u/hawkwood4268

Background: In the future where humanity has solved all questions of survival and war is a bygone embarrassment, how do people spend their time? Playing games of course. These games aren't played on digital screens or jacked into a virtual sphere from visors placed on your head. They're built in real space with real swords, dragons, evil wizards, underground castles, and so on. But what fun would a game be where you could only be you? Technology now allows for magical wands and scrolls and spells, enhanced strength, magical flight, and polymorphing into gigantic monsters. And you can be what you want to be. Orc, gnome, elf, even a halfling (just be careful with magical rings).

Enjoy and feel free to give feedback.

KOBOLDS RUN IN PACKS

The party crept down the dark corridor with torches in hand. Two sets of pointed ears and one round straining for sounds of foot steps or skittering things that might be moving just out of sight. The orange and yellow glow flickered and shone on the moist stone bricks that made up the floors and walls. The stone was rough from years of water erosion which made them less slippery in the cave-like moisture that coated everything. The smell of it was like an ancient concrete bunker Ruka had once visited with her dad back on Earth that dated back to the Old World.

Kamo walked in the middle with his longbow in both hands while Ruka lead the front with a torch in one hand and her bastard sword in the other. The light reflected off the many rectangular metal plates of her splint mail.

Wulfy and served as the rear-guard of their small troop. He wielded a longsword in a gauntleted hand, and a silversteel shield in the other. It gave off a pale moonlight glow.

Being a knight in full plate, he didn't exactly make the stealthiest of the three of them. His plate would clank or his steel boots would crunch and clatter against the stone floor making Kamo wince.

Kamo wore his soft leather boots that muffled his footsteps and had always walked softly, perhaps owing to his desire not to be noticed by other people.

This excursion into the dungeon had so far proved uneventful. They had discovered a small chest and some crates which held some supplies, extra torches, some flint and steel, a pristine food ration, and an iron helm. The helmet probably wasn't enchanted, Ruka had said, but she stashed it in her large pack anyways. She carried the largest pack of the three of them to store the most loot. She was also the strongest of the three, her gray skin rippling with muscles from wielding the heavy bastard sword.

Ruka held back the hand with the torch and the two boys halted behind her. The corridor was long and the ceiling low, they had finally reached another door way. The door was broken off its hinges and lay sprawled on the dungeon floor in the next room. The whining jibber-jabber voices of kobolds came from the room beyond them.

"Why do you get the ring? I was the one who fished it out of there." Said a whining voice.

"Because I'm the leader, that's why," said a second more bravado.

"Yeah, JuJu, he's the leader," simpered a third breathy voice.

"Remind me again, who made you the leader? Weren't the chief or she'd have told us."

"Chief's too important for a lesser management decision like that," said the deeper voice.

"Yeah, JuJu, too important," the third one said ingratiatingly.

Ruka and Wulfy carefully extinguished their torches wrapping them in their thick cloaks so as to not make any noise. The party crouched closer together as Ruka very cautiously poked her head low through the door frame.

She saw the source of the flickering light in the room, a small fire had been lit and two plump newts were skewered over it roasting with a pleasant aroma. Three scaly blue kobolds sat round the fire. One tended to the newts, slowly rotating the spit on which they were skewered.

The room opened into a tall conical ceiling that went up and up with a winding stair that was broken halfway up. The smoke from the fire drifted upwards to an unseen draft and filtered out of the room.

There must have been ventilation holes for air to flow in from the surface to keep it from growing stale and hard to breathe. Kamo noticed there was natural light too that seemed to come down all the way from the surface, and vines grew from rectangular holes carved into the stones possibly ventilation shafts. They trailed down the stone brick walls and clung in great clumps and shone with moisture in the light.

"But if the chief didn't make you the leader, then why do you get to decide who gets the loot?" said the kobold who's name must be JuJu who was sitting on the left of the kobold tending the fire.

"I'm the boss," said the one on the right of the fire.

"Yeah, he's the boss," again said the kobold in the center, tending the newts.

"We voted for it," said the boss.

"I don't remember no vote," whined the kobold on the left who's back was facing toward the three heads poking into the room from about 15 meters away.

"Yeah, I don't remember no vote," said the middle one, seeming oblivious that they were now agreeing with JuJu.

"We'll do it proper democratically. I vote myself to be the boss," said the boss kobold. "Now you vote."

