The inside of Lyra's house was no longer a welcoming sanctuary.
It was a cage.
The air was thick with a tension you could cut with a knife.
Lyra had recovered from Gandalf's verbal smackdown and was now trying to pretend everything was fine.
It wasn't working.
"Don't listen to him," she said, forcing a bright, brittle smile.
"Burton is just… stressed."
"He's always so serious."
She gestured towards a plush-looking sofa.
"Please, sit."
"I'll have a servant bring some wine."
I didn't move.
"He said the barricade needs reinforcements."
"Tonight."
My mind was racing, processing the new information.
Ogres.
War.
Thin front lines.
This wasn't a newbie zone.
This was a contested area.
We had stumbled into a warzone with level one gear made of leaves.
Epic fail.
"Oh, that," Lyra said, waving her hand dismissively.
"He's just trying to scare you."
"You're a guest."
"He didn't sound like he was trying to scare me," I said.
"He sounded like he was giving an order."
Yael started pacing the room.
Her movements were tight, agitated, like a wolf in a pen.
"I knew this was a bad idea," she hissed, her voice low enough for only me to hear.
"I told you."
"'Let's go to the village, Quinn.'"
"'Let's get a roof over our heads, Quinn.'"
"Now we're going to be Ogre-food."
"Shut up, Yael," I muttered back.
"I'm thinking."
"Thinking?" she scoffed.
"What's there to think about?"
"We're screwed!"
"That Gandalf guy wants to use us as cannon fodder!"
She was right.
That's exactly what he wanted.
He wanted to throw the pretty, distracting new guy into the meat grinder to see if he'd break.
It was a test.
A very, very dangerous test.
Outside, the mood of the village had shifted.
The happy, peaceful vibe was gone.
I could hear the distant, rhythmic clang of a blacksmith's hammer, working late into the evening.
The sounds of guards calling to each other as they changed shifts.
I saw one of the male elves who had been trying to hit on Yael earlier.
He wasn't smirking now.
He had a grim look on his face as he hefted a spear and headed towards the eastern edge of the village.
Towards the barricades.
The threat was real.
So much for a quiet evening.
The air, which a minute ago smelled like wine and woodsmoke, was now thick with the stench of something big, something ugly, and something that was coming to kill us.
This wasn't a sanctuary anymore.
It was a cage.
Just as Lyra was pouring me another glass, a low, sad sound echoed through the trees.
A horn.
The alarm horn.
Crap.
My hand trembled, and red wine splashed across the polished floor.
Looked like blood.
Great.
Then came the screaming.
Not the far-off kind you hear in a movie.
This was close.
The kind of raw terror that gets cut off with a wet crunch.
Underneath it all, a deep, guttural roar shook the entire treehouse.
"No…" Lyra whispered, her face going white.
"The barricades…"
"The barricades are gone," Yael said.
Her voice was ice.
She was already crouched, a wolf ready to spring.
The war was here.
And then the whole world exploded.
BOOM!
CRACK!
The wall to my left didn't splinter.
It vaporized.
A hurricane of wood and moss blasted into the room, and a massive, hulking silhouette blocked out the light.
An Ogre.
It was ten feet tall, easy, with sickly green-gray skin stretched over muscles like boulders.
In one hand, it held a club that was basically a tree trunk with sharp rocks jammed into it.
Its tiny, pig-like eyes glowed red.
A system notice screamed in my head.
HP: [200/200] MP [10/200]
A boss.
MP: [10/200]? It was hungry.
And we were basically wearing salad for armor.
Perfectó.
My brain just… stopped.
The smell of unwashed monster and old blood filled my lungs.
You see this stuff on a screen, and it's cool.
You feel the 99% realism version, and it's a thousand times worse.
My body was a block of ice.
Locked solid.
A mage with no spells.
A raid leader who couldn't even squeak.
→ All motor functions suspended due to overwhelming physical threat.
"ROOOOAR!"
The Ogre bellowed, rattling my teeth, and swung its massive club.
WHOOSH!
For something that big, it moved like lightning.
The club was a blurry log of death arcing straight for my head.
Well, this is it.
I'm going to die.
Again.
Just as it was about to turn my skull into paste, a solid force slammed into my ribs.
BAM!
It was Yael.
Pure meat-shield instinct.
She'd driven her shoulder into me, shoving me out of the way.
I went stumbling, cracking my head on the floorboards as the club missed me by an inch.
But the wind from the swing caught her like a hurricane.
CRACK!
The shockwave launched her across the room like a broken doll.
She hit the far wall with a wet, sickening thud and crumpled to the ground.
Not moving.
The Ogre turned its tiny, stupid eyes from her body and locked them onto me.
It took a heavy step, the floor groaning as it raised its club again.
I was still on the floor, paralyzed.
The terror was so absolute it felt like my veins had frozen solid.
Then, a high, piercing shriek cut through the air.
It was Lyra, hiding behind a couch, screaming for a hero.
A hero that wasn't me.
"GANDALF!"
She screamed his name.
"HELP US, GANDALF!"
She didn't scream for me.
The handsome, mysterious stranger.
The guy who was right there.
She screamed for him.
The real warrior.
That name wasn't a cry for help.
It was a verdict.
It hit my pride harder than that Ogre's club ever could have.
The ice in my veins didn't melt.
It flash-boiled into white-hot, humiliating rage.
Rage flooded my system.
Motor functions restored.
Heh.
You just made a big mistake, you ugly piece of crap.