The Last Experience Point

Chapter 51: World Famous

Even amid a terror that struck so deep it made her feel weak and helpless, Kalana’s heart swelled with pride as she watched Zach dash from home to home as he tussled with a gigantic dragon that, for all its power, just couldn’t quite catch him. She didn’t know how Zach was doing the things he was doing or how he’d acquired such an incredible set of abilities, but right now, she didn’t care, either. She just wanted him to be gone from there, knowing she wouldn’t be able to breathe properly until it was over. Every time the dragon swooped in for an attack or launched another of its gigantic fireballs, she tensed up and thought her heart would explode in her chest. She wondered if she was feeling more stress watching this than Zach was feeling participating in it.

“Rian,” Alex said into his phone from the seat to her left. “You’re doing great, but don’t worry about the girl’s circulation. You need to tighten that tourniquet.”

The two of them were traveling in the back of an armored transport DEHV chauffeured by a captain of the peacekeepers. With its emergency sirens blaring, the DEHV cut across and in some cases through the intense traffic in the worn-down but bustling city. It was incredible, too, because in the half a minute it had taken the two of them to sprint out of the school, a peacekeeper transport had somehow already arrived and had been waiting for them. Apparently, she and Alex were making their way towards a so-called “War Council” in Tomb of Fire, which also happened to be the place that Donovan Iseldar had promised Zach would ultimately end up—and alive, he’d assured them.

He’d better be, she thought darkly.

“Tighter,” Alex said into his cellphone. “No, that’s still not enough.”

“It’s already hurting her, and…any tighter and she might lose her arm, sir.”

“Isn’t that better than losing her life?”

“Well, yes, but she’s only seven years old, and Lienne can try again to—”

“It won’t work,” Alex shot in. “Healing spells either work the first time you cast them or they do nothing at all. If there was no improvement whatsoever after the first use, then the wound is too deep. I’m sorry, but the responsibility is on you now to stop the bleeding—quickly. The girl can live with a prosthetic, but she’ll die if she loses any more blood. As it is, she’s going to need several transfusions when she gets to Tomb of Fire. Do not let her lose any more blood, Rian.”

“All…all right, sir.”

Alex frowned. “Concentrate. You need to stop looking over your shoulder. I know you’re worried about Zach, but more people need your help. Save every life you can. Believe me when I say I know it’s hard, but you can do this, Rian. You’re a brave kid.”

“I know. I’m sorry.”

Now that the news helicopters had shown up, Alex had told one of Zach’s new friends—apparently that boy, Rian, whom he’d met in the dungeon—to stop focusing his video stream on Zach and to instead assist his sister, Lienne, as well as some gun-toting, scale-armor-wearing woman with evacuating the civilians and administering emergency first-aid.

“That one, you skip,” Alex said a few moments later, his voice turning cold.

“But she’s dying.”

“She’s not going to make it. There’s no time to argue about it. That old woman stands very little chance of surviving, but her grandson might still pull through. Show me his stomach.”

Although Kalana did not peel her eyes off her own phone, her ears did perk up as Alex’s conversation with Rian created a clear-enough picture of the awful brutality that was unfolding in the Den of Ziragoth. It was to such an extent that she was willing to put her own ambitions aside for now and do whatever had to be done to free the world of this evil creature that had spawned in on her poor Zach. Gods, if anything ended up happening to him…

“It’s a shrapnel wound. It looks like he’s been hit pretty badly by a siding from one of the destroyed houses. If you pull it out, Lienne’s slow-heal might be able to patch him up.”

As Kalana listened to Alex’s conversation with Rian while simultaneously watching Zach actually engage in a solo duel with a level-245-equivalent superboss, she could not stem the guilt that rushed into her. If she had only gone to him quicker, she could have been there with him. She would have been able to help, too: protected him. If she lost him, she didn’t want to exist anymore. She couldn’t open her eyes tomorrow in a world where he didn’t exist. She couldn’t do it! And right now, he was all alone. It wasn’t fair. He shouldn’t have to do this alone—or at all. Especially since she knew this was not something he wanted to do—at least based on the Zach she remembered. He’d clearly changed, but she couldn’t imagine he’d changed that much.

In all her life, she had never been as afraid as she was in this moment. Not even when that mean guild-person, Varsh, had tried to abduct her and her father—not even then had she been this worried. It almost made it impossible for her to sit still. The only reason she wasn’t sprinting at full speed in his direction right this moment was because she knew that, even if she began running at her fastest, which she estimated to be three-times greater than what this DEHV was capable of going, she still wouldn’t reach him before the others—not to mention she’d probably run through buildings and DEHVs and kill many hundreds of people along the way.

“Kalana,” Alex said to her. “Donovan is almost there. Just a little bit longer.”

She briefly took her eyes off her phone and looked at him. “Can’t he go any faster?”

“I’m sure he’s asking the pilot that very same question. The important thing is that we trust in him to…huh?”

His attention seemed to become diverted at the words spoken by a male reporter, whose voice came through Kalana’s phone. She’d been keeping it on speaker for him, as he’d claimed he wanted to multitask and monitor the evacuation efforts while still listening in on the news’s commentary.

“All right, folks,” the voice said, “we’ve managed to get our N-B-O-N ‘ear cams’ working. We now bring you live audio directly from this brave, young warrior. A reminder, though, that this is live, uncensored audio and may be disturbing for some viewers. We hope this will give us a much better idea of what’s going on down there.”

The sudden, totally unexpected sound of Zach’s voice caused Alex to immediately drop his jaw and raise his eyebrows. It also came as just as much of a surprise to Kalana, who glanced down at her phone in awe. It seemed that the media were using some kind of long-range, audio capturing equipment along with a speech-detection algorithm—whatever that was—to isolate the sound of Zach while discarding the cacophony of other loud noises that would otherwise render him indiscernible. Now, the unmistakable vulgarities of Zachys Calador filled the back of the armored DEHV transport.

“Are you fucking kidding me?” screamed an angry, frustrated, and clearly irritated voice that Kalana couldn’t believe she was actually hearing on the news. Given that this was on every channel and involved a disaster of a magnitude unparalleled in recent history, there were undoubtedly tens of millions of people watching right now with millions more likely tuning in every minute.

