strike again while Bodi might be confused. As it stepped in for the attack, Bodi snapped out his arm slamming the table leg into his teeth.

  The teeth cracked.

  The left troll grabbed at his back, but Bodi already knew the first troll had been taken out. He tucked in his hurt ear and swung toward the one behind him. The rolling swing missed. The troll now considered his remaining options. The minotaur was on the ground, still bellowing in pain. His right companion was spitting out teeth bits and blood.

  Bodi didn’t appear particularly phased, and behind him, Laural had formed a rat conga line on her table. Spoon stood up, and that made him out numbered. The troll had no way of knowing the second he woke up Spoon wasn’t using any magic.

  He scampered off keeping his face towards the strange group of attackers.

  Bodi went over to Day. Already his ear was scabbing over faster than normal. Quicksand skin for the win then.

  She got up brushing off her clothing then wobbling a little. “Where’s my drink?”

  Bodi offered her an arm and she took it. Spoon, staggering as badly as the rest, floppily waved at Laural. She bid farewell to her rats, and all of them staggered back to the dog house.

  Nette frowned at them all. When they staggered into the room. “I see we didn’t get all the supplies we needed. Or it got robbed off you drunken lot.”

  Bodi realized they had lost all their stuff in the scuffle. Nettle looked considerably recovered, and Day took only very minor injuries. Nothing that would slow them down traveling.

  “We should probably leave soon. Especially Bodi. They saw you the best.” Spoon rubbed his forehead. “You can’t just wreck a whole bar and expect nobody to hold any grudges about it.”

  Day grumbled. “It’s not my fault it’s a stupid holiday.”

  “It will be faster to take the cart out alone and then meet up together after. No reason for us all to sit in traffic when it’s avoidable. Plus, we need some supplies to make up for what we lost tonight.”

  Nettle nodded. “This way we get Bodi out of town and hopefully can avoid any further issue. Laural and Day won’t get noticed?”

  Bodi shrugged. “Even if they do, we still have to get enough food.”

  “Right, right. I guess we’ll deal with it tomorrow then.”