Charlemagne slowly regained consciousness, and the pounding in his head increased along with his level of awareness. Slowly pushing himself to his feet, he discovered that it wasn’t just his head that was in pain. His entire body felt like it had been tenderized with a hammer, and he felt so weak that his legs were trembling under his own weight. But at least he was still alive. Realizing that he still had a half-chewed piece of snake in his mouth, the young rooster downed the rubbery morsel as quickly as he could. The difference made by his newest body tempering achievement was immediately noticeable: the spicy tang of the venom had been transformed into a largely sweet flavor that still had a bit of heat. As his strength slowly returned, Charlemagne hunted down every morsel of snake he could find. Once the pit had been picked clean, the rooster flew out.
After he took a moment to understand that announcement, Charlemagne had two feelings at the same time about it. On one hand, he was happy that there would be no more snakes barring his way. On the other hand, whatever power the squiggles had just brought him made the snakes so delicious his beak was practically watering at the thought of finding more of them. His conflicting emotions confused him, increasing the count of simultaneous feelings to three. This was one too many for his avian brain to handle and caused his emotional state to immediately reset to default. With the snakes now gone, Charlemagne went looking for something else to eat.
It took the rooster less than thirty seconds to learn that “no longer spawn” was not synonymous with “will disappear”. The lesson took the form of an adder to the face. Although now highly resistant to the toxins found in the snake’s venom, the rooster very much did not appreciate a fang through his eye. He wasted no time in killing and eating the Assassinadder, adding badly-needed nutrients to his system and enjoying a delicious snack at the same time. Putting aside the holes in his face and focusing on the continued existence of his new favorite snack, Charlemagne forgot all about his mission to find the pangolin and started hunting around for more of the delicious adders.
With two of his new Champions asleep and Ricardo not doing anything worth watching, Grimfalk changed over to watching Charlemagne’s feed. He and Longclaw watched in horror and fascination as the young rooster plunged headfirst into a pit filled with venomous snakes, instantly being mobbed to the point that he was hardly visible.
“Is that light what I think it is?” Longclaw asked as a blue glow began emanating from within the cluster of adders.
Grimfalk leaned forward and frowned.
“That’s gotta be his Mana Core,” the deity agreed. “But it’s way stronger than I would have expected. I think that rooster may be some sort of savant when it comes to mana manipulation.”
“It’s that hard?”
“Look at it this way,” Grimfalk answered as the blue light continued to build in intensity. “How many eons has it been since you learned how to utilize divinity?”
“Hey, never ask a woman her age!” Longclaw laughed. “But I see your point. Charlemagne has been using mana for only a few weeks now. And as far as I can tell, he hasn’t used any sort of training exercises, guides, or even queried the System about how to use his Mana Core. He just tries things, and they always seem to work out.”
“Yeah, he reminds me a lot of someone I know,” Grimfalk said with a grin and nod, noting with pleasure the snake pieces flying everywhere.
“I think your memory has gone bad after all these millions of years. You were always the one who had to work the hardest out of all of us to get ahead. That’s how you eventually stood at the top of the food chain: sheer determination. I have always admired that about you, you know.”
“I thought it was for my rugged good looks and amazing talents,” Grimfalk joked. “But thank you. I’ve always admired not just your mind but the way you use it. You could have done so many different things with all your intelligence, but you chose to put your kin first. That’s why we make a great…woah!”
On the screen, Charlemagne collapsed for a moment before dragging himself toward a small piece of snake flesh as if he were a man dying of thirst trying to reach a nearby stream. He then weakly chewed at the tough snake meat, swallowed some of it, and then promptly passed out.
“What just happened?” Grimfalk demanded.
“It’s probably the venom. Snakes have hollow teeth and they use them to inject a whole bunch of nasty things into the bodies of their opponents.”
“I know about venom!” the deity shouted, his confusion making him louder and angrier than he had planned to be. “I figured by this point he would have gained a resistance skill to it. I would have!”
“Resistance skills are actually very rare, especially for attacks that don’t cause physical damage. Charlemagne’s Ironskin is probably the most common defensive skill out there. I can probably pull the stats if you want.”
Stolen story; please report.
Grimfalk just grunted and leaned back, waiting to see what would happen next. Longclaw went back to tapping on her phone as her companion started to channel surf, flipping between the feeds of other Champions at a rapid pace. The pair sat in comfortable silence until Grimfalk managed to cycle through all the feeds that were public and return to Charlemagne’s. The rooster had fully recovered and was out hunting more of the adders, catching and eating any that he found.
Soon after, a telephone icon appeared on the screen, signaling that someone was calling them. Grimfalk quickly answered the call, and the green, scaly snout of Liang Xing, deity of pangolins, immediately took up most of the screen.
“Liang Xing, it’s been a while. To what do I owe this honor?” the theropod deity asked as he greeted his caller.