“AGAIN with this bullshit?” he shouted. “All you know how to do is use that one asshole fireball attack. Stupid fucking dragon! That’s right. Go ahead. Try it again, you son of a bitch, piece-of-shit lizard! You can kiss my Gods-damned—”

“Okay, we’re sorry about that, folks,” said the male reporter—Domanik—who abruptly cut off the transmission. “Like I said, the nature of this kind of live, uncensored audio does leave open the possibility of that kind of language coming over the air. We recommend parents with young children use their best judgement while we continue to offer live coverage of this horrific, unprecedented event.”

Alex sighed. “He needs to stop swearing so much.”

Kalana nodded. “I agree. But um…I’m just happy to hear his voice at all right now. Please, Alex. Tell your friends to hurry up.”

*****

A roar from the skies was the only indication Zach needed to leap forward and off the roof of the last-remaining house in this section of town that wasn’t either completely demolished or engulfed in flame. A moment later, his feet clicked against one of the last undamaged segments of concrete road as Ziragoth’s entire body flew through the center of the home, smashing it apart with a loud series of snaps and leaving in its wake a ruinous husk of what had once been a place of refuge for the family who’d lived there. With that, there were no more rooftops for Zach to blink across.

Now, back on ground level, he struggled to keep his fear in check as he glanced around for where to move next. Most of the road and many sections of sidewalk near him were damaged and uneven, and every home was destroyed and aflame. A tremendous blaze surrounded him on all sides, the heat from which made it increasingly more difficult to breathe.

There’s nowhere left to run.

Whether it had been the result of intelligent, strategic thinking on the part of Ziragoth or merely just the product of instinct, the wyvern had put Zach in a situation that severely limited his maneuverability. Completely encircled by the intense inferno, this sole unoccupied portion of town was basically encased in a prison made of flame. Sure, he could easily Phase Blink through the wall of fire if he absolutely had to escape, but the problem was that fleeing anywhere outside of this small area would put him—and Ziragoth—in contact with vulnerable, defenseless townspeople and would almost certainly lead to an even greater loss of life.

Although many of the residents had already fled to the western end of town to await extraction or had otherwise escaped in their DEHVs, there were still many hundreds of people who were trapped or unable to leave. For starters, the creature had essentially cut off the few-hundred people who were now stuck on the eastern side of town, as there were no roads leading out and fleeing against something this fast on foot would be pointless. It would likely kill anything within several miles’ distance once it got done with Zach. But that was only the first issue.

Secondly, the roads in numerous critical locations were now so badly damaged that leaving via DEHV was clearly no longer a possibility. Put simply, there was no way any additional DEHVs would be able to hover over some of these deep, ten-foot craters, and unlike that “car” he’d driven in “New Jersey,” the computers on DEHVs would override driver commands found to be unsafe or against road regulations. Therefore, Zach’s only two options at this point were to either continue his death-defying dance with the tremendous wyvern inside this fiery prison or retreat to more favorable terrain, which would in effect pull the boss with him and knowingly cause the number of casualties to begin climbing yet again. As things stood, no additional people had crossed the dragon’s path since he’d come here to this isolated part of town, and he really needed to keep it that way.

But I can’t keep this up much longer…

Having spent a great deal of the remaining duration of Unleashed Phase from his near-nonstop use of Phase Blink, Zach was left with just shy of four minutes before it expired. He also guessed he had around forty or so seconds to go before help began to arrive. But did that timeframe include how long it would take for the helicopters to land and for backup to physically make their way to his location? Mr. Oren hadn’t been clear about that. Genuinely, Zach had no idea how much longer he’d actually have to keep this up for, and now that he was basically contained within a tiny section, it was difficult to keep his morale up and not give way to total despair.

Haven’t I done enough? he wondered. These people can fend for themselves, can’t they? No one can say I didn’t already do enough. Haven’t I done my fair share?

He knew the answers to these questions even as he asked them. Yet a part of him was searching for any excuse—any rationalization that would justify him fleeing the scene and letting someone else worry about the lives of the townspeople. After all, this was tempting fate, wasn’t it? It would only take one hit. It would only take one scratch. This thing was so incomprehensively strong that any contact at all would likely result in his instant death. And Zach really, really was not in the mood to die today. Not when he was so close to finally reuniting with Kalana. If he turned tail and fled, he could be with her before dinner. Morally, he was totally in the clear to ditch this wyvern and find his girl.

Yet…he continued to fight on. All other factors aside, Zach knew that, the moment he disappeared, the beast would resume its earlier rampage. Even just ten seconds uninhibited would be enough time to wipe out another hundred—if not a great deal more—lives. This was especially true since they were all being herded towards the west end of town. Ziragoth was simply too strong and commanded a power too destructive. If it launched one of those fireballs at a fleeing crowd, it would, without question, annihilate every man, woman and child. And so, on this partially destroyed, disadvantageous terrain, Zach decided to continue waging this totally one-sided contest with the T7 wyvern.

Why does it have to be me, Gods-dammit? All I ever wanted was to be a greedy, rich asshole. Not this.

Due to the intensity and even height of the inferno surrounding him, he could no longer see Rian, Lienne, Anelia, or any of the others. Yet he took it on faith that they were doing everything they could to continue evacuating as many people as possible. If they were doing their part, he’d keep doing his. With that thought in mind, he steeled himself as the ground shook with the impact of the wyvern slamming down onto the concrete before him.

“Here we go again,” he said aloud.

As though it were losing patience, Ziragoth hissed and lifted its barbed tail up over its own body then smashed it down onto the concrete where Zach was standing. Lacking any other choice, Zach used Phase Blink and put himself behind the creature—and into another one of the craters in the street. This time, however, he did not panic as the creature responded by spinning around, opening its large, fang-filled mouth, and filling the crater with more of its firebreath.

Having realized his earlier mistake, Zach leapt up into the air and over the fire—but only enough to put him level with the ground. Then he activated Phase Blink yet again and once more zipped behind the creature on the heels of another sonic boom. Despite having crashed its tail down in this very spot only a moment prior, there was still a small piece of flat, undamaged terrain that Zach luckily found himself standing on. Then, ignoring the incredible bout of nausea that resulted in using a targeted Phase Blink twice in a row, he growled and began to slash away at the gigantic dragon’s left leg, hitting for 0 damage each time. Somehow, he managed to gain all five stacks of courage in a single volley of attacks, and he immediately activated his sword’s ability.

