As the gruff Ogre commander steered the wooly beast-pulled wagon down a dirt path, he yelled, “We're almost there, ya gits! It's almost time to fulfill yer duties to the Demon Lord!”

  Qolmador woke with a start, pulling his ugly, military-issued, thick purple robes closer to his white chin. Looking around to get his bearings, he groaned at the cramped, smelly wagon he found himself in. Since joining the 7th legion, things changed; before, with the Professor, life had been simple; he could study about society all day and learn to control his psychic abilities. He was allowed to clean his scaly blue skin every night and was able to pick out his clothing; now, his every move was dictated to him by those he considered beneath him.

  This meat-headed ogre could barely string a sentence together. Yet, he was superior to him, not to mention the silent hardy, looking gunslinger that stared off into space; his long black hair and ratty black coat showed a life lived on the roads. At least the gunslinger didn’t smell like dirt or pine trees like the dwarf or the elf he was sandwiched between for the entire bumpy, uncomfortable, foul journey.

  The dwarf's dark iron plate armor gave him a reverent fiendish outline. The pine-reeked elf wore simple white robes that reminded him of his Professor, but the thick tome at his side reminded Qolmador why he suffered this indignity. He would show the 7th legion how the Professor’s genius dwarfed any other with his own success.

  The wagon shuddered to a halt with whining noises from the two wooly beasts dragging them along. “GET OUT!” the ogre roared over its shoulder.

  Qolmador rolled his eyes from the order.

  “You get out….” He whispered.

  “What was that?!” He bellowed, looking at Qolmador.

  Raising his palms defensively, he shrugged his shoulders. Squinting his one good eye, the ogre turned back around to which Qolmador stuck out his tongue.

  “I saw that.” The commander growled.

  Wincing, Qolmador watched the oafish creature shift his massive bulk off the front of the wagon, causing it to shudder but giving him a clear view of the wooly beasts’ asses. The commander’s pale, peach-colored skin was riddled with pockmarks and scars from past battles, with a pronounced overbite that gave his heavy chin a menacing appearance. Plodding to the back of the wagon, he swung down the little gate that prevented dirt from falling out, glaring through one beady yellow eye.

  “Out.” He commanded again.

  Qolmador sighed, but the pine-smelling elf scooted off the wagon, leaving behind a thick red tome; he landed in the dirt, looking up at the ogre with a goofy grin. The greasy gunslinger pushed past the pine elf without waiting, and his too-long gun slapped Qolmador as he exited. With an annoyed grunt, Qolmador slipped on the tome, pushing it behind the wagon bench before landing in the soft dirt. Taking in the dirty, dusty scene, he noticed the cave mouth standing a few feet away from them where they stood in a dirt clearing surrounded by forest.

  Qolmador turned his nose to the smell of recently wet dirt turning to mud mixed with the stench of wet tree bark and moss. The pine elf took in several sharp inhales, sighing his satisfaction at the smell. But the smell of death assaulted Qolmador’s nose from somewhere deep in the cave; a cold wind blew from the depths of the cave carrying a low moan with it.

  Was something living in the cave?

  What exactly were they supposed to find here?

  No matter, he assured himself, he’d touch its psyche before it ever saw him.

  “Welcome to da 7th legion!” The ogre barked. “Yer first mission is to clear out this cave for the Goblins. Dey is having their grand oracle come for a celebration in three days. The goblin king wants this cave cleared out before then, he sent a troop of goblins in, but they never came back. So he hired some mercenaries that never returned; now he’s asking the 7th legion to do his dirty work. The Demon Lord needs the goblins to join his forces, and this is the first step to get us there. Any questions?”

  “Ja, what is it we are clearing out?” Qolmador asked with grunts of agreement from his new compatriots.

  The ogre looked down at the diminutive kobold through his one good eye with the best scowl Qolmador had ever seen and said: “Dunno. I just told ya nobody’s come back from in there, ain’t ya listening? Any other dumb questions?” He challenged.

