03/12/00: Dragonslayers Anonymous, Chapter One
by Joey, The Black Prince of Muncie

Vassa stared.

It was, frankly, all he was able to do. His master - whom he had always regarded as a tempermental, good-for-nothing hedge wizard - was now little more than dripping pieces of flesh hanging betwixt the dragon's teeth. The dragon, for his part, looked none to pleased that someone else remained to eat.

That's when Vassa stopped staring and ran for his life. Foolhardy enough to follow his insipid teacher into the lair of a dragon known for both his wealth and his village-burning maiden-devouring all-around-nasty attitude, but not foolhardy enough to stay there. He was also greedy enough to plan on returning after he had gained a bit of power and some friends with large swords.

The dragon simply chewed on his hedge wizard happily.

In the land of Khollus there lived an old man by the name of Erax. When he was young, Erax was a mighty warrior and fairly handy with a sword too, and so managed to carve out a sizable portion of the land into a kingdom. In his later years, however, Erax had let his iron hand slip from the scepter of rule to the scepter of attracting much more comely women than any king or baron or emperor or stylized oligarchial ruler should ever been in close proximity too.

This, of course, meant financial ruin for his happy land. Economic difficulties did not really concern Erax insofar as he was already much more concerned with the new scullery maid and her flaxen hair. What did concern him, however, was that said scullery maid was going to be fired (and accordingly executed on order of the Warden Of Most Gainful Employing) due to insufficient funds left to pay her and the rest of the governmental employees.

Erax was understandably angered and frustrated at the same time.

"Where in all the hot and stinking afterlifes am I going to find a mountain of gold and jewels and magick the likes of which Khollus has never seen so that I might have my way with the girl...I mean that I might rebuild my glorious kingdom," he was fond of musing over bucket after bucket of ale.

Around the third or fifteenth bucket, a dragon promptly attacked.

Sadly, it killed the Warden Of Most Gainful Employing with a gigantic gout of flame. Happily, it gave Erax the inspiration he needed to have his way...er...rebuild his country.

"I'll kill the dragon and use it's gold to have my way...er...rebuild my country!" He exclaimed to the large woman who was trying in vain to poison his ale bucket so that the whole of Khollus might have a day of celebration and then get back to being oppressed.

The dragon simply chewed up a part of the castle and flew away.

Also dwelling in the land of Khollus was a testy scullery maid by the name of Glenda. In fact, Glenda was not her real name - at least not to her. She always hated the name Glenda and had made every effort get everyone to refer to her only as Adnelg, a much more pleasing sound in her opinion.

She also liked to wiggle around on her belly while chewing on whatever rug or rugs were present. Glenda (Adnelg) was, in sort, a blindingly odd lunatic. And she was also the one responsible for shoving the Warden Of Most Gainful Employing into the large spray of dragon flame. Adnelg (Glenda) was furious over this turn of events; not because the Warden Of Most Gainful Employing was dead - she had a knife all picked out for his guts anyway - but instead because all of her arm hair had been singed off in said spray of dragon flame. She decided then and there to give up the life of a scullery maid (well, sort of. Glenda (Adnelg) was under the impression that she was Arrmamlamapgao The Hideous Lizard) and become a dragon slayer. Adnelg (Glenda) snatched up her knife and ran for the hills before anyone could stop her in the unpleasant crossbow involved fashion reserved for fleeing scullery lizards.

The dragon simply found a nice spot on his mountain of gold and jewels and magick the likes of which Khollus had never seen and took a nap.

Mazza was shaking with rage, spite, and even a hint of fear (though she certainly would not reveal the latter to anyone important). Ever since her failed mission to kill the Mighty King Erax of Khollus with either neurotoxic levels of ale or suitably fatal amounts of poison in said ale, she had been repremanded to the darkest dungeon in all the temples of the Holy Order of Poisons and Killing Obnoxious People Other Than Those In Our Holy Order.

Her superiors were none too pleased at the lack of a swiftly expiring Erax, for instead of falling over stone dead and ridding the world of a Most Obnoxious Person Who Is Not In Our Holy Order, he had nearly bounced out of the castle and onto a horse and sped off in chase of a dragon.

Mazza had been hit on the head by a scullery maid that was trying to follow his horse for her own twisted purposes (Mazza had known Glenda for a long time, you see).