A thin, orange, and bubble-shaped barrier of energy surrounded him as Ziragoth roared. The sound of it sickened him from this close, but having already lasted this long, he refused to let it intimidate him or frighten him away. Instead, he gripped his blade tightly and awaited the horrific beast’s next move—which came fast and frantic. Lifting its tremendous right wing, Ziragoth swung it horizontally at Zach as though it were a garage-sized blade. Zach knew he could absorb the hit on his barrier, but he decided to save it in case he made a mistake later on. Thus, once more activating Phase Blink, he rushed forward at a speed faster than he could even feel and then reappeared behind the creature—who somehow appeared to be expecting just such a maneuver.

Zach cried out in horror, alarm, and disbelief as the sight of Ziragoth’s mighty, barbed tail filled almost the entirety of his vision. As though evolving and adapting to Zach’s combat tactics, Ziragoth had already swung his tail as if he knew that Zach would be blinking behind him. With a loud, terrifying thwack, it both popped and bounced off the barrier, leaving Zach unharmed. Yet it was already coming around for another strike.

Confused, demoralized, and lacking any time to cognitively assess his situation, Zach Phase Blinked yet again—only to find the creature’s wing streaking towards his face. There was no longer any doubt about it. The dragon had learned somehow from the battle up until this point, and the back-and-forth stalling tactics Zach had used would no longer work.

Gods, this is bad. This is so, so bad!

Panicked, desperate, and lacking any idea of what to do, Zach activated Phase Shield. Even amid the intense inferno and during a sunny day, the golden shield that materialized in the air before him cast a bright enough glow to temporarily drown out all other sources of light. With an impatient, angry hiss, Ziragoth bashed its wing into the shield—and then Zach’s entire body erupted with a searing, splitting, and unbearable pain as he was thrown off his feet and sent flying backwards at a speed far faster than what he could run while under Unleashed Phase.

Even as his body soared through the air, he both saw and felt gashes beginning to form all over his body and on his skin: his arms, his legs, his chest, and even his forehead. At the same time, he felt his ears, nose, and even his eyes begin to run with what he was pretty certain wasn’t sweat or tears. The wind pounded into him as the pain intensified. His muscles felt as though they’d completely broken down, and his chest ached. And through it all, he could only think one, horrified thought: that this was only a fraction of a fraction of the damage that the T7 wyvern’s wing strike had actually done. It was the smallest, tiniest slice that had been returned to him via his shield.

His eyes blurry as they leaked blood, Zach lost all sense of where he was or where he was moving. From the brief, but very painful spike in body temperature, he assumed he’d been hurtled straight through the wall of fire, and now, with a loud crunch, he blasted through what he thought was a brick wall and into what looked like a tiny clothing shop. Still, his flight did not end. With a crash, he broke through the storefront’s glass display window then continued to sail over several now-empty booths in the open air market before at last coming to a halt with another painful bang that took all the air out of his lungs as he slid down the side wall of what was likely the town’s only fast-food restaurant.

Landing on his feet, he immediately dropped to his knees, fell forward onto his palms, and began to cough and wheeze. He needed air. He couldn’t breathe. Everything hurt. Where was the dragon? Exhausted and in immense pain, he fell forward completely onto his stomach and then rolled over onto his back. Every part of him ached. He wiped his eyes with the sleeve of his tunic, then stared in a mixture of horror and disgust at the sight of red. He really was bleeding from his eyes. It felt as though a million invisible tweezers were pinching every muscle in his arms and legs while an intense headache erupted in his forehead.

Now on his back, he saw the dragon flying in circles and darting its head around as if searching for him, its powerful wings making an audible thwap as they flapped against the wind. It didn’t take long for it to spot him, though, and when it did, the wyvern threw out both its wings, causing an audible whoosh as it came to an unbelievable, instantaneous stop midair. Then it angled its body downwards and began to dive straight towards him while releasing another mighty roar powerful enough to make the ground shake.

Zach rolled over onto his belly. Fighting against the pain, he pushed himself back up to his knees as he looked around for some place to blink as the dragon dropped down towards him like a bomb. Still somewhat disoriented, he was surprised to hear a voice speaking to him.

“Are you all right, son?” a woman asked him.

Zach swore loudly, which confused the woman, but he didn’t care. “What are you doing here?” he yelled at her. She offered nothing in reply other than a blank stare.

You’ve got to be kidding me.

Why were there people here? Gods-dammit! Wiping blood and sweat out of his eyes with his forearm, he quickly looked around to see that there were in fact several people here. From what he could tell, they were all older, slower people who were still making their way to the west end of town but for some reason hadn’t gotten there yet. Judging by the sight of suitcases and other personal items carried on their person, it soon became clear as to why. These absolute morons had chosen to go back into their homes to retrieve clothing, jewelry, and other items rather than make a break for it with everyone else.

The worst part is I can’t even blame them, he thought, too hurt and too exhausted to feel anger towards them. It’s all they have. But even still—Gods damn them!

“Go,” he wheezed, finding it difficult just to speak. They seemed to pick up the pace somewhat as the furious wyvern raced down towards them. But they weren’t going to get far enough fast enough, were they? When Ziragoth slammed into the pavement, he was going to kill every single one of these people, right? Was there any chance that they could move far enough away in time to avoid the dragon? With less than two seconds to spare, Zach pulled up his list of abilities once again, as well as his duration remaining on Unleashed Phase. Things weren’t looking good. Not at fucking all.

Unleashed Phase Duration

1:50 Remaining

Wave Slash

1:15

Boundless

0:10

Phase Blink

0:20

Phase Shield (COOLDOWN) (2 seconds remaining)

0:45

Phase Rescue

0:35/2:15 (if used with Boundless)

Phase Slash

1:10/6:10 (if used with ??)

This was no longer a question of saving the lives of others but saving his own life, too. If Zach wanted to stand any chance of making it out of this alive, he’d now gotten to the point where his only option was to phase blink over and over until Unleashed Phase ended and he collapsed of E-debt. Given how much his body had endured recently, he was certain that a single high-exertion debt was something he could survive. He’d nap it off, hopefully far enough away for the dragon not to see him, and then he’d hope that someone found him alive and pulled him out of there. But as far as these five—or was it six?—old people were concerned? Well…maybe they should fend for themselves. After all, why should Zach die for them? They’d already lived their lives, and his was only just getting started. And they wouldn’t even be in danger if they’d have just gone with the others instead of lagging behind for the sake of their belongings. How could anyone even possibly expect Zach to trade away his own life in exchange for these five old…oh no. Gods, no, no, no!

