The red-orange fire roared out of Jack"s hands in a torrent, gathering into a sphere of blazing heat as it hurtled towards the backs of the two fleeing gnolls. Within a moment, it collided with the two shapes, exploding on impact with the nearest in a bright and deafening blast that nearly knocked Jack over, and blew down large chunks of the charred buildings in the shockwave.The flash cleared almost immediately, leaving behind only a small amount of smoke in the air, as well as dust and ash from the buildings. The nearest gnoll was nowhere to be seen in the steaming crater of the fireball"s blast impact. The second one had gone from running to flopping around on the ground in a shrieking pile, its entire body ablaze with magical fire. After a moment the creature grew quiet and still, leaving Jack alone with the corpses.
The smell of burning flesh and fur hit Jack"s nose like a hammer, and made him gag. He pulled his t-shirt up over his nose, and walked back over to his axe, which still sat buried in the gnoll he left it in, the beast"s blood starting to congeal around the exposed blade and seep into the cracks of the scrollwork. Planting his feet on either side of the dead creature"s body, he grabbed the handle of the axe with both hands and pulled and jerked until finally the weapon popped free with a meaty wet plopping sound. Somehow, the smell of gnoll guts managed to be even worse than the previous horrible smell, and Jack doubled over, wretching as he threw his arm over his nose and stumbled away from the corpse.
The gnoll he"d bound in steel cable wasn"t moving either. When Jack inspected it, he found it just as lifeless as the others. Apparently he"d managed to crush it to death when he bound it up. Oops.
After pulling himself together for a moment, Jack looked around his surroundings for any sign of Rose or the other gnolls. The street he stood in was empty of moving shapes. In addition to the six dead that he"d taken care of, three more gnoll corpses lay further down where he"d seen his companion fighting previously, one of which conspicuously lacked a head that Jack for the life of him could not seem to find.
As he turned a corner on the narrow street, he stumbled onto two more gnoll corpses, one with a familiar-looking sword sticking out of its skull, and a large swathe of fabric he recognized from Rose"s shirt clenched in its claw, soaked around the edges in crimson.
He looked frantically left and right, trying to find any sign of his compatriot, but saw nothing but the corpse, Rose"s sword, and splatters of blood, some of which continued in a trail of drips and drabs further on down the street.
The sight sent a sudden surge of panic down Jack"s spine. What if it were Rose"s? Had she been overwhelmed and tried to run away when they injured her? What if the last one had caught her, and killed her while he was too busy being terrified?
Oh G.o.d.
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The thought of her being cornered and murdered by those beasts made him physically ill, and he ran down the street, following the trail of faint splatters here and there across the cobblestones.
The street made one final bend, and he rounded it to find Rose standing in front of the small form of Madeleine, and the last gnoll between him and them, slowly closing in on the two girls. The left sleeve of Rose"s tunic was missing, and her arm was visibly gashed open, the blood dripping onto the street stones.