Chapter 4: For whom the bell TROLLS!

I woke up from my nap feeling utterly refreshed. Boy, I felt great!

And check it out: my scrap with that slime from yesterday had earned a brand-new skill! [Duplication]. With it, I could create, yep you guessed it, duplicates of myself! I guess this was how genderless monsters like slimes reproduced.

Now there could be more of me to go around! That’s pretty cool, right? Well, not quite.

My duplicates were only about half as powerful as I am. Which isn’t a big deal. I didn’t need progeny running around that were as dangerous as me. I wanted servants, not potential replacements!

No, the real problem is that my dupes were…well…stupid.

They had about as much natural intelligence as a slime. They operated on pure animal instinct, and their actions were completely without logic. That meant they couldn’t use the skills they inherited from me. They just ran around trying to chop up everything in sight!

My second issue with them was that they were uncontrollable! They wouldn’t obey! It was so embarrassing! They made me feel like a young mother whose toddler was running wild in the supermarket! I could practically feel the judging eyes of the forest looking down on me.

“Ugh, this is why I’m glad I stayed single!” thinks the owl.

“C’mon Axe, control your kid!” thinks the frog.

“God, if you’re going to take that brat outside, at least put a leash on him!” thinks the squirrel.

You guys are so mean! You have no idea how hard it is being a single parent!

So, yeah, the dupes were useless. For now, anyway. I’ll figure something out with them later. I always do!

Enough about them. Now was the time to focus on Operation Troll!

Were you worried I’d forgotten about him? Don’t be! I had sworn a sacred oath of vengeance! The troll had to pay for the awful thing he’d done to me that I was very upset about. The details were a little hazy, sure, but I think I had the gist of it down. The troll was bad, and the troll had to go!

Oh, Morrison! Yeah, I was avenging Morrison, that was it. Are you wondering how I could have forgotten about Wilson? Err, Morrison? Well, I’m the sort of person who likes to live in the moment. I really don’t hold grudges over anything. Why be like that? Don’t you think there are way too many people these days who nurse grievances? That’s not healthy!

In my opinion, life was too short to cling to anger. I say live and let die! And if you let someone die, go live somewhere else! Possibly under an assumed identity.

However, this wasn’t about me. This was about Thompson! He’d been my brother, my pal, and my main means of transportation. Having him taken away was a real inconvenience that had to be answered for! The Troll had to die, plain and simple.

However, Mr. Slime had taught me the foolishness of blindly charging at my prey. I wouldn’t make the same mistake with the troll. It was time to go old school on this guy!

There’s a saying I’ve always liked: Information is power. And it sure was! Back on Earth, you couldn’t just run around killing whenever you felt like it, no matter how bored you were. There were always consequences for the unprepared! Were there cameras nearby? Witnesses? Forensic evidence? That wouldn’t be good! More importantly, could your target defend themselves? If so, how effectively?

The easiest way to gain this knowledge and eliminate any unnecessary risk, was to disguise yourself and shadow the person you were after. Learn everything about them that you could! Their movement patterns, their weaknesses, who their friends and loved ones were, that sort of stuff!

Once you had everything you needed, the next step was to use your knowledge to give your new friend a fun surprise when they least expected it!

It’s called being an ambush predator. It’s not fair. Life isn’t fair! I heard that somewhere, once.

So, my first step was tracking down the troll, which wasn’t difficult at all. He left big, heavy steps deeply impacted into the ground. Very easy to follow. I pulled myself along his trail by using my [Rooting] skill to grow tendrils that would drag my body along. I eventually came to a cavern, not unlike the one Johnson and I had visited days earlier that had housed that big rhyming spider.

No, it was more than similar! It was exactly like the other one. Interesting.

Obviously, I wasn’t going inside. It was far too early to pick a fight. But knowing where my prey lived was an excellent start.

The stone flooring of the cavern would be too strong for my roots to penetrate but the mossy webbing clinging everywhere inside gave me an idea. I quietly sent thin tendrils to the roof of the cavern and began pushing them along, creating a network of vines across the cave ceiling. Then, I used my [Compound Vision] and combined it with my roots. Earlier, I’d accidentally discovered that I could use my skills in combination with each other to trigger different results. Remember when I combined [Rooting] with [Solar Absorption] to keep Donnelley fed? Same principal!

By combining [Compound Vision] with [Rooting], I could see through the vines I was sending into the cave in flawless 360-degrees perfection. And by using them in conjunction with [Divine Eye], I could see through the darkness of the cave as though it were bright and sunny in there! It was a perfect surveillance system! Gosh, I wish I had something like this back on Earth.

Uh. For reasons.

I pushed my vines further along and soon found what I wanted to see.

