League of Legends: Short Stories

Kled: Where the Drakalops Roam

The Northern Steppes ain't the place for fancy undies and golden piss pots. It's tough land. Ain't nothing go here but barbarian raiders, poison grass, and harsh winds. To survive, you gotta eat rocks and crap lava. And I'm the toughest, meanest, killingest bastard in these parts. So I figure that makes these plains mine.

"But how did I end up here? And why am I alone with yer dumb yella hide?" I say out loud, starting it off again.

Skaarl snorts her response from the rock she's sunning herself on. Her scales is dark metal with hints of gold. Ain't nothing can break that drakalops's skin. I've seen a steel sword shatter against her leg.

Don't make her farts smell any better though.

"I'm callin' you a damn coward. You got somethin' to say about that?"

"Greefrglarg" it says as it looks up and yawns.

"It was a hooked grouse! No bigger than my hand. And you run... Darn dumb, stupid animal!"

"Greef...rglarg?" Skaarl asks as it swats the flies away from its half-opened eyes.

"Oh, good retort! Yeah, real funny, right? Ha ha ha! I'm damn tired of yer heretical pontifications. I should leave ya here to die. That's what I should do. You'd die o' loneliness. Hell, you wouldn't last a day without me."

Skaarl lays its head back down on the rock.

There ain't no use communicating with her. I should forgive her—but then, and no doubt to mock me, her sphincter splutters rhythmically as she breaks wind. The smell hits me like a frying pan.

"That's it, you bastard!" I throw my stinking hat onto the ground and march away from the campsite, swearing I'll never set eyes on that foul-mouthed drakalops again. 'Course, it was my good hat, so I have to trot back and snatch it off the ground.

"Yeah, keep sleeping, ya lazy flaprat" I say as I walk away. "I'll do the patrol!"

Being ten moons from any farmstead don't preclude doing the patrol. It's my land. And I aim to keep it that way. With or without that treason-ish lizard's help.

The sun's dragging its way down to the horizon by the time I reach the hills. This time of day, the light plays tricks on you. I meet a snake who wants to discuss pie crusts. Except it ain't a snake, it's the shadow of a rock.

Damn shame. I have some durn specific notions about pie crusts. At least when I remember what they are again. I ain't had a proper conversation about the subject in years.

I'm about to take a swig of my mushroom juice and explain my views to the snake, when I hear them.

Drake hounds howling and braying. It's the sounds those beasts make when they is herding elmarks. And if there's elmarks, then there is humans. And those humans is trespassers.

I scramble up a nearby boulder and check north first.

The rolling hills of my grasslands is empty, save for the iron buttes scattered across the horizon. The braying sounds might be the mushroom juice playing tricks on my head... But then I turn south.

They is about a half day's walk from this hill. Three hundred elmarks grazing. Grazing on my land.

The drake hounds circle around the herd, but there's no horses. A few humans walk around them on foot. Humans don't like walking. So it don't take a genius to figure they must be part of some larger convoy then. 'Course, I am a genius. So that was easy to figure.

My blood begins to boil. That means more damn trespassers, disturbing my peace. Here, when I was about to have a lovely conversation about pie crusts with that snake.