"Just a Rock"
Damp frigid earth cannot be felt by the stone skinned chimera, but he nonetheless feels cold inside. Zelgadis has found himself in a truly unfortunate situation today. Bitterly Zelgadis wonders where it all went wrong, but knowing his luck such situations like this one are inevitable.
Two days ago his latest quest started out like any other. Zelgadis was in a new settlement where an ancient shrine sat undisturbed. Although, because of the buildings decrepit condition, Zelgadis found it necessary to use somewhat 'destructive' means of entering the sacred building. For days Zelgadis struggled with the unkempt shrine and for his efforts nothing of any value to him was ever found. It was another dead end and a waste of his time.
Unfortunately, his excavation of the ruins did not go unnoticed. There was a town nearby that considered the shrine sacred and did not take kindly to Zelgadis's excavation of the premise. The town was so upset that they managed to hire someone who would do anything if the price was right. Unbeknownst to the townsfolk though, was the fact that Zelgadis was a human. But being the scared humans they were, no one ever considered reasoning with a monster. They assumed that Zelgadis was a rock golem monster gone out of control.
With curves of infatuating beauty and hair of dark splendor, a golem expert sorceress easily captured Zelgadis, not realizing that he was a human. She used a spell to control the rock golem portion of Zelgadis before he ever had a chance of explaining himself.
Which leads up to the position Zelgadis has currently found himself in.
Zelgadis feels like his mind is mush. His thoughts are scattered and bouncing off the walls of his mind making him unable to understand much of anything. It is like when you wake up in the middle of the night convinced that if you turn to your left the pink flamingo talking to you on your right will make you a carrot cake.
The only voice that makes any sense is that constant noise talking to him at Zelgadis's side. Her voice is an endless chatter in his mind and even though he cannot understand much of what is happening inside him, Zelgadis's body aches to escape.
"And you know what he said?" the woman laughs. "I think your drunk lady, HA! Can you believe the gull of that man? Ohhhohohohoho!"
An unseen grimace cries out from Zelgadis's muddled mind.
Zelgadis is only able to find relief when the woman beside him, in her cozy blanket, falls asleep. For several hour Zelgadis remains lost until the suns morning rays spread across the glistening earth. Like an ice cube slowly going down his spine, Zelgadis's mind finally begins to comprehend what has happened to him.
In a growing panic, Zelgadis attempts to stand and run, but his body refuses to obey his commands. Invisible hands seem to pin him in place. As he struggles more fiercely against this unseen force his mind once again begins to regress into a state of jumbled gelatin.
Sensing that his mind is slipping again, Zelgadis abruptly stops. His heart pounds hard against his stone chest making his ears begin to burn slightly.
For several hours Zelgadis stares through the dense trees at the sky above. No matter what Zelgadis tries, he is unable to break the hold on him. The only thing that he can figure will help is being knocked on the head by Lina or if this crazy girl figures out that he is not a rock golem.
By this time, the morning hours have slowly slipped away and the annoying woman has just begun showing signs of life.
With a loud and obnoxious yawn, the woman stretches and gazes lazily around her. When her eyes fall on Zelgadis, he attempts to glare at her, but of course his eyes remain placid and unmoving.
"You are one strange rock golem," she says at length. "Most rock golems don't last as long as you have." She pauses studying the rock in front her a moment longer. "Come to think of it you aren't much to look at either. Rock golems are supposed to be large and intimidating. A true show of workmanship. But you . . . ohohohoho. . . you might as well be a failed attempt in a sculpture class." Again a loud horrendous laugh can be heard as the woman removes herself from her knapsack.
"Ugh, I have never been so degraded in my life, being force to sleep outside and not in the pleasant comfort of an inn," the woman whines. "Clean this up."
All of Zelgadis's hatful thoughts vanish momentarily as his body sets to complete its master's task. Before long Zelgadis has cleaned up the woman's mess, caught her breakfast, cooked it and cleaned up her mess again. The next thing Zelgadis knows is that he is stiffly walking beside his new master towards who knows where.
Zelgadis wants to get away as fast as he can, but of course he cannot.
For the remainder of the day Zelgadis finds himself carrying out the woman's every whim. When she gets tired of walking, he is forced to carry her. Next he is forced to fight off a horde of bandits for her. Then she uses Zelgadis as a chair when none are available at a local tavern.
The stares the people give him is enough to nearly drive Zelgadis insane all over again.
But what does it for him. The thing that draws that line. What really causes his blood to boil is what she does the night. They have finally found an inn that suites the woman's high tastes but rather than use the coat rack by the door she does something more creative. The annoying woman uses him as a cape, shoe and armor rack instead.
