CHAPTER 9

T’hurlk appeared on Thebos with his entire society but instead of their human
bodies, they dropped from the suns of their new planet all the way to its surface
as blobs of pure light energy!When the huge brilliant rain coming from the suns was
over, they were clustered on the ground like a terrestrial galaxy. Suddenly they
began to reform into humanoids and their flesh was changed to a state of fluxing
energies not as physiologically human as before at all but something between a
state of light and of humanity. Their new forms were largely transparent but
objects would appear distorted and sometimes magnified or diminished in their
dimensions when perceived through their new bodies. The light army wound up along
the divine pink riverbanks which Halabarefth cherished as her favored route to meet
with her man. This time around for T’hurlk the pink channel was an even more
wonderful sight (than when he’d just escaped from an underground prison!) and he
leapt into the water then floated away as a flickering brightly illuminated light
form. He swam through the rolling pink river water in a refreshing reprieve,
splashing madly in his invigorating refreshment. It was going to be a short
vacation on the foreign planet he sensed and all of his light people were in tune
with the situation without words or gestures of visible communication.

He leapt up out of the water and the vast horde of radiant humanoids lined
themselves up and down the rolling pink river banks. The wood people had reformed
into their former selves, actually they had not even traveled by light but appeared
from the forest they originated from in a way which none of the light people would
have been able to notice or understand (the tree people were really an advanced
life form and playing along with this was as amusing for them as it was a
vacation). The tree tribe malingered on equipment which was something like stilts
but made of trees! The series of young trees they had requisitioned from rooted
positions nearby in the forest, not their own but close to the riverbeds were not
mature and their softer pink mossy leaf tops made a nice pillowy cushion for the
tree people’s feet. The pink pillowy leaves in question were comprised of
multitudes of miniature leaves within each leaf, each mini one being so small that
it was imperceptible to the naked eye by its shape to resemble something like
another leaf. The result was a soft hair like density which made the wood men’s
feet feel very comforted indeed, also the tiny leafs on each major leaf created a
form of stability for them because the mini leaves would latch on easier to the
flesh of their feet with it’s minute geometrical holds. The wood men danced about
on their baby tree stilts and then began to leap about, springing forth playfully
in bouncing rhythms to the gathering of tremendous numbers of T’hurlk’s light folk
on the magnificent pink riverbeds.

The light army decided to all go into the pink waters when T’hurlk dove under for a
lengthy amount of time. When he was diving back into the pink river this time he
could not resist falling asleep with a huge smile all over his face while he
floated down from land into water. T’hurlk surfaced with a mad giggle and began to
backstroke, then float downward and upward in a loiter (he was able to use his
light energy to direct himself whichever way he needed to and whatever pace,
despite the severity of the currents in the magical pink river). Pretty soon every
stretch of of the rolling pink river was completely filled with the light people
and the wood warriors on trees threw off their bushy-topped tree stilts so that
their stolen trunks lay zig zagging across the banks of the river onto both sides,
which created a temporary bridge for smaller creatures to traverse over the pink
flows of crisp sluicing juice.

Suddenly the water completely stopped as the entire channel was damned up by all
those light soldiers and then the pink flowing river began to flow in reverse,
apparently back to its source! The photon people began pushing with everything they
had against the water, connecting with the physics of the aquatic element as people
on Earth would push forward a car which was not starting while the driver was at
the wheel trying to get the engine to turn over. The pink fluid of the magical
river was pushed all the way up to its source from the sheer magical might and will
of the light folks, and the source would surprise some to know that that source
actually turned out to be the central sun to their triple sun system. As the
flowing sky river made itself into a brilliant aqua bridge to their most powerful
sun, it became impossible to see eventually because it stretched so far and so long
into space that it trailed off but the central sun itself began to spit pink solar
flares which were so magnificent that they were visible back on the surface of
Thebos. The army of light people followed T’hurlk’s lead. The sun warrior began to
step along the pink water path and jogged himself all the way to the center of the
centered sun. Eventually the entire group with tree people included (who did grab
their pink bushy tree stilts to help them on their journey) traveled the rosy
watercourse up and eventually found themselves protected by the magic of the pink
river water from the intensity of a burning star which they still needed despite
being on the threshold between light and flesh.

They all dropped out of the sun back on the young dragon Shuke’s world and the army
of light beings surrounded the vast black crystal mountain at its roundish base
which was presently surrounded by hanging dark blue clouds in every visible
direction. The numbers of the new light people were impossible to estimate but they
were so many that they lit up the entire base of the mountain from the ground,
encircling it in a frenzied bustle. After each individual light person had gone
around the mountain from an originating point back to where they started, a shower
of light sparks erupted from their group and they all cheered zealously!

It appeared from the vantage point of Gaelron who was perched atop the cranial mass
of the great dark dragon Ardugaknathal that a spinning golden ribbon had arced
around the base of the mountain magically, he could not discern any individuals
from his height though he had impossibly powerful vision. Gaelron craned his neck a
bit to get a better glimpse while the light show of sparks and motion had reached
its apex but he managed to doze off instead of gleaning any new information or
insight from the strange magic show. His lips were open as he dreamt and the drool
he dribbled crystallized into black shards as it dropped from his mouth to the
floor, somehow a causation by interacting with the red snow that was in the air.

Halabarefth saw the trail of light folks traveling the vast distance to the sun and
ran as fast as she could to catch up. When she had made it up to the main sun she
entered it, growing momentarily large enough to walk through it as a physical door.
When she was barely through, the pink waters began to fall back in the direction of
the river banks on the planet Thebos, gently filling the dry riverbed where the
water belonged returning it roughly like its previous state. She fell onto Shuke’s
world and into the black crystal area where Gaelron was resting atop his dragon
friend’s head. As Halabaregth descended at a great speed downward and in a sailing
motion through many complex angles into the area where Gaelron was atop the great
scaled skull of his dragon friend, a pair of thick black smoke clouds from the
sleeping Ardugaknathal’s nostrils erupted and floated to greet the falling guest.
The dragon smoke buffered her fall and floated her over to be at rest side by side
with her man, safely sticky with dragon sap so she would not be able to fall off
while in perfect position with Gaelron to lean on him for a possible nap of her
own. Gaelron was unimpressively slobbering in his dreamily happy state which caused
Halabarefth to chuckle to herself then flop gracefully onto the shoulder of her
man, sliding softly up against him in a lovers nuzzle that Gaelron instantly
stopped slobbering for and began to smile without waking up. She rubbed his face
tenderly and smooched him with great affection before leaning back and staring up
at the red waning moons. It tempted her a moment to tickle Gaelron but in her zeal
she simply fell asleep and her lovers arm instinctively draped over her in a
guardian’s embrace. Her hair rippled in the wind as Shuke creaked out something
like a yawn and turned over in his sleep in his lair above them.
Herdoles assessed the situation. Endless arrays of huge goblin beings who were
malformed were a sight to behold for any being no matter how advanced in any field
of inquiry, sorcery included! The mobs made a low booming roar which was
disgustingly overbearing to be near, sounding something like a bowel movement and
screaming centaur. The wood sorcerer’s feet shook on the ground at the rumbling
being made by the quaking masses. All his powers would be needed to traffic the
beasts across time and space for the great battle which was formulating across the
oceans of the cosmos.

There was just one tiny problem— how to do this? An experienced sorcerer would
spare his energy before a battle and getting a grand magical spell to transport a
goblin army was a feat which would not just kill but obliterate the soul of most
magic weavers who would even attempt such a feat. After some short thought, he
focused on the lock of hair left by H’aru at the nether hole. That was the wizard
he was to face in battle and he would use it to tap the power of his nemesis
instead of draining his own! Herdoles imposed his will at the identity of the hairy
wizard, which was possible through his connection with various spiritual pathways
which flowed in through the natural elemental aura of the strand of hair, which he
rubbed in his hands. An illusion to command his enemy would be in order and the
best way to facilitate this dark trickery was by making a locking bond to the
genetic and mystical makeup the lock held to the magical habits of the bizarre
elementalist called Frabagalarangus. Herdoles used his psionic might to overpower
the material and the hair burned into a nether smoke. Upon the dark vapor Herdoles
spat red gobs of molten lava which lit up the nether fog remaining and it spelled
out to all those who had the power of nether sight that he would be arriving to
battle soon with his battalions ready to war!

Frabagalarangus returned to Ulojhr where he often found hidden sanctuary in a large

pink flower which was located off near one of the brooks within an area which
wavered a bit in its visibility from an anomaly with the natural sun rays and the
magic of unusually flowing waters. Two petals from the immense dark pink velvety
flower unfurled for the wizard as he approached, providing access to an ovals
section which led into a hole in the thick green stem. He wandered into the little
perennial abode and pleasantly adjusted his perceptions to the inner environment of
the sweet flower. The air inside blew at a very agreeable temperature for
Frabagalarangus and it had a pleasant moisture with a leafy honeyed aroma which
uplifted his mood considerably. He noticed his mind had become lost in
concentration about…what was it now? Ah yes, only an army of deformed goblins
clamoring for battle who were led by a powerfully malicious sorcerer who was
beckoning him for war on a distant star system! Frabagalarangus was not entirely
prepared for this exact situation but was confident that before too long a certain
solution would present itself so he just relaxed more. He was all the way to the
bottom of the roots of the giant flower now after climbing down a hollowed out
section which led down with little foot sized notches in the juicy meat of the
inner stem. At the bottom was a tiny enclosure made up of moist soil specked with
gold nuggets here and there which twinkled mystically without any visible light
source to reflect from.

The rounded dirt room contained a fat mushroom with orange and purple spots and a
cat so small that it resembled the size of some of the little sparkly gold nuggets
on the soiled floor. The kitty leapt onto the wizard’s fingernail and curled
herself up for a nap. When the kitty was in Frabagalarangus’ fingernail the little
bitty feline would not be awaken by the pink and yellow worms which commonly
rippled through the soil and begged her to play! She was pink furred and when she
dreamed she turned a very bright red, which happened to be right as soon as she
wrapped herself around her own body in the mushroom mage’s nail.

