carl@fire

Ir'alith sat on a cushion of wind energy inside the basin of the volcano into which the dwarf city Khir Turuhm extended partway. The spear that she had been loaned hovered by her side along with her helmet, and she stared down into the bubbling lava in a deepening meditative trance.

Her time visiting with Carl had brought her a revelation, and so she focused herself on forging her resolve, aided by the immense heat of the volcano.

She was not weak.

No, such a thing was impossible. What was weak was that she had doubted herself.

Had she not been capable of sanely thinking and speaking of humans while with Carl? She had lost her way for a moment, but it had only been a moment.

She was not going mad.

She lacked conviction.

That she must exterminate the humans was a given. It was not something she must even consider.

What required her attention was which humans must be cleansed from the lands.

Allowing herself to think of the entire race as needing to be purged permitted her thoughts of rage and hatred to overflow, affecting her judgment. What she must do instead is focus those feelings, to craft them into a point so sharp that they could permit no other thoughts to be affected.

There was one human, one man, she hated more than anything else in existence.

He would be that point, her focus, which she destroyed before any other.

Once she was freed from those thoughts, she could think sanely again.

She would kill, but she would direct her intent onto that point.

Yes, it made so much sense to her now as she meditated.

Why would she spread her rage so thinly now?

She had always had the desire to kill him.

A single man who had humiliated her.

Who attempted to break her will.

He was a hero to the humans.

The most childish of heroes.

She vowed her revenge.

She would have it.

A single man.

Normannus.

Kill.

Seth'tith groaned. "What is this way of the ninja?" he demanded of the core, knowing instinctively that this was yet another that had been damaged by the passage of time.

"I'm gonna be the hokage! That's my way of the ninja! Believe it!" the core shouted again.

"These old anime ones are the worst," Carl grumbled, tossing the yellow and orange core into his pocket dimension.

Seth'tith glowered. How could his daughter have become so affectionate towards this dragon?

He was so lazy!

Did he stand regally, holding Seth'tith over one shoulder and striking a pose to intimidate the dungeon cores as he asked his questions in order to awe them into submission?

No! He sat on a chair which transformed in such a way that he could lie down!

Seth'tith had never seen such a two-faced non-human creature in all his centuries. Carl had rescued his daughter, dazzled her with wild magic, and even employed the work of an elven genius to raise her opinion of him, but the instant she departed, he had degenerated into a sluggish, haphazard creature who seemed to have not a care in the world!

Where was the deity-hunting Carl who sent trophies to his daughter? Did he even exist, or had it been a complete fabrication?

This Carl seemed satisfied with resting lazily in a chair, despite claiming to have some desire to assist Ir'alith with her quest for vengeance and liberation.

"THANK YOU FOR THE BANANA CHAPTE—" a brown and yellow core shouted before Carl discarded it.

Seth'tith had always tried to be a good father despite the difficulties he and his daughter had endured, but he would not—could not—tolerate seeing her deceived by one such as this Carl. What if she became infected by his apparent lack of motivation?! What if she forgot her duties and left their kin to fend for themselves, convinced by Carl to spend her days achieving nothing?

"How many even is that," Carl said, as though he could not be bothered to count the number of flawed cores that they had painstakingly sorted through.

"Twenty two," Seth'tith said. He would convey everything he learned of Carl to his daughter once they were reunited. She had closed her mind to him as she meditated, and he could not prevent himself from worrying that she had undertaken an unwise course of action in his absence.

He should be with her now, protecting her from harm and providing her with the wisdom he had accumulated from not only his centuries of experience, but that of his own mother and father, who had inhabited his massive war hammer until he freed them to join the ancestors before committing his soul to his daughter's axe.

"How big do you think a dungeon can be?" Carl asked, his tone indicating that it was an idle question and not something he had any serious concern over. "Like, if I was going to really try and make the biggest one ever…"

Instead, however, Seth'tith was here with Carl. And he was beginning to doubt the dragon's intellect based on what he had been seeing.

A powerful ally Carl could be, but he was not well-suited for his daughter.

She would be successful without him, and Seth'tith would ensure that his little Alith, who had once ridden giggling and laughing atop his head while holding his horns to balance herself as he ran, remained happy once he had chased away this scoundrel.