eyes sharpens and twists into a scary glance. Zrak hissed through his sharp incisors.

And then, he screamed

The metal ball drags along the stone ground as he dashed on his hands and feet around the assassin. His sharp teeth dripped with the remaining dry blood in his mouth as he bites at the sword-wielding assassin like a wolf!

Teeth pierce the assassin's neck, digging furrows as Zrak pulls back out. Not much remains of the assassin's neck and clavicle as the corpse falls to the ground, the grass underneath soaking with blood.

Malkala, after managing to parry the last attack, takes a step back, her foot splashing back into the stream. The acid drips into the water, instantly steaming and evaporating the liquid, as she bends back. As if she was sneezing, she shoots her head forward, mouth open. Instead of a sneeze, though, she lets loose with a roar, letting loose with a fifteen foot cone of acid.

The assassin to her right ducks behind the stone bridge, completely avoiding the spray of acid. Some of the bridge dissolves under the acid, leaving pits in the stonework. The other assasin, however, takes the acid breath to the face, letting out a cry of surprise and great pain. The acid building up in Malkala is gone, and she seems a bit exhausted from the effort, but she lets out a smirk at the breath's somewhat success.

There is a moment of hesitation from the crossbow assassin as they watch their companion fall to a barbaric rat. But, they shake their head, the fear going away, and they let loose with another bolt. Without seeing where the bolt landed, they then reload their weapon and fire a snap shot. The first shot sticks into Zrak's left leg this time. The second flies way off of its target, bouncing off of the wall.

Meanwhile, the assassin hiding behind the bridge vaults over it and steps toward Malkala in the stream. He swings wildly with his blade, hoping to land some kind of strike. His partner, still screaming in pain, follows suit, anger fueling his swings at the dragonborne. Malkala skillfully dodges, sidesteps, and parries most of the strikes against her. However, one dagger slides between protective pieces of her gear, leaving a thin line of blood.

More pain swells in Zrak's head as he falls to the ground. Thr arrow in his leg sends more blood down upon the garden grass, with him sneering and snapping his incisors together. He is unable to smell the sweet grass or hear the flowing water under his animalistic rage. All his mind processes is the pounding of his head and heart, as his black and white sight, under the darkness, eyes the remaining crossbow assassin with murderous intent.

"You... basssstard!" he hisses in fury as, against all sense, he forces his legs to move, running on all hour limbs even as blood trickles down. His metal ball drags with him, scraping the stone with a harsh screech.

And before the assassin knows it, Zrak is already upon him, clawing at his body and biting like a wounded wolf!

The frenzied attack from the furious rat is a shock to the assassin, who is unable to do anything as he is taken to the ground, ripped and torn asunder.

Meanwhile, Malkala is holding her own against her two foes. But the occasional strike getting through her defenses is going to wear her down fast. After Zrak finishes with his foe, he looks up to make eye contact with the dragonborne duelist. Without saying anything, Zrak knows what Malkala wants: for him to move in like a stalking predator. He immediately moves forward, getting behind one of the assassins to flank them.

She smirks as he does, seeing that the assassin does not know what has happened until it is too late. She then focuses her attention on the flanked target, knowing that he has to split his attention between two targets. However, despite the advantages she is building for herself and Zrak, the assassin proves themself to be agile, avoiding each of her two strikes.

The acid-soaked assassin does not seem to care about attacking the ratfolk, though, all of his rage focused on Malkala, the one who melted him. The other assassin hesitates for a moment, but decides to keep on Malkala. Dagger strikes after dagger strikes rain down upon Malkala, leaving cuts and slashes along the scales of the dragonborne. Zrak watches as the dragonborne drops to one knee, immediately weakened from the attacks. Yet, her eye shines with determination as she wobbles back to her feet.

It is a blessing that the two assassins are two occupied to look over their fallen allies. Zrak's claws, and especially his teeth, had carved all over the assassin and left him unrecognizable.