Frabagalarangus chortled inwardly and sat on top of the mushroom enjoying the
coziness of “Krisivrish” as the delightful feline might be known. The solution
which had presented itself to the bewildered wizard on how to deal with the wartime
situation was how to find then apply the right ingredients for a counter-spell.
Fortunately, one of the things he surely needed could be obtained by Kristvrish.
Blowing some warm air on her ears (which she found utterly intoxicating and
relaxing), she awoke blissfully then crawled up him to curl over his upper ear and
started to rest again with a purr. The kindly wizard hummed a little tune and she
perked up just before falling to sleep— then fell right off his ear as she slipped
into dreams! Kristvrish landed upright of course because a cat on any world is in a
way like a dragon which meant that often they would defy physical laws or logic of
every kind. Rushing around in circles to regain her senses, she then poked through
the soil and disappeared.

Frabagalarangus was deep in concentration soon after her exit and he rubbed his
fingertips together absently running over his many many options on many varied
planes of magic. His wits would fail him in a pressurized situation like this so he
relied purely on his ability to not concern himself with any problem whatsoever
which by his philosophy would invariably lead to the best possible resolution. He
gently hummed a soft melody and his finger rubbing began to produce a spider silk
cloud in front of him. He plucked his frictional finger against the shiny
translucent material which produced a droplet of water from it to spring onto his
skin and his entire body transformed into water which splashed all over the ground
just as a bright yellow worm popped through the soil. This was a game they played
that allowed the fat little yellow worm to wriggle around on the freshly damp soil
floor and display enormously bad manners, which was the ritual the worm had with
the wizard before they ever had any other forms of greeting or communications. When
“Frajahejale” as we call this little rotund yellow worm bursted off and beveled
himself below the soil in a fast disappearing act, Frabagalarangus returned to his
fleshy form from his bony white feet up to his exceedingly strange hair.

Frabagalangarus made a buzzing sound with his vocal chords as he materialized back
to flesh, a masterful illusion which was so real he was bending matter around its
light to achieve what would have been the same physical object only this was
achieved with his magical humor. His red tooth wrapped around the inside of his
mouth with its black ridge gave him the ability to be musical in a way which
somewhat resembled an Earth mouth-guitar and a zither. He whistled buzzingly in his
unique and merry way, letting the time grow by as he imagined some wonderful place
almost as good as this one. A glowing form appeared in the room, a vision with a
soft golden nimbus to it. Whatever it was definitely originated from another world
and had traveled through many worlds other than where it was from. The gold
nimbused emanation depicted all the knowledge of the intelligence working within or
through it or both and Frabagalarangus was highly attentive! He realized it was an
entity visiting as a guest and it resembled a white horse like creatures with pink
teeth and nostrils that were dotted all over its whole body and these vacuously
sucked at the air around it then used the operation to float around in a speedy
trajectory. When Frabagalarangus had opened his mind and soul up to the visiting
aura, the nasal bodied horse absorbed everything it could in an instant. When they
had both gotten to know each other, the golden nimbused aura evaporated into
nothingness with a sound like a pair of magnets sealing themselves in a lock.

Frabagalangarus decided it was time to consume some mushrooms so he swept his

digits under the mushroom he was seated upon and scooped out a healthily abundant
dose of the best possible nutrition he could think of— the magical fungus which
only grew within that special flower which he called home. The mushroom had changed
in appearance and was now brown with mossy green fuzz encrusting its stem. The
brown color was mixed with a deep dark green. This particular mushroom had
extraordinary powers of regeneration and the generous portions of its flesh had
spawned multitudes of tiny little mushrooms all over the ground beside the stem.
The tinier little fungi were much more of a delicacy but he was not all that hungry
at the moment and was focusing his energies for the task at hand, which was to not
worry about something he’d forgotten about again.

Weaving a little spell to help him through the times he felt it hardest not to doze
and completely forget something which he really needed to be getting done (in order
to sleep more contentedly later), he delved into his ritual magics to be on a plane
with the natural world beyond where it was as his consciousness was able to grasp
differences between realness versus the imaginary. He began to swim through murky
green waters of a distant cave in some far off subterranean world as his minds eye
leapt out of his body to seek an answer for what was missing in his new spell.
Exploring the cave with the dank greenish water, he saw the face of a great
sleeping dragon, one most ancient and powerful by the estimates of Frabagalarangus
and the feelings of the wizard indicated that the dragon had recently given birth.
The dragon was assuredly aware of the nosy wizard’s presence but it did not seem to
startle him out of any planes for sleep. The mushroom mage’s body shook a bit as he
next saw massive sweeps of human beings who were embodying the suns powers as
partially invisible people but with a visible brightness pouring out of them as if
rays from the sun were bursting from their insides. His visions changed quickly to
goblin hordes, masses upon unending masses of them, deformed and chaotic in the
energy patterns the mushroom mage registered but the goblins were ruthless and
appeared to be being led by three enormously powerful red goblins, much more nasty
and magical than any average goblin that Frabagalarangus had ever dealt with before
(which was quite a few).

After envisioning all of the goblin army, the dragon and the three red goblin
leaders— he saw Frajahejale! The little kitty was inside the body of the yellow
worm which was presently making a sound somewhat like a modern Earth ‘hair dryer’.
Frajahejale was plowing through the moist dirt now and the wizard was seeing from
the perspective of the burrowing creature while sensing the kitty cat’s presence
inside. There were things which he would have believed to have been vegetables at
first in the worms path now! The vegetable beings began to swirl around and
pulsate, change color and form rapidly to many shapes with all colors. Some became
humanoid for a moment, resembling something like ginger root or yams only they were
ambulating through thick soil. Suddenly the worm and its kitty occupant came to a
mushroom buried deep in the soil so the worm stopped. The buried fungus appeared
fully formed and the worm spit out a sticky goo from its tail end which stuck to
the mushroom at its base, then the plump yellow
worm began to drag its prize elsewhere!

Frajahejale sped through the moist dirt now, passing the animated shapeshifting
vegetables and some freshly sprouted true vegetables which appeared probably good
for eating to some of the residents of Ulojhr if they were to find some like it
above. The yellow worm appeared from under the soil back into the dirt workshop
where the wizard’s color shifting mushroom seat was found. Frabagalangarus grew in
his magical form from a size small enough to squeeze inside Frajahejale back into
his regular form and then floated on air over to his mushroom stool. The fungal
wizard’s eyes opened wide and he rubbed them with fists wondering how to avoid
sinking into the most pleasantly wonderful lazy state that he could imagine to fall
asleep in. The worm Frajahejale rubbed affectionately up against the seated mage
then whipped the mushroom they had found from deep beneath the soil from off his
sticky tail and onto Frabagalangarus’s feet. The magician got into position to
gobble it up by jumping down off the mushroom to kneel down and plant his face half
against the ground with the other half on its side to consume the sweet stuff like
a deranged animal.

As soon as his meal was complete, his whole body morphed into green vapor and he
appeared suddenly appeared in a strange land before an army of deformed giant
goblins! The massive horde saw Frabagalarangus as some sort of god apparently and
each and every single one of the perhaps multiple millions of them crammed together
all dropped to their feet in reverent worship. The fungus magician’s eyes began to
churn colorations with flames for irises, blazing in a rainbow of colors until
finally they flickered with a deep green. His skin was beginning to turn pale
green, too and it was obvious he was growing to resemble the goblins who were
awaiting his command. The greenish Frabagalarangus raised his fists up at the dark
night sky and focused his magics to create a searing downpour of blood red snow.
The goblin swarm was being pummeled by incessant red powdery iciness and the
snowstorm was only present immediately above their heads, nowhere else around them.
Frabagalangarus sprung from a mushroom he had placed from the ground after
producing it from his hair and the springiness fortunately was enough for him to
leap all the way on top of the red snow clouds. When he reached them he began to
run along it over the huge goblin gathering. The wizard began harness the energies
from magical ethers which came from alien macrocosms and echoed battles long past.

What the wizard was doing above them was rearing up the collection of miscreant
monsters for some kind of great battle. The goblins were growing feisty now and
some were frothing a blackish paste out of their hideously grotesque mouths and a
few began slaughtering each other out of haste to start fighting. That’s when
Frabagalangarus leapt off his snowcloud perch and landed onto his mushroom that he
had sprung into the air from. That buffered his fall and he landed off it with an
adroit agility to firmly stand in place in a position to command his new army of
slimy gross green mongrels! A waterfall of pitch black slime appeared beside
Frabagalarangus but he had nothing to do with its formation. It had come from a
foreign magic he knew was of the nether and it was definitely not something he
wanted to investigate further. Suddenly the nether slime began to pour outward and
it created a nether chasm into the ground like a whirlpool of nothing swirling into
something absolutely nasty and unpleasant. The wizard sank like quicksand into the
nether pool and disappeared!

The masses of warmongering goblin giants rushed toward to the nether slime falls.
Har’u, Guhkthl and Blixighisk suddenly appeared with their lava red skin and
approached the nether falls eagerly. As the three goblin masters reached the nether
slime waterfall, it had oozed all over the ground and they began sinking got lower
and lower and lower. The entire array of goblins all began to arrive into the
nether slime underfoot and they sunk downward slowly in the gloppy tarry ooze. When
not one of them was left in sight, Herdoles appeared and snapped his fingers then
disappeared with the nether falls which had been hanging in the air.

Thunder snapped on Shuke’s world as the sky opened up into fresh new storm of red
flurries of snow. Thick black putrid slime rained down in the hot new place! The
black gooey stuff landed and thickened itself all over the a tier of the black
crystal mountainside which was very near the absolute bottom, just above where
T’hurlk’s light army soldiers had gathered. The multitudes of deformed oversized
goblins appeared from the nether slime, only this time they were rising out of it
on a continuous path as if they hadn’t noticed any difference from going down and
out of the old world then up then onto the surface of the new one.

Gaelron’s drool was not like most human men as his often changed shape and color,
density level and other properties as it would descend from his mouth to the ground
or whatever else it would hit— and sometimes it would defy what we call gravity and
go upward or in other directions. This time, when he was sleeping atop his dragon
pal and his saliva fell off his chin in impressive proportions, they managed to
sail all the way down in a rainbow array of brightness into the nether slime. By
the time the droplets hit the black nether moat which was forming with the great
goblin army, the drool droplets became blackish grey but surrounded by golden
light. The moat shaped river rapidly churned with its thick gooey blackish nether
slime and the pace was directly synonymous with that of the general malicious
morale of the huge and terrible goblins who were parading all over their new
territory, preparing for battle confidently. The droplets of Gaelron’s spittle hit
the ebony nether goo moat which lit the entire thing up in a flash of rainbow
colors. The actual mass of drool raced all around the moat several times, packing
the nether slime in magically with some form of rare magic that fed on the energies
of the natural surroundings. This tamed the moat somewhat, helping it form its
sluicing bubbling dark currents into a continuous and less chaotic current. The two
black crystal grassy fields on either side of the ringed river (the black grass
broke into powdered shards when crushed under foot).

