Warning: Chapter contains action/violence.

By the time the adventurers reach the pack of orcs at the ancient ruins known as the Spire, the dwarf is nowhere to be seen.

"Are we too late? Is the dwarf dead?" Orianna's voice is low as her eyes scan her surroundings in search of a body, careful not to trigger the orcs' attention through their 'Passive Perception'.

"I guess so." Adam's mouth twists into a grimace. "I was hoping we'd at least get here in time for me to have a chance at resurrecting them. They must've died quick."

"Lame," Seamus says, "you'd have thought they would've put up more of a fight. It took us what, a few minutes to run here?"

"Yeah, well they were outnumbered like ten to one." Kohl gestures at the cluster of orcs; some are seated around a campfire, ripping off large shreds of roasted meat from the spit. Some food flakes come flying out their mouths when one seemingly tells a successful joke; the others clap him on the back and laugh loudly. Seamus frowns, wishing that he was closer and that he spoke the orc language so that he could've heard the humor.

There's a few others a couple dozen feet away, sloppily clubbing a deer to death. Though they're missing the target about half the time, the job seems to be getting done. One of the deer's legs still twitches.

"Not to mention orcs are one of the most brutal races in the game. Well, what do you guys want to do now? Orianna was gonna explore here for a sidequest, but the orcs will definitely attack on sight. Are we all still up for a fight?" Adam says, looking around at each of his friends for input. He glances back at the monsters, stiffening as they take notice of a fawn wandering a little too close. The baby deer lets out a loud cry, seemingly searching for its mother. One orc breaks away from the other three and stumbles towards it, club in hand.

What was once a clear, blue sky suddenly darkens, numerous rain clouds forming over the Spire within a sixty foot radius. Lightening strikes down hard on the orc heading for the baby deer, vaporizing him where he once stood. The frightened fawn scampers away to a hopefully safer spot.

The group members look around at each other in amazement and bewilderment, just in time to catch Sage closing her spellbook through her character menu screen. She shrugs. "I vote they still die."

One creature cries out something in Orc, a language that only Kohl can comprehend, and tries to move towards his dead companion's disappearing body. The others look up at the rainclouds in utter confusion until it finally dawns on them that they're under attack. Now wielding their weapons, the monsters start scanning the treeline for spellcasters. Every member of the party receives a notification that combat has been initiated, and the background music changes once again to something more dramatic and dynamic.

"Come out, coward!" The aforementioned orc shouts in Common, the language almost every creature can understand. He appears to sway as he stands up from where his friend once was, and makes a hiccup-type sound before he speaks again. "I kill you now!"

"Gruumsh! Gruumsh! Gruumsh!" The remaining orcs thrust their maces, clubs, and swords into the air, continuing their chant. Sometimes the word comes across clearly, but most of the time it's the sound-equivalent of a pile of mush. Even Kohl has to listen for a minute to figure out the orcs aren't shouting gibberish.

"What the hell are they saying?" Seamus says, his confusion mirrored in the faces of his friends.

"It's a battle chant, Gruumsh is the orcs' god. Super evil dude. Anyway, they seem down to fight, so I say we give the monster people what they want, am I right?" Kohl winks at Seamus as she releases an arrow from her bow, nailing an orc straight through an eye. Blackish blood and white goo bubbles out of the socket, but the monster stays standing until Orianna's 'Magic Missile' finishes it off. Adam gives the wizard a high five.

"Oh, you're totally right." Seamus makes a ranged attack of his own, throwing small knives into the chest of one of the creatures charging straight for them, having located the general area party from Kohl's launched arrow. The rest of the orcs still charge clumsily, not acknowledging their comrade's death. "That brings your lifetime total of rightness up to what now? Four, I think?"

"Psh, it's at least twice that. Remember that time you wanted to come over to my house in seventh grade and I warned you my mom was making vegetable pizza for dinner?"

Sage calls down another strike of lightning. A pile of black dust is all that remains where the evil creature once stood.

"I certainly remember what it smelled like when she packed you the leftovers for lunch the next day." Seamus shudders as Adam runs out to meet the oncoming orcs, his greatsword swinging at the nearest enemy target. "Asparagus and squash were never meant to touch the greatness of pizza. I'll never see your mom the same way."

The ground underneath the pack of orcs starts to shake, courtesy of Orianna. As the tremor spreads throughout the targeted area, nearly every monster falls prone onto the newly split, jagged earth.

Taking advantage of the vulnerable state of their enemies, Kohl and Seamus ditch their ranged weapons for their blades and dash forward to attack.

"You should see the kind of things she makes with goat cheese." Kohl sinks one blade into a fallen orc's chest. The shortsword's companion soon finds its way into the same target. Kohl then twists the twin swords until the screaming orc turns to pixels. "It's super nasty."

Seamus slits the throat of another knocked down enemy. "Not as nasty as your fac--"

One of the tips of Kohl's swords nearly nicks Seamus's own neck as she stares the halfling rogue dead in the eyes. "Finish that sentence, and see what happens."

"--etiousness. Your facetiousness. I wasn't, and would never, insult your lovely face, if that's what you were thinking I was going to say. It was not."

The half-elf pirate pauses for a moment, gazing at her small-in-stature friend as her the murderous glint in her eyes fades. "Dude, you either don't know what facetious means, or you're the world's biggest hypocrite."

Two orcs, upon seeing some of their opponents lack focus, start to move in a little too slowly. Adam's greatsword slashes one across the back while Kohl clues in and kills the other. "Guys," Adam says, dissolving particles of his victim particularly obscuring his face, "maybe not the best time to flirt."

"What? I would neve--" As Kohl vehemently denies the accusation, Seamus just gestures to the almost empty battlefield.