"Well I vote for myself," said JuJu immediately.

"Yeah, I vote for myself," said the chef kobold who didn't even seem to be paying attention but was now delicately sprinkling a spice onto the newts while it rotated.

"Seeing as how I'm the boss, my vote should count for two." Said the boss.

"That's not very diplocratic," complained JuJu.

"I can't listen to this anymore," groaned Ruka. With a battle cry she leapt into the room. The kobolds toppled over each other and the spit with the newts went knocked flying into the air and sailed straight up. The chef kobold frantically tried to catch it, and successfully kept it from hitting the ground but immediately shrieked and dropped it and began sucking on their clawed scaly fingers.

"My roast!" the kobold moaned, its voice muffled by its fingers.

"What'd you do that for?" The voice belonging to the chief crossing his arms across a a leather vest.

Ruka halted mid charge, sword frozen above her head. None of the kobolds seemed to be holding any weapons.

The cook kobold carefully wrapped the spit in a bit of thick cloth and was just about to reinsert it over the fire when Kamo and Wulfy charged in behind Ruka. Kamo let loose two arrows, one after the other. The first whizzed passed JuJu's long head and struck the wall. It clattered to the floor. The second arrow embedded itself in one of the plump newts.

The cook kobold yelled in fright again and the newts plunged into the embers of the fire. Kamo and Wulfy stopped behind Ruka who was staring at the kobolds.

"Now it's charred," said the husky voiced cook.

"I like a bit of char," said the boss kobold."

"You like it burnt, you do," said the cook. Ruka stamped her steel-toed boot on the stone floor with a clang.

"Oi! For foo's sake! We're adventurers, we're going to slay you and take your loot." Ruka said defiantly.

"Adventurers always yelling and slaying and looting," said JuJu.

"You looted that ring off an adventurer didn't you?" said the cook, trying for a third time to right the skewer without touching the hot rod.

"No, no that was just an old skeleton. Could've wanted me to have it."

"And now it's mine," said the boss who was holding up a silver ring between two claws and admiring the bright emerald glow sparkling in the low light cascading down from above.

"That's still up for debate," countered JuJu. Kamo and Wulfy looked on with as much surprise as Ruka did. Usually monsters started attacking immediately.

"Aren't you going to pick up your spears and fight us?" Ruka asked.

"My code says I can't fight an unarmed foe," whispered Wulfy behind her.

"That's your code," said Ruka, lifting her sword once more.

"It's a good code." countered Wulfy.

"We don't got no spears," said JuJu shrugging his shoulders.

"Yeah, lost 'em fishing in an acid pool, didn't we?" said the cook.

"Well, I didn't know it was an acid pool," mumbled the boss.

"You could've figured it out before you used JokJok's spear, and mine too," said Juju.

"There was a right plump fish in there."

"It was a skeleton, wif no meat on it."

"Got this nice ring though, didn't I?"

"I fished the ring with a bit of twine and a bone hook. You took it from me."

Ruka was flummoxed. She took a step forward and swung her large sword over the head of JuJu who ducked and scrabbled a step backwards colliding with some ceramic pots and shattering one or two of them.

"Give it to them!" hissed Juju in a panicked voice. "Maybe they'll leave us alone."

"No. It's my ring, I'm the boss."

"I'll slay whoever's ring it is and take it off their corpse," said Ruka. Wulfy looked unhappy about this and said something about "code" very quietly.

"It's your ring JuJu, you take it," said the boss tossing it to JuJu who caught it, fumbling for a moment. Ruka raised her sword at him.

"S'not my ring, it's JokJok's," he said and tossed it to the chef kobold who had finally realigned the spit on the fire and was brushing off ash with the same cloth. It plunked against JokJok's head and fell into the fire.

"We're taking all your loot! Drop it or we'll destroy you," said Ruka swinging the impressive sword over her head.

"Wh-wh-what about the newt skewers?" JokJok stammered.

"I said all your loot!" Ruka yelled again. JokJok looked crestfallen.

Wulfy whispered something the kobolds didn't hear and Ruka made an exasperated groan.

"You can take *one* of the newts. But drop everything else and begone!" she said fiercely. The kobolds hurriedly dropped their leather pouches and a hide helmet and everything went clattering to the floor. JokJok plucked a newt off the skewer and juggled it from hand to hand and they all went scattering from the circular room with whooping noises.