He groaned as he saw a little boy partially concealed behind one of the old townspeople. The child was tugging on the sleeve of an old, silver-haired woman with horn-rimmed glasses on her shriveled, frightened, face. “Grandma, I’m scared. It’s coming, grandma!”

“Please,” she begged Zach, looking right at him. “Please don’t let it kill my—”

With tears—or maybe blood—leaking down his eyes, Zach shouted, “Run! Just fucking run!” And with that, he waited the one final second required for the cooldown to refresh, and then he again activated Phase Shield a mere instant before the humongous, roaring wyvern crash-landed and killed all of them. Almost in the exact same instant, the golden shield popped into existence, the dragon slammed itself down into it, and like a nail driven by a hammer, Zach was furiously thrown down so fast that he bashed into the ground with enough force to smash straight through several feet of concrete and dirt. This, even as he activated Phase Blink.

And as the pain began to form all over his body, he knew that this time…this time he’d done real, grave damage to himself.

As Phase Blink carried him away somewhere, he didn’t bother looking around to see where he went or where he ended up. He couldn’t, in fact. Truly, he was unable to form any coherent thoughts at all. The only thing he knew was that the level of pain he was in was now so great that nothing he’d ever before experienced could even compare to it. Worse, something was missing. He wasn’t sure what. But he had the sense that something was wrong: very, very wrong. He couldn’t see properly. His vision was off in a way he couldn’t quite grasp. Was his right eye closed?

He tried to blink, but only his left obeyed. Confused, he raised his right arm to feel his right eye—only for nothing to happen. And so he tried again, but as though it had fallen asleep, his arm simply would not obey his commands. He craned his head down to look, and a rush of dizziness caused him to nearly fall over as the world seemed to twist upside down. Shaking his head, he again glanced down, and this time, he shrieked in pure pain and torment as a feeling of dread and horror arose within him—one strong enough to crush his willpower and make him weep like a child.

His arm. It was gone.

Where once his right arm had resided there was now just a steady ooze of blood that poured out of a torn off stump with uneven strips of jagged flesh ending at the point of his shoulder blade. He also felt warm liquid pouring over the right side of his face, and as he began to stumble forward in a strange sort of bewildered misery, he caught his reflection in the half-broken glass window of a local barbershop.

Oh, Gods. No! What have I done? Please don’t let this be real. Please don’t let this be real!

His face was so bloody that the sight of it didn’t seem real and for a brief moment left him stunned and confused. But then, with his left, shaking hand approaching but not quite touching the socket, he realized that the kid he saw in the reflection with the missing eye and the missing arm was none other than himself.

Now, he well and truly screamed. He screamed unlike he’d ever screamed before. He couldn’t stop himself even if he wanted to. In this moment, with this level of anguish, he doubted any of this was worth it. It wasn’t like it’d been during his fight with Moldark, where he only knew he was going to die. Now, he felt it, too. Gods, he couldn’t even believe it was actually possible for the human body to experience this much pain at once. It hurt so badly that part of him almost wanted to die just so it would end. It was only out of his desire to see Kalana at least one more time that he continued to stumble forward, his sword now clutched in the grip of his only remaining hand.

“GRAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!”

The wyvern was on him so quickly he could only whimper and Phase Blink forward out of sheer desperation. Then, even as the sonic boom was still echoing behind him in the distance, he used it again. And then again. And then…then it refused to work. Why? Oh…right. He was running out of time. Glancing over his shoulder, he saw a bloody trail leading from the open-air market to wherever this was that he’d ended up. His eye was going in and out of focus. He needed to Phase Reset. Why wasn’t it working? For some reason, he couldn’t get that ability to work, either. Did this mean that the duration on Unleashed Phase had fully expired? If so, then all he could really do now was keep wobbling forward on shaky, unsteady legs as exhaustion and pain collided together to create what he was sure would be a slow, sorrowful march to his inevitable death.

And all the while, the wyvern…it came for him.

“No, go away!” he shouted. Everything hurt so badly. “Leave me alone!”

This was it. He was done for. He was dying. Nothing and no one could save him now. The world had finally taken everything from him. Worse, since his Unleashed Phase had hit zero, it was time to pay his exertion debt, and so now, he felt as though he were running at full speed even though his arm refused to move and he could barely keep stumbling forward. Yet, even as he continued to scream out in fear and agony, the one thing he did not do—the one and only thing he would not do was beg.

“Fuck you!” he screamed at the dragon, which was now right behind him. Still glancing over his shoulder, he saw the creature open its mouth, and Zach felt his entire body tense up as he prepared to be burned to death. Instead, however, the wyvern’s forked tongue flew out of its mouth and shot across the air towards him. Through sheer coincidence, he happened to trip and fall, which resulted in him somehow managing to evade the disgusting, elongated pink dragon tongue.

Instead of grabbing his body, the creature instead wrapped its tongue around his sword and yanked it right out of his hand while the rest of him landed on the concrete with a plop. Spinning around and shuffling backward on his rear, Zach watched as the tongue began to retract. In less than a second, it snapped back the fifteen-or-so feet of distance and disappeared inside Ziragoth’s mouth, which he then snapped shut. Before his very eyes, Zach witnessed the sword he had earned in the Catacombs of Yorna break into three separate pieces, all of which then faded into nothingness as though they had never existed at all.

Now, something changed in the wyvern’s eyes. It regarded Zach with a look that could very well have been merely his imagination as he fought to stay conscious as he paid off his exertion debt. Was he hallucinating? It almost seemed like Ziragoth looked…satisfied? Pleased with itself? It was just the way its eyes narrowed ever so slightly as, once more, its tongue shot out of its mouth and headed straight for Zach, who spun around and began frantically crawling away on one arm. He was now on his belly, and the right sides of his face and body left a dark, bloody trail behind him as he tried to slither away. Unfortunately, he was far, far too slow.

He yelled in terror as he felt a squeezing tightness in his gut as the creature’s tongue wrapped around him. Fighting and clawing to no avail, he found himself being dragged, his face rubbing into the ground and scraping more flesh away from the socket of his missing eye, somehow managing to further his pain as more blood smeared the damaged pavement. Even though he knew it would do him no good, he punched at the monster’s tongue, then tried to pry it off himself. Even if he hadn’t been paying off a hefty exertion debt, he doubted he’d have anywhere near the strength required to break free. Eventually, his strength failed him, and he allowed his arm to hang limply and lifelessly as he wept in pain, his face continuing to scrape against the concrete.