“Oh, this and that,” the pangolin responded, eyes darting around the room rapidly. “Ah, Grimfalk, I see that Longclaw is with you. Good, good. Always a pleasure to see you…both of you, of course.”
“This and that, huh?” the theropod deity noted with a grunt. “We’ve barely spoken in …what…three hundred years. And you just happen to call a few days after our Champions got into a scuffle?”
“I apologize, Grimfalk. I never meant for the argument to get so out of hand,” Liang Xing said with a slight bow. “But, the rules are clear. If you build a settlement in the middle of another player’s road, it no longer counts as continuous for the ‘longest road’ card.”
“And I told you it was a stupid rule!” Grimfalk roared as he leapt to his feet. “And I told you that I refuse to follow it.”
“Yes, and we should have had a discussion at the start of the game. That was my fault,” Longclaw cut in as Grimfalk postured angrily in front of the screen. “But at any rate, that was three hundred years ago. Let’s talk about today instead of the past, okay?”
“Yes, this is great wisdom,” cried the pangolin. “I called today with an offer I believe you will be eager to take.”
Grimfalk’s tail slowly stopped whipping about behind him as he regained his composure. He took a deep breath and then backed up to the sofa before flopping down, grabbing a Stoat Water out of a nearby cup holder and gulping it down.
“So what’s the offer?” he ground out. “I'm going to be really upset if it’s not a good deal.”
Liang Xing gulped.
“Well, you know how your Champion and mine are in the same area?”
“I didn’t realize that you had a Champion anywhere near Afghanistan,” Longclaw noted with a slight frown.
“No, no. I don’t have a Champion anywhere near there. Well, I do in China, but none of them are close to the border.”
“So, which of my many Champions are we talking about, then,” Grimfalk asked.
“The one in West Africa, of course,” the pangolin answered, seemingly confused by the question.
“Oh, so it’s Charlemagne you want to talk about, huh? Well, he’s pretty special, so you’ll need to pay me a whole lot if you want to hunt him without me coming after your own Champions.”
The panic on Liang Xing’s face was impossible to miss.
“You…you misunderstand me! I am not wishing for our Champions to meet in combat. Quite the opposite, in fact!”
“So, then what do you want?” Grimfalk asked. Longclaw glanced over at the theropod deity, wondering if he was playing with the pangolin deity.
“Well, if it wouldn’t be too much trouble, I would like very much for your rooster, Charlemagne, to stop hunting my Champion. They actually crossed paths not too long ago, but my Champion retreated before any serious harm was done to either side. Perhaps you were watching the match?”
“Oh yes, that’s right,” Grimfalk lied. “Charlemagne was going to eat your Champion, just like he’s eaten a few others already. He’s really on a rampage, isn’t he?”
The pangolin deity turned even greener as Grimfalk proudly announced his Champion’s deeds.
“Well, yes, but that’s an outcome I am wishing I could avoid. You see, my first Champion in the area was killed when the humans rained fire and destruction across the Earth. This one was given to me as a replacement, and…”
“Oh, so this one is special to you, huh?” the theropod deity responded with a glint in his eye. “I think that’s going to cost you extra.”
Liang Xing sighed.
“If that is what it will take, I feel I am honor bound to pay it. But I believe that you’ll find my terms are already generous. I will pay you one thousand DKP if you tell your Champion to leave mine alone. That’s all I am asking for. Just to ignore my small, humble Champion and carry on with his business. What do you say?”
Grimfalk made a show of considering the deal, but in reality his mind was already made up. One thousand DKP just to tell Charlemagne to knock it off and go eat something else? Only a sucker would turn down that deal.
“All right,” he said after a long hesitation. “I guess that would be acceptable. Let’s hammer out the exact terms of the deal…”
Charlemagne dropped what he was doing, which happened to be a half-eaten Assassinadder, and shot off like an arrow. He had forgotten what he was in the forest to do, but as soon as he got a whiff of the elusive scent, he remembered the promise he had made to himself. He was going to hurt the pangolin until it told him where the animal city was. And then he was going to eat it.
Sprinting through the forest was a great way to get attacked by snakes, however. In less than a minute, Charlemagne had been bitten three times by adders. Thankfully, due to his recent tempering, the bites hardly bothered him, although the puncture wounds bled more freely than expected, given the anticoagulant properties of the Assassinadders' venom. But that didn’t worry the rooster, because his goal was just ahead.
At that moment, the squiggles arrived, interrupting his plans for vengeance.
Charlemagne skidded to a stop, as all his attention was devoted to the text in front of him. It must be his Patron, Grimfalk, who was sending him a message. His heart leaping with joy, the devolved rooster asked the squiggles to play the message.
This time, however, instead of a vision of his Patron, the squiggles reconfigured themselves to display a command.