The goblins roared beside the river-moat, unable to contain their warlike
aggressions in any way before the tremendous clash they knew was coming. The slick
hot nether pitch was marked now by three great red bridges of flame colored clay
brick which were heated and formed by each of the fanatically charged and newly red
goblin masters. The flaming bridges were at equal angles to each other around the
moat of nether sludge so one could find a bridge at predictable intervals in any
direction. The nether liquid river-moat itself would be valuable against light
creatures because it was infested with nether stuff which was the essence of crazed
and haunted souls, the cries of whole races and species being tortured collectively
over the eons of time and space. In the nether were imprisoned spirits that
thirsted for freedom from themselves, all the woes of a boundless array of enslaved
worlds, then even much worse than that and more of it. To touch upon the abyss even
in this barely real liquid form was certain fatality to almost any creature,
including many of the varieties found on the dragon side of the bog on Thebos.

The bridges of flame were placed to encourage battle opportunities, allowing the
light beings a chance to get to place on the mountain side where the three goblin
battle masters were gathered as generals. Blixighisk, Har’u and Guh’thl each had
grown several times their previous physical size. The red goblin commanders
retreated into their lairs, two within caves nearby and one to a pond which was
filled liquid which had been magically transferred temporarily from the bog on
Thebos to Shuke’s planet. H’aru was fast enough to skip around on the bog’s liquid
surface occasionally bouncing off the silvery rocks in the tiny lagoon, not paying
any attention to the dangers usually inherent to touching the bog fluid.

CHAPTER
Shuke woke up. It was still early in his lifetime, the first really delicious sleep
he had since waking up and launching into flight for the first time. He noticed a
funny little man with a very lovely lady down below on the ledge underneath the
crystal nest of his lair, both sleeping atop a much, much *much* bigger dragon was.
Shuke understood at once the dragon was there for a respectable purpose which had
something to do with those massive armies all the way down at the bottom of his
mountain, partly because the great black ancient one had positioned itself below
Shuke’s nest but also because of the aura that the incredibly massive black scaled
dragon was emanating. Shuke decided to ask the bird chief head still inside its
special internal chamber whether or not to stay awake or better yet, possibly find
the time to participate somehow in the conflict ensuing below. The chief delighted
in being noticed and his eyes lit up as they opened up brightly. The great veteran
bird head squawked battle plans which were silly to Shuke. The chief bird had
fallen for the dragon’s ploy which was for the chief to fight his own offspring
rather than have the courage to contend with Shuke. If the chief had been more
courageous, the young dragon may have been entertained and allowed him to keep his
flock as they were.

Shuke gazed far down below, acknowledging the creepy festivities of light soldiers
gathered around the base of the mountain and the great goblin masses just above
them. Shuke appreciated the nether moat with the little fire bridges, finding them
a bit tempting as he could gobble the fire and consume the bog fluid for a little
snack but he wasn’t all that hungry. The three red demon goblin leaders were
visible to Shuke through his nether vision, peering through all obstacles by
actually witnessing them directly from where their magic drew from in the nether
world and this reflected exactly their location and the appearances they had within
their local environs. Presently they were monitoring their hideaways intently,
gearing up for battle and sensing out intrusions from the light folk below which
had not yet happened but were inevitable. They were mingling with the energy of the
electricity in the atmosphere which was blood fueled and violent, imagining their
slaughter of masses of pitiful light men and women. The red goblin spawns began
conducting their own feverish magics into streams of windy nether black colored
mists which shot around the moat-river and began creating ropes from the flaming
bridges which extended over the side of their ledge on the mountain to the base
where the light beings were gathered to make war.

The stringy extensions overreaching the side of their perch were infused with some
of Galeron’s spittle magic and this created a much easier climb for the light
beings because the nether ropes would have burned their light-flesh enough to make
a small difference in the battles they would invariably have to fight as soon as
they reached the top. When the nether material of the rope extensions made contact
with the black crystalline mountainside to set up for the warfare which was brewing
into a frenzied start, Shuke sensed the friction right away as if an alarm bell had
sounded— but for dinner or what purpose? The new dragon decided it might be worth
rousing himself from his short nap and wondered if perhaps the light people would
taste as good as those nice birds he munched down for such a sweet treat?

T’hurlk gripped one of the wispy ropes which had turned a flaming red color by the
infusion of the fire magic of the bridges connecting with the nether material it
was made of. He hoisted himself up and began climbing at a swift pace to reach the
top, getting closer and closer to the swarming goblin giants above. He noticed the
ropes were giving him a burning sensation but felt that it could have been much
worse, and it was merely a feeling rather than a sign of any damage. When he was
almost at the top he shook reached down with one hand and shook the nether-fire
rope to rattle a signal below for his brethren that there was nothing to fear on
the way up and they could proceed! He began to whistle, aiming his breath at the
center of the unique ropes and this delivered a resonating sonic frequency which
traveled to the bottom making a sound much like a wood flute. This harmonic tone
expanded itself after traveling down the nether-fire ropes and encapsulated the
base of the crystal black mountainside which infused the encircling light army with
the necessary heroic inspirations to their morale to help them propel themselves
with improved confidence to the menacing goblin masses they were facing! A musical
battle cry which enthused his light army into shouts and laughter. They began to
edge toward the nether-fire ropes to make haste upward.

Frabagalarangus was in a little area amongst the light beings now, looking much
more like his old self. He slipped through a very thin crack in the mountainside
which left him alone with some unusual little mushrooms which happened to be on the
ground of the little black grassy glade. His hair began whipping violently in all
directions now and he got on the ground then began moving like a spindly spider on
all fours while his hair whipped around frenetically. As the cunning elementalist
nimbly danced along in his peculiar way, he chewed up a few of those little
mushrooms on the ground that beckoned to him which caused him to develop into the
form of a slithering asp. He began to develop a scaly shininess of a beautifully
red, blue and yellow spotted anaconda with a single long yellow fang in its mouth.
Red eyes with black slits had a thin ribbon of flame around the lids and
Frabagalarangus hissed with lazy authority.

Herdoles was jogging around to each fire bridge one by one, inspecting them for
structural integrity so the battle would proceed well. He needed them to be
functional so the killings would be expedient with no loss of time for the mission
at hand, partly for general efficiency but also because crossing the nether slime
would drain the light beings of some energy which would seep out into the air
boosting the morale and dark spirits of the goblin attackers. Seeing T’hurlk
dismounting from the nether ropes, Herdoles strode forth with his eye-palm facing
outward and he uttered strange sounds which were followed by a blasted of very pure
raw nether energy which appeared as an undulating stream of colors pouring outward
in a uniform stream through space at the former miner. T’hurlk was woefully
unprepared for the assault and he sprawled backward and off the cliffside where the
nether ropes were. He tumbled through the air all the way down but when he reached
the bottom Herdoles was met with some prepositioned nether slime puddles which his
head landed on which sent him rebounding all the back to the top where he had just
fallen from! That was part of the spell the dark sorcerer had cast, who was
cackling insanely at this hilarity with the success of his little joke. He kicked
some dirt off at the funny little light man called T’hurlk and pounced off,
shapeshifting his form majestically to a vaporous sphinx like being moving at an
accelerated speed off into the distance. The dirt which was kicked at T’hurlk hit
him hard in the face with a magical force and the pressure smacked him with enough
to knock him right back off the ledge!

T’hurlk splashed into the ground all the way below, his light-blood flowing where
his nose broke and from a myriad of cuts which were caused by banging up against
the hard black mountainside. Some of the wood people (who were not flickering in
and out of light-flesh states) approached the downed light warrior and sang in
whistles to him, rubbed his wounds, blew some pink tree leaves and rubbed tree sap
all over his wounds. Within a few moments, the injured light-flesh being was
looking as if he’d never had been damaged. If T’hurlk would be able to lead his
photonic people to a new phase of their evolution then it would have to start with
an inner resilience, a personal strength beyond flesh or magic. T’hurlk stood up
and gritted his semi-translucent teeth. The leader knew that if he was destroyed by
some of the nether goo or one of the goblin leaders to a point where he was
obliterated, which was possibly considering the power of the nether magics, then
his soul would dwell in the absent infinity of sorrowful misery within the demonic
nether world where he’d be a captive to feed on for his enemies. The wood men
sucked up the remaining photon blood from the ground and spit black birds out of
their mouths which floated into the air. The little black birds sang jubilantly
then darted through the air into the moat-river where they became liquid nether
slime, apparently all that was left of the nether energy from T’hurlk was
represented by the masterful magic. The luminous leader shook himself awake,
stumbling on his light-hammer which was beginning to vibrate violently with his
near death experience from the assault by Herdoles, a foe even T’hurlk was no match
for. The problem with being a light-creature in transition from physical realms was
that it did carry the slightest chance of becoming forever banished to the nether
if their energies were misaligned with the cosmic forces at work with their spirits
and an unfortunate magical act against them pushed them into the abyss. “Forever”
was a relative term and goblins were spun from within the regions of the under-
nether world, a life form many had claimed in their annals was only a reflective
illusion thus time meant almost nothing to them but as a tool for malice. The
beaming demigod was in a way even more vulnerable than a mortal human within this
war on Shuke’s mountain and presently he felt in a way as a child would when
getting up from a blow in a fight with a bully.

