Chapter 36: Interlude: Tales of the Kobold Rangers (1/2)
“Your Majesty?” Victor asked, his body slippery and sultry from the gold shower.
“You know what I want, Minion,” After watching him swim in his golden hoard, he could barely restrain himself. “You are the shining jewel of my hoard…”
Victor blushed, his white skin glittering like silver in response. Truth to be told, he had never dared voice his feelings for his great, wealthy master.
“Bragging Day is tomorrow, and I need to… treat myself,” Vainqueur’s voice was heavy with desire. “Lay on the gold.”
“Pink, what are you writing?”
Writing in Nethermart’s cozy drink shop, Pink jumped out of her seat; she accidentally dropped her beer cup on the ground, much to the imp barista's annoyance.
The other Rangers looked at her in confusion. “Pink, you’re late for the training, and Red is getting mad,” Black said, frowning at her as she whistled. “Now you’re acting suspiciously.”
“She’s hiding the text behind her back!” Yellow said, trying to circle her.
“No!” Pink turned to face Yellow, only for Blue to use the opportunity to grab her scroll from behind. “Give it back!”
“Is this the sequel of the War of the Hoard?” Blue immediately opened the scroll. “Sweet!”
“No, don’t read it!” Pink attempted to reclaim the paper, but Yellow and Black restrained her. “It’s not meant for publication!”
Her comrade didn’t listen and suffered for it. The more the kobone read, the more he shook, the crimson light in his empty eye sockets faltering. “Oh, gods…” Blue dropped the document in horror. “I feel fear. I am undead, and I feel fear!”
“Pink, what have you done?” Black released the bard, who immediately recovered her scroll.
“I… I just had a plot lizard that wouldn’t leave,” Pink said, sheepish and ashamed. She never expected anyone but her to read it.
“What do lizards have to do with… with this?” Although usually the most aloof member of the group, Blue kept shaking in dread. “How could you write the Emperor and Lord Victor like that?”
“But they are obviously made to be together!” Pink complained. “Emperor Vainqueur, Lord Victor, and the Hoard!”
She couldn’t help it since she had started taking levels in [Bard] after writing the War of the Hoard. The signs were there! Chocolatine, Allison, Lynette, they were all false leads which the good Emperor Vainqueur had to eat to win his minion’s heart! Why couldn’t anyone else see it?
“Ugh, one of your V&V ‘fanfics’ again?” Black rolled his eyes. “How many has it been? You haven’t even finished your ‘Bad to the Bone’ Vainqueur and Furibon story.”
”I'm ChocoVic all the way,” Blue said.
”And I'm a VainquHoard!” Yellow declared, fist bumping Blue over compatible fan followings, ”And now I want to read Pink's story out of morbid curiosity.”
“No!” Pink kept the scroll behind her back. “No reading my unfinished works! Please!”
“Guys, stop bullying Pink!” The voice of Red Ranger made the kobolds and kobones behave, their tall, powerful leader walking into sight with the musket and rapier Lord Victor provided him. “Why are you taking so long?”
“It’s nothing, Red!” Pink lied.
“Pink was getting drunk writing a fanfic again!” Yellow mercilessly betrayed her, Pink kicking him in the leg’s bone. It hurt her more than him. “Ahah! I don’t feel pain anymore!”
“Traitor!”
Red sighed. “Pink, you can write what you want, and I am proud that you can.” Few kobolds could even read or write. “But drinking beer before our rehearsal? What am I supposed to think?”
“I need to get alcohol to proceed with my writing sometimes,” Pink admitted. Some of her ideas were so dark, so deep, so artistic, that she couldn’t bring them out without help. “When Emperor Vainqueur asked me to write about the… the lead event, I had to get drunk before I could commit it to paper.”
“We all know how traumatizing the Event was,” Red said with sympathy. “That is why we must train hard. So this kind of senseless atrocity can never happen again on our watch. Remember what Lord Victor said. We are the elite of the minions!”
“Minion lieutenants!” Black pumped a fist.
“We are His Majesty’s shield!” Red reminded them, his words brimming with charisma. “The Hoard’s last line of defense! The last line to hold! We… are the Kobold Rangers!”
“Kobold Rangers!” the group shouted, the imp barista ignoring them as he served a drink to Barnabas the troll.
Pink remembered that fateful day, when they stole the Apple of Knowledge from that human. The second they had laid their eyes upon the ancient techniques of the Tokusatsu clan held within, of these brave warriors fighting paupers with style, the Kobolds had understood what they had missed in life.