  Not getting a response, he lumbered back to the wagon, leaving them to their task, whipping the reigns of the two wooly beasts. The four stood awkwardly before the cave mouth, watching the wagon roll away with a chorus of ominous moans from the squeaky wheels. The golden rays of the setting sun filtered through the trees, casting long shadows across the small clearing. Though, the cave seemed to repel the daylight, not letting the group see any deeper into it.

  “Were the wheels moaning, man?” The pine elf asked.

  “I heard that too,” The dwarf said, rubbing the symbol of Vesper on his gunblade’s stock. “Ye think it was just the wheel making the noise?”

  “I’ve heard some wild wheels in my travels, my man.” The pine elf answered.

  “Who cares about the wheels?”Qolmador snapped. “We should get this over with.”

  He took a few steps toward the cave, not bothering to wait for his new, forced compatriots. With a focused mind, he probed the darkness beyond the cave mouth, searching for any signs of life. He opened his mind as the Professor had taught him, allowing his focal point to be at the center of his forehead. Waves of psychic resonance pulsed from his mind into the dark cavern to bounce off any minds within a hundred feet of him. Three echoes bounced back from his troop and nothing else.

  “The way is clear!” he exclaimed.

  “Whoa, how can you tell, man?” the pine elf asked.

  “I’m glad you asked, elf.” He smugly replied. “My mind is my weapon, und I can see beyond what yours can. I’ve let my mind wander into the cave and found no brain activity; now follow me onwards!”

  “Hold yer horses, son; let me scout ahead,” the gunslinger suggested. “I’ll holler if— hey!” He whispered harshly.

  Qolmador waved him away to walk headlong into the darkness of the cave; the trio watched shadows swallow him whole. Looking at each other while waiting for anything to happen, they hesitated. The dark cleric took a few cautious steps forward, his hand on his weapon, squinting to see inside the cave.

  “FOLLOW!” Qolmador yelled.

  The trio jumped out of their skins, each sighing in relief with a nervous laugh.

  “I’d like to get out of this Vesper-forsaken cav— AARRRRGGHH!!

  Nobody moved. The pine elf strained his ears toward the cave making out faint moans break the silence. A long sequence of wet slapping noises followed by muffled voices ended in a sickening crunch of what the elf assumed was bone.

  “Uhh, I don’t think that little blue dude knew what he was doing.” The pine elf said.

  “Help, help! It has me!” He yelled. “I made a mistake! I made a mis—“

  Heaving a heavy sigh, the gunslinger whipped his long rifle off his back to aim inside the cavern.

  “That ain’t right….” He groaned, lining up a shot.

  Squeezing the trigger let out a cacophonous explosion sending a streak of hot iron into the cave, followed by a sickening squelch.

  “Zank you!” Qolmador shouted.

  His tiny blue form rushed out of the cave slamming to a stop mid-flight with a pained expression before being dragged by his tail back into the darkness. Clawing and reaching out for his new compatriots, Qolmador felt cold bony fingers digging into his tail. With a panicked look, he tried to call for help, unable to find his voice, and silently plea for help from the trio.

  They stood in stunned silence, watching him get vanish into the cave.

  “Whattaya waiting fer, cleric? Get your ass in there!” The gunslinger urged, reloading his weapon.

  Shocked out of his stupor, the cleric unsheathed a long curved blade that ended in a gun barrel, holding his finger over the handle’s trigger.

  “ARRRGGH!!” The cleric yelled, charging into the darkness.

  Aiming again, the gunslinger’s eyes spun in their sockets switching lenses to zoom into the black cave; another green flash flickered over one eye. Bringing the sight to that eye, he squeezed the trigger.

  KRACkOOOOM!

  The hot iron streaked past the screaming dwarf slamming into soft flesh with another wet explosion. Qolmador’s tail fell free after the explosion allowing him to scurry away, putting his back to the cave’s mouth. Seeing the writhing mass of walking corpses shambling toward them, his jaw dropped. The dwarf ran past him sinking his blade into a fat corpse’s stomach.

  Saying a quick prayer caused his blade to emanate a thick bruise-colored mist that wrapped around the edge, sliding down to the trigger. Pulling down hard sent a blast of energy through the thing’s stomach, pulsing out into a ring of zombies, knocking them down or blowing them apart. Viscera and entrails splashed over Qolmador’s face and seeped into his far too open mouth; he wretched hard, fighting the urge to lose his meager lunch.

