We made a very strange party of beings, me leading the forces clad only in my underwear and hat, with my minions backing me up. Xyleon's chef outfit was now smeared with dirt and leaf juice, from long periods of trooping through the dense underbrush. Greg's hard-wearing overalls barely noticed the various stains. And thus we kept walking, in search of giant spiders to punch in the face for their silk. This plan of mine was brilliant, and now I was glad that I had a Subspace Pocket, as now the facts of biology caught up to the changelings, who suddenly remembered that they hadn't eaten for a considerable length of time. I looked at the sun to try and guess the time. Huh, looks about noon now, probably time to stop.
"Alright you sons of mothers, stop complaining, we're going to stop for a bit and have a rest." With that, and a bit of Subspace Pocketing, I decided to mess with them a bit. I reached my hand behind my back, opened my Pocket, gripped a folding chair and brought it out from behind me. The looks on their faces made me laugh so hard, I coughed up my lungs. Literally. That really happened. While I pulled my lungs back into me, Greg and Xyleon glanced between them, as if disbelieving in the chair that I had just pulled out of what looked like (to them) absolutely nothing.
Greg was the first one to speak, watching me with a cautious eye as I pulled out two more chairs. "Um, sir?" When I paused and focused my glowing eyes on him, he got a bit bolder. "Would you mind telling me exactly how the hell you did that?" Xyleon nodded, the more taciturn and quiet changeling nonetheless amazed by my Subspace Pocket. Then again, I'm amazed by myself and my amazing subspace pocket. Only makes sense that people who haven't even heard of the concept would regard it as some sort of amazing, supernatural feat.
I spread my arms wide and sat down on my chair with a leisurely sigh. "Ask and you shall receive, my loyal minions! Now, sit down, I've got a decent bit of ground to cover."
Greg and Xyleon sat down and I explained. "You see, I'm a very powerful magic user, a sorceror. You know this well, I'm capable of trashing pretty much everybody here. That means that I can do things that are normally impossible. Basically, I have a personal dimension that I keep all my stuff in. And before you ask, no, I do not keep clothing in there. Only hats, various foodstuffs and liquors, various doodads and memories." I leant forwards, and pulled out a pair of flagons. I handed them to my loyal minions and continued talking. "Here. This is some high quality water. Or juice. I... think it's juice? I have its quality assured to me by a young man with a ponytail. He describe it as the very essence of thirst-quenching. It's so quenching, in fact, that it may well be the quenchiest thing I have ever drunk."
I smiled as I remembered that young man. Him and some other kids had been travelling through a desert when they'd encountered my passed out drunken state. After talking with them a bit, and making sure that they weren't screaming at the mere sight of me, he handed me several flagons worth of this stuff and bid me on my way. Also I rode a flying bison, no biggie.
"Very friendly guy, if you ask me. Had a boomerang and a nice sense of humour. We spent that trip in the desert swapping crazy tales about our life. I went to his funeral, it was very nice and formal. Still, he at least managed to sell me several barrels worth of that cactus juice stuff before that happened, so there is that. Now, what was his name again?" I leant on my palm and started to ponder. Meanwhile, Greg and Xyleon had hastily finished their flagons. Xyleon smacked his lips thoughtfully,
"I have to say, that was actually really good. Bit fruity, don't you think man?"
Greg nodded. "Yeah, can't quite place the taste of it though." He smacked his lips thoughtfully, then turned to me. "What exactly was that? It's not going to kill us, is it?"
I snorted. Then again, I hadn't exactly told them what it was that they were drinking, so they would naturally be confused. "It's cactus juice, you two. The quenchiest drink in existence." And with that, I got up, minions following me. "Well, the moment has passed, back to work."
My minions got up, and Greg looked around him with a rather stupid glazed look on his face. "Hey Xante. Have you ever noticed how... colourful the forest is today? I hadn't noticed it until just now." He smiled even wider and started stroking a tree trunk. "The trees are speaking to me right now."
I facepalmed as I remembered. "Oh yeah, that stuff'll give you a wicked-nasty high. Don't worry too much, it'll wear off in about a days' time. How're you, Xyleon?" I turned to my other minion, who turned around with whiplash inducing speeds. "Don't look at me, I haven't done anything! I haven't been sneaking wine for my own personal supply or anything!" He giggled a bit, then turned back around and pulled out a hip flask from his white trousers. He took a swig before looking at me. "This is water. Totally not stolen wine."
Well, that seemed legit. I was about to rebuke him for that when it suddenly kicked in. I was sober. At that, I decided to rectify the situation a tiny bit. With a flourish, a bottle of vodka appeared in my hand, and I took a healthy swig. That done, I turned to my minions, now drugged out of their minds. "Minions, we should probably get moving. Those spiders won't punch themselves in the face, you know." With that, my hilariously drugged-up minions cheered. And with that, we were on the road again.
==-----Golden Oaks' Library-----==
Twilight Sparkle paced up and down, fretting. "Okay, okay, it's all good. He should be fine. If he isn't back when he says he'll be back, then the tracking spell will allow me to find him and get him out of whatever mess he's managed to get himself into." Besides, Greg and Xyleon should be capable of keeping his excesses in control."
Beside her, Spike crossed his arms. "Geez, Twi, I thought you wanted to get away from him for a while? You know, because he's generally..." the words totally insane briefly crossed his mind before he dismissed them in favour of, "eccentric, right?"
Twilight nodded at an incredibly high speed. "That's the thing! Whenever I try to relax, I always imagine he's doing something utterly, UTTERLY stupid." She sighed, and slumped down on a chair. "At least those two changelings should be able to keep him in line."