The wood men laughed and spit at T’hurlk with their teeth which had turned to nuts
like the type found on the pinky bushy stocks of the treetops they all had as
footpads. There were only a few dozen around T’hurlk at the moment and the others
were probably off frolicking about at play awaiting the hilarious battle to ensue,
or they were likely otherwise dozing in some peaceful confine they had found
locally available which was not easily visible anywhere. One of the varieties of
nuts grown from the pink bushy trees exploded when bitten into from a gas contained
inside the shell from a natural fermentation process. The combustible nuts would
only burst in their mouths when the tree masters would want a laugh, otherwise
their strange versions of tongues which could twist, stretch, contort, expand or
retract and otherwise use them would somehow contain all the gaseous fermentation
upon chewing. When the tree folk had spit at T’hurlk with the less offensive nuts
(which were pink and green, very round and fat with extremely moist shells) he was
forced to boom out a guffaw which was soon followed by a rallying cry from his
friendly troop of yuksters. One of the wood people spat on of the fermented
exploding nuts at T’hurlk and it landed in his groin! Light-being or not, his eyes
popped out wide as he clenched his shaking hammer in grim agony. Roaring all the
way to the top of the mountain with his outrageous thundering voice, he charged up
the nether ropes for a proper beginning to the combat!

Herdoles appeared above T’hurlk again, knowing exactly where to wait for the pesky
light defender. The tree sorcerer drooped his head over the edge of the black
crystal cliffside and kicked some red and black crystalline pebbles down at him.
The sharp edged crystalline pebbles sank down through the air at a speed which was
obviously not relative to the conditions of the environment because it was as if
they were being sucked down by some enormously powerful magnet or other powerful
gravitational like force. Herdoles’ spell was to ‘trick’ the air that there was
less space between the ground and the rock by removing bits of the abysmal dark
energy which connected the air to reality— an illusion which would convince anyone
anyone untrained enough in nether magics that the stones were falling much harder,
faster and with more massive weight behind them then they actually had. The mini
lava rocks almost caught T’hurlk in the eyes but fortunately he just caught them
coming in his look upward form his climb to measure the distance left in his
journey to battle and slammed into his forehead instead. He wailed in horrific pain
and fought to regain his strength of will which was sapped by the intensely strong
nether magic powers contained in the spell the stones were volleyed at him with. He
regained composure with recognizing the suns as his pathway to rebirth and when he
had realized what had happened (that the same sorcerer was waiting for him again at
the top), he doubled his efforts and began to climb more quickly and readily to
manage a defense against the crazed magic user!

Frabagalarangus slithered up from out of nowhere to the demented wood sorcerer and
uncoiled from his asp illusion into human form while emitting a rattle with a hiss!
Herdoles saw the mushroom elementalist and sped behind Frabagalarangus as he was
transforming himself in a vulnerable instant! The opportunistic nether sorcerer
unceremoniously kicked the morphing Frabagalarangus right in the rump, sending him
off the ledge! The stunned wizard whinnied like a horse in shock and frustration as
he plummeted below. Herdoles raised his eye-infused hand and the entire palm glowed
feverishly, lighting his surroundings enough to see as the red snow descended more
rigorously against the deepening night. He spun around feverishly into an unnatural
fury and an amazing spiderweb form of liquid blood enveloped his gaunt body
completely, ensconcing him in a ghastly coat of protection against the elements.
Herdoles concentrated his magical mights into his hair which began to sift and
contort before spitting some little animated figure that spun speedily around,
forming the distinct shape of Frabagalarangus but with buttocks for a face!

The sorcerer chortled at his own joke and kicked one of his own buttocks by
lifting a foot backward and tapping his heel to it, which sent him off the ledge
falling fast downward. His magical hair adapted quickly and formed into a swift
bird shape a swift bird much like the kind who had helped convert the green golem
to a stone in the mercurial forest Guh’thl ***NOTE CORRECT NAME?*** had visited.
The bird of hair shat onto T’hurlk with some blackish nether poop who was nearing
the top finally to see how he would engage with an enemy too powerful for him to
face alone. The bird poop was electrically charged and hit the illuminated hero
onto his hands which caused the nether excrement to explode into rainclouds. The
combination sent him once again sprawling downward onto the ground below.

Frabagalarangus was saved by his colorful spidersilk garb which pillowed outward to
make an airworthy glider that allowed him to sail lightly and to land gently onto
the base of the mountain below. His magics were powerful but his ability to harness
such powers were not beyond that of the extreme forces Herdoles was recently
harnessing. The power of the nether moat was spinning the wood sorcerer a web of
protection and increasing his attack power, like a node which constantly fed him in
his spiritual nether needs so long as he was near it. All this commotion of the
moat, the shining army awaiting goblins with the massive goblins above was bringing
an interstellar collection of beings to witness as an audience feeling invited to
witness such festivities! There were some visible forms of apparitions and many
manifested into local repitles, birds, beasts, vegetable life and sometimes either.
All of the life-force they brought added to the karmic force of the outdoor battle
area and the theater of war was getting a charged energy to the air which was
become highly palpable.

Frabagalarangus giggled madly as he collected light blood from the ground where
T’hurlk had recently impacted then gotten up in a jiffy. Rubbing the radiant bloody
liquid over the injured leader’s forehead, T’hurlk shimmered brilliantly and within
a few moments the warriors wounds were removed. The pain he had escaped from
T’hurlk’s body as an illusion managed by Frabagalarangus into the form of a colored
snake cloud which crawled up the black surface of the crystalline mountainside then
leapt off while changing to a red scaly appearance which blended in with the
tempest of red snow smattering the region. Frabagalarangus spit out drops of nether
goo which is what was left over from the pain and damage contained in T’hurlk’s
previous wounds. The wizard had prepared for dealing with nether wounds and had
freshened up on his magical confluences to the idea of seeing to heal such physical
traumas. The light people were only possible to injure by nether fueled magics,
weaponry or beings who were formed from the abysmal world of nether itself. This is
because their sojourn into evolution had managed to push them over the threshold
from flesh into pure energy and nether was the antithesis of photonics.

Herdoles knew what the wizard had done to heal the light warrior below the ledge
because whenever a wound he had created with nether magic was healed by opposing
forces, he regained the nether powers which he let loose to attack his enemy with.
The strange sorcerer began to pace fervently around the entirety of the nether-moat
which made his mouth grow into a gradually increasing smirk. The temporary wound
was enough to demoralize the might of T’hurlk slightly, feeling the raw powers of a
sorcerer toying with his magics on him. The great light hammer was the one thing a
bit intimidating to the sorcerer because Herdoles knew it could crush through all
his spells at once with a well executed blow, penetrating through his nether
defenses and possibly crushing him to death! This was a unique situation for the
deranged tree sorcerer who was accustomed to just about any non magical weapon
having little effect on him, and even some pretty impressive magical ones not
having much chance to cause damage through his nether barriers. He was intent on
not giving the thundering warrior any opportunity to strike from any stable
position so the smart sorcerer wandered into the nether moat itself, refusing to
sink but rather using it as a slippery pathway to enliven and charge up his goblin
troops! He surfed along the rows and rows of sniveling, raucous and enormous
goblins who were bashing at each other with violent authority, releasing their
bloodthirsty battle rage.

After hours and hours of traveling around the vast nether moat and raising the
spirits of his ugly goblin giant troops, he leapt out of the moat then sprang up
from the ground to land atop the heads of the densely packed goblin hordes!
Traveling across their dense skulls, he led a marathon of inspiration in a
continuous sprint. He’d fly between the spaces where the goblin giants weren’t
physically close enough together for him to find solid purchase as stepping stones
one of the other, then he’d land again on the next set of craniums to begin
cajoling, grunting, mocking them into a battle fury! Herdoles feasted on the goblin
soldiers malevolent energy which were directly channeling and harnessing increasing
nether power from the moat and the battle situation. The experience charged him up
so much that he used some of the excess of nether powers funneling through him to
vanish into invisibility for a moment. The vanishing act commanded somehow the
appearance of yet even more new legions of grossly misshapen goblin brutes began
spilling out of the nether-moat as it churned and bubbled hideously in a crude act
of magical unbirth.

By this time, the mobs of glowing light beings had all managed to start climbing up
the huge number of nether ropes which led up the semi-circular black glassy
mountain base. As they began to reach the edge of the cliffside above and began to
pour onto even ground with the goblins, a high pitched sound like Gaelron’s dragon
horn was heard!

Ardugaknathal awoke and yawned. A nice battle starting? Thirst. Gaelron and
Halabarefth were tossed backward and off the great dragon’s skull to land perfectly
onto its inner wings, one on each side. With this, the gigantic scaly black dragon
gently rose into the air and began to circle the top of the mountainside just below
Shuke’s black crystal nest. Ardugaknathal was not awake for what would account for
billions of generations in Earth time and for this momentous occasion it was going
to be only slightly awake, enough to focus on some entertainment and enjoying some
companionship the amusing Gaelron and his lass who had somehow recommended the
dragon. The sky they soared through manifested a flickering green shower of sparks
from light to deep greens with each beating of the magnificent dark dragon’s wings.
The lone moon was phasing in and out, going from crescent to full at accelerated
paces with red hues swirling around it like a new whirlpool of dragon blood. The
battle energy which Ardugaknathal felt was affording him the chance to help
engineer some alterations such as the waxing and waning of the moon, a touch to
give Gaelron and Halabarefth a bit of a boost to their pleasantries. Gaelron and
Halabarefth were awake and in splendid moods, enjoying every vigorous minute of
their adventure together as it happened.

Suddenly the dragon flitted its wings about and the happy pair were tossed adroitly
back onto Ardugaknathal’s upper brow again, where they softly landed next to each
other shoulder to shoulder. The two were safe on the dragon tougher without dragon
sap as the bond of love between them made stable upon the dragon in flight (even
dragon’s recognize love as truly is the most powerful force since it is the heart
of creation and revolution). The delighted couple clung to the dragons upper brow
in a fold of wrinkly leathery flesh which were between dragon scales which each
dwarfed their diminutive humanoid dimensions.

Ardugaknathal decided to plunge downward dramatically all of a sudden to help

invigorate them all and give the romantic couple a boost of excitement! They all
plunged to the surface together at a bristling speed but still it took quite a
while to be even a fraction of the way down the impossibly steep cliffside. The
crystalline black shiny mountain so huge even the great dragon Ardugaknathal was
barely visible as a small dot in the bright bloody moonlight as it descended at a
blinding speed to the surface below. Eventually the dragons eyes widened open as it
sighed, disappointed somewhat to be awake at all but at least it was to be part of
a war! Wars were generally fun for a dragon because they had such opportunity to
feast or realize the splendor of a ridiculous display of destruction which was
usually for reasons that were as silly as rain, hence mostly amusing for the dragon
community.

