A monstrous voice snarls, hardly human, and yet its words are almost recognizable as that of a human's. There is a sickening laugh, with a voice smooth and cold.

The monster roars and punches at the voice, it's blind in its rage and misses entirely, spinning around until it can clumsily regain its footing.

"Heeheeheehee!" The voice snickers from atop the monster's head. "Hahaha!"

"RAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!" The monster screams and grabs at the voice, words of an almost human sound tumble from its inhuman lips. "GRAAIVE BRAAAK!" It screams in a blind fury.

"Tut tut tut!" The voice shushes, patting the monster on its gigantic forehead. "Now is not the time for such behavior Clovey! You've got a job to do!"

The monster snarled swinging its arms at its head, trying to capture its tormentor, but the man whom the voice of ice belonged to was fast, and it couldn't reach.

"Eheeheehee!" The crescent grin was back, spreading from cheek to cheek in the face of its owner. "Go forth now and show me your will!"

The first thump wasn't enough to rouse Brandon from his sleep. He was too deeply entangled in the warm sheets and feather pillows. He'd been offered the attic as a place to stay, there were two beds, one for him and the other for Arthael. Chaston was asleep downstairs in the rooms designed for housing, but would awaken very early in the morning to begin whatever general activities a tavern owner took care of during the day. Arthael would wake up a little later and rouse Brandon with him. This would be where the boy would make his decision; to stay or to leave with Arthael.

He'd been up all night thinking about it and he wasn't sure. Staying with Chaston was a pleasant idea. This town seemed charming and Brandon could easily have fun here, but traveling with Arthael might get him closer to home… Eventually he'd fallen asleep, undecided.

The second thump almost caught his attention. He shook his head a little, yawned and dug back under the covers. Arthael made some sort of noise from across the room, but Brandon was far too sleepy to comprehend any part of it.

The third thump woke him up a little. The boy blinked his eyes several times in the darkness. The morning sun was just slightly poking at the horizon, giving the dark blue sky a small ray of light. He didn't feel like now would be a good time to wake up. So he closed his eyes again.

THUMP.

Okay, perhaps it was a good time to wake up after all. Brandon sat upright, rubbing his eyes and yawning, until yet another thump caught his attention. He stood from his bed, slipping on his shoes and cape, to look cool. "What could possibly be making that much noise?" He muttered to himself and covered his mouth with his hands. He shifted his eyes to assure he hadn't awoken Arthael, but to his surprise, the man was not in his bed. Brandon shrugged his shoulders and started down the stairs.

He paused for a moment, looking back at the cross bows. Would he need them? After a moment's consideration he took them in his hands and shoved them in his pockets. Just in case.

It was eerily silent on the boy's way down the stairs. He tried to be as quiet as possible on his way down, but it almost seemed as if every step creaked under his weight. He made his way into the tavern. In the dim light he could see the well cleaned tables and floors, with the chairs stacked neatly on the table tops. Chaston really knew how to keep a place in order.

After a few seconds of admiring Chaston's handiwork, Brandon's attention was drawn to the sound of another thump, a bit louder than the others. The floor shook very slightly under his feet with the noise. The boy looked up at the front door.

Something was wrong.

He made his way to the heavy wooden door frame, it was closed tight for the night, but with a little effort, Brandon managed to push it open enough for his skinny frame to pass through.

In the few minutes Brandon had spent waking up and sneaking downstairs, the sun had risen across the horizon further, not enough to light up the sky, but enough to give the boy an outline of the town.

Everything was silent and everyone was asleep, so nothing seemed very out of the ordinary, until yet another thump nearly caused him to lose his balance. He regained it in a stance, with no intention of tripping over again.

Then a new sound drifted into his ears. It was some sort of low grumble. He couldn't make out exactly what it was. Perhaps an injured animal? Brandon decided he should investigate, although any amount of common sense would tell him otherwise.

The boy took a few steps in the direction of the forest with the intent of investigating the noises, but before he could make it past the tavern another thump caught him by surprise, the ground underneath him shook and then a sound of a crack, as if something were being snapped in half. There were further similar sounds and the thumps grew more frequent and more powerful. Brandon peered in the direction of the forest, squinting his eyes just to catch a glimpse of any form of movement. His wish was granted as the sounds of trees being broken and knocked over surrounded the village and something huge stepped free from the forest. With the dim lighting Brandon could see hardly anything, but its silhouette… but it wasn't human.

This thing was nearly three times the height of any normal human being; it had a body of a grotesque purple/black shade and horns like the devil sticking out from its forehead. It hunched over as a beast unable to hold its own weight would. It had massive arms and legs, strong enough to crush almost anything in its path and a mat of wild brown hair. There was not a pupil to be found in its rage filled eyes and within its strong jowls stood a set of flat, grinding teeth, as if stone. And yet the most surprising fact of this monster was that it wore a set of human clothing, a sleeveless shirt in white with pants in grey.

Brandon stood there dumbstruck. What the heck was this thing?