Once their voices had receded down the connected corridor, the party lowered their weapons. Ruka and Kamo made eye contact and burst out laughing.

"Are all kobolds that dumb?" said Kamo wiping a tear from his eyes.

"Pretty much," replied Ruka, bending over the pile of abandoned belongings and sorting through them.

"They're not dumb, just a bit simple," said Wulfy surprising the other two by defending them. "There's nothing wrong with simple living."

"They're thieves," said Ruka dismissively.

"Well, so are we," he responded a bit of indignation seeping into his voice. "Did you have to take their dinner?"

"Kobold newt kebab is really tasty," said Ruka defensively, picking up the kebab in a gauntleted hand and taking a big bite out of the plump newt. She held it out to Wulfy who turned his nose away.

"What, your code say you can't enjoy the spoils of battle?" Ruka asked rolling her eyes and rifling through a large leather pouch. It jingled with a fat coin purse which she tossed into her pack.

"As a matter of fact, it says that stealing from innocent unarmed-"

"If anything," Kamo said interrupting Wulfy and wrapping an arm around both of them. "We're all scavengers. Now let's check out the loot!"

"You wan' any of 'is?" Ruka said with her mouthful of the roast. "It's good."

Kamo looked dubiously at the skewer. It still had little eyes. He knew it was more or less the same as the synthmeat they had in Mars City, but he secretly decided he would stick to cram rations.

Ruka bent down and plucked the ring from the fire and bits of soot fell from her studded leather gloves. The emerald was small but it sparkled impressively even in the low light of the fire and what little sunlight filtered in from above them through cunning channels cut into the stone to allow it to pass deep beneath the surface for those that dwelled here long ago.

"We'll have to identify it before we try it on but-"

"Ooh can't I just try it on?" interjected Kamo. "It will match my cloak," which was a deep green and mottled gray.

"First of all, that's a bad idea because it could be cursed. Second of all, what makes you get the ring?" asked Ruka folding her arms across her metal-plated chest.

"Well, I did deal the only blow," said Kamo.

Ruka scoffed and held up the second newt skewer by the shaft of the arrow sticking from it.

"We could vote for it," suggested Wulfy. The others stared at him, not sure if he was joking.

"He who dealt it, welt it." Kamo replied shrugging his shoulders.

"That doesn't even make sense," said Ruka but tossed him the ring anyways. She turned back to the small pile left behind by the fleeing Kobolds which trailed partway out of the room in their haste to depart.

Wulfy watched Ruka with an expression of distaste as she upturned a pouch and dump its contents onto the stone floor.

"Whoever fells the foe, gets the dough," said Kamo.

"What does baking have to do with conduct for the spoils of battle?" Wulfy asked over the sound of Ruka shaking the bag rigorously. A can of mysterious contents dislodged and clattered as it bounced along the stone floor.

"Dough as in dosh, bling, booty. Not bread dough," Kamo replied. Wulfy shook his head as if even more confused.

Suddenly, a flash of light made them shield their eyes. Kamo yelped and everything around him started rising, growing upwards until the round walls towered impossibly tall above him and seemed ten times the distance away.

"Are you alright?" a voice boomed over him and he cowered as a giant loomed its great helmeted face over him, ice blue eyes wide in concern. It was Wulfy. He had grown huge. He was a giant in shining plate mail. If the room hadn't gotten gigantic as well, he would have had to double over to fit against the roof of the tower far above them.

Why was he asking if Kamo was alright? Kamo opened his mouth to ask if *Wulfy* was okay, and what the foo had happened to him. But all that came out of his mouth was a strange sort of croak.

He looked down and was horrified to see his enlarged clothing strewn about him. He was laying atop a gigantic cloth mountain and two pairs of towering leather boots and his bow where must have dropped it seemed a great distance away. Wulfy hadn't grown huge, Kamo had shrunk to a minute fraction of his original size. And that wasn't all.

*Croak* he gulped heavily and lowered his head to look down at his body. He was a pale orange color and his short limbs ended in tiny four-fingered hands with little bulbs on the end of them. And he was covered in some sort of slimy substance. And he had a *tail.*

He thought he might faint.

Thanks for reading! More parts to come in the future. How does Kamo the newt ranger get out of his predicament? Will the kobolds ever emotionally or fiscally recover?