Now he wants to kill her.
She has no right to treat him like furniture. Being a chair was bad enough, but there were no chairs available at the time. Now there is a perfectly good clothing rack available and she ignores, purposefully putting him through a humiliation that is not necessary.
And for some reason that is enough.
The rock golem portion of himself actually responds to Zelgadis's feelings of disgrace and humiliation. He lashes out at the woman and begins to attack her blindly.
With a scream of surprise the woman dashes past the monster as Zelgadis rams into the bed and wall. Zelgadis's eyes are blazing red and his heated thoughts demand only one thing; to have that women become his coat rack.
Shrill screams echo down the hall as Zelgadis chases after the woman numbly.
"Freeze Arrow," the woman calls as she flings the spell behind her.
"Fire ball!" Zelgadis calls out, successfully blocking the freezing spell, along with causing a bit of damage to the inn around them.
"Ekkk," she cries skipping steps as she nearly tumbles to the bottom floor of the inn. For some reason she begins to laugh as well. Perhaps it's a bad habit of hers, but laughing seems to be her default vocal response to most situations. Buzzed men and weary travelers look up in disbelief as they watch a gorgeous woman without a cloak, armor or shoes race out the door. The blue angry monster follows closely behind, only a few paces away from her, chasing her like a wild animal.
Desperately the woman rattles off ice spell after ice spell succeeding in only angering the chimera man further. She eventually manages to freeze him into a nice ice block any sculptor would be happy to see, but Zelgadis easily melts the ice when he sets his body on fire.
She screams again, cutting off her premature victory laugh. While Zelgadis steps forward, the woman is forced to back up into a wall, leaving her cornered.
The woman begins to babble.
"Look, you are a reasonable rock golem and I'm amazing so why don't you turn back into to your normal self and go back to that temple you love so much."
Zelgadis keeps slowly walking towards her.
"I can't believe you are doing this to me. I haven't done anything that terrible to you. It's not like I'm the one who made you look like . . . look like . . . THAT! Whoever made you could have at least put a little more effort into it."
Zelgadis stops as he stands directly in front of her, his eyes are still red in a blind rage.
"GAH! You are not allowed to look at me like that unless I want you too," the woman screams and in a heat of nervous rage she slams Zelgadis hard on the head with her hand.
WHAM! The rock man crumples to the ground as the audacious woman begins hopping around and nursing her throbbing hand.
"Ouch, Ouch, my beautiful hand, my perfect lovely hand!"
Easing into a sitting position, Zelgadis rubs his head gingerly. It doesn't really hurt, but he still felt it. "I hate you," Zelgadis says to the woman. He looks down at himself and curses when he sees that most of his clothes have been burned away.
"What," she stops and looks at Zelgadis blankly. "You can talk?"
"Yes, I can moron," Zelgadis says. "I am not a rock golem, I am a chimera! And you have been treating me like your personal slave."
For a moment the woman doesn't say anything, she just stares.
Anger begins to simmer within Zelgadis once more. "Well don't you have anything to say," Zelgadis glares with stiff lips. She has been talking none stop all day; it is strange for her to stop now.
She smiles. "Well, I could have done much worse to you if I had known," the woman says with a swanky pose. She winks seductively at the man and places her hand firmly on her round hips.
Zelgadis goes red.
"Oohohohohoh!"
The alluring pose is lost as soon as she laughs.
In an instant Zelgadis grabs his fallen sword and has it poise at her neck.
"Calm down, calm down, I'm not going to hurt you," she calmly showing no ounce of concern. "I am Naga the White Serpent, ohohoho."
Crystal blue eyes narrow slightly at their prey. "Zelgadis Greywords."
"See now isn't that much better," Naga says as she gently swats the sword away. "Now we must find you some proper clothes you cannot very well walk around looking like that."
"How is it any different from you," Zelgadis remarks coolly.
"Unlike you I have the confidence to make this beautiful, you are nowhere close to matching my confidence," instead of laughing Naga merely looks back at Zelgadis with a knowing smile.
"I will not try to ever match such impudence."
"You are extremely rude to a lady who is offering to help you. Especially after you attacked her and she hasn't even done anything wrong."
Biting his tongue, Zelgadis reluctantly follows after the woman as the two make their way through town in order to find him something to wear.
For the next several weeks Naga becomes an unwanted traveling companion for Zelgadis. No matter what he does, Zelgadis cannot get rid of the woman, but she does prove somewhat useful. Even though Naga appears to be nothing but mindless beauty her knowledge of rock golems is unparalleled and is something Zelgadis has no choice but to acknowledge.
And so it is that two unlikely acquaintances begin searching for a cure that only one of them really cares about.
The End