"Fight's pretty much over, dude." While Seamus is speaking, Sage's lightning vaporizes a third victim. "And now it's completely over. This was a cakewalk."

Orianna, with Sage following close behind, skips into the now monster-free Spire with a huge grin on her face. "That went so much smoother than the last fight! Did you guys see me cause that earthquake? That was so awesome!"

"Kinda hard to miss." Kohl kicks at the still-difficult terrain. "Plus the ground is staying all shoken up."

"You know, it's funny, I don't miss almost dying during combat at all. So, so strange." Seamus sits down on one of the pieces of rumble from the ruins that the orcs had presumably placed around their campfire in lieu of proper seating. He starts helping himself to some of the remaining roasted meat.

The others join him, apart from Sage, who first goes to check on the deer the orcs had been attacking when the adventurers arrived on the scene. It lives just long enough to dissolve into the druid girl's inventory when she looks for signs of artificial life. Sage rejoins her friends, and when the food runs out far too early, skins and butchers the dead deer. The rich aroma of meat cooking soon fills the air once again. The juices dripping off of the food sizzle as they touch the fire, and the group enjoys the change of music to a more upbeat song.

Adam peers up at the game's sun, trying to gauge the time of day with the stick he stuck in the ground. "We should leave soon if you guys want to try to make it to the wizard's tower tonight. Orianna has to do some looking around here first though, so we'll see how long that takes."

"You should stay for awhile, this is a wonderful place!"

Five heads turn in the direction of the voice, and are surprised to see it belongs to a male dwarf with long red hair, a giant beard, and an even bigger barrel strapped to his back. He grins, his bushy mustache doing little to shield onlookers from the blinding brightness of his smile. "May I join you?"

"Absolutely you can, friend." Adam stands up, extending a hand to the newcomer, who accepts and shakes vigorously. After glancing at his character interface to check the mysterious man's status, Adam asks, "What brings a solo player like you to this neck of the woods?"

"Exploration! So much work was put into making all the cities and zones in Towers & Tieflings look unique and beautiful, I want to experience it all. There's so many cool hidden quests and Easter eggs to find!"

The red-haired dwarf plops down on an empty rock near to Sage, who instinctively scoots closer to Orianna on the makeshift seat they share. She stares at the stranger in shock. "You... you're not dead?"

"Wait, is this the dwarf you saw with the orcs earlier, Sage?" Adam turns his confused gaze to the perfectly healthy dwarf when the elf girl nods. "How did you get away from those monsters?"

"Oh, them?" The dwarf lets out a hearty chuckle. "It wasn't easy, seeing as orcs are programmed to hate my race along with so many others. But, I managed to convince them to let me go after we shared a few drinks together."

He then pats the large barrel on his back, which the group realizes is in fact a cask of ale. The stranger then sets his cask on the ground beside him. "Speaking of which, you guys want some?"

Seamus immediately dumps out his waterskin and tosses it over to the dwarf to fill. "Wait a second, are you telling me the reason those orcs were so easy to kill was because they were drunk?"

Golden ale streams from the spout of the barrel, most of it making its way into Seamus's container. The dwarf shrugs as he hands the waterskin back to the halfling rogue. "Could be. 'Intoxicated' can be quite the debuff. I've been trying to find an enchanter who can fix that. A perfect beer shouldn't impair one's combat capabilities."

Seamus looks at the alcohol drink in his hand, now unsure of whether he should partake. Adam and Kohl, who had been debating accepting the offer of ale, silently decide to decline.

No one wants to be drunk when it's time to fight the all-powerful wizard.

The dwarf keeps right on talking. "That's actually what I'm doing out here, I heard there was a pretty formidable wizard out in Starchasm Forest and I wanted to see if I could add him to my list of magic-users who've helped enchant my beer barrel."

Separate from the newcomer, the four original party members exchange looks. Sage's attention stays glued to the dwarf, who's recalling the tales of the other wizards and spellcasters who've enchanted his ale with amazing detail, animated expressions, and exuberant hand gestures.

"Should we invite him to come along with us?" Orianna asks. "It sounds like he's looking for the wizard tower too."

"Yeah, but it doesn't sound like he's looking to kill him, which could get awkward." Seamus says. "I don't want there to be any bad blood, when we, you know, spill the wizard's bad blood."

Seamus's joke earns him a whack upside his halfling head from Kohl, who then says, "I actually agree with moron here though, this guy's play style seems so different than ours. Plus, we know absolutely nothing about him besides the fact that he's got fake free booze."

"--and that spell is the reason why the cast never runs out of ale. Now, the fact that it's enchanted to have such a phenomenal flavor is another great story. Let me get out my lyre, there's a part of the tale that's really better told through song." The dwarf rummages through his bag, retrieving a glossy wooden instrument.

Sage's eyes sparkle with interest as she sips on the sample of beer the dwarf has given her. Show does agree it has an amazing taste and compliments the delicate and complex flavor profile. "It's yummy."

"I'm so glad you think so! So, this story has to do with a dragon, a few mermaids, and a rare breed of scorpion way out in the far eastern desert biome. One day, I happened across som--"

"Hey, sorry to interrupt, but what class are you playing? And, come to think of it, what's your character's name?" Adam asks. His intrusion earns him a glare from Sage, upset by the disruption to the dwarf raconteur.

"Oh I didn't mention that? I go by 'Turtle' in this world, and I play a bard. I'm actually max-level!"

Multiple jaws nearly drop to the floor, everyone seeing the dwarf in a whole new light.

This changes everything.

~~~

Word count: 2285

Total word count: 16278

T&T Handbook:

Easter egg - a surprise hidden in a video game by the game developers for players to find (real-life references, messages, etc)

Anything I miss? Let me know and I'll add it in!