"NOBODY TOUCHES THE HAMMER!" Spun-Duh roared, surrounded by six Ghul'rok.
His beard, Alewhisker, sensed danger. It began to respond, the ferromycelial symbiosis activating. This would be glorious. This would be—
The beard formed a soup ladle.
"Not now!" Spun-Duh hissed at his facial hair. "Weapon! WEAPON!"
The beard reconsidered, shifted, and became... a larger soup ladle.
The Ghul'rok paused, confused. One tilted its head. "Is he going to... feed us?"
"It's a tactical disadvantage!" Spun-Duh insisted, swinging the ladle-beard. It made a pleasant *ting* against the Ghul'rok's armor. "Making you underestimate me!"
Alewhisker, apparently offended, changed form again. This time: a corkscrew.
"Oh, come ON!"
The lead Ghul'rok actually lowered its sword. "Is... is he having a stroke?"
"I'M HAVING A TACTICAL MOMENT!" Spun-Duh charged, beard spiraling like a wine opener.
Then something miraculous happened. The corkscrew caught in the Ghul'rok's armor joint, twisted, and somehow - SOMEHOW - popped the entire chest plate off like a wine cork.
*POP!*
The armor flew off. The Ghul'rok stood there, confused, in its undertunic.
"I MEANT TO DO THAT!" Spun-Duh declared, as Alewhisker promptly formed into what appeared to be a tea strainer.
But here's the thing about Spun-Duh - he committed. He swung that tea-strainer-beard with all his dwarven might, and by pure accident, it caught another Ghul'rok in the eye holes of its helmet. The beard, excited by success, immediately expanded into a full colander, trapping the creature's head.
"BEHOLD!" Spun-Duh shouted. "THE ANCIENT DWARVEN TECHNIQUE OF... KITCHEN-FU!"
By now, Alewhisker had settled on becoming a pasta maker, somehow extruding metal noodles that were tangling everyone's feet. The battlefield looked like an Italian restaurant had exploded.
Kaelen, watching from nearby, rubbed his temples. "Is he... winning?"
Ora watched a Ghul'rok slip on metal linguine and impale itself on its own sword. "I... think so?"
Later, in the tavern, Spun-Duh regaled everyone with the tale: "And then my beard became Glamdring itself!"
"It became a potato peeler," Kaelen corrected.
"A TACTICAL potato peeler!"
## The Curse of Truth
"This plan is perfect," Kaelen announced at the war council. "We'll hit them at dawn, catch them completely off-guard."
"12.7% chance of success," Spun-Duh stated flatly.
Everyone turned to stare.
"What?"
"12.7%. I calculated. You're forgetting wind direction, assuming their scouts are incompetent, ignoring the marsh becomes impassable at dawn due to condensation, and—" he sniffed, "—you're thinking about your dead wife again which is compromising your tactical assessment by approximately 34%."
Kaelen's face went red. "How dare you—"
"How dare I what? Count? Use observational data? In Boleto, emotional compromise was factored into all tactical decisions. Very practical. Your grief-cloud is visible in your pheromone signature."
Later, Ora confronted him. "You know your honesty hurts people."
"Yes. 100% awareness. But lies hurt worse, just slower. Like fungal infection. Starts small, spreads everywhere, kills eventually. Truth is clean cut. Heals faster."
"Is that really what you believe?"
Spun-Duh paused. For once, his percentage certainty faltered.
"In Boleto, there were no lies because thoughts were shared. Everyone knew everything. It was... beautiful. Terrifying but beautiful. Now I'm surrounded by mouth-noise and deception and nobody says what they think." He looked at his hands. "My honesty isn't kindness. It's homesickness. I'm trying to make your world work like mine did. Success rate: 0%. But I can't stop. It's all I have left of home."
"That's the most honest thing you've ever said."
"No. The most honest thing is that I know exactly when you're going to die, Ashkore. Your corruption rate, cellular degradation, memory loss acceleration. I calculate it every day. Update the percentage every morning."
Ora went still. "How long?"
"Seven months, three days. Plus or minus eleven days depending on memory sacrifice rate."
"You've been carrying that knowledge alone?"
"In Boleto, terminal diagnoses were communal knowledge. Shared burden. Here, I carry everyone's death percentages alone. Yours is 7.3 months. Kaelen's is 23.7 years. The healer girl has 67.4 years. Dies happy, surrounded by grandchildren."
He turned away.
"Want to know the worst part? My own percentage changes daily. Sometimes 40 years. Sometimes 40 minutes. Can't calculate properly without the network. I might be immortal or already dead. Without other minds to verify my existence, I can't prove I'm real."
"You're real to me."
"That's a 63% comfort. Better than nothing. Thank you for the statistical improvement in existential certainty."
It was, Ora realized, the closest thing to "I care about you" that Spun-Duh could say.
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*End Chapter 13.0.5*
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