The cracks on the wall grew larger with each muffled blast from the other side.

  Balthazar raised an eyestalk up in the air to peek at them before lowering his focus back to the group circle.

  He hadn’t used it in a while, but if there was a time to use his Leader’s Voice skill, it would certainly be with his current dysfunctional party of dungeon explorers.

  [Leader’s Voice]

  [For 5 minutes, you and up to six of your allies receive +3 to all attributes, and all actions performed as a team receive a large bonus to success.]

  “Alright, listen up,” Balthazar said to the others. “Those ogres are about to burst through that wall with the intention of getting their dirty mittens on us. Last time we got away by the chitin of our pincers, thanks to Dru—” He paused and glanced at his goblin and assistant and the kobold next to him. “Thanks to the hero’s magic. But this time we won’t have that move to pull. So we’re going to be smart. We’re going to be tactical. We’re going to act like a clever team.”

  With a slightly strained expression on her face, Thunk pushed the unicorn helmet up with one of her thick sausage fingers in order to scratch the side of her head.

  “Confusing. Head hurt,” the brute groaned.

  The crab sighed. “Weeee… neeeed… to fiiiight… smart.”

  The barbarian stared slack-jawed at the crustacean for a few seconds before finally letting out a grunt.

  “Huh?”

  Inhaling deeply, Balthazar brought his pincers up next to his eyestalks and stared at the adventurer.

  “Thunk smash head good so ogre not get up no more. No smash legs or arms. Smash head. Got it?”

  “Oooooh!” she howled before grinning and giving a thumbs up. “Me can do that.”

  “Made me really pull on my speech skills there,” the crab muttered under his breath before rolling his eyes to Hannabeth. “As for you…”

  The knight perked up and spoke in her canned voice.

  “Aye, good merchant, my shield and I stand ready to—”

  “No,” Balthazar quickly interjected. “No, you do not.”

  Hannabeth’s shoulders deflated slightly, and her voice lowered in tone. “Pardon me?”

  “You’re not ready for a light scuffle, let alone a proper fight,” the merchant said. “For starters, remove thy helmet, silly knight.”

  “My helm? I cannot remove my helm, friend! It is an essential part of a knight’s armor, and—”

  “We don’t have time for this, just take it off!” the crab yelled.

  “Alright, alright, geez!” she said, dropping the knightly tone.

  With visible effort, the knight-paladin pried the bucket helm from her head. Like the barbarian, long platinum blonde hair fell over her shoulders. But unlike the other adventurer, Hannabeth’s hair looked luscious and shiny, falling in a perfectly straight curtain that went down to her waist level.

  As she shook her head slowly, causing the hair to produce almost hypnotic waves, Balthazar heard a faint “wow” escape the farmer boy’s lips behind him.

  Thunk glowered at Joshua and then at the knight, her mouth turned down into a hard line as she cocked an eyebrow.

  “Woah, this cave is not as dark as I thought!” Hannabeth said, looking around before her bright blue eyes landed on the barbarian’s equally ice-colored stare. “And you’re even bigger than I thought!”

  As the knight’s gaze reached Khargol, her eyes slowly started squinting while a frown began to form on her brow.

  “You’re… You’re an orc!” she exclaimed, her hand patting around her waist for a weapon she did not have.

  “And you are a very unobservant human,” the chieftain said in a low and unbothered tone, his arms remaining crossed.

  “By the gods! I must slay thee at once—”

  “Nope!” the crab yelled, stepping between the knight and the orc with his pincers held out. “No slaying my friends, please!”

  Khargol’s left brow raised ever so slightly at the crab’s words.

  “But he’s an orc! I am bound by honor to slay foul beas—”

  “And I’m a wild crab who lives by a pond. Blurp-blurp, pinch-pinch! Are you going to slay me too for some experience, are you?”

  Unauthorized tale usage: if you spot this story on Amazon, report the violation.

  Hannabeth stared at the crustacean, visibly struggling with her confusion.

  “But… You’re a merchant! A wild crab, granted, but also a merchant. I cannot slay an upstanding merchant!”

  “And Khargol is the proud leader of a tribe of hard-working orcs who craft, hunt, and trade just like any human community would. He’s a sharp tactician, a brave warrior, and a loyal ally. Remember when we first met, and you went on a quest to find the petals of that flower to brew a cure for my assistant? Well, guess what! It was Khargol who had brought his tribe’s shaman to us so she could figure out the cure we needed. If it wasn’t for him, my friend might not have survived. Does that sound like a fiend to you? Honestly, if you started trying to slay him right now, I think any reasonable person would rightfully see you as the dangerous, evil fiend.”

  The adventurer paused, an inner conflict clearly brewing inside her.

  “But I…”

  “In fact, I’d even say you’d be acting like a true villain,” Balthazar added.

  Hannabeth’s gaze jumped up to look at the merchant and her bright blue eyes widened.