When Zach was a mere moment from being eaten, the creature’s tongue hauled him upright and a bizarre, inexplicable sensation flared up in his stomach; it was only then that he realized he had been launched into the air. Below him, he saw the creature open its mouth expectantly, its razor-sharp teeth awaiting its meal.

Son of a bitch is toying with me.

The thing had actually thrown Zach up just so Zach could plummet into its mouth and to his death. This was not normal mob behavior. Zach was sure of it. This was spite. It was angry that Zach had wasted its time. Had it even been a minute and forty-two seconds yet? He wasn’t sure. It had likely been more than two minutes by this point. But what did it matter? As he began to fall, he cried out one final time. He screamed Kalana’s name. He prayed for his pain to be quick and the end to come swiftly.

In the distance, he could hear what sounded like many helicopters approaching at once. But it was too late, wasn’t it? For him, anyway. As he fell, he saw something unusual moving in the corner of his one working eye. Something was heading towards him—fast. He had no idea what it was. It looked like a gigantic, black projectile of some kind heading in his direction. His vision was too blurry for him to really make out much at a distance. Not that it mattered, though. Nothing would save him now as he picked up speed, falling faster and faster into the mouth of Ziragoth even as a blackish blur continued to race towards him.

Then there was darkness. He must’ve dozed off or zoned out, because he now found himself inside the mouth of the creature. He could feel its tongue on his wounds, which made them sting. It was also tighter in here than it was the last time he’d almost been eaten. Everything hurt so badly, and he was so confused. He couldn’t take this pain anymore. He couldn’t take this grogginess or this confusion. Why were his legs and his arm sticking out of the monster’s mouth? Why wasn’t it crunching down on him? Was it playing with him? Was it toying with its meal? Maybe it planned to slowly bite down to maximize the pain for having disrespected it?

It did neither of these things. Instead, for a reason he could not discern, it spit him right back out, and he found himself rolling over several times along a section of smooth, flat road before coming still. “What…?” he wheezed. He could barely speak.

His one eye continuing to go in and out of focus, he realized he was now gazing upon an entirely different monster. Whatever mouth he’d just been in, it certainly hadn’t belonged to the wyvern. No, this was something very different. What stood on all fours beside him was some kind of massive panther twice the size of a lion with black fur, viciously sharp teeth, and emerald-green eyes that seemed to bulge with a rage so intense it made Zach shiver—or maybe that was just the cold from his blood loss. Either way, he could hardly believe what he saw out of his one eye, as even the hate-filled stare of the panther was nothing compared to the vicious, bloodthirsty roar it made as Ziragoth began to approach it.

Up until this point, Zach had believed he understood what it meant for someone or something to be angry. He thought he’d seen the darkest depths of rage. But nothing had ever growled with quite the fury and burning passion that this giant panther sent towards Ziragoth. Whatever this thing was, it had some kind of personal grudge against the wyvern, as it ran straight for the dragon in what could only be described as a mad frenzy. It was as though it were possessed by some kind of vengeful spirit—as though all the hate in the world became channeled into a single entity, and that entity was this unnaturally huge panther, which had to be at least half the size of an adult elephant. And it spoke, too. It actually spoke.

In a voice twice as deep and twice as booming as Maric’s, it shouted, “YOU HURT MY HUMAN! I KILL STUPID DRAGON!”

Ziragoth roared, causing the ground to shake. And the panther growled right back at it. Though the ground did not shake, the rage evident in the sound more than made up for the lack of rumbling. Unsheathing its claws, Zach began to fade away as he watched the creature explode forward into a series of frantic slashes with such speed and rage its paws appeared as a blur. Ziragoth again roared, but this time in what actually sounded like surprise as the gigantic cat slashed at its face over and over, dealing between 10 and 15 damage each time. Whipping up its tail, Ziragoth tried to crush the panther, but the cat merely jumped directly to the side as the concrete beside it exploded. Once more, it rushed in and hissed with pure fury as it slashed again and again and again, growling each time. The panther clearly hated the dragon with every fiber of its being. That much was beyond obvious.

One time after the next, it struck out at Ziragoth, who again tried—and failed—to retaliate with its tail. At the same time, a large shadow popped into existence from somewhere far up above. Groggy, in total agony, and morbidly confused, Zach weakly lifted his chin and looked up to see that a gigantic, fluffy cloud had just appeared in the otherwise cloudless sky, though it was dark and looked highly unnatural. No sooner had it appeared than it began to flash, and now, at a speed far, far too great for the eye to follow, one bolt of lightning after the next began to pour down on Ziragoth so fast that it looked as though it were literally raining lightning. Each time a bolt struck, it made a slapping sound and dealt between 12 and 17 damage. Yet the bolts came in with such unbelievable rapidity that the numbers all blended together.

What’s happening?

Zach wasn’t sure what he was seeing was even real. Was this actually happening? Seemingly out of nowhere, this gigantic creature had shown up and was now somehow putting out hundreds of points of damage each second as it vented whatever personal grudge it had against Ziragoth. Over and over, it clawed the wyvern across its face while it struck out with lightning.

A cat…that makes lightning?

If not for the fact that he was now too weak to do anything but blink and take shallow, unsatisfying breaths, Zach probably would’ve realized well before that point exactly what—or more specifically, who—the creature was that had come to avenge him. Yet it was so hard to think as his body grew colder and more and more of his blood spilled out of his shoulder and eye socket. Even still, he was truly grateful that his buddy had come to him before the end. Was it normal to be so moved shortly before death?

“Fluffles,” he whispered. “Run. Can’t help. Dying.”

It had to be Fluffles. There was no other explanation. Zach didn’t know how the cat had known to come here or why, but as he lost all sensation in his left hand and both of his feet, and as his eyelid began to droop, he recalled once seeing Fluffles transform into a crude imitation of a human male. Clearly, he was better at transforming into other types of cats than he was at humans. This much was obvious from the way Fluffles had taken on the form of a panther three or four times its natural size and continued to strike out at Ziragoth in what was decidedly a serious vendetta. This was personal for Fluffles. It was, wasn’t it?

Such a good cat, he thought. Such a good boy.

Zach tried to call out to Fluffles: to beg him to run. But the way the cat hissed told him that Fluffles wasn’t likely to stop any time soon. A sick, twisted thought popped into Zach’s head, as he now hoped he’d die before he saw the dragon get Fluffles, too. That was one sight he did not want to take in before he left this world. Oddly, the closer he came to death, the less he began to fear it. Of all things, he began to feel peaceful. He was going to see his mother again, wasn’t he?

