— “Damn, that looks painful, sure you don’t want to use the blade?” dAnkan says looking at you squirming on the ground.
— “Have you actually lost your shit man, ain’t Santa some sort of holy figure or something, what about your oath?” you manage to ask even though it feels like you have to balance even your words when speaking them.
— “Yeah right, kind of forgot about that thing, heat of the moment ya know, though it would not have been my first sacrilegious act committed against this order, buuut that’s not here nor there, right where wer…” dAnkan’s sentence is cut short by Santa’s steel-laced candy cane whip.
— “HO HO HO, YOU FOOLS CAN’T BREAK MY CHRISTMAS SPIRIT!!” Santa says in a jovial tone.
— “Ahh shit when did he get that whip, this old man seems to have turned into a freak in more ways than one! Ohh you get your quack together, here take this, use it as a cane!” dAnkan hands you a candy cane.
Just as you grab the candy cane, Santa once more uses his whip and breaks your brittle cane, leaving you with only the shards left as well as on the floor as you still have not regained your balance.
— “Ahhh come on man, now this is just getting embarrassing” you say, once more facing the ground.
— “Alas here! I was saving this one to have after the fight but I guess you need it now instead”. dAnkan hands you a small vial. You read the label, it says eggnot 3000, NOW WITH HEALTH RESTORING PROPERTIES. You drink the contents of the small vial and instantly feel refreshed as well as feeling your sense of balance returning to you which is a bit weird since eggnog usually does the opposite. As you get up on your feet again you get ready to swing against Santa who parries you with the whip.
— “Hmmm, we can’t seem to reach him, he’s too strong right now” you exclaim.
— “Maybe we don’t need to reach him though, look at that door” dAnkan points at a door on the other side of the room.
— “If we can just reach that we can lock him in, deal with the dragon and then turn him back into normal. We just need to distract him long enough.” dAnkan says.
— “Wait I know what to do, hold him off for just a moment” you reach into your satchel to grab a pint of milk and a plate of cookies that you’ve saved in case of emergencies.
As soon as you pull out the milk and cookies you feel Santa’s attention instantly targeting you instead of dAnkan. You throw the cookies and milk to the other side of the room and like a starved bodybuilder Santa scurry after the treats.
—“NOW’S OUR CHANCE; LET’S RUN FOR IT!” you shout as you start sprinting towards the door, dAnkan waddling after you. As soon as the two of you have exited the room dAnkan puts a giant magical seal on the door locking Santa inside the room.
—“THAT WAS CLOSE WAAAY TOO CLOSE!!” dAnkan says.
—“Good thinking with the cookies and milk, he must not have had any for a while by the look of that comically muscular body of his, never did I see as many veins on a man as today.” dAnkan says impressed.
Just as you are about to respond in agreement with dAnkan’s remark a loud roar can be heard from down the corridor. You and dAnkan start running towards it knowing what it is that you will meet in the huge room at the end of the corridor. However, when you reach the room it’s empty.
—“Hmmmm, that’s weird I could have sworn that I heard a ear-deafening sound coming from this very room.” dAnkan says.
Before you can answer the whole room starts to shake and several fissures appear on the ground, separating you and dAnkan where you stand. Before you can react, said fissures starts filling with lava from underneath.
— “HAHAHAHA, I have to give credit to you foolish cretins that you’ve managed to reach this far in but alas it was all for nothing. Think carefully for this will be you last thoughts in this life.” the dragon who was hiding in the roof shouts.