The dragon-chicken alighted.
Ramses salivated incessantly, which was far from good, for in his excitement his mouth spiraled at such a great pace that all that could be seen of it was a white blur along with strings of saliva, like the water of a sprinkler being ejected everywhere.
I covered my face immediately. But of course, a sudden, unbidden gale came and decided to have some fun. It pushed all of Ramses spit backward toward us. I felt and heard it splashing against the back of my hands. It was colder than winter and viscous and seemingly endless.
Soon, I was drenched. I considered barreling the hell out of there, lest I ended up trapped and frozen in Ramses' goo. Of all the deaths I could think of, that one didn't please me in the slightest.
However, before I could make up my mind, the freezing, disgusting liquid stopped coming, and the voice of Ramses echoed through the vast field.
It was a horrible, absolutely off-key scream filled with desire, like hearing a kid who doesn't know how to play a guitar, playing an old, detuned guitar filled with rust he’d found in the basement of a haunted house. "Bring it on, baby!"
I lowered my guard and found my arms enveloped in Ramses' translucid, thick substance, and my shirt and pants drenched with it. I fought back the burning disgust growing in my stomach, and attempted to shake the spit away. However, it refused to leave, as if it had decided my arms would be their house for all eternities to come.
I changed my strategy. I threw my arms downward, letting gravity do its work. The saliva, however, fell at the same pace a slow snail leaves a trail: too fucking slow.
Pushing it away with my hands and arms wasn't an option. Both were covered in goo, and when I attempted to do such a thing, it slipped and threatened to merge.
The cold bit my upper extremities. It didn’t burn as ice does, but I could bet my life it soon would.
Midst my desperation, I could swear I heard the wind laughing while it swirled away.
I peered at Vormin, hoping he could help me, but what I saw made me go taut as stone. He stood a couple steps away from me. The saliva hadn't hit him as thoroughly as it'd hit me. But it'd stained his pristine, perfectly braided, ginger beard.
It looked as if he had run into an enormous, slimy cobweb and smeared his beard all over it with the same intensity and lack of rationality as a penniless drunkard bolting the shit out of the tavern after seeing his tab.
His eyes were fixed on the empty space in front of him, and they held the same vicious hatred of a man witnessing a demented old man peeing naked in his front door, while his wife stared in sheer horror unsure of what to do. And if that wasn’t enough, his fists were clenched, waiting for the incipient rancor growing in his heart to explode.
And boy it did. It did in such a subtle way that it was a piece of art of unparalleled beauty, a masterpiece that would drive even the most renowned artists to compete in a deathmatch against each other only to be able to claim the right to capture the moment.
His wrath exploded in the shape and brevity of a peaceful breath. His eyes turned to Ramses--who was attempting to gain the dragon-chicken's trust pretending to be one of the family by making clucking noises and swinging his four arms as if they were wings. Somehow, it was working.
The dwarf darted toward Ramses, or should I say scuttled toward Ramses, as despite the rage propelling him forward, his steps were short due to his tiny legs. It was like watching an angry child--disguised as Death--ran to massacre his neighbor for not giving him sweets in Halloween, with the exception that Vormin was now holding an axe twice his size instead of a plastic scythe.
I didn’t have the slightest clue as to where he'd gotten it.
Partially crippled with Ramses' goo, I couldn't do other thing but watch. I would be useless without my arms against a dragon-chicken. In all honesty, even with my arms, I would've been useless.
It was then when I remembered that I still had my voice. "Ramses! Watch out!" I yelled, and he turned. Unfortunately, it was too late.
Vormin sprung toward him, throwing Ramses to the ground, raised his axe aloft and swung it downward, aiming for the demon’s head. Ramses let out a chuckle, and when the edge met his face, he turned himself into flames and scampered away, burning Vormin's entire beard in the process, along with the goo.
Vormin remained on the ground, crying as he caressed something that was not there anymore. His wails told such ineffable tragedies no poet nor writer could ever describe. It was the grief of a man who had been stripped away from all he ever loved for a moment of irrational rage.
Ramses, on the other hand, didn't give a fuck. He came out of the whirlwind of flames besides me and placed his four hands over the goo on my arms. There was a sizzling sound, and tons of steam, but the substance melted, and I was free again.
"Is that or eating it," Ramses said, his grin spinning. "It's a delicacy, not as much as chicken soup, but tasty nevertheless."
The dragon-chicken let out a shrilling bray that gave me gooseflesh. It sounded exactly like a donkey watching a morbidly obese man dressed in an expensive suit walking in its direction with the clear intention of sitting on its back. Then, the dragon-chicken stooped its head and breathed inward, sucking the souls by the hundreds.
"Perfect!" Ramses exclaimed, throwing his hands in the air. Then, he turned to me. I avoided eye contact. "I will need your help. The plan is the following, I distract the skeletal beast, you steal the axe from Vormin and cut a bone of the dragon-chicken. It can be any of them, they are big enough for twenty chicken soups. Then, once you've done that, you scream at me, and we get the fuck out of here."
I grabbed Ramses' arm before he could go, wincing as my fingers burned. I had a question blazing my mind since the moment I'd first seen the dragon-chicken made of bones. "How do you make a chicken soup out of a chicken that doesn’t have any meat?"
Ramses grinned. "I won't spoil the surprise… but are you sure it doesn’t have meat?" He darted in front of the dragon-chicken and it was then when he realized he didn't have to do anything, for the chicken was already distracted devouring souls.
I ignored the violent thumping of my heart, and barreled toward Vormin. I shed a silent tear when I saw him and his well of grief.
But this wasn’t the time for feelings. And so, I snatched the axe out of his hands, and he didn’t even try to fight me for it. Instead he kept caressing the space his beard once occupied.
The axe was light as a feather despite its size, which was a pleasant surprise. Perhaps, completing my part of the plan wouldn’t be that hard after all.
I barreled toward the dragon-chicken. For a moment, the fear didn't exist, my legs moved as if they had a live of their own, my eyes teemed with insanity.
I was going to quarter that dragon-chicken.
It stood immobile, sucking the souls. I swung sideways at his leg. It was hard as iron. The axe was weak as an armless man. The recoil threw me to the ground. The adrenaline ran off. Fear smothered me. The dragon-chicken kept eating. Food-loving motherfucker.
I peered at Ramses, my eyes wild at the edges. He was reading a book and whistling. He eyed me. I saw the beginning of my worst nightmare. He kept reading. I got to my feet. A stroke of brilliancy struck me.
"Ramses!" I yelled as the dragon-chicken kept sucking souls. "Can't you just do a por--" I remembered Ravren. Where was he? I scanned the place, yet he was nowhere to be seen. Had he escaped when Ramses' saliva attacked?
"What?" Ramses asked, his voice shaky. He lifted his book ever so slightly that I could see the title, it read: In-depth Descriptions of the Moaning Beings Make When They Taste a Perfect Chicken Soup. Was he aroused? He couldn’t be. What sort of erotica was that?
"Can't you just do a portal over one of the spaces between this creatures bones?"
He grumbled and mocked me. "Kint yi jist di a pirtal ivr, bla bla bla." He came beside me and the dragon-chicken. He walked awkwardly, with long strides, as if hiding something under his robe. "That's the easy way, what's the fun?"
"Not dying?"
He sighed. "You are fortunate something came up. Otherwise, I wouldn't have made it so easy for you." He made the Opening Faucet technique and a portal appeared next to us and through the middle of a bone of the dragon-chicken. "Jump. We are going to pay Mother Knitter a visit.
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