Colors and sounds all began to distort. He became confused. He was no longer certain what was real and what was imagined by his dying brain. He thought he saw several more shadows racing towards the ground. With just enough strength left to shift his eyeball upwards, he wondered if he was imagining those five people he spotted literally jumping out of a helicopter far up above the town. He wondered if one of them was really glowing with an intense, reddish aura that left an actual streak behind in the air as the person fell directly down towards Ziragoth. It looked like a man: one covered from head to toe in midnight-black plate armor that had spikes jutting out of his shoulder pauldrons as well as along the backs of his gauntlets. He also appeared to be wielding a gigantic battle axe as he began to glow brighter and brighter as he fell.

Is any of this real?

He watched as Fluffles jumped backwards a moment before the man crashed down with an actual bang on top of Ziragoth, slamming his axe down on the creature’s head and dealing 11,421 damage while sending a wave of electricity throughout the giant wyvern’s body. An instant later, several other people landed beside him, some of whom Zach recognized.

“Fucker is stunned for ten seconds,” the plate-wearing man said. “Alixa, spam amnesia. Now! Fluffles, get your human out of here before he dies on the side of the road.”

“FLUFFLES KILL DRAGON!” the cat cried, his voice so utterly deep and booming. “IT HURT ZACH. FLUFFLES WANT REVENGE!”

The man turned his plate-covered head in the direction of the cat and widened his furious eyes, which were filled with equal parts ferocity and command. “Fluff, he’ll die if you don’t get him to Kesten on the west end of town. Now go! Hurry!” Then the man looked directly at Zach and grinned. “You’re not dead yet, kiddo.”

“I’m…dying.”

“Not yet you’re not. Not this time. Good job, by the way. You saved so many lives.” Even as he spoke, another dozen or so people jumped out the side of several more helicopters and began landing down next to him. Raising his voice, he shouted, “Remember! We’re here to distract only. I expect at least five minutes out of you lot. If that boy”—he pointed at Zach—“can go two minutes solo against the dragon, I don’t wanna hear any bitching. Five minutes. You all have to survive five minutes and then we can leave. Fluffles, get him out of here now before it’s too late.”

Zach tried to say something in reply. He was so Gods-damned confused. He was so hurt. His pain intensified as he once more found himself in the mouth of the creature who had saved him. His cat? Was this Fluffles? He couldn’t remember. He forgot what had even happened, actually. Wait, wait, what did happen? Was he hurt? Did someone hurt him? Why couldn’t he remember anything? What was going on?

He was moving really, really fast. Something was carrying him and jumping from one rooftop to the next. Hadn’t he done something like that once? He couldn’t remember. Why did he hear the sounds of battle from wherever he’d just been? It sounded like a whole bunch of people were making a whole lot of noise. Why couldn’t they just be quiet? He was so, so tired. Yet over and over, people kept telling him not to sleep. More than one person, too. Wait, how many people? And why did they have to be so rough with him when they loaded him into the gurney and strapped him in. Was he on a rooftop? This one seemed way higher up. Like, as tall as a skyscraper. Since when was there a gigantic building like this in the middle of the Den of Ziragoth? Also, how could he be so cold with the sun so strong in the sky and practically baking him beneath it?

Where am I? Nothing’s making any sense!

He was so disoriented and confused that he actually had to really struggle with the question of why there was a rooftop inside of his cat’s mouth. Also, if he was inside of his cat’s mouth, then why was his tiny little black-and-white cat meowing at him as he ran alongside the gurney, beyond a pair of double doors, and into a much colder, much darker place while several people hovered to each side of him and various machines beeped as needles were stuck in his arm. Where the fuck was he?

“Do not fall asleep,” said a man with shaggy blonde hair wearing spiked bracelets and a leather jacket. Zach knew him, didn’t he? Yes. Yes he did. He remembered. This guy was Kesten. A doctor. Why was he seeing the doctor? Was he sick?

“Where,” he said weakly. “Hurts. It hurts so much. I want Kalana. I don’t care about anything anymore. I just wish she was here.”

“I’m right here!” said the voice of Kalana, squeezing his one arm. She was holding onto him and ruffling his hair. This wasn’t real, was it? Was that really her? It couldn’t be. How had she gotten inside of his cat’s mouth? Was she in the Den of Ziragoth too?

“You’re not really here.”

“I am. See? It’s me. I’m really here. I promise. Oh, Zach. What did that thing do to you?” She was crying. Her face was so red. Did he upset her again? He was being wheeled along some kind of hard-surfaced floor. But where was he? Why was no one telling him anything? Why couldn’t he make sense of anything anymore?

“His blood pressure is too fucking low,” Kesten said with an angry grunt. “Not good. We can’t use the stones on him like this.”

“Why not?” Mr. Oren demanded. “I don’t care what it costs us. Give him my emergency light stone.” He reached into his lab coat and pulled out the most beautiful, vibrant, rainbow-colored gem that Zach had ever seen. It had to be worth at least a bazillion gold. Weakly, he lifted his hand and tried to take it. He chuckled, which caused both Mr. Oren and Kesten to look at him as though in disbelief.

“Zach get to have pretty gem,” Fluffles said, running alongside the gurney. “He want gem. Fluffles know!”

Mr. Oren shook his head as though ignoring whatever the cat had said. “I will provide the stone. I’ll pay for everything.”

“It’s not about the money!” Kesten shouted, frowning. “Gods, Alex. After what he just did, there isn’t a single guild on either side that wouldn’t cough up any gold asked if it’s for the kid. Hell, even the Gods-cursed Royal Roses offered to pay for his treatment—publicly. The problem is that his vitals aren’t stable, and if you go jamming a stone into him, it’ll kill him. He’s too wounded for even the stones right now.”

“So what, then?” Mr. Oren asked. “If there are no spells or stones. Then what?”

“He needs surgery,” Kesten said. “And I can’t do it. I’m a doctor, not a surgeon.”

“I’ll handle that,” another voice said. Zach did not recognize him. He was a tall, brawny man wearing the fanciest business suit that Zach had ever seen; a stunning, golden crown was embroidered on the lapel of his tuxedo. The man had smooth, black hair, and he was quite tall, though not as tall as Mr. Oren. He was also handsome in an almost regal sense.

“How generous of you,” Kesten said with obvious sarcasm. For some reason, this caused Mr. Oren to give him a look of warning.

