Unlikely Heroes

Challenge #02328-F138: Recommended Serving Size

(I thought of this and didn't know what to do with it. My apologies if it is not your style.)

"If you got drunk ONCE by ACCIDENT then you CANNOT call yourself an alcoholic!" -- Anon Guest

Most intelligent creatures have something close enough to alcohol for Humans to drink it and find it close enough to get drunk on. Elves have a potent honey brew that, after a few beginning incidents, were served to the Humans in thimble-sized glasses. Elves drink it out of tankards. They know how to party.

Kobolds, by comparison, shouldn't have alcohol. Their draconic heritage means that they do not react to it as if it were a depressant. However, they do brew up a thick, dark liquid that is ordinarily served in shell-like spoons.

Marvin had, only yesterday, made the mistake of trying 'a swig'. This was the morning after. He walked in a world of broken glass, splinters, and ear-splitting klaxons that nobody else was sensitive to. His squint said that light was being mean to him as well, even the dim light of the candles. Lady Anthe, watching him creep painfully towards the table and sit as if he were performing a penance, decided to be merciful. "Have we learned something?" she murmured.

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Challenge #02283-F093: A Lie For the Lye

The human smiled wickedly. "You know what they say about a man with nothing to lose?" -- Anon Guest

His name was Marvin. He was a little bit hopeless, when it came to social interaction. He had started as a fighter in the sway of a bad gang, belittled for everything he said or did. Since he swapped teams, he had grown. Physically, mentally, emotionally. He was still pants at social interactions but the rest of his team were there to help.

Challenge #02280-F090: Take My Hand

The tomboyish girl is actually not a tomboy. She has more dresses than you can imagine, she just understands that a dress is not suitable for her line of work -- Anon Guest

In every village with a dressmaker, Lady Anthe would order a dress. The rest of their group would hear nothing more about it and honestly believed that they would never see them again. Even Wraithvine was mystified and ze had hundreds of years of experience with almost everything. The

Challenge #02265-F075: Realised Set-up

A character rips up some paper -- writingprompts365

[AN: My hub site is down and therefore so is my prompts queue. In the meantime, I'm making do with the tag #writing-prompts on Tumblr. Normal services will resume as soon as we establish what 'normal' is]

In retrospect, maybe they shouldn't have taken the job from Lee R. "Slick" DeSchonko. In retrospect, letting Marvin do the negotiations was a bad idea. The Human fighter and trainee wizard was the most open and trusting

Challenge #02246-F056: Before You Can Fly

Hope may be the wings,

but courage is the belief

you were born to fly.

~Tyler Knott Gregson -- Anon Guest

Is there any greater motivation to the heart, mind, and soul than the words, you can't? The tinkerer known as Steelfoot didn't think so. She lost her feet to the cruelest winter that had ever cursed the northlands, and her legs below the knee with them. She was told she would never walk, she would never run.

She studied the metalworkers

Challenge #02237-F047: Could Be Worse

So, the big dangerous creature you were supposed to be fighting is now bawling it's eyes out. Worse still, a few of your crewmates/party keep giving it empathetic looks. What are you supposed to do? -- Anon Guest

The gigantic beast sat in the middle of the chamber and howled like an infant. Marvin, Wraithvine, and Lady Anthe all glared at Rumtum.

"You idiot," said Lady Anthe. "Why would you claw a baby inside its nose?"

"Now it's mother's going to

Challenge #02231-F041: Workarounds

"You're being stingy."

"Yes, I know." -- Anon Guest

"I warned you," said Lady Anthe. "These caverns are not as friendly as the rest of the Underdark. You won't find luminous mushrooms or special glowing crystals here, and most of the fungus among us is either deadly poison or just plain carnivorous. I used to survive in places like this."

"You mean you used to live--"

Anthe cut Marvin's well-meaning correction off. "I wouldn't call it living. After three more days, neither

Challenge #02213-F023: Prepared Countermeasures

A villain always mind-controls the same person to do their bidding because everyone knows that person is a goofy sweetheart who nobody wants to hurt, especially the hero. -- Anon Guest

"Oh shit," said Wraithvine.