The battle apparently had gotten underway down below as Ardugaknathal eventually
reached the last third or so of the mountain to begin speeding into a nice position
so the more mortal pairs of eyes of Gaelron and Halabarefth would be delivered a
perfect vantage for their perusal of the enraging combat. Ardugaknathal snorted a
glob of nether puss out of its nose (which any dragon could generate at will
effortlessly but this dragon was particularly adept with nether magic). The nether
phlegm dropped right onto a significant population of light beings who were sizzled
up instantly by the abysmal booger like crispy barbecued fresh Earth meat at a
Texas pit party. Fried as bacon on that Texas morning without eggs, it was a pity
if you liked the light folk but such was the war and the dragon was beginning to
enjoy itself, anyway.

The three goblin demon masters began to hum to themselves in their separate little
lairs. They were each focusing power on their onto their nether-ropes. Red beams of
light sprayed from their eyes which reached the nether ropes as wispy tendrils
which wrapped around the nether material of the ropes, crystallizing them in the
process. The brittle light vines developed jagged edges harmful to the touch for
the light people. The luminescent soldiers finally had all begun to reach the top
of their journey and begin to confront the goblin military masses but the last of
them suffered some fairly serious injuries from the goblin’s dastardly new magic on
the nether ropes.

The wood men were the only ones left on the spiky red crystalline ropes after the
radiant former miner folk had all finally made their way onto the surface with
their goblin enemies. The unfazed crew of tree men were only on the crystal red
jagged nether ropes now in order to mock the battle and throw nut after nut from
their bushy footpads at the hordes attacking the goblins perhaps whenever they got
the chance. When they reached the top, they started firing their nut missiles into
the goblin armies which mostly exploded onto the faces of the individual goblins in
precise hits, making each assaulted party member swing their fists into the heads
of their brethren which knocked many of their allies coldly to the ground. It was
hysterical for the wood people who began falling over the cliffside again to grab
onto the barbed red rocky nether extensions off then leapt off the crystal ropes to
parachute down. The parachutes they used were bunches of mini-leaves off their
treetop footpads which fell off their treetops to spin around like little
propellers in the air which swirled around the wood men and created an air buffer
of the storm of little pink flower petals. Landing softly to the reddish sandy area
they happened onto, the remains of some of the extinguished light people destroyed
by Ardugaknathal were strewn about the ground. The wood men piled onto each other
and managed to stretch their inner bones so that they quickly grew like trees
upward growing so that they didn’t need to climb but created a massively long rope
replacement out of their adjoined bodies. Then the tree fellow at the highest
elevation reached up with a stout palm and his entire hand changed into a mess of
gangly tree roots that broke the black crystal meadow’s surface. His root hand
burrowed into the soil it like an anciently anchored tree then all the other tree
people connected below him used the hand planted anchor man to pull themselves up
as if he became the new rope. When they all had sprouted to the top, the first to
arrive removed his rooted hand from the ground and it returned to a more normal
form but inside his palm was a large nut which he flung madly at one of the
particularly large goblin warriors which knock the brute into the nether moat! The
goblin was daunted and dazed, sank below before being spit back up and out of the
syrupy nether stuff to be put back in line right where he had been before as if
nothing happened.

The light army was confronting the goblin battalions now! Huge strength and size
over the illuminated humans was a clear advantage as the goblins were bashing at
the light beings with incredible severity, brutally successfully beating many of
them to death. The goblins deftly demolished heads and whole chests at a time using
their fists with a surprising agility, precision. Obviously the powerful nether
magic was at work with Herdoles harnessing the power because his personal goblin
killers were adroitly massacring the first wave of light soldiers to reach them.
The humanoid light men and women fought back valiantly, glowing incandescently
whenever their battle passions would flare in rebuttal of the invasive scourge. The
blood of the goblins they spilled was pitch black and thick as most tree saps,
spilling out in a gushing roar that indicated they had more than would be possible
from just their insides (the nether regions the source of their inner juices were
flowing from were prodigiously being channeled directly from the nether abyss).
When the goblin trolls were deceased, their bodies slowly melted into pure nether
slime which oozed back into the river-moat rapidly. The underworld was unforgiving
and it would not waste a drop of itself thus the slain goblin giants were drawn
into the nether-moat.

The wood men were all over the goblin invaders now but what they tended to do
rather than fight them was distract them and make unwitting comedy with them. Like
three of the wood warriors at once would charge at several hundred or so goblins
and then the tree people would hurl some of their pink tree nuts onto the ground
which would help the goblin murderers find purchase with the seeds underfoot,
sending them in a sprawl to the ground and into each other. Some even took serious
injuries from the effort and masses of them sprawling into each other, falling over
and some even taking serious injuries. This caused the wood people to collapse in
hysteria, and then they would curl into a ball to bowl through rows and rows into
the slurry of goblin aggressors which sent yet even more to the ground. Other times
some of the wood people troops would swipe a goblin head or two off by slicing the
necks with a fingernail then plucking the whole cranium off! Then they would stick
the the heads right back onto the black nether blood spewing goblin necks and spin
the heads around like a top. Eventually the heads stopped spinning and these giant
goblins appeared to hardly notice anything had changed. The great goblin population
did not have any losses but morale was boosted for the light warrior and the
goblins were perhaps every so slightly disoriented as a group.

T’hurlk was charged up. He was unable to pass over the flaming bridge at this time
but since he was aware that he was being cornered into the moat otherwise, he
focused on a solution with immediacy. There were simply too many of the goblin
savages hacking too much misery into the dying light folk to get past, they were
everywhere and he could not even see a way out from the densely packed swells of
embattlement. When the light warriors managed to kill any of their goblin enemies,
their slime would reach the nether moat filling it slightly higher with the nether-
sludge, intensifying the black magical powers contained within the goo with every
slain goblin. The over-large goblins were all getting drunk on their power and they
were taking down many times more light defenders than the other way around. The
fallen goblins that did go down actually hyped up the remaining goblin numbers,
putting them into a slightly fiercer modality with each rising of the infinitely
dismal nether moat.

The light people were not winning and T’hurlk was feeling drained himself. Several
slashes on his arms were starting to slow him down and worsen his pain. He he had
slain the most goblins of any light soldier by far, many times more and actually
about the same as how many the light army had managed to execute combined. He was
growing frenetic in his passionate poetic violence now. The sun hammer he held had
grown in size too and emitted a howl upon each swing through the cold night air!
With a feverish battle cry, he pummeled through a huge horde of goblin attackers
whom noticed him for the first time when they were in their last moment.

T’hurlk crushed one head to pulp. The next was wholly split down the middle like a
rock breaking after a fall off a steep cliff. He punched at several dozen of the
bigger goblin riffraff all at once with his entire hammer swinging rapidly to and
fro at blurring speed which created a force field about the blunt weapon and a hazy
blue arc. Thrashing through a large number of yet even more goblin heads, he was
able to start breaking through the outer perimeter of the fire bridge and as he was
encroaching it a huge wall of particularly beefy goblin attackers confronted him!
The homunculus goblin defenders maintained a position at the front and the middle
of the flaming bridge, determined not to let the heroic light man get past them
(though they only did this to be dastardly, the situation was much worse for
T’hurlk by the looks of it on the inner island of the moat). Concern for his self-
preservation left him in a berserkers rage! He stomped his feet and light sparks
showered around him, a feast of energy which formed shafts of sunshine up above him
as if he were on a special patch of grass in the wilderness one lazy summer
afternoon on Thebos, scratching his belly in relaxed comfort. This projection
stayed of sun rays floating above him from that point on and functioned as an
energy source for T’hurlk. He began growing larger and began swinging recklessly
all around him at the endless physical impositions of goblin giant attacker after
giant goblin attacker.

Green malformed heads shattered, limbs were cracked and pounded in some cases
completely off. T’hurlk’s energies flared up and his mallet responded, taking
dozens of sun force impacted goblins out at once with a riveting turbulent energy
which sliced through the dark night with a rippling trail of sparks. The massive
magical swipe had a thunderous sound accompanying it’s incredible assault power and
cracking of the sonic barrier by his mighty mattock impressed Har’u who took it as
a cue to emerge from his cave and seek out the source of this booming magical
weapon. T’hurlk sweat beads poured off him in multi-colored shimmering droplets and
they dropped onto the black crystalline ground then trickled off into the flowing
nether slime. The droplets hardened on impact and danced across the moat to the
other side before leaping from the putrid abyss to land on the black grass where
they adjoined into a puddle. The sweat puddle evaporated into spindly rainbows
which disappeared into the air and apparently cast some kind of spell on the
goblins who were made momentarily caught off guard enough by the brilliant
beautiful display enough for several rushing rows of light soldiers to lop off the
heads of a great many goblin foes!

A group of courageous light people formed a solid penetrating front line something
like a phalanx and entered one of the huge flaming bridges. Together a great many
of them in the front slid to the ground on their knees then planted themselves
tightly against each other when they came to a halt. They were battered to a pulp
at first by a wave of goblin soldiers but their light flesh bodies were interlocked
at the arms in a way which made helped them absorb much of the shocking impact with
a geometric confluence that reduced a lot of the potential damage. Their improvised
blockade was improved upon by the next row of light warriors who slid into the
first interlocked group and strengthened it with even more of a tightly interlocked
chain! A cluster of heavily muscled goblin giants charged at the front line from
the inner island of the moat, then rammed the light fleshed humans hard enough that
many died instantly. The corpses of the fallen light soldiers were smushed into the
living wall of the remaining light people by the invading wave of the muscular
goblins but this time the goblins were being pressed back by the remaining forces!
Sliding backward on their clawed feet the goblins were being pressed all the way
back to the end of the bridge which connected to the inner perimeter of the island
inside the nether moat.

The goblin’s had failed to keep their territorial advantage on their end of the
platform and when the moment was understood by both sides that way, the insane
goblin giants let out horrendous ghastly groans in defiance. They were flaring up
in rage and as the light troops breached their perimeter and poured over the
flaming bridge to be the other side with the nexus of horrible goblin troops. The
inner ring is where the mightiest of all of them were and the huge goblins the
light beings now faced began to assault them in a crazy hysteria! Their rage caught
most of the light people off-guard and several of them were beheaded in the
frenzied violence. But that only encouraged the beastly goblins but too many of the
light foes crossed and furiously assaulted the hostile goblin armies on the other
side. The hardiest of the great goblin attackers made a ferocious fight but began
to be beaten back by the encouraged light soldiers! The light beings fought through
the massive muscular ones and crushing them expediently, trampled over their fallen
foes and charged toward the remaining masses on the other side of the bridge which
were assembling into legions to face the new invaders.