Plainly ignoring the show of disrespect, the man nodded and said, “The best surgeons in Tomb of Fire are already rushing over here as we speak.”

“Thank you, Sir Peter Brayspark,” Mr. Oren said.

Zach was too weak to feel any surprise at the name. Nor was he clearheaded enough to really contemplate the significance of the fact that the leader of the Guild of Gentlemen and only surviving child of Peter IV was now striding confidently alongside him and looking upon him with gratitude plain in his expression.

“Kal,” Zach moaned. “Are you really here?”

“I’m here, baby,” she said.

Upon her words, Zach finally came to understand that he must have been seriously, seriously wounded; otherwise, the fact that she’d just called him “baby” would have sent him into overdrive. If only he could understand what it was that had hurt him? Why was he here? Once again, his brain went through the typical routine of trying to figure out what had happened to him and when.

“Where am I?” he asked.

“You’re in the hospital,” Kalana said.

“Why? Am I hurt?”

“You…you don’t know?” she asked, sounding alarmed.

As if to reassure her, Kesten said, “That’s normal. Not brain trauma. He’s just in shock. The fact he knows who you are is a good enough sign. One less concern to knock off the checklist.” As Zach found himself turning a corner, he saw a bright light above his one working eye. He realized it was Kesten, shining something down at him. He narrowed his eyelid and turned his head away.

“Zach, can you see this?”

“Yeah.”

“What is it?”

“A flashlight.”

He switched it off. “All right, good.”

“Where am I?”

At this question, Kesten did frown slightly as though worried. “We just told you. Don’t you remember?”

He nodded—or tried to, at least. His head wouldn’t move. “The hospital.”

The frown quickly gave way to a relaxed expression, perhaps one of relief. Zach, still in a great deal of pain, tried to clarify. “I’m sorry if…if I confused you. I’m just having a hard time thinking. I meant to ask why I’m here, not where I am.”

“You…you got into a fight,” Kesten said.

“A fight?”

“Yes. With a dragon.”

A Dragon?

All at once, the image of Ziragoth’s demonic, hate-filled eyes flashed in his head. He could see it again. Those eyes. Those fucking eyes. It was after him. He was still there. This was all an illusion. He’d never left the town. Of course he hadn’t. He was still there! He began to struggle, fighting against the binds securing him to the gurney.

“His heart rate’s spiking!” Kesten said.

“Get it away!” Zach screamed. “Get it away!” Tears began to fall down his face. “It’s going to kill me. Get it away. Kal!”

“Zach,” she said back to him, grabbing him even more tightly.

He was still fighting it, wasn’t he? Of course he was. Its tongue was wrapped around him. He was dying. He was still there. All those bodies. All those people. They’d been butchered and ripped into little pieces. The streets. They were covered in blood. Gods, make it stop. Please. Please. Please. Make it go away. There were so many bodies. Dead children. They were bleeding. He was bleeding. More death than he could conceive of.

“GET IT AWAY FROM ME!” he screamed. “I DON’T WANT TO FIGHT IT ANYMORE!”

Zach thrashed and writhed against his bindings as he struggled to free himself. This, as the machine to his left beeped louder and louder and his head became foggier.

“What’s wrong with him?” Kalana asked, pain and alarm in her voice. “What’s happening to him?”

“PTSD most likely,” Kesten said. “Not my field of expertise.”

Zach continued to fight and claw at the straps securing him in place. “It hurts! It hurts!”

“Give him pain medicine,” Kalana said. “Please!”

“He’s already had too much.”

Someone was grabbing him—no, it was multiple people. They were picking him up and dropping him onto a bed. He kicked one in the face—or tried to. Mr. Oren merely dodged and didn’t seem slightly offended. Even as Zach kicked out at him, he couldn’t understand what he was doing or why. Now, he found himself on a bed in a gigantic hospital room that seemed fit for royalty or someone rich and famous, as it was private and had an entire team of nurses and doctors on standby as though they’d been waiting here just for him. The moment he was on the bed, they snapped into action. Connecting him to various machines, sticking things into his arm. His arm? Where was his other one? Again, it flashed inside his head as though it were only happening now. “I’m ruined,” he whimpered. “It took my arm. It took my eye.”

“It’s okay,” Mr. Oren said. “You’ll get them back. I promise.”

“How?”

“Regrowth treatment.”

“Did this really happen? Am I really here?”

“Yes.”

“How? How am I here? I’m so confused.”

“You’re still in shock. Just be calm, my man. The surgeon is on his way up right now.”

“Why do I need surgery? Kal. Get me out of here.”

“Nah-uh, you need to get better.”

“I’m fine. That thing. It’ll find me here.”

“No, it will not,” Mr. Oren said.

Zach looked around, becoming panicked. His adrenaline was coursing through his veins. There was a window not far from him. He peered out of it fearfully. He was sure he could see it—that gigantic creature. He could see it flying straight into the window, causing the glass to break. He flinched and closed his eye. Then he opened it, and he saw that the window was not only still intact, but that the sky was clear.

“I’m gonna kill it for you,” Kalana said to him. “I promise.”

Upon hearing these words, Zach struggled furiously and nearly succeeded at getting out of the bed if not for multiple sets of hand restraining him, including Kal’s. “No you’re not!” he shouted at her. “I don’t want you ever going near that thing ever.”

Rather than reply, she merely cupped his chin and smiled at him. “Don’t worry.”

Only now that she was standing right before him and he had become somewhat more lucid could he truly appreciate how much she’d changed, physically, since the last time he’d seen her. In a matter of weeks, her shoulders had become more broad, her hair was now longer and the color of pure gold, and her ears were more pointed and Elvish in appearance. But more than that, she had completely ditched her typical modest attire, revealing a lot more skin than she used to. She wore a pair of tan-colored shorts, likely equipment, with a dagger sheathed at each of her hips, and she also had on a tan-colored chest guard that ended at the bellybutton and revealed much of her stomach.

“His heart rate’s spiking again,” Kesten said. Then, in the corner of his limited vision, Zach saw Kesten staring at him, at which point he seemed to be following the path of Zach’s one eye as though trying to discern what Zach was looking at. A moment later, he grinned and said, “But in this case, it seems fine.”

“Why? What happened?” Kalana demanded, frowning. “Why’s his heart going up? What happened?”

“N-nothing,” Zach said. “It’s just a medical thing. Don’t worry about it.”