Zrak, for his part, hasn't even comprehended his brutality, or his own injuries, snapping his sharp incisors together while flanking the remaining foes. With arrows in his limbs, the ysoki doesn't appear overly worried for Malkala's condition, if because he is instead lost in his own rage.

SNAP

The sharp clash of his teeth bleeds into the assassin's ears as he is surrounded by Zrak and Malkala. With a deathly look in Zrak's wild green eyes, he charges forward, biting at the assassin's sword arm just as he did before!

The assassin does not notice Zrak's attack until it is way too late. Bone snaps and blood sprays as the ratfolk barbarian takes hold with an unbreakable grip and pulls. The arm does not completely come out of the shoulder, like the assassin from the first battle, but there is not much left. The assassin looks down, sees the mess that was his arm, and does not scream. Instead, the adventurers can see his eyes roll back and he just collapse from shock. Even if he manages to survive, there is no way he would be able to fight anymore.

Malkala sees the remaining enemy and calculations start quickly running through her head. A second later, she looks at Zrak and tilts her head to her right. Without even thinking about it, Zrak shuffles to his left, so that he is now flanking the next assassin with her. As he does, and the assassin's attention turns to him for a split second, she snaps a vial from her backpack, uncorks it, and downs the drink in one gulp. Zrak watches as her wounds close slightly. Malkala growls slightly, annoyed at how little the elixir healed, but she turned her focus back on the fight, knowing that she may live another attack.

The last remaining assassin seems conflicted between Zrak and Malkala. He, however, turns to Zrak, the warrior that had managed to nearly single handedly kill his allies. With a scream, he strikes out at the ratfolk, his dagger flashing in the torchlight as it becomes a storm of metal. Zrak feels the metal dig into his skin twice, leaving gashes that will need to be looked into soon.

In all truth, Zrak is a bloody mess. The two gashes dug through his armor and his fur, providing two deep scars which will carry him for some time; his blood soaked into the water stream he stands in, like red strands flowing and tainting the clear waters. Combining that with the unrecommended move of his shot arm and leg leaves him breathing hectically, furious underneath the blind rage that keeps him going.

The remaining assassin is just another figure: a lone, cornered beast whose time has come. Perhaps one thought Zrak as this; perhaps Zrak thinks himself as this beast, had he not lost himself in his wolfish fury.

So as a wild creature, he leaps forward, refusing to flee. His bone-thin hands and legs tore at the bridge's stone railing, cracking the well-made material and sending bits down to the water. All he gives is a wild scream signaling someone's death, whether his own or his foe's.

Zrak is only able to reach the assassin's torso, as he has to reach above the stone bridge. However, that is enough. Bones crack and shatter as the ratfolk's teeth break through the assassin's ribs. The man instinctively pulls back, which only makes things worse for him before he collapses, dead.

Seeing all of their foes dead, Malkala nearly collapses herself, greatly weakened and exhausted by the fight. But, she manages to pull herself to dry land before sitting down, breathing a bit heavily. She then starts pulling out medical supplies from her backpack and works on patching up her wounds.

"Man," she says, "That was a rough fight. I guess I haven't woken up completely, yet, since you seem to be handling everything yourself." She then sees the injuries on the ratfolk, and takes a moment to pull out one of her vials, "I can get to your wounds soon, but in the meantime, you can take a vial."

Zrak still has the squishy remains of... something in his mouth, finally spitting it out along with the bits of blood he pierced through. The mad look in his bloodshot eyes diminishes, revealing a blood-soaked ysoki who misses his cloak right about now.

He gives a deathly chuckle, slumping to the stone bridge with the arrows still lodged in his arm and leg. "I'm just very good at hunting and killing," he responds as if speaking humbly. Yet his words give him a rather menacing presence. "Damn, guys sure made me hurt." A shaky sigh releases between his incisors as he takes Malkala's vial and chugs it down as if it were mead.

Yuck. The bitter taste stung his mouth more than the pain from his wounds. The vial helps the pain, as did taking the time to treat his wounds.