Ardugaknathal was starting to get interested. It was a lot of goblins *and* light
beings, some of which could be tasty. The giant dragon didn’t really favor one over
the other for a snack but together they might make a nice combination, something
like peas and carrots? The dragon was having a harder and harder time resisting the
temptation to do something entertaining with the opportunity so it let out an
avalanche of fecal droppings onto the hugest collection of goblins remaining on the
blackened crystal battlefield. The stuff plopped onto a huge number of deformed
goblins without any warning noticed by them and the load crushed them all instantly
to death. Then the dragon dung connected, the dark green goblin soldiers were but
the poop was absorbed by their decaying corpses and they soon reformed into
chiseled, proportioned elite version of their former selves! Their muscularity was
increased and their breath was a nether mist that would clearly be poisonous to the
light soldiers. The super goblins marched toward the invasive light warriors who
had recently breached the bridge. The goblin elite had developed temporary wings
and flown to the inner ring just past the fire bridge before their new wings fell
off, which the elitist horde picked up to use as swords against their light foes.

None of the light soldier infantry was expecting the invasion of the super goblins
with wing-swords (which looked like they were made of clear-black crystal bones
with red blood pulsing inside). Whatever confidence was gained by the achievement
of light soldiers penetrating across the flame bridge to the other side was
demolished in an instant when most of them who had mate it across were sliced to
shreds or run through by the new goblins with their amazing wing-blade weapons.
There were so many killed so fast by the wing sword goblins that the battle had
turned to an obvious difference in masses of remaining soldiers for either side
very clearly favoring the goblins goblin enemies. The nether moat would go down a
bit each time a light soldier would perish (still going back up with the loss of a
goblin) and at this point the moat very very deep deep, like a drought was
occurring for it! The slime inside did this not because of its diminished volume or
power but because it condensed and concentrated its power. Something extraordinary
was needing to be done by the light people or the battle might turn into a total
and complete victory over the T’hurlk’s people forever, ending their evolutionary
cycle and banishing them potentially into the permanence of the nether abyss!

Herdoles gloated at the success of his goblin troops, celebrating the good fortune
of a bit of help from the great black scaled dragon. The sorcerer unleashed his
malice with the zeal of a jester. Walking up and kicking T’hurlk right in the
buttocks, the stunned giant miner of light moaned in shock and pain! T’hurk was
already feeling exhausted from his recent excursion across the fire bridge which
was not easy for him to make his way across but he managed to swipe down dozens
upon dozens of angry goblin soldiers with his mighty hammer to get through.
Apparently goblin forces were being diverted to the inner sanctum of the nether
moat for the final battle to be fought. After the kick by Herdoles, T’hurlk had
buckled forward with his chin landing first to the ground and he screeched in
agonizing pain. Herdoles swiftly produced some nether slime from the moat by using
a hand to ladle some up then he blew it over to T’hurlk, who covered his mouth
struggling to keep from breathing in any of the noxious underworld fumes. The
disgusting stuff had splotched on his face and worked to remove the nether goo off
his face with alacrity, wiping briskly and flitting off all the bits he could.
Efforts to avoid the nether poison fumes didn’t work and the pain from inhaling it
was so excruciating that as he violently backward, he bit right through his upper
lip! Drops of luminous blood burst from his mouth which created a strange pattern
of light drops onto the reddish black crystal grass turf he was butting up on.

This was all Herdoles needed to rush forward and dance in front of the photonics of
phlebotomy before him, making a little rain dance out of it which he augmented
magically with miniature churning clouds above. The golden colored clouds rippled
thunder, cracked red lightning then emitted dark blue rain drops all over, masking
the lighted blood in the downpour. The weather incident seemed to hurt T’hurlk
badly and in a reflexive act he reached down then plunged his fist into the black
and red crystal grass, crunching it to bits. He raised himself upward by planting
his hand over his hammer head which was anchored to the ground shaft first, then
using it as a mount for his weight he kicked his foot outward and to the rear up at
the sorcerer in an insanely daring strike! Herdoles was at too much of an advantage
and T’hurlk had underestimated the physical capabilities of the wiry sorcerer. The
shockingly agile conjurer spun around with an outward kick himself this time, but
he connected and tripped the light man who had just gotten to his feet after his
failed attempt to lunge at Herdoles. T’hurlk went down to the ground in the same
spot he had just got up from. His luminous blood did not flow as much this time and
he found himself raising his foot in an automatic response and managed this time in
his unpredictable effort to connect perfectly with the groin of Herdoles! Merely
impacting him with his great heel was not enough to cause any noticeable harm
however for the mad sorceror’s loins were petrified at the moment, a spell which
broke upon impact. Apparently the wizened magic user had prepared for such an
offensive and made sure it would not do more than tickle before his first magic
shield there dropped. The magically petrified codpiece shattered with a loud
splintering sound and Herdoles cackled at the event, then raised his hands to the
sky to release some crackling blue lightning which made his groin shield return
somehow into another petrified state.

T’hurlk realized he was no match for the bizarrely powerful and twisted soul before
him, a master necromancer in his element within a war he had personally cooked up.
But he knew there was someone who could possibly do something about this and he
whistled loudly which produced two distinct separate and wonderfully sonorous
harmonized pitches! Frabagalarangus heard the call in his ears a vast distance away
but what was more startling was the sight of the giant tail of a dragon which
managed to soar over and above the mushroom wizard an instant after T’hurlk’s call.
The enchanting elementalist braced himself magically for a vigorous confrontation
with T’hurlk, whom he had sensed with his magical perceptions in a way which gave
Frabagalarangus a clear understanding of the essence of T’hurlk (which did include
a visual picture in his mind, smells, his size, the hammer he wielded, his
feelings, his aura and so much more it would take another book to list them).

T’hurlk sensed the sorcerer welling up with a defensive magical force as the
sorcerer right in front of him made a sour contemplative face. What to do!? T’hurlk
took the message that the spell weaving for whatever defensive energies Herdoles
was applying was just the distraction he needed to escape and he bolted past the
sardonic sorcerer without paying any attention where he was headed. Herdoles broke
his concentration long enough to reach out with his foot and trip the gullible
light man which *again* sent him once more to the ground with a painful grunt. This
time when he hit the ground his mouth connected with the crushed glassy grass
blades about the ground which cut him fiercely before the miniature crystal shards
turned to powder, releasing huge amounts of glowing light blood drops which
appeared as hot looking liquid gobs erupting with sun power. The light warrior was
really hurt this time from some sort of powerful magical addition to the kick made
by the sorcerer but shakily T’hurlk remained conscious as the wood sorcerer crept
off. The wounded warrior of the sun got up and staggered about, alive but shaken
and in excruciating pain.

CHAPTER
H’aru grew impatient. He ventured out to the edge of his boggy pool and surveyed
the battlegrounds. Fortunately for him he saw the enormous sight of Ardugaknathal
arriving onto the scene way high in the air (fortunate because all goblins like
dragons and dragons tend to avoid eating goblins, they are more tolerable than most
of the humanoid races and H’aru of course was from the blood of a dragon, making a
small kinship). The pair of lovers on the unbelievably gigantic black dragon’s brow
ridge were visible to the goblin chief through his nether vision, which was
manifested all over the dragons body. The happy pair who had hitched a ride on the
Ardugaknathal soared downward and onto the scene under the dragon’s guidance and
upon seeing the aggravatingly cheerful little humans the nasty H’aru snarled orders
up at the dragon to find the light warrior!

The dragon was intent upon locating T’hurlk anyway for some entertainment all three
of them would enjoy and H’aru’s body suddenly became enflamed with a green fire as
Ardugaknathal seemed to acknowledge H’aru and sped up in the descent, began making
more sharp angles in its flight path. Green bubbles formed on his thick red skin as
the goblin chief readied himself for combat! The sickly bubbling flesh boiled over
and all the bubbles popped which released a sticky green slime that seeped into
H’aru’s body that caused his red flesh to be coated in an dark green oily slime.
This gave him a power to collect more nether energy from the ether surrounding him,
which would add to his combat rage for a huge advantage when the aggressions got
underway.

The dragon of course knew the location of T’hurlk without having to do any
searching but it took its time gently gliding around in the air until it came upon
a nice the crowd of embattled goblins with light soldiers. The dragon suddenly
broke wind! Flatulence is powerful in itself for even a small animal but with a
dragon the issue takes on a difference of epic proportions. The truth would be that
dragons can do anything with their gaseous releases that they wanted, including
coming up with several new sphincter like organs to arrange for a multiplication of
blasts at will. In this case, Ardugaknathal was only playing with the combatants
and they all felt the ferocious wind of a green gaseous anomaly which suddenly made
them all freeze up and stop fighting! The smell was apparently hypnotic for both
sides with overwhelming power of dragon stink magic and the goblins almost smiled
as they drunkenly locked shoulders after dropping their weapons then began to sway
in a form of song which a putrid representation of gurgling chirps, muffled groans,
hideous attempts at actual musical singing. On the other side of the situation, the
light soldiers gazed upward and all began to hum the same pitch, delightedly
meditating together in a mass spiritual attempt at sudden enlightenment. After a
few moments of this bizarre display, a cold black rain swept through the area and
woke them up suddenly! They returned to fighting each other as if nothing happened
in between, but both sides were rejuvenated and fought much more valiantly against
each other! Please with his effect, Ardugaknathal a bit and gently circled all the
way around the mountain several times in a whooshing rush.

H’aru was excited because he happened to troll up just as the dragon fart blasted
through the battleground and caused such hilarious results. Red snow was pelting
his body but evaporating dramatically on contact as the flames began again on his
red skin, just a subtle flicker all over his body of red and gold magical fire. The
great Ardugaknathal swooped down to the ground in an impressive decrescendo from
the sky and got all the way close enough to the ground for H’aru to hop onto its
tail where he started to run up it’s vast length! The streaming red demon was fast
enough as he ran upon the magnificent black scaly tail that the deranged red dragon
spawned goblin was actually enough to tickle the colossal Ardugaknathal and the
tail made a tiny whipping motion at its tip (which had actually a thick roundish
formation on it which hummed and glowed a nether aura). The mountainous sized
dragon forced the greedily vicious red goblin to disembark! The red goblin leader
plummeted downward in the red snowy ice cold air— in just the right position to
land on top of T’hurlk for a murderous ambush!