On their own, Kobolds were weak, small, and unremarkable. Most died before they hit ten winters. But by learning the ancient techniques held within the Apple, and reviving the Tokusatsu clan’s traditions, Red had argued that they could become more than mere Kobolds: they could become legends whom their kind would celebrate in tales for centuries! They may die anytime, but their legacy would live on forever!
And so they became the Kobold Rangers, the elite warriors of the Murmurin Empire.
“His glorious Majesty, Emperor Vainqueur’s Bragging Day will happen soon!” Red reminded them. “For the sake of the Emperor, we cannot embarrass him. Our dancing and motto must be perfectly executed. And… and...”
“And?” Pink frowned, sensing her leader’s troubled mind. “What is stressing you out so much?”
“Rolo has a quest for us,” Red continued. “A very dangerous quest. A monster is feasting on the vegetables. If this continues, the livestock will starve, and His Majesty’s Bragging Day Feast will be ruined!”
“Who would dare launch such a treacherous attack?” Black spat on the ground. “The elves?”
“Worse,” Red replied ominously. “A rabbit.”
A rabbit. The ancestral nemesis of koboldkind; they fought those mammal vermin over burrows since the dawn of time. The brave fathers of the Rangers’ warren had managed to fend off one of their invasions before Pink was born.
Now, it was her turn to defend the burrow of Murmurin against those hungry monsters.
“And not any rabbit,” Red added, turning away with a dark look on his face. “A Black Rabbit.”
The Rangers gasped and exchanged worried looks.
A Black Rabbit. A rabbit who gained magical powers by becoming a dark prince among its filthy, verminous kind. It could summon armies of rodents, grow to enormous sizes, and cast spells from its horn.
Black Rabbits were blights upon the land, devastating all in their path. Countless kobold martyrs had fallen to them.
“If we do not kill him, entire cultures will fall to its hunger,” Red said. “Rolo is convinced he will attack by twilight.”
“Can we… can we defeat him?” Yellow joined his hands in a silent prayer. “One of them killed my father with its horn.”
“For His Majesty, I am not afraid to die again!” Blue replied with empty bravado, his voice breaking.
“If it comes to it, and we cannot defeat the Black Rabbit on our own…” Red trailed off, turning to Pink. “We will have to summon the Mimiczord with your song.”
“But she cannot control it!” Black protested. “Once called, there will be blood!”
Red slapped some sense into him. “Get a hold of yourself, you coward! There is no greater honor than dying, so that His Majesty may be fed!”
“I…” Black scratched his cheek. “I am sorry, I… I let fear control me.”
“It is okay to be afraid in the face of such evil,” Red consoled his friend. “But so long as we are together, you can rely on us. That is what being a Kobold Ranger is all about.”
Black nodded firmly, imitated by the others. “Let’s repeat the motto,” Red said, happy with the group’s resolve. “We fight for the hoard!”
“We are made of gold!” Black continued.
“We strike from the shadows!” Blue added.
“We strive for His Majesty!” Pink shouted, the drink shop’s clients glaring at their magnificent display.
“Prepare to meet your dooom!” Yellow said, going off-script with his deep, undead voice.
“Yes, that is rig—Yellow!” Red stopped in the middle of the motto, everyone else groaning, “You’ve gone off-script again!”
“I’m sorry, it’s too hard to resist!” Yellow replied. “I… I will say it right next time!”
Red sighed. “Second attempt!”
The beast arrived under the twilight sun.
Never before had Pink seen such a monstrous being. The incarnation of Hell had fur that was as black as night, with big vicious eyes; his enormous ears reminded the Bard of twin pillars of darkness. While as tall as any other rabbit, the ground shook under the immense power of its back legs. A single, golden horn shone in the middle of the monster’s forehead, surging with magical power.
The Kobold Rangers established a defensive perimeter, Rolo’s fields of carrots and lettuces behind them. Yellow and Pink carried bows, while Black and Blue had switched to spears. Red remained at the forefront, musket, and rapier in hand.
Pink knew this would be a dangerous fight. All of them had levels in [Outlaw], but only Pink and Red had delved into other, combat-oriented classes. And this… this… this was a legendary beast, far more terrifying than Gustave the Scorcher, who killed Blue and Yellow in the past.
“Food?” the black beast uttered with a guttural, dark voice.
Pink’s [Bard] mind filled out the words left unsaid, translating the monster’s black speech into true epic dialogue.