Lady Anthe looked. Swore. Damnit. Marvin was possessed. Again. "Damnit, Marvin," she sighed.

Rumtum volunteered, "I could stab him until he's unconscious," and didn't even notice that the other two were glaring at him.

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Prompts remaining: 71

Challenge #02199-F009: Much Mightier

"The pen is mightier than the Sword."

--insert knife in the Shape of a writing-Feather here-- -- Anon Guest

[AN: The word combo you were looking for is "writing quill" btw]

It was a beautiful blade. Someone had made it look like the wing-feather of a goose, only three times the size. Every detail was there. The rachis, the vanes, even the fine detail of the interlocking barbs. Whoever forged it had even made the crossguard look like a cluster of long,

Challenge #02193-E364: Baby Steps Please

Welcome to wizardry, where people with awful ideas and no social skills invoke supernatural forces to gain power and respect. Almost makes you want to tap out and start a little shop selling healing potions, huh? -- Anon Guest

They say that anyone could be a wizard. They never say whether or not anyone should be a wizard. This was zipping through Lady Anthe's mind as she raced after Melvin and the phantasm he had conjured. She was the fastest of the

Challenge #02189-E360: Backfire Initiative

"Fear me, for I am descended from tigers!"

"That would be much more impressive if you weren't only as tall as my boots and as heavy as this bag." -- Anon Guest

People assume. It's in their nature. They also fail rather spectacularly at connecting certain dots. Dots like - there's a small, medium, and large version of every type of creature. It's just that many of them avoid the more common thoroughfares, or interaction with the greater realms.

However, there are

Challenge #02165-E336: To Cross the Lake of Certain Death

So long, and thanks for all the ghoti. -- Anon Guest

They were large, piscine lifeforms, big enough to swallow a Goliath whole, and the lake they inhabited was as large as an entire country. It would take too long to go around. They had to go across somehow.

"You can fly, right?" said Anthe. "Just zip us across?"

Wraithvine said, "Look for what isn't here," and summoned an illusory globe via Prestidigitation and floated it out over the surface. It fizzled

Challenge #02164-E335: Gift For the Mage

“One can never have enough socks. Another Christmas has come and gone and I didn’t get a single pair. People will insist on giving me books.”

– Professor Dumbledore in Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone -- c/- Anon Guest

Lady Anthe smirked in the warm glow of the Candlenights Hearth and said, "You haven't looked hard enough, then."

There are downsides to sharing one's adventures with a Rogue, and not the ones that you might expect. Wraithvine still remembered

Challenge #02163-E334: Don't Ask!

"We've got the girl, the gold, and didn't have to kill a single goon! What can possibly, realistically go wrong?!" -- Anon Guest

The Universe is glad to educate someone who asks silly questions like that. Melvin was behind on learning that question but clearly realised that he had said something wrong, the instant that Wraithvine and Lady Anthe smacked themselves in the face.

What could realistically go wrong was a thousand well-camouflaged guards coming out of the woodwork to oppose their

Challenge #02158-E329: Shattering Performance

The noise was indescribable, and practically cleaning the windows. -- Anon Guest

If there is any sound in the entire planar system to be feared, it is that of a Kobold Bard about to commence a Traditional Kobold Folk Song.

"Eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee..." the Bard took another deep breath, "Eeeeenouncing salutations, my merry pack this day... We celebrate the ending of a knight who came to slay..."

Kobolds, being creatures of darkness and tunnels, had bats to teach them what music was. They do

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A 173-post collection

Challenge #02328-F138: Recommended Serving Size

Challenge #02283-F093: A Lie For the Lye

Challenge #02280-F090: Take My Hand

Challenge #02265-F075: Realised Set-up

Challenge #02246-F056: Before You Can Fly

Challenge #02237-F047: Could Be Worse

Challenge #02231-F041: Workarounds

Challenge #02213-F023: Prepared Countermeasures

Challenge #02199-F009: Much Mightier

Challenge #02193-E364: Baby Steps Please

Challenge #02189-E360: Backfire Initiative

Challenge #02165-E336: To Cross the Lake of Certain Death

Challenge #02164-E335: Gift For the Mage

Challenge #02163-E334: Don't Ask!

Challenge #02158-E329: Shattering Performance