Frabagalarangus knew it was an opportunity to seize upon an advantage over his

adversary and if for no other reason than to gain momentum for his own confidence,
he popped a mushroom into his mouth which had swirled into existence in a spiraling
brown and green sparkle of magical illusions! The hungry wizard consumed the fist
sized bright blue and brown spotted mushroom in a single gulp. Then he moved
forward over the crunchy black crystal grass which was littered with body parts of
light people and goblins alike, the goblins currently and quickly decomposing into
oozing crude slime which trailed its way into the disgusting nether-moat.
Frabagalarangus closed his eyes and wandered if into a standing sleep but this was
a little bit different than the typical long rests with listless dreaming to do for
the wizard. An air pocket was created by the snoring of the wizard which swelled
and formed an invisible slingshot that Frabagalarangus used by springing quickly
into a ball then springing upward so as to arm himself into the air slingshot! His
body slightly hardened, fueled by the absorption of his mushroom magic and his
physical stiffness was a slight graduation to being a better suited fit for the
magical air weapon. The sightless slingshot fired the mentally unstable wizard
forward toward— Herdoles! The warlock was knocked over by the semi-petrified
bunched up body of Frabagalarangus, sending the stupefied Herdoles onto his back
with a loud crunchy *THUMP*. While he was lying there the stunned sorcerer had the
opportunity to gaze straight up at the speedily waxing and waning moon and noticed
that for a brief instance Ardugaknathal passed across it with two funny people on
his head (which Herdoles was able to see of course through the nether sight he had
powers of). The tawny spiritual magic user rolled back swiftly then got up and
leaned forward to get up quickly and strike Frabagalarangus somewhere sensitive!
But the adroit mushroom mage saw the move coming early and used his hair to form a
net which would suitably sized to catch Herdoles in. When Frabagalarangus swung the
hair-net at the fiendish warlock the hairy net captured nothing but air because hat
captured nothing but air as Herdoles was able to gather a bit of nether liquid out
of the red snow by swatting his hand in a hasted state (speeding his body movements
up to an imperceptibly fast rate of motion), catching some red cold weather in his
hand then rubbing his fingers together mystically. This happened all in an instant
so fast it would be challenging for anyone but the most advanced magical entity to
perceive! The nether goo was like turpentine to paint and his swiping erased enough
of the net of hair out of existence as the rest of it was thrown over his body. The
hole in the hair net allowed Herdoles to work the rest of his nether slime onto
some portions of Frabagalarangus’ net which wound up shuffling its magical matrixes
to turn the hair-net to fine black crystal powder, apparently the same quality of
the glass below them. The net of hair transmogrified into pure nether sludge and
headed in an autonomous trail to the nether moat.

Frabagalarangus hiccuped and purple bubbles were blown at of his mouth which
floated over to the sorceror’s smirking face and momentarily blinded Herdoles him
when the bubbles burst open to assault the silly sorcerer with something which
would resemble the tree sap of Herdoles’ spire! A cruel magical joke by the aloof
fungal magician who was adding the shock to the spell of insulting Herdoles by
revealing his inner secrets as totally exposed to his opposition. Wiping the sappy
substance off his bony face, Herdoles wryly smirked as he began to rock back and
forth energetically. His to and fro motion in a frantically frenetic hysteria was
whipping up a magical spell to create a ball of simmering black energy from his
eye-palmed hand! The dark matter held spinning clusters within it’s deep center,
shining like a miniature galaxy of stars inside a perfectly round shiny sphere.
Herdoles had managed to capture the pain of T’hurlk with his nether ball and all
the sparkly little stars in it were representative of the anguish of the strained
leader.

The beguiling wood sorcerer concentrated intently on raising a spirit up and out
from a particularly ferocious and overage goblin minion. In order to complete his
spell successfully, Herdoles would have to use his own spiritual force to reach
inside his goblin commando cohort and bond with its nether spirit. Black smoke
began gather in front of his eyes which began to flicker blue static electricity as
the crazed sorcerer extracted the life force from the goblin giant! The frothy
mouthed goblin Herdoles focused on happened to be engaged in a furious
confrontation with a pair of light warrior twin sisters and the tortured nether
soul of the ignominious goblin warrior was siphoned mystically in a trail of black
smoke which was streaming from the sorcerer’s eyes. A vacuous sucking sound was
audible and the twin light warrior lasses seized the moment of their nemesis being
momentarily distracted and both bashed the goblin at the same time from either side
with their shoulders. The deformed goblin brute’s body slumped to the ground and
its nether soul floated to the moat for a final calling. This granted Herdoles a
restoration of his magical powers as his spirit absorbed the best facets of
strength from the brutal goblin giant’s experiences as it separated from the
sorcerer’s spirit, congealing into dark oozing nether slime which raced in a stream
toward the moat.

Herdoles raised his eye-palmed hand up high into the brisk dark night air and it
began to twirl and spin around as if the wrist functioned as an axel to a wheel.
His guttural chanting accompanying the magical revolutions of his hand encouraged a
void to appear hovering in the air directly in front of him…

Frabagalarangus began to shriek! He knew the spatial nether void his arch-enemy had
created in the air a moment ago was most dangerous and the gangly wizard’s
reflexive response was to have the magical hair on his head to spin around his
entire body like a lasso being tossed about before targeting its prey for
entrapment. Herdoles’ hand suddenly stopped spinning abruptly and his nether void
was launched from a stationary position into a streaming projectile heading
straight toward the lasso-haired wonder! Frabagalarangus managed to use his
follicle defenses with tactical mastery as he lassoed the nether void just as it
was about to implode or whatever else onto his body. This wound up making his
waterfall like hair blow around as soon as he did so as if it was caught up in a
hellacious gale. The only trouble with this defense was that by netting the black
nether hole rodeo style, the nether magic sliced right through the fungi wizard’s
strange hairs, the lasso only partially diverting the offensive missile. It cut
through to Frabagalarangus’ face and sheared a good portion of his facial flesh
apart with a horrific sizzling sound.The ripping through of the wizard’s skin on
the skull was a glorious sight for Herdoles but fortunately for the hairy
elementalist an illusionary magical mechanism was already in place ready for such
an affront and the moment Frabagalarangus was shorn in his noggin, he disappeared
into the ground then sprouted up from the soil right behind his sorcerer enemy—
whom he proceeded to bite into with his great red choppers! Frabagalarangus
appeared to the eyes of Herdoles to be in the same place he was before, dripping
with blood all over his face as he screamed in agonizing woe. The defensive spell
of the mage had worked wondrously, tricking the bright mind of the sorcerer
momentarily who was perhaps caught up in the success of his vicious black nether
hole missile. It was a battle of energy between them for a moment with karmic
magical energies tugging and pushing at each other invisibly through the air! The
wizard’s fang had sunk deep into Herdoles' trapezoids but were quickly rejected by
the crafty spell of the sorcerer whose prepared defense for such an attack had
rendered a force field which was bonded to the frequencies of his inner bodily
workings and blue wave of energy rippled outward from beneath his skin. singing the
wizard with electrical burns! Frabagalarangus flew back and into the air as if he’d
been launched from a catapult and then he landed on the ground with a hearty
*THUMP*. Herdoles came to and the illusionary Frabagalarangus dissipated at the
instant that the mad sorcerer recognized the real mushroom mage who had gloriously
spilled out on the terrain before him.

Herdoles made fun of the wizard in the hilarity of the moment as the proud sorcerer
was overcome with amusement at the sprawled Frabagalarangus suffering so vividly on
the black powdery ground (since all the grass had been crushed by their intense
antics). Heroles invited the pained wiz to a wrestling match or maybe some more
pugilistic hand to hand martial tactics in a brutish display by assuming a look of
mockery on his face, raising his fists up and beckoning him hither. The ridicule
appeared to have some effect as Frabagalarangus sprang up in a hurry from the
powdery black ground, almost like he had first landed on some imaginary trampoline
to bounce up with his own inverted inertia. Instead of boxing or wrestling, the
bemused but hurt mushroom wizard managed to slap Herdoles right in the face which
wound up burning Frabagalarangus hand badly! A hand print appeared on the opposite
side of the face which he had struck the sorcerer, apparently the joke of some
fiery nether magic again pre-planted by the sorcerer in case of just such an event.
The burn on Frabagalarangus’ hand was not light and an emergency spell was
activated which made a yellow flower appear growing from the dull black ground. The
petals of the large flower began spinning until the whole botanical floated upward
and sent a gentle breeze toward the mushroom mage which soothed his burning hand
enough that he could at least use it and hopefully begin to heal.

Surrounding the two utterly insane spell weavers during their exchange was a raging
battle of goblin giants versus the smaller but more agile and tenacious light
fighters. The two groups had eaten into each others numbers leaving gigantic
heaping losses on both sides. The newer super goblins with wing swords were now in
complete command of their territory having slain every last light person within
their sight, leaving a terrible mess of light bloodied corpses and injured,
agonized bodies all over the ground. There were so many kills and still living but
vanquished light defenders that their blood had begun to illuminate the blackened
ground which gave a dim reflection off the powdery black grassy remains.

The smell of victory had brought the bark-skinned commander Guh’thl out of his
defensive lair and he careened around his masterful super goblins upon arrival,
cheering and grunting, laughing maniacally (which sounded a lot more like grunts
and belches than any human like guffaws). The mountainous piles of light bloodied
bodies were intoxicating for the goblin chief and he felt a certain high as if he
had drunk some fizzy elixir of Master Herdoles but it was only the bloodlust in the
air that he responded to, a delicious moment of truth where it was looking very
clear that his mission would soon be accomplished and all of the light soldiers
would be dead. The endless stacks of light humans with radiant blood everywhere was
a vision of loveliness so profoundly great to Guh’thl that he actually wound up
buckling to his knees in sheer delight, an actual nether tear forming at the
lustrous beauty of his achievement! A goblin rarely showed such affections for any
moment in their endless personal histories (most goblins were not immortal but
wouldn’t die unless killed in a very precise manner— which is a secret as to
precisely how to destroy a goblin, and the secret is kept or you won’t be around
for long no matter what planet you are on).