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  “Move, ya blue imp!” The gunslinger ordered, chambering another round. “Elf, do something useful!”

  He took aim into the crowd of zombies and blew a hole straight into a line of them; he rounded on the elf with a menacing glare. Snapping his rifle open to expel the spent brass, he pointed to the elf and then to the cave.

  “No need for all the yelling.” The Pine reeked elf stated. “Watch me whip out some tasty spells; let me just… Uh, have you seen my tome, dude?” he searched his robes for his ruby tome coming up empty.

  Giving the gunslinger a conceding shrug, he raced into the cave with his quarterstaff raised high. Coming down hard onto the head of a zombie splitting its skull, the undead fiend dropped in an instant; the surge of adrenaline pushed him onward. Swinging wildly into the darkness, he became a flurry of blows, leaving crushed heads, broken jaws, and unmoving corpses in his wake. Blood rushed to his head, quickening his heartbeat to beat against his ears, making him miss a cry of warning from Qolmador and the gunslinger.

  With a cry of visceral rage, he yanked his staff from his last victim like a pendulum on the head of a tall brutish zombie. Connecting with a solid thunk, he reared back in the darkness bringing the staff sailing into its head again, finding no purchase. Instead, he saw his body going limp from higher than he thought he should be, not noticing the brute now holding him by the hair. His last thought fell back to the wagon and how he wished he had his book.

  “Cursed shit.” The gunslinger cursed.

  “By Vesper’s terror….” The cleric prayed.

  “Scheisse!” Qolmador yelled, taking a long deep breath.

  Releasing the breath in an arc of pure electric energy lit up the cavern to shriek through the cave, splintering the zombies apart. In that instant of white-blue light, they all watched in horror as a massive brutish zombie came into full view holding the head of the pine-reeked elf. As the light petered out, it brought the head to its mouth as the light faded to black, followed by a wet crunching sound.

  “What is zat!?” Qolmador cried, scuttling back out of the cavern. He scrambled to his feet, running out of the cave into the fading light of the day. Scurrying behind the legs of the gunslinger, he watched the brute break out of the shadows to reveal its decaying form. Its flesh barely clung to its blood-smeared face, stuck in a horrifying grimace of pain; in its right hand was a handful of hair that it let slip to the dirt. Its hulking form loomed over the dwarf, who stood stupefied with the gunblade shaking at his side.

  It reached one gnarled bony hand down to the dwarf when a raucous explosion ripped through the silent clearing, the flash of the muzzle lighting up the cavern. Its shoulder exploded from the impact sending it reeling backward; its head swiveled down to focus on the source of its pain.

  “Cleric, any time now!” The gunslinger urged.

  “Right!” He readied the gunblade. “Vesper, lord o’ the nightmares, let me blade strike fear into those who refuse yer gifts!” Coalesced nightmares formed from the cleric’s circlet to flow into the chamber of his gun. Chittering laughter and screams escaped the blade’s barrel; the cleric heard a distinct voice calling to him through the nightmare. The voice transported him back to sitting on a dock with his sisters; they all laughed and fished until a deep dark voice called to them. It called to him now, taunting him for calling upon it in his moment of need; it promised chaos for the brute reeling from being shot.

  The brute took a giant step back to recover from the gunslinger’s bullet, digging his foot into the bare dirt while the gunslinger attempted to reload. The brute rushed forward as the cleric cleaved his blade into its leg, pulling hard on the trigger. A stream of nightmarish energy ripped out of the barrel blowing the hip off the brute in a rupture of unholy screams that sent it crashing to the ground.

  No howl of pain or grunt of agony escaped the brute; it simply turned its attention to the cleric, digging its massive clawed hands into the dirt. It dragged itself toward the stunned cleric, who tripped hard over a decayed body lying limply on the ground. Sensing the sudden vulnerability, the brute dug both hands into the dirt, launching forward. Without even a moment to scream, it landed on the cleric full of stone-cold malice with its mouth hanging open. At that moment, its head erupted from a slug embedding itself into the back of its decayed skull.

