The card had said it would resurrect all monsters in the area. Unfortunately, no one had been fully aware of what deceased monsters were in the area. There was the pile of dead hobbs, of course, but the group was made immediately aware of something else as the volcanic stone floor erupted in an open space several yards behind Pan.

  Pan grunted, taking damage from the casting of the card, and then became overwhelmed by the eruption.

  “Pan!” Athena cried, “What did you do?!”

  The monster roared. It came out both shrill and deep, a discordant duet of a pitched down and pitched up version of the same cry.

  “B’GAWWWWK!!”

  The hobbs came to life and began to charge the distracted heroes. Apollo looked away from the creature and triggered his spell. It was Earth Spike, and the bulk of the pile was immediately impaled on sudden rising spikes.

  Athena cast Thrust and killed one of them which had remained unaffected. There were still several more advancing on the heroes who surrounded them.

  The cavern rumbled with aftershocks as the huge creature lumbered out of its stony grave.

  “Hell no man,” Horse said, his voice quavering. He turned and bolted into the darkness. A few hobbs followed him, leaving only a handful for the rest of the group to mop up.

  “Horse!” Apollo yelled, “Get back here!” The creature – a giant scorched skeletal chicken, the size of a two-story house – advanced on Pan. It looked down at the faun like he was a piece of corn or some helpless insect.

  A card flashed in front of Athena, a card called Javelin, and hurled a spear of light at one hobb.

  “Apollo, he’s gone, now cast a spell so I get another action. We’ve got to deal with these mobs first.”

  As his response, a card flashed, Fork Lightning, and two hobbs fell with a zap of electricity.

  “Thank you,” Athena said, bowing dramatically before casting a card called Baton Strike. She whirled a light spear over her head briefly, swinging the end fatally into the skull of another hobb. “Where’s Pan?”

  Apollo kicked a hobb, sending the stout creature flying backwards only to get up and charge again. “He’s holding the bird’s aggro right now.”

  Pan was fixed by the bird’s gaze. He stared right up into those empty sockets in blackened bone as it took step after jerky step. It tilted its head first one way, and then the other, clucking softly. Pan couldn’t look away.

  WHAM!

  The ground shuddered as the chicken pecked the ground. Pan, at the last moment, broke from the paralyzing fear and dove out of the way.

  “Pan!” Athena cried. The final hobb fell. Both were out of actions, waiting for their hands to refresh.

  WHAM!

  WHAM!

  The chicken advanced, pecking at Pan as he dove and tumbled, dodging the deadly beak.

  “I think we made the wrong call focusing on the little mobs,” Apollo said as he could only watch the creature advance on their helpless friend.

  “Do you have something?” Athena asked, impatience edging her voice. “Anything?”

  The chicken was getting angrier, and Pan was running out of stamina.

  B’GAWWWK!!

  The beast cried out in fury, flapping its skeletal wings impotently.

  Apollo held his empty hands out, shrugging.

  “We’ve got to get him out of there. If I can time it right, I think I can grab him and spring away without it hitting us with that beak,” Athena said, indicating her route across the uneven terrain with her finger, more for her own sake than for Apollo’s. “If you can distract it, that would make you a smidge better than completely useless while running down the timer.”

  WHAM!

  WHAM!

  Another two pecks, both dodged by the huffing, wheezing faun.

  Then, before Athena could act, a card flashed in front of Pan. Athena got an action back, and her remaining card wasn’t discarded. The skeletal chicken bawked curiously before becoming suddenly rigid.

  This story is posted elsewhere by the author. Help them out by reading the authentic version.

  “I cast Joint Pain on it,” Pan called to them through gritted teeth. “Athena, make this count. I could move it if I were stronger, but all I can do now is hold it in place. Oh shit this hurts.” He began panting like someone struggling to lift and enormous load.

  “Well, that worked out,” Athena said to herself. She sounded mildly surprised. She activated a card, Skull Splitter. It depicted a milky-eyed hoplite cracking a skull with an overhead strike from a spear. The familiar weapon formed in her hand as she leapt into the air, as if carried by a gust of wind.

  She twirled the spear, bringing it down heavily on the chicken’s skull. Pan braced, making sure to keep the chicken held firm for the strike, thinking, Is this gonna hurt me?

  CRAACK!!

  The spear came down, and the impact resounded. The chicken, only held in place magically, recoiled from the hit. Unable to work its legs and arms, it lost its balance and fell forward.

  “No, no!!” Pan shouted, cowering at the collapsing goliath. The chicken, while still falling and unable to resist the effect of the card, made the same pose before falling in a heap on top of the faun.

  Apollo ran forward, wading through the pile of giant bones and cloud of volcanic dust. “Pan!” he shouted.

  The creature’s wing bones were huge, and the impact with the floor sent them sprawling every which way like the shards of a dropped glass sculpture. From where he was standing, he had seen the thing’s rib cage land directly on the cowering Pan, just before the cloud had sprung up.

