Gardevoiran

The Narrow Path

"Hmph," the elf remarks before closing his tomes, still keeping his sword drawn. "You were on the right track, mate, but you were off by just a hair or two... thousand."

"What do you truly mean by powerful warriors, mate? A paladin with a temper? A skeleton too dumb to realize he can't drink? Oh! That goblin who hasn't been helpful? Sure, you have the girl and the werebear, but they're a pairing anyhow, so once one of them is gone... well... sucks for them, I guess."

"I wasn't meant t'kill ya', oh no. Yashar himself wanted that luxury. Unfortunately for him, my pay rates go higher n' higher as I'm hired, so keepin' ya' alive is in my best interest... for now." The elf takes a pause before continuing, as if he's stalling.

"I'm just stallin' fer' time, now. Yashar gave me enough men to surround the forest and then some. Yer' friends are bein' capped as we speak. I suggest gettin' to them." The elf pauses again as he turns around, his sword sheathed.

"The name's Westley Stride, mate. Next time, this won't be so great for ya'."

And with that, Stride walks off towards the burning house you fled from.

The Narrow Path

Gobbo sprinted off towards Brock as you are left facing this elf. Both of his tomes are open, and you actually recognize one of them as the same tome Death had. It let him summon ethereal scythes, but you didn't know if they did anything special.

"Alright, y'shit. You get one chance from me to tell me why I shouldn't end you here."

You were at his mercy. Both of those tomes he had seemed especially deadly, but you could still fight him if you wanted. It might not spell out the greatest. There was also the way you could talk to him for a bit, see if he'd let you go.

"Go on. I'm listenin'," the elf said as his neck bled slightly from the stitches and scars around his entire neck. He looked like someone attached his head back onto his body. Maybe it's a weak point?

The Narrow Path

You notice everyone else is a decent amount ahead of you when all of a sudden you hear a smarmy voice in your ear. One that wasn't friendly, not at all.

"Oi. Where d'you think 'yer goin'?"

You feel your feet halt in place as you turn to see Yashar's student, his hand raised and his eyes visible. His crimson-colored eyes. He was a half elf, not much larger than you, but his robes told you all of what he was. In his free hand held a blood-red sword, gleaming in the rising sun as if it was freshly tinted.

"You got a commitment you gotta fill."

The Narrow Path

"Oh, we're not staying here either. If Yashar hunts you down, we're probably next up for helping you," Maggy said as she climbed up onto Aithwale's back, a bag being pulled over onto her own back. "Plus, we know that guy. He'd sooner kill me than you."

Brock opens the back door as the stump rushes out, three thick vines wrapping around Jen's body as it runs towards Charlie, falling down and apart as it approaches. "Charlie, pick the girl up. We gotta go!" A large vine flops out of Charlie as it grabs hold of Jen, placing her on it's own back and securing her tightly down. "Mountains are that way. We gotta go through the Savannah to get to them. Let's move people!" Brock said as he pointed towards the peaks of the mountains, just barely visible over the trees.

You can hear the front door get kicked as everyone piles out. Probably time to leave.

The Narrow Path

"Tobias, we need to handle this situation first." Maggy chimed in this time, running over to you and grabbing you by the shoulder. "Your friend is not okay. Those guys are here to kill you, her, and Brock. You guys need to cut your losses and get the hell out of here!"

Upon closer inspection, you can see she is right. The man leading the series of orcs and hirelings is dressed in the same garb Yashar's student had before his "death". His bushy hair and stitched neck revealed that this guy might actually be that student. If he was brought back from the dead, who knows what he's capable of, especially with the three staves on his back and two tomes floating around him in the air.

"We can't afford to let them get this book, Toby. We need to go," Brock said as he pulled his plant tome out, a stump rising out of nowhere and picking up Jen off the ground.

The Narrow Path

"You'll need a fuckin' army to take Yashar on. He's sent literally fifty different guys to come and get my tome, and I've killed them each time," Brock said as he glanced over at Jen's body. "You also gotta think about her. If you two really came from the same world, you two should be like peas in a pod. If you go against Yashar and die... well... she'd be ruined. Not to mention I think Yashar could steamroll her in a heartbeat if he had the balls to pursue this tome as much as he-"

You hear the sudden arrival of horses into the town as Brock is interrupted. Something isn't good.

The Narrow Path

"One specific forge will near those mountains, and in any case, it'd be a lot harder to fish a book out of a sea of magma, right?" Brock says as he pulls another bottle of alcohol out of his shirt. "Plus, you were the one to pick it up in the first place. It'll be you and me until the book is destroyed, pal. That is, unless you want Yashar to gut you like a pig for leaving the book in the hands of it's owner."

The Narrow Path

"Well, she wrecked the floor in this spot, but I know a guy who can fix that cheap," Maggy said as Aithwale lifted Jen up with his bear-strength and sat her upright, mainly so the blood wouldn't find a way to drown her while she was coming back to her thoughts.

Jen was awake for the moment, wiping the blood off her lip as she stared at Brock. "H... how?! Not even Deprave was able to get through that attack unscathed!" Ah, yes, that was a fight indeed. Jen coughed a small bit of blood up as Brock responded. "It's why we're going to a dwarven forge to throw it in magma, you crazy-ass paladin."

Maggy casts a small healing spell onto Jen as the paladin's palms slowly start to heal up. It was clear she was mad at both you and Brock for supporting the action of carrying that book. Well, it was, until she fell backwards into an unconscious state from a combination of overexertion and it being the dead of night.

Gobbo ran out from behind the table as he tried to cast a spell of his own onto Jen. It enveloped her in a green light, but it didn't really do anything. Still, it was better than something.

The Narrow Path

"SILENCE." Jen's body was replaced with a form of ethereal aura, similar to The Light itself, as her voice boomed through the room. It was enough to scare even Aithwale, a literal bear!

Jen dropped the book onto the floor and aimed her hands at it, a holy energy shining through her palms as the book was emblazoned in white-hot holiness. You could feel the heat against your skin as Brock covered his eyes, Jen's form blinding the both of you extremely so. If Jen was trying to demonstrate her power, it was clear that she was packing extreme heat.

A few seconds pass before Jen returns to her normal appearance, her gloves burnt off from the heat and her palms smoldering with ash. She was breathing heavily, but as the dust settled, she saw it in disbelief.

The book sat in a pile of soot, completely unharmed by the holiness used against it. "What... kind of..." Jen was cut off as she collapsed onto the ground, blood spurting out of her nose.

The only voice you could hear after the thud of Jen's body on the ground was Brock's, and only after a second or two. "That's why you leave it in my possession," he said as he scooped up the tome off the ground and put it inside of his shirt again.

The Narrow Path

"You can say that all you want, but if I'm down for the count... I hope you'll make the right choice," Brock says as he reaches for the tome again, but just as his hands clasp the tome down, Jen swipes it up and holds onto the book. "No you are not," Jen authoritatively says as she holds the book tightly in her hands, refusing to let go.

"Whoa there paladin. Not even someone of your rank is safe holding it."

"I will take my chances with possessing this tome."

Maggy looks at you with an expression of uncertainty, like she didn't know what was going to happen. She didn't want her shop ruined from the fight.

The book was something Brock wanted to destroy, but at the same time, was the book truly safer in the hands of it's creator if it had the power to rule the world?