==-----Back in the Everfree Forest-----==
"GO BOSS!" Greg cheered me on as I stared down the gigantic rock-crocodile thing that had just emerged from the river. Beside him, Xyleon was draped over a log and rubbing himself on it like a cat. He even purred a little bit. Man, those drugs were awesome. I had plenty of embarassing photos of them to show them later. I kept my eye contact with the gigantic rock-crocodile. "Have you heard of Rule 1, you bag of rocks in the shape of a crocodile?"
Not my best insult, I will admit, but I currently had three bottles of vodka sloshing agreeably inside me, so my higher insulting processes weren't at their best. Poison generally didn't bother me unless it was specifically tailored to harm undead beings, so I had to drink a LOT of alcohol before I felt properly sloshed. Three bottles of vodka was generally enough for me to feel a little bit tipsy and sap at my situational awareness.
Anyway, the crocodile evidently hadn't, as it started snapping its jaws at me like an uncouth mobster. I waved a finger at it. "Rule one is: never mess with a lich unless you want to go on a one-way trip into the painy season." I posed dramatically.
"That's the first Rule of Nature for you, son! Now fight me like a man, you sissy!" And with that, lich and rock-crocodile clashed. I timed the music, and on the first scream of 'RULES OF NATURE!,' I gripped it with a magical ice hand. "Ice Grip!" With a casual flick, I sent the giant crocodile into the air, and simply let gravity do the rest of the work on turning this crocodile into a novelty pair of shoes and a handbag. I know that it's technically wrong, but if it's in self-defense and food, then it's alright.
I turned to my changeling minions, who had watched the entire thirty-second battle with the rapt attention of the most baked beings on the planet. Greg cheered me on, while Xyleon, after a brief moment, decided to rub his face on the ground. I sighed. "Xyleon, in all my very long life I have only learned to cook scorpion, and that was in order to appease a dark demon in a quite literal Deal With The Devil. And then I used the opportunity to kill said demon by poisoning the scorpion meat." I snorted. Demons could be remarkably stupid for supposedly 'all-seeing, all-knowing' beings.
After Greg managed to stagger up and look at the challenge, he looked at me. "Well, go on."
I looked at him. "Excuse me?"
Xyleon almost fell over, but righted himself. "Go on, do your magic Subspace Pocket thingy and give me a knife. Preferably several knives, it's going to be a right hassle cutting this thing up."
I grumbled, before reaching in and pulling out a katana. "There's a long and interesting story associated with that katana, if you're interested; which you're probably not."
Xyleon gripped the blade fairly inexpertly and took a swing. I rolled my eyes. "No, you hold it like so, and so. Now, take a swing." He did so, and he cut straight through the rocky hide of the giant crocodile creature with an appropriate squelching sound. I made a suitably appreciative noise and sat down, continuing with my story. "So, there I was, in the port of Zabren- it's a pirate city, very fun place on certain dates, especially when the pirate wenches are there. Oh, but you have to wrap your willy or you could catch something. Actually, I nearly caught several interesting venereal diseases, like my brother. He's got them all, he does. Healing magic and the occasional pact with the forces of darkness keep him from spreading those diseases." I leant against Greg, who currently thought he was a chair or something similar. "I'll tell you what, Bards have to put up with some shit at Epic Level. You know, where I'm from, there's only, like, a thousand people in a population of about two billion who are Epic Level. It's hard to achieve guys."
I continued on with my story, pulling out my vodka bottle again. "You see, you have to gain a lot of power really quickly. Get it in your prime. Then, you have to do a certain ritual- one that tests your strength, speed, mind, everything about you. Only those with strong souls and bodies can even survive it. And the test is different for each and every person and their profession. After that, if you succeed, then you have become Epic-Level. You see, people where I'm from have a 'levelling-system,' which measures your experience. You gain it either by long years of experience, or just killing loads and loads of monsters and people." I chuckled darkly, before taking a pull of vodka. "Guess how I got my Epic-Level status. Lots of grave-robbing and fights with heroes. But it was worth it, you bet your boots it was. Epic-Level people can do crazy things, on the level of the gods. I knew a thief, once, who could steal cities. Literally. He'd walk through a major population centre, and the next day the entire town would be physically gone. It was crazy."
Greg looked at me groggily. "I don't think that was part of your original story at all, actually."
I blinked; he was right, I'd gotten off track. "Thank you, my loyal minion. You can have my portions of this fine late lunch thing. Crocodile. Rockodile. Whatever it is, I don't really care." I paused. "Where was I?"
"You were at Zabren, or whatever it was called." Greg called over his shoulder as he carved lumps of giant crocodile meat. I gave him a thumbs up at that.
"Right, Zabren. So, I was in Zabren, and I was looking to score some fine pirate booty, if you know what I mean, when all of a sudden this samurai-looking pirate comes crashing into me. Now, he stank of rice wine, so I knew that he was an appreciator of the finer pleasures of alcohol. So anyways, I was about to leave and go slaying the fine red dragon that all women have with my trusty sword when he decides to get all up in my face with his drunkenness and general horrible body odour."
I shuddered as I recalled his leering face. "So he makes a big stink about me hitting him. I go 'no way, you bumped into me first.' But he was all- I made a stupid face, tongue sticking out and eyes crossed "'oh, I'm going to cut you for that, with this cursed sword possessed by a demon that was given to me by my murdered parents who were killed right in front of me and now I'm so edgy ooh' and that got on my nerves. So, after I faux-apologised and bought him another drink, I got him to play cards with me. He cheated, by the way. I still won his 'demon-possessed katana' though, so there is that. It's not actually possessed," I added as Xyleon dropped it like it was a snake with rabies, "I think he made that up in order to feel better about himself and his horrible body odour."
I smiled, then turned to Xyleon. "Is that cooking yet, or do you need fire for that?"