Chapter 35: High on MFB, yeah you know me

Sherri sharpened her blade carefully with a sharpening stone as her allies rested. Her sword had been dulled significantly as it cut her enemies down. It had been a long and dangerous journey so far today and she could still see town from here. "Why do we seem to keep running into random battles with all manner of creatures? First it was the lizard creatures, then those annoying little goblin things, and now a hoard of orcs."

Kurk dusted off his priest robes. "No kidding, the battles have been difficult thus far, and you all seem to think the best strategy to hold off the enemy is to throw your bodies at them. I'm having trouble keeping up with all the healing you all need to stay alive. It doesn't help either that our mage, Gary, keeps casting his explosive spells in the same area as the rest of the group."

Gary laughed. "The placement of my spells is selected by estimating the optimal damage distribution on the enemies. A bit of collateral damage is to be expected."

Sherri asked "Why does the optimal location for spells always seem to fall right around three inches from my face?"

Gary responded "Since you insist on being the one that runs out way in front of us to charge straight into the fray, you usually place yourself right in harms way in more ways then one."

Kurk continued "The only person I never have to heal is Rick, because he doesn't actually fight when we're in combat. As a matter of fact he's usually pretty far away from the excitement more often then not."

Rick shrugged. "As the official bard of our group, it is my responsibility to tell the tale of our adventures. Fighting with weapons seems so crude for an artistic genius such as myself."

"Yes as important as my legacy is, I'm sure in the middle of the heat of battle is not the best time to be composing any sort of ballads" Sherri said as sarcastic as possible.

Rick shrugged. "What can I say, that is when the inspiration hits me."

"You can say 'I'm sorry, I'll pay attention to the dangers around me from now on and help fend off the enemy'" she retorted. "Or else inspiration won't be the only thing that will be hitting you in battle."

Stacy the pixie flew over and landed on Rick's shoulder. "I really enjoy the songs he writes, they make me happy." She giggled and then started playing with Rick's hair.

Sherri groaned. "Well if you want to keep him around a little longer Stacy, I guess we can keep him. After all, we all need a good laugh from time to time. Every time even the smallest bit of ale hits Rick's lips, that's when the real fun begins."

Rick looked over at Kurk embarrassed. "Do I really cause as big a scene as she implies?"

Kurk laughed. "I would say some of your best performances have been once you get hammered. Don't worry though, we usually keep you mostly out of trouble. The girl in that last down won't be forgetting you for a while."

Stacy giggled again. "No I doubt she remembers anything either."

Sherri stood up. "Enough rest, I think we should get going, we still have a long ways to go."
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"Hold up, what's the rush. We're trying to role play our characters here" Nikki asked.

Millie frowned. "I'm just trying to keep things moving. It seems like we're just sitting around talking and I want to get on to the next fight."

Brian cut in. "My character is a world renowned bard who.."

"You're not world renowned" Nikki interrupted, "You're not even Sherri, Stacy, Gery and Kurk renowned, you're just Rick, that guy."

Brian frowned. "OK fine my character is just 'that guy' who everyone so eloquently put, does not have much in the way of combat prowess."

"By not have much, you mean has none" Ralph added.

Brian examined his character sheet closely and then nodded. "Right, I do not have the capacity to fight and so I really excel in what I do within the role play aspect of the world. So give me the opportunity with my words and stories to paint an interesting environment since in a fight I just paint the ground with my blood."

Millie said "I have built my character to have maximum combat abilities for her level, I am essentially a perfect killing machine."

Heath said "Hey that's my line!"

Nikki asked "Millie, how is it that role playing games are the only thing you demonstrate any level of competence in?"

Millie threw some of her dice at Nikki "I am too competent in other things like.....uh....."

Ralph laughed at Millie. "Epic fail Millie, epic fail." He picked up some of her dice and added them to his own collection. "Thanks for the new dice."

Ethan shook his head. He was waiting patiently for the players to figure out what they were doing. He had grown impatient with the players bickering though. "In a stroke of unlucky happenstance, a large airship build by some gnomes high on mind flayer brain dust, accidentally fly their ship into the side of the mountain you were resting next to. In a large explosion that vaporized the airship in the process, they managed to dislodge a large amount of rocks perched precariously overhead which roll down the mountain. Rocks fall, you die!" Ethan then reached over and set Millie's character sheet on fire with a pocket lighter. He then started to move around the table to incinerate the other player's character sheets.

Nikki frowned as Ethan reduced her character to ash. She then pulled out an identical copy of the sheet and placed in in front of her. Ethan set to burning that one as well. She pulled out a third copy which he also burned. Then she pulled a fourth copy out and said "We can do this all day if you'd like brother, though I'd suggest you move on."

Ethan frowned but moved on to Heath who had already managed to build some sort of viking burial ship out of some extra construction paper. "My character deserves a proper burial at sea."

Ethan pulled out a flask of lighter fluid and doused the ship and Heath's character sheet in it. "More like burial at FIREBALL" Once lit, there was a quick flash incinerating both the sheet and the ship in a small fireball.

When it was Brian's turn, he finished jotting down some journal entries for his character before handing his character sheet over to be cleansed. "May his memory live on in his writings."

Ethan finally moved on to Ralph's side of the table. Ralph motioned Ethan to stop for a moment. "Actually I don't think I would have been killed when the rocks fell upon the camp my allies and I had set down to rest at."

Ethan said "Explain."

Ralph continued "Well before we left town, if you remember I went ahead and got a boulder flu shot at the local healer so that I could build up a resistance to boulders. I should be resistant to boulders by now and so the rocks would not have killed me."

Ethan thought for a second. "Yeah you're right, except medical technology still sucks. You got your boulder flu shot with a rusty used needle." Ethan then incinerated Ralph's character sheet. "Tetanus happens, you die."