Guh’thl spit on the dark grassy crystal turf which beneath him and it made the
surface quake. The tremor shattered most of the glassy grass blades under his
clawed feet and the rumbling shook the bodies scattered all across the way and sent
them by the magical force of the goblins spittle into a rolling state as if they
were suddenly in a descent down a steep hill, though they were almost on almost
perfectly flat land. The momentum sent the decaying light body heaps wheeling
toward the nether-moat, as if they were positively charged lodestones and the moat
was their negative counterpart. The thick hided goblin blew fire out of his thick
dark greenish lips which helped push the dead or nearly dead light people (so many
that one could not count them) into the nether-moat! The gooey nether slime in the
moat began to pulsate rhythmically with the vibration of the incoming energy,
responding to the imminent victory of the nearly wiped out light people by the
successful oversized goblin horde. Guhkthl moved around unctuously, urinating all
over the battleground with a fiery red liquid, permanently marking the ground with
a signature marking that scarred the terrain like a knife had carved into it.

Halabarefth smiled as she and her man careened around the cliffside on the head of
their great dragon friend and the two marveled at the sights of the war below them.
The masses of animal life surrounding the mountain at its base all had begun to
notice with aloof interest that some great happening was occurring with a
spontaneous and pregnant electricity to the air. The monstrously large
Ardugaknathal hugged the side of the mountain in his soaring agility, the side of
the mountain and when finding the just the right spot (something like a dog
revealing in circles many times before finally settling in for a nap), the
unfathomably immense dark dragon butted talons from both claws into the rocky black
crystalline mountainside! A bellowing echo was heard and black powder flew all over
the place, cascading to the ground deep below. Momentarily the whole mountain
vibrated but it was just enough pressure applied by the magical dragon that
Ardugaknathal had formed a shelf into the cliffside. sizable enough if its body was
used by the opposing factions that their entire battle up to the minute would have
been possible upon its plateaued body. The dragon blended right in with its pitch
dark scales, imperceptible to the naked eye as if the dragon were actually made of
the crystal black mountainside itself, rather than any kind of dragon scale or
wings.

Gaelron’s smile was equally broad as his lover’s as both comfortably nestled into
each others bodies in a great snuggling embrace. The tremendous dragon afforded
them a balcony style view for the operatic sequence taking place below them.
Gaelropn and Halabarefth rested contentedly in each others arms, cuddling deeply as
the climactic battle raged on far below. From their viewpoint they could see a
great deal of the action, including the super goblins which had conquered their
territory with terrible brutality and speed. Ardugaknathal had selected a prime
spot on the lower mountainside, just right for their human eyes to indulge in the
concourse of viciousness turmoil beneath them.

What the in love lovers settled their spectator attentions on with utmost interest
was the struggle between the long haired mushroom wizard and the frenetic wood
sorcerer. The hairy elementalist formed a pair of swords with his hair which
swatted at the spindly with meticulous but swift dexterity, Herdoles was dashing to
and fro heroically, spring from side to side in an awesome display of grace before
invoking angular orange light beams from his eye-palm! The hardened light
projectiles surrounded the wizard leaving wild bright orange traces as they
imprisoned the baffled wizard by plunging themselves into the ground to form a
circular expanse around him! This stopped Frabagalarangus from swinging wildly with
his hair-blades and forced him to focus on finding a key to freeing himself from
his unfavorable position. His hair mimicked the linear light bars sticking up and
out of the ground around him— a prison made of a deep amber honey like bars which
also created a force field of energy. The resourceful Herdoles made clicking noises
with his mouth which magically manifested in an infestation of miniature orange
ladybug like insects which feasted on the amber lighted energy beams protruding
from the dark soil as if they were a sweet nectar. The little orange bugs grew as
rapidly as they fed and quickly became a much bigger menace to Frabagalarangus than
the prison was istelf! He was watching the insect army turn from orange to deep red
and they began to develop a liquid armor that was somehow not spilling of them as
they flowed around their increasing bodies protectively, like a lava that was
clinging to their natural form instead of oozing out of the mouth of a volcano. The
shape of their molten armor turned from body-hugging to the formation of fire-
liquid wings. Soon the imprisoning light barriers were entirely consumed by the
little demonic spawns and the wizard felt a mortal threat from these incredibly
potent magical beings!

Frabagalarangus reached deep inside himself for any defense he could muster,
sensing great peril and a desperation of sorts which was almost completely unknown
to him (though he did manage a yawn somewhere in all this). The fungal magician
breathed in all the cold tense air that he could to get his magical senses and
powers up to the maximum they could possibly be before he decided how to counter
this swarm of enemies concocted by the awesomely powerful Herdoles!. The challenged
wizard used all his powers to merge his two lungs temporarily into one larger one
which grew a living mushroom inside it. This acted as a filtration device for him
to defend with and the result was that instead of blood or whatever else he had
inside his veins the moment before (one could never be sure with a wizard), the
fungus master began to pump a pure water throughout his body. The water was so pure
and clean that it encouraged a protective aura to be happening from inside his body
which projected outward rapidly (the truth is pure water itself is the most magical
thing known to spellweavers, if you could ever ask one but it was also almost
totally impossible to find *truly* pure water of any kind!). The watery blood he
was now filled with gave Frabagalarangus confidence and a boost to his magical
powers.

Suddenly the rejuvenated wizard barfed up a huge amount of mycelium which had been
produced by the mushroom inside his enlarged single lung! The white hairy mushroom
fabric which spewed forth from Frabagalarangus’ throat in a mass of throw up became
animated at the point it met with the chilly air and the stringy strands of white
mushroom silk fell to the ground then bundled together! The molten armored insects
all hungrily focused on the nutritious mushroom candy and they greedily marched in
unison to the food which was utterly irresistible to them! The irony of the moment
was that the more the fire insects feasted on the delicious magic mycelium, the
more they shrank instead of grew and eventually their hungry fever had made them
dwindle into nothingness with a loud *POP* as they vanished all together and at
once.

Herdoles lauded his opponent, admiring the tactfulness and humorous distinction to
his clever and remarkable saving throw. Leaning forward and offering a cocky half-
smile, Herdoles appeared gratified in a way that his spell hadn’t killed the
mushroom magician but instead had surprised the sorcerer into a comical repose— so
rare for him to find a match of wits or magic. Frabagalarangus appeared
electrified, glaring but bewilderingly curious about the mighty sorcerer who had
almost ended his life. The entertaining magician produced a bright purple flower
petal from his right nostril suddenly. The instinctive response by Herdoles was
that this was some clever ruse which was intended to distract him and set him up
for some form of lethal assault. Frabagalarangus sprinted up to Herdoles and sat
down on the ground, crossing his legs before calmly gazing up with a friendly smile
at the befuddled sorcerer. The crazed mage popped the purple petal into his mouth
then he leapt up off his feet and began to dance across the ground away from the
sorcerer on toes which moved at a blinding speed. Herdoles realized too late that
there a large slippery flower had grown quickly beneath his feet and he wound up
slipping on the flower petal then bonking his nose on the hard ground! Blood began
pouring out of his broken nose and cut up mouth, yellow blood which which was
infused by strange blue insects that also began streaming out of his ears then into
his nose and mouth! The bugs sealed the wounds quickly, ending the damage and
applying a healing salve from their natural secretions. The injuries were also an
insult and though quickly recovered from, caught the sorcerer’s attention and
reminded him that he was not the only one who could manage to hurt his foe.

All of this colorful action delighted Gaelron who whooped and hollered, cheering at
the great event! Halabarefth giggled and planted a kiss on his cheek, lighting up
with the intensity of the moment. The dragon was a very fine host and it managed to
locate and invite a uniquely courageous bird which had a particularly sharp beak to
drink some fresh dragon ‘blood’ (which was actually a form of its water— whether a
dragon has blood or not remains a mystery). This was an honor for the bird and only
possible with the assistance of the dragon when it provided a breath of fine mist
first to protect the little mortal feathered creature. Ardugaknathal let a tiny
mist escape from its mouth to coat the bird in supreme magical energy created by
the vaporous outpouring which gave it the temporary strength to pierce through a
portion of one of the dragon scales. When thirstily penetrating through the first
layer of a scale for a drink. The way this particular dragon’s scales were formed
was with many layers of icy waters which were tinged with the juices of the
dragon’s inner energies. Just hitting the first layer of cold hard waters of
Ardugaknathal would grant the bird access to a hypnotic treat which it would barely
be able to survive the drinking of. As the birds beak plunged in for the slurping,
a gurgling grayish liquid began leaking out with a sweet smelling beautiful rainbow
hued smoke. The dragon thanked the bird by exhaling a labored sigh and that forced
the bird to fly away at a hypersonic speed until it eventually stopped coldly in
mid-flight where it shape-shifted into a dragon influenced version of its former
self which wound up creating a new species of bird in the area! The bird was
honored with dragon genetics and eventually much later began to lay eggs in honor
of Ardugaknathal.

Gaelron and Halabarefth knew a gift when they saw it and cupped their hands in
anticipation of a special drink. As they gulped down voluminous portions of the
grayish dragon ‘blood’, their human skin began to sparkle radiantly with a golden
energy! They were feeling the magic of the dragon now which was eternal and grand
so that their merry laughter was resounding in a dream world and across all the
galaxies of the universe. They continued to sip on the divine stuff until
Ardugaknathal sealed up his scale, sensing they had their fill and anymore might
actually make them too happy which would turn them into dragons permanently.
Enjoying the paradise of the glamorous moment, the loving lovers began to feel
effects of a strong aphrodisiac and they became highly erotic with each other as
the vitality of their heightened state gave them a powerful new vitality. They
managed to contain themselves enough to continue spectating but were all over each
other absently with hands, legs rubbing each other, faces nuzzling and tender
kisses being planted one after the other. The war below was increasingly
interesting to them despite their physical longings and they managed to keep an eye
on it throughout their affections. Ardugaknathal closed one eye to take a nap with
one half of its brain. The dragon sensed a dramatic conclusion to the great battle
before it and wanted to rest up a bit for the big show…