When she awoke, she cursed the name of her god (Arrmamlamapgao The Hideous Lizard) and was immediatly confronted with a very angry aspect of hideous lizardity. She screamed and ran all the way back to the temple, where she was thoroughly beaten up and locked away in a really dark and smelly place.
Luckily, King Erax the Mighty rode straight through the Temple Of Poisonous Things And Obnoxious People Charged With The Death Of Obnoxious People Not Of Their Holy Order on his horse, Mighty Steed (his first wife's name). After they were done screaming, the priests and acolytes and hideous lizards all got up and chased after him.

Without any guards, Glenda (Adnelg) was more than happy to wander in after King Erax and unlock all the doors in the temple just to let the bugs in. Even the doors to the dark and smelly places. Mazza was relieved at being released, but she was also still a bit angry at Adnelg (Glenda), and so broke her nose.
Together they set off after Erax. One to marry him and one to try to kill him in a most expedious fashion. Which was going to do which changed from minute to minute.

The dragon simply hates temples and refused to go anywhere near one even to help out the story. Not even a little bit. I told you he was the nasty sort.

After a few days, Mighty Steed died while Erax was still in the saddle (much like his first wife) and Erax was forced to go it alone (again, must like...oh, you get the idea). He was not very alone, however, as Glenda (Adnelg) and Mazza soon caught up with him, got a bit confused as to what they wanted to do with the old sod, and ended up fighting in the middle of the road over which got to marry him and which got to kill him, though not entirely in that order, for the most part. This scared Erax and he ran away

"Well, would you look at that" Mazza remarked as she pulled out a large chunk of Adnelg's (Glenda's) hair.
Glenda (Adnelg) was unable to answer as she was busy trying to bite Mazza's fingers off.

Just then, the Great And Powerful Archwizard Vassa of the Land Of Khollus appeared (Great And Powerful Archwizards of the Land of Khollus can do that sort of thing).

"Now stop running!" He yelled.

Erax stopped running, turned around, and started running in the other direction.

Bemused (which means filled with unholy bubbling anger in wizard-speak), Vassa waved his arms in a circular fashion and screamed, "And you two, stop fighting!"

Mazza and Glenda (Adnelg) immediatly stopped fighting, brushed themselves off, and charged Vassa with full intent on throttling him.

Erax, upon seeing the two women running towards Vassa, drew his Mighty Sabre (which was, in fact, a two-handed sword and not a sabre) and held it in front of himself in a pose that would strike fear into the hearts of anyone whose heart is fear stricken by such things.

"Gee, if I was young again I'd chop you all up into tiny bits and then go kill the dragon all by myself." Erax chuckled to himself.

"Oh ho, you old goat! I'm old and it only helps my wizardly appearance. See? I have a long white beard. They don't let you be an Archwizard without a long white beard. You should have studied harder and been a wizard instead of a silly warrior. Ha ha ha! I laugh at you!" Thankfully, Vassa was forced to break off from his ridicule of Erax to deal with the two women that very much wanted to choke the life out of him

Vassa waved his hands in a different pattern, and then made noises like a gestating spider monkey while pointing his arms at Mazza and Adnelg (Glenda). Mazza and Glenda (Adnelg) immediatly froze, expecting some terrible spell to blow them to bits any second. Their stopping was, of course, the effect Vassa intended. He didn't get to be an Archwizard for nothing, you know.

"Ha! You've stopped dead in your tracks! That's what I meant for my spell to do. I didn't get to be an Archwizard for nothing, you know." Vassa snickered whilst the two women gave him puzzled looks and comptemplated returning to the business of throttling him to death.

Now that everyone was preoccupied with wondering what exactly to do next, Vassa took the initiative and screamed in a much too high pitched voice for a man his age. "I hear that you three want to be dragon slayers! Well, I already am a dragon slayer, but I like to pass on the trade to other generations just to keep it alive. I know where a dragon's lair is, with a mountain of gold and jewels and magick the likes of which Khollus has never seen. Oh yes, it's wonderful. Shall we go there now?

"Piss off!" Mazza said politely.

"Sure." mumbled Erax.

"Whur's meh gobots?" asked Glenda (Adnelg).

Vassa nodded, "Grand, simply grand. Follow!"

And with that, the Dragon Slaying Four was formed.

The dragon simply snored and chased after flaxen haired scullery dragons in his dreams...

Er.....what? Anyway...watch for chapter two of Dragons Anonymous, coming soon!