  “Pan!” came Athena’s cry. She had landed just behind the massive creature and had also rushed to his aid.

  They found the faun still cowering, standing inside the chicken’s breast. By stages, he realized he was ok.

  “Tell me that wasn’t a Kentucky fried chicken,” was all he said.

  Apollo couldn’t help it. He laughed. Seeing Apollo laugh made Pan chuckle.

  “That’s stupid,” Athena said. But she was smiling.

  “I think we’re getting better at this monster slaying,” Pan said. And a cloud of sparkles appeared on one of the chicken's ribs.

  “No help from that Horse, though,” Athena said. She growled before adding, “And we gave him one of the Crystal packs!”

  Pan, upon looting the chicken, had a card pack in his hands. “Well, it looks like we got another one.”

  “Oh?” Apollo said, “What is it?”

  The packaging was black with mint green accents. It depicted skulls with green comet tails flying around a dark pyramid at night. It said, Necropolis.

  “Spooky,” the Scholar said. “Athena?”

  She had been only half paying attention, consumed by her frustration at the fleeing centaur. She waved irritatedly at her brother and walked off. “Just, hurry up. I want to get a move on.”

  “You open it, Pan,” Apollo said. “I don’t want to dip into necromancy.”

  Pan didn’t tell the Scholar that he had no desire to either, but opened the pack anyway. Beggars and choosers. Four cards came out, along with an amber gem.

  “What gives?” Pan said. “There’s only four cards in here.”

  Friends Till the End, depicting a human dressed in a breast plate and tricorner hat with a feather, his hand over the shoulder of a skeletal version of a man dressed similarly, its arm over the first guy’s shoulder. When a chosen mob would die, it’s reanimated for a limited time and fights for the caster.

  Life Drain, like what the succubus had from the fight in the forest. It dealt damage to a monster and the caster gained that much life.

  Again With Feeling, depicting a paused fight scene on a stage, the director talking to one of the sword wielding actors, the other looking bored. This card copies the previous card played by the caster.

  Ditch, depicting two cards being thrown down a well. This card and a random card in the caster’s deck are destroyed.

  As Pan was considering the implications of Ditch, Apollo spoke up. “You got an upgrade gem.” He sounded impressed. “What color is it?”

  “It’s an amber color, like that stone with the fossilized mosquito from Jurassic Park.”

  “Athena!” Apollo cried. But the girl didn’t respond. To Pan he said, “She’ll be really interested in that. Hold onto it. I don’t think you can use it.”

  The cards and gem flowed to Pan’s inventory. Apollo started moving in his sister’s direction.

  “I can’t use these cards yet. I’ve got to empty my hand before I can edit my deck. This damned Rack is ruining me.”

  “Huh?” Apollo said, caught off guard. “You can edit your deck so long as we’re out of combat.”

  “It’s not letting me,” Pan said. It wouldn’t let him select any cards to remove, and it wouldn’t let him add any more. “I went up a level though. My stats improved a bit. I’ve got a couple two’s now, and a three in dexterity. Is that good?”

  “Let’s check it out later,” Apollo said hurriedly, “I think she’s going to leave us behind.”

  The two chased after Athena, who was walking aggressively into the darkness.

  “Your sister is really intense,” Pan whispered as the two rushed to catch up.

  The Scholar shrugged. “She knows what she wants. We’re total opposites in that way.”

  “Oh yeah?” Pan pulled out a Torch card and activated it. A two foot length of stick with one end wrapped in cloth and set ablaze appeared in his hand, dispelling the darkness. The way Athena had gone had tapered into a tunnel, and Pan realized they were walking alongside a streamlet of pale green water.

  “I haven’t seen her take shit from anyone. She’s usually on the giving end. She got banned from the coffee place on campus because she threatened the girl who kept spelling her name wrong on the cups.”

  Banned? Over a name on a coffee cup? He thought. “Did you say college?”

  “Oh yeah. I’m going for my bachelor’s in poli sci and Athena’s working on an engineering degree.”

  Pan thought about his own attempts at schooling. Below average grades all through grade school, and then when he graduated, he hadn’t qualified for any scholarships. Of course, his parents weren’t able to sponsor his attempt at higher education either. So right out the gate he had applied for any minimum wage job he could find. Then after working for retail for a year, he started applying for jobs with at least some kind of benefits. He ended up as a telemarketer on contract.

  He didn’t mention any of this to Apollo and only shrugged. “Do you think you’ll be able to finish, considering…” he trailed off, gesturing vaguely at their surroundings.

  Apollo sighed and said, “I’m really hoping all of this is just some kind of dream. In the back of my mind I’m thinking, this isn’t real, I’m going to wake up in a bit.” He smiled awkwardly. “But that hope is beginning to fade.”

  Shortly thereafter, they caught back up with Athena. And right as they had, she shouted, “There you are you motherfu-“ and ran off, the rest of her sentence inaudible.

  Horse, who had just come into sight with the help of the torch, was caught like a deer in headlights, a vengeful Athena running at him full tilt.