“Kesten, his face is going red,” she said. “Do something.”

“That’s supposed to happen, Kal. It’s part of the healing.”

“Nah-uh.”

Mr. Oren sighed. He opened his mouth as though to speak, but before he could form a word, a man in pure plate armor barged in and began moving towards them all with quick, powerful strides. Zach vaguely recalled seeing him earlier. He was the man that had jumped out of the helicopter.

“Zachys Calador,” he said with wide smile on his face as he removed his helm. Zach winced in pain as the man pulled up to the side of the bed and gave him what he might’ve intended to be a playful slap on the shoulder but was more like an attack from Ziragoth. “Good fucking going, kiddo. Gods, you saved so many damn people. That was a hell of a show you put on.”

“Boss,” Mr. Oren said, backing away and bowing his head. “It’s good to see you’re back unharmed. Did…did anyone die?”

“Two people, yeah,” he said sadly. “Both from Boss Rush. But we managed to evacuate the West and East ends of the town. Then we hurried everyone back here.” Accompanying him were Alixa and Spider, and both of them looked weary and exhausted.

“Oh, hey again, Spider. That’s the guy who beat me up,” Zach said deliriously, chuckling.

Kalana’s expression darkened, and she glared. “Who is?” She lowered her hand slowly down to her side as though to draw one or both of her daggers. “Point him out to me.”

“N-nobody,” Zach said with a smile. “I was just confused.”

She regarded him skeptically for a moment, but then soon after, her face visibly relaxed, and she rested her head in his chest. She felt nice. Zach was too weak to grab her back or he would pull her closer.

“So, what are we dealing with?” Mr. Oren asked, causing Kal to let go of him, stand upright, and face the others.

Donovan grunted. “It’s bad, Alex. Really, really bad. We’re gonna need a raid of at least a hundred-fifty. Probably more. Son of a bitch is powerful. It almost killed me.”

“Is it…a roamer?” Mr. Oren asked fearfully.

“No clue, but my gut instinct tells me it is. We won’t know until we observe it for a few hours. News media has been told not to get any closer than fifteen miles. One of their helicopters already got blown out of the sky.” He laughed. “Fuckers deserved it if you ask me.”

Mr. Oren frowned. “That’s not funny, boss.”

He shrugged. “To each their own. Anyway, we’ll talk about all of this at the war council. For now, all I’ve got is my hunch.”

“And that is?”

He lowered his voice, his tone becoming abruptly serious. “I think it’s gonna roam, and I think it’s gonna move on Shadowfall Coast. Seventy-two hours at the latest.”

Mr. Oren hissed in vexation. “That only gives us less than three days to prepare.”

“It is what it is. But we’ll talk about it later. For now, I wanna shake hands—or hand, I mean—with Mr. Hero over here.”

Nervously, Zach tried—and actually succeeded—in raising his hand. With a surprising gentleness, Donovan took it in his plated grip and shook it. “You did a very, very good thing, Zachys.”

“Call me Zach.”

“You did a very good thing, Zach.”

He winced. “Will I really get my arm and eye back?”

“You better believe it, kiddo. So, how’s it feel to be famous?”

“Huh? Famous?” For some reason, Kalana chuckled, and so did Donovan. Then, oddly enough, the literal son of Peter IV also let out a bout of laughter. “Why’s everyone laughing at me? What gives?”

“Yeah, what give?” Fluffles asked, jumping up on top of him and walking across his chest before jumping onto a green padded couch across from his bed. “Why laugh at Zach?”

“You don’t know, do you?” Kalana asked. She looked way too amused. “Of course ya don’t. How could you?”

“Know what?” Zach asked, becoming nervous. Just then, four men in blue surgical gowns wearing facemasks entered into the room, though all four stood by the door as though intentionally giving Zach time to communicate with his friends, associates, and new acquaintances before doing to him whatever in the name of the Gods they planned to do. This, Zach gleaned as Kesten addressed them and said that Zach should be fine for a few more minutes.

“Someone tell me what’s going on,” he demanded.

Rather than reply, Kalana marched across the room, grabbed what appeared to be a black remote off a nightstand, and then returned to the bed, whereupon she pressed a button, and a gigantic, eighty-inch TV mounted on the wall above the door lit up.

He squinted, unsure of what he was seeing. There appeared to be dozens upon dozens of reporters all converging on a hospital while peacekeepers held back a massive and growing crowd of people. They were reporting from a beautiful city with buildings that lit up red and a few that had actual streams of flame shooting up from the ground. It had to be Tomb of Fire. Come to think of it, Zach had always wanted to visit that city.

Wait a second…

Zach turned his head to the left and again peered out of the window where he’d mistakenly believed Ziragoth was flying towards him. Only now, having become much more lucid, he was able to actually make sense of what he saw when he looked out on the world. Now, he realized he was actually in Tomb of Fire. Then he looked back at the screen before again looking out of his bedside window.

“Wait a second…”

Kalana raised the remote and dialed up the volume. A reporter stood with her back to a hospital building as a rapidly growing crowd of people chanted a name that sounded eerily similar to his own.

“Thanks, Trillia. Yes, I’m standing here outside Humanity’s Great Mercy in Tomb of Fire where we have just received word that Zachys Calador is being prepped for surgery.”

Zach swallowed as a nervous sensation bubbled up in his chest. “Why did she just say my name on TV?” he croaked. He was so surprised by the sound of it that it pulled his attention off the sight of Ziragoth, who it appeared the news helicopters were continuing to follow and who was now being shown inside of a box on the bottom-right corner of the screen.

“Right you are again,” the reporter said, answering a question he’d been unable to hear. “The young man who’s being hailed as the hero who saved over a thousand lives is said to be in critical but stable condition. As you can see, the Guild of Gentlemen have ordered an extra layer of security to hold back the growing crowds eager to catch a glimpse of him.”

“And is it true that he’s only seventeen years old?” a female voice asked. “That’s the same age as my son.”

“That’s right, Trill. He’s only seventeen.”

“Well, I’m just glad to hear he’s going to be all right. I think everyone here at the studio heard me scream when he lost his arm.”

“I think the whole world screamed with you, Trill.”

His mouth falling open, Zach stared blankly as he struggled to comprehend the fact that they were talking about him on the TV. “What the fuck is going on?”

“Language,” Mr. Oren said with a frown. Then, ruffling his hair, he added, “You’re about to become the most famous adventurer who’s ever lived.”

Zach groaned. “Do I have to?”