The monster stood at the opening of the woods breathing as if it were exhausted, until it caught sight of Brandon in its white eyes. Suddenly Brandon felt very alone and very afraid. He was the only one awake, alone in the street with this monster staring straight at him.

There was a moment of chilling silence as the two stared at each other from nearly two different ends of the town. Brandon stood in an awkward stance, his legs spread, as if he were preparing for an earthquake, his hands were poised midair, although he wasn't sure what he would do with them.

There was a grunt, and then a growl, until finally the monster reared its head back and roared, and then charged at Brandon, who could do nothing, but stand there, frozen.

The ground shook as the monster stampeded toward him, grunting and panting, its nose flaring as it charged, blindly toward its victim.

As the monster was nearly upon him, Brandon was sure he would have been trampled, had a strong hand not reached out toward him and pulled him out of the way. Brandon found himself scrambling to regain his balance and his nerves, while Arthael stood, watching the monster as it turned to face them once again. It opened and closed its fists, as if eager to squeeze the life out of someone, and for the moment, Brandon and Arthael were the only ones to squeeze.

"Get a hold of yourself Brandon!" Arthael yelled and stood his ground against the monster.

"What the heck is that thing?" Brandon cried regaining his footing and balling his fists. He wasn't going to stand there and let it attack him this time.

"I've never seen anything like this before." Came the more steady voice of Chaston as he emerged from the tavern, holding nothing more than a kitchen knife as a weapon. "It doesn't look like a typical beast for this area or any."

"It's wearing clothes!" Brandon pointed out as the monster began its charge back at them, grunting and roaring. With a nimbleness he didn't know he had, Brandon managed to evade the onslaught and found himself directly behind it. Something was different. He felt different.

"I get it now!" Arthael called over to the both of them, people could be seen, slowly peering out of their windows to see the commotion, but so far no one had come to provide aid, as, at the moment, there was not a single warrior in the small town. "This is a human! He's been changed!" Brandon looked back at Arthael to find him pointing at the monster's chest. "There! Do you see the glowing?"

When Brandon turned, sure enough, he could see a glowing, underneath the monster's clothing, around where he collar bone would be. He looked back at Arthael, in confusion. "Is that what's making him like this?"

"Yes!" The man called, fearing for the boy's safety as he was very close to the monster. "Deal damage to it and it should calm him down! Or kill it, whatever works."

"O-Okay! I've got this!" Brandon declared as the monster swung at him, with a brute force that would definitely kill him had he not been nimble enough to evade the attack. Taking a short moment to draw in a deep breath, Brandon reached into his pockets and pulled out the crossbows. He weighed them in his hands in what seconds he could spare and set his finger on the trigger. "…okay." The boy murmured to himself and looked up at the monster, which hovered over him, preparing to slam its fist down onto the boy.

With a leap, Brandon dodged the pounding and took the opportunity to aim at the monster's chest. He pulled the trigger to the weapon in his left hand, hoping it would hit its target.

It missed.

"…urg…" Brandon gritted his teeth and dropped the spent crossbow. One shot left, he had to get closer, he had to get right onto its chest.

Arthael and Chaston were getting the idea and took the opportunity to provide what assistance they could, calling out and waving their arms so that the monster's attention was drawn from the boy. Stupidly it turned to them, growling some kind of words, nothing that could be understood from the tone in which it spoke.

Brandon grinned and took the opportunity to leap onto the monster's back, although somewhat surprised with the height he'd achieved so easily, he shook off his pride and scrambled up onto its head and then crawled, or even more so, shimmied down its face. Brandon took a second to grin nervously at the monster, which just roared and reached forward to rip him off. Brandon dropped off of its face, latching a hand onto its shoulder, where he was face to face with the monster's chest, right in front of the mysterious glowing. In an attempt to grab Brandon, the monster slapped its own face, winding it for a moment, where Brandon took his opportunity. Aiming the crossbow directly at the glow, Brandon held his breath and took his shot.

The monster froze and although Brandon held onto its shoulder, eyes squeezed shut for a few moments, it did not grab at him. Brandon looked up at it as the monster began to sway back and forth before keeling over right onto its back, with Brandon sitting on top of it.

There was silence then. As if everyone were holding their breath.

The sun had risen above the horizon and now the sky held a red/orange hue to it, leaving a soft glow over everything. Brandon could see the monster he sat on clearly. Its eyes were shut and its mouth left agape. Brandon sat up, looking at Arthael and then at Chaston.

"…did I win?"

In that moment people began to cheer from their houses and Arthael struck a pose. Brandon looked dumbstruck for a few moments, until he began to smile. "Ehe…ehehehe…! Hehehehe! I did it!" He was grinning now.

Unfortunately, Brandon did not have long to celebrate as the monster's body began to shrink. Brandon just sat, unsteadily on top of it as it halved and then halved again in size. Its skin faded from purple into brown and its shaggy hair smoothed out into a slightly less wild shape and even its clothes shrunk to fit it once more.

Brandon found himself to be sitting directly on top of a boy, no older than himself.