When he stands again, he makes for the stream and washes the blood off his ratty head; the dry blood slithers down the stream as he stands back up, ready to move again.

"Are we ready to get going again?" Zrak speaks with a smile, as if a life or death battle means little to him. "Sure hope there isn't much left to check."

After finishing her work, and chugging down a healing vial that does little, Malkala sighs, "My luck just keeps on going, huh?"

She then shakes her head, stretches, and stands, "Might as well. We are in the east wing, heading for the feast hall. I imagine that everyone is holding up either in their rooms, or in the feast hall."

With that, she takes a grip on her dueling sword, and starts to move forward, but then halts, "Oh, I almost forgot!"

She reaches into her bag and grabs a potion with a bright orange liquid, looking more like goop than a drink. She hands it over to Zrak, "Here, take this. Normally, it would give a person sharpened teeth and nails to use in combat, but since you have that already, it should enhance what you already do have. However, it does come at the cost of lowering your defenses and reflexes."

With that done, she moves to the door and cracks it open. She sees a hallway with the bloodied corpses of six guards and three people wearing black cloaks. There is no one else in the hallway, but it is easy to hear the sounds of combat further in, and the screams of a large, booming voice, "Where are you, halfling? I can't see you no more! I smash you eyes good when I get you!"

The exceptionally wounded, patched ysoki eyes Malkala's odd vial; the sight of bodies and blood doesn't catch his interest. He's seen potions able to do some exceptionally unique effects but never figured out how they got made. Malkala's vial is no exception, as its bright orange liquid flows like fire in the container. A dark smile forms across his face, thinking over Malkala's description of the liquid.

He tucks the vial away in a pocket within his armor, hearing all the shouting down the hallway. "Hey, ain't that from Amiri?" His sharp teeth chatter with the tips of his lips leaning upward. He'll be disappointed if he can't see Amiri's giant weapon in action.

The ratfolk dashes down the hall with an uncanny enthusiasm, only slowing down and moving through the shadows as the sounds of combat increase. With Malkala's vial on hand, Zrak craves battle even after nearly dying from one.

It does not take long for Zrak to find the room where the yells are coming from. In fact, as soon as he enters the hall, he can tell they come from the room immediately to the right.

The door is slightly open, revealing a modest sized library that lies in ruins. Bookshelves along the east and west walls have been emptied; books lie heaped into a pile in the northeast corner. Set atop this heap are the severed arms, legs, and heads of a dozen guards and would-be heroes. A blood-spattered padded chair sits next to a shuttered window.

Inside, thrashing at anything it can find, and yelling more and more, is a giant. It barely fits in the room, only able to move around freely by hunching and squatting occasionally. The furs it wears is very visibly lice ridden, the crawling creatures causing the giant to occasionally scratch at itself. Not only that, but arrows and bolts sticking out of its back and wounds near it lower half show that it has been in battle already. But its most telling injury, is the one it received right across its eyes, blinding it.

Cowering behind the bloody padded chair is the tiny form of Linzi, her face deathly pale, and her eyes darting all around the room, trying to find escape. With the door only slightly ajar, she has not seen Zrak or Malkala yet.

Well, THAT sure isn't Amiri.

Zrak's ratty snout just peered past the tiny gap in the open door, looking at the terrified halfling and the damned giant. Between the guard and assassin corpses, he can't tell if the creature is acting under no allegiance but his own. Either way, the only way it would've gotten inside was under the cover of that eruption-like storm.

While he wants to use Malkala's bestial vial, he isn't keen on being splattered by this lumbering giant. He briefly has a mind to leave, let the halfling be to her fate, and return with allies and numbers on his side. On the other hand, he and Malkala need allies now, even if Zrak doesn't want to fight the giant.

But with those slashed eyes, the giant can't see very well. And that means Zrak can sneak all around the towering foe.

The ysoki twists his head up to look at Malkala. "You stay here," he whispers. "Cause a distraction if something goes wrong." He doesn't explain the plan, not that he has much of one. Quietly, he opens the well-kept door without a squeak, skittering