  Silence settled back into the clearing surrounded by a quickly darkening forest. The three compatriots backed away from the cave sitting in a heap next to each other, letting their heavy breaths talk for them.

  “Zat went exactly as I planned it!” Qolmador declared. “Though, admittedly, I did not think zee elf would go rogue on us. A bit of a miscalculation to be sure; for our next mage, I’ll ensure he has a spellbook.”

  The dwarf and gunslinger looked at each other and then at the small kobold rolling their eyes.

  “Planned, my arse.” The dwarf growled.

  “Ja. I knew zere would be an army of undead based on the lack of brain activity. Und we needed them to come out for our sniper here.” He explained. “I also knew that if I called for help, he would not hesitate as he is an android clearly made for long-range combat. On top of zat, I knew the cleric could turn away the undead fiends, though I am unclear as to why he did not employ this technique.”

  He shot an angry glance at the cleric and a nod of appreciation to the gunslinger, patting him on the arm.

  “Stick with me und you will go far in the 7th legion,” He said, turning to the Cleric. “For one following zee way of nightmares, I had my hopes up.”

  “Hold yer tongue whelp! I got my piece of the brute!” The cleric argued.

  “Nein. Our android friend shot the killing blow, und I cleaned up the rest.” Qolmador explained. “Now, let’s clear out zee rest of the cavern. Chop, chop.” He clapped his hand twice.

  Offering a shrug to the annoyed cleric, the gunslinger followed Qolmador into the cave’s shadows. Despite himself, he took a liking to the small kobold and his verbose claims. He decided he’d watch over him until the mission ended; he might be fun to keep around. Besides, it was going better than the last mission he went on when he woke up face-down in a barren hellscape.

  “By Vesper’s fearful claws….” The Cleric gasped, dragging the gunslinger back to reality.

  “I must say, we did quite a number on these things,” Qolmador said, walking into the darkness.

  Beyond the yawning mouth of the cave sat a round chamber littered with undead creatures; some human, elven, dwarven, and even a few dragonborn in the mix. A subtle drop in temperature made Qolmador’s scales clammy from the dry clearing. The smoky char of flesh assaulted their noses from the ravage of lighting spewed by Qolmador. He took in a deeper inhale to appreciate his work but paused at the body of the pine-reeked elf.

  “We should burn his body.” He said matter-of-factly. “Zere is no reason for us to risk him coming back.”

  The cleric paused, looking at Qolmador in disgust.

  “Ye cold lizard,” The Cleric argued. “Vesper has ways to honor the dead.”

  “You are right.” Qolmador nodded.

  The cleric gave a nod and pulled out a holy symbol.

  “Let's see if there's anything useful on him first; then we can burn zee body." ” He finished.

  “That’s not what I meant!” The cleric growled.

  The gunslinger slipped past the arguing pair to get a better look inside the chamber; with a thought, he shuttered the lenses of both eyes to green. On either side of the room lay shattered, empty coffins that could have been that way for months. He looked down at the bodies and then back up to the coffins knitting his eyebrows together; he tried counting them before getting confused.

  “Do you think all these bodies fit in those things?” he asked the group.

  Qolmador paused, hearing the question asked amid his heated debate. He used his darkvision to scan the area, counting every corpse in the cave as best he could since some pieces were charred away.

  “No.” He declared. “I think not,”

  Walking up to an undead creature, he picked up an arm and gave it a sniff.

  “These are the corpses of those that tried to clear the cave before us.”

  “Poor souls…” The cleric said. “May the eternal dream take them.”

  Still holding his gunblade, he held it out to the undead horde to perform last rites on them. Qolmador rolled his eyes as he examined the rest of the coffins with a thoughtful nod at each one.

  “These sarcophagi must have held more of those brutes,” he declared. “Meaning there are four more just like him somewhere in the cave. I suggest caution moving forward.” He decided. “But first, introductions. As leader I will start: I am Qolmador Siverius Tempna Veth III.”

  He dipped low into a bow, letting his long robes scrape the floor.

  “Sangna.” The gruff cleric spat.

  “Nomad.” Offered the gunslinger.

  “Wonderful! Now, let’s go kill some brutes.” Qolmador said with a wicked grin.