ot: More of you dudes join in. Dalboz, Somagu, anyone! /ot

Although Chad's neck was wickedly charlie horsed, he struggled over to flop on top of one of the orc's, and bit down deep into it. He knew he had to build up his strength. "That be da' spirit me boy! You gots to get dem Wheaties in you before you goez a fightin'! These not be Wheaties, but dey be close enough. Yes, meboy! and he also struggled over to another pile of limbs and began feasting." Soon both of them were overfed, and retreated to both corners of the room. "Let's rest, but keep your head turned towards da' door. Keep your sword arm out and at the ready! And let's sleep in shifts! You go first newbie. Me Mirthy be tire!" And Chad took the first shift.

Mirthful and Chad had the first good rest since...this whole story started. A single, wimpy plant did pop up once, but after it nipped at Mirthful's stump, he absentmindedly did an ambidextrous strike at it and decapitated. After putting a kiwi in his mouth, he went back to sleep.

After the two woke up, Mithful pulled out a palimpset and began playing a sad dirge...

"What is that?" Asked the sleepy wanderer. Mirthful didn't reply, but continued singing and playing. The word's were even harder to understand than normally, and with much concentration Chad found out that he was seemingly singing about a ham, that fell to the ground and got dirty, thus becoming inedible. He didn's belive he had heard it right, and so he let it be and started searching the altar. Soon he was familiar with the god, and gave the deity a few sacrifices from the late orcsis belongings. He replaced his own, broken iron helm with an orcish example, but found nothing else interesting. Mirthful's song had reached an eclipse, abut it seemed that the tasty ham hadn't even been picked up yet, so Chad waved him goodbye, tightened his belt (to keep the torn armour from falling) and walked outside. After ten minutes, he had searched almos all of the tunnels, whacked the hell out of a dozen individual, normal plants and a few hedgehogs. He was weeling stronger than ever... And was starting to get the hang of using his sword too! Mirthful's voice had faded away and back again all the time. Now it was a distant, comforting voice that told him that there was a friend around. It gave him courage. He had found a couple of rooms before, and collected a few pricely-looking items. Now he came by another one, but it seemed different. There was roots everywhere, even above the ground, unlike the rest of the level. Some had even tried to climb up the wall, but hadn't succeeded. He proceeded carefully, encouraged by the distant song, and peeked inside. Chad's condition: - All good * Has chipped meteoric steel leg - Knows * Loricatus * Legifer - Inventory: * Lantern * A scroll of detect material * An iron Pick Axe * An empty bottle * Ommel hair belt * Various valuable items - Wielding: * Leather boots, gloves (+2), armour (broken) * Iron helmet * a Hardened leather belt of carrying +1 (broken) * An iron short sword +1

As Chad peered inside the rooty room, he saw something he had never seen before. When he first entered this level, he met with plants as big as himself. After killing several of these, it seemed as if the level knew that he had become tougher, and send bigger and meaner plants against him. But THIS, this monstrosity was at least 8 times as big as anything he had ever seen. It sensed him, and gave forth a level-shaking bellow. Even if Chad had thought about the futility of attacking this titan of the plant kingdom, three guardian plants formed a way across the plane of the door before he could even blink. He blocked the first two bites and was nipped in the groin by the third. "Why always the groin?!" he though annoyingly. Chad was going to have to visit the Ye' Olde Attnam Sperm Bank if he was ever to have little Chads in the near future. Chad didn't want to become plant-food again so soon, and so he swung hard a couple times and ran for Mirthful's location. "Mirthful!!!!!!!!!! Big Plant!" Mirthful thought he had heard something, but kept singing his diddy. The ham had dropped onto the floor now, and some goblin had picked it up and thrown it back into the air. This goblin obviously had had a great deal of ommel to drink before throwing it, because the ham had nearly penetrated the atmosphere. But thankly, it hadn't, and was on its way back down. Mirthful remembered his first taste of the precious family of ommel elixirs... "MIRTHFUL!!!!" That must be Chad, Mirthful thought, and gathered up his toiletries with a sigh. The bastard must've up and run into Genetrix or something. Mirthful didn't mind Jennie too much, and even fenced with her on occasion before running like hell to train up his bladed crutch skills. But he couldn't let her live much longer on Chad's account, because that oaf would just get himself killed. Mirthful brushed off his stubby legs, sharpened his crutches quicly with an improved whetstone, and walked out of the room in the direction of Chad's voice. "Me be coming skinnybones!"

Mirthful ran towards the sound of Chad's voice, and Chad towards Mirthful's. But wouldn't you know it, right before they closed the gap between themselves, six plants just had to sprout up and form a wall, three for Chad, and three for Mirthful.

A sketch of Chad swinging Mirthful's bladed crutch into the back of a orc would be priceless.