Yep, this had definitely been a rhyming spider’s home, before the troll had taken over. I knew that for a fact, because the resident spider had been torn apart and partially eaten. Wow. I mean, yeah, I’d killed one of these things myself, pretty easily in fact, but that was mainly because it was focused on trying to eat Johansson, which let me take a clean swing at its unguarded neck. The troll had simply beaten the darn thing to death in a straight up fight! That was impressive.

I liked fighting too, but only when I knew for certain that I’d win. Otherwise, I just struck from a safe distance. The troll didn’t care about tactics like that. That told me he had huge confidence in his abilities. A real apex predator…

The fact that it had eaten the spider also told me that it didn’t fear being poisoned by the creature’s venom. Considering how potent I knew that venom to be, having practiced with it on a few hapless flying bugs, that meant the troll either possessed poison immunity or a high degree of resistance. That meant [Envenomation] was out. Nuts, it would have been handy being able to just poison him and wait until he died.

Speaking of which, I could see the Troll laying on the cavern floor, sleeping. Ah, exclusively nocturnal, also good to know. And…how about that? He had taken a bunch of the rhyming spider’s webbing, bundled it up into a big wad and was resting his head on it. He’d made a pillow.

That answered another question. I’d been wondering if the troll was intelligent or just a big animal. I wouldn’t have been able to tell if he hadn’t made the pillow. See, animals have strong nesting instincts: they would have just taken a bunch of soft material, torn it up, and slept on it without forming it into a specific shape. The troll, however, had taken the time to make something that would make his head comfortable. He was also wearing a loin cloth.

Clothing. Bedding. Intelligence.

Rudimentary intelligence, anyway. I doubted he could speak multiple languages and write romantic poetry. Still, he had something going on up there in that noggin of his. It would have been nicer if he was merely a dumb beast, but under the right circumstances, intelligence could be a weakness too.

Dumb people didn’t think enough. Smart people thought too much. It was the classic clash of mindlessness versus mindfulness.

All right. Here’s what I knew so far: The troll had superhuman strength, decent combat ability, he was highly resistant to poison, and he possessed at least basic levels of intelligence. That was a pretty slick combination of features. No, I definitely wasn’t going to be fighting this big boy fair-sies and square-sies. Are you kidding me? Being honorable could get a fella killed!

The only thing I didn’t know was if I could cut him. His hide seemed to be made of a stone-like substance. Rough and strong. Probably highly resistant to piercing and slashing attacks.

Gosh, it was like this guy was my natural enemy! My destined nemesis! Everything I had, he seemed to have an answer for. Darn troll! Well, don’t get me wrong, I was still going to kill the guy, I just wished he wasn’t making me work so hard for it. I liked it when things were easy for me! Wait, didn’t I say earlier that I preferred being challenged? So, which was it? Ha! I’m such a temperamental axe! I let the wind blow me every which way, don’t I?

Yeesh, listen to that troll in there, snoring like he didn't have a care in the world! Taking in those big, deep, rattling breaths and practically blowing the roof off the place when he exhaled! A lot of people don’t know this, but snoring can be symptomatic of some serious cardiovascular health issues. A lot of people who do it end up developing breathing…problems. Breathing problems. Breathing problems.

Why hello there, Mr. Solution. Nice to see you again!

How ya been, pal?

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“Die! Die-Die-Die-Die-Die-Die-Die-Die! Die!” screamed the strange running axe as it came racing at Brognyr.

Brognyr had been having a strange nightmare. He’d recently caught a human being of all things, wandering throughout his lands. Humans were a rarity this deep into the blackened wood, so naturally Brognyr had feasted on it at once.

It had been delicious, of course. Such a robust flavor! Brognyr wished he had taken his time to enjoy the meal, really savored the complexity of its taste, its umami! Sadly, by their nature, trolls were impatient gluttons. So, he’d gobbled the human up, enjoyed it, grew disappointed that he didn’t have another one on hand to eat, and eventually went to sleep angry.

But it had been a troubled sleep. Trolls could absorb the residual memories of their prey through the consumption of their brains. The human Brognyr had eaten must have been an extremely troubled soul. Possibly insane! Oh, the dreams its deluded memories had caused…

Well, it was nothing now. The poor soul was at rest, surely frolicking with its ancestors in the lands beyond the grave, or wherever it was that dead mammals went after being consumed. It wasn’t suffering anymore, that was what mattered. In that sense, Brognyr felt a bit proud of himself. Easing the suffering of a poor animal was the least he could do.

And then the axe attacked.

“Die! Die-Die-Die-Die-Die-Die-Die-Die! Die!” it said again. It leapt atop Brognyr’s chest and began hacking away at his face, screaming in mindless bloodlust.

The dreams had been true! Oh, that poor human! It had indeed been the victim of a maddened enchanted weapon! And now, with the human safely beyond its reach, the demonic thing wanted to claim the life of Brognyr!

As if the troll would let him!

“Vile assassin!” he cried, grabbing it by its handle and hurling it against a cavern wall.

“Die! Die-Die-Die-Die-Die-Die-Die-Die! Die!”

“Not this day, fiend! You’ll find my hide quite impenetrable! I suggest you remove yourself from my domicile, unless a vigorous thrashing is what you seek! Begone!”

“Die! Die-Die-Die-Die-Die-Die-Die-Die! Die!”

“Very well! You were warned! Have at you!”

Brognyr leapt across the cavern and brought his feet crashing down onto the axe, which didn’t bother trying to avoid him, so frenzied were its actions. The side of its blade was now dented inwardly, and its handle was bent. Still, it came at him!

“Die! Die-Die-Die-Die-Die-Die-Die-Die! Die!”

“Your tenacity is almost admirable, Axe! If only your frenzied ferocity could be directed towards a more noble purpose! Alas, it is not my place to correct the many wrongs which bedevil this poor world! Still, I can at least contribute towards a common good by seeing to your destruction!”

“Die! Die-Die-Die-Die-Die-Die-Die-Die! Die!”

“We shall see, Axe!”

The axe tried chopping away at Brognyr’s ankles, seeking a weak spot to sink its blade into. Foolish thing! There were no weaknesses on a fully grown forest troll’s body! Try as it might, its blade would find no vulnerability to exploit!

“Enough!” Cried the troll, ready now to bring an end to this farce.

He lashed out with a powerful fist, a whistling roundhouse punch which smashed through the axe-head, penetrating it and leaving a massive hole in its center. The axe crumbled to its sides, flopping limply on the ground, now mortally wounded.”

“…die...die…die…,” it said weakly.

“Not today, friend,” Brognyr replied as he brought his foot down on the axe and ended it.

His victory now complete, Brognyr threw back his head and roared his triumph to the world! Or rather, he roared it to the interior of his cavern, but there was no need for semantics. All that mattered was that the axe had been slain, and Brognyr had once more proven his superiority!

What a fool that axe had been! Didn’t it know that achieving success in battle took more than reckless bravado? It should have at least tried to plan ahead! Ah, but regardless of whether or not it had a plan, the outcome would have been the same! For trolls truly were invincible—

When had all those vines grown in?

Faster than Brognyr could blink, one of the vines snaked down from the ceiling and shot straight into his mouth, forcing itself into his throat, brutally closing off his airway. He couldn’t breathe.

Laughter filled the cavern, reverberating throughout the place, filling Brognyr’s ears with its cruel mockery. He managed to bite down on the vine and severe it, but it was still no use. He couldn’t dislodge the clump in his throat. In desperation, he reached into his mouth, hoping to dislodge it with his fingers, but before he could even try, webbing began shooting onto him, an endless series of rapid-fire shots that hindered his movements and bound his limbs in place.

Ordinarily, Brognyr would have easily been able to rip through the stuff, but only if he could first take a breath. Air. He needed air! He needed to breathe! His vision began changing colors, first turning red, then purple, then slowly began fading to black.

Why? He wondered.

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Hey, how about that? [Razor Web] did a great job of holding the troll in place. He didn’t have enough oxygen left to fully contract his muscles, so he couldn’t tear himself free. Gosh, I bet his head must have been swimming!

“Hey, buddy!” I said, after I crawled down from my perch on the cavern ceiling. “Thanks for playing with my little duplicate! He was a rambunctious little tyke, wasn’t he? Between you and me, I think he took after his mom. I’m kidding! He didn’t have a mother. I’m an axe.”

The troll tried to say something. I couldn’t tell what. Probably something along the lines of “Don’t do this!” Or “Please let me go!” You’d be amazed how often people repeated those little chestnuts when they realized they were about to croak. Or in this case: choke. Oh, well. Even if I wanted to save him, which I didn’t, the goof had bitten through my vine. I couldn’t do anything for him except watch him die. Which was pretty much all I wanted to do anyway, so that suited me just fine.

“I sent my dupe in here because I wanted to know if I could cut you,” I continued. “Turns out, I couldn’t! Woo! What a little lifesaver he turned out to be. And now he’s gone. And we’ll never know how he would have turned out! Honestly, Mr. Troll. Murdering a child. And right on the heels of eating my best friend, Higgens! Are there any depths to which you won’t sink?”

The troll’s chest was now barely able to move. His frightened, yellowed eyes continued to bulge from their sockets. His body began shaking violently in an uncontrollable, spasmatic seizure.

“For your crimes against Axe-kind, I now sentence you to be my experience points! Does the condemned have any final words? No? So be it.”

After a few more minutes, pleasant for me, torturous for him, the troll’s head drooped, then fell forward. He was dead.

“Justice served,” I declared. "This was for you, Morrigan! Rest easy, old friend."

I am a good person. I am a very good person.

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