  [The Gift of the Crab: Success]

  “Nay! I would never!” the knight-paladin said, voice lofty and loud again. “I am a noble knight who fighteth for that which is right and good in this world! I could ne’er raise my hand against one who is noble of heart as well. If thou dost vouch for this gentleman’s honor, I shall trust thy word and regard him as an ally too, good merchant!”

  Balthazar turned to the chieftain.

  “Yeah! What she said!”

  Khargol raised an eyebrow before exhaling sharply.

  “Can we get back to the fight that is about to take place here?” he said.

  “Oh, right, that!” exclaimed the crab. “So, my guys and I will assist from the back while—”

  The cracks in the walls burst open, and a gaping hole appeared, with zombie ogres pouring out, clubs dragging along as they groaned hungrily.

  “Ah, crabapples! So much for careful planning! Hannabeth, you have no weapon, so you will shield Khargol while he slashes away at them. Do not let him get hit, got it?”

  The knight placed a closed fist against her chest. “You have my word that—”

  “Yeah, yeah, good enough!” Balthazar interrupted before turning to the other adventurer. “And Thunk…”

  The barbarian’s head snapped to look down at the crab, eyes narrowed under her unicorn helmet.

  “…Smash!” the crustacean said with a snap of his pincer.

  Thunk grinned and broke into a sprint toward the breach.

  The ogre at the front of the incoming horde raised its club to strike down the adventurer, but the charging barbarian was faster. Like a lumberjack chopping wood, she raised her warhammer overhead and, with a powerful swing, brought it down, crashing right through the crude club and smashing it to smithereens. Her attack continued with so much force that both of her feet came off the ground as she connected with the beast’s head, pushing its neck into its ribcage.

  “Yeah, go Thunk!” Joshua yelled, pumping his fist in the air from behind Balthazar.

  After lifting her sledgehammer from the now very compressed and very much dead dead ogre, the muscular woman continued on to her next target, dishing out blow after blow with almost childlike glee.

  The thralls continued pouring in through the hole in the wall, and despite her energetic head bashing, they were starting to surround the barbarian in a circle.

  “I got your back!” Khargol exclaimed as he cut a smaller ogre’s knee clean off with his battleaxe, causing it to fall as it was about to club the back of the adventurer’s head.

  Thunk turned and repaid the thrall with a hammer blow to the face before looking back up at the chieftain and giving him a quick nod of appreciation.

  “And I got your back!” Hannabeth yelled, coming out of nowhere to block an ogre’s club with her shield as it was about to hit Khargol’s spine.

  As she parried the attack away, the gems around the ward became slightly brighter, making the knight’s eyes shine too.

  “They glow for real now!”

  “Druma, hop on Blue’s back and use your vantage point to call out openings where she can spray some fire on the ogres from a distance. Target the eyes, but do not get close enough to become a target. And do not use Firestorm! You’d burn up all the air in a small cave like this, and we’d suffocate.”

  The goblin gave one firm nod and did as he was told.

  Standing on a rock, Blue scanned the battle scene along with her rider, and whenever Druma pointed and yelled, she would shoot a jet of fire at the face of a thrall about to strike one of their allies at the front, causing them to stumble back and miss.

  All seemed to be going well, despite how many ogres continued to come into the cave from the breach, but then they saw it again—the purple mist oozing out of the wall.

  The tall and slender figure of the lich lord emerged between the mindless thralls and stood at the breach, watching.

  All the way from the other side of the chamber, Balthazar stared at his partially obscured face. It was gaunt, almost skeletal, his head hairless under the veil draped over his skull, and where the eyes should be were just two black sockets.

  Not empty, however.

  They were tiny and faint, but the crab could see a pair of glowing purple orbs within. But they were not looking at him.

  They were staring at the goblin wizard who had thwarted the lich’s previous assault with his arcane blast.

  “Druma, watch out!”

  The lich lord raised his skeletal hand and pointed a bony finger at the goblin wizard, his maw opening to whisper an inaudible command.

  From a dark mist at the edge of where their lights reached, a much smaller ogre appeared behind Druma and Blue, club raised, milky white eyes fixed on the goblin.

  [Undead Ogre Thrall - Level 38]

  It was like watching a carriage crash in slow motion while being unable to stop it. Balthazar knew he could do little more than yell a warning as he was too far away. He knew that a single strike from the level 38 zombie would be deadly against Druma’s meager level 3.

  The goblin and the drake turned their widening gazes up to the weapon coming down toward Druma.

  Balthazar wanted to close his eyes, but he couldn’t—both because he was unable to look away, and also because crabs have no eyelids.

  For a split second, the merchant cursed himself for bringing his friends to such a dangerous place when he knew their levels were so low.

  And then he saw something else.

  A tiny orange blur jumping out of nowhere between the ogre and the goblin.

  “The Hero, I will save!” Kole yelled valiantly as he threw